20:05 Mr James Gray (North Wiltshire) (Con)

Without being difficult, however, I have a couple of questions for the Government on which Ministers might choose to brood before they come to reply. First, I have some difficulties with the constitutional aspect of taking something that should be a ministerial or political duty and trying to put it into law. Law is something for which there is a sanction if it is not adhered to, so I wonder what would happen if some subsequent Government—I am sure not this one—20 years from now failed to fulfil the covenant. What would be the sanction against the Secretary of State? Would he come before the House and get ticked off? Would he go to prison, pay a fine or lose his job? What would be the sanction inherent in the Secretary of State failing to perform under clause 2? The same applies to a number of Bills that we passed before the general election on climate change and child poverty. They are not capable of sanction, and I slightly wonder whether there is a constitutional difficulty with putting the covenant in the Bill as it has been. In other words, should it not be a matter about which Ministers are overwhelmingly concerned, whether or not it is written into law? If they were not, they would lose power at a subsequent general election, so there is quite an interesting constitutional conundrum in the Bill.

[Source]