Andrew Lansley: Thank you very much, Mr. Deputy Speaker, for the opportunity to make my maiden speech. It is a daunting prospect, not least because I follow the exemplary and entertaining speeches of the hon. Members for Aberdeen, South (Miss Begg) and for Cumbernauld and Kilsyth (Ms McKenna). I am more than happy to pay the warmest tribute to my predecessor, Sir Anthony Grant, who was the hon. Member for...
Andrew Lansley: When he expands on the detail of his proposals, will the Minister explain how he proposes to give a voice to the many Scots and Welsh people who are not resident in Scotland or Wales, but who feel deeply about constitutional change affecting their place of birth, the place of their previous residence or the place of their possible future residence?
Andrew Lansley: Perhaps the right hon. Lady will now tell us whether she proposes to pay additional benefits to lone parents over and above the benefits that would be payable to married couples in the same circumstances. Will she pay those extra benefits? Will she give us a clear answer?
Andrew Lansley: May I add to what my hon. Friend the Member for Daventry (Mr. Boswell) said? It is a matter not simply of SSAs, but of the ability of local education authorities to pass money through to schools. The hon. Member for Cambridge (Mrs. Campbell) spoke of cuts in a school in her constituency, yet she will know that a Conservative administration in Cambridgeshire, which was returned on 1 May, is...
Andrew Lansley: It is a great pleasure to be able to congratulate the hon. Member for Cleethorpes (Ms McIsaac). She paid generous tribute to her predecessor, which I know will be appreciated throughout the House, and made an intelligent and thoughtful contribution to the debate, which augurs well. She will be listened to with great attention in the House. Many hon. Members have made maiden speeches. I will...
Andrew Lansley: Thank you, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Many parents on low incomes make the choice to send their children to St. Mary's because it is a single-sex girl's school with a Catholic orientation. I visited the school during my election campaign and asked the girls where they would go to school if their parents were not to have the choice available to them through the assisted places scheme. The answer was...
Andrew Lansley: The hon. Gentleman proposes that a Scottish Parliament must, of necessity, control an entirely separate fiscal regime from the one applying to the rest of the UK. That seems to imply that a Scottish Parliament must, also of necessity, be economically independent from the United Kingdom Parliament.
Andrew Lansley: rose—
Andrew Lansley: Parents' reasonable expectations of what was to happen to their children, in respect of clauses 1 and 2, are clearly now not going to be fulfilled. What does my right hon. Friend believe the Government propose to do about that?
Andrew Lansley: Will my hon Friend reflect on the fact that a delay of three years in the implementation of the Bill would give the Government an opportunity to plan public expenditure properly beyond the ambit of the present planning timetable?
Andrew Lansley: In South Cambridgeshire, the constituency which I am privileged to represent, we have a number of schools with assisted places. It would be very much to the benefit of parents who have children in assisted places in those schools if the Committee passed this group of amendments, thereby delaying by three years the coming into operation of the Bill. There would be several benefits in such a...
Andrew Lansley: My hon. Friend referred to admissions criteria. What will be the implication for siblings who are not able to follow their older brothers or sisters into a school on an assisted place? The younger siblings may not satisfy the admissions criteria of the school of their choice, so they may be doubly affected. They would not be able to exercise their choice by attending an independent school on...
Andrew Lansley: Labour Members have not come here to participate in the debate. I, too, am a new Member. I thought that the purpose of our coming here this evening was to debate the Bill, to determine whether it had merit and, if possible, to improve it. That is exactly what we are trying to do.
Andrew Lansley: I am interested in my hon. Friend's observations from his constituency. Given that, in the circumstances that he described, younger siblings would be displaced into state schools, would parents be able to choose another single-sex school for their children? Is such a school readily available in my hon. Friend's constituency? Once the pupils were displaced out of the independent sector, would...
Andrew Lansley: Many parents whose children go to schools such as my hon. Friend has described are working mothers or lone parents who have to accept responsibility for delivering children to, and collecting children from, school. Labour Members may not want to hear this argument. In the past, their contention has been that they wish to help lone parents into work, but this kind of measure could place...
Andrew Lansley: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what action he plans to take to ensure the continuing provision of an adequate number of prison places. [924]
Andrew Lansley: Will the hon. Lady ensure that the supply of prison places is sufficient to implement a policy of honesty in sentencing so that there will be no automatic early release from prison?
Andrew Lansley: rose—
Andrew Lansley: In respect of options A and B, under which flat payments or payments according to the schedule will be made, there is no reason why compensation should not be paid quickly. Will the Minister give an undertaking that compensation will be paid within 30 days in those cases?
Andrew Lansley: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a statement on the role of the European Parliament. [1174]