Commons
Statutory Instrument
1 December 2025
2 contributions
Armed Forces Chaplains (Licensing) Measure 2025 (HC 1454)
Abuse Redress Measure 2025 (HC 1455)
Does it have to be a point of order?
On a point of order, Mr Mundell. I would just point out that systems are set up in good faith to redress problems that have arisen, but unless those systems are overseen and scrutinised, they very often fall into disrepute themselves and fail to deliver what the legislators intended. I am appealing …
Commons
Debate
26 November 2025
6 contributions
Budget Resolutions
Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?
It gives me a certain pleasure to share some agreement about the need for more resource in defence and resilience with the hon. Member for Warwick and Leamington (Matt Western). For all the Government’s talk of increasing spending on defence, the vast bulk of the promise they have made is after this…
+4 more contributions in this session
Commons
Ministerial Statement
25 November 2025
G20 and Ukraine
Does the Prime Minister agree with many assessments that make it clear that Russia is actually in a far weaker position than President Putin pretends, so long as we continue to support the war effort in Ukraine? That depends on us developing more independent, non-American capability, and the best wa…
Commons
Debate
24 November 2025
4 contributions
English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill
It is the Government’s clear intention to devolve powers, but in the reorganisation of local government, the Government are taking sweeping powers to determine the outcome of any reorganisation—in Essex, for example. Will the Minister undertake to listen to the consultation and to reflect the consul…
Today the Government put forward 23 of their own amendments, which meant that the Minister allowed less than a minute for each one in her speech. That includes two new schedules. Moreover, we have still not seen a great deal of the regulation that will flow from the Bill, even in draft form. Is this…
+2 more contributions in this session
Commons
Proceedings
20 November 2025
Ukraine: Forcible Removal of Children
I remind the Minister that I look forward to tabling a motion for a Backbench Business debate on Ukraine, which will refer to the 20,000 abducted children. I join him in congratulating the hon. Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire South (Johanna Baxter) on the work she is doing on this subject. That …
Commons
Proceedings
20 November 2025
Russian Ship Yantar
May I congratulate the Government on being more forward in their public responses to this kind of provocation than any other European member of NATO, let alone the United States, but also point out that this underlines what we know from what Putin and Lavrov have been saying? They think they are at …
Commons
Debate
17 November 2025
Budget: Press Briefings
Can I ask the Minister whether I have got this right? The Chancellor made a speech to try to reassure the markets that she was going to plug the enormous black hole in the Government’s finances. It reassured the markets to an extent, and the forecasted borrowing costs fell. The OBR adjusted its fore…
Commons
Ministerial Statement
13 November 2025
Business of the House
I thank my right hon. Friend the shadow Leader of the House and others for pressing the case for a Backbench Business debate on Ukraine. I also thank the Leader of the House for considering the matter favourably. May I just emphasise the importance of having a motion on the Order Paper for such a de…
Commons
Debate
12 November 2025
4 contributions
Energy
My right hon. Friend is making a very able speech explaining why the clean power 2030 action plan is so ruinous for consumers. What she has not mentioned is that trying to connect up this very dispersed array of wind farms across the North sea requires an enormous amount of new infrastructure. We no…
The Minister will let me explain why, in the Alice in Wonderland world of the Government’s net zero policies, it is right to import liquefied natural gas, which for some reason does not count in our carbon footprint, instead of producing our own gas, which would count but which would be cheaper, far…
+2 more contributions in this session
Commons
Debate
3 November 2025
“Soldier F” Trial Verdict
I am listening carefully to the right hon. Gentleman, and the whole premise of his case is that it is somehow in the public interest for people in that community to carry on trying to find people to blame and prosecute on both sides of the argument. Is the real case here not that it is not only an e…
Commons
Oral Questions
Defence
3 November 2025
Defence Sector Innovation
Can the Minister describe what he is doing within his own Department so that his own officials actually reward, recognise and engage with innovation? The acquisitions system in the MOD is notoriously bureaucratic, incredibly risk-averse and makes it impossible for small companies, in particular, to …
Commons
Debate
27 October 2025
North Sea Oil and Gas Industry
Why does the Minister refuse to issue new licences for the exploitation of new gas fields and new oil fields in the North sea? That is what the industry would like, and that is what the country would like, because we would like a stronger balance of payments, more tax revenues for the Exchequer, and…
Commons
Proceedings
20 October 2025
Alleged Spying Case: Home Office Involvement
May I first invite the Minister to clarify what he said in response to my question last week? I pointed out that, in his letter to the Select Committee Chairs, the Director of Public Prosecutions was clear that he had asked for a statement that China was a national security threat, and it was not fo…
Commons
Proceedings
16 October 2025
Official Secrets Act Case: Witness Statements
Given that the deputy National Security Adviser is a civil servant and therefore accountable, who was holding him to account for the job that he was doing? May I just emphasise that I am sure he was doing his level and honourable best in the circumstances in which he found himself, but it is really …
Commons
Debate
15 October 2025
Sustainable Aviation Fuel Bill
On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. Earlier today, the Prime Minister promised that certain papers would be published as soon as they could be, but he did not give a time. Has there been any indication of when those papers will be published? We are still waiting for them.
Commons
Ministerial Statement
15 October 2025
Ukraine
Given that time is the most precious commodity in war, and that, as former head of MI5 Eliza Manningham-Buller said, Britain may already be at war with Russia, why have we allowed Russia so much time to build up a stock of 155 mm shells, for example—three times the quantity of the entire European an…
Commons
Ministerial Statement
13 October 2025
Security Update: Official Secrets Act Case
We know the very basic facts, which is that the Director of Public Prosecutions asked for a statement from the Government to clarify that, at the time of the offence, China was a threat to national security. He says in his letter that such an assurance, or evidence, or a statement from the Governmen…
Commons
Proceedings
11 September 2025
UK Ambassador to the US: Appointment Process
May I just point out that it was as plain as day, after the exchanges between the Prime Minister and my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition yesterday, that Lord Mandelson could not possibly carry on in his role? Why did the Prime Minister delay—or did he have to wait to be told what to do…
Commons
Ministerial Statement
1 September 2025
Ukraine
The House should be grateful to the Secretary of State for giving this statement today, because it underlines how the Government are determined to keep this issue at the top of the British political agenda. He gave quite an optimistic assessment of how we, the Ukrainians and her allies, are doing in…
Commons
Ministerial Statement
14 July 2025
State of Climate and Nature
I am as passionate as the Secretary of State about achieving net zero across the world and about the decline in species in our natural environment, but that cannot be the only thing we worry about. I do not know whether he has had time to read the “Fiscal risks and sustainability” report produced la…
Commons
Westminster Hall
14 July 2025
Northern Ireland Veterans: Prosecution
That point cannot be overstated, because many Northern Ireland veterans already suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder and other mental health problems. I speak as a vice-president of the mental health charity Combat Stress. The very idea that there are people who are nowhere near a prosecution …
Commons
Ministerial Statement
8 July 2025
2 contributions
Road and Rail Projects
How can I possibly welcome the Secretary of State’s statement when, by her own admission, she has cancelled the A12 widening scheme and said nothing about the dualling of the A120 between Braintree and Marks Tey? How does she intend Braintree, Colchester and Tendring to deliver the massive new housi…
On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. In my 33 years in this House it has always been the practice that a statement of this nature would be made alongside a White Paper, which would be available in the Vote Office to Members as soon as the Secretary of State sits down. There is no White Paper i…
Commons
Debate
7 July 2025
Government Performance against Fiscal Rules
Has the Chief Secretary seen the much longer-term forecasts by the OBR for the growth in public spending and the growth in debt rising to more than 250% of GDP in decades to come and the debt interest rising to 12% of GDP? Now that there is a gaping hole in the Government’s financial plans because o…
Commons
Ministerial Statement
3 July 2025
NHS 10-Year Plan
I join others in welcoming much of the Secretary of State’s plan, but I want to return to the question of the Health Services Safety Investigations Body, to which my right hon. Friend the Member for Melton and Syston (Edward Argar) referred. I welcome the tone of the Secretary of State’s response to…