How did an amendment brought by a Lib Dem backbencher to an uncontroversial bill wind up with the government sustaining its first proper defeat? Today Greg Mulholland’s changes to the Small Business, Enterprise and Employment Bill which would allow pub landlords to buy beer from whatever company they liked rather than the company who owns their premises passed 284 votes to 269.
The Times’s Sam Coates reports that the minister responsible for the Bill, Matt Hancock, was seen grovelling to the Prime Minister for the defeat, which everyone involved regards as entirely unnecessary. This is the first proper defeat because it is the first time the government has lost a vote without collective responsibility being formally suspended. There were 15 Conservative and 28 Lib Dem rebels, including Duncan Hames, who voted against his wife, the Business Minister Jo Swinson. Presumably an offer of a quiet pint to patch things up wouldn’t help in this case.
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