Patrick Cormack

Question on Fine Payment Defaults in Northern Ireland - 14th May 2008

Sir Patrick Cormack (South Staffordshire) (Con): May I associate myself with the remarks made by the hon. Member for Blaydon (Mr. Anderson) and the Minister about that cowardly and brutal attack on Police Officer Crozier? It was good to see that Mr. McGuinness was among the first visitors to the hospital.

I also associate myself with the other remarks made by the hon. Member for Blaydon. Does the Minister agree that it is difficult to understand—let alone explain and justify—the fact that people with a few hundred pounds owing are put in jail, while people who have defrauded the Exchequer of millions through fuel smuggling appear to get suspended sentences?

Paul Goggins: In individual cases, it will always be for the judges to decide the appropriate penalty. My role as Minister with responsibility for criminal justice and policing is to make sure that courts have sufficient powers and a range of powers. I want on the one hand to be tougher, but on the other to make sure that when fines and other non-custodial sentences are handed out, they are properly adhered to.

I know that the hon. Gentleman takes a great interest in the issue of sentencing. I am pleased to confirm that following Royal Assent for the criminal justice order last Wednesday, I shall tomorrow sign the order to commence the new indeterminate and extended prison sentences, so that anybody who tomorrow or any day afterwards commits a serious sexual or violent offence and is deemed to be dangerous can be sent to prison on an indeterminate sentence.

Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill - 19th May 2008

Sir Patrick Cormack (South Staffordshire) (Con): The hon. Member for Blackpool, South (Mr. Marsden) said he did not want to canonise. I want neither to canonise nor to demonise. I fully respect the views of
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those fellow Christians who believe there is nothing morally wrong in moving down the line of having mixed embryos and so on, but I am afraid that I take a different line—an absolutist line. I think there are cases where one has to face up to the fundamental question of whether the ends justify the means. While we have all received letters, such as that read out by the hon. Member for Norwich, North (Dr. Gibson), from people suffering from grievous diseases and we all wish to see cures, we must also accept the mortality of man. We have to accept that there are certain things that man should not seek to do. The mixture of embryos—the creation of something that is part animal and part human—is a line beyond which I am not prepared to go. Therefore, I do not support the modest amendments proposed by my Front-Bench colleagues, and I do support the amendment moved by my hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough. I hope very much that the House will agree to it, although I fear it will not. I shall therefore console myself with the immortal words of Willie Whitelaw: that things are never either as good or as bad as they seem. The step we are contemplating taking is a very serious one. Great as is my respect for my hon. Friend the Member for Salisbury (Robert Key) and others, I believe that the cardinals have it, and it is in accordance with that that I shall vote tonight.

Question on Child Centres - 19th May 2008

Sir Patrick Cormack (South Staffordshire) (Con): Does the Minister accept that in Crawley, in Staffordshire and everywhere else the best possible centre is the family? What is she doing as a Minister of a Department that carries that word in its title, to encourage families and not to institutionalise children, irrespective of their backgrounds?

Beverley Hughes: I could not agree more with the hon. Gentleman, although—the Conservative party has recently recognised this, rather belatedly—some families want some support in bringing up their children. That is part of the services that children's centres are providing. In particular, those in Crawley have developed an important standard of excellence in the services that they are developing for parents, including services for fathers, grandfathers and male carers, and talking toddlers groups—all those things that are helping parents with what in today's society is perhaps the increasingly difficult job of bringing their children up well.

Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill - 20th May 2008

Sir Patrick Cormack (South Staffordshire) (Con): Does my right hon. Friend accept that a good many of us wish that the situation were as described by the hon. Member for Islington, South and Finsbury?

Mr. Duncan Smith: I enjoy my hon. Friend's interventions as ever.

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Dr. Harris: On the European convention on human rights, the House is advised by the Joint Committee on Human Rights, which includes Members of the right hon. Gentleman's party. In a unanimous report, the Committee stated that "Without justification, such distinctions"—the distinctions that he wants to put into the Bill—

"may be in breach of the right to respect for private life without discrimination".

The report continued:

"Similarly, the Convention prohibits unjustified discrimination"—

he has not shown justification for his position—

"between married and unmarried parents for the purposes of recognition of parental responsibility, or wider family law decisions on access and custody."

The Committee went on to say that that needs to be removed in order for the provisions to comply. If the right hon. Gentleman is relying on people being able to go to the law, rather than having law that does not discriminate, I would suggest that he has got the law the wrong way round.

Question on Postal Services - 22nd May 2008

Sir Patrick Cormack (South Staffordshire) (Con): As one who has always supported the Royal Mail and did not welcome the liberalisation, I ask the right hon. Gentleman whether he agrees that my constituents, and his, have received a continually deteriorating service. It would be appalling if, having lost the second delivery, we lost the delivery on a Saturday. Will he do everything in his power to ensure that the people of this country get a decent service from the Royal Mail?

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Mr. Hutton: Yes, I will. I agree with the hon. Gentleman's comment about the importance of a delivery on Saturday, too. I do not think that we will build confidence in the need for the taxpayer to continue to invest significant amounts of money in the Royal Mail—we are putting nearly £2 billion in to sustain the Royal Mail network and to modernise it to meet the challenges of the future—if the price is a constantly deteriorating service to consumers. We cannot build consensus on that basis and on those terms.

Topical Question - 22nd May 2008

Sir Patrick Cormack (South Staffordshire) (Con): May I ask the Secretary of State whether he will have
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discussions with the Secretary of State for Health to assess the effect on the nation's blood pressure of the increase in automated phone calls, to which the hon. Member for Thurrock (Andrew Mackinlay) referred? There is nothing more excruciating than being put on hold by a series of Dalek voices.

Mr. Hutton: I shall examine the hon. Gentleman's suggestion, although I am not going to promise that I can take forward that review. Perhaps this holds out the prospect that the Conservative party will do less phone canvassing in Crewe.

Planning Bill (Programme) (No. 2) - 2nd June 2008

Sir Patrick Cormack: I was going to make that very point. I thank my hon. Friend for making it for me. Yes, guillotine motions were not introduced— either by dear Michael Foot when he was Leader of the House and dealt with five in a day, or by any member of my party—unless the Committee stage had almost ground to a halt because of the amount of time allotted to the Bill in question. The guillotine motion had to be justified, had to be advocated and had to be defended, and it was voted on. We now have the automatic programme motion, which represents, in effect, the emasculation of this place.

I sometimes wonder what is the point of this place. If I did not, deep down in my bones, believe in it, I would think "I have had enough". I stay here only because I want to see the day when Parliament is once again able to behave as a civilised Parliament in a civilised nation. It is utterly disgraceful.

I have a fond personal regard for the Minister, a decent man who is being made to do a very indecent thing today—to defend the indefensible. No one who truly believes in parliamentary democracy or that it is our duty critically to examine and scrutinise measures brought before us by the Government of the day can possibly defend what is now being done. It would be bad enough if this were just an ordinary Report stage, because the time given is not great, but as a number of colleagues have mentioned, this is effectively a new Bill, rewritten by the amendments listed on the Order Paper. Most of those amendments will not be discussed at all, although some will be referred to. I support strongly the suggestion made by my hon. Friend the Member for Macclesfield (Sir Nicholas Winterton) that the Procedure Committee should look at the issue of programming.

I make one final point, to support the brave words of the hon. Member for Pudsey (Mr. Truswell). I know what it is like, as does my hon. Friend the Member for Macclesfield, to speak out and vote against the Government of the day who in general measure one supports. It is not easy. But the fact that the hon. Gentleman, briefly and eloquently, said that he and a number of his colleagues could not support the motion ought to make the Minister realise that he has gone too far.

The Bill makes radical changes to our planning system and takes power away from the people, rather than giving it to them—something the Prime Minister is always harping on about. It takes power away, this very afternoon, from Parliament; again, the Prime Minister is always taking about that. The Bill makes utter nonsense of all his protestations to be a doughty defender of democracy and the champion of this place. The Prime Minister has taken away power from this place and continues to do so. He is taking away power from the people in the country, who have the right to have a true say in the planning process. It is a shoddy bit of work. It is a bad day for Parliament and the Government should be thoroughly ashamed of themselves.

Topical Question - 5th June 2008

Sir Patrick Cormack (South Staffordshire) (Con): Will the Chancellor now come to the Dispatch Box and acknowledge the disproportionate impact that the increase in vehicle excise duty will have in rural areas?

Angela Eagle: Again, it depends on the cars being driven. There is no obvious reason why there should be a disproportionate impact in rural areas, as opposed to urban areas. The idea behind the changes is to encourage people to move to cleaner, less polluting cars. The Conservative "Quality of Life" report proposed putting the idea into effect in a much more draconian way than we are suggesting, yet now the Conservatives vote against it and do not support it.

Question on Vehicle Excise Duty - 5th June 2008

Sir Patrick Cormack (South Staffordshire) (Con): Is the Minister aware that this is the most intellectually threadbare argument that the House has heard for a long time? How can she conceivably justify such retrospective taxation, and how does that show any understanding of the plight of the rural community?

Angela Eagle: It is not retrospective legislation. Will the hon. Gentleman explain to Labour Members why the quality of life policy group report, which the right hon. Member for Witney (Mr. Cameron) welcomed and said would form part of the Conservative manifesto, suggested an even greater increase between the top and bottom bands based on CO2 emissions?