British Board of Film Classification (Accountability to Parliament and Appeals) Bill

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Maldon and East Chelmsford (Mr. Whittingdale), who speaks with extraordinary erudition, which probably shows that many a night has been spent studying the subject. It is a great honour to be associated with the Bill promoted by the hon. Member for Canterbury (Mr. Brazier). I pay tribute to him for his courage in promoting the Bill and his recognition of the widespread public concern. It is also a great honour to be in the Chamber with my right hon. Friend the Member for Leicester, East (Keith Vaz), who has done more than many a Back Bencher to bring the issue forward. He should be given credit for that. Let me respond briefly to the points made by the hon. Member for Maldon and East Chelmsford. In this country, there is a profound sense of disquiet and a feeling that societal norms—what is normal for the majority of people—are not reflected in the British Board of Film Classification. That is my concern. I understand that we are prisoners of history in many ways. We can think back to Mrs. Bowdler trying to expurgate Shakespeare in the 1870s, or the late James Michael Curley, a much-lamented former democrat mayor of Boston who banned virtually everything and gave the phrase ““banned in Boston”” to the world. We can think of many examples, but the reality of the situation is that the constituents of the hon. Member for Canterbury, my constituents and—dare I say it—the constituents of most right hon. and hon. Members are profoundly concerned. The problem that they see is that not only the people who access, watch and see the material are denigrated but those who participate in it are denigrated, too. It sets a standard, so that beyond that cinema or wherever people go to watch those foul DVDs—outside that community—such things might be seen as normal. The hon. Member for Maldon and East Chelmsford talked about ““Straw Dogs””. I am a great admirer of Susan George and of the director of that film, but the film contained a particularly graphic scene of anal rape. Many police officers said at the time and afterwards that there were copycat examples of that scene and the foul desecration of that woman. Should we ban it? Should we pretend that such things do not exist? No. We have to accept that there are certain standards, certain information and certain publicity that simply cannot be allowed to flow freely. The debate comes back to two things. First, does the community have confidence in the present system of classification? Secondly, can we discuss censorship on the Floor of the House without being accused of trying to turn the clock back and wanting to live in a sanitised, homogenised world where nothing nasty ever happens, where we have nothing but endless Disney films and where we are denied Russ Meyer, let alone Sam Peckinpah? The hon. Member for Canterbury is trying to achieve a balance. Inter alia, he has finally given the House a reason for early-day motions. I tabled an early-day motion six years ago that said that they were a confounded nuisance, that they were a great problem for staff and that they took up far too much parliamentary time. It urged all right hon. and hon. Members never, ever again to sign early-day motions. A large number of my colleagues signed it.