I thank the Leader of the House for announcing the business for next week. I am not sure whether she is going to the Brexit bonding/war session later this afternoon, but can we have a debate on what other dystopian nightmares Brexit will not be quite like? Maybe “Apocalypse Now”— apocalypse in a couple of years?—or “Children of Men”. My favourite would have to be “The Matrix”, as we have a bunch of clueless fantasists living in an alternative world and believing that they can impose their version of reality on everyone else—it could not be more apt than that.
On alternative realities, we had English votes for English laws in all its absurd glory yesterday. Bells go on, bells go off; Mace comes down, Mace goes up. Nothing ever happens. There is no debate and no consideration of all these weighty English-only issues; nothing goes on at all. It is now becoming profoundly embarrassing for this House. EVEL now seems to be designed only to get in the way of the workings and procedures of this House, and it is a psychological barrier to the unity of the membership of this House based on nationality and geography. For goodness’ sake, Leader of the House, get shot of this absurd system.
Lastly, I had the good fortune of being at the Brits last night to see the cream of British musical talent on show. Before you ask, Mr Speaker, MP4 were once again shamefully passed over for the parliamentary rock band of the year. It has taken our musicians to remind this Government to do the right thing, and the hon. Member for Walsall South (Valerie Vaz) is right to mention Stormzy and his tour-de-force performance last night in which he asked, “Where’s the money for Grenfell? You thought we were all going to forget about Grenfell? Well, we are not.” It is great that our actors, our young people and our musicians are reminding this Government to do the right thing.