Commons
Ministerial Statement
13 November 2025
Business of the House
We are in a farming emergency with the family farm tax, the early cutting off of the sustainable farming incentive and the watering down of measures to prevent equipment theft from farms, yet this morning, Members across the House who wanted to question Ministers from the Department for Environment,…
Commons
Oral Questions
12 November 2025
2 contributions
Mobile Phone Signal: Rural Communities
3. When she expects all rural communities to have a reliable mobile signal.
I am grateful to the Minister for his answer, but villages in my constituency—less than 50 miles from where we all are now—such as Cuddington and Bryants Bottom still have zero mobile coverage. I have raised this issue with the Minister’s predecessor and all the networks. When are we going to get to…
Commons
Westminster Hall
12 November 2025
Carbon Budget Delivery Plan
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir John. Since the Labour Government took office, they have pursued an ideological net zero agenda that places meeting targets above supporting our constituents and cutting bills across the country. The carbon budget delivery plan is the latest exa…
Commons
Oral Questions
4 November 2025
Topical Questions
T9. With reports that the Chancellor is eyeing up doubling council tax for bands G and H, can she tell me whether she really considers the family who wrote to me yesterday—both have mid-range salaries, are fully eligible for child benefit and bought a home for just shy of £500,000 in 2013—rich enoug…
Commons
Proceedings
30 October 2025
Business of the House
The Liberal Democrat-chaired Buckinghamshire and Milton Keynes fire authority has cooked up a dangerous plan to remove nearly a third of the fire engines from the area, including Haddenham. They are also fully closing Stokenchurch and Great Missenden fire stations in my constituency. Can we have a d…
Commons
Proceedings
29 October 2025
Gaza and Hamas
Does the Minister agree that, on top of the absolute imperative of Hamas releasing the remaining hostage bodies and not only completely disarming but being removed from all governance in Gaza, there must be a widespread deradicalisation programme to undo the damage done by innocent children in Gaza …
Commons
Westminster Hall
29 October 2025
Vehicle Headlight Glare Standards
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs Harris, and I am grateful to the hon. Member for Crawley (Peter Lamb) for securing this debate.
We have all heard from constituents who say that they now avoid driving at night altogether because of dazzling headlights. The BBC recently reporte…
Commons
Proceedings
23 October 2025
Business of the House
In 2023, my private Member’s Bill received Royal Assent, becoming the Equipment Theft (Prevention) Act 2023. In order to bring it into force, some statutory instruments had to be introduced. Police forces up and down the land, as well as police and crime commissioners, hailed it as a major step forw…
Commons
Westminster Hall
22 October 2025
4 contributions
Coal Tip Safety and New Extraction Licences
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Twigg. I congratulate the hon. Member for Caerfyrddin (Ann Davies) on securing the debate.
The themes of the debate are at the centre of Britain’s industrial sanity. The Government’s approach to our own resources, making us more dependent on dir…
The ending of coal-fired power stations was incredibly welcome, but the reality of the transition is that just turning things off overnight does not work. In the example of the steel industry, had we opened the coalmine in Cumbria and delivered cheaper, less carbon-emitting coal from our own shores …
+2 more contributions in this session
Commons
Oral Questions
16 October 2025
Topical Questions
T4. In a stunning setting with superb facilities, Garsington Opera in Stokenchurch provides incredible training opportunities for young people who want a career in the arts. Does the Minister agree that this is a vital facility, and what more will she do to ensure that all young people who want a ca…
Commons
Oral Questions
16 October 2025
2 contributions
Listed Places of Worship Grant Scheme
8. What recent discussions she has had with relevant stakeholders on the potential impact of changes to the listed places of worship grant scheme on listed places of worship.
I am grateful for the Minister’s answer, but I am not sure the Government have understood the level of uncertainty and panic that has set in following their approach to this grant scheme. Some of the most cherished buildings in our constituencies are waiting on clarity for when the Government will c…
Commons
Debate
15 October 2025
4 contributions
Sustainable Aviation Fuel Bill
To begin, I draw Members’ attention to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests with regard to the synthetic road fuel provided to me for a constituency surgery tour last year. That is not strictly relevant to sustainable aviation fuel, but I want to be entirely transparent about it,…
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his intervention. I will come on to some of the technological points he made earlier, which it may surprise him to hear that I was incredibly sympathetic towards. On the timescale he asks for, I think it reasonable that, when a new Act comes into force, the Go…
+2 more contributions in this session
Commons
Ministerial Statement
14 October 2025
Middle East
There is a widely held belief that the catalyst for the pure evil that happened on 7 October was the fear among Iran and its terrorist proxies that Saudi Arabia was close to signing the Abraham accords. The good news is that the Abraham accords peace agreement, between Israel, the United Arab Emirat…
Commons
Oral Questions
14 October 2025
Grid Infrastructure
On grid infrastructure, the Chinese wind turbine manufacturer Ming Yang has said that it is looking to set up a wind turbine factory in Scotland. Our security services have warned us about the risks of Chinese state-sponsored hackers trying to infiltrate and destroy energy systems in the west, and h…
Commons
Oral Questions
11 September 2025
2 contributions
Driving Test Availability
When driving tests came up at Transport questions in May, it was revealed that the wait time for a driving test on average was up, from 17 weeks in July 2024 to 22 weeks now. It has since been revealed that many test centres around the country have reached the maximum legal limit of a 24-week wait. …
The Minister is right that there is still more to be done—there is a lot more to be done. He inherited a broken system from his own predecessor in the Department for Transport, under whom the problem got significantly worse over the last year.
I do not think the Minister is listening to the country…
Commons
Ministerial Statement
4 September 2025
Early Education and Childcare
Today is my youngest child’s first day at school, so may I put on record my thanks to Chearsley and Haddenham Under Fives for providing exceptional early years education to both my sons, Charlie and Rupert, over recent decades? I mean years—it feels like decades!
There is much to genuinely welcome …
Commons
Oral Questions
4 September 2025
Sustainable Farming Incentive
After the elephant in the room that is the farm-destroying family farm tax, the No. 1 issue that is raised with me by Mid Buckinghamshire farmers—not least at the Bucks county show last week—is the uncertainty over the future of the SFI. I do not think it is going to cut it with farmers to say that …
Commons
Westminster Hall
3 September 2025
2 contributions
Pavement Parking
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs Hobhouse. I, too, congratulate the hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell (Helen Maguire) on securing this debate. I am grateful for the opportunity to speak in today’s debate on pavement parking, an issue that may seem mundane at first glance, but tha…
I have a lot of respect for the hon. Lady. The Government have had a year to take action, and they have not. I have not been in the House as long as she has, but I was here in the last Parliament and I was a member of the Transport Committee for the entirety of it. I, too, sat around the horseshoe w…
Commons
Oral Questions
22 July 2025
2 contributions
Neighbourhood Health Centre: Long Crendon
4. If he will make an assessment of the potential merits of siting a neighbourhood health centre in Long Crendon, Buckinghamshire, as part of the 10-year health plan for England.
I am grateful to the Minister for that answer. He will have heard me put the case for Long Crendon many times over many years, and given the proposals for neighbourhood health centres in the 10-year plan, Long Crendon offers a very quick win. The community has the land, the planning permission and a…
Commons
Ministerial Statement
21 July 2025
Middle East
There is a narrative around aid—we all want to see it reach the innocent in Gaza—which is that Israel is blocking it getting into Gaza. However, over recent months Israel has facilitated nearly 2 million tonnes of humanitarian aid getting into Gaza. As of this morning, 700 trucks of aid have passed …
Commons
Ministerial Statement
21 July 2025
Independent Water Commission
I am genuinely all ears for any practical steps that can be taken to build on the Environment Act 2021 to clean up our waterways, but may I pick up the Secretary of State’s comments on the role, as he put it, of citizen scientists and local communities? In my constituency, water heroes like Doug Ken…
Commons
Oral Questions
21 July 2025
Topical Questions
The superb John Hampden school in Wendover reports that it is running a £109,000 deficit supporting students with significant SEND while they await assessments. However, it is an infant-only school, and the money often does not come through until the pupils have moved up to a junior school. Will the…
Commons
Oral Questions
Business and Trade
17 July 2025
2 contributions
High Street Businesses
At the heart of every high street are wonderful hospitality SMEs—pubs, cafés, restaurants, bars and coffee shops—yet the 2024 Budget was a hammer blow to them. With £3.4 billion of extra costs, one in 10 restaurants faces closure this year. Indeed, Labour’s Budget has already cost hospitality 69,000…
That answer is simply not good enough for the 63% of employees in the hospitality sector whose jobs are on the line. Yet we now read in the press that the Government appear set on forcing restaurateurs to monitor customers’ calorie consumption—another crippling blow of red tape on top of national in…
Commons
Westminster Hall
16 July 2025
Blue Badge Eligibility
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Christopher. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Maidstone and Malling (Helen Grant) on not just securing the debate and championing her constituents so well in her speech, but bravely telling her own story as part of it, just as the ho…
Commons
Statutory Instrument
14 July 2025
2 contributions
Financial Assistance to Industry
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Desmond. I begin by drawing the Committee’s attention to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests. I have spoken at length on this subject, in the last Parliament as a member of the Transport Committee and from the then Governmen…
My right hon. Friend is absolutely right. If we look at the marketplace out there for both private and commercial vehicles—particularly vans, heavy goods vehicles and larger vehicles—those who have to take a personal financial risk on them are not choosing to do so. Particularly in the HGV sector, t…