Hilary Benn
MP for Leeds South · Labour · United Kingdom
“As the right hon. Gentleman knows, the Irish Government published on 8 June their legislative outline, entitled “The General Scheme of the Legacy of the Troubles Bill 2026”. That is intended to fulfil the commitment that the Irish Government gave in the joint framework to co-operate to the fullest extent possible with the commission.”
“Northern Ireland is a society, as the hon. Gentleman knows better than most, that has been undergoing profound change since the signing of the Good Friday agreement 28 years ago. As the famous lines go, we have a shared history, but not necessarily a shared memory.”
“The right hon. Gentleman raises a really important point, and I am grateful to him for his question. We all have a responsibility—political leaders have a responsibility to call out what was witnessed for what it is and not mince our words, and as I have already indicated, social media companies have a responsibility to ensure that such m…”
“I hope the hon. Lady will recognise that the common travel area, which is more than a century old, is of great benefit to the citizens of the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland. Many people in Northern Ireland live their lives across that border every single day.”
“I do agree with my hon. Friend. The attack on Mr Ogilvie was truly shocking, and there was no justification whatsoever for the racist thuggery we witnessed on the streets of Belfast in the days following.”
“That was, of course, an awful feature of what we saw. One of the things I learned in my discussions was that those from the far right had taken a list of houses in multiple occupation in Belfast—a list that, in the interests of openness, was properly available on the Belfast city council website; the council has now taken it down—and used…”
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“I agree with my hon. Friend, but the answer lies in the hands of the Leader of the House, who has shown a willingness tonight to devote more time to debating the allocation of time than he is prepared to give to debating the proposals themselves.”
“I agree. I have a great deal of respect for the Leader of the House, but I must say that I do not think he has done his job properly on this occasion.”
“My hon. Friend has made a powerful point. Judging by the attendance in the Chamber tonight, and because so little time has been allotted, I fear that there will not be time for all the Members who will want to participate in tomorrow’s debate to have a chance to express their views to the House.”
“I agree. The proposal does indeed have profound ramifications and implications for students not only in England but in other parts of the United Kingdom, which is why we need more time.”
“My hon. Friend has made a powerful point, which I am sure that he and other Members will seek to put to the Minister tomorrow. As he says, time is required for us to be able to consider all the ramifications of the proposals, and the plain fact is that we are not being given enough time to do that.”
“Thank you, Mr Speaker. I think that the very least the architect of the policy could do, particularly in view of the pledge he signed before the election, is go and talk to students and explain why he has changed his mind.”
“I had hoped that in moving the motion this evening the Leader of the House would have enlightened us on that very point, but I am afraid no elucidation at all was offered as to the amount of time given to us. I want to come on to one of the problems that we may face tomorrow. Although what is on offer now—”
“If either of those eventualities arose, the British public and Members of the House would be denied even the paltry five hours being offered by the Leader of the House.”
“I agree with my hon. Friend. It is an outrage, as I indicated earlier. I wanted to say something about the amount of time that we may actually get tomorrow to debate this subject. Although the five hours that we have been offered is a 30-minute improvement on the previous period allocated, it is not absolutely guaranteed. That is because although the Leader of the House has just told us that the Government do not intend to make any statements tomorrow, it is possible that some matter may arise. You, Mr Speaker, may receive a request for an urgent question, and if that is granted we would lose time, as we will if Government Back Benchers suddenly decide they want to raise numerous lengthy points of order.”
“My hon. Friend makes a powerful point; indeed, she anticipates something that I am going to refer to a little later in my speech. It is about the nature of the debate that we may find that we are allowed, or not allowed, to have because we will be debating a statutory instrument rather the White Paper, which has not been published.”
“My hon. Friend makes a powerful point. To answer her very direct question, I fear that we will not have enough time to examine that, and many other aspects.”
“The point that my hon. Friend has just made illustrates clearly why we need more time tomorrow to examine the position of the Liberal Democrats, in all their splendour.”
“My right hon. Friend speaks with unique authority and force on that subject. He is giving the House a very clear warning, because if people do not feel that the House of Commons—their elected representatives—has been given adequate time to debate this very profound change, they will be even more angry than they are already.”
“My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Tomorrow the eyes of the House will be on Liberal Democrat Members in particular. Everybody knows that how they choose to vote will determine whether this proposal goes through or not.”
“Indeed. Back Benchers have the opportunity tonight to decide whether the motion will be passed. That is why I hope that as many as possible will join us in the Lobby to vote it down.”
“That is the case. With five hours, there will be an opportunity for only a relatively small number of Members to participate in the debate. The number of Members who have sought to intervene in this debate tonight is a pretty good indication of the number who will want to speak tomorrow.”
“My hon. Friend makes a powerful point. The large number of matters that Members will undoubtedly wish to raise tomorrow will only add to the pressure on time, if Ministers are even to begin to attempt to answer them all.”
“Gentleman is not a fan of injury time and I suspect that is because the coalition Government are not terribly keen on having a full and open debate on the matter in hand. There is another reason why more time is required. The measures we are being asked to vote on tomorrow cannot be described as the original proposals of Lord Browne. That is why my earlier quotation was relevant. When Lord Browne produced his report, he said that his proposals had to be considered together, but we now know that the Government’s plans differ from those of Lord Browne. That is very pertinent to the argument about why more time is required, especially when one bears in mind that the Government have had no debate in their own time on Lord Browne’s proposals.”
“There are many U-turns fighting to get into that top-10 list, but my hon. Friend makes a good point. Had the roles been reversed, the Deputy Leader of the House would have been fulminating from the Dispatch Box about how outrageous it was. He could have the opportunity to do so now, but I see that he simply wants to remain in his place. I should like to make a suggestion about how we could guarantee even the inadequate amount of time given so far. We have just had very helpful guidance from the Speaker about making manuscript amendments, and the Leader of the House could amend his own motion to ensure that there would be injury time if an urgent question were to be granted or if extensive time were taken up with points of order. I know that the right hon.”
“That is indeed the case. Hon. Members are being denied that opportunity because the Government have chosen to put the cart before the horse.”
“Thank you very much indeed, Madam Deputy Speaker. I was about to respond to the intervention made by my hon. Friend the Member for City of Durham. Yes, many people in the country have watched the video that the Deputy Prime Minister made in which he uttered the pledge. [Interruption.] It has to do with the time because we need to hear from Liberal Democrats—perhaps we will be lucky and hear from the Deputy Prime Minister in tomorrow’s debate, but who knows?—and we need time for an explanation of what exactly happened between the making of that pledge and the U-turn that he has performed in introducing these proposals tonight.”
“We do indeed. One of the big problems that Members will face tomorrow is that we do not yet have a lot of the information, and a lot of the questions that have been asked have not yet been answered. How on earth is the House meant to make up its mind on a fundamental part of these proposals in the absence of all that?”
“I happen to have a copy of “Erskine May” and am very happy to lend it to my hon. Friend, as long as he gives it back to me, because I intend to quote from it a little later.”
“My hon. Friend is, indeed, right. The Leader of the House could indicate now what self-denying ordinance or otherwise Ministers will adopt in order to give Members as much time as possible for debate. There is a fundamental problem, however, because Ministers want to say a lot on the matter, and they should rightly have that opportunity, but Members want to raise a lot of points, too, and we cannot fit it all into the five hours for which the motion provides.”
“I am sure that the occupant of the Chair will have noticed that advance bid, but I fear that tomorrow many Members will end up disappointed because not enough time has been allocated for the debate.”
“That is the point I advanced a moment ago, because whether we get the full five hours depends very much on what happens before the debate. I fear that we might not, which shows just how inadequate the motion is.”
“I am afraid I cannot give my hon. Friend any guidance on that at all. Perhaps a Minister on the Treasury Bench would like to answer his question. I would very happily give way if they wanted to inform the House.”
“I am grateful to my hon. Friend for drawing my attention to that clock. I fancied that I had been speaking for slightly longer than four minutes, but who knows?”
“It is completely inadequate. We have, however, found a solution for tomorrow, because if we could ensure that that is the clock by which the debate is timed, all right hon. and hon. Members might have the opportunity to participate.”
“A moment ago, I was pointing out that the proposals that the Government have decided to adopt are different from those made by Lord. He said that student numbers should rise by 10% over the next three years, that there should be clawback to deter unnecessarily high fees and that there should be the right to go to university, determined by academic qualifications. We need more time to discuss the report, precisely because the Government have not adopted all his recommendations. We have not had a chance to debate that matter.”
“I will respond to the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Bolton West (Julie Hilling) before I take any further interventions. She raises precisely the type of matter that needs to be explored properly and fully in the debate tomorrow. The fact that we will have inadequate time means that we run the risk of its not being addressed.”
“A very powerful case has been made this evening for providing more time, and given where we are now, the only way in which more time could be provided would indeed be for the matter to be put off until another occasion.”
“The Leader of the Opposition needs no lectures from the hon. Gentleman about talking to students and, more importantly, listening to what students have to say—a problem from which Members on the Government Benches are suffering.”
“I am not in the least bit surprised that so many Members have put in to participate in the debate tomorrow. The information that my hon. Friend the Member for Bristol East (Kerry McCarthy) has just given the House demonstrates the complete inadequacy of the time that we are being offered, because it is very hard to see how all those Members will be able to participate in the debate.”
“It is very important that Members of whatever party have full and ready access to the House, particularly tomorrow, given the importance of the subject of the debate and the significance of the vote that we will cast—if the business motion is passed—at about 5.30 pm tomorrow.”
“Undoubtedly, that is not enough time. If the number of Members who have already indicated that they want to speak is anything to go by, they could have, depending on the length of speeches by Front Benchers, about four minutes each or even less. How can any Member advance a reasonable argument in that inadequate amount of time?”
“I am not sure that the current Register of Members’ Financial Interests extends that far. Hon. Members will want to make a lot of points in tomorrow’s debate. Indeed, as this evening progresses, we will hear from other hon. Members who will want to speak tomorrow. That reinforces the point that the Leader of the House has now perhaps taken on board; namely, that it would have been much more sensible to have given us enough time to debate the proposals than to debate the problems tonight.”
“Indeed—that may well be the case. As the evening wears on and as the sense of anger grows among Opposition Members at the inadequacy of the time, more Members will probably be encouraged to go to Mr Speaker’s office to indicate that they wish to take part in tomorrow’s debate.”
“Without prejudice to their subsequent proper Parliamentary consideration, the Government believes it is appropriate to refer in this Memorandum to the other elements of the funding and finance package in the context of which the new basic and higher amounts are made.” These are not the first elements: these statutory instruments are the consequences of other decisions that the Government have already made.”
“I shall make a little progress and give way later. The Government of the day would normally have published a White Paper before asking us to vote on such proposals. I have inquired at the Vote Office, but it does not have a White Paper, because the Business, Innovation and Skills Secretary has not yet published one. On reflection, that is quite extraordinary. We will be asked in a few hours—less than 21 hours—to take a decision that will pre-empt the whole of the Government’s policy on higher education without our having a chance to find out what that is. It is interesting that the explanatory memorandum that accompanies the Higher Education (Basic Amount) (England) Regulations 2010 states: “The Regulations raising the basic and higher amounts are the first elements in the reform package to be presented for Parliamentary approval.”
“That is a trifle ungenerous, because I am trying to assist the House so that it will have enough time tomorrow to debate this. Paragraph 8.1 of the explanatory memorandum on the consultation outcome is germane, because it states: “These Regulations are informed by Lord Browne’s review which took evidence from students, teachers, academics, employers and regulators over a period of almost a year. The need to provide clarity for students and universities about the contributions they can expect to make and receive means that the timetable for laying the Regulations has been highly compressed, and this has prevented a separate external consultation exercise on the Government’s proposals.” Highly compressed? It is more like “cut and run”, because that is what we are dealing with tonight.”
“I am grateful for my hon. Friend’s support. I am sure that her constituents, like those of other hon. Members, would wish their representative to have the opportunity to participate in the debate tomorrow.”
“I certainly do. I hope that the force and the number of interventions that I have taken this evening will have some impact on Government Front Benchers and, even at this late stage, they will think again about the time that they have allocated.”
“My hon. Friend makes a powerful point. The number and strength of the interventions that we have heard this evening are for a specific purpose—to try to win for this House enough time to debate this issue. The fact is that the number of Members who are in their places, especially on the Opposition Benches, is a sign of the anger and outrage that is felt about the amount of time that has been allocated. It is in the Government’s hands to bring this particular debate to an end by saying that they will go away and think again. I hope that the Minister will do so.”
“I agree with my hon. Friend. People look to the House of Commons to speak for them and they look to us as Members to represent their views. They want us to consider in appropriate depth and with adequate care the proposals that come before us. The number of people who are concerned about what we will be asked to consider tomorrow should find expression in the number of voices that are heard in this Chamber. We will be denied that opportunity because of the inadequacy of the time that is being offered.”
“It is. If such an approach is good enough for Liberal Democrats in private, it ought to be good enough for the House of Commons in public. We are the voice of the nation.”
“It certainly does. As my hon. Friend says, there is a serious issue here. If the public do not think that we have properly considered the matter, it will not build their trust and confidence in Parliament, and it certainly will not build their trust and confidence in the Government—it will damage it.”
“The Deputy Prime Minister will have to explain his imperfections and I hope very much that he will participate in tomorrow’s debate, because many hon. Members will want to intervene on him.”
“Indeed. Given the number of things that the Deputy Prime Minister has had to say about the tuition fee increase that he intends to vote for tomorrow, the very least he could do is to come into the debate. I hope that he might be able to participate, because many people would like to hear how he explains the change in attitude—the 180° turn—that he has performed in a very short space of time.”
“It is clearly not sufficient time to debate those matters, which brings me to the second reason why more time needs to be found, which is the nature of the change that the Government wish to make. The proposals on fees that we are being asked to consider tomorrow cannot really be seen in isolation from the wider Browne proposals or the Government’s spending review. The truth is that they are intimately bound up, one with another, which is why the House needs proper time to consider both. As we know, the huge fee increase is a result of the Government’s decision in the spending review to impose on universities not the average cut that they have been applying—a cut of 11%—but an unprecedented 80% reduction in university teaching budgets.”