Meeting of the Parliament (Hybrid)

Meeting date: Thursday, October 7, 2021

Official Report 1077KB pdf

Point of Order

On a point of order, Presiding Officer. I seek your guidance, under standing order rule 13.2, on how I can request a minister to exercise their ability to provide a statement as to why, since the start of this academic year, in the daily coronavirus Covid-19 data that is issued at 2 o’clock each day, a subparagraph contains the phrase

“Data on students at universities and colleges testing positive for COVID-19 is no longer being updated as most teaching has stopped for the summer.”

Universities went back for the new term as early as 4 September, so how can a Government minister be urged to attend Parliament to give a statement as to why the academic dates are not known within Government and, more importantly, why the data has not been provided?

I thank the member for his point of order. Mr Whitfield will be aware that consideration of the business programme is a matter for the Parliamentary Bureau in the first instance. Therefore, he might wish to ask his business manager to raise the matter at the next meeting of the Parliamentary Bureau.