Business of the House (Lisbon Treaty)

I am dealing with the hon. Gentleman’s usual manner, Madam Deputy Speaker. We are very happy that the treaty should be scrutinised. I have made the point that the scrutiny should have come first, before we dealt with the Bill. However, we support the Bill because it will allow the United Kingdom to make the treaty part of UK domestic law. Without proper scrutiny, however, some of the proper questions that the hon. Member for Glasgow, South-West (Mr. Davidson) and other colleagues want to ask cannot be asked. Such questions could well throw up issues that, by definition, scrutiny is designed to reveal. We have never given anyone a blank cheque but, at the end of the day, the Government of any country have the executive responsibility to seek to negotiate treaties with other countries. If we had been the Government, the result would have been different. Unfortunately, we were not elected to form a Government last time, but I hope that, before the hon. Gentleman and I have finished our time here, the Liberal Democrats will have formed a Government. He will then be able to hold us to account.