Chris Philp

It is a great pleasure to address you by your new title, Madam Deputy Speaker. You and I were first elected in 2015, and it is a real pleasure to see the first of the 2015 intake assuming the Chair to preside over our proceedings. I am delighted to be at the Dispatch Box for your first appearance in the Chair—the first of many over the coming years and, I hope, the coming decades—and I congratulate you on your well-deserved election. As the Leader of the House said at the beginning of her eloquent and detailed speech, standards and integrity are critical to this House of Commons. We are the crucible of our nation’s democracy. Our constituents have sent us here to represent them, and they are entitled to expect the very highest standards of behaviour from us as Members of Parliament. We are fortunate that our standards in public life are higher than those in many other countries, but there is no room for complacency and we should strive constantly to improve and perfect the standards met in this House. That is a duty we owe the public. I broadly welcome the initiative taken by the Leader of the House, but I want to make a couple of general points before turning to some of the specific matters before us. First, it is very important that these reforms, or indeed any reforms, command public confidence and are seen to be conducted for the best of reasons. It is important for us to proceed on a cross-party basis, because that will show that the measures are being taken not for party-political reasons but for the best of reasons—as I am sure they are—and will ensure that they stick. If there is a broad cross-party consensus, whatever reforms are made will endure and survive beyond any change of Government in the future—hopefully the near future from my point of view, but not, I suspect, from the point of view of the Leader of the House.