Commons
Ministerial Statement
20 November 2025
Business of the House
Nearly two thirds of the land in our country is owned by a handful of aristocrats, oligarchs and bankers, who often hide their wealth in trusts, and corporations, which never die. May we have a debate on how we might raise more revenue from those ultra-rich landowners, and so afford some more genero…
Commons
Debate
18 November 2025
Warm Homes Plan
I absolutely agree with the hon. Member that a well-funded warm homes plan is essential to insulating draughty homes and cutting bills. I wonder if she aware of the situation faced by my constituents in Letchworth Garden City. They have a separate scheme of management, so people applying for insulat…
Commons
Westminster Hall
18 November 2025
3 contributions
Land Use Change: Food Security
It is an honour to serve under your chairship, Dr Murrison. I draw Members’ attention to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests, and my employment by CPRE before my election to Parliament. I congratulate the right hon. Member for Aldridge-Brownhills (Wendy Morton) on securing this …
That is a very fair intervention—I take the point. Indeed, the right hon. Member made some powerful arguments about the beauty of our countryside, and we should be up front about the fact that those aesthetic values are worth fighting for—perhaps I should have put it like that. I do not think my hon…
+1 more contribution in this session
Commons
Proceedings
17 November 2025
Illegal Waste: Organised Crime
Alongside our people, our natural heritage is the most important part of our national identity, yet every week, profiteering corporations and organised criminals treat it as a giant dumping ground for pollution and waste. It is these enemies of our countryside, not asylum seekers escaping hardship a…
Commons
Debate
13 November 2025
Planning and Infrastructure Bill
I declare an interest as a vice-chair of the Climate and Nature Crisis Caucus.
At the outset of my contribution to today’s debate on this important legislation, there are a few general points that are probably worth reiterating. There need be no conflict between house building and nature; the real …
Commons
Prime Minister's Questions
Prime Minister
12 November 2025
Engagements
Q9. During the debates on assisted dying, I and many others highlighted the importance of palliative care provided by hospices, but this vital work has been left reliant on donations and charity for far too long. Garden House hospice in Letchworth now faces a serious funding gap. I welcome Governmen…
Commons
Westminster Hall
11 November 2025
Rural Railway Stations: Step Free Access
What the hon. Lady is describing sounds very familiar to the market town of Baldock in my constituency of North East Hertfordshire. Baldock is due to double in size, but does not have any step-free access. Would she join me in urging the Minister to ensure that rapidly growing rural communities rece…
Commons
Ministerial Statement
5 November 2025
Curriculum and Assessment Review
I really welcome the efforts to curtail the excessive examination time that our children are facing. It does not help real learning and is having a big impact on the mental health of the younger generation. What opportunities does the Secretary of State see for introducing more modern approaches to …
Commons
Proceedings
5 November 2025
Conflict in Sudan
I echo the comments of those who have highlighted that the atrocities in Sudan are absolutely abhorrent, and I welcome the Minister’s statement that we must hold those responsible to account, but may I ask for some further reassurance? Will he press for the expansion of the jurisdiction of the Inter…
Commons
Westminster Hall
5 November 2025
Fresh and Nutritious Food: Inequality of Access
Does the hon. Member agree that one solution to the problem of access to sustainable and nutritious food would be the right to grow food on public land, as campaigned for by Incredible Edible, forming part of the wider campaign for community rights that is coming to this Parliament?
Commons
Westminster Hall
5 November 2025
2 contributions
Bronze-age Heritage: Cambridgeshire
I sense the hon. Member is winding up, but before he does, I would like to say that across the border in North Hertfordshire we also have some fantastic bronze-age heritage in places such as Arbury Banks and Therfield Heath, but we have had real difficulties in preserving that heritage because of th…
While the Minister is talking about the brilliant work that the Government are doing nationally to protect and preserve our heritage, can I encourage him to welcome the fact that the now Labour-run North Herts council is choosing to prioritise investment in our museum storage, so that we can preserv…
Commons
Debate
30 October 2025
Property Service Charges
The scandal of property service charges is one of the most unjust, indefensible and generally enraging issues facing my constituents. In many cases, the charges amount to little more than a form of parasitic exploitation of ordinary people by absentee landlords and businesses. It has been allowed to…
Commons
Proceedings
30 October 2025
Business of the House
Neil Whitehouse, a loving father and grandfather who lived in my constituency, sadly lost his fight with cancer earlier this year. Neil was a lifelong advocate of the NHS, but tragically delays in communication between NHS departments may have prevented him receiving earlier, lifesaving treatment. W…
Commons
Westminster Hall
27 October 2025
3 contributions
Statutory Maternity and Paternity Pay
Charting a path to national renewal means making decisions today, although the full benefits may not be felt for years to come. In the first few years of life, more than a million new neural connections are formed every second. During that time, more than any other, children must be nourished and su…
Will the Minister give way?
+1 more contribution in this session
Commons
Debate
16 October 2025
Biodiversity Beyond National Jurisdiction Bill
On land and at sea, our natural environment has suffered a soul-crushing collapse over many decades, putting the future of iconic species and entire ecosystems at risk, as was so eloquently described by my hon. Friend the Member for Brent West (Barry Gardiner) in a tour de force of a speech. The Gov…
Commons
Debate
15 September 2025
8 contributions
Provision of Council Housing
Council housing is the first, most important and only viable solution to the housing crisis and to creating a society that matches the hopes of both the Labour movement and the wider public. Not long ago, under the leadership of the current Prime Minister, Labour Front Benchers now sitting in Cabine…
I fully agree with my hon. Friend. The points he raises perfectly exemplify why the provision of council housing is so important.
England has seen 724,000 more net additional dwellings than new households since 2015, yet in the same period the number of households in England on local authority hous…
+6 more contributions in this session
Commons
Oral Questions
Home Department
15 September 2025
2 contributions
Scientific Procedures: Use of Animals
2. What assessment she has made of the potential implications for her Department's policies of the approval under the Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act 1986 between April and June 2025 of the use of 1,656,930 animals over the next five years.
More than 1.6 million animals have been approved for testing over the next five years, including through licences for invasive brain research on monkeys and for looking at different methods of killing animals in laboratories. Labour’s manifesto committed to phasing out animal testing. Can the Minist…
Commons
Debate
10 September 2025
Bus Services (No. 2) Bill [Lords]
I speak in support of the Bill and in favour of new clause 22 in my name.
We can now say in complete confidence that the privatisation and deregulation of our bus services has been a catastrophic failure for rural towns and villages such as those across North East Hertfordshire. Decades of dogmatic…
Commons
Proceedings
8 September 2025
Palestine Action: Proscription and Protests
I thank the Minister for his answers, and I fully agree that there can be no place for violence in our politics. However, does he accept that elderly retired priests and disabled veterans would not be protesting in the way they are if they genuinely believed that Palestine Action was a similar organ…
Commons
Westminster Hall
8 September 2025
Indefinite Leave to Remain
Given the unanimity of feeling in the Chamber today on the importance of BNO visas and the uncertainty that the consultation is creating, will the Minister put it on record that he recognises that uncertainty, and that it will be foremost in his mind as he develops policy going forward?
Commons
Proceedings
4 September 2025
Business of the House
The current drafting of national planning policy is allowing developers to ride roughshod over local democracy, imposing completely inappropriate bolt-on estates to market towns such as Buntingford and Royston, while wholly failing to deliver the genuinely affordable housing that we need. It is diff…
Commons
Westminster Hall
3 September 2025
Living Standards: East of England
I also find in my constituency that the cost of a decent home is far too high for far too many of my constituents. Does my hon. Friend agree that the solution to that problem is not, as is believed in some quarters, to give the developers the right to strip away our environment and destroy nature, b…
Commons
Debate
16 July 2025
2 contributions
Giving Every Child the Best Start in Life
We understand on this side of the House that the wealth of our country does not lie in the bank accounts of casino capitalists or the title deeds of billionaires. It lies in nature, with each chalk stream and ancient woodland a national inheritance to be cherished; it lies in the bonds of community …
I wholeheartedly agree and have heard exactly the same thing from students in my constituency. Each and every one of the children in our country deserves a safe, healthy and stable home that is genuinely affordable and does not leave families struggling to make ends meet month after month. If we giv…
Commons
Oral Questions
15 July 2025
Household Energy Bills
The Government have taken long-overdue steps to secure rooftop solar on new builds, but there is even greater untapped potential on existing commercial and domestic rooftops. Will Ministers consider introducing a scheme, similar to those in other countries, offering free installation of rooftop sola…
Commons
Oral Questions
Treasury
1 July 2025
Topical Questions
T8. In recent weeks Ministers have been arguing that vital support for the disabled is fiscally unsustainable because it is forecast to rise to £60.7 billion a year by 2029-30. What assessment has the Chancellor made of the fiscal sustainability of the 107 non-structural tax breaks that are currentl…