Speeches by Powell.

“I shall. The business for the week commencing 9 December will include: Monday 9 December—Remaining stages of the Terrorism (Protection of Premises) Bill. Tuesday 10 December—Committee of the whole House on the Finance Bill (day one). Wednesday 11 December—Committee of the whole House on the Finance Bill (day two). Thur…”

“It will make interesting reading.”

“I agree 100%, and I have made that clear to the person, or the Department, that did not do that. Any other such cases that I receive—I think there has been more than one, actually—we will take up very strongly. We have also done a bit more training on that for the parliamentary teams, to reiterate the point that writte…”

“Yes, they have. Over the summer, I sent all Cabinet Ministers your predecessor Committee’s last report on the performance of certain Departments on PQs and correspondence, reiterating that their job is to respond in a timely and accurate manner and in a good way. If you have seen that, you will have seen which Departme…”

“Absolutely. I have very high expectations—that is the first thing to say—and they are not just my expectations, but those of the Prime Minister and others. I have heard the Prime Minister reiterating those points to colleagues. To be clear, the “Guide to Parliamentary Work”, which goes to all Ministers, says that “in r…”

“More experienced MPs have certainly contacted me since the election about those issues quite a bit: in business questions on the Floor of the House, in the Tea Room, by emailing me, by writing to me or indeed PQ-ing me about PQs, which has happened. I have held a number of sessions for new Members on how to make the mo…”

“Good luck with your SI, Tracy! Be scrutinising.”

“We have seen a real spike in written questions being tabled, since there are so many new MPs. We absolutely need to make sure that questions are answered well and in a timely way and that Departments really are forthcoming with the information that they are providing. In return, what I would say to colleagues is that t…”

“Timely and appropriately forthcoming answers to written parliamentary questions are incredibly important. Parliament should expect that, and Ministers and Departments should be doing it. I have written to all the Cabinet Ministers and other Ministers and have spoken to special advisers and others about how it is the ex…”

“You can’t be missing from an SI Committee.”

“It is automatic for seven, under the baby leave and baby loss provision—the paragraph that Michael has just mentioned. You can bring that forward if you want to, whenever you are ready to say, “I don’t need a proxy any longer.” But everybody would get it automatically for seven months, with no questions asked, and they…”

“Under the medical proxy, I do not know whether the time allowed has changed over time. As I said, there have been some issues with that in the past, which is why your predecessor Committee was going to have a good look at it—to be fair, being transparent, open and, to my mind, erring on the side of granting, of people …”

“Now I have to find that letter—I have it here somewhere, but remind me.”

“Possibly. I would only know those if people like you looked into them and raised them with me, or other colleagues did—please, stress-test that for me, if you would not mind.”

“That particular bit of the scheme? Obviously the medical proxies are not self-certified in that sense; you require quite a lot for the paperwork, and then consideration is given to allowing them. That is governed by the Speaker’s Office—it is not that Mr Speaker is being subjective; he tries to do that within the rules…”

“I do, because the issue is that IVF treatment, or complications in pregnancy, have in the past been deemed not to be serious illnesses. That is why I thought that that was a much better place for those things to be, so that they were not subjective or did not have a subjective opinion applied to them.”

“There is a key thing that I always point out. We are never not at work. Being an MP is not a job. It is a way of life; it is a duty. We are office holders. We are nearly always working. I got elected when I was pregnant with my youngest, and I think I came back to Parliament when he was three months old. Day two after …”

“It is, but again, if this Committee identifies gaps in that, then please let me know.”

“At the moment, it does not extend to that. That might be less ongoing. The point with proxies really is more that you can get it for a decent chunk of time—parental leave or whatever. We have slipping and other ways in which people are able not to be here to vote, if it were a day here and there.”

“The good thing about the scheme is that you literally just email the Public Bill Office and say, “I am poorly with pregnancy. I need a proxy,” and it is given to you. You do not have to provide any details for it, explain what it is or even know that it has a name. You are given a proxy, no questions asked. You can hav…”