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Business of the House

It is custom and practice for Leaders of the Opposition and chairs of the trustees of parliamentary pensions to receive a draft copy before it goes to the printers. That has, indeed, occurred on this occasion. As to the various speculations in the newspapers about the SSRB report, we will have to wait until it is published to establish whether the leaks were accurate. On public sector pay policy, it is not jumping the gun in respect of the SSRB report for the Prime Minister to point out—and for the Government to strongly take the view—that we are paid out of the public purse. That being the case, we should expect to have the same public sector pay discipline applied to us as has been applied to the rest of the public sector as we take the difficult decision to ensure that pay is staged so that inflation stays down and interest rates remain low in order for the economy to remain strong.