Public Accounts

Indeed. Of course, that leads me straight on to the hon. Member for Great Grimsby, who brought us down to reality in a typically robust, wide-ranging speech. He reminded us again not only that much of our work is about helping the lives of ordinary people, but that many of the problems that we face in this country relate to our excellent civil service gold-plating European directives. We saw that particularly with the Rural Payments Agency. My hon. Friend the Member for South Norfolk (Mr. Bacon) gave a virtuoso performance. The temptation in our debates is always to read out our speeches, because we want to get everything in and be serious, but he did not read his speech at all; he just produced about 20 reports and used them brilliantly as a prop. After what he has said today, we have to try to modernise our procedures in this debate and ensure that they are up to date. The concept of having to stick rigidly to matters on which there has been a Treasury minute is outmoded. It was outrageous that yesterday, when Postcomm was before the Committee, its representatives did not once say that Postcomm was to come out with a major announcement two hours after appearing before us, the senior Committee of Parliament. It is unbelievable. It is perhaps even more wrong that we cannot have a proper debate about that today. Of course I thank the hon. Member for Thurrock, not least because he is not a member of the Committee. It is important that these debates do not become a Committee love-in, in which we all pat ourselves on the shoulder. We want to bring in people who are not Committee members. His constituency was the common thread in his comments on all the reports that he mentioned, including the reports on the Thames Gateway, flood alleviation and landfill; I thought that that was an excellent way to go about making his speech. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Ludlow (Mr. Dunne) for hot-footing it back from Crewe and Nantwich—I know that he has spent a lot of time there recently—to grace the Conservative Benches in his typically diligent way. My hon. Friend the Member for Putney (Justine Greening), the Opposition spokesman, is a newcomer to our debates. She put her finger on it: the point of our reports is that they are based on evidence and fact, as the right hon. Member for Swansea, West (Mr. Williams), who is the Father of the House and the longest-serving member of the Committee, always says. Our reports are only as good as the facts on which they are based, and that is why it was such an appalling let-down when the Department for Transport gave us incorrect figures on motorcycle evasion. We never want to see that happen again. It destroys the credibility of the Committee, and of Parliament, when we are given wrong information. Lastly, may I thank the Exchequer Secretary to the Treasury for a typically witty, charming tribute to our work? Quite rightly, she set us right a bit when we perhaps strayed into criticism of the Government on tax credits or prescriptions. As always, the debate was not a party political affair. It genuinely sought to shed light on the workings of Government, and not to generate only heat. I thank the House for its attendance. Question put and agreed to. Resolved,"That this House takes note of the 41st and the 42nd and the 46th to the 65th Reports of the Committee of Public Accounts of Session 2006-07, and of the Treasury Minutes on these Reports (Cm 7275, 7276 and 7322); and of the 1st to the 4th, the 6th and the 9th to the 13th Reports of the Committee of Session 2007-08, and of the Treasury Minutes on these Reports (Cm 7323 and 7364)."