Mr Dave Nellist: I am not sure why hon. Members find that so funny. What is the Secretary of State frightened of? Why will he not answer the question?
Mr Dave Nellist: rose—
Mr Dave Nellist: rose—
Mr Dave Nellist: rose—
Mr Dave Nellist: Will the Prime Minister give way?
Mr Dave Nellist: Will the Prime Minister give way?
Mr Dave Nellist: I do not want to distract my hon. Friend from his line of thought, but would it not be appropriate at this point to remember that only a few short years ago the partial explosion of one nuclear power station at Chernobyl had serious long-term consequences in Wales and in Scotland and that one accident in Bhopal had long-term consequences for the lives and livelihoods of thousands of people in...
Mr Dave Nellist: At the end of a long parliamentary day, I am grateful to you, Mr. Speaker, for returning to the Chair for what is likely to be the last scheduled debate on the middle east and the Gulf before the expiry of the deadline set by the western powers of midnight, 15 January 1991, for Iraq to leave Kuwait. I do not claim to speak in the debate on behalf of the parliamentary Labour party. However,...
Mr Dave Nellist: Is my hon. Friend the Member for Linlithgow (Mr. Dalyell) not absolutely right in that, in the 1980s, Iraq was the middle eastern country favoured by the western nations? During the Iran-Iraq war, America provided $2£5 billion of food aid and $5 billion of trade credit. In October 1989, one of the Minister's colleagues —now the Secretary of State for Health—told the House that the...
Mr Dave Nellist: What about two years ago?
Mr Dave Nellist: I refer to the statement made by the right hon. Member for Bristol, West (Mr. Waldegrave) when he was a Foreign Office Minister. He said two years ago that the Government officially condemned the Iraqi bombing of the Kurds, when 10,000 people died in Halabja. Ten days later, the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry rewarded the same Saddam Hussein, who we are now told is such a bad...
Mr Dave Nellist: Will next Monday's debate on the Criminal Justice Bill allow a comparison to be made between the maiden speech in the House of Lords yesterday of the former Home Secretary, Lord Waddington, on the need for the reduction of custodial sentences, and the sentencing last Friday of a 20-year-old unemployed man in Grantham for being unable to pay his poll tax? It has cost the state more in the...
Mr Dave Nellist: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will review the operation of the magistrates courts dealing with poll tax cases; and if he will make a statement.
Mr Dave Nellist: Does the Minister realise that hundreds of thousands of people have been dealt with far worse than criminals in the magistrates courts in recent weeks? In Warrington and in Lymington, people have been dragooned through, eight or 10 at a time. In Hitchin and in Stevenage, the courts have been closed to the public. In a number of magistrates courts from Coventry down to Bournemouth, people have...
Mr Dave Nellist: Further to that point of order, Mr. Speaker.
Mr Dave Nellist: I am grateful that at least the Secretary of State changed the practice that was prevalent a few days ago and actually notified hon. Members that he intended to make a linkage. You, Mr. Speaker, will recognise that 16 questions were reached today, eight of which were on the poll tax, and on which seven supplementaries were asked. The other eight—half of them were reached—raised 19...
Mr Dave Nellist: To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what is the progress of his latest review of the poll tax; and if he will make a statement.
Mr Dave Nellist: Is the Secretary of State aware that I spent yesterday afternoon in Lincoln prison with Bryan Wright, a 20-year-old unemployed man, who last Friday became the Government's first poll tax prisoner? When the Secretary of State conducts the review will he consider that if Bryan had been born in Glasgow and not in Grantham he would not be in prison, because Scottish law abolished prison for debt...
Mr Dave Nellist: Will the Secretary of State instruct local authorities, during the period of his review, not to take any court action that could send anyone to prison for something that is not a crime and may not even be an offence any longer?
Mr Dave Nellist: Don't be so bloody stupid. That was a serious question about the review of the poll tax.