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Business of the House

I can assure the hon. Gentleman, as I have the shadow Leader of the House, that we intend to make progress on the Wright Committee's report. I reiterate that that Committee's work was not foisted on us: we actually welcomed the proposal made by my hon. Friend the Member for Cannock Chase (Dr. Wright) to set up the Committee and swiftly brought forward the resolution to establish it. We are grateful for the work that it did, including over the summer recess, and we want to ensure that it is built upon and taken forward. As far as the freedom of information request and the veto is concerned, there was a full statement on that by the Justice Secretary on—I think—10 December. ... I beg the hon. Gentleman's pardon—he is right that it was a written ministerial statement. I think I remember that that statement contained the information that there were something like 16,000 routine FOI requests, of which only two have been vetoed, so it was a very exceptional occurrence, which is why things were spelt out in a written ministerial statement. The framework that is set down by the Freedom of Information Act 2000 was followed as part of that process. As for charities, resources and the health service, there are Health questions next week, so the hon. Gentleman could look for an opportunity to raise that issue. If his question goes wider to include the funding of charities as part of the contribution to our health services, he might find an opportunity to catch Mr. Speaker's eye in the debate on the pre-Budget report, which will happen immediately after business questions. On financial regulation, the hon. Gentleman will know that the House has devoted a considerable amount of time—and rightly so—to the question of the regulation of financial services since the global credit crisis was precipitated in the United States. That has meant more work to toughen up the regime of the Financial Services Authority, the Financial Services Bill and international action so that we can work with other countries to ensure that this contagion of a lack of confidence in financial services does not spread with such devastating consequences as it did before. He will know that such things are constantly on the Treasury's agenda, the business Department's agenda and the House's agenda. On the UK and Iceland—as it happens, the Netherlands is also involved—the UK Government stepped in. That was part of the action that we have taken so that people have not been left to sink or swim during the recession. Just as we have taken action to protect people who are at risk of losing their jobs, protected small businesses and protected people from losing their homes, we have taken action to protect people with deposits in Icelandic banks. That is all part of the action that has necessarily resulted in an increase in the deficit. Who would say that it was not worth increasing the deficit to make sure that we protect not only people's deposits in Icelandic banks, but confidence in financial services by the action that this Government have taken? All those things are part of what has built up the deficit. The next time anybody says that we should not have allowed public debt to rise, they should say where they think we should not have taken the action that has been so important. We will carry on with our bilateral work between not only ourselves and Iceland, but our European colleagues, to make sure that Iceland plays its part in paying back what it owes to the Government and people in this country.