Standing Orders can always be altered, particularly by Governments, but by doing it unilaterally the Government have, on this occasion, created an extremely unsatisfactory procedure, as this afternoon’s debates have amply demonstrated.
Let me say something to the Scottish nationalists. I have not seen, none of my colleagues have seen, and the House has not seen them present in such numbers in
debates on the Housing and Planning Bill, and at no stage—not on Second Reading, in Committee or on Report—have we seen them vote on the Bill. The hon. Member for Perth and North Perthshire (Pete Wishart) said this afternoon, “We have little interest in this Bill”, and he was right, because so little of the Bill concerns Scotland. He and his party would do much better to concentrate on his own poor record in government, and on improving what the SNP Government are doing about housing in Scotland. There are 150,000 people on the council house waiting list in Scotland and there is the lowest level of house building in Scotland since 1947. This debate—these proceedings—is simply preventing us from getting on with the proper job of holding this Government to task on the Housing and Planning Bill in this Chamber, and I hope we can move on to Third Reading without any further delay.