Treasury and Work and Pensions

It is a genuine pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Dagenham (Jon Cruddas). From earlier exchanges in a different context this year, I well know the knowledge and insight that he brings to his own area, particularly in respect of the pernicious activities of the far right. That was acknowledged recently when one of The Spectator awards went in his direction, largely because of the quality of insight and personal courage that he brought to his activities, which was very much on display again this evening. As he has had one happy competitive moment of late, who knows, he might have another in due course. We shall watch with interest and wish him well. That, however, is certainly outwith the remit of the Queen’s Speech, so I shall not stray on to it. As I listened to the opening exchanges with the Chancellor earlier this afternoon, I reflected on the fact that what has generally been regarded as a not overly heavy Queen’s Speech this year leaves a fair amount of flexibility for changes at the top of the Government during this parliamentary Session. My mind could not help but go back to discussions that the Prime Minister and I have had, at his behest, over the past few years. The Prime Minister tried to dissuade me from Liberal Democrat support for a referendum on the single European currency, which he thought was a daft idea. When that was put on the shelf, he tried to dissuade me from Liberal Democrat support for a referendum on the proposed new European constitution. At that time, I was told, there was no way either Schröder or Chirac would touch such proposition with a bargepole, yet, lo and behold, a few weeks later they did. It was pointed out that advance announcements from the Government were destabilising as they led to paralysis. The irony was that the Prime Minister’s somewhat premature decision on the night of the Hartlepool by-election to tell the country that he did not intend to be around, even if he won the general election, itself generated a fair amount of paralysis, which will be overcome only when the change takes place. In the context of that transition, I want to put one or two pleas to the likely next head of the Government, the present Chancellor, in the light of the proposals in the Queen’s Speech. We hope that he will look at a few things afresh if he takes over the helm of government, not least the social justice agenda. There has been overall acknowledgement in some of the less heated moments of today’s debate that over a remarkable decade in office and fairly benign macroeconomic circumstances, some credit is due to the Chancellor for helping to influence that—