Commons
Ministerial Statement
9 September 2026
Jaguar Land Rover: Redundancies
The Jaguar Land Rover hack started over a year ago: manufacturing ground to a halt and the Government stepped in and made the UK taxpayer the insurer of last resort to the tune of £1.5 billion. Yet the Government have still not said who did this to our country. It has been widely reported that the a…
Commons
Ministerial Statement
7 September 2026
Local Government Reorganisation
Building 1.5 million new homes and doing LGR at the same time was clearly bonkers. From freedom of information requests that I have submitted, I know that local councils in my area have already spent more than £1 million trying to do LGR. That much-needed money could have been spent on special educa…
Commons
Proceedings
3 September 2026
Bluetongue Virus in Livestock
Livestock farmers in Devon are facing this bluetongue outbreak at an already difficult time. They are meeting unexpected vaccination and fallen stock costs following a summer of drought, while changes to agricultural property relief and business property relief are adding to concerns about farm fina…
Commons
Oral Questions
Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office
1 September 2026
Topical Questions
T4. As bond yields climb sharply and turmoil in the middle east revives inflationary pressures, how is the Foreign Secretary reassuring international partners that Britain can pay its way? More importantly, is he warning the new Prime Minister of fresh, non-essential spending?
Commons
Westminster Hall
1 September 2026
Face-to-Face Banking: Rural Areas
I thank my near neighbour, the hon. Member for South Devon (Caroline Voaden), for bringing this important subject to the House. Like her, I have seen many of these problems in my constituency.
We have had a number of problems in Budleigh: every major bank has left the town. Importantly, there are a…
Commons
Proceedings
1 September 2026
Speaker’s Statement
T4. As bond yields climb sharply and turmoil in the middle east revives inflationary pressures, how is the Foreign Secretary reassuring international partners that Britain can pay its way? More importantly, is he warning the new Prime Minister of fresh, non-essential spending?
Commons
Oral Questions
Home Department
13 July 2026
Topical Questions
As the House will know, the Home Office does not routinely publish figures on the number of small boat arrivals who abscond or whose whereabouts subsequently becomes unknown. Given that the Department holds case records that would allow that to be calculated, will the Home Secretary commit to publis…
Commons
Proceedings
8 July 2026
Maritime and Coastguard Agency
In Exmouth and Exeter East, the local coastguard rescue team covers the Exe estuary, mudflats, tidal waters and busy open coastline. It is called on when local people or visitors are cut off by the tide, trapped in mud, in difficulty in the water, or at risk of self-harm. The Minister says that a mo…
Commons
Oral Questions
Defence
6 July 2026
Defence Investment Plan
Earlier this year, when I served on the Armed Forces Bill Select Committee, the then Armed Forces Minister, the hon. Member for Birmingham Selly Oak (Al Carns), assured us that funding for service housing was “ringfenced” and:
“Nothing in the DIP process will stop us getting on with the job”.
Howe…
Commons
Debate
6 July 2026
National Security (State Threats) Bill
To return to the point made by the hon. Member for Leeds South West and Morley (Mark Sewards), it is clear that this new piece of legislation could allow hostile states to set up shell charities or hide behind humanitarian cover. As a matter of purely operational wording, does the British state have…
Commons
Proceedings
15 June 2026
Point of Order
On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. During the urgent question on the defence investment plan, the Minister for Defence Readiness and Industry said that the Government are committed to all 62 recommendations laid out in the strategic defence review. In a later response to a right hon. Member,…
Commons
Debate
10 June 2026
4 contributions
National Resilience
It is a privilege to lead this evening’s Adjournment debate on improving national resilience. I am also glad that the Security Minister is responding. He is a man for whom I have a great deal of respect. As we have both served in what is now the Special Forces Strike Group, albeit at different times…
The hon. Member raises a serious points, which I will come on to, on interconnectedness. We saw how covid-19 affected so many different parts of society—it closed down industry and the economy. We have to start to think about these things cross-departmentally.
The Government’s definition of nationa…
+2 more contributions in this session
Commons
Oral Questions
Health and Social Care
9 June 2026
2 contributions
Health Services for Men
7. What assessment he has made of the adequacy of the provision of health services for men.
The NHS itself says that prostate cancer often has no symptoms at first, and Prostate Cancer UK says most men with early prostate cancer have no symptoms at all. The Government’s TRANSFORM trial exists because current detection methods are recognised as inadequate. Why does Government messaging stil…
Commons
Proceedings
8 June 2026
Water Companies
The Minister will know from our conversations that sewage pollution is a regular problem in Exmouth and Exeter East. However, the Lib Dems on East Devon district council propose to build tens of thousands of new homes, and I do not have faith that South West Water will keep pace with all the new dev…
Commons
Oral Questions
Northern Ireland
3 June 2026
2 contributions
Replacing the Northern Ireland Troubles (Legacy and Reconciliation) Act 2023
10. What steps he is taking to replace the Northern Ireland Troubles (Legacy and Reconciliation) Act 2023.
In the previous Session, the troubles Bill drew criticism from nine former four-star generals, regimental associations and veterans across the country. The Defence Secretary told this House earlier this week that he had “dealt with their concerns” and would make “significant amendments”, but every t…
Commons
Oral Questions
Defence
1 June 2026
2 contributions
Russia: Level of Threat
This morning, France once again demonstrated that seizing sanctioned Russian shadow fleet vessels in international waters is both legal and achievable. In contrast, although the Prime Minister confirmed on 25 March that we have the legal basis to act in our own territorial waters, since that pledge,…
There is a chasm between supporting and leading. Is it not the case that the Attorney General—the same Attorney General who has no hesitation in hounding British veterans through the courts—has now decided that intercepting Russian shadow fleet tankers would breach maritime law? Our allies in Finlan…
Commons
Debate
20 May 2026
Banking Hubs
I welcome the Minister to her new role.
On the criteria, I have pushed for a banking hub in Budleigh Salterton for a great deal of time, but it was pushed back because there is a post office in the town. The post office was closed for 10 weeks last year, and the surrounding rural villages—places su…
Commons
Debate
20 May 2026
Defence Readiness
It is an honour to wind up the final day of debate on the King’s Speech for His Majesty’s loyal Opposition. We have heard many sterling speeches from Members across this House, and I will turn to some of them shortly.
First, however, I want to pose once more the central question of this debate, and…
Commons
Debate
13 May 2026
2 contributions
New Developments: Unadopted Roads and Public Amenities
I thank the hon. Gentleman for bringing this important topic to the Chamber. We have had a great deal of development in my constituency, and we are seeing these issues play out in places like Cranbrook, Pinhoe and Lympstone. In Cranbrook, no grit bins were provided during the cold weather at the end…
Like many other Members, I am exhausted by dealing with the Liberal Democrats on East Devon district council and Devon county council. They seem completely unaccountable, so can I ask the Ministers directly what can be done to make local government more accountable for the adoptions of roads?
Commons
Debate
27 April 2026
Lord Mandelson Humble Address: Government Response Update
The Minister says that 300 documents have now been shared with the ISC, but how many are left to be processed? More importantly, what has the process been in ascertaining a document’s relevance, and who decides whether a document is important?
Commons
Debate
20 April 2026
Security Vetting
The Prime Minister has chosen to blame his officials for this debacle, so can he confirm that he knows the names of the FCDO civil servants who made the decision to override UKSV on 29 January 2025—yes or no? Has he made the decision to suspend them all from duty, pending a full independent inquiry—…
Commons
Committee Stage
14 April 2026
7 contributions
Armed Forces Bill (Fifth sitting)
I will just pick up on a point I raised this morning, which I discussed with an hon. Friend who has experience in this space. Take, for example, a crime that is committed while a person is serving that is not serious enough to warrant their being remanded into custody—it goes over the six months bec…
I will make that intervention now, and then we can carry on that conversation. If there is zero tolerance of drugs, and if the person who has committed a crime knows they will be kicked out—as they should be—it would be good to hear from the Ministry of Defence if there is a loophole in which someon…
+5 more contributions in this session
Commons
Committee Stage
14 April 2026
12 contributions
Armed Forces Bill (Fourth sitting)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Efford. As we all know, drones and other uncrewed systems are rapidly reshaping modern defence and are already central to surveillance, logistics and frontline operations. Their importance will only grow in the years ahead. For our armed forces, the…
It is difficult to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Solihull West and Shirley—he is a former Army officer, a doctor and a barrister—but I will attempt to add to the debate.
This issue is clear: under the present framework, a service court can only impose protective orders—such as a sexual harm …
+10 more contributions in this session
Commons
Ministerial Statement
13 April 2026
North Atlantic Submarine Activity
I thank the Minister for advance sight of his statement. With all eyes on the middle east, let us not forget that Russia remains the most acute, persistent and active threat to the United Kingdom. Putin’s goal of conquering Ukraine is unchanged, and that continues to place our entire European contin…