Alberto Costa
MP for South Leicestershire · Conservative · United Kingdom
“Sue Mitchell confirmed with me only a few hours ago that the Home Office has not engaged with her or her team, post broadcast, about the evidence that they gathered during their painstaking and thorough investigation.”
“I hope the whole House can agree—surely it can—that public confidence in our immigration system depends on the principle that those who seek to undermine our borders, exploit vulnerable migrants or, worse still, profit from illegal migration are identified, apprehended and removed wherever possible.”
“Twana Jamal was exposed as an illegal asylum seeker apparently working in my constituency in Blaby—and worse still, in a mini-mart right next door to my constituency office.”
“Why was the effectiveness of the high streets organised crime unit completely lacking when, two weeks ago, BBC journalist Sue Mitchell and her excellent team exposed the case of Mr Twana Jamal working in such a high street business right next door to my constituency office?”
“We have talked about large and small businesses being affected, but my constituent Joe, who is a sales director in an SME likely to be affected, is deeply concerned about his livelihood.”
“On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. I would like to apologise to the House for failing to declare an interest during a debate on 16 July 2025 about the Committee on Standards’ third report of the 2024-25 Session, which concerns the Register of Interests of Members’ Staff.”
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“Why was the effectiveness of the high streets organised crime unit completely lacking when, two weeks ago, BBC journalist Sue Mitchell and her excellent team exposed the case of Mr Twana Jamal working in such a high street business right next door to my constituency office? Why has neither the Home Secretary nor any of her Ministers had the courtesy to respond to my correspondence asking for an urgent meeting on this nationally significant case involving a convicted human trafficker?”
“Can the Minister assure all of us that convicted human traffickers will not be allowed into the United Kingdom, let alone allowed to apply for asylum?”
“Sue Mitchell confirmed with me only a few hours ago that the Home Office has not engaged with her or her team, post broadcast, about the evidence that they gathered during their painstaking and thorough investigation. I am grateful to the Home Secretary for confirming earlier today that she will seek to ascertain why civil servants have not responded, or done me the courtesy, as the local MP, of giving me an update on what the Home Office is doing, and I hope that the Minister will ensure that that is taken forward. What we all want to know today, and what I would be grateful to hear from the Minister, is whether the Bill will militate against a case like that of Mr Jamal’s arising again, if it is passed into law.”
“Twana Jamal was exposed as an illegal asylum seeker apparently working in my constituency in Blaby—and worse still, in a mini-mart right next door to my constituency office. According to reporting by Sue Mitchell and the BBC, Mr Jamal is a convicted people smuggler who was sentenced to five years’ imprisonment in France after being identified by French authorities as a major organiser of illegal migration operations. The BBC subsequently traced him to my South Leicestershire constituency, where he was allegedly working while also claiming asylum in the United Kingdom. The allegations reported by the BBC are extremely serious.”
“I hope the whole House can agree—surely it can—that public confidence in our immigration system depends on the principle that those who seek to undermine our borders, exploit vulnerable migrants or, worse still, profit from illegal migration are identified, apprehended and removed wherever possible. All our constituents expect robust border security, effective immigration enforcement, and a system that distinguishes between genuine asylum seekers and those who seek to abuse the rules. It is against that backdrop that I wish to raise the deeply troubling case of Twana Jamal, who was recently exposed by journalist Sue Mitchell and her team through a BBC investigation, which was broadcast only a week or so ago.”
“We have talked about large and small businesses being affected, but my constituent Joe, who is a sales director in an SME likely to be affected, is deeply concerned about his livelihood. I have a very simple question for the Minister: if he is taking on board industry feedback, will he publish detailed information on safeguard quota allocations and anticipated utilisation rates before those measures come into place on 1 July?”
“On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. I would like to apologise to the House for failing to declare an interest during a debate on 16 July 2025 about the Committee on Standards’ third report of the 2024-25 Session, which concerns the Register of Interests of Members’ Staff. During the debate, I inadvertently failed to declare a relevant interest: I employ my wife, who is subject to the rules about the Register of Interests of Members’ Staff. This was in breach of the House’s rules and I apologise to the House for this error.”
“Putting aside for a moment the rights and wrongs of the Prime Minister’s decision on Saturday morning, the BBC is in a unique position: running BBC Persian language broadcasting into Iran. Given that and given President Trump’s wishes for the Iranian people themselves to take control, will the Prime Minister put on the record whether he will work with the BBC over the coming days to ensure that there is more Government funding, wherever necessary, to broadcast what is required to the Iranian people?”
“Friend the Member for Harborough, Oadby and Wigston (Neil O’Brien) at the Dispatch Box, it would really behove the Minister to stop doing that, and just to ensure going forward that the Labour Government act with the same standards of conduct that they demanded of my party in government? Also, given the Minister’s statement, might he request that the Prime Minister attend a meeting with the Committee on Standards to outline exactly how, moving forward, the Prime Minister will uphold the highest of standards?”
“I never comment on any conduct or standards issues that may impact individual MPs, precisely because of my adjudicatory role on the Committee on Standards, and I do not propose to refer to the Prime Minister in respect of the potential that, if not all the documents are disclosed to the House, there might be a breach of privilege. However, let me say this gently: the Minister constantly refers to the past, and to my party’s role in government with regard to breaches of standards issues. From this moment on, will he accept that, given the litany of issues that have befallen the Labour Government, as outlined by my hon.”
“There is an interesting potential conflict here, because Leicestershire county council is, rather unusually, the promoter of that housing development, as well as being the minerals authority tasked with approving the proposed quarry on the doorstep of its own proposed development.”
“I have had regular meetings with residents and the Misterton and Walcote residents group to examine the proposals for the mega sand and gravel quarry. I am pleased to say that some of those residents are here today. Three main concerns have emerged: the first is the scale of the proposed development, which covers 74 hectares—the equivalent of 104 full-sized football pitches—and will extract 400,000 tonnes of sand and gravel a year for at least 20 years. It has caused understandable concern over dust, noise and the movement of heavy goods vehicles, especially given that the site is directly opposite a proposed flagship housing development.”
“In 2022, a new proposal from Tarmac was floated for a mega-quarry in the hamlet of Misterton, which will have a huge impact on residents in Lutterworth, as well as the villages of Walcote, Cotesbach, Kimcote and Kilworth—to name just a few. In engaging with that proposal, I have come to understand just how outdated, inconsistent and, in some places, inadequate the planning guidance for quarry operations has become. Nowhere is that clearer than the guidance on air quality. The documents that local authorities are expected to follow do not reflect comparable environmental standards in developed countries, the latest science or the reasonable expectations that residents like mine hold about their air that they and their children breathe.”
“I beg to move, That this House has considered planning policy for quarries. It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Dr Murrison. I am grateful for the opportunity to bring the issue of planning policy for quarries to Westminster Hall today. I thank the Backbench Business Committee for granting this important debate. I would like to declare at the very outset that, like many hundreds of my constituents, I will be impacted by the development that I am going to refer to. My South Leicestershire constituency has been home not just to me and many hundreds of my constituents, but to many quarries throughout the years.”
“The guidance is also far too subjective, offering scope for varied interpretations and approaches. We now know that PM 2.5 particles—those fine particulates that penetrate deep into the lungs—can travel much farther than previously assumed. The use of a 250-metre screening threshold, still applied in the current guidance, significantly underestimates risks, because it treats those dangerous particles as behaving in the same way as nuisance dust. Evidence from recent legal cases, including the Corby litigation, which was depicted in the Netflix hit series “Toxic Town”—I encourage listeners and viewers to watch that—has shown that those particulates can travel well beyond 250 metres, exposing far more people to harm than our assessments currently acknowledge.”
“The IAQM guidance to which I am referring is used by developers and planning authorities to assess air quality impacts, particularly in relation to fine particulate matter such as PM 10 and PM 2.5 . I welcome the fact that it is under review, but I wonder: had the residents group not informed my team, and had my team and I not written to the IAQM to raise the concerns of South Leicestershire residents, would the review be under way now? The 2016 primary guidance documents from the IAQM, which are now under review, are used by the industry, and I understand that overall it is very good guidance, but in key areas it is behind current scientific understanding of the risks of respirable dust particle behaviour and the Government’s own commitments under the 2021 Act and the clean air strategy 2019.”
“The Government’s own interim planning guidance on PM 2.5 , published by DEFRA in October 2024, already encourages local authorities to take the 2028 interim and 2040 targets—10 micrograms per cubic metre annual mean—into account in planning decisions. Dr Murrison, I promised you that this speech would be full of technical details, and I hope that I am not letting you down. Given the legally binding obligations under the Environment Act 2021 and Environmental Targets (Fine Particulate Matter) (England) Regulations (2023), can the Minister confirm, either today or by follow-up letter, how planning authorities should apply the most up-to-date scientific evidence and statutory air quality objectives when assessing quarry applications, especially given that the relevant IAQM guidance is under review, as I have just outlined?”
“That note says: “The 2016 IAQM Guidance on the Assessment of Mineral Dust Impacts for Planning is now nine years old and as such there are some elements of the document that are dated”. I repeat: “there are some elements of the document that are dated”— this is the document being used— “and the focus of assessment is changing. A full review is being carried out by an IAQM Working Group established specifically with regards to this guidance.” Is the Minister’s Department liaising with the IAQM to ascertain when the review will be completed and a report published? With the guidance now formally under review, developers and planning authorities need clarity on the interim approach, such as the one faced by the residents in my constituency.”
“The document sets the industry standard for how dust, particulates and emissions must be modelled or evaluated when a quarry is proposed. Last year, I wrote to the IAQM, raising concerns shared by my constituents, such as whether the IAQM guidance adequately distinguishes between nuisance dust and finer, more harmful PM 10 and PM 2.5 particles; whether the 250-metre screening criterion remains appropriate for fine particulates, given the emerging evidence showing that those dangerous particles can travel considerably further; and how well it aligns with forthcoming legal PM 2.5 targets, with which the Minister will no doubt be familiar. The IAQM has since contacted me and put a note on its website to say that the guidance on assessment of mineral dust for planning is now under review.”
“Although the IAQM is a respected professional body that works closely with regulators, it is important to recognise that it is a membership organisation and, therefore, potentially vulnerable. For example, its members may also have commercial interests in consultancy firms that deliver air quality services to clients seeking planning consent, such as Tarmac. The most relevant document used as guidance for developers and local authorities is the IAQM’s 2016 “Guidance on the assessment of mineral dust impacts for planning”. It is fundamentally used as the de facto industry standard by all who work in the industry, including developers, consultants and local authorities, but that guidance is now nearly a decade old.”
“Even Tarmac’s own consultants—Vibrock—reported significantly higher background levels than those quoted by the county council. Does the Minister agree that, to ensure evidence-led decision making, it is imperative that baseline data should be up to date and, if more recent local data exists, it should be used? Does she consider that, where a proposed major industrial development has the potential to increase community exposure to PM 2.5 , a mandatory period of local monitoring should be undertaken to establish a reliable baseline before permission is considered? The main guidance that developers and local authorities rely on comes from the Institute of Air Quality Management.”
“If the Minister is unable to answer any of the questions I put to her today, I would be grateful if she would answer in writing, not least because the residents association would be most grateful. On air quality, I have a specific concern about the regulation 25 notice issued by Leicestershire county council to Tarmac. Forgive me, Dr Murrison, for the highly technical nature of some of my speech. That relies on the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs 2021 background model, which produces artificially low PM 2.5 figures that no longer reflect the current conditions on the ground. We now have local post-pandemic monitoring data from Harborough district council, showing that background PM 2.5 levels in rural areas close to Misterton are already at or above the Government’s future legal target.”
“Because virtually every qualified planner we approached—and there were a great deal—cited potential conflicts of interest with Tarmac. In fact, Tarmac is such a big beast of industry that it took nearly a year to find a planner willing to produce and put their name to an impartial report reviewing Tarmac’s Misterton quarry application. I am concerned that ordinary groups of residents who want to hire a specialist barely stand a chance because of Tarmac’s influence on the industry. Does the Minister share my concern that local communities often struggle to access independent, impartial technical advice, particularly where the applicant is a large and influential company in the industry?”
“As the hon. Lady will hear in the remaining parts of my speech, I entirely concur with her comments. Given that the proposed quarry site is not allocated in Leicestershire county council’s minerals plan, which runs until 2031, we can understand why a group such as the concerned residents present today would try to seek the advice of a professional minerals planner to review the proposals, consider the data and write a report that the residents group could use as the basis for their representations to Leicestershire county council, as the appropriate local planning authority, on Tarmac’s proposal. What surprised me, as their Member of Parliament, was that it was nearly impossible to help them find someone in the industry willing to produce a report that the residents association could use. Why?”
“Does the Minister agree that environmental protection, worker safety and public health will benefit if we treat quarrying operations as the major industrial undertakings that they are? Finally, I hope the Minister will agree that targeted reforms, the clarifying of interim assessment standards and the modernising of safety regulations will deliver better outcomes for the industry, for workers and, most importantly, for all our constituents, wherever they may be.”
“Quarries present many of the same hazards as large construction sites, including airborne dust, heavy plant machinery, vehicle movements and complex site operations, but under the current framework there is no consistent requirement for structured design or risk assessments, no formalised application of the “as low as reasonably practicable” principle, and no robust mechanism for protecting the public from involuntary risk. Incorporating operations into the CDM framework could deliver more rigorous and consistent risk assessments, clearly documented mitigation strategies, legal accountability for duty holders and, crucially, better protection both for workers and for the surrounding public.”
“Would it not make sense for quarry operations to be brought under the Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 2015, for which the Minister has ministerial responsibility? She knows that the CDM regulations are not just best practice but required under the 2015 statutory instrument, which requires comprehensive risk assessments, formal hazard identification and clearly defined duties of care for all parties involved. Those measures are now standard practice across the construction industry.”
“Accordingly, I would be grateful if the Minister could confirm, either today or by follow-up letter, whether she believes it is right for professional bodies like the IAQM to set air-quality guidance for quarries, as opposed to the relevant statutory public bodies, given the possibility of a conflict of interest between public health goals and financial gain. Does the Minister agree that we need to ensure that the guidance that underpins air-quality assessments is independently reviewed, regularly updated and aligned with statutory obligations on air quality and public health? In addition, the regulatory framework for quarry safety could be strengthened. The Quarries Regulations 1999 focused primarily on workplace safety, but do not require the same structured pre-emptive risk management that is now standard in other high-risk sectors.”
“That is a legally binding obligation, and rightly so, but we will not meet it if the standards we use to assess air quality for quarries are not up to date with the latest scientific evidence. If we keep relying on outdated guidance, we will keep underestimating the risks to public health, particularly for children, older people and those with respiratory conditions who live near quarry sites. Furthermore, when key guidance is issued by professional bodies rather than statutory authorities, it is far harder for us as lawmakers, and for the public, to scrutinise and challenge their work. That can lead to accountability issues. At the same time, the reliance on organisations such as the IAQM places a significant burden on them, and they may lack the resources or mandate to keep up with changing scientific and legal requirements.”
“I absolutely agree, and I sympathise entirely with the hon. Lady. I would go further. I made the point earlier about finding suitable experts who are able to apply their technical expertise to help campaign groups or MPs to rebut planning applications on a technical basis. They are simply not there, for fear of a conflict of interest given their commercial interests with large-scale developers. The hon. Lady makes an important point and has put it on the record. The UK has committed, through regulation 4 of the Environmental Targets (Fine Particulate Matter) (England) Regulations 2023, to achieving an annual mean concentration of 10 micrograms of PM 2.5 per cubic metre by 2040, with an interim target for 2028.”
“I also thank Lord Bach of Lutterworth for his strong support. I am grateful that the Minister said she will respond to the technical issues I raised; I will send her a letter shortly. We all want to ensure that vital mineral extraction proceeds responsibly. I am grateful to all MPs who have spoken on behalf of their constituents. Local communities must have confidence in the process and confidence that public health is firmly at the heart of planning decisions, while allowing for the building of infrastructure, with the necessary mineral extractions that entails. Question put and agreed to. Resolved, That this House has considered planning policy for quarries.”
“To conclude, there is no doubt that quarrying plays an extremely important role in delivering the homes, roads and infrastructure that our country needs, as the Minister has said and I acknowledge. That cannot and must not, however, come at the expense of the health of the people of our country. The residents of Misterton, Walcote, Lutterworth and the surrounding villages, as well as all our constituents, are asking us to pay attention to the latest science and heed the lessons of the past, particularly on air quality. I am grateful to the residents who travelled here today: Liz and Nick Marsh, Paul Mann, and to those who have taken part in the Misterton with Walcote residents group, including Adrian Lott, Graham Jordan, Paulette Murrell, Mark Denton and Richard Nunn, among others unable to be here.”
“I end with the comment made by the former Minister, my right hon. Friend the Member for Melton and Syston: “There is no limit to the number of applications for reconsideration which made be made.” That is the mischief—but, if the Government are serious on this, they can attend to that mischief and rectify it.”
“That is why I ask the Minister whether he agrees that the reconsideration mechanism should be limited to one application per parole decision, which would still allow a prisoner to apply to reconsider a decision, and would in no way detract from that prisoner’s having the right to issue an application for judicial review if the decision was generally irrational or unlawful. We must remember that the reconsideration mechanism is relatively new, and making this change would restore it to what it was always intended to be: a targeted safeguard against wrongful release, ensuring that the Secretary of State could respond to significant public pressure, as we witnessed with Worboys. It should not be, and was never intended to be, an open-ended appeal system for dangerous offenders.”
“Secondly, the changes introduced last year were made through secondary legislation, just as the reconsideration mechanism itself was created through secondary legislation in 2019. It follows that, if the Government seriously consider limiting the mechanism to one application per parole decision—and I very much hope the Minister will take it into account, given the high profile nature of this case and the cross-party involvement in my campaign to highlight the issue—that too could be achieved through secondary legislation without the need for primary legislation.”
“While I fully accept that there must be a route for prisoners to challenge genuinely flawed decisions, my view is that there must be a right to apply for just one reconsideration, whether by the prisoner or by the Secretary of State. I note that the Parole Board rules were updated last year to strengthen the system, for example by tightening the criteria for claiming a procedural error under rule 39. Those were welcome changes, and I would be grateful if the Minister could update the House on their impact. If he is unable to do so today, I invite him to write to me on that point. I will raise two related further points. First, those changes, while welcome, do not change the fact that a prisoner can still apply for the reconsideration of an already reconsidered decision, as Mr Pitchfork did in 2024 on the grounds of irrationality.”
“The Parole Board—rightly, in my opinion—decided recently that Colin Pitchfork is not safe to be released to the public at present, but my South Leicestershire constituents are now in the unpalatable position of waiting to see whether Mr Pitchfork will challenge the board’s latest provisional decision, made only on 27 October. Pitchfork has until this Thursday to do so; if he does, not only will it be one of the first cases in English history where a prisoner who has committed such offences has asked for reconsideration, but it will effectively mean that he is being given the opportunity through these rules to request that a reconsideration of an already reconsidered decision is once again reconsidered. That is a farce.”
“That is his right, but none of us expected that the reconsideration mechanism rule would be used for never-ending challenges by the prisoner, repeatedly calling for a Parole Board decision to be reconsidered until effectively they get the decision they want. That potentially never-ending process has created legal uncertainty in the parole system, delaying finality and causing ongoing distress to victims’ families and friends. The public understandably feel that justice is now always hanging in a fragile balance, where a murderous sexual predator can exploit a loophole in a way that was never intended by David Gauke or Sir Robert Buckland when the rules were first introduced.”
“He confirmed to me: “There is no limit to the number of applications for reconsideration which may be made.”— I repeat that statement; it is what the Minister said— “There is no limit to the number of applications for reconsideration which may be made.” He went on to state: “Consequently, there will be a final decision only where a provisional decision is not subject to an application for reconsideration (from either party) or where an application for reconsideration is made but then rejected by the Reconsideration Assessment Panel.” That is a problem, because there is no finality. Imagine the pain that my constituents and the victims’ family members have to go through when Colin Pitchfork, every couple of years, makes a bid for parole.”
“That is all they ask from the reconsideration rule and it is what they deserve. That is why I have raised concerns over many years about Colin Pitchfork, and over the last few years particularly about the reconsideration mechanism rule, with successive Ministers of different governing parties. Pitchfork has already once successfully used the mechanism to request reconsideration of an already reconsidered decision. After Pitchfork’s successful application for reconsideration last year, I wrote previously to my right hon. Friend the Member for Melton and Syston (Edward Argar), then the Minister responsible for justice and sentencing.”
“On its website, the Parole Board explains that its role is “to determine whether prisoners serving indeterminate sentences, and those serving certain determinate sentences for serious offences, continue to represent a significant risk to the public.” The Parole Board has an incredibly important role in protecting us all, and our constituents the public, from the most dangerous offenders in the criminal justice system. The public and victims’ families need to know that when the Parole Board makes a judgment, it is definitive. If the Parole Board’s work is disrupted by repeated or opportunistic applications for reconsideration, the public understandably lose trust in its ability to deliver timely and conclusive decisions. Victims, their families and the wider public want clarity and finality.”
“Before Colin Pitchfork was caught, he forcibly manipulated one of his colleagues into giving DNA evidence on his behalf, to deceive police into thinking that his DNA did not match that of the killer. Pitchfork was eventually caught and the case was of national significance for English criminal history, because it was the first in which the embryonic DNA fingerprinting technique was used. Pitchfork received life imprisonment for the two offences of murder, with a minimum term of 28 years, and concurrent terms for rapes and perverting the course of justice. That is just one of the high-profile cases in which a dangerous, violent sexual predator and murderer has served their sentence and the Parole Board has had the unenviable job of deciding whether that prisoner is safe to be released into the public.”
“One example is the high-profile, nationally renowned case that occurred in my South Leicestershire constituency involving one Colin Pitchfork, who brutally raped and murdered two young girls, Lynda Mann in 1983 and Dawn Ashworth in 1986. For those who did not live in South Leicestershire at that time, as I did not, it is impossible to comprehend the anguish and worry felt in the areas of Narborough, Enderby, Blaby and beyond between 1983 and the day when Pitchfork was caught in 1987. Those were four whole years when parents were terrified to let their daughters out of their sight, women were scared to walk home alone and suspicion was rife, while families and friends grieved for the lives of those two young women, who would be around my age today had their lives not been taken so early and so brutally.”
“The so-called reconsideration mechanism is effectively a form of internal review, giving the Secretary of State an element of authority over the Parole Board, without in any way compromising its independence, but merely to request that it review a potentially flawed decision. The right to apply for reconsideration was also extended to prisoners. It is now clear, however, that what was intended as a safeguard to prevent dangerous prisoners such as Worboys from being wrongly released while a Secretary of State watched from the sidelines is now being deployed by such prisoners to mount effectively limitless, cost-free internal appeals against decisions they do not like.”
“He had to wait powerlessly—those of us who were in the House will remember it—for the outcome of a separate third-party judicial review, which thankfully led to the quashing of that irrational Parole Board decision to release John Worboys. To avoid this happening again, that same Secretary of State for Justice, David Gauke, rightly considered and introduced the policy that became—I think under Sir Robert Buckland—the reconsideration mechanism in 2019. Those changes created a specific route, the reconsideration mechanism, that allows the Secretary of State to apply for an internal review of a Parole Board decision to release, on the grounds of either an error in law, irrationality or material procedural error—in other words, grounds similar to those for an application for judicial review.”
“I beg to move, That this House has considered the reconsideration mechanism and the Parole Board Rules 2019. It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Dr Murrison. In 2018, the Parole Board decided to release John Worboys, the so-called “black cab rapist” who drugged and raped women between the years 2000 and 2008. It is believed that he assaulted more than 100 innocent victims. That was the wrong decision, and the Parole Board clearly made an error in assessing the level of risk that Worboys posed to the community, and particularly to young women. At the time of that decision, the then Secretary of State for Justice had no means to ask for a review, because he would have had to apply for judicial review proceedings against a public body over which he had ministerial responsibility. His hands were therefore tied.”
“I also place on record my thanks not only to fellow members of the Privileges Committee—I see one or two in their place this evening—but to the Clerks of the Committee and the advisers who helped us to navigate what is a challenging constitutional point. To conclude, the Committee believes that the House should do all it can to help the Omagh bombing inquiry in its work. We wish the inquiry well as it continues to seek the truth behind the terrible events of 15 August 1998. We should always remember that truly dreadful human tragedies lie behind what we are doing this evening. I commend the motion to the House.”
“We have added to our report a recommendation that the Government remind Ministers and officials, when drawing up terms of reference for future similar inquiries or for public bodies, that more care might be taken when it comes to intruding on matters that fall within the exclusive cognisance of Parliament. That is not in any way intended to be a partisan point; the terms of reference for this inquiry were drawn up by the previous Government. We would wish all Governments to take more care in future to recognise the rights of the House of Commons. I hope that the Minister can provide some reassurance on that point.”
“I also thank the inquiry for the assurances it has given my Committee about how it will handle the material, and in particular what steps it will take to ensure that any national security concerns have been fully discussed with the security services before it shares the document or relies on it for its own conclusions. Those assurances may be found in the appendix to our report. Thus, given the assurances received from the inquiry and in the light of the overwhelming public interest in providing aid to an inquiry into the murder of so many people, I trust that the House will feel confident that my Committee has recommended an appropriate course of action.”
“The terms of reference drawn up by the then Government enabled the inquiry to consider the allegation made by the now retired police officer. The unreported transcript of his evidence was not, however, the property of that or any Government; it belongs to the House of Commons. As it is unreported, it has not been seen by current Members of the House, other than those who sit on the Committee of Privileges; nor will this motion make it available to the House of Commons. In short, in proposing that we provide the transcript to the inquiry, we are giving control of the transcript to that inquiry. This, so far as we are aware, is an unprecedented procedural step. However, I praise the inquiry for its careful, helpful and co-operative approach to the matters of parliamentary privilege raised by this step.”