Speaker’s Rulings — Oral Questions—Members Quoting Partial Statements

Members, following a point of order from the Leader of the House, I’ve decided to make the following ruling. It is both the longstanding practice of this House and exceedingly common for members to use excerpts in questions—Speakers’ ruling 177/7. Standing Order 390 explicitly states that questions must be concise, which means quotations of any great length will be ruled out of order. Members asking questions may choose which part of a Minister’s statement to quote, as long as they do so accurately, can authenticate it, and do not misrepresent the statement—for example, by failing to include the word “not” or similar. If words are missed from the middle of a quote, an ellipsis must be used—Speaker’s ruling 178/3—and the missing words cannot fundamentally change the meaning of the quote; if they do, the question will not be allowed. In return, a Minister can choose how much context they wish to include in their answer. All members will be familiar with the phrase “I stand by my full statement in the context in which it was made”. The answer is so familiar as to be routine in this House and only underlines the accepted practice of quoting partial statements.