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Members' Salaries, Pensions and Allowances

I cannot say that I relish speaking in this debate; like many right hon. and hon. Members—and, it would now seem, the Government—I believe that there has to be a better way to determine the pay of Members of Parliament. However, we are where we are. Whatever the proposals for the future, we must address the proposals brought forward by the Government on the back of the SSRB report. First, I want to comment on the Government's handling of the report; that has been raised in interventions by a number of right hon. and hon. Members, and it informs us about the Government's attitude to the issue. That is part of the reason why right hon. and hon. Members are concerned about the Government's unwillingness to give an absolute guarantee that decisions on the new mechanism will be taken before the summer recess. The Government sat on the report for a considerable period. Indeed, I almost felt for the Leader of the House when in business questions every week she kept being asked when the report was coming forward. Each week, she tried to find different language—““shortly””, ““very shortly”” and ““imminently””. She was desperately trying to find a way of explaining what was happening. Then there was a farcical situation; the reason given for not publishing the report for Members—[Interruption.] My hon. Friend the Member for Buckingham (John Bercow) anticipates what I am about to say. We knew that the Leader of the Opposition and the leader of the Liberal Democrats had received copies and believed that certain others had also received some, yet we were told that Members could not have copies because they had not been printed. That announcement was met with howls of derision, and that showed how poor the response had been. The issue was not only about Government dithering; crucially, while they were sitting on the report and not allowing Members to see it, they were leaking details to the press. The Prime Minister went on the BBC to explain the Government's position and what he wanted MPs to vote on, yet we had never seen the report. The whole thing was a farce, and it is against that background that a number of interventions have been made on the Leader of the House about expectations about the Government's intentions for the introduction of the new system. I support the Government's desire to introduce a new system; indeed, my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition called for one some time ago. However, we need to be clear that the Government will bring it in before the summer recess—that should be an absolute, rather than the Government's intention. The Leader of the House determines the business before the House, and it is up to her to say whether that debate will take place before the summer recess.