Commons
Westminster Hall
14 July 2026
Coastal Communities: Isolation and Hidden Deprivation
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Alec. I congratulate the hon. Member for Isle of Wight West (Richard Quigley) on securing this key debate.
The vital question on “Desert Island Discs” is not what luxury a person desires or which tune they would save from the waves; it is how t…
Commons
Ministerial Statement
9 July 2026
NATO Summit
Scotland stands ready to play its full role in the defence of Britain with many fine young men and, increasingly, women in our forces. We also have a huge array of industrial companies working on defence contracts. There is a problem, however, which is the Scottish Executive. In a remarkable display…
Commons
Oral Questions
Business and Trade
2 July 2026
3 contributions
Youth Employment
16. What steps he is taking with Cabinet colleagues to support the creation of jobs for young people.
While still at school, I played my part in the creative industries by playing in bands with names as louche as Street Lethal and Cheap Sweeties. It was very lucrative.
+1 more contribution in this session
Commons
Oral Questions
Work and Pensions
29 June 2026
2 contributions
Social Security: Fraud and Error
15. What recent estimate he has made of the level of fraud and error in the social security system.
In Scotland, benefit fraud has effectively been decriminalised; the number of prosecutions is vanishingly small. Given that the Department for Work and Pensions continues to have a role in Scotland—administering some benefits, despite devolution—what can the Department do to tackle fraud there? It i…
Commons
Proceedings
29 June 2026
Prisoner Early Release
Soft-touch fever is spreading across the land because in Scotland, the SNP Scottish Executive are about to start releasing rapists as much as 2.5 years early. Do the Ministers on the Front Bench not realise that they are so out of touch with the public on this issue that they risk the very fundament…
Commons
Oral Questions
Scotland
10 June 2026
2 contributions
Scottish Independence
3. What recent discussions he has had with the First Minister of Scotland on a new referendum on Scottish independence.
My constituents will be alarmed to hear that, because Labour’s “devolve and forget” approach is a huge problem. When the Secretary of State is away, the nats will play. We know that the First Minister has gone abroad using taxpayers’ money to talk about the breaking up of Britain. Should the Secreta…
Commons
Statutory Instrument
10 June 2026
5 contributions
Draft Scotland Act 1998 (Increase of Borrowing Limits) Order 2026
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Vaz. At first blush, the draft Scotland Act 1998 (Increase in Borrowing Limits) Order 2026 is, as outlined by the Secretary of State—we are honoured to have him with us, and it is the second time I have seen him today, which is twice more than th…
Absolutely. I would like to clarify my point: it is not unreasonable in the context to look at this issue in the round. This is public money. The SNP wants to pretend that this is an internal matter for themselves, but question marks still hang over us about whether or not public money has been invo…
+3 more contributions in this session
Commons
Westminster Hall
8 June 2026
3 contributions
Progression of Bills through Parliament
It is a pleasure to serve under the iron grip of your chairmanship, Sir Edward.
We are here not to relitigate the substance of the assisted dying Bill, but to consider a profound change to the way we in this place carry out our duties as legislators. The petitioners seek, in short, for a failed Bil…
I completely agree with the hon. Gentleman that this Bill has huge difficulties, and its popularity does not capture those. The Salisbury-Addison convention that the Lords will not seek to prevent the Government from implementing manifesto pledges simply does not apply. In this case, it has not been…
+1 more contribution in this session
Commons
Proceedings
20 May 2026
Processed Russian Oil Products: Sanctions
I had constituents in the Gallery today, and they will be aghast to find out that their flight back to Scotland is potentially using Russian fuel. Surely, regardless of whether that was the case before, we need to grip that issue. We also need to grip the reality of the North sea. We keep hearing th…
Commons
Oral Questions
23 April 2026
Topical Questions
T5. Happy St George’s day, Mr Speaker. We face many threats, but happily dragons are no longer one of them.The Government maintain that the messages between Morgan McSweeney and his mentor Peter Mandelson are under the aegis of the Metropolitan police and therefore cannot be released, but surely the…
Commons
Oral Questions
22 April 2026
Defence Sector
Thank you, Mr Speaker. I do not know whether to stand at the Dispatch Box or on it.
For want of a horseshoe nail, the kingdom was lost. The defence of our country today rests on modern nail-makers—the small and medium-sized enterprises supplying small but vital parts for frigates and fighter jets a…
Commons
Oral Questions
Education
20 April 2026
2 contributions
Apprenticeships
12. What steps she is taking to promote apprenticeships as an alternative to university education.
At an awards ceremony in Scotland last month, apprentices said time and again how they were told throughout their school careers that their grades were good enough to go to university, and that they should think again about going into an apprenticeship. Apprenticeships create not just jobs but caree…
Commons
Ministerial Statement
16 April 2026
British Industrial Competitiveness Scheme
The buzzword this morning is “bold”. Yet the reality is that, though this plan might be bolder than what went before, it remains with all the oomph of a 40W bulb. When electricity in Dumfries in my constituency is four times the price in Dumfries in Virginia, in the United States, this country has a…
Commons
Debate
15 April 2026
Strategic Defence Review: Funding
To listen to the Minister, one might think that the DIP matters very little and that we are cracking on regardless, but the truth is that the MOD has been out-manoeuvred by the Chancellor, and the DIP is pinned down by the Treasury. The DIP matters a very great deal to industry because the demand si…
Commons
Proceedings
24 March 2026
Defence
It is an old quote—I am sure my hon. and gallant Friend will recognise it, given his service—that while veterans talk logistics, amateurs talk tactics. He is outlining a dire situation, because we are not gripping the logistics problem.
Commons
Oral Questions
24 March 2026
Topical Questions
T8. Nith Inshore Rescue in my constituency has lost a sponsor that provided it with free fuel, because of soaring costs. Will the Secretary of State go to the Chancellor and point out that VAT and fuel costs are a matter of life and death in remote and rural Scotland?
Commons
Debate
23 March 2026
2 contributions
Middle East
Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker— [ Interruption. ] Excuse me; I have swallowed a fly.
I think I just about am, yes. The situation we are talking about today is a shooting war, but of key interest to us is the tug of war going on between the MOD and the Treasury over the defence investment plan. We have some indication of what is going on—I think we have gathered that it will not come…
Commons
Oral Questions
23 March 2026
Topical Questions
Small boat returns run at around 6% of the total numbers arriving in this country, but the Home Secretary denies that this is anything to do with the European Convention on Human Rights. If not the ECHR, which part of the Government’s flawed policy is responsible for that feeble rate?
Commons
Debate
11 March 2026
Lord Advocate
I beg to move,
That leave be given to bring in a Bill to make provision about the role and functions of the Lord Advocate; and for connected purposes.
Chaos and decay are priced into the lives of people in Scotland as they suffer under the yoke of the Scottish National party Administration at Holy…
Commons
Ministerial Statement
9 March 2026
Social Cohesion Action Plan
In 1979 my father took me to Newton Stewart cinema to see “Monty Python’s Life of Brian”, and I recall my father being more upset by a spoof travel documentary that preceded the main film, because there was swearing in it, than he was about the supposed slights to Christianity. It was an early lesso…
Commons
Oral Questions
Work and Pensions
9 March 2026
2 contributions
Unemployment
3. What assessment he has made of trends in the level of unemployment.
Youth unemployment is, in fact, spiking at nearly 5.3%, which is heartbreaking, particularly for young people who cannot get that all-important first job. The Government like to pretend that they are a cork in a storm-tossed sea and unable to do anything about this, but they could reconsider employe…
Commons
Debate
4 March 2026
Department for Business and Trade
It is a pleasure to take part in this debate, and I congratulate the right hon. Member for Birmingham Hodge Hill and Solihull North (Liam Byrne), who chairs the Business and Trade Committee on which I serve. As Chair of such a Committee, he is that rarest of things: capable of independent thought.
…
Commons
Westminster Hall
3 March 2026
Small Charity Sector
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Roger. We Scots are often portrayed as parsimonious—or, to put it another way, as tight as two coats of paint. It is a myth largely down to comedian and singer Sir Harry Lauder, who, to raise money for wounded great war veterans after the death …
Commons
Westminster Hall
2 March 2026
2 contributions
Public Right to a Vote of No Confidence
This is unquestionably a really important issue, and the petition is indicative of the public’s unhappiness with this Government. Does my hon. Friend agree that the great difficulties people have with this Government include the number of manifesto pledges that have been broken, the introduction of …
I am very much looking forward to the ending of this chaos; it seems that we are completely mired in it. As a former member of the fourth estate—I was a journalist for a long time—I am always concerned when politicians blame the media. I do not think the media are creating the chaos; they are simply…
Commons
Westminster Hall
23 February 2026
Firearms Licensing
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Alec.
Scotland has been talked about quite a lot here today. Policing in Scotland is separate, but the proposed changes would affect Scotland, and it is worth having a look at some of the figures associated with Scotland. Figures from the Briti…