Lindsay Hoyle is, to put it mildly, on the warpath. The Speaker is now giving almost daily statements in which he complains about the government’s habit of making announcements to the media rather than in parliament.
Last week he was furious that Health Secretary Sajid Javid had held a Downing Street press briefing on Covid instead of coming to the Commons. Yesterday he granted four urgent questions as punishment for the latest round of briefings. Today he was back fulminating again, telling the chamber that the government was breaking its own ministerial code by giving Budget announcements to the press first. He continued:
I want the House and especially the government to be clear if the government continues to treat this House in a discourteous manner, I will do everything in my power to ensure ministers are called here at the earliest opportunity to explain themselves.
There are suspicions in Tory ranks that Hoyle will make some kind of statement before he leaves the chair for the Budget
This might, to an outsider, sound a bit like someone complaining about being NFI to a party, but it is important.
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