ConservativeHome's ToryDiary

Still governing by proxy

We thought we'd resurrect the above graphic (from last October) to mark Labour's latest attempts to copy Tory policies.  Brown made his draft Queen's Speech statement earlier and David Cameron noticed quite a lot of policy pinching.  During PMQs Brown had accused the Tory leader of being shallow.  Cameron responded: "He can’t really say we haven’t got any substance when he’s taken it all and put it in his Queen’s Speech."

CCHQ has just published a "dirty dozen" of Tory policies that Labour has stolen (but won't implement properly).  See this PDF.

The text of David Cameron's full response to the Queen's Speech is here.

Darling raises tax allowances to compensate 10p tax victims

Developing >>>

3.49pm: Darling - Individual tax allowance up £600 but (IT SEEMS) for just one year - to £6,035.

3.49pm: Highlights of George Osborne's response:

• "Humiliating" for the Chancellor to have to make the tenth emergency statement since becoming Chancellor
• "Humiliating" to have to introduce a mini-budget to compensate for Gordon Brown's tax con Budget of 2007
• This is less like a considered statement from a Chancellor - more like a cynical press release in the middle of a by-election campaign
• What are the long-term plans to compensate people?  This is just a one-off measure - like the pre-election council tax discount.

3.55pm: Vince Cable welcomes the statement but attacks Darling for not giving him or George Osborne any pre-notification of the announcement.  He asks how many people will NOT be fully compensated by this move and urges the Chancellor to reconsider giving a rebate to people.

3.58pm: Frank Field apologises to the Prime Minister for what he said at the weekend about Mr Brown.

4.05pm CONSERVATIVEHOME'S VERDICT: Cynical?  Yes. Related to the by-election?  Yes.  Forced upon Labour?  Yes.  Even more borrowing?  Yes.  The right thing?  On the face of it, Yes.  As Lord Forsyth advocated some weeks ago: Raising the personal tax allowance was the right response to this issue.  The Tories should have recommended this option weeks ago, too.  We should now press for these higher thresholds to be made permanent.  It is right that as many low income people as possible are taken out of the tax system.

4.30pm: Nick Robinson's take: "Labour MPs are happier than they have been for weeks and the Tories, for the first time in a long time, look wrong footed."

4.43pm: Download PDF of full statement from George Osborne.

4.49pm: Guido welcomes Labour's "unfunded tax cut"!

4.52pm: TaxPayers' Alliance's response: "This 10p saga has been a mess from the beginning and this is a poor attempt to fix it. Large numbers of people on low incomes will still lose out, and even those the Chancellor says will be compensated are simply being given their own money back. It is a sorry state of affairs when taxation is pushing millions of families to the brink and the Government struggles to even make up for its own bad decisions. People urgently need Alistair Darling to make serious reductions in the tax burden, but at the moment he barely seems capable of tinkering around the edges.”

5.30pm: ThreeLineWhip: The Tories should have listened to Forsyth on 10p tax

5.59pm: From George Osborne: "What he didn’t tell us was that 1.1 million low earners on between £6,635 and £13,355 will still be worse off, by up to £112 a year. So the poorest people will still lose out."

The shadow cabinet versus the cabinet in parliament

Daily Mail sketchwriter Quentin Letts has scored the shadow cabinet against their opposite numbers in parliamentary debates:

Tory winners: Hague V Miliband; Davis V Smith; Duncan V Hutton; Gove V Balls; Hammond V Cooper; Hunt V Burnham; Strathclyde V Ashton.

Tory losers: Ainsworth V Benn; Herbert V Straw; Lansley V Johnson; Villiers V Kelly.

Most surprising Letts' verdict: "George Osborne v. Alistair Darling, Chancellor. For all Darling's troubles he has not yet been comprehensively bettered in the Commons by his shadow. Osborne found it easier to score against Gordon Brown. It's never easier playing an underdog. Score draw."

Meanest Letts verdict: "Theresa May v. Harriet Harman, Leader of Commons. Kitten-heeled May is no Cicero and makes far harder work of Harman than she should. If it's possible for both teams to lose a match, this is it."

The full article is here.

David Cameron's response to Budget: The Prime Minister who got us into this mess cannot possibly be the man to get us out of this mess

Highlights, Not verbatim:

This was a budget of reannouncements.

It was delivered with all of the excitement of reading out a telephone book.

This Government is not living in the same world as the rest of us who are paying more for our petrol and mortgages.

As this country enters troubled time we could not be less prepared.

We have the highest tax burden ['So what?' interjects Ed Balls!!].  The worst budget deficit.  The highest interest rates in the G7.

This Government did not use the good times to prepare Britain for bad times.

Debt is £100bn more than planned leaving no room for manoeuvre.

Other countries have room to cut taxes to help them out of recession.  Britain could not be less fiscally prepared for these bad times.

Whatever measure you take inflation is higher than in 1997.  The real inflation rates paid by families in Britain are much higher than the Government acknowledges.

Taxes are being raised on the very businesses and enterprises that we need to grow the economy.

He didn't mention the abolition of the 10p income tax band. But because of that low-paid NHS workers will pay more tax. Part-time teachers will pay more tax. Soldiers fighting in the heat of Afghanistan will be paying more tax.  5.3m of the lowest paid will be paying more tax.

What would we do?

Higher green taxes would be used to help all families.

We'd scrap complex business tax allowances to reduce corporation tax on all businesses.

We'd target higher taxes on alcohol on those drinks used by binge-drinkers.

[After another Balls' interjection, Cameron responds: He may be minister for children but he doesn't have to behave like one].

The City may be having a credit crunch but this Government is having a credibility crunch.

All over Britain people are wondering: I'm paying more tax post so why is my post office closing? I'm paying more tax but my maternity ward is closing? I'm paying more tax but I see so much waste?

The Prime Minister who got us into this mess cannot possibly be the man to get us out of this mess.

Labour backbenchers desert Brown for Christmas (a sign of things to come...?)

The benches behind him were relatively empty this afternoon as the Prime Minister got up to deliver a report on last week's EU summitry.  Although Mr Brown did not mention the Lisbon signing neither David Cameron nor Vince Cable were willing to let him push the issue under the carpet.

David Cameron said that the Prime Minister will not restore trust in politics until he grants a referendum.  This issue will not go away, the Leader of the Opposition insisted.  The Prime Minister's behaviour is making him look "shifty" and "untrustworthy".  As Mr Cameron concluded he suggested that Mr Brown was "weak", "dithering", "second-rate" and "not straight with people".

In his last Commons appearance as acting LibDem leader, Vince Cable said that the Prime Minister had been "incompetent" for not organising his diary so that he could attend the Lisbon signing, or "discourteous" for not having tried or "duplicitous" for trying to have a halfway house of signing when noone else was there.

Listen to Brown's statement via ToryRadio.

4.30pm: Download PDF of David Cameron's EU statement.

David Cameron's response to The Queen's Speech (highlights)

6.45pm: Guido has a graphic that the Brownites will hate.

4.30pm: I won't endear myself to the diehard loyalists with this verdict but Brown did okay this afternoon.  He wasn't as witty as Cameron.  Nor as smooth.  But he was weightier.  Cameron's remarks were light on policy.  Peter Riddell wrote last week that our party still had some way to go on policy substance.  Peter was right.  Brown also thinks he is on to a winning theme with whether or not the Conservatives will hold a referendum on the EU Treaty, should it be ratified.  He kept inviting David Cameron to say whether he would or not.  An uncomfortable-looking Cameron stayed glued to the green benches.  He did get up later - challenging Gordon Brown on whether he had looked at the opinion polls before cancelling the election and if he had planned to cut IHT before the Tory plan was announced.  The Tories roared with laughter when Brown said the IHT tax cut had been long in the pipeline.  I wouldn't say that Brown won the exchanges but this was an improved performance and a clear signal of his attempt to revert to his pre-Chicken Saturday strategy: I'm fit to be PM; Cameron is all PR.  Brown will find that a much harder sell than it was six weeks ago.

Fraser Nelson otoh thinks Cameron easily won the exchanges.

4.25pm: Download a PDF of Cameron's full text. ToryRadio has the audio.

Not verbatim:

3.30pm: David Cameron finishes by listing what Britain really needs.  He lists key Tory pledges on school reform, the environment and the family.

3.28pm: This is an incompetent government.  Its own lab caused Foot and Mouth.  We've had the first run on a British bank.  The Government doesn't know how many immigrants are in Britain.  The PM's British Jobs for British Workers pledge is illegal.  Where was the PM's moral compass when he borrowed slogans from the BNP and National Front?

3.27pm: This is a government of dithering and U-turns.  School surpluses. Taxes on bins. Entrepreneurs pay CGT. And then the biggest U-turn of all - the election was called off.  We've swapped a strong PM for a weak one.

3.25pm: Labour backbencher asks if Cameron will offer a referendum if the Treaty is ratified?  Cameron responds by saying he wants a referendum now and calls on Labour MPs to vote for it.

3.24pm: There is only one black hole in British politics and that's where the Prime Minister's credibility  used to be.

3.21pm: Where is the Government's vision?  His Budget wasn't a tax cut, it was a tax con.  His Party Conference speech was a laundry list of small promises.  It was a speech borrowed from John Kerry.  The Pre-Budget Report had a flight tax, inheritance tax and non-dom tax - all taken from the Conservatives.  The PM has nothing new to offer.

3.20pm: Attacks proposed abolition of A-levels, slamming on the brakes on City Academies and Labour's obsession with top-down control.

3.19pm: Attacks the PM's promise of deep-cleaning for the NHS.  What needs a real deep clean is the Government's reputation for half-truths.

3.17pm: The real problem with this Prime Minister and this Queen's speech is that it's all quick fixes and no long-term thinking.

3.16pm: Quick mention of Brown's broken promise on referendum.

3.15pm: There is no case for extra state funding of political parties unless there is a cap on all sources of donation.  Having chickened out of one election, Brown wants to fix the next.

3.15pm: Welcomes Counter-terrorism Bill and inclusion of Tory recommendation of post-charge questioning.

3.13pm: We welcome some Bills - not least those we proposed.  Some of these Bills have been recycled including the one on CrossRail - announced 11 times before.

3.12pm: After jokey responses to the traditional speeches from the Government backbench David Cameron invites the Prime Minister to comment on strategy in Afghanistan.

David Cameron responds to Brown's statement on the EU Treaty

David Cameron began his response to the Prime Minister's statement on the EU Treaty by noting that Mr Brown didn't mention the issue of a referendum once.  'If Labour can't trust the people, the people can't trust him,' he charged - echoing the words of Labour MP Gisela Stuart.

Cameron invited the Prime Minister to confirm:

• That this Treaty gets rid of the national veto in 60 areas.
• An EU President, Foreign Minister and diplomatic service would be created in all but the name.
• A new ratchet clause will be effected that will allow more vetoes to be scrapped without an IGC.  This ratchet clause will allow institutional changes every year.

Mr Cameron then listed the opinions of others:

• The Irish PM says that this Treaty represents 90% of the Constitution; the Spanish PM says 98% the same; Chancellor Merkel says the substance of the Constitution has been preserved.
• His new Minister, Lord (Digby) Jones of Birmingham has said that it's a con to call it a Treaty, it's a Constiutution.
• His Labour colleagues on the EU scrutiny committee say that the Treaty is substantially equivalent to the Constitution.

Cameron blasts Brown's "unacceptable" behaviour over Iraq withdrawals

The real fireworks will happen on Wednesday - at PMQs (which, as usual, we'll be live blogging) - but responding to today's Iraq statement David Cameron had his first opportunity to cross swords with Gordon Brown.  After statesmanlike questions on the meat of Mr Brown's announcements (which included rights for Iraqi interpreters to apply for UK residency if they've served for twelve months), the Tory leader went for the jugular in his closing:

"You promised a thousand of our troops would be brought back before Christmas - but isn't it the case that 500 of them had already been announced and 270 of them were already back in the country?  I have to say to the prime minister, this is of a different order of magnitude to what we've had from him over the last decade.  This is not double-counting of government spending, this is not just spinning the good bits of a Budget, this is about dealing with people's lives and the families of our servicemen.  And does he agree that this is just not an acceptable way for a prime minister to behave?"

First blood to Cameron in Commons blast at Brown

Gordon Brown has told the Commons that he wants to deliver a new "constitutional settlement" for the British people:

• He promised twelve transfer of powers from the Prime Minister and the Executive to Parliament - including the Executive's powers to declare war, request the dissolution of Parliament and key public appointments (including the Governor of the Bank of England and Church of England bishops).
• He promised the creation of a National Security Council - an idea already proposed by Pauline Neville-Jones some months ago (he went on to nick at least two other Tory ideas).
• He promised a new ministerial code overseen by an independent adjudicator.
• He also called for a cross-party debate on a new written Constitution and floated ideas such as weekend voting and a lower voting age.
• In his only clear nod to the LibDems on PR he promised a full report on the success of the new voting methods used since Labour came to power.
• Some civil libertarians would be pleased with his announcement that the restrictions on protests in Parliament Square could be lifted.

David Cameron then had an opportunity to respond - in his first parliamentary clash with Gordon Brown as the new Prime Minister - and his response was very impressive.  In a key passage he said:

"Constitutional change is not the solution because the constitution is not the cause: the cause is broken promises. People will ask how the person who broke this trust can be the person to mend it."

British life is too centralised, the Leader of the Opposition said, and Gordon Brown had been the great centraliser of the last ten years.

The new Prime Minister wants more openness and honesty but as Chancellor, Gordon Brown had levied taxation stealthily and failed to answer questions on the tax credit chaos.

He challenged Gordon Brown to reverse the transfer of power from democratically elected local councils to unelected regional assemblies.

What was the new Prime Minister going to do about the fact that there were two classes of MP in Britain?  MPs for English seats who had no influence on Scottish matters and Scottish MPs like Gordon Brown who could decide how English hospitals and schools were run.

He ended with an attack on Gordon Brown's failure to grant a referendum on the draft European Treaty.  It was, David Cameron said, yet another broken Labour promise.

The Prime Minister responded by joking that he thought David Cameron had wanted to end Punch and Judy politics.  He quoted Ken Clarke two or three times to back up his positions and embarrass David Cameron but this was definitely an exchange won by the Conservative leader.  He will have raised morale on the Tory benches.  It's the first Brown-Cameron PMQs tomorrow.  ConservativeHome will be live blogging it.

Cameron: Let the people decide

Speaking in the Commons this afternoon (where the number of Tory MPs appeared to significantly exceed the number of Labour MPs), the Conservative leader David Cameron said that the issue at stake in discussion of the Constitution/ EU draft Treaty was whether this Government was serious about listening to people or not.

Addressing The Prime Minister, Mr Cameron said the failure to agree to a referendum would "be remembered as one of the most flagrant breaches of any of the promises you have ever made."  He said that the Treaty was largely the same as the Constitution and quoted remarks from Bertie Ahern and Angela Merkel in support (Open Europe have a full list of Constitution-friendly EU leaders telling their electorates the same).  Mr Cameron went on to say that there were sixty areas where Britain would lose its veto - including energy, transport, the EU diplomatic service and employment law.

The EU was lacking the political will, he concluded, to tackle the real issues of climate change and economic competition.

Mr Brown, the Conservative leader concluded, had promised to be humble, a servant of the people and to listen.  Voters would only take these words seriously if he let the people decide on this Treaty.

David Cameron: "The tragedy of this Prime Minister is that he’s promised so much and delivered so little."

I didn't hear David Cameron's response to the Queen's Speech as I've been away from my desk all afternoon but here are a few highlights from the text:

Things to welcome in the Speech: "I am delighted the Government is to link the basic state pension with earnings – our proposal at the last election. The Treasury has finally been forced to make the provision of statistics independent. Again, something we called for at the last election.  And then there’s the Climate Change Bill – proposed over and over again by Conservatives, and opposed by the Prime Minister. Can I say how delighted I am to see a Bill in the Gracious Speech? I hope it will be a proper Bill and not a watered down Bill.  Government has to give a lead by setting a proper framework.  That must mean an independent body with annual targets and an annual report from government on its progress."

Iraq: "There are no easy options.  Militarily, we must do all we can to build up the Iraqi army. Diplomatically, we need to involve the regional powers.  While there is merit in contact with Syria and Iran – after all, the point of diplomacy is to talk to countries well beyond our traditional friends – it is on the moderate Arab governments that our efforts should concentrate.  Their support for stability in Iraq is what we most need.  And the key to securing that support is a fresh and unremitting push to resolve the Israel-Palestine conflict.  I hope the Prime Minister will press President Bush to use America’s influence to the full to achieve this, as well as enlisting the support of Europe. Taking these steps and maximising stability is the right background to bringing our troops home. But we should not set an artificial timetable."

Northern Ireland: "Turning to Northern Ireland, we back the efforts to restore power-sharing devolution in Northern Ireland. We are clear that if it is going to succeed then Sinn Fein must support the police, the courts and the rule of law. They could start by telling their supporters to co-operate with the police investigation into the brutal and callous murder of Robert McCartney.  When people look back at the Prime Minister’s time in office, they will give him enormous credit for his unstinting efforts to bring peace to Northern Ireland."

The Blair years: "After three massive majorities, almost a decade in power, 10 Gracious Speeches, and 370 pieces of legislation, the question they have to answer is why has so little been achieved?  It’s because they have put headlines above delivery.  They believe in centralised power, not social responsibility.  And, all too often, they’ve passed laws to score political points, rather than to achieve real change.  And Mr Speaker this Queen’s Speech is no different.  It’s so repetitive and so hollow that people know they’ve heard it all before."

No action on the causes of crime: "At the beginning of his time, the Prime Minister offered the nation hope that he would tackle the causes of crime.  As we look at the measures placed before the House today, all we see is the betrayal and debasement of that vital agenda.  Nothing about family breakdown.  And nothing about tackling addiction and dependency.  The Prime Minister’s simply given up on the causes of crime.  All we get is a series of eye-catching initiatives, which last about as long as a news bulletin."

Download PDF of full text of David Cameron's response.

Open thread on Queen's Speech

Please use the thread below to post your reactions to The Queen's Speech.

This just in from The Freedom Association: "New laws proposed today in the Queen's Speech pose a severe threat to freedom. New anti-terror laws will seek to further restrict the innocent in the name of security, and the reintroduction of the Mental Health Bill, which will allow people to be locked up without any crime having been committed, risks the freedom of thousands of innocent people.  Mark Wallace, Campaign Manager of The Freedom Association, said:

"Today's proposals threaten to make the already draconian restrictions on civil liberties in Britain even worse. It seems that the Government may even try to reintroduce the defeated plans for internment for 90 days without trial or charge. The Mental Health Bill would give yet more questionable powers of imprisonment to the State, allowing people innocent of any crime to be locked up. The vandalism of our justice system and historic freedoms seems set to continue apace.""

Parliament likely to be recalled after UN resolution

This morning's Telegraph was one of a number of newspapers to report mounting calls for Parliament to be recalled.  Half of the 170 MPs who have called for a return of Parliament are Labour.  Tony Blair's inner circle fears that a recall will be used by dissident Labour MPs to attack his support for Israel and, perhaps, to marshall renewed calls for him to quit Downing Street early.  A hint of the temperature of opinion on Labour's backbenches comes from an article by Kitty Ussher in this week's New Statesman. Before becoming an MP last year Ms Ussher was hardly a left-wing firebrand.  She was an economist for Britain in Europe and special adviser to Patricia Hewitt.  You know that the PM is in trouble when the likes of Ms Ussher write that "the only conclusion any right-minded person can draw is that the Prime Minister thought it was OK for Muslims to keep dying."  Very strong stuff.

Tony Blair fears that any recall of parliament without a UN resolution - or a substantial de-escalation of the fighting in Lebanon - risks exposing him to massive Labour unrest.  Government backbenchers like Joan Ruddock (formerly of CND) have already warned that Labour MPs are more unhappy at their leader's stance on this issue than they are over Iraq.

As for the Tory position?  The Telegraph reports David Davis as saying that Parliament should not be recalled on the back of yesterday's events but that there are arguments for MPs debating the Israel-Hezbollah-Lebanon conflict.

Related link: WhenWillBlairGo.com?

Backbench power 1, Freedom of association 0

Shadow Health Secretary Andrew Lansley reacted to last night's comprehensive ban on smoking in public places with this statement:

"The Conservatives were the first to offer a free vote on this issue.  The House of Commons took a decision in favour of a comprehensive ban on smoking in public places.  I took the personal view that that was a step too far and that private members clubs should be able to make a decision for themselves.  I object, however, to Government Ministers who brought forward legislation three months ago which included a series of exemptions for non food pubs and to allow smoking rooms in pubs and clubs, and argued for them to the House.   This evening those same Ministers did a series of hand-break turns and voted against each of the polices they had previously presented to the House.  Why on earth did Ministers not offer options and a free vote to the House last year as we told them they should?  The Government’s conduct of this bill has been a shambles.”   

Mr Lansley is, of course, right.  Labour's frontbench have been consistently outwitted and out-fought by an increasingly assertive parliamentary Labour party, unwilling to tolerate the high-handedness of their frontbench - high-handedness that they found insufferable during the last two parliaments with Tony Blair's three figure majorities.  The newly empowered Labour backbenches are not going to stop asserting themselves now that they have tasted power.

But if, after this vote, backbenchers and parliament are stronger against the executive, the freedoms of groups to associate together  are weaker.  That is certainly the conclusion of Robert H Halfon, our prospective parliamentary candidate for Harlow.  Robert sets out his objections to the ban on smoking in private clubs in the exclusive text below.  He argues that "Banning smoking may be good for a health, but it represents a fundamental assault on our civil liberties."

"Last night something remarkable happened in British politics. Far more important than the ban on smoking in public was the ban on smoking in private clubs.  The implications of this are enormous.  The Governnment have ruled that a group of individuals cannot get together in an association and smoke, even if every member, including staff agree to do so. 

Of course there is a case for banning smoking in public places (not an argument with which I agree, given that restaurants etc can have special rooms and smoke filters), nevertheless there may be those who believe that the health argument is so great that the public deserve to be protected.

But the ban on private clubs is a step too far. If the state can interfere in the running of private clubs in this way, where next? What happens if the state decides that alcohol is harmful? What happens if the state decides it doesn't like certain political activity? In short the vote banning smoking in private clubs has established a nasty precedent and given the Government unprecedented powers to intefere in civil society and private association.

This has not been a good few days for civil liberties. First the Government tried to appease Islamic fundametalists over the Danish cartoons; second the Government have forced ID cards through the Commons; and now we have  legislation allowing the state to control the activities of private clubs.

Little by little, important civil liberties are being whittled away by stealth. Now we hear the Government want to abolish next year's local elections in the interest of 'local government reform'.

We may not be thankfully under dictatorship, but this is not how a free, open and democratic society should work."

Cameron: Tony Blair's £7bn EU rebate surrender

During furious Commons exchanges David Cameron taunted the Prime Minister over his "£7bn EU rebate surrender":

"On the budget, does the Prime Minister remember having three clear objectives?  First, to limit its size, when almost every country in Europe is taxing and borrowing too much.  Second, to ensure fundamental reform of the CAP.  And third, to keep the British rebate unless such reform occurs.  Isn't it now clear that he failed in every single one?"

Mr Cameron concluded with these words:

Why did he give up £7 billion for next to nothing?  And - vitally - how is the Chancellor going to pay for it?  More taxes?  More borrowing?  Or cuts in spending?  Which is it?  A good budget deal would have limited spending.  It would have reformed the CAP.  And it would have helped change Europe's direction.  Isn't it the case that none of those things happened under the British Presidency?  Europe needed to be led in a new direction.  Aren't we simply heading in the same direction, but paying a bigger bill?"

Mr Blair defended the deal by saying that Britain had invested in the future prosperity of Eastern Europe:

"To have championed the cause of these new states; to have welcomed them into NATO and Europe and then to have refused to agree a budget that protects their future economic development would have been a betrayal of everything Britain has rightly stood for in the past 15 years or more since the fall of the Berlin wall.  They are our allies. It is our duty to stand by them. But it is also massively in our interest."

Read the full text of David Cameron's Commons speech.

The Beast of Bolsover accuses Osborne of snorting cocaine

BBCi:

"Labour MP Dennis Skinner has been banned from the Commons for the rest of Thursday for accusing shadow chancellor George Osborne of snorting cocaine.  The claim came as Mr Osborne took on ministers at Treasury questions.  Referring to the 1980s, Mr Skinner said: "The only thing that was growing then was the lines of coke in front of Boy George and the rest of the Tories."

Daily Mail:

"Dennis Skinner's Commons outburst against the new Tory team is by no means the first time the MP dubbed the Beast of Bolsover has fallen foul of such rules of Parliamentary behaviour.  In 1992, the plain-speaking scourge of sensitive Speakers - was ejected for calling the, then, Agriculture Minister John Gummer a "little squirt of a minister" and a "wart".  He was also removed for the day by former Speaker Betty Boothroyd in 1995 for accusing ministers of engaging in a "crooked deal" to sell off the coal industry.  In 1981 he was also "named" - the next stage up in the Speakers' disciplinary weaponry - and banned from the chamber for five days."