Commons
Westminster Hall
26 November 2025
2 contributions
1994 RAF Chinook Crash
I have a history with this story. Back in 1999, the late Lord Chalfont and I tried to draw attention to the fact that even at the time, the rules said that only if there was no doubt whatsoever should dead airmen be blamed for gross negligence. Since this case, under no circumstances are dead airmen…
I apologise for intervening after having stepped out for part of the debate—this may already have been covered. Has any consideration been given to possible embarrassment over the decision to put so many staff, in so many sensitive positions, into a single aircraft? Despite my past interest in this …
Commons
Ministerial Statement
25 November 2025
G20 and Ukraine
May I ask the Prime Minister to focus on the question of effective security guarantees? Security guarantees deter aggression only if there is no doubt that the guarantor will act in accordance with the guarantee that he has given. Therefore, if there is a security guarantee to unoccupied Ukraine, it…
Commons
Debate
24 November 2025
HMP Downview: Female Prisoners
I know the Minister is a reasonable person, and I am trying to find some common ground here. I could understand it, if the transgender males held in this particular unit had at least undergone reassignment surgery. They would definitely be vulnerable in a male prison. The argument for them to be hel…
Commons
Debate
24 November 2025
English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill
My hon. Friend will be aware that the District Councils’ Network has been briefing Members on both sides of the House that if the Government go ahead and force these changes through, the very least they can do is to have district councils represented on the strategic authorities until all the change…
Commons
Ministerial Statement
24 November 2025
Critical Minerals Strategy
Will the Minister tell the House what is so special about the year 2035? It is the year by which the Government say they will achieve expenditure of 3.5% of GDP on defence—compared with the 4.5% to 5% we used to spend in the cold war years of the 1980s—and it is now the year by which that the Govern…
Commons
Proceedings
24 November 2025
Maccabi Tel Aviv FC: Away Fans Ban
It sounds as though the Minister is getting to grips with this, and I am very grateful for that. Will she accept that the counterpart or corollary of operational independence for the police is their political impartiality, and does she agree with me that the last thing we want is a poisonous cocktai…
Commons
Debate
20 November 2025
2 contributions
Injury in Service Award
rose—
I have listened carefully to the whole debate, and I thoroughly support the proposal. From the Minister’s summing up, it sounds as if the decision is more in the hands of civil servants than in those of Ministers. May I gently point out to him that civil servants are never remiss when it comes to aw…
Commons
Ministerial Statement
20 November 2025
Reoffending: Rehabilitation in Prisons
In the light of the urgent question earlier today, does the Chairman of the Committee believe that it is essential for the purpose of rehabilitation that prisoners should be protected against indoctrination by convicted terrorists?
Commons
Ministerial Statement
20 November 2025
Migration: Settlement Pathway
As the descendant of immigrant grandparents, I have a high degree of empathy with the Home Secretary’s opening remarks about her own family. Does she agree that the reason that both main parties are facing the possibility of an electoral bloodbath is not so much the overall level of immigration, but…
Commons
Ministerial Statement
20 November 2025
Business of the House
Last Thursday, there was a heavily subscribed Westminster Hall debate about the terrible problem of rogue and conmen builders who fleece people of thousands upon thousands of pounds for work that is never completed and is often not started at all. May we have a statement from an appropriate Minister…
Commons
Proceedings
20 November 2025
Separation Centres: Terrorist Offenders
Normally, I like the Minister’s can-do attitude. Is she really telling the House that this Government would rather make payouts to terrorists than disapply the ECHR?
Commons
Proceedings
20 November 2025
Ukraine: Forcible Removal of Children
By putting forward proposals that could have been drafted by the killer in the Kremlin himself, it seems that President Trump has finally given up on the Nobel peace prize, and is content to settle for the Lenin peace prize instead. Do the Government share my concern at the remarks, admittedly aspir…
Commons
Proceedings
20 November 2025
Russian Ship Yantar
Responding to that directly, if the Government are trying to map the capabilities of the vessel, can they tell us whether they knew in advance that it had this laser capability, and if they did, whether steps are being taken to find methods of protecting our personnel against such laser attacks? Wil…
Commons
Proceedings
19 November 2025
Flooding: Monmouthshire
May I appeal to the Minister to help us in one way? Although this is a devolved matter, it is possible in the internet age very easily to make charitable donations, so could she investigate whether there is a reliable local charity to which people across the country can make donations? Could she per…
Commons
Debate
18 November 2025
5 contributions
Northern Ireland Troubles Bill
On what I hope is a non-contentious point, will the Secretary of State explain to Members in all parts of the House something that not everybody realises, which is that the Northern Ireland (Sentences) Act 1998 means that no matter how heinous the crime, and no matter whether it was committed by a m…
My hon. Friend says that it is highly likely that an appeal would have succeeded. In support of that, I cite the fact that the Defence Committee took evidence in great detail from four professors of law in 2017. They were not talking about that specific legislation, but they all agreed that it was p…
+3 more contributions in this session
Commons
Ministerial Statement
18 November 2025
Gaza and Sudan
On Gaza, will the Government consider making representations to the Israelis about the fact that it does Israel’s reputation no good, and does not help the BBC World Service to report accurately, if external journalists are not allowed into the Gaza strip? Now that the fighting has diminished, the e…
Commons
Ministerial Statement
18 November 2025
China Espionage: Government Security Response
Do the Government accept that China is a bad faith actor whose basic technique can be summed up by a single phrase: buy influence and build dependency? Is that not exactly what has happened in our universities?
Commons
Debate
17 November 2025
Small Modular Nuclear Reactor Power Station: Wylfa
No one likes to consider the prospect of international conflict, but we have seen from that between Ukraine and Russia how dangerous a situation can be when fuel supply installations are targeted. What thought have the Government given to affording the same level of protection against either sabotag…
Commons
Debate
17 November 2025
Budget: Press Briefings
I am disappointed that the Minister does not know of the example of the Chancellor who resigned from Attlee’s Government for inadvertently or otherwise leaking details of the Budget. Does he at least appreciate that there is a difference between speculating about the contents of a Budget and leaking…
Commons
Oral Questions
Home Department
17 November 2025
Topical Questions
It is often reported that a high proportion of people who enter the country illegally do so without any reliable identifying documentation. Can any Minister say, in percentage terms, roughly what the proportions are of illegal immigrants who do and do not have documentation?
Commons
Proceedings
13 November 2025
Northern Ireland Troubles Legacy
May I take this opportunity to point out something that the Defence Committee discovered in its investigation of these matters in 2016 to 2017? The maximum of two years actually spent in jail, no matter how horrendous or multiple the murders, also applies to British service personnel. The argument i…
Commons
Westminster Hall
13 November 2025
2 contributions
Rogue Builders
This is an issue that is crying out for a solution. In my opinion, there are two principal remedies that need to be applied to the plague of rogue builders: criminalisation of those builders who are shown to have fraudulently fleeced their innocent victims; and a requirement for all builders to be r…
What about the fact that these people, in some cases, are criminals and their actions ought to be subject to the criminal law?
Commons
Debate
12 November 2025
Energy
Can my hon. Friend throw any light on the apparent contradiction whereby the Government seem prepared to import fossil fuels—thus exporting our carbon footprint—but not to allow us to develop our own fossil fuel resources? Is it because they are afraid that, once we develop them, we will not want to…
Commons
Debate
12 November 2025
4 contributions
Taxes
As somebody who has been around a long time and remembers when Chancellors used to have to resign for leaking things about the Budget in advance, may I ask the Minister to explain how it has been possible for the present Chancellor to make speeches about what may or may not be in her Budget in advan…
rose—
+2 more contributions in this session
Commons
Proceedings
11 November 2025
Blood Transfusions during the Falklands War
As an officer of the all-party parliamentary group on haemophilia and contaminated blood, I would like to confirm, in support of what the Minister is saying and the advice she is giving, that the contact I have had with IBCA has been very positive. It seems to want to engage on a personal basis with…