Enterprise Bill
10:30 am
Mr Ian Pearson (Assistant Whip (funded by HM Treasury); Dudley South, Labour)
I am glad that the Opposition at least recognise that the Government have been flexible to a degree by altering the business to be considered today. I do not want to cover old ground, but it is a bit rich for Opposition Members to criticise the Committee for not considering all the consumer protection clauses. We had 16 hours 20 minutes of debate before the first knife fell on proceedings. Some 36 clauses were covered and 24 clauses were not covered, which, it is fair to say, was due to the Opposition not managing their time very well. Notwithstanding our feeling that they spent an awful lot of time on clause 20 and could have used their time better, we decided that we wanted to offer the extra sittings to allow more effective consideration of the Bill.
We are being reasonable and are prepared to look again at the matter if we find that the insolvency provisions are going to take longer to consider than has been allocated. Four full sittings have been allocated to the insolvency provisions, which is reasonable. We think that the original Programming Sub-Committee resolution was also reasonable, but we are prepared to be flexible and look at things to ensure good and effective consideration of the Bill.
Question put and agreed to.
Clause 66 ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Schedule 5 agreed to.
Clause 67 ordered to stand part of the Bill.