Commons
Ministerial Statement
7 September 2026
Local Government Reorganisation
Less than two months ago, the right hon. Lady’s predecessor rushed to the House on the last day before recess, to say how essential these measures were, and Conservative Members warned that it was gerrymandering. It is not that the Secretary of State has listened; she has been told by her lawyers th…
Commons
Ministerial Statement
7 September 2026
Economic Growth
Is it not bizarre that just a few hours after the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government came to the House to pause local government reorganisation on the basis of legal risk, so that she can have more consultation, the Chief Secretary to the Treasury said, “We will bring a…
Commons
Statutory Instrument
7 September 2026
3 contributions
Draft Digital Government (Disclosure of Information) Regulations 2026
Will the Minister clarify how many people are within scope of benefiting from the regulation and what the total cost will be, in terms of the savings they will get?
I speak to my brief exchange earlier with the Minister. As the previous speaker, the hon. Member for Harpenden and Berkhamsted, said, the draft regulations are fairly benign and very welcome to help people who are struggling with their bills. Fundamentally, however, when changing the law, it behoves…
+1 more contribution in this session
Commons
Ministerial Statement
16 July 2026
Local Government Reorganisation
When a Minister comes to the House on the last day before summer recess to announce proposals that his own MPs describe as “utterly unacceptable”, “sacrificing their communities” and “a disgrace”, and other proposals such as those for Cambridgeshire are put on hold, it is a clear sign of a flawed pr…
Commons
Debate
6 July 2026
Environmental Protection
The Minister was just talking about metrics. Further to the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Fylde (Mr Snowden), will she say a little more about organised crime? In assessing the effectiveness of these changes, what key metrics would she apply to prosecutions relating to organised crime?
Commons
Ministerial Statement
30 June 2026
Defence Investment Plan
The strategic defence review highlighted the importance of the active reserve, but the defence investment plan shows that there is no increase in reserve numbers this Parliament. Remarkably, the reserve is not mentioned in the land section. Even the commitment on cadets, made less than a year ago in…
Commons
Statutory Instrument
9 June 2026
9 contributions
Draft Marine Licensing (Miscellaneous Provisions) (Amendment etc.) Order 2026
What is the maximum fine for a company that does not comply with this regulation?
My reading last night suggested that it was just £50,000. It is interesting that the Minister does not know what the fine actually is. What does she think the cost of complying with the EIA requirement would be for a company?
+7 more contributions in this session
Commons
Oral Questions
Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
4 June 2026
Topical Questions
On a point of order, Mr Speaker, as long ago as September 2024, the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs was notified of a category 1 incident, the most serious category of pollution incident, which occurred near Whittlesey in my constituency. When no prosecution occurred following the…
Commons
Debate
4 June 2026
General Medical Council
A nine-year-old constituent of mine, Jack Moate, died in 2015, two months after an operation was carried out on his hips by an orthopaedic consultant at Addenbrooke’s hospital in Cambridge. Jack’s mother, Elizabeth, said he spent his final weeks in “constant agonising pain”. At the time, she had bee…
Commons
Westminster Hall
22 April 2026
9 contributions
Army Reserve
I beg to move,
That this House has considered the Army Reserve.
It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Mrs Barker. It is also a pleasure to have the Minister in her place; she brings with her a distinguished service record and is recognised across the House as having a genuine commitment…
I know that the hon. Member has a long-standing commitment to the cadets and the military in general. The cadets is a recognised pipeline into the armed forces, and I am sure the Minister recognises its importance in giving people their first taste of military experience. Again, I think that is an a…
+7 more contributions in this session
Commons
Debate
20 April 2026
Security Vetting
In the readout of the Prime Minister’s meeting on 15 April on vetting, it states:
“There is no evidence that the decision to grant DV despite the UKSV advice had been disclosed to anyone outside FCDO and UKSV”
until the vetting document itself was shared with the permanent secretary of the Cabinet…
Commons
Debate
25 March 2026
4 contributions
Victims and Courts Bill
The Minister gives the fact that she needs to consult as a reason for turning down the Lords amendments. Is the usual approach not to consult before bringing the legislation, not to bring the legislation then consult afterwards?
It would be easy for anyone watching the proceedings, with not many Members in the Chamber to discuss these Lords amendments, to think this is about some technical issue or minor point of debate, but the votes today really do matter. They matter to victims, who are currently charged often thousands …
+2 more contributions in this session
Commons
Proceedings
24 March 2026
Defence
Does my hon. Friend agree that one way to respond to a crisis and to deliver mass quickly would be to scale up the reserves during this Parliament? Does he find it surprising, as I do, that the relatively small cost—in a £60 billion budget—of scaling up the reserves would help to deliver some of tha…
Commons
Debate
23 March 2026
Middle East
There is a glaring contradiction between the Defence Secretary’s statement, which refers to
“taking the necessary action to strengthen our collective defence,”
and announcing to the House that we will have another recess without the defence investment plan. Does he recognise that last year the Def…
Commons
Oral Questions
23 March 2026
Topical Questions
The Government are making top-up payments to asylum support enablement cards, but have refused to answer my written parliamentary questions regarding how many payments have been made and how much is being spent. That is even though that is information the Department must have. It is held digitally, …
Commons
Westminster Hall
23 March 2026
3 contributions
Court and Tribunal Transcripts
My hon. Friend is making an excellent speech. I fully support the case that he is making for full transparency, but in the spirit of “I’ll start by starting”, he touched on witness statements that would have been prepared beforehand but were still not available. If the Minister accepts the principle…
Over the years, I have often found that when the Members on each Front Bench agree on an issue, there are dangers for Parliament, not least because legislation is often insufficiently scrutinised. Conversely, when the Back-Bench Members of each of the parties agree, it is often—it certainly was when…
+1 more contribution in this session
Commons
Ministerial Statement
19 March 2026
International Development
I support prioritising hard power over soft power to protect our national security. In her statement, the Secretary of State drew a direct link between additional defence spending and reducing the development budget, but that was the exact opposite of the position put forward by the Prime Minister w…
Commons
Oral Questions
19 March 2026
Business of the House
On Tuesday evening, a car with five teenagers left the road near Wisbech in my constituency and entered the river. Tragically, only three of the teenagers exited the car. I am sure the whole House will join me in sending our condolences to the families affected by this tragedy and the emergency serv…
Commons
Oral Questions
19 March 2026
Topical Questions
After a serious pollution incident, the Environment Agency produces a help report, which is shared with the Secretary of State’s officials, so she would have been notified of the category 1 pollution incident—the most serious rating—that occurred in September 2024 at Stanground, near Whittlesey in m…
Commons
Debate
18 March 2026
2 contributions
Flooding: Rural Communities
I also commend my hon. Friend for raising this hugely important topic, and she is right to highlight the importance of local voices. Local voices know best where the flood risks are. They are most at risk and have real skin in the game, but they often feel that bodies such as Natural England and som…
The Minister invited hon. Members to present pain points, so perhaps I can share one from my time in her Department. Natural England’s gold-plating of some of its statutory objectives often seemed at odds with the ministerial steers that were given. Does she feel she has sufficient control over the …
Commons
Oral Questions
23 February 2026
Labour Together and APCO Worldwide: Cabinet Office Review
Can the Minister confirm that the new head of propriety and ethics was appointed without a fully open, competitive recruitment process, and that the outgoing head of propriety and ethics was promoted to permanent secretary also without a fully open recruitment process? If so, he will know that both …
Commons
Debate
11 February 2026
Police Grant Report
As the Minister is getting into the detail of the funding package, will she accept two broad points? First, the overall number of police officers in England has fallen on Labour’s watch. Secondly, because of cost pressures on police forces from other decisions taken by her Government, the Associatio…
Commons
Debate
26 January 2026
5 contributions
Armed Forces Bill
Further to the previous intervention, the covenant is predicated on veterans not being disadvantaged by their service, as the Secretary of State will know. However, Northern Ireland veterans will be subject to records that do not apply to civilian terrorists. Will he confirm that there will be no di…
The Defence Secretary opened the debate by talking about the Bill taking significant steps to improve service lives, but the reality is that the rhetoric is not matched by the record.
Let me take as an example the significant section of the Bill that is devoted to reservists. There are measures tha…
+3 more contributions in this session
Commons
Debate
20 January 2026
2 contributions
Holocaust Memorial Bill
I rise briefly because I agree with both the tenor of the debate and the tone in which colleagues across the House have quite rightly highlighted the sheer horror of the Holocaust, the importance of remembering its sheer scale and the challenges particularly, as the hon. Member for Chelmsford (Marie…
If the hon. Member will let me, I would like to finish.
When all in the House agree on something, the question is whether the designs have been sufficiently scrutinised. Therefore, my plea to the Minister is to make a commitment to transparency and to communicating the pressures, which I foresee wi…
Commons
Debate
20 January 2026
Chinese Embassy
Does the Minister believe that the approval of this Chinese mega-embassy makes the British people safer?