International Development (Reporting and Transparency) Bill

It is a pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough (Mr. Leigh) who is a fellow Lincolnshire Member of Parliament and a highly distinguished Chairman of the Public Accounts Committee. This matter was debated in Committee, and the additional point was made that because of the—correctly—increasing budget of DFID, half an hour was perhaps not long enough for DFID questions, especially given that Foreign Office questions are allocated one hour. I also note that there has been a subtle change in the Bill since the Committee stage—initially, it stated that the report would go to ““either House””, which was questioned, but it has now been changed to ““each House””. That is welcome. The point also needs to be made that debates in Westminster Hall on Select Committee reports seem to be subject to significant delay, and we need to ensure that when this report comes to the House, that is not the case. My final point is that other Departments have annual debates. A Welsh debate takes place, on St. David’s day, I think—perhaps the Minister will clarify that—and there are also annual fisheries and defence debates. In relation to this important report, the Opposition see no reason why there should not be an annual DFID debate on the Floor of the House.