New Speaker tells ministers to stop policy leaks

By Tim Castle

LONDON (Reuters) - New Commons Speaker John Bercow told ministers on Wednesday to stop their practice of using the media to announce policy and to return to giving such statements to parliament first.

Bercow, presiding over his first session of Prime Minister's Questions since his election on Monday, also told MPs to keep their interventions brief and to hush their noisy barracking so that House of Commons debates could be heard.

Governments have long become used to trailing policy decisions in advance in newspapers or BBC Radio's early morning Today Programme, but Bercow said the time had come for this to end.

"When ministers have key policy statements to make, the House must be the first to hear them, and they should not be released beforehand," he said.

Bercow, at 46 the youngest speaker for 170 years, had promised if elected to reform parliamentary practice and reassert the role of non-government backbenchers.

Many have blamed the pre-announcement of policy for falling attendances in the Commons chamber, where debates rarely attract more than a handful of MPs.

Dressed simply in a business suit and tie, and wearing a black gown, Bercow intervened early in the half-hour session during which Prime Minister Gordon Brown takes questions from backbenchers and opposition leaders.

Many Conservative MPs regard Bercow as a turncoat after moving from the far-right of their party to a position many feel is too close to Labour.