时间：2001年7月18日下午
地点：英国议会下院
时段：Prime Minister’s Questions
事件：威廉·黑格作为保守党领袖最后一次参加首相质询时间
Mr. William Hague (Richmond, Yorks): Is it still the Prime Minister’s view that the Government’s annual report is a major innovation to be repeated every year?
The Prime Minister: Before I answer the right hon. Gentleman’s question, as this is his last Prime Minister’s Question Time I want to say that Members on both sides of the House wish him well and good luck for the future. We shall all miss his wit and humour—although I may not, as I was the object of most of it. Anyway, we wish him well in the future.
In respect of annual reports, it is important that we set out the Government’s achievements and lack of achievements in whichever year we are in power.
Mr. Hague: I thank the Prime Minister for his remarks about me. Debating with him at the Dispatch Box has been exciting, fascinating, fun, an enormous challenge and, from my point of view, wholly unproductive in every sense. I am told that in my time at the Dispatch Box I have asked the Prime Minister 1,118 direct questions, but no one has counted the direct answers—it may not take long.
Four years ago, the right hon. Gentleman said:
"The Annual Report is a major innovation. People are entitled to know how we are shaping up . . . This Report is part of that process. We will repeat it each year."
The first annual report was called “So what do you think?” and the second was called “So what are we doing?” This year’s seems to be called “So where is it?” How does the Prime Minister feel about not even keeping his promise to publish a report about keeping his promises?
The Prime Minister: I confess that I never thought the right hon. Gentleman was that keen on our annual reports when we did publish them—but what we do, of course, is publish all the results of the things we have done during the year, and the things we have not done, as well. Those are the things about which the right hon. Gentleman has asked me in the more than 1,000 questions that he has asked from the Dispatch Box.
Hon. Members: Where is it?
Mr. Hague: “Where is it?” is indeed the question. As the Prime Minister has abandoned the annual report as a way of holding the Government to account, what about the traditional way of holding the Government to account? What about Ministers—[Interruption.] Labour Members must understand that Governments must be held to account between elections as well as at elections.
What about Ministers taking responsibility? The Government’s introduction of AS-levels has made schoolchildren’s lives a misery, added to the burden on teachers and led to the extraordinary circumstances in which the Government cannot even guarantee that the results will be published on time. Which Minister will take responsibility for that?
The Prime Minister: Of course we take responsibility—all of us collectively, as a Government for both the publication of results and the AS-levels. The AS-levels were introduced to ensure that children were tested properly throughout their schooling; that is in common with the system in many other countries. Of course, after their introduction it is important for us to look at the way that has been done and there may well be lessons that we can learn, but I think it would be a big mistake for us to end up saying that it was not important to test children throughout their schooling and to publish the results.
Mr. Hague: In other words, no Minister will take responsibility. AS-level students are told that if they
"do not offer an adequate attempt to answer the question or complete the task"
they will be ungraded. It is a good job that the Prime Minister is not doing AS-levels.
No annual report, and no Minister willing to take responsibility—let us try another form of accountability. The Prime Minister has said that he accepts the need for a proper inquiry into the foot and mouth disaster. Does he agree that a proper inquiry must be a public inquiry?
The Prime Minister: I do not agree that it must be a public tribunal inquiry, for the reasons given by the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons, which said that it was sensible to have a different type of inquiry in order to produce an inquiry more quickly. We will have that inquiry, and we will publish the results. But we have also said, again in line with what the royal college has said, that it is better to have the inquiry after we have eradicated the disease, which must remain our No. 1 priority.
Incidentally, in respect of the AS-levels, I did not say that no one would take responsibility; I said that we all, as a Government, take responsibility.
Mr. Hague: Well, for the whole Government to resign immediately would be a rather extreme step to take over AS-levels. [Interruption.] It might be a welcome step, however.
So, there is no annual report, no Minister will take responsibility for a fiasco, and no public inquiry will be held into foot and mouth despite all past precedent. Perhaps the Prime Minister will at least agree to accountability to the House after this week’s vote in the House. Will he now listen to Members in all parts of the House, and adopt the proposal that Select Committee members should not be appointed by the Whips or by any party managers?
The Prime Minister: I gather that the Modernisation Committee decided this morning to look into the matter. It will publish a report and we will consider it carefully.
I simply point out that it is funny that in the 18 years of Conservative government, when the right hon. Gentleman was in office, all these great designs to reform Parliament never saw the light of day.
Mr. Hague: My 1,123rd and final question is on the same theme of accountability. May I ask the Prime Minister about what he and I know to be the case—that allowing one Prime Minister’s Question Time a week is not an adequate way of holding the Prime Minister of our country to account? Members of all parties should have an opportunity to question the Prime Minister of the day more frequently, and on a more sustained basis. Would that not be in the best interests of the Government, Parliament and public engagement in our political life?
The Prime Minister: In respect of holding the Government to account, let me point out that over the four years that I have been Prime Minister I have answered questions in the House for longer than either of my two predecessors, and made more statements.
In respect of accountability, of course we as a Government are held to account. We are held to account in the House, where, for example, the number of ministerial statements has, I think, been far in excess of the number under the previous Government, and we are held to account by the British people. We were held to account by them on 7 June. We were returned with this majority as a result of that general election.
We will indeed miss the right hon. Gentleman’s wit and humour. I hope that he is not retiring to the Back Benches as they are getting rather overcrowded at the moment. I would have thought that there was every role for him, for example as shadow Foreign Secretary. If the right hon. and learned Member for Rushcliffe (Mr. Clarke) were to win, he could come here and tell us about the virtues of the single currency and the rapid reaction force. Alternatively, if the hon. Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Mr. Duncan Smith) were elected, he could come here and tell us what a dreadful idea it was and how the country would have none of it. In any event, whatever the right hon. Gentleman does, we wish him well.
