speaker as robin cooke recognized as his new home secretary realizes this cannot go on. so why is he seeking to restart a general debate on electoral reform? we had the update. the independents power inquiry, we can't afford to wait for a cross-party consensus because westminster stitcher. we don't neat need to wait for his cabinet to make up its mind. it's not up to them to decide how our democracy works. people should now be given a say so will the prime minister now call a referendum this autumn to give people a choice? a choice between the bankrupt system we have now and serious proposals for reform which finally puts people in charge, not the politicians. mr. speaker, the prime minister has nothing to lose. this is no time for his trademark timidity. just get on with it. will he cancel the recess and pass the legislation that we need and give people the say we deserve. >> mr. speaker, let me say we agree first of all -- we grow and i'm glad he has said this explicitly that we will all support the new parliamentary standards authority. we'll move from self-regulation