Speeches by Bryant.

“Oh dear, the hon. Gentleman is worse than me. [Interruption.] Oh yes he is—and it’s not even panto season yet! [Interruption.] He has a very moderate tie, though. It is important that we have proper evaluation. We are in the process of working out precisely how we will do that. I have said to the group that we will con…”

“Yes, and I commend Acoustic Couch. I have not visited, but I am sure an invitation will be on its way very soon. We want to preserve as many of our small music venues as we possibly can. That is why we are pushing as hard as possible the idea of a £1 levy on arena tickets. I am delighted that the Royal Albert Hall anno…”

“The one bit we have not been able to address is the amount of money that goes from the streamers themselves directly to the record labels. That is an international settlement, so it is more difficult for us to address. There was a time, when I first arrived in the House, when musicians were getting absolutely nothing a…”

“First of all, can I wish—was it Big Huge New Circle? [Interruption.] Yes, Big Huge New Circle. So we have got it in Hansard three times now. I will take my fee later—10% obviously. Or 15%; it is 15% for lots of agents these days. Obviously, the future of the music industry in the UK depends on having a pipeline. The si…”

“I think the hon. Member is in danger of becoming a national treasure herself. [Interruption.] Oh, I see that I have not united the House on that, but—[Interruption.] The right hon. Member for Daventry cannot keep heckling; he is the shadow Health Secretary now. The important point is that the hon. Member for Harpenden …”

“The argument for doing this is partly because all musicians simply do not earn enough to make a living. That is the truth of the matter. Having 12 million streamings might equate to earning a theoretical amount of money, but the musician will not earn that amount because it will be diluted by the various processes it g…”

“I am grateful for the comments about my tie. I would say that it is understated compared to some of the other ties I have worn, so I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for his commendation on my sartorial elegance. But he is wrong about YouTube. YouTube is one of the streaming services and people are remunerated. …”

“I am grateful to my hon. Friend for what she said about Dickon. He was really very helpful at Universal in the process of getting us to this place, particularly on the issue of per diems—the £75 a day—which was one of the major asks of the Ivors Academy, and I am really pleased we were able to do that. She is right tha…”

“Yes, I am more Wet Leg than Oasis as well.”

“I am afraid it would cost £2.4 million more to stay in Wilmslow than it would to move. All the right hon. Lady’s statistics are purely imaginary and speculative, and therefore cannot be relied on. That is why we have to go through a proper process and not simply put things together on the back of a fag packet. Addition…”

“It would be easier for me to respond to a lot of the right hon. Lady’s questions if she was not attacking me quite so much. The point I am making is that this is a body based in her constituency, and for the whole of the past year we have been debating the Data (Use and Access) Bill, now an Act, which refers specifical…”

“I will in a moment. I throw this point back at the right hon. Lady; I am sure she would not want to waste taxpayers’ money.”

“The ICO went through a thorough process. It had to gain approval at the end of that process, although it had been speaking to the Cabinet Office from the very beginning. That is why I believe it has come up with the best solution to ensure it has the talent it needs into the future, bearing in mind that nearly 10% of i…”

“I am not, I am afraid, going to give way now—[Interruption.]”

“I will not give way to the right hon. Lady for a moment, because she has posed quite a lot of questions that I need to answer. The right hon. Lady asked about funding. A statutory instrument was laid to change the ICO’s funding arrangements, because successive Governments have loaded it up with more and more work, and …”

“As usual, it is a great delight to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Twigg. I warmly commend the right hon. Member for Tatton (Esther McVey) for doing something perhaps intrinsic to our political system—because, unlike in many other systems around the world, we have a constituency model—and standing up for her constitu…”

“Oh dear.”

“Well, this is a rum old affair, isn’t it? I think we can definitely put this down as one of the recondite moments of parliamentary democracy. A number of people have asked me today, “What on earth is all this about?” and then said, “What is an opposed private Bill?” or “What has the Chairman of Ways and Means got to do…”

“And the former Minister for common sense has now completely abandoned common sense, clearly. Anyway, Emeli Sandé sang: “You’ve got the words to change a nation But you’re biting your tongue, You’ve spent a lifetime stuck in silence Afraid you’ll say something wrong.” Since the Government do not have anything to say on …”

“I think I will make sure that gets into Hansard now. The right hon. Gentleman is taking objection to me personally. Well, there we are.”