argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2018-06-12
Topic: Other
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): I am very grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his point of order and for the courtesy with which he raised it. What I want to say succinctly to him, and for the benefit of the House and others interested in our proceedings, is that there are matters that admit of discretion and matters that do not. Where there is discretion that can be exercised by the Chair—I say this in no spirit of self-advertisement and am simply trying to put the fact on the record—my instinct, as I have said to a number of colleagues in conversation today, has always been to allow more debate and more votes. If there is a desire for an urgent question and I think it is urgent, I grant it. I have done that on hundreds of occasions during the past nine years. That will please some people and displease others, but I am trying to do the right thing by the House of Commons I hope that the hon. Gentleman will understand—I know Ministers will—when I say that the Standing Orders are not accidental. This is not an inadvertent omission or construction of words on the part of those who drafted the Standing Orders. The Standing Orders are as they are for a reason, which is that they were drawn up for a purpose and they have been accepted by the House, and they do not admit of any discretion on my part. If I had discretion, no doubt I would exercise it, but I do not. I entirely understand what the hon. Gentleman is telling me, but my advice to him and to others who are similarly concerned—this is a general piece of advice, not specifically in relation to this Bill—is that if they feel strongly that there is an aspect of our procedures that should be handled differently, it is a good idea to address such matters in what I would call "peacetime", rather than simply raising them in "wartime". I have never known any Member previously raise this matter with me by way of complaint. Members are now complaining—I am not complaining that they are complaining, as they have every right to complain if they so wish—because it affects them here and now, or it affects the point they want to make, the subject they want to broach or the amendment they want to put to the vote. I have to work on the basis of the Standing Orders as they exist, and that is what I have done. I am not insensitive to the wider point that the hon. Gentleman has made.
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2018-06-12
Topic: Other
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): I am alert to the danger of a repetition, as articulated by the hon. Lady. I think the answer is that it is up to the House to determine the programme motion. If the programme motion is considered unsuitable and unlikely to facilitate the nature and extent of the debate that the hon. Lady and her colleagues want, they know what their recourse is. They must seek to persuade a majority of the House to reject such a programme motion I have looked very closely at the amendability of such motions, and I know that an amendment was tabled. The Standing Order specifies that the Question on the programme motion should be put forthwith. As the hon. Lady knows, I regularly select amendments in debates that are voted upon, including on legislation, and while amendments to the programme motion are not prohibited—they can be tabled—there is no means by which they can be voted upon, as I interpret the Standing Order. It is therefore up to Members, if they do not like the programme motion, to defeat it. I am sorry if that does not satisfy the hon. Lady. I am not insensitive to this issue, but that is the factual position. Some Members may not like Standing Orders, but I owe it, in fairness to those who drew them up, to say that there is no constitutional or procedural impropriety in what has happened today. There may be other grounds for objection, but there is no procedural impropriety. The Minister, in addressing the matters as he did, allegedly for 19 minutes, was entirely within his rights to do so and, to be fair, he did take quite a lot of interventions in that period.
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2018-06-12
Topic: Other
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): I do not have a photographic recall of the Standing Orders, but I am sorry to tell the hon. Gentleman that the word "debate" does not feature especially prominently in them. Ordinarily, one would of course interpret the word "debate" as meaning the exchange of opinions, and there was some exchange of opinions. I have known the right hon. Member for Aylesbury (Mr Lidington) for over 30 years. We knew each other before either of us came into this House and we have known each other for over 20 years in this House, including for the last 21 years as next-door neighbours, he in Aylesbury and I in Buckinghamshire. He is a most courteous fellow, and he did take a lot of interventions in his speech. Was it a debate in the sense that there was more than one speech? No, but if the hon. Member for Airdrie and Shotts (Neil Gray) is suggesting that the powers of the Speaker should be extended to allow him to adjudicate on these matters, heralding a panoply of new Standing Orders that would invest the Speaker with some sort of imperial power, I fear that he may find that this would not be altogether popular in the House. I would live with it—it would be a considerable burden, but I would do so with as much stoicism and fortitude as I could muster—but I rather doubt that the hon. Gentleman would persuade the House of the merits of such a proposition.
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2018-06-12
Topic: Other
Simon James Hoare (Conservative, Centre-right): On a point of order, Mr Speaker. It is clear, I think, from this afternoon’s proceedings that there is a feeling, shared, I suggest, on both sides of the House, that the Opposition have used the opportunity to call Divisions to act as a fig leaf to hide some of their embarrassment over this debate about devolution. Although I would probably have disagreed with many of the arguments deployed by SNP Members, they certainly have a right to be able to articulate them in this place Mr Speaker, accepting entirely your ruling that we are all bound by the rules of procedure and our Standing Orders, what scope, if any, exists—and, if it does exist, what avenues do Members have to promote this—to invite the Procedure Committee to consider that, on such a debate with multiple Divisions, the time taken by Divisions should not be included within the three-hour segment of debate, almost like the extra minute that we get when we give way to somebody when we are under a time limit? It would require a proper hearing by the Procedure Committee, but that might be one way to address what is clearly a very thorny issue.
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2018-06-12
Topic: Other
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): I am very grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his point of order. It would be perfectly possible for a programme motion to allow for such injury time caused by Divisions, but it is not for the Speaker to stipulate that it should. However, it could. Moreover, these matters could indeed be considered by the Procedure Committee, of which the hon. Gentleman was a distinguished ornament and of which, for all I know, he may still be a member.
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2018-06-12
Topic: Other
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): Ah, he advises me that he is no longer a member of that Committee. I am sure that the Committee will feel considerably impoverished by his departure from it, but will do its best to cope in the circumstances. It is an unenviable scenario for the Committee, but I hope that it will manage.
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2018-06-12
Topic: Other
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): Order. I do not mean to be unkind to the hon. Gentleman, who is an absolutely indefatigable Member of this House and an almost permanent presence in the Chamber, but the second part of his observations was pure politics. That is not a novel phenomenon in the House of Commons, but I am afraid that it was not even dressed up as a point of order. I think that we will have to leave it there.
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2018-06-12
Topic: Other
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): I will hear other Members if they insist, but the hour is late, so I would ask colleagues to show some sensitivity to the need to move on to the Adjournment debate. If people want to be heard, I will hear them briefly.
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2018-06-12
Topic: Other
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): Procedural change could prevent it. That is putting it very simply. The hon. Lady will probably be aware that I have heard representations privately from her leader and her Chief Whip, and in days to come, if she and her colleagues wish to take opportunities to air these matters further, it should not be beyond their ingenuity and sagacity to find such opportunities. If there is a desire for such opportunities, the Chair is not an obstacle; the Chair is a facilitator.
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2018-06-12
Topic: Other
John Robert Lamont (Conservative, Centre-right): On a point of order, Mr Speaker. Given that the effect of the vote on the last group of amendments was to create an even more powerful Scottish Parliament, which Scottish Nationalist party Members have voted against, what procedural changes will be made in this House to reflect those changes across the United Kingdom?
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2018-06-12
Topic: Other
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): Off the top of my head, I do not have the foggiest idea. I do not know. The reason, however, why I do not feel very guilty in responding in such terms to the hon. Gentleman is that although it is always a pleasure to listen to him, and his intervention was enjoyable, it did suffer from the material disadvantage that whatever else it was, it was not a point of order.
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2018-06-12
Topic: Other
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): If Lords amendment 26 had been defeated, the effect would have been to restore to the Bill subsections (1) to (3), which that amendment omitted. But that is all hypothetical, and I would not want to go any further for fear of causing confusion, not least as there were proposals from all sides, as people will not be surprised to hear, for amendments to amendments.
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2018-06-12
Topic: Other
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): I hear what the hon. Lady has said. I hope that she will not take offence if I say that that point is not new. That is not an indictment of it. There are not that many new points made in this House. Repetition in the House of Commons is not a novel phenomenon. This is a matter for consideration by the Procedure Committee. I have expressed views myself in the past on the matter of electronic voting, but I have always done so taking care to make the point that the question of the means by which we vote in this place is a matter for the House of Commons. It is certainly something that can be strongly argued by the hon. Lady. I myself can see many arguments in favour of electronic voting, but it is not a matter for me—it is a matter for the House. She has made her own point in her own way, and it is on the record.
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2018-06-12
Topic: Other
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): The hon. Gentleman has achieved his own salvation. He has put that on the record, and he can circulate it to media outlets in his constituency and elsewhere. Moreover, if he continues to be the eager beaver that he has always been thus far in his membership of the House, I dare say he will beetle into the Chamber for business questions on Thursday morning and leap to his feet to seek a debate or a governmental statement on that very matter. He is many things, but he is not lacking indefatigability, and he is not knowingly understated.
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2018-06-12
Topic: Other
Douglas Gordon Ross (Conservative, Centre-right): The hon. Member for Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey (Drew Hendry) has just informed the House that all 35 SNP Members wanted to speak in the debate and were aware that there were 90 minutes available. What kind of debate do you think we would have procedurally if each Member had 30 seconds to speak, as the SNP was trying to impose on us?
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2018-06-12
Topic: Other
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): I believed that to be so. I am not sure that I can presume to judge what assessment people around the world will make of this matter. I rather suspect that it will not be a unanimous judgment. In my experience, it is a very common tendency—one that no doubt I share myself—to assume that views that we hold are views that most sensible people also hold. That may be so, and it may not be so. There may be people who think that these arrangements are deeply reprehensible and other people who are rather more relaxed about them I understand what the hon. Lady says—that any attempt to reform procedures would come after these events. I was just gently making the point, to go back to what the hon. Member for Perth and North Perthshire (Pete Wishart) was saying in reference to Royal Assent, that this Bill is unfinished business, and if it still has further consideration in this House, which remains to be seen, it may be that there will be a programme motion that will bring a smile to her face. I am not volunteering that with especial confidence, but it is possible.
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2018-06-12
Topic: Other
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): I think the hon. Gentleman has just done so. I do not wish to be discourteous, but I have been in the Chair, and it is an enormous honour to have been in the Chair, without interruption, since 11.30 this morning—I have now been in the Chair for eight and a half hours, and it is my great privilege to be here and to sit through these debates and, for however long it takes, through all the points of order—but I genuinely do not think there is anything in what he said, with his usual eloquence, that requires a response from me. Forgive me, but I think he has said what he said, and I respect that.
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2018-06-12
Topic: Other
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): I am grateful to the hon. Lady. It is open to Ministers to come to the House and make a statement. The hon. Lady is an experienced Member of the House, and she will know that Ministers tend to preface the delivery of an oral statement with the courteous words, "With permission, Mr Speaker," but it is in fact a prerogative of a Minister to come to the House and make an oral statement if he or she so wishes. I am sure that the point that the hon. Lady has made will be heard by the Cabinet Ministers to whom she referred, and it is open to them to do so tomorrow. Alternatively, it is open to Members to seek to procure their presence Equally, it is open to Members to air these matters at business questions on Thursday, if they so wish. If Members of different political parties, or of several political parties, want to air their discontent—to some extent, they have done so tonight, but they might wish to do so in a more formal way to try to influence a subsequent programme motion—it is absolutely open to them to do so, and it will then be for the House to decide how it wishes to proceed.
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2018-06-12
Topic: Other
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): The hon. Lady is seeking an opinion from me about support for the Government’s position or opposition to it, and I genuinely do not think it is proper for the Speaker to offer such an opinion. I have been quick to say that no procedural impropriety has occurred. I was completely sensitive to that before this array or flurry of points of order, but 43 minutes in, I am even more familiar with the extent of the irritation on this subject. I am not knocking it, but trying to be fair, as the Chair should be. No procedural impropriety has taken place I entirely understand the hon. Lady’s anger and that of the leader of her party, her Chief Whip and other Members. They have not stayed for the benefit of their health, but because they wish to make a point with force, and they have done so. I hope they will agree that I have been patient, as I should be, in listening to them doing so. As to whether things change in the days to come, wait to see, and bear in mind that Members can use the mechanisms open to them, as the leader of her party knows, to try to register a view more fully and to elicit a ministerial response.
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2018-06-12
Topic: Other
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): It is not for me to support the programme motion or oppose it, which in a sense is what I am being invited to do. I certainly would not accuse any Member of wasting time by having a vote. I would not do that. It is for Members to judge when they want a Division. The hon. Lady is right that there are a very large number of amendments on the paper and that there have been rather fewer votes. Her point is clearly registered. As to whether things should be done differently, that is another matter. It is a simple fact that there was not a lot of time today for all the issues to be aired in the way that Members wanted and for anything like the number of Members who wished to speak to have had the chance to do so. That is a matter of regret to a great many Members, and if it is a matter of sufficient regret to them that they wish to try to bring about a change next time, they must make their preparations sooner rather than later.
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2018-06-12
Topic: Other
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): I briefly studied comparative politics at the University of Essex a little over 30 years ago, but I did not study these particular matters. Of course, I could not possibly have studied matters relating to the Scottish Parliament for the simple reason that it did not exist at the time at which I was undertaking my undergraduate exertions. These matters will come to be considered in the days ahead, and there will be opportunities for Members to keep raising these issues. Whether a statement is offered or not is not a matter for me, but it is open to Members to seek to put questions of an urgent character if they see fit. There are many opportunities for that, and if matters are thought to be not just of urgency but of emergency, there is a procedure available for that purpose as well. The Speaker is not an obstacle. The Speaker seeks, as appropriate—I have to reserve the right to judge each case—to be a facilitator.
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2018-06-12
Topic: Other
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): I understand the hon. Gentleman’s point. He and I have had an exchange of letters about the University of Essex—I think we are both immensely proud of our link with the University of Essex—and I hope he will not be offended if I say that his point of order had a kind of university essay quality about it. I felt that he was reverting to academic practice. I do not think that it is for me to attempt to compare and contrast the respective merits of the two Houses’ consideration of matters. The House of Lords operates on a different basis. We have procedures that have been adopted here that do not apply there. The other place must go about matters in the way it thinks fit. My concern is simply to try to do the right thing by the House. I will continue at all times to do so, wanting the maximum number of Back-Bench Members to have the chance to contribute to important debates that affect their constituents, present and future I think we come to what I hope—I do not mean this unkindly—is the last point of order.
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2018-06-12
Topic: Other
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): Well, that is very kind of the hon. Gentleman. I will let him into a secret: I was advised on a previous occasion by the good doctor, the hon. Member for Central Ayrshire (Dr Whitford), that it is not good for one’s health to sit in the Chair for very, very extended periods, as I did at the start of December 2015. The reason I do not think the hon. Gentleman should worry too much is that that was a genuinely long session for the Syria debate. I was in the Chair without interruption for 11 hours and 24 minutes; it was a very great privilege. Today, I have not notched up even nine hours yet, so I do not think the hon. Gentleman needs worry too much. [Interruption.] The Chairman of Ways and Means says that he could help. I am already 22 minutes late for a dinner engagement; that does not matter—the House is more important. I take all good wishes in the spirit with which they are volunteered. All I can say is that having spent as long in the Chair as I have, I probably ought to go for decent length’s swim in the morning, as I did this morning I understand people’s upset and irritation, but I thank them for the courtesy with which they have raised their points. We are now coming to the Adjournment debate. The House will probably be very relieved to know that it will be rid of me for tonight and that it will luxuriate in the lather of having its proceedings chaired by the Chairman of Ways and Means.
West Anglia College — House of Commons, 2018-11-12
Topic: Mixed Topics
Questions: What discussions he has had with West Anglia College on his Department’s document “Investigation Report: the College of West Anglia”, published in August 2018.
Anne Frances Milton (Conservative, Centre-right): The hon. Gentleman’s term "shambles" is not inappropriate. This has been a shocking case, and it is from such cases that we learn lessons to make sure that it does not happen again. He talks about paying the money back, and I am sure the ESFA is looking at all possible options to make sure that his constituents are well served.
Apprenticeships — House of Commons, 2018-11-12
Topic: Other
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): I call Rachel Maclean. [Interruption.] Beetle in, beetle in. It is very good of the hon. Lady to drop in on us. I hope she was advised of the grouping by the Government—I am sure she was. I hope she is now ready, as I have given her a bit of injury time.
Apprenticeships — House of Commons, 2018-11-12
Topic: Mixed Topics
Anne Frances Milton (Conservative, Centre-right): Yes, I can. The right hon. Gentleman perhaps ought to know that I have continued contact with my fellow Ministers in the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, because this issue is important. We are not being rigid. There are ways around this, and I had a recent meeting to discuss exactly this point. It is important for the industry to get together and talk to the Institute for Apprenticeships, because there are ways around this.
Social Mobility — House of Commons, 2018-11-12
Topic: Other
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): There is an enormous amount of rather noisy chuntering from a sedentary position, principally emanating from a senior statesman in the House—namely the hon. Member for Huddersfield (Mr Sheerman). His colleague the hon. Member for Manchester Central (Lucy Powell) is trying to encourage him in good behaviour; I urge her to redouble her efforts, as she has some way to travel.