Speeches by Hillier.

“I hope that the Intelligence and Security Committee will get a good chance to dig into what has happened in this place, because we are hampered in the Chamber by not being able to look at sensitive issues. I also hope that the Minister will lend his weight to the approval of many senior Members of this House, prior to …”

“I congratulate the new team and welcome them to the Government Front Bench. A week is a long time, but I had a promise to meet the previous Minister to discuss the immigration system, because one of the challenges that the Home Secretary has inherited is a broken processing system. As one of the Home Office’s largest c…”

“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Dr Allin-Khan, and I congratulate the hon. Member for South Cotswolds (Dr Savage) and other colleagues on setting out the case so clearly. I want to focus on solutions and some asks for the Minister. I also want to highlight some of the work done in Hackney, where we h…”

“I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Warwick and Leamington (Matt Western) on securing this important debate. I extend my congratulations to my hon. Friend the Member for East Renfrewshire (Blair McDougall) on his elevation to His Majesty’s Government. It is an honour and a privilege to be a Government Minister…”

“I welcome my right hon. Friend’s commitment to the hope of decent homes. In my constituency, children and families are leaving in droves and schools are closing because of a lack of properly affordable housing. She knows, as I do, that whatever we do in planning, without the skills that we need to build those homes, th…”

“We will look for that line in the accounts.”

“I am sure that we will be looking at that.”

“Will you be doing that in future sets of accounts?”

“What contingent liability have you set aside for compensation for this data breach?”

“While I am not a member of this Committee, Chair, I hope that you might consider those points in your recommendations.”

“Can I just ask the Treasury Officer of Accounts has your team now discussed with the Comptroller and Auditor General how this is dealt with in future? Do you now have a protocol going forward, were there to be any other such super-injunction or similar challenging legal issue to overcome?”

“Of all the people in this room, I absolutely get and understand that, and it is not something that I ever chose to have, but there were many times when I was called in to Government Departments to be told something very sensitive, usually well before it appeared in the accounts. Although during this time there was no C…”

“As you are aware, there has been a lot of discussion in Parliament, and it got quite some traction at the end of the last Parliament, of having a special committee set up to look at the very few rare, sensitive issues in a very constrained environment. Is this one of those that could have been dealt with by such a comm…”

“Would you have applied to the court for it to be removed? You did eventually, because that is what happened.”

“So the decision was taken at that ministerial level. The Osmotherly rules say that Parliament should be informed, and you may be aware that the Public Accounts Committee had an issue about the Rwanda scheme, where we were requesting information. The Treasury Officer of Accounts very helpfully wrote round to colleagues,…”

“We appreciate that it was an unusual situation, but, as you know, there is a well-worn route to brief the Chair of the Public Accounts Committee in confidence, if there is a reason why you cannot brief the Committee in confidence or in public. As you and I know, we have been round that circle a few times—sometimes beca…”

“Constitutionally, the Comptroller and Auditor General is responsible for oversight of this very important role. Why did you not think it appropriate, or did you try to inform him?”

“You thought it would be into the full public domain at that point.”

“It was the court, was it, that decided to put in a super-injunction?”

“We would understand that you would not necessarily expect a super-injunction. Just to be clear, the Report talks about how you did not originally apply for a super-injunction. You applied for an injunction.”