I1l M.P.s no barrier to pairs — Labour

Press, 9 March 1982, Page 6

I1l M.P.s no barrier to pairs — Labour

PA ‘ ” Wellington Government members who suffer illness will be treated ' generously by the Labour ; Opposition in Parliament this year, according to the Labour Party. ' : Illness of either members ; or their families would be the one ground which readily ' earned a “pair” in the-House, said spokesmen for the Labour Party yesterday. This would avoid members of Parliament having to be 1 carried to the voting lobbies from their sick beds, as happened once in Britain. ’ Pairing means the Opposition stands down one of its ' members in the absence of a. 1 member from the other side, i enabling the Goverhment to i

maintain its majority. The Government will have only a one-vote majority on the floor of the House this session. The Labour Whips, Mr Jonathan Hunt and Mr Stan Rodger, said that their party would be “more generous about the illness of members or their families” than the National Opposition was during the one-vote majority of the 1957 to 1960 Labour Government. But they said Labour would not grant pairs easily. “Labour is entitled and will be expected to make proper Parliamentary use of its larger numbers which result from it getting a

higher total vote than the Govenrment itself,” they said. They said they wanted the public to understand that the granting, of pairs was not governed by Parliament’s standing orders, nor was it. part of parliamentary practice in the legal sense, i

“Some traditional or conventional 'rules’ ' have evolved over the years to meet the practical needs of Government, which involve the absence of Ministers from the House from time to time, and to meet the inevitable personal needs of members, such as illness, bereavement, and so on," they said.