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Inter-Parliamentary Union

It is a great pleasure, Mr. Bercow, to serve—for the first time, I think—under your gimlet eye. The last time that we debated the Inter-Parliamentary Union, it was under the gimlet eye of my hon. Friend the Member for Macclesfield (Sir Nicholas Winterton). I know, Mr. Bercow, that you will resist the temptation to step down from the Chair and participate in the debate, but I know that you feel very strongly about a number of the issues raised. Like the Minister, I congratulate our chairman, the hon. Member for Kingswood (Roger Berry). I have never been on an IPU delegation with him, but I have been on an all-party trip with him, and I know how seriously he takes all the issues under discussion. At times, there is a cynical view that our IPU delegations go on surf-and-sand trips abroad. Although some of them are in what could be regarded as desirable parts of the world, many of them are not, and from talking to colleagues who have participated, I know that they involve a considerable amount of work. I was struck by the mention made by the Minister and the hon. Member for Kingswood of the remarkable man who co-founded the IPU. I have done a little research on him. William Randal Cremer—he preferred to be known as William Randal—was a Liberal Member of Parliament, although I suspect that if the Labour party had existed then, he would have been a Labour MP. He left school aged 13; he was self-taught and eventually became a carpenter. He worked incredibly hard in many social areas. What is particularly cheering is that he did not become a Member of Parliament until he was aged 57. An article on him states:"““Thirty-six years were to elapse from the end of his apprenticeship in 1849 to his first election to Parliament in 1885, at the age of 57. Nowadays a newcomer of that age would stand little chance of being adopted as an official candidate of a major political party. That he achieved so much in the remaining 23 years of his life should be viewed as a classic example of how much society can benefit by not treating citizens over the age of 50 as past their prime.””" Most of us here would say, ““Amen to that!””