Whitsun Adjournment

Before the House adjourns for the Whitsun recess, I wish to raise a number of points. When I spoke in the Easter Adjournment debate, I said then that it would be the last Easter Adjournment debate before we had a general election, and, obviously, this will be our last Whitsun Adjournment debate before a general election. Much has happened since Easter, and we have only to look at the Chamber at the moment to see that all is not well with the House. Before my party leader called for an election, I felt that the paralysis that we in Parliament are suffering from was simply not tenable. I cannot conceive of how the House can limp along—with little or no business at all and Members, for whatever reason, feeling more and more disillusioned and stressed—until April next year. Without being political, I should say that the country needs to be governed and the House needs to address very serious issues at the moment. For all sorts of reasons, I doubt whether Members can concentrate their minds fully on those issues. That is why we need a fresh mandate. Furthermore, given Mr. Speaker's decision to stand down, it is right that a new Parliament, with some new Members, should elect a new Speaker. I want to say something about expenses. When I was first elected to the House in 1983, it sat for five days a week; we were always here on Fridays. The first Bill on which I sat in Committee was the Rates Bill. Members may be appalled or they may laugh, but one of our sittings lasted 48 hours. It is always fine to be wise in hindsight, but the time to change the arrangements on second homes was probably when the House changed the hours that we sit and how we work. In those early days, I represented Basildon, which was even nearer this place than Southend, West, but I could not get home to my constituency at 3, 4 or 5 o'clock in the morning. In hindsight, I wish that I and others had spoken up when we decided to change our working hours and that we had dealt with the issue then. It is a sorry state of affairs, and I cannot see how we can continue in this way until April next year. I apologise for having been late to the debate, Madam Deputy Speaker; I had given Mr. Speaker notice of that. I was at Westminster cathedral for the installation of the Most Reverend Vincent Gerard Nichols. I took the right decision in leaving halfway through, because the two-and-a-half-hour service does not end until 2.30. It was a privilege to be in a packed church. Throughout his nine years as cardinal, Cormac Murphy-O'Connor has done a splendid job given all the difficulties faced by any Church at the moment. Sometimes I am guilty of nodding off during a priest's sermon, but I listened carefully to the sermon given by the Most Reverend Vincent Gerard Nichols. His message was that we should listen to one another; I do not know whether that always happens in this place, but his message was to a wider audience. He also spoke about faith schools, an issue that the House has considered. Furthermore, he said that just because people have strong views on certain issues, they should not simply be derided as bigots. His message was strong. Recently, I made a small contribution to The Tablet, in which I said:""We are seeing a decline in the number of people going to church and he"—" that is, the new cardinal—""needs to address that and how the Church can be relevant in people's lives. The faith of society is also changing and bringing terrible problems which the Church can have a hand in solving. He needs to show the Government that the Catholic Church and Catholic education are resources worth tapping into, and that the Church can help with a lot of the problems that the Government is currently experiencing."" I am sure that I speak for most fair-minded women and men in the House in wishing the new cardinal well with the challenges ahead.