15/04/2016 The Week in Parliament

Hello and welcome to the Week In Parliament.

When the row over the Panama Papers tax revelations got personal.

The publication of Prime Minister's tax information in this way is

unprecedented but it has the right thing to do. I am not sure that the

Prime Minister appreciates the anger that is out there over this

injustice. corridor as the chairman

of the Home Affairs Committee kicks I am going to excuse you from this

committee. And is it time for a rethink about

how MPs put forward their own bills? Some of the debates have been

embarrassing to be part of. the Parliamentary week was dominated

by the Panama Papers - leaked documents from the law

firm Mossack Fonseca, which revealed how rich and powerful

people hid their wealth offshore. The story landed in Downing Street

when it was discovered that an investment fund set up

by David Cameron's father had been There was no suggestion

that he or his father had But questions about whether

the Prime Minister had benefited dragged on until

finally David Cameron Mr Speaker, there have been deeply

hurtful, profoundly untrue allegations made against my father

and I want to, if the House will let This investment fund

was set up overseas in the first place because

it was going to be trading predominantly

in So like very many other

commercial investment funds it made sense to be set up

inside one of the main centres of Even a quick look shows

that the BBC, the Mirror Group, Guardian newspapers,

and to pick one council entirely at random, Islington,

all have these sorts of Since 2010 I have not

owned any shares or any The publication of a Prime

Minister's tax information in this way is unprecedented but I

think it is the right thing to do. May I thank the Prime Minister

for the advance sight of his It is absolutely

a masterclass in the art of What they have driven home,

Mr Speaker, is what many people There is now one rule

for the super rich and I'm honestly not sure,

Mr Speaker, that the Prime Minister fully appreciates the anger

that is out there over this How can it be right that

street cleaners, teaching assistants and nurses work

and pay their taxes yet some of at the top think the rules simply

don't apply We have to ask ourselves, all of us,

whether the scale of the problem has been taken seriously

because quite patently it has not been thus far, either

domesticically or internationally. One Conservative MP called on

critics to snap out of what he called synthetic indignation.

is that they hate anyone who

even has a hint of wealth in their lives.

May I support the Prime Minister in fending off those who

are attacking him, particularly in thinking of this place, because

we risk seeing the House of Commons which is stuffed full of low

achievers who hate enterprise, hate people who look after their own

family, and who know absolutely nothing about the outside world.

The row spilled over into Prime Minister's questions on Wednesday by

which time Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn had also published as tax

return. This tax return was

a metaphor for Labour It was late, it was chaotic,

it was inaccurate, it was uncosted. Mr Speaker, I am grateful

to the Prime Minister for drawing There, warts and all, the warts

being my handwriting, all being my I actually paid more

tax than some companies Last month the OBR

reported that HMRC doesn't have the necessary resources

to tackle offshore tax disclosures. The Government is committed

to taking ?400 million out of

HMRC's budget by 2020. Will he now commit to reversing that

cut so they can collect the tax that

will help to pay for the services? I'm afraid his figures rather

like his tax return, his figures are not

entirely accurate. In the summer budget

2015 we gave an extra fund additional work

to tackle tax evasion and noncompliance between

now This is going to enable HMRC

to recover a cumulative 7.2 billion in tax over

the next five years. David Cameron on tax

and tax collection. Now let's take a look at some

other news from around The campaign over our EU membership

is now officially under way. The Leave and Remain campaigns have

come out fighting ahead But in the Commons at the start

of the week there was anger over a pro EU leaflet sent out

by the Government to every The idea that this leaflet

simply has facts in it, when it says for example,

who now believes we except the fantasists

in the Foreign Office? Or that we will keep our own border

patrols when we have to admit almost any person who says

they are an EU citizen. not be part of further

integration, and I am quoting. The absurd proposition

that the Government of the day is not entitled to form an opinion

on policy on the role of the Government in the modern

world or is not allowed to communicate reasons

for having that policy to the The Government has promised

significant concessions over plans to make local authorities in England

sell off their high value housing The money, paid by councils

to Whitehall even before any sale is made, is to be used to compensate

housing associations for allowing their tenants

to buy their homes at a discount. Now ministers have agreed

that properties must be The concessions came in a week

when the Government suffered a series of defeats in the Lords

on the Housing Bill. Veteran Labour MP Dennis

Skinner was ordered out of the Commons chamber on Monday

after referring to the Prime The Speaker suggested Mr Skinner

rephrase his question. and when he refused

the Bolsover MP was ejected. Meanwhile on the committee

corridor the chair of the Home Affairs Committee,

Keith Vaz, was so angered by one witness that he was dismissed

from the session. Top Whitehall mandarin

Oliver Robbins was threatened with being held in contempt

and repeatedly criticised when he failed to answer questions

over the budget of UK Border Force. We are asking you specifically

on an issue that has been raised by this

committee with Sir Charles Does Sir Charles Montgomery

know what his budget is? It is either a yes or a no,

Mr Robbins. And if you don't answer the question

we might hold you in contempt. I intend to excuse you from this

committee because I think the evidence so far has

been unsatisfactory. ringing in his ears,

Mr Robbins left the hearing. There have been calls for the BBC

to speed up efforts to increase diversity among its on-air

and off-air workforce. The demand came from a Labour MP

who is clearly losing patience At the end of this month the BBC

will publish an equality and Yet another one is coming very

shortly and it's all going to be Another strategy to get

our teeth sunk into. If it is genuinely a universal

broadcaster we have to ask, it can no longer be

about skills training. MPs have been told they'll have

to wait a little longer for publication of the Chilcot

report into the Iraq war. It's due to be handed

to the Government for security But publication is not

expected until the summer. The fact is the report has been

pored over by many people for five We are not in the era

of hot lead typesetting. Somebody said to me this morning

that I might have summarised that rather long motion

rather more crisply by saying this House instructs Sir John Chilcot

simply to press send. A new high speed rail line

was proposed by Labour back in 2010. The bill to construct

the first phase, from London to the West Midlands,

has been slowly making its way The legislation has now arrived

in the Lords where a Government minister set out the now

familiar case for HS2. Patchwork and sticking

plasters will work for a period but are not

the This will not help us create

the capacity we need on the It will not improve our

country's connections. It will not maximise

the opportunities for our northern cities and cities

in Scotland to grow and prosper. The noble Lord has said he was proud

that HS2 had not demolished a single Well, ancient woodlands

are the grade one We cannot doubt that those who live

on or near the line face The Government has an important

responsibility, this is my main point, to continue to listen

to their concerns and to work with them and prove worthy

of their trust. I do wonder whether the second part

of this investment might be called in to say we can't complete

it beyond Birmingham. I am not aware, my Lords,

of a single country high-speed rail between its major

cities and now thinks that this was Parliament was on its Easter recess

when news broke of the crisis Tata Steel is selling

off its loss-making UK plants - A buyer has been found

for its Scunthorpe plant. But the future of the Port Talbot

plant in south Wales Business Secretary Sajid Javid

was criticised for being away In the Commons on Monday he told MPs

he was fighting every hour of I have been in contact

with potential buyers making clear that the government stands

ready to help. This includes looking

at the possibility of co-investing And we have appointed EY

as financial advisers Earlier I spoke to BBC Wales'

Parliamentary Correspondent David Cornock and asked if Westminster -

or the Welsh Assembly - was making I think there is a sense that the UK

Government was caught on the hop by the announcement by Tata Steel

last month that it was Mr Javid famously had to fly back

from Australia and has since been to Port Talbot,

the biggest steel works twice and then this week to MPs,

he talked more about what the UK He talked about co-investment,

was not entirely clear what that meant, but he did under pressure

from MPs suggest that perhaps it would involve taking

over some of the debts, going in with a private company,

helping essentially to oil It is very much top of his agenda

at the moment because the clock is ticking in terms of Tata Steel

being able to find a buyer for a business that is losing

a million pounds a day. There was a bit of grumbling

about the fact that the Westminster Parliament was not recalled

when this crisis broke What was the First Minister able

to do or say? Assembly members disappeared

for their elections or retirement in some cases, cleared their offices

only to be brought back for only the third time in the Assembly's

history to debate the steel crisis because it was an iconic industry

in the history of Wales and it The First Minister said

that he was in favour of short-term public ownership, if that

was what was involved, but of course the Welsh Government

did not have the power to do that so he had to work with the UK

Government and in terms of the Welsh Government's powers,

they control business rates in Wales now but again,

that had to be approved by the EU so Port Talbot is now

in an enterprise zone but again some of the levers that are being used

rely on approval from other It is quite unusual in the sense

that in policy terms it is three different layers of government

interacting on this to try You mentioned the Assembly elections

which are coming up in a couple of weeks, how far has the steel

issue overshadowed or even It has very much overshadowed

the early weeks of the campaign and yes, the political parties

are continuing to publish their manifestos and talk

about schools and hospitals and all the day-to-day stuff,

but I also think that the focus on the steel crisis,

the overwhelming nature of it and the response of the government

has focused people's attentions on the fact that there

is a government in Wales, there are elections being fought,

elections in which most people tend not to vote and in that sense it may

yet increase turnout. Thank you very much

indeed for coming in. Backbenchers have branded

the system for Mps trying to get their own bills

through Parliament a "disgrace". Every session a few Mps

get the chance to bring They're debated on 13 sitting

Fridays - but are often talked out by other backbenchers

or government ministers. The Commons procedure

committee is taking a look In a Westminster Hall

debate Labour's Jeff Smith called for change -

and was backed by a former deputy I absolutely agree with the

honourable member about the absurdities of Fridays. It does not

do any good for the image of Parliament, it is wearisome even for

those who are here and I think I can make the claim for what it is worth

that no other member of this house has resided over as many Friday

debates as I have done. And it really is a disgrace.

behind that debate - Jeff Smith .

I think the public are increasingly fed up with the charade that happens

on Friday when bills about quite serious issues that are talked

about and we are not allowed to vote on them.

Not taken seriously, some of the debates have been

I think it is a view that is shared widely across the house.

I think it looks as though Parliament is not taking serious

issues seriously and that brings Parliament into disrepute.

So what do you think can be done to change the current system?

There are three things we can do very easily.

We could move the debates from Friday to a Tuesday

or Wednesday to make sure that lots more MPs are around.

Secondly, we could impose time limits on speeches.

We do it for other debates and there is no reason we cannot do

it on private members bills and thirdly we can guarantee a vote

so it does not come before us and not be voted on.

These issues come up time and again but surely government backing

We need the backing of government, but the committee last time had

said the time had not come for the change.

I would argue that the time has now come given what we have

Now let's take a look at some of the week's

# 5,4,3,2,1.# The Foreign Office unveiled a new recruit this week.

Palmerston is a rescue cat, hired to catch mice.

Seven candidates are vying to become the next Liberal Democrat hereditary

peer in the latest House of Lords by election.

It is a very select electorate, only three people can vote.

An old London tube station uses a bunker by wartime PM

Winston Churchill, is opening for tours next month.

The station closed to passengers in 1932.

There is a call to limit so-called Henry VIII clauses in bills.

The former Lord Chief Justice Lord Judge wants these ancient measures

to enable ministers to change laws without Parliamentary scrutiny.

And campaigning in the EU referendum is officially underway.

Vote Leave is leading the out campaign while the lead Remain

campaign is Britain Stronger in Europe.

Let's take you back fifty years to the early hours

Voting in the general election ended a few hours earlier and the results

It's shortly after 3am in the BBC's election night studio,

I thought we could at that time take the opportunity to give

you the whole long list of the 42 Labour gains that we

There is an additional one, I gather on that list,

that was mentioned before that Labour have gained Croydon in South

That means that Sir Richard Thomas has lost a seat he has

That is another gain to Labour and down in the south-east that

gives us an opportunity to go across to David Holmes.

I was going to give you a list of gains that we had

The national gains of 42, we have had 17 with that one we just

Part of the BBC's Live coverage from election night 1966..

And with me is the victor of that Croydon South contest,

And the only MP in the current House of Commons to have first

Thank you very much for coming in to see us.

I understand that is the first time you have seen that clip.

Tell me what you do remember about that night, I understand

there were a couple of recounts.

Labour lost and perhaps it was along the lines when I could stand

in the by-election not knowing that we would lose all by-elections

My agent went through the piles at the end and he went

through four Tory ones, just to see and lo and behold,

100 votes that belonged to me as the Labour candidate.

Then the Tory agent went through mine and at any moment

I thought he would produce 100 Tory votes but he did not and I won.

Dramatic and rather nerve-wracking for you.

It was and of course, for my team and I owe a debt

of gratitude to the voluntary agent who worked in the Pakistan High

Commission and later opened a newsagent shop in Croydon

So, you have been around politics for a long time,

you have been in the House of Commons for

Modern technology, we had correspondents

at the time from constituents but nothing like today.

Moreover, there was no secretarial support at all.

If you did manage to find a part-time secretary,

you could not afford a full-time one, it would come out

I think you got one third off your income tax as a result.

Office accommodation, what happened was I came

to the Commons, as all MPs duly elected do, that is our main place

of work and I had correspondents and I went up to a room

which was to be occupied or had been occupied by some eight members,

Labour members, and took a seat, which was vacant.

Within a matter of three or four days, the Serjeant at Arms

or the named Serjeant at Arms sent a note that said, would you please

You have not been allocated it and I wrote back and said

I would leave once you provide me with some accommodation so I can

We mentioned that although you were elected in 1966 you have been

in the Commons for just over 40 years.

That is because you had some time out and that means you're not

The father of the house is someone who has continuously been

At the moment it is Gerald Kauffman because he signed

If the other two had signed it first, he would not be

I will not be the father, uncle or cousin of the house.

I did not go there to be the father of the house.

You stood in plenty of elections, do you still find them nerve-wracking?

Elections, yes, because mine is a marginal.

I do find it nerve-wracking, I would not wish to

At least standing for re-election, even more so, one does not wish

In the last two elections, they have been tied but the last

election, 2015, I increased my majority over 2010 and here I am.

You're one of the more senior members of the house,

When I do make up my mind, I'm aware of my age and I am not

a George Clooney lookalike, mind you I probably

was not one in 1966, but when I do make up my mind,

I think my constituency party will be the first to be told.

For now, thank you very much indeed, David Winnick.

Just how easy will it be to implement the sugar tax,

the surprise measure unveiled in the Budget aimed at tackling

obesity? The levy on sugary drinks will be imposed in two bands,

a lower one for sugar content above 5 grams per 100 millilitres

and a higher one for content with more than 8 grams

When MPs had the chance to question a leading economist,

one Conservative wondered how the tax would work in practice .....

But if is going to work, I do not know if you know this

If you have premixed alcoholic drinks, where the sugar

in the alcohol is exempt but if it is put in a fizzy

If you have a premixed glass of Pimms, which I believe

you can get in little cans, where do you think the tax falls

My understanding is that it will be applied to soft drinks and that

Are we in the situation that if you mix your own gin and tonic,

you pay tax on the tonic, but if you buy it premixed,

Jacob Rees-Mogg with a glass half full kind of question!!

And that's it for this edition of the programme,

but do join Joanna Shinn on Monday night at 11 for another round up

of the best of the day here at Westminster.