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Speaker's Committee on the Search of Offices on the Parliamentary Estate

I will not give way, because time is very short. To wait such a long time before Parliament has an opportunity to make a decision would, I think, be wrong. That is why I have a great deal of sympathy with the amendment tabled by the right hon. and learned Member for North-East Fife. I hope that the Leader of the House and other colleagues will reflect on the issue. It is possible for the Committee to meet and, of its own volition, to decide to sit in camera and to adjourn. If there are to be seven wise people, we assume that they will be wise enough to know what bits they do and do not want to put into the public domain. If we do not trust Members of the House to deal with those processes, there will be no one else whom we can trust in respect of these matters. There has been speculation in the press about whether the Home Affairs Committee is to hold an inquiry on these matters. These matters go far beyond its remit. There are distinguished members of the Select Committee from both sides of the House all around me; we will not have a chance to discuss these matters until tomorrow, which is when we will take a decision. However, before then it is important for the House to reflect on what is a very serious situation. If it is only a question of timing, that is a very small concession that the Government have to make, and then one leaves it to the good offices of those sitting on the Committee to make a decision. I have debated with the hon. Member for Ashford many times across the Floor of the House on matters to do with home affairs, and I have always found him to be a decent man and a person of great integrity. We, as Members of this House, are able to put up with the brickbats of public life and exposure in the media, as we all do many times, some more than others. My sympathy is with his family, especially his young daughter, in having faced what he and they faced that day, and with his members of staff. I know that members of my staff sometimes wish that somebody would come and take all their computers away because of the level of casework that we have. However, it must be a terrible experience for the hon. Gentleman's staff and constituents, because on those computers is routine casework. Some cases may well involve complaints against the press—[Interruption] I mean the police; perhaps that was wishful thinking—and therefore cannot be dealt with. The hon. Gentleman therefore has our sympathy. I hope that as a House we can come together on this matter. It should not be a partisan issue—it should be a question of the rights of Parliament, and I hope that the Leader of the House will bear that in mind when she replies to the debate.