Speeches by Powell.

“It is very important to set the context of a trajectory going upwards, and of a Government that takes these matters seriously, and demonstrating that—”

“Yes. There are logistical things to do. But what I want to be really clear about, what would have happened previously and was suggested—not by the Secretary of State—was that the Secretary of State would do that conference somewhere, while a junior Minister gave the statement in the House. Sometimes Mr Speaker will mak…”

“We could have had that afterwards. That is something we constantly stress test and consider—the logistics of that. The reverse of that would be that parliamentary business is not as predictable. Let us say that that day, a press conference with the Prime Minister and the Chancellor, at a hospital, near London, had been…”

“Of the House—yes, the Ministerial Code reflects those of the House is what I am saying.”

“The 10-year plan, which was a 169-page document, I think, was published to the House first. It was not a press conference about the whole document itself; it was about plans for the NHS. I don’t not take your point. These are balances to get right, but the plan itself was published to the House. The statement was adver…”

“Not at all.”

“Yes, but to be clear, the SDR was published to the House—published, as opposed to people being allowed to go into a reading room and so on, earlier in the day, in the form of embargoed copies. We can come on to the specifics for journalists, but the SDR was published to the House first. Another balance that we need to …”

“I am sorry if you have had that impression, because I am really happy to be here and to answer these things.”

“That is absolutely not a feeling that I have made known.”

“Do you want me to go through that?”

“As I said, on the strategic defence review, both myself and the Secretary of State—he apologised to the House for this—probably could have been more explicit and narrower about who had access to a reading room beforehand, making that clearer for people. Maybe some of the media handling around that as well, and some of …”

“The statement is still being made to the House. Announcements are not just made in oral statements. In written ministerial statements, in answers to parliamentary questions, either orally or in writing, and in coming to a Select Committee, you are making those announcements to the House. Just recently—I know this is of…”

“Such as?”

“There are those big set-piece moments—those big White Papers, big new plans, defence reviews, Budgets and so on—which are taken as read. Then, on a daily or weekly basis, it can depend on other things that are happening at the time. It can depend on demands of the House as well. For example, the Foreign Office and the …”

“I actually think the House’s expectations have changed the other way. It was not that long ago—the Clerks might remember it—that you gave two weeks’ notice of a statement. If something happened, you would give two weeks’ notice of that statement. That only changed in the late 1990s. The emergence of urgent questions is…”

“It does not say “all”. It says “the most important”, which is a collective decision made every day, every week.”

“It is not that long ago when I was elected in 2010, and we hardly even had Facebook. If a journalist was given an unauthorised leak of something as the Secretary of State was on their way over to the House, it would take that journalist 24 hours to get it published somewhere, or certainly 12 or 14 hours. They would hav…”

“Oh, are you later than me?”

“It is an important comparison. If you look back over that whole Session, what has changed over time—I am sure you will agree—is the expectations about oral statements. The use of urgent questions, even when I was first elected 12 years ago, was very rare. The use of urgent questions has now become much more part of the…”

“I think it has got some of that flexibility in it, but they are judgments for him. I talk to him all the time about how we approach Parliament and how we can do that, but we all need to recognise that, for example, even 15 years ago, Facebook was hardly invented. I have been an MP for nearly 15 years; you have been an …”