Standing Committee on Regional Affairs

The President of the Council and Leader of the House of Commons (Mrs. Margaret Beckett)

I beg to move, That Standing Order No. 117 shall be repealed, and that the following Standing Order shall be made: 117.—(1) There shall be a standing committee called the Standing Committee on Regional Affairs, which shall consider any matter relating to regional affairs in England which may be referred to it. (2) The Committee shall consist of thirteen Members representing English constituencies nominated by the Committee of Selection; and in nominating such Members, the Committee of Selection shall—

1. (a) have regard to the qualifications of the Members nominated and to the composition of the House; and
2. (b) have power to discharge Members from time to time, and to appoint others in substitution.

(3) Any Member of the House representing an English constituency, though not nominated to the Committee, may take part in its proceedings, but may not make any Motion, vote or be counted in the quorum; provided that a Minister of the Crown who is a Member of this House but not nominated to the Committee may make a Motion as specified in paragraph (10) below. (4) The quorum of the Committee shall be three. (5) Paragraph (1) of Standing Order No. 88 (Meetings of standing committees) shall not apply to the Committee; except that the proviso to that paragraph shall apply to any sitting at Westminster. (6) A Motion may be made in the House by a Minister of the Crown to specify (or to vary) any or all of the following:

1. (a) the matter or matters to be referred to the Committee;
2. (b) the period to be allotted to proceedings on such matters;
3. (c) when and where (within England) the Committee shall meet;
4. (d) the hours for the commencement and conclusion of any sitting;
5. (e) any days when the Committee shall meet at Westminster at Ten o'clock;

and such Motion may be moved at any time; and the Question thereon shall be put forthwith and may be decided at any hour, though opposed. (7) Where any order made under paragraph (6) above makes no provision for the period to be allotted to the proceedings on any matter or matters which have been referred to the Committee for consideration at a particular sitting, those proceedings shall be brought to a conclusion no later than three hours after their commencement. (8) At the commencement of business at any sitting of the Committee, the Chairman may permit Ministers of the Crown, being Members of the House, to make statements on any matter or matters referred to the Committee for consideration at that sitting, and may then permit members of the Committee to ask questions thereon. (9) No question on a statement by a Minister of the Crown shall be taken after the expiry of a period of one hour from the commencement of the first such statement, except that the Chairman may, at his discretion, allow such questions to be taken for a further period not exceeding half an hour. (10) The Committee shall, following any such statements and questions, consider each matter referred to it on a motion 'That the Committee has considered the matter'; the Chairman shall put the Question necessary to dispose of the proceedings on each matter at the time, or after the period, specified in accordance with 290 paragraph (6) or paragraph (7) of this Order, and the Committee shall thereupon report to the House that it has considered the matter or matters without any further Question being put. (11) Any period allocated to the consideration of any matter or matters shall include any time spent on statements by Ministers of the Crown and questions thereon, except when otherwise provided by any Order of the House made in accordance with paragraph (6) above.

Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Michael Lord)

I remind the House that Madam Speaker has selected amendments (a) and (b), which stand in the name of the right hon. Member for Ross, Skye and Inverness, West (Mr. Kennedy) and his right hon. and hon. Friends. There will be a joint debate on the main motion and the two amendments. Decisions on the amendments will be taken when the debate ends.

Mrs. Beckett

I propose to be brief in moving the motion because the proposal that it enshrines is perfectly straightforward and simple and because the procedure that it suggests is already extremely familiar to the House. The Standing Orders already contain provision for a Standing Committee on Regional Affairs, to debate primarily matters that are of concern to Members who sit for English constituencies. The Standing Order was decided and placed on, so to speak, the statute book of the House in the context of previous moves—[Interruption.]

Mr. Deputy Speaker

Order. I ask right hon. and hon. Members who are not staying for the debate to leave the Chamber quickly and quietly.

Mrs. Beckett

The Standing Order was decided in the context of previous moves to introduce devolution for Scotland and Wales. It means that the House has already debated and decided the issue of principle.

The Standing Order ceased to be used after 1979 but it has never been removed from the statute book of the House. In consequence, it remains part of our potential procedures. However, since it was carried, many of our procedures have changed. That is why the motion brings the Standing Order up to date, as I see it, using today's procedures. I hope that this will make the Standing Order both more flexible and more useful to the House.

It will be apparent already to hon. Members on both sides of the House that the model that has been used is that of the European Scrutiny Committee. The Government believe that that is an effective model both in informing Members and in calling Ministers to account.

Mr. Dale Campbell-Savours (Workington)

I wonder whether my right hon. Friend will explain something to me. Many of us believe, certainly in terms of regional affairs debates, that there is an argument for bringing in civil servants, in a Select Committee mode, and taking evidence from them. At a regional level, they are critically important in the taking of decisions under the new structures that we have set up. When my right hon. Friend was considering these matters and the tabling of the motion, did she consider a procedure whereby that would be possible?

Mrs. Beckett

Yes, I did, and I accept my hon. Friend's point. It is a matter that the House may consider again in future. That is a point that I intended to make at the end 291 of my remarks. However, it seemed to me that the important thing was to create or to revive a potential forum for debates for Members who sit for English constituencies, and to do so in a framework in which the priority would be for Members to have a capacity for statements to be made by Ministers and for questions to be put to them. It seemed also that that was the model of the European Scrutiny Committee. My hon. Friend will know that it is widely valued across the House as a model that works effectively.

Mrs. Gwyneth Dunwoody (Crewe and Nantwich)

My right hon. Friend will know that the Select Committee looking at matters concerning the environment and transport also has an involvement in regional affairs. How will the new Committee and the Select Committee work together?

Mrs. Beckett

My hon. Friend makes a very important point, which is part of the answer to my hon. Friend the Member for Workington (Mr. Campbell-Savours). The Select Committee on the Environment, Transport and Regional Affairs does indeed have the capacity to which my hon. Friend refers. To that extent, there is less of a gap in the House's capacity to look at issues such as that of regional civil servants.

My hon. Friend the Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Mrs. Dunwoody) is an expert, and is well aware that the Select Committee shadows the entire work of the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions. It is not possible for it to specialise in matters that have a regional context and edge, and it is possible only for members of the Select Committee to take part in its debates. That seemed to me the most powerful argument in favour of us using afresh a Standing Order which—I remind the House—has already been agreed by the House. The proposed Committee will be the only forum available to all hon. Members who represent English constituencies, and it will be available only to those hon. Members.

There is also the thought that, as in the European Scrutiny Committees, the presence of a relatively small core membership could lead to the build-up of expertise in regional matters. That, too, would be valuable to the House.

Mr. Owen Paterson (North Shropshire)

I am a member of European Standing Committee A, and regularly attend other Standing Committees on European matters. It is obvious to me that the right hon. Lady does not attend those meetings often. I can tell the hon. Member for Workington (Mr. Campbell-Savours) that civil servants are present at those meetings, and that they spend their time frantically scribbling notes to Ministers who cannot answer questions because they have mugged up on the issue at hand only half an hour before the sitting.

Mrs. Beckett

With respect to the hon. Gentleman, I think that he cannot have been listening to the question that my hon. Friend the Member for Workington asked. He asked about taking evidence from civil servants, and that is not the point that the hon. Gentleman is making.

Mr. Edward Garnier (Harborough)

I accept the Leader of the House's point that all hon. Members with English constituencies will be able to speak at sittings of 292 the Committee, but only 13 will be allowed to vote. Does the right hon. Lady not see a difficulty, in that the tiny core of Committee members—we do not know from what regions they will be drawn—will not be able to vote in a way that allows them to represent the interests of all the regions of the country?

Mrs. Beckett

The hon. and learned Gentleman may not have scrutinised the Standing Order as closely as he might have. It is not envisaged that the Committee will take the sort of decisions to which he refers. The Committee will give hon. Members with English constituencies an opportunity to scrutinise issues that are of concern to them.

As I mentioned a few moments ago, before I took one or two interventions, the Standing Order includes provision for ministerial statements to be made to the Committee, and that such statements can be followed by questions, when that is thought to be helpful and for the guidance of the Committee. Hon. Members of all parties will recognise that there is nothing like knowing that questions will be faced, in the House or in Committee, to concentrate ministerial attention on an issue. I repeat that all hon. Members will have the opportunity to debate matters that might be referred to the Committee.

The indicators from the regional development agencies highlight some of the subjects that are likely to be discussed in the proposed forum. Those subjects include economic development, social regeneration, employment and sustainable development skills. All those matters arouse particular concerns among hon. Members who represent English seats, and the forum will allow the matters to be aired in more detail than would be possible in other circumstances. Although there is a core membership of the Committee, Members representing any English seat will be entitled to attend and participate.

There are, of course, alternatives, such as the sittings in Westminster Hall, which provide a fresh opportunity for scrutiny. There is no doubt that that provides a potential forum for debates that highlight the affairs of the English regions. It is not solely a forum for Members who represent English constituencies. It is an experimental forum, but it was intended from the outset to provide more time for the discussion of Select Committee reports and specialist debates on, say, foreign affairs. It would be to lose some of the opportunities provided by the forum in Westminster Hall were we to seek to dominate that by matters that arose solely in the context of English constituencies.

Mr. James Gray (North Wiltshire)

I am listening carefully to what the right hon. Lady is saying. I know that we will have some time to discuss the merits and demerits of the proposal in the hours ahead. In the meantime, will the right hon. Lady say whether the proposal comes from the Procedure Committee, which must presumably have looked at it, or from the so-called Modernisation Committee? If not, what is its provenance?

Mrs. Beckett

The hon. Gentleman is perfectly aware of its provenance. I made it plain in my earlier remarks that the proposal has come from the Government. It was aired in the Modernisation Committee, because it was thought to be a matter that might find common ground on both sides of the House. Given that much concern has been expressed across the House about the insufficient 293 opportunities for debates for those who represent English constituencies, and only English constituencies, the Government thought that Conservative Members as well as Labour Members might appreciate the opportunity for those debates to be extended.

We shall shortly have the opportunity to test whether Conservative Members meant anything that they said about wanting opportunities for debate specifically for Members representing English constituencies, or whether they simply wanted to complain about the lack of those opportunities—all mouth and no delivery, to coin a phrase.

Mrs. Ann Winterton (Congleton)

I believe that the right hon. Lady said earlier that ministerial statements would be made to this Standing Committee. Were such statements made in the 1970s, when the Committee was previously in existence? Is it not right and proper that ministerial statements should be made in the House, and not to a limited Standing Committee?

Mrs. Beckett

No, that was not the procedure when the Committee was first set up. That is one of the reasons why we are moving an amendment to the existing Standing Order, which is thought to be somewhat inflexible. At that time, the House did not have the kind of procedures that it has today. The House did not have anything like the number of Committees that it has today. The House did not operate in forums in which it was possible or likely that Ministers would make statements. We do all those things in the proceedings of the House today. As I understand it, those procedures have developed because the House, as a whole, thought that they offered additional and more varied opportunities for scrutiny.

Mr. Peter L. Pike (Burnley)

My right hon. Friend rightly said that the proposal was aired in the Modernisation Committee. Would it not be true to say that one of the reservations that the Modernisation Committee had about launching the Standing Committee on Regional Affairs was that hon. Members, myself included, did not want to launch it at the same time as Westminster Hall? We wanted to allow that to get established before launching this Standing Committee, which is exactly what the Government have done.

Mrs. Beckett

My hon. Friend is correct. There were those who felt that it was not a good idea to launch two experiments, as they saw it, at the same time. Others, as it transpired, saw the proposal as some kind of pro-European plot. So it became apparent that it was not necessarily all that likely that the proposal would command common ground.

Let me return to the point that perhaps was behind the intervention from the hon. Member for North Wiltshire (Mr. Gray). When it became clear that there would not necessarily be all-party support for a move along these lines, I withdrew it from the Modernisation Committee because it is an all-party Committee which seeks to proceed by consensus. I made it plain at that point that, because this was a decision that the House had already 294 made, the Government might seek to move forward on the proposal in another context, and that is precisely what we are doing tonight.

Mr. Patrick McLoughlin (West Derbyshire)

Will the right hon. Lady give way?

Mrs. Beckett

I will, but after that I propose to end my remarks, which I had already almost concluded.

Mr. McLoughlin

The right hon. Lady says that statements could be made to the Committee. What will be the mechanism for notifying Members of what the statements will be on? What kind of notice will she give Members that a statement is to be made?

Mrs. Beckett

I am sure that the hon. Gentleman, especially in view of the honourable position that he holds in the House, is more than well aware of how such procedures work. It is intended that they should proceed by discussion across the House in the ordinary way. We would give as much notice as we reasonably could of issues that could be aired.

The reason for having a core membership is not merely so that members can build up a wide expertise in regional affairs rather than just in a particular region but so that they can begin to form views about what issues have not yet been aired. Should the House decide to set up such a Committee, I hope that that is something on which there would rapidly develop common ground. That is the way in which many of our affairs work and it is something—

Mr. John Bercow (Buckingham)

Will the right hon. Lady give way?

Mrs. Beckett

I am sorry. The hon. Gentleman knows that I would readily give way to him, but I am about to conclude my remarks. I do not wish to detain the House unnecessarily about a straightforward and simple proposal. I propose—

Mr. Bercow

In one sentence

Mrs. Beckett

Oh, all right, in one sentence.

Mr. Bercow

I am grateful to the right hon. Lady for giving way. What is the rationale behind the first part of subsection (9) of the proposed standing order?

Mrs. Beckett

Without finding paragraph (9) immediately, I should simply say that the whole idea behind the proposal is to create an additional forum for the House. I do not intend to search for subsection (9) now.

The Government recognise that, in the aftermath of devolution to Scotland and Wales, which is an issue that has been debated extensively in the House and has long been decided, there is a call for a forum specifically for Members who sit for English constituencies. The Government recognise the validity of such a call. Or perhaps I should say that the Government thought that they recognised the validity of such a call, but we shall judge tonight whether that call was valid or was in fact merely an excuse for people to complain.

295 The Government are perfectly prepared to extend the opportunities available to those Members who sit for English constituencies to air specific concerns that arise in their constituencies and to make that forum one that can provide not merely for debate but for extended scrutiny of Ministers, and the opportunity to seek ministerial statements and to question Ministers on those statements. We believe that such a forum will add usefully to the procedures of the House and to the opportunities available to Members to hold the Government to account. Conservative Members continually complain that they lack sufficient of those opportunities. We should judge whether they really mean it by how they vote tonight.

Sir George Young (North-West Hampshire)

The good news about the motion before the House tonight is that the Government have at last recognised that post-devolution there are some unresolved questions relating to England. The Leader of the House confirmed that in her remarks. The bad news is that the Government have come up with the wrong answer. I want to explain why the proposal before us is, first, inconsistent with the Government's manifesto commitments for devolution in England; secondly, an inadequate response to the so-called West Lothian question; and, thirdly, one that cuts across the work of existing institutions of the House, especially the Select Committees and the recently established Westminster Hall.

The proposal for this new Standing Committee has not been put to the House with the approval of the Select Committees on Modernisation or on Procedure—the preferred way of changing how the House works—but comes from the Government.

A year ago, the Modernisation Committee reflected on this proposition, which had been put to it by the Leader of the House. After discussion, the Government decided—rightly—not to pursue it, so we heard no more for nearly a year. The week before last, in a great hurry, the proposition was taken off its dusty shelf by the Government, following some adverse press coverage of the Government's lack of progress in setting up regional assemblies.

The proposal appeared on the Order Paper shortly after the Prime Minister gave a speech on Britishness on 28 March. His speech generated some adverse comment: PM rules out home rule for the regions…the move will be seen as a bruising rebuff to regions such as the North East and North West. That was in the Daily Mail on 29 March. [Interruption.] I thought that the Daily Mail was most important to the present Labour party.

How about The Times? On 29 March, it stated: Blair back-pedals on regional assemblies … Tony Blair rebuffed John Prescott's demands for the creation of regional assemblies in England yesterday. On the next day—30 March—the Leader of the House announced the initiative at business questions. That is the background.

The motion is not a considered response by the House as to how its procedures might be improved. It does not fit into a coherent philosophy of devolution; it is a political gesture, made by the Government to head off criticism of yet another of their ill-considered constitutional changes.

Helen Jackson (Sheffield, Hillsborough)

The right hon. Gentleman is twisting history somewhat. He should 296 acknowledge the arguments that were primarily about the fact that the House was trying to achieve a consensus on the establishment, in Westminster Hall, of a Chamber in which such issues could be debated—as my hon. Friend the Member for Burnley (Mr. Pike) has just pointed out. That is why the proposal was made.

Sir George Young

I am not sure whether the hon. Lady sustained her initial accusation that I had twisted history. However, she was able to insert her interpretation of events into my speech. I hope that she can catch your eye later, Mr. Deputy Speaker.

There are three reasons for my view that this proposal is not the best way forward. First, the new Committee would sit uneasily with other institutions of the House, especially the Select Committees and Westminster Hall. Since 1978—the last time that the Standing Committee met—there have been major changes in the operation both of the Government and of the House, which dramatically weaken the case for the Standing Committee.

We have a major Department—the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions—which has responsibility for English regional affairs. That Department is shadowed by an active and effective Select Committee—as one would expect of a Committee chaired by the hon. Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Mrs. Dunwoody).

The DETR annual report for 1999 on regional responsibility lists the Department's achievements in 1998 as follows: Royal Assent for the Regional Development Agencies Act 1998; the establishment of eight RDAs on 14 December; and the appointment of the chairmen, members and chief executives of the RDAs. The work in progress included the further development of RDAs; encouraging the development of voluntary regional chambers in each region; contributing to the development of the new assisted areas map; and improving relationships with Government offices.

That major Department of State has responsibility for regional affairs. Within it, there is a Minister with responsibility for the English regions—I am delighted that the Minister for Local Government and the Regions, is in the Chamber tonight. There is also an Under-Secretary with responsibility for the regions, namely the Under-Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions, the hon. Member for Stretford and Urmston (Ms Hughes).

The House monitors the Government and holds them to account on regional matters through a Select Committee. That is exactly what the Environment, Transport and Regional Affairs Committee has been doing. It produced reports on regional air services on 25 July 1998, regional Eurostar services on 26 January 1999 and regional development agencies on 25 May 1999. It must remain the principal means of monitoring the Government on regional affairs.

We also have other departmental Select Committees that cover other subjects. For example, if the House wanted to examine agriculture in the south-west, fishing in the north-west or the motor industry in the north-east, those subjects come under other Select Committees. The proposal for a Standing Committee on Regional Affairs risks short-circuiting the existing Select Committees, assuming, of course, that the House could find Members 297 to take an active part on it, given the difficulty that confronts many Committees in maintaining a quorum and a good turnout.

Mr. Campbell-Savours

The right hon. Gentleman has missed a crucial point. Any Member of the House of the Commons—not only members of the Select Committee—will under this proposal be able to ask detailed questions of Ministers and secure answers. He simply does not understand that point, but it is why the change is so important.

Sir George Young

If the hon. Gentleman considers the way the agenda is constructed, he will find that the Government, not the Committee members, will set it. I shall refer shortly to Westminster Hall, which is an appropriate forum for some of these issues.

Mr. Garnier

I wish to follow up the point made by the hon. Member for Workington (Mr. Campbell-Savours). All sorts of Members representing English constituencies may be able to go to the Committee, question Ministers and make speeches, but, whatever the views expressed by those attending, the Government will be able to pack the vote. They will have the majority on the Committee.

Sir George Young

Indeed, and the majority will reflect not the balance within England, but that within the United Kingdom as a whole. I shall discuss the relevant amendment shortly

Mr. Edward Leigh (Gainsborough)

rose—

Sir George Young

I want to make a bit of progress, and then I shall give way.

The agenda of the Standing Committee, unlike that of a Select Committee, will be dominated by the Government and not by its members. The House may have considered paragraph (6) of the motion. The matters referred to the Committee, the period for discussion and the location and the duration of the discussion will all be decided by the Government. The normal powers available to a Select Committee will not be available to the Standing Committee, which is further evidence of the Government's ability to talk the language of devolution, but to retain central control.

The House is familiar with the debate about Westminster Hall. One of the concerns about establishing a forum that did not meet in the Chamber but that potentially had a large membership was that it might shift the centre of gravity away from the Chamber and take Members out of it. The jury is out on that issue because Westminster Hall is still an experiment. However, a Standing Committee on Regional Affairs must accentuate that risk.

Dr. Ladyman

I wanted the right hon. Gentleman to give way before he moved too far away from his remarks on Select Committees. Does he not accept that those of us who sit on the Environment, Transport and Regional 298 Affairs Committee are not able to proselytise on behalf of our own regions? The advantage of the Standing Committee is that we shall be able to represent our regional interests on it.

Sir George Young

If the hon. Gentleman had listened to what has just been said, he would have found out that he will not have that freedom. He can proselytise on any subject only if the Government decide that it is a subject that the Committee can discuss. The whole terms of trade are weighted in favour of the Government, not the House.

Mr. Leigh

On the point that the voting in the Committee will reflect party strength in the United Kingdom as a whole and not just England, does my right hon. Friend recognise that the project may be considered by some to be an embryo—if an inadequate one—for an English Parliament? If that is so, does he accept that it is a rare case where an early abortion of the project would be a great kindness?

Sir George Young

My hon. Friend has used rather violent language. We should not make progress with the Standing Committee for the reasons that I have set out, and its membership is one of them. If the proposal is being sold to English Members as an English solution of some sort, the Committee should reflect the balance in the House of Members from England and not the United Kingdom. I shall say a word shortly about the amendment that addresses that problem.

The Procedure Committee suggested that the Grand Committees should be suspended while we wait to see what happens with Westminster Hall. Its Chairman may catch your eye, Mr. Deputy Speaker. If his Committee wanted the existing Grand Committees to be suspended, it is difficult to see that it would want a new one to be established.

Westminster Hall already provides opportunities for debates on English regional matters, answered by Ministers. Subjects for debate included, on 16 January, shipbuilding on the Clyde; on 14 March, housing in Norfolk; on 21 March, housing in Hampshire; on 22 March, NHS provision in Oxfordshire and the economy of the east midlands; on 29 March, the Diamond Synchrotron and science in the north west; and, on 4 April, prospects for shipbuilding and related industries on the River Tyne. All those subjects are chosen by Members of the House and the Speaker, not by the Government.

Mrs. Beckett

I gently remind the right hon. Gentleman that although as a member of the Modernisation Committee, which recommended the experiment in Westminster Hall, he rightly and honourably voted for that proposal, the vast bulk of the Members sitting behind him voted against it, and now apparently will vote against this one. Where does that leave their claim to want a forum for English Members?

Sir George Young

The proposal for Westminster Hall came to the House from the Modernisation Committee, which approved it. This proposal has not come from the Modernisation Committee with the approval of a Committee of the House; it has come directly from the Government.

As I said earlier, my first reason for believing that this proposal is not the best way forward is that it does not make sense within our rules and procedures. Last May, 299 the Procedure Committee published an excellent report entitled "The Procedural Consequences of Devolution". This proposition was not one of its proposals, nor indeed did it feature in the Government's response.

That brings me to my second reason. The motion in no way responds to the imbalance created by devolution. The House should tonight be implementing the Procedure Committee's unanimous recommendation that Madam Speaker should identify Bills that apply only to one part of the UK. That would begin to be a coherent response to the English question, as it would open up the way to a new procedure for English or English and Welsh Bills.

"The Procedural Consequences of Devolution", which we debated on 21 October, contained key paragraphs—23 to 27—which responded to the current inequity that affects English MPs and our constituents better than the proposal before the House. Paragraph 25 began: However, the current Standing Orders do not deal satisfactorily with legislation relating exclusively to England, Northern Ireland or Scotland … No provision at all is made for Bills relating exclusively to England.

The next paragraph took the argument a stage further. It said: The main point of principle to be considered is whether it is appropriate to retain special procedures for Bills relating exclusively to one of the constituent countries of the UK, as currently apply to Bills relating exclusively to Scotland or Wales. On balance, we believe it is.

That led the Committee to its recommendation in paragraph 27, which said: We recommend that the provision allowing the Speaker to certify Bills as relating exclusively to Scotland be transferred to a new Standing Order and adapted so that the Speaker may certify that a Bill relates exclusively to one of the constituent parts of the UK. That was the unanimous view of a Committee consisting of nine Labour MPs, three Conservatives and two Liberal Democrats. That is what we should be debating this evening.

That recommendation was rejected by the Government, who in their response asserted: If…it were possible to identify some bills as relating exclusively to England, it is not clear what benefit this would have for the House. The whole debate on the West Lothian question had gone straight over their head. It is not that they disagreed with the solution; they had not even seen the problem. The unanimous recommendation of the Procedure Committee would pave the way for the solution proposed by my party to the West Lothian question, and if the Government had tabled that as a motion today, they would have had our support.

The Standing Order would not allow the Committee to deal with Second Readings. The Procedure Committee also recommended that the Standing Order be lifted which requires Standing Committees to reflect party strength, so that the Standing Committee on Regional Affairs could reflect party strength in the constituent part of the UK. Again, the Government have not accepted that. The Government's proposal will perpetuate the inequity rather than solve it. An amendment has been tabled which would require the balance in the Committee to reflect the position in England rather than that in the UK. That strikes me as an amendment worth supporting if we are to have the Committee, but we do not believe that the Committee is the right answer to the post-devolution issues that concern many hon. Members.

300 My third and last reason is that the proposition does not even fit the Government's agenda. Here we are, approaching the end of this Parliament, and the sad epitaph to the bold claims about regional devolution that we heard from Labour Members a few years ago is this Standing Committee. Elected regional assemblies have disappeared and, as a sop, we are to have a Standing Committee on Regional Affairs. The commitment to hold referendums on regional assemblies has gone the same way as the commitment to hold a referendum on electoral change.

Mr. William Cash (Stone)

Does my right hon. Friend agree that, to deal with the question of Scotland and Wales—especially Scotland and the West Lothian question—it is necessary to adjust the Standing Orders to ensure that those who will otherwise vote twice are not allowed to do so?

Sir George Young

That was indeed the logic of the unanimous recommendation of the Procedure Committee that was put to the House last year.

At the general election, the Labour party pledged legislation to allow the people, region by region, to decide in a referendum whether they want directly elected regional government. The Home Secretary has also promised that devolution to Scotland and Wales, to Greater London and to the English regions, greater responsibility to local authorities, far better accountability for quangos, will decentralise and devolve power across Britain and give people a say where one is denied today. Regional government was intended to break up Britain and create a Europe of the regions. As Labour argued before the election: The regional chambers would become each region's voice in Europe and would co-ordinate regional bids for EU funding. Despite that initial enthusiasm, Labour's attitude appears to have cooled. The Minister for Local Government and the Regions recently described regional government as a "diversion", claiming that few of her north-east constituents were interested. That was reported in The Guardian on 4 August.

It appears that the motion we are debating is all that remains of the Government's bold pledge to devolve power to the regions. As is so often the case with the Labour Government, they are all mouth and no delivery. We do not support the idea of regional assemblies, and my hon. Friend the Member for East Worthing and Shoreham (Mr. Loughton) will explain why. They would be wasteful and bureaucratic and they do not attract significant support in the country. In my part of the country, when people talk of Wessex, they mean Sophie and Edward, not a regional assembly.

What Labour Members really want is elected regional assemblies, especially in the north-east, to which decision making is devolved from Westminster. However, the motion pulls in the opposite direction. The Campaign for Yorkshire's background paper states: The Campaign for Yorkshire is not asking for yet another body, but looking for the RDA to be made into an elected assembly. The Local Government Association's letter about the proposal states: though we welcome greater scrutiny of RDAs by Parliament, the Association favours increased scrutiny by the region itself. If the RDAs are to be a genuine step towards increased decision making in the English regions, the Committee must recognise that RDAs should ultimately be accountable to regional interests themselves. 301 The motion is yet another example of the Government thrashing around in a constitutional vacuum, starting a reform that they have no idea how to finish, responding to some bad press with an ill-thought-through response. We do not believe that it should be supported and I invite my hon. Friends to register their opposition in the Lobby.

Mr. Paul Tyler (North Cornwall)

I beg to move amendment (a), in paragraph (2), leave out "thirteen" and insert "twenty-four".

Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Michael J. Martin)

With this it will be convenient to consider amendment (b), in paragraph (2)(a), leave out "composition of the House" and insert— party representation of Members of the House sitting for English constituencies".

Mr. Tyler

The motion is a curious proposition and, as has been made clear by hon. Members on both sides, its paternity is odd. The Standing Committee on Regional Affairs has been in abeyance for 20 years and we do not appear to have managed too badly without it.

Already, inquiries have been made of the Leader of the House about the function that this child is to perform. What is its purpose? Government Members have already suggested that a body with some of the characteristics of a Select Committee would be more appropriate than a Standing Committee; but, as the Chairman of the appropriate Committee has also already pointed out, to set up such a Committee would entail duplication. Already there is doubt about the purpose of the exercise.

I hope that all hon. Members have taken the trouble to read the Order Paper and the amendments. The House is now debating a series of amendments starting, obviously, with amendment (a). We will then debate amendment (b). I hope that later we will have an opportunity to consider some of the other issues.

I have some sympathy with the point of view of the Conservative spokesman, the right hon. Member for North-West Hampshire (Sir G. Young).

Mr. Campbell-Savours

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Mr. Tyler

With due respect, I have hardly started. I know that it was said of Mr. Gladstone that he was an old man in a hurry, but will the hon. Gentleman please be a little bit patient? I wish to be as brief as possible, as others want to speak, so I do not intend to take a lot of interventions.

As the Conservative spokesman made clear, the aspirations of many parts of the country, including my own, for some form of real devolution are to be denied this evening with a sop—a stopgap. I know that that will cause disappointment in all parts of the House. It looks as though old Labour has produced a knee-jerk response to those aspirations. As it has burned its fingers in Cardiff, Edinburgh and now London, real devolution is being put on the back burner and we are to be fobbed off with yet another Committee—a puppet Committee with a built-in Government majority.

302 I do not believe that that is what people want. The Prime Minister promised, not just at the general election but more recently, that we would have more accountable regional government. This is not regional government. It does not even bring regional administration under the control of the House or any other elected body. For that reason, we must study the proposition carefully. It may be just a modest improvement. If so, perhaps it has some merit, but it is certainly not what it is cracked up to be by the Leader of the House or anyone else.

Amendment (a) would expand the core membership of the Committee so that at least a sufficient number of members would not only attend meetings, but vote there, to give the Committee a more effective role in scrutinising Government policy and practice at regional level. Our suggestion is that the number should be 24.

More important still, it would be a constitutional absurdity if the calculation of the Committee membership by party were based on representation in Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and even London. We therefore suggest in our second amendment that party representation should reflect party balance in England, if that is to be the agenda for the Committee. It would be totally illogical for those who represent Scottish constituencies effectively to determine representation on the Committee. The Government have clearly made a ludicrous blunder.

Mrs. Beckett

As the hon. Gentleman suggests that a ludicrous blunder has been committed, I should inform him that it has been calculated not by me, but by the relevant authorities, that his proposal would mean an extra seat for the Conservatives and one fewer for the Liberal Democrats.

Mr. Tyler

I have no problem with that. The argument of simple party advantage is ludicrous. I well recall the Labour protest when the Conservatives in the previous Parliament insisted on putting English Members on the Scottish Grand Committee. That was ludicrous then, and the proposal now is ludicrous. I hope that we will see no double standards from Labour Members who objected at that time.

Mr. Andrew Miller (Ellesmere Port and Neston)

Will the hon. Gentleman give way.

Mr. Tyler

No, I will not.

The motion reflects a subtle but extremely important difference in the way in which the Committee is to be managed, compared with 25 years ago: a Minister of the Crown will take all the major initiatives in deciding what comes before the Committee, where it meets, when it meets and so on. In our view, that is inappropriate. If the Committee is to be an effective organ of scrutiny that will make the Government accountable, the Chair of the Committee should have that role, and he or she should be an Opposition Member. Surely that is the right approach. I hope that hon. Members will re-examine the motion.

The proposal's greatest defect is the lack of a timetable. It is as though the Committee is intended to act for ever and a day as a substitute for effective regional scrutiny of the regional administration of national government. That is why we have proposed a sunset clause. Although Standing Orders cease at the end of every Parliament and 303 the motion will therefore be effective for only a short time, I hope that the Government will not pretend that it is a permanent solution to the democratic deficit in the regions of England.

The motion is not a substitute for effective regional government. Anyone who claims it is such a substitute misunderstands the Government's proposition completely.

Mr. Bercow

The hon. Gentleman referred to the proposed Chairman of the Committee. Does he believe that the Chairman should be plucked from the Speaker's Panel or appointed in some other, unspecified way?

Mr. Tyler

If we are considering a Standing Committee, the Chair must be a member of the Speaker's Panel. It includes Opposition Members, so that is not a major problem. If the initiative, the agenda, the timing, the location and the business are in the hands of the Government rather than the Chair and the Committee, the Committee will not be an effective organ of scrutiny for all Back Benchers and all parties.

I represent Cornwall, which we do not regard as part of England, but I am prepared to make an exception for the purpose of our discussion. My constituents are entitled to know that the Committee will be an effective scrutineer of regional and local government.

Mr. Nicholas Winterton (Macclesfield)

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Mr. Tyler

No, I want to complete my remarks. [HON. MEMBERS: "Go on."] I spoke in the Chamber at 1.10 this morning; I do not believe that anyone wants to hear me speak at length this evening.

Mr. Bercow

We want Tyler.

Mr. Tyler

The hon. Gentleman can have Wat Tyler if he likes.

Hon. Members on the Treasury Bench want to buy off parts of England that have a perfectly reasonable aspiration in the aftermath of devolution to Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland—we hope that devolved government will resume in due course in Northern Ireland. The motion is simply a stopgap and must be treated as such. It may have short-term merits, but only if it is greatly improved by our amendments.

Mr. Dale Campbell-Savours (Workington)

I have listened to the hon. Member for Truro—

Mr. Tyler

North Cornwall.

Mr. Campbell-Savours

I am obviously thinking of the previous Parliament.

I tried to intervene on the hon. Gentleman early in his speech because in his opening sentence, he suggested that things had worked perfectly well without the Committee for which we have pressed. I remind him that his part of the world is applying for objective 1 status. That suggests that there are major problems in Cornwall. Twenty years of Thatcherism and all that that entailed have left a legacy that the hon. Gentleman does not enjoy. He should 304 therefore have been at the forefront of those who required the Government to table the motion that has been presented this evening.

I welcome the motion. We have asked for it for 20 years; we have finally got it. In 1979, when I was first elected, the first debates in which I participated were about regional affairs. We had to argue with the Government through the usual channels for those debates. They were repeatedly refused. We asked for the establishment of a Standing Committee on Regional Affairs immediately after the election in 1979. Our request was refused. Over the following year and every year, the issue was repeatedly raised in Labour party conferences up and down the country and in trade union conferences. If the truth be known, Tory Back Benchers wanted a Standing Committee on Regional Affairs just as much as we did. I am looking at one now—the hon. Member for Macclesfield (Mr. Winterton). In the early 1980s he attended meetings of the textile group of Members of Parliament to ask for such a Committee to be established.

Mr. Nicholas Winterton

I hesitate to counter what the hon. Gentleman says, but it would be appropriate to quote chapter and verse, such as a date and a relevant Hansard column. Although I participated in the Committee under the old Standing Order, which I much prefer to the Standing Order that we are debating, it is wrong to introduce the motion as we are still involved in the Westminster Hall experiment. We should see whether it succeeds. I have the honour to chair Westminster Hall and I must tell the House that I am trying to create some atmosphere and make it work.

Mr. Campbell-Savours

The hon. Gentleman is a weather vane. Clearly he has completely changed his position over the past 20 years.

Mr. Winterton

Rubbish.

Mr. Campbell-Savours

I remember those occasions.

Mr. Deputy Speaker

Order. The hon. Member for Macclesfield (Mr. Winterton) must not shout across the Chamber.

Mr. Campbell-Savours

Those matters were discussed by the Paper and Board Federation because we were concerned about the impact of energy prices on the paper and board industry. We argued that we needed a mechanism in the House of Commons whereby we could debate such issues intensely with Ministers, but that was not provided. In the 1980s, we repeatedly made requests through the usual channels for a structure to be set up, but we never got what we wanted. This time we have got it, and I thank my right hon. Friend for that.

Let me tell the House why the Committee will work. Many of my hon. Friends may not have had the opportunity or have needed to attend European Standing Committees. They are perhaps the best in terms of holding Ministers to account.

Mr. Paterson

Oh come on!

Mr. Campbell-Savours

Oh yes, those Committees are excellent as they sort out the good Ministers from 305 the bad. In the previous Parliament, I was leading in Committee for the Opposition and a Minister said, "Do you realise, Dale, that I had to get up at 4 o'clock this morning to prepare for this because I do not want to muck it up? When I go before the Committee, I want to be sure that I have done my homework." They provide the only mechanism that I have seen in the House of Commons that subjects Ministers to persistent questioning on issues of which they often have little notice. Ministers are held fully to account, which is why I want this structure to be created.

Ministers will have to be fully briefed and able to reply if they are to appear before the Committee on issues that relate directly to our constituencies. The danger is that they will look inadequate if they do not answer detailed questions. Nothing keeps Ministers on their toes more than the need to impress a Committee, particularly when they are live on the box.

Mr. James Paice (South-East Cambridgeshire)

Although I do not agree, let us accept the hon. Gentleman's point about the effectiveness of European Standing Committees. Is not there a significant difference here because the European Scrutiny Committee, not the Government, decides whether an issue is appropriate for debate? In the new Standing Committee, issues will be debated at the behest of Ministers. If they do not want to be interrogated in the way that he describes, they can purposely avoid that by not putting certain issues down for consideration.

Mr. Campbell-Savours

Within the structure that we are establishing, it is inconceivable that Ministers would be able to find some way of avoiding giving detailed answers to questions about the northern region or the north-west region. The Government will announce the business of the Committee for a particular day, for a particular region and probably for a particular Department. It could be Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions, northern region, Department of Trade and Industry, north-west region, lottery matters covered by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, south-west region, or whatever.

I presume that when those items go on to the agenda, Members—if they are inclined to do what I intend to do—will give Ministers notice in detail of the questions that they mean to ask, so that there is no excuse for those Ministers to give half-baked answers. Then, during the questioning session that will open the proceedings, they will ask their questions, receive live answers and follow them up, as can be done under the European Committee structure that we have already established. Members can ask supplementaries repeatedly, and press Ministers into a corner in order to exploit fully the issues that they are raising.

Mr. Pike

I am sure my hon. Friend does not believe for a moment that, once the Committee has been established, Conservative Members will not press weekly at business questions for issues to be debated in it.

Mr. Campbell-Savours

I am absolutely sure that they will. Every Thursday afternoon they will ask for items to be discussed in the Committee. Having begun by meeting 306 perhaps once a week or once every two weeks, the Committee may well meet two or three times a week, depending on the nature and scale of demand from members of all parties. The Tories, if they are wise, will be just like us, and use the new structure to hold Ministers to account. I think that they are mad to reject it.

Dr. Ladyman

Let me ask my hon. Friend a question to which I genuinely do not know the answer. What would stop an individual Member tabling a parliamentary question asking the Government when they intended to debate a particular subject in the Committee, and what would stop the Environment, Transport and Regional Affairs Committee making recommendations to the Government, if it so wished? Whether the Government accepted them would be another matter.

Mr. Campbell-Savours

Everything that my hon. Friend has said is possible, and I am sure that Conservative Members will find ways of ensuring that it is possible. They will exploit the system in exactly the same way. There must be Conservative Members who know in their hearts that this is the very structure that they want in order to secure regional accountability.

Mr. Bercow

Given what the hon. Gentleman has just said about the scope for taxing interrogation, can he explain why, in paragraph (9) of the proposed standing order, the period for ministerial statements is unlimited, but the period for questioning of those ministerial statements is strictly limited? There is an incompatibility there.

Mr. Campbell-Savours

The procedure has worked perfectly well under the European scrutiny arrangements; and these are early days. It may well be that, in the end, most of the proceedings in the Committee are dominated by questions. We may well find that in a year's time, or in two years' time—depending on the scale of the great success of this procedural change—Members want more time in which to ask questions. I will be in the Lobby with the Tories if they want to table a motion to that effect: I have no problem at all with it, and nor have my colleagues on the Front Bench.

Mrs. Beckett

Having now found paragraph (9), which I must admit was not present in my memory, I can assist my hon. Friend, and respond to the concern raised by the hon. Member for Buckingham (Mr. Bercow).

The whole point of the procedure, which is modelled on that of the European Scrutiny Committee, is to prevent Ministers from monopolising the Committee by making overlong statements, but to allow the Chairman the facility to extend the period of questioning should the Chairman conclude that the Committee has not had sufficient opportunity to press a Minister. That is what happens in the European Scrutiny Committee, and that is the reason for our proposing this procedure.

Mr. Campbell-Savours

That is a very sensible response to the question asked by the hon. Member for Buckingham (Mr. Bercow). He should go away and consider the whole procedure again. He is one of the Members who will be able to use it, because, as we know, he is a questioner. He, along with some of his 307 hon. Friends, will be able to exploit the procedure—and I hope that they will, because we all want Ministers to be held to account.

Mr. Gray

The hon. Gentleman talks about persistent and demanding scrutiny of Ministers. Has he seen the official record of the recent meeting of the Select Committee on the Environment, Transport and Regional Affairs, where Lord Sainsbury was reduced to a quivering jelly by the hon. Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Mrs. Dunwoody)?

Mr. Campbell-Savours

I am sure, then, that the hon. Gentleman will look forward to many similar occasions with other Ministers, if he gets his way. We accept that. Indeed, Ministers accept it.

I draw attention to one or two issues that I should like to raise in the Committee. It is not only about the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions. It will cover other Departments.

Mrs. Dunwoody

What concerns me is not that we should follow the European Standing Committee—

Mr. Campbell-Savours

Where my hon. Friend was very good.

Mrs. Dunwoody

I enjoyed it. It was an interesting and useful sitting because we could keep a Minister there for more than an hour, forcing him to answer questions. One thing worries me. Given the number of English Members who would have the right to come along and to question the Minister, rightly, how long would each one get to put trenchant and important questions? How many answers would they receive?

Mr. Campbell-Savours

During a sitting of European Standing Committee B that dealt with agricultural matters, my hon. Friend always seemed to secure answers to the repeated questions that she asked; it was particularly the case on European matters. She was very able to do so. I do not see any problem arising. Anyhow, it is not as if the Committee will meet only once. As I say, it may meet regularly every week on a number of occasions. I hope that it does. I hope that Members take advantage of it.

Mr. Paterson

The hon. Gentleman should listen to his colleague, the hon. Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Mrs. Dunwoody). She makes the very good point about the one hour available on European Standing Committees. The most that I have ever achieved is three questions to a Minister, interspersed with other questions from other Members.

If the hon. Gentleman had been at the Select Committee on Agriculture this morning and heard his colleague, the hon. Member for Great Grimsby (Mr. Mitchell), going on and on and on and on at Baroness Hayman, the Minister of State, Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, he would have seen what persistent questioning means. A Select Committee is a far more effective format for grilling an ineffective Minister than a Standing Committee, as we see with the European model.

Mr. Campbell-Savours

We are splitting hairs. [HON. MEMBERS: "We are not."] I am sorry. I think that we are. 308 The Committees provide adequate opportunity for Members to question Ministers. It might be true that, in the proceedings this morning, the Minister was pressed, but there is one advantage that Standing Committees do have; I suppose it applies to Select Committees, too. If they are very clever, a group of Back Benchers will get together and ambush a Minister. That is the real art.

I saw that happen once. It was during a very well attended sitting—I am sure that the hon. Member for Macclesfield will remember the day. Mr. Oppenheim was the Minister. He was answering questions during the run-up to Maastricht. There was a big sitting in Committee Room 12. The proceedings had to be transferred to that Room because so many people wanted to speak. Does the hon. Gentleman remember the ambush? Did it work? It did. That is why the new procedure will work. [HON. MEMBERS: "It did not work."] It did. You got the ambush in. I was there. I witnessed it. We sat back and said nothing. Your people did the job against your own Ministers.

Mr. Deputy Speaker

Order. The hon. Gentleman could not be referring to my people because my people are not in the Chamber.

Mr. Campbell-Savours

Thank you, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I should never have made that remark. The people of the hon. Member for Macclesfield ambushed his own Minister and it worked very well.

Mr. Nigel Evans (Ribble Valley)

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Mr. Campbell-Savours

I shall. I like these exchanges.

Mr. Evans

Does the hon. Gentleman believe that the 13 core Members should reflect the political make-up of the English regions, or of the whole House of Commons?

Mr. Campbell-Savours

I have not given the matter a thought. I am leaving that to Liberal Democrat Members, who have tabled an amendment on it. I shall look to my Whips for a bit of guidance on how I should vote on it, because it is not the issue that is concerning me. I am interested in the principle.

Mr. Tyler

The hon. Gentleman will have to vote soon on our amendment.

Mr. Campbell-Savours

I am going to ask my Whips which way to vote—I am very honest about that. When I am ignorant about something, they invariably give me very good guidance.

When the new regional structure and the north-west regional development agency—in the north-west of England—were established, there was much argument about whether Cumbria should be covered by it. Many of us wanted to be included in the northern region. I do not want to re-open old arguments, but the reality is that there was a very heated discussion. Although that structure is now working quite well, at that time we believed that we were not being listened to. If we had had in place the structure proposed in the motion, what a field day I would have had. Ministers would have been pilloried in that Committee and driven into a corner, to reveal the true 309 reasons why the decision had been taken. That is only one example of a situation in which I believe that the proposed structure would have operated better.

A decision was then taken, at a regional level, without the intervention of Ministers, on where the regional development agency's offices in Cumbria were to be located. It was small matter for people in Westminster, but it was very important for us in Cumbria. I wanted the offices in Cockermouth, but the agency wanted them in Penrith. The agency won, but why? It won because there was no accountability and no process by which I could influence events. When I tried to influence events in informal proceedings, it turned out to be a complete and total waste of time. I want a structure whereby I can hold a Minister to account on a decision of that nature because I am elected and I am accountable, just as every other hon. Member is. We have to find a way of ensuring that our voices are heard and that we can question Ministers on those issues.

Mr. Andrew George (St. Ives)

The hon. Gentleman said earlier that anything is possible, and he mentioned the definition of "regions". Surely that issue really is at the heart of the proposal and the factor determining whether the emperor has any clothes at all. Do regions as defined by central Government exist other than as part of the diseased mind of a bureaucratic and centralised Government? Does he agree that the fundamental issue in the debate is the possibility of identifying regions that are based on real community identities?

Mr. Campbell-Savours

I agree with the hon. Gentleman.

Mr. Stephen Day (Cheadle)

The hon. Gentleman mentioned the debate on which region Cumbria should be in, and I remember the debate well. However, surely he does not believe for a minute that that issue—which was a great one for him—matters at all to his constituents. They do not recognise the north-west as an entity—it does not exist. They recognise their own county and city, and those are what make them what they are. They also recognise the fact that they are English. That is the issue that needs to be addressed. We are talking about rights for English Members to represent their constituents here in this House.

Mr. Campbell-Savours

Those who are taking administrative decisions within the county of Cumbria recognise the north-west regional authority as the entity that is responsible for the region's future. There is no problem about that—we accept the north-west as an administrative entity. However, the hon. Gentleman is raising issues that we are not addressing in this debate.

There is an argument about the impact of the strength of the pound. [Interruption.] At Question Time, I have heard Tory Members and Labour Members, including me, repeatedly asking questions about the impact of sterling's high value on industry in the regions, particularly in the north of England and in Scotland. I think that it is perfectly reasonable that we should have a structure whereby we are able to bring in even Treasury Ministers, so that we can ask them questions and to justify their policy on the current value of the pound in relation to the 310 euro. I should like to see Treasury Ministers put under pressure by answering questions on those issues. Hands up any hon. Member who does not agree with me. Surely they would all want to ask Treasury Ministers these highly important questions.

Mr. Paterson

Where does it say in the motion that the Committee will have the power to call anyone? The Government will decide who goes before the Committee. That is the critical difference between a Select Committee and the way in which the proposed Committee will be constituted. There is no power whatever—

Mr. Deputy Speaker

Order. Interventions must be brief.

Mr. Campbell-Savours

When the hon. Gentleman asks on the Floor of the House for a debate on his part of the country on a matter relating to the currency, he requests or requires the attendance of a particular Minister to make a statement to that Committee.

Mr. Malcolm Bruce (Gordon)

Last week, the Scottish Grand Committee heard a statement on the Budget and debated the strength of the pound and its impact on the Scottish economy. In spite of the fact that the Chancellor of the Exchequer is a member of that Committee, we had no Treasury Minister replying to us.

Mr. Campbell-Savours

I am sorry for the hon. Gentleman; he should have exercised his influence. There is a special Committee for Members to exercise influence over a Labour Government, and we have provided them with the opportunities to do so.

Mr. Evans

The hon. Gentleman says that, during business questions Back-Bench Members ask the Leader of the House for debates. I am an assiduous attender of business questions, and the Leader of the House says time and again, "This would be a subject for Westminster Hall." Surely what the hon. Gentleman is asking for is already served by the Select Committees and by Westminster Hall.

Mr. Campbell-Savours

That is one option; we are now offering another way to secure such a debate. The incidence of the hon. Gentleman's success should now double.

Mr. Evans

Twice zero is zero.

Mr. Campbell-Savours

I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will get it in the end.

I am worried about the disparity between property prices in the north and the south. The people in the south have a huge advantage over my constituents. A terraced house in London costs £500,000 to £1 million. A terraced house in my constituency might cost between £20,000 and £40,000. When there is property price inflation, the people in the south benefit, yet it is my constituents in the north of England who are putting their backs into the use of equipment and machinery and generating the wealth that keeps the country working.