Part of Digital, Culture, Media and Sport – in the House of Commons at on 26 May 2022.
Lucy Powell
Shadow Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport
Sorry, but I thought it was Ministers who decided which questions they responded to, not the other way around. It was their decision to do it this way. [Interruption.] The question about Channel 4 is on the Order Paper.
Is it not the truth that the Secretary of State made up her mind long, long ago, based not on the evidence or the responses, but on her own ideology and a petty vendetta against Channel 4’s news coverage? The evidence is compelling: privatisation is bad for levelling up, bad for the skills pipeline, bad for the independent production sector and bad for our world-beating creative industries. Just like the forthcoming BBC licence review, is not this process just a sham? She does not listen to evidence, the industry, the public or many of her own Back-Benchers. Why does she not drop the ideology, support British jobs and British broadcasting, and stop the sell-off?
Secretary of State was originally the title given to the two officials who conducted the Royal Correspondence under Elizabeth I. Now it is the title held by some of the more important Government Ministers, for example the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs.
The order paper is issued daily and lists the business which will be dealt with during that day's sitting of the House of Commons.
It provides MPs with details of what will be happening in the House throughout the day.
It also gives details of when and where the standing committees and select committees of the Commons will be meeting.
Written questions tabled to ministers by MPs on the previous day are listed at the back of the order paper.
The order paper forms one section of the daily vote bundle and is issued by the Vote Office
