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Fixed-term Parliaments Bill

If I may say so, the ““and”” is disjunctive, not conjunctive—and I know that because I drafted that piece of the manifesto. I simply do not understand why—and we have heard no serious explanation as to why—the Government are bolting it. This morning, the Leader of the House gave us a further example when he announced a decision—not a proposal; it had been decided, and that was the word he used—that this Session should last for two years. He then tried to excuse that, having run into something of a squall in the House, by saying—we can check this against the record—that it was a ““proposition”” that could be further considered in this Bill. I hope that the Deputy Prime Minister will examine closely what the Leader of the House said about commitments for debate on that aspect of a consequence of this Bill.