GOVERNMENT plans to restrict Scottish MPs from voting on English matters dominated yesterday’s pre-Budget Prime Minister’s Questions.
Plans to change the House of Commons standing orders to bring in English votes for English laws (Evel) will be voted on next Wednesday.
Labour Party acting leader Harriet Harman accused David Cameron of breaking a manifesto commitment to consult the House of Commons Procedure Committee before the vote.
Harman pointed out that Cameron “cannot have consulted the Procedure Committee because it has not even been set up yet”.
She continued: “The Prime Minister should recognise the strength of feeling in all parts of the House about the proper processes to get to this change. He should consult properly, or he will be breaking a promise he made in his manifesto”.
SNP MP Kirsten Oswald followed up and asked Cameron to “please tell us why he is breaking his manifesto promise?” to which the Prime Minister replied: “We are consulting the whole of the House of Commons, and the whole of the House of Commons will have a vote. “
Cameron added: “Given our modest proposal would actually restrict the SNP from far fewer votes than its own self-denying ordinance does, I would think it should vote wholeheartedly with the Government on this modest proposal.”
The Government faces the prospect of a first defeat when the House votes on Evel. Tory backbench rebels who want to spend more time discussing the proposals will side with Labour, the SNP, Plaid Cymru and Northern Irish parties to vote against.
During the session, in his weekly question to the Prime Minister, SNP leader Angus Robertson asked Cameron to ensure the Government did everything to mark the genocide in Srebrenica 20 years ago.
Replying, the Prime Minister said: “It was the largest act of genocide since the Holocaust on the mainland of Europe ... 8,300 people were murdered.
“The first thing is to be very clear that it was genocide, and to say to people who question that that they are genocide deniers. I am very proud of the fact that Britain has the second largest set of commemorations and events to mark the anniversary of these dreadful events.
“We have been holding the pen at the UN in drafting a resolution to try and bring the world together to make sure it is remembered in the right way, and we should continue to do all we can to keep this at the front and centre of politics so people realise this was a genocide. We must learn the lessons from it.”
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