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12,832 spoken contributions under 12 words (interjections such as “Will the hon. Member give way?”) are hidden. Show them

1. 14 Sep 2026·Parliament·Labour·Paul Davies

   Water Sector: Public Ownership

   I absolutely agree, and under this Government work has been taking place to ensure that we have control over our vital services in the UK. The Government are aware of the failures; their response so far has been to tighten regulation of the sector. In January, Ministers published a White Paper titled “A New Vision for Water”, which was broadly in line with the recommendations made by the Independent Water Commission, also known as the Cunliffe commission. The commission was tasked with establishing key changes to improve the water sector regulatory system, including the creation of a stronger integrated water regulator that is more streamlined and more closely embedded in the affairs of the water companies; regional planning systems; a new water ombudsman; a clearer national strategy through revamped strategic policy statements to regulators; and national targets.

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2. 14 Sep 2026·Parliament·Labour·Paul Davies

   Water Sector: Public Ownership

   I absolutely agree with and support the hon. Gentleman’s point. The issue is also about how we look after our water in the future; unfortunately, it would appear from the last few years that such innovative and sustainable initiatives would not happen under private models.

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3. 14 Sep 2026·Parliament·Labour·Paul Davies

   Water Sector: Public Ownership

   I will bring in the hon. Gentleman later, but first I will make a bit of progress. While the steps I mentioned signify some progress—and they are welcome—they only tinker at the edges of reform. I am concerned that the Government have failed to address the fundamental error of the past four decades: while water remains a commodity, it will never deliver an outcome in the interests of the public or the environment. It was disappointing to learn that the Government did not even permit the Independent Water Commission to consider alternative ownership models, including whether public ownership was an option. That signifies a further issue, which is the continued lack of democratic inclusion in the decisions that affect the sector.

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4. 14 Sep 2026·Parliament·Labour·Paul Davies

   Water Sector: Public Ownership

   I absolutely agree. As a fellow Yorkshire MP, I know only too well the issues with Yorkshire Water and their impact on citizens in our region. Public ownership is incredibly popular among the public—Ash’s petition demonstrates that, as does opinion polling. In May this year, YouGov reported that 82% of Brits believe that the water companies should be run in the public sector, compared with just 8% who believe that that they should remain private. That is a marked increase from the 59% in favour in 2017. That support is not limited to Labour voters, of whom 84% are in favour: 66% of Conservative and Reform, 83% of Liberal Democrat and 87% of Green voters are also in favour. The public overwhelmingly back the public ownership of water—in my view, with good reason. Public ownership would mean that the £22 billion earmarked for shareholder returns and interest over the next five years would go instead towards repairing our broken water infrastructure, paying off debts and letting water company staff do their jobs properly.

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5. 14 Sep 2026·Parliament·Labour·Paul Davies

   Water Sector: Public Ownership

   Again, as I run through my speech, my hon. Friend will see the position that I am taking on public ownership. I absolutely agree that it beggars belief to see money being siphoned off from the water sector into private hands. As has already been mentioned, many shareholders are not even in the UK while our citizens are suffering badly. The £22 billion earmarked for shareholder returns alone would help address water poverty, which 1.8 million households faced between 2024-25. Look across the water: Paris took water back into public hands in 2010. Once that move was made, a range of social subsidies were introduced to help safeguard access to water for all. Crucially, public ownership is essential if we want to restore public trust. Last year, the Consumer Council for Water’s annual survey found that trust in the water sector had hit an all-time low. The high cost of bills, repeated violations of environmental standards and continued enrichment of company bosses has left the public disillusioned.

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6. 14 Sep 2026·Parliament·Labour·Paul Davies

   Water Sector: Public Ownership

   I absolutely agree. As a former councillor, I have sat on many planning committees and in many instances I was extremely frustrated by the lack of engagement or, where there was engagement, by it not being up to the standard needed. I believe the move into public ownership would help us resolve that. Regulation alone cannot fix the crisis of confidence and, as we all know, the Government’s ban on bonuses for water companies that fail to meet high standards has been widely bypassed, with reports indicating that bosses’ total pay actually increased in the past year. Even when under an intense spotlight from academics and campaigners such as Ash, the industry is willing to blatantly outwit regulation. To rebuild trust, the public must know for certain that their bills are being used to fund services, not profits.

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7. 14 Sep 2026·Parliament·Labour·Paul Davies

   Water Sector: Public Ownership

   I absolutely agree. I am old enough to remember when raw sewage was pumped into the coastal waters where I was born in south Wales. We started to change that and it changed quite dramatically. We seem to have regressed badly and we have seen a complete failure by the private sector to control that problem. People must be able to see that their concerns are being listened to and that they have a meaningful say in how the industry operates. That brings me to the purpose of Ash’s petition.

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8. 14 Sep 2026·Parliament·Labour·Paul Davies

   Water Sector: Public Ownership

   I am going to make a little bit of progress. Ash calls for a referendum because, in his words, “I think people are sick of being told they can’t have healthy rivers and seas, just because powerful financiers want to keep making money from our water bills. Our government is listening to them but not to us, so this is how we stop being victims and start fighting back.” I appreciate where Ash is coming from—[Interruption.] I will make a little progress; I am conscious of time. Despite its popularity and the strength of the case behind it, there has been a total failure from successive Governments to consider the merits of public ownership. I believe we have a strong opportunity to rectify that. It is no secret that our politics has undergone significant change in recent months. We now have a Prime Minister, Andy Burnham, who proudly states a commitment to delivering “stronger public control” of essential services. In his first statement delivered to the Commons as Prime Minister, he criticised the political path of the past 40 years, which had taken control away from communities, and cited the water sector “as a leaking monument to that approach—a country run in the private rather than public interest.”—[Official Report, 1 September 2026; Vol. 790, c. 27.] I commend the Prime Minister for those words, but words must become action. There are practical steps that this Government can take now.

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9. 14 Sep 2026·Parliament·Labour·Paul Davies

   Water Sector: Public Ownership

   I absolutely do not think that is fair. That comes to the nub of what we are talking about: the total lack of fairness in how the sector is operated and its impact on all our citizens.

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10. 14 Sep 2026·Parliament·Labour·Paul Davies

    Water Sector: Public Ownership

    I will, and then I will have to make some progress—that is just a warning to other hon. Members.

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11. 14 Sep 2026·Parliament·Labour·Paul Davies

    Water Sector: Public Ownership

    I absolutely agree. Many of us are now customers of Thames Water; I have Yorkshire Water and Thames Water. I am sad to say that I have not been impressed as a customer with either, but what has happened to that gentleman is just not acceptable. There are practical steps that the Government can take now. One option is for the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs to conduct a feasibility study of alternative models to ensure that public ownership has been given due, fair and full consideration. I understand that previously the Department has cited a total cost of £100 billion for full nationalisation, which it based on the regulatory capital value of the sector. However, that approach has been widely criticised as misleading for failing to represent the accurate market value of a company. For example, Thames Water’s RCV is more than £20 billion, yet the 2025 rescue bid from Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co., before it walked away, valued the equity at around £4 billion because the company’s debts had all but wiped out the value of the capital base. A feasibility study would provide full transparency and accuracy. It is also true that the Government face a more imminent crisis with the likely collapse of Thames Water. Here there are several options, including a special administration regime. Although that is technically a temporary form of nationalisation, it would allow the Government to test the waters for more far-reaching reform. Without an SAR water companies will know that, no matter how bad it gets, there is no real sanction. The credibility of the regulation will be fundamentally undermined. In the spirit of devolution we must strive for a water sector that is decentralised, democratic and that serves the interests of our communities. There are strong precedents for that. Some hon. Members may be familiar with the example of Berlin’s water utility, which was re-municipalised following a grassroots campaign in the early 2010s. That was driven by demands for greater transparency and accountability, issues that have already been raised several times in interventions in this debate. Today, Berlin’s water provision is managed by a 16-person board with eight shareholder representatives appointed by the state of Berlin and eight employee representatives elected through workforce representation mechanisms. International evidence shows that long-term democratic involvement in running our water sector is essential to rebuild trust and to secure stronger outcomes. It also has practical benefits. The cost of regulation will fall when information becomes open and transparent, and it will provide a lasting guarantee that water is run in the interests of the public, not those of the private sector. At its heart, this debate is about the right of the public to have their say over one of the most basic and essential services. If we are serious about setting a new political path, as the Prime Minister has said, we must heed the call of campaigners such as Ash and deliver a water system that is innovative and sustainable to underpin the essential infrastructure of our economy and the health of our nations. We must be brave in our approach. We need to look at history and the decisions of past Governments. We do not remember small-scale reforms or tinkering with a broken system. We remember those who had the courage to rewire the state and deliver lasting change. This Government now face that moment. They must choose whether to preserve a failed model or to deliver a system that is stronger and more accountable. The choice is clear: it is time to put water back into public ownership.

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12. 14 Sep 2026·Parliament·Labour·Paul Davies

    Water Sector: Public Ownership

    I start by thanking not just Ash for the petition, but the many campaigners who have worked so hard and tirelessly on this issue. You have made sure that there is no hiding place for the water companies, and that is the most important thing; this is out in the open and it is clearly understood by the public. We know that the public view the model as completely broken and are demanding significant change. I know that you will keep the work going, and you need to keep it going because you need to keep all of us on our toes and pin us down to make sure that we deliver as well. I thank all hon. Members. There has been a clear consensus across the House that the model is broken. There are some nuances in terms of views on the solutions, but the starting point is clearly that the privatised model does not work. If we go back to 1989, the architect of the model, Margaret Thatcher, told Members not to pontificate and to look in the “light of the facts”. Well, I think we have all looked in the light of the facts. We know where we are. We know that we need to make that change. I said in my speech that the Government have to be brave, and I say it again. We have to be brave. There are clearly many issues on the road to public ownership, but that does not mean that we give up at the first hurdle. We have a direction that many of us have talked about, and we have to find solutions and ways to overcome those obstacles and make this a reality. Again, I give many thanks to Ash and everybody else, and to all the Members who contributed to the discussion.

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13. 14 Sep 2026·Parliament·Labour·Patricia Ferguson

    Israel and Palestine

    I welcome the contribution by the Minister of State, Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, my hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff South and Penarth (Stephen Doughty) this evening and that of the Foreign Secretary last week. Having supported the cause of the Palestinian people since the early 1990s and having a keen interest in Jewish culture and religion, I was particularly eager to visit the countries for myself to better understand the situation. I did so in May this year with Members from across the Chamber, and I am very grateful to Yachad for organising the visit. I declare an interest in that regard. Like most Members, I have read and thought a lot about the events of 7 October—the attack on the kibbutzim and the music festival, the murder and kidnapping of so many people, and the treatment of those held hostage. Those were dreadful events, each and every one of them, but to visit a kibbutz and to hear how the attack unfolded there—armed paragliders descending on the kibbutz in the early hours of a Saturday morning, and the murder and kidnapping of its members—was frankly shocking. It also took the IDF more than 24 hours to get to those people, and even longer to safely escort them to safety, and that was heartrending. The actions of Hamas on that date and beyond were monstrous. The woman who showed us around the kibbutz lost her home and her son, a father of three, on that day, but when we asked her what she does now, she told us that she does what she has always done: she goes into schools to talk about peace. Many Israelis we spoke to expressed similar hopes; they have great hope that the elections next month will make a difference and that a public inquiry into the events of 7 October should be held, as the hon. Member for Birmingham Perry Barr (Ayoub Khan) suggested. Israelis are right to be saddened, angered and outraged by those events, but their Government’s response against the people of Gaza has been disproportionate and is a stain on the conscience of the world. However, the problems did not begin in 2023. Indeed, my late father was stationed in the middle east during the second world war. He loved the region, but was depressed by what he saw then and by what unfolded in subsequent decades. I am proud that this Government have recognised the state of Palestine, and I am even more proud that we are now committed to banning the sale of goods and services from settlements. I am also proud that we have taken such a strong leadership role internationally to get to this point. The international effort is crucial if there is to be progress. However, let us be under no illusion. When we talk about settlements, we are not talking about small villages with rudimentary services and a rural lifestyle. Many are large industrial towns with successful industries and excellent public services, most are strategically placed to prevent a Palestinian state from ever being contiguous, and all of them are illegal. E1 is potentially vast, and it is just the latest addition to that policy, which is not new. In Hebron, the second largest city in the west bank, a settlement was created in the middle of the city in 1968, and as a result the city centre is a ghost town. We see on our televisions and online the extreme actions of the settlers, and I will come back to that, but we should not underestimate for a moment the sheer grind that Palestinians in the west bank experience each and every day as they try to go about their lives—checkpoints, roads that are off limits to Palestinian cars and commercial activity, or just off limits to Palestinians full stop. The village of Khirbet Zanuta in the south Hebron hills was home to some 250 Palestinians who were forced off their land by settlers after a campaign of harassment and intimidation.

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14. 14 Sep 2026·Parliament·Labour·Patricia Ferguson

    Israel and Palestine

    Indeed, I agree with my hon. Friend. We heard of examples of that when we visited this year, and it is of course deliberate. It consists of incidents such as she describes, but also of people peering in windows and polluting watercourses used usually by the women of a village. That kind of behaviour is just not acceptable. The villagers of Khirbet Zanuta won a Supreme Court ruling that they could return to their village, and many of them did, but they were forced out again. This time, the settlers bulldozed the village, including its school, which had been built in part with UK taxpayers’ money. At Umm al-Khair, we saw how settler outposts had expanded directly alongside the village and heard about the death of Awdah Hathaleen in July 2025. Awdah was shot dead by Yinon Levi, a settler already sanctioned by the UK Government. Despite video evidence —and I mean really strong video evidence—no charges have ever been brought and no prosecution has taken place. We visited the American co-ordination centre in Kiryat Gat, and I have to say that was quite an unreal experience. There are military personnel from about 20 countries working on aid delivery, monitoring the ceasefire and planning the reconstruction of Gaza. We discussed with an Israeli army officer the distribution of aid in Gaza, and our concerns about the designation of many items as potentially of dual use and as a consequence banned from Gaza. This included items such as tent poles, therapeutic toys for children and cochlear implants for children. We also met the Norwegian Refugee Council. Its assessment of the volume and effectiveness of humanitarian aid could not have been more at odds with what we heard at Kiryat Gat. Whatever the facts of the matter are, it is clear that the humanitarian situation is still dire and that life for Palestinians in Gaza is a question of survival rather than living. With little in the way of healthcare and education, it would be helpful if the Minister closing the debate could indicate whether we will expand our support for Palestinian students wishing to study in the UK, and for injured and sick Palestinians struggling to access healthcare. It is a sad fact—actually, it is not sad; it is horrifying—that Gaza has per capita the highest number of child amputees in the world, many of whom have not had access to proper treatment, rehabilitation or appropriate prosthetics. We must do more to help. The way ahead will not be easy, but the only way forward is for a safe and secure Israel to be able to live with a safe and secure Palestine as its neighbour. Hopefully, that aim will be helped by the election of a new Government in just over a month, and the continuing efforts of the Government and their international partners. I was struck by something my hon. Friend the Member for Wirral West (Matthew Patrick) said in his speech. I was reminded of a comment made at the time of the Good Friday agreement, which is—I will close on this—that you don’t make peace by talking to your friends.

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15. 14 Sep 2026·Parliament·Labour·Pamela Nash

    Speciality Steel UK

    I wholeheartedly welcome the Government’s action to secure the Speciality Steel UK sites in England. The Secretary of State is aware that the workforce in Motherwell’s Dalzell plate mill have been repeatedly and sorely let down by Speciality Steel, which has left the site underfunded and unable to carry out contracts. The workforce have also been let down by the SNP Government, which sold the site to those cowboys in the first place and then left the playing field. Dalzell was part of British Steel; that plate mill is the jigsaw piece that completes our steel offering in the UK. It makes sense for it to be brought back into the fold as soon as possible. Will the Secretary of State confirm to the House that he will take all necessary actions to save Dalzell and get it up and running again, ensuring that growth in every postcode includes ML1?

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16. 14 Sep 2026·Parliament·Labour·Noah Law

    Water Sector: Public Ownership

    I welcome the fact that, under the Prime Minister’s leadership, the conversation on public control of the water industry has fundamentally shifted. We must no longer bury our heads in the sand over the question of public control of the water sector, but we owe our constituents honest answers, not easy answers. I am sure that there are few in this House who feel that they could credibly advocate that there is truly a cost-free form of nationalism out there—or for expropriation, as it more honestly should be called. Despite my background, I promise that I am very much not the “It’s all about the bond markets” guy in this case. I think we all know, however, that there is no free lunch at scale when it comes to the overall cost of funding the industry. At the same time, this industry should never have been privatised in the first place, and immense sums have been extracted from it over the years. Although some of the more recent investment expectations under this Government have begun to temper that, the extraction is still happening in egregious cases such as that of Thames Water. Let me briefly take Members through the four options for taking back control of the industry. Option one is a pragmatic approach to cost-free nationalisation, which says that even more stringent regulation would bankrupt the companies so that we could acquire them for nothing. The problem is that we can get as good of a deal with these companies as we like, but the British public would still have to foot the £100 billion-plus investment in upgrades over the next five years or so. Option two is that we pay the full whack. I think we all know that RCV is not a fair market valuation, but when the debt, which needs to be paid down or taken on, is factored in, the figure is up to the better part of £100 billion. Even then, there is the investment on top of that. Option three is to wait for the water companies to go bankrupt and then acquire them for next to nothing. Ofwat sees 10 of those companies with high financial risk, but the Government would still have to foot the infrastructure bill on a company-by-company basis—that would be cheaper, but slower. Option four is to start with what the British public actually want to see from its water system and have a democratic conversation about what they are willing to invest to solve the problem. We then work out the impact that that has on the value of the industry. The reality is that we have already had that conversation—we know what the British public want because they have been shouting it from the rooftops, often in wetsuits with surfboards in hand. I commend the work of the Good Growth Foundation, which has gotten to grips with some of the challenges and opportunities presented by the special administration scheme to take back control of the water industry for the public good, and enable us to take those profits and reinvest them into fixing our water system.

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17. 14 Sep 2026·Parliament·Labour·Noah Law

    Water Sector: Public Ownership

    Does my hon. Friend support our Labour Government’s initiative to build more reservoirs for the first time in decades?

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18. 14 Sep 2026·Parliament·Labour·Nesil Caliskan

    Local Authority SEND Services

    Creating additional SEND spaces is critical for my constituency as we have had a 100% increase in education, health and care plans and an extra 1,000 students now need special educational needs support. Will the Minister reassure us that when the schools Bill comes through, as part of the proposals there will be additional support for mainstream teachers to get the training they need so that there is support in mainstream schools?

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19. 14 Sep 2026·Parliament·Labour·Neil Duncan-Jordan

    Sovereign Grant Bill

    As I said during the ways and means debate last week, I welcome the Government’s decision to bring forward this legislation to make it possible for the sovereign grant to be reduced in future if necessary, and to return any unspent grant more quickly. I am grateful to the Exchequer Secretary for his letter this morning, which covered some of the points that I made in that debate. Today’s Bill feels like a missed opportunity, especially as a number of issues surrounding the grant remain to be addressed by the Government. The first issue is the link between the grant and the profits of the Crown Estate. Members will know that the Crown Estate commands a massive £16 billion portfolio, owning much of our coastline and the corresponding seabed, but it is not the private property of the monarch, nor do the revenues from the estate belong to them. In fact the Crown Estate is quite separate from the monarchy, and operates to generate revenue for the Treasury. The implication of the current arrangement is that the monarch forgoes his profits from the Crown Estate in return for a payment of a percentage via the sovereign grant, yet all the profits are public funds. That is an odd form of indexation, and raises the question of why the grant is not based on the needs of the monarchy or its costs. It would have been better if the Bill broke the link to the Crown Estate and gave power to the royal trustees to decide the appropriate figure, based on need. That raises the second question of how the grant should be set. I believe that it should be done on an annual basis, and that it is important for the funding of the monarchy to be transparent and open for MPs to debate. All public funds should rightly be open to scrutiny and parliamentary oversight. On numerous occasions I have tried to table questions about these issues, only to be told that this is not something for Parliament to discuss. That must change, and that is why I will support amendment 1. The Bill calls for a substantial increase in the grant, and a rise from 12% of the Crown Estate profits to 20.5%. However, the royal family is smaller than it was in 2011, when the grant was first introduced, and the King and the Prince of Wales are said to favour a slimmed-down monarchy. It would appear that the anticipated increase to £99.9 million is not based on any assessment of need, and I should appreciate it if the Minister explained exactly how we have arrived at a figure that is 322% higher than it was when it was first introduced in 2012. Even allowing for inflation and the building maintenance programme that has been mentioned, the proposed grant is well over twice the real value of its starting point. As I mentioned during the ways and means debate, there are also some anomalies when we look at the monarch’s wider financial arrangements. Why, for example, is no account taken of the profits of the Duchy of Lancaster when the level of the sovereign grant is being set? Ideally, Madam Deputy Speaker—I can see that you are very keen to bring me to book—we should have before us a Bill to ensure that the amount of the sovereign grant is appropriate to the relative needs of the monarch, and that Members of Parliament are not restricted to just approving a new percentage figure once every five years, via an arbitrary and unnecessary link to the Crown Estate. The Bill is, in my view, a missed opportunity to modernise the monarchy. I look forward to hearing the Minister’s comments.

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20. 14 Sep 2026·Parliament·Labour·Neil Duncan-Jordan

    Israel and Palestine

    Because you have called me last, Madam Deputy Speaker, I owe my hon. Friend the Member for Alloa and Grangemouth (Brian Leishman) a pint, so thanks very much! You were not to know, of course. Last week, the Foreign Secretary firmly committed the UK Government to supporting the call for accountability for what has happened in Gaza and the west bank. It is on that matter that I wish to reflect, because last month an Israeli prosecutor announced that he would not pursue criminal proceedings for the murder of my constituent John Chapman, an aid worker from Poole who was killed by the IDF in April 2024 while working with World Central Kitchen, which was mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Truro and Falmouth (Jayne Kirkham). The officer responsible for the strikes claimed that the workers were identified as targets after a brief encounter with armed guards presumed to be from Hamas. That has been found to be a baseless accusation. The IDF, operating a policy of “guilt by association”, then attacked the aid convoy. The IDF conceded that the murder of the aid workers had been the result of an “erroneous assessment that Hamas military operatives were present in the vehicles”, but concluded that that did not give rise to a reasonable suspicion that a criminal offence had been committed. The IDF is getting away with the murder of John and his six colleagues, including two other British citizens. It is an absolute disgrace. The Minister said in his opening remarks that it would be for the courts to decide on this, but I think that the IDF has got an effective “get out of jail free” card. The world that we leave to our children is not set in stone; it is one that our Government and their allies help to shape. It is shaped by every action and every failure to act set the boundaries of acceptability—what is tolerated and what is condemned. These choices mould norms, establish red lines, and decide whether the world becomes safer or more dangerous. The Foreign Secretary’s step last week was one such choice—it takes us closer to upholding human rights and democracy—but the killing of John and his colleagues cannot go without accountability, and I would welcome information from the Government about the steps that they will take to secure justice for him and his family. That is the very least that they deserve, because if international law is to be meaningful, justice must prevail and someone must be held responsible. The Government must set out a pathway to a comprehensive arms embargo with the state of Israel, because it is clear that these weapons are being used to commit war crimes. They are turned on aid workers such as my constituent, including British citizens, and they are used recklessly without any accountability. Challenging this is how we become a world leader for peace, and I urge the Government to go further, faster, to achieve that.

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21. 14 Sep 2026·Parliament·Labour·Naz Shah

    Israel and Palestine

    I, too, put on the record my thanks to the Minister’s predecessor, my right hon. Friend the Member for Lincoln (Mr Falconer), for all the work he has done to get us to this place, and to the Minister and his team for all the work they are doing at the moment, particularly last week. I welcome today’s general debate on Israel and Palestine. It is a timely debate that rightly deserves the attention of the House. There will, no doubt, be a small minority online who will ask why events thousands of miles away should take up time in the British Parliament, so let me address that from the outset. First, Britain does not exist on a planet of its own, detached from the rest of the world. What happens beyond our shores has consequences here at home. We also have a particular historic and moral responsibility when it comes to Israel and Palestine, given the Balfour declaration, the British mandate and our country’s historical role in the region. But even putting that history aside, whether we like it or not, conflicts elsewhere affect the lives of people right here in Britain. A war in Ukraine, a war involving Iran or instability across the middle east can mean higher prices at the petrol pump, higher energy bills, greater inflationary pressures and, ultimately, higher borrowing costs for families. More fundamentally, growing instability around the world threatens the peace, security and freedoms upon which all our lives depend. Britain therefore has both an interest and a responsibility in seeking peace, upholding international law and preventing further conflict. Secondly, we cannot discuss this conflict without confronting the extraordinary loss of human life. According to figures published by the United Nations, more than 73,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since 7 October 2023. More than 21,700 of those killed have been children—21,700 children.

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22. 14 Sep 2026·Parliament·Labour·Naz Shah

    Israel and Palestine

    Certainly, the Secretary of State highlighted in his remarks last Tuesday that the Government will seek advice from the ICJ and are continuously supporting those inquiries, but the hon. Member makes an important point. Sadly, we live in a world where we can go about our daily lives and not always feel the seriousness of the pain in Gaza, or comprehend the magnitude of the killing. Putting those thousands of deaths to one side for a moment, as mothers and fathers, in this Chamber and beyond, can we not feel the pain being felt by the people of Gaza? I recently saw a video of a father who believed his child was dead, only to be reunited with his son more than two years later, having thought that he had been killed and buried beneath the rubble of Gaza’s destruction. He holds his son, pulls him close and cries uncontrollably, completely overwhelmed with emotion. Can we imagine being that father? If we had lost our child, can we imagine the happiness, relief and overwhelming emotion of that moment of being reunited? That is one story that at least has some happiness at the end, and it makes us tear up because we imagine, “What if this was my child? What if this was your child?” But I ask: how do those mothers who will never see their beloved children again feel; those fathers who will never again hold their children tightly to their chests; those children growing up in Gaza with no mother, no father, no guardian and no shelter? What is it like to live in a conflict zone where someone who is a journalist, like Hamza al-Dahdouh, can be killed in an Israeli airstrike, or, like Shireen Abu Akleh, can be shot dead while doing their job? Years later there is still no accountability to bring about justice for their families. It is a conflict zone where someone can be a British, Australian, Canadian or Palestinian aid worker for the World Central Kitchen, trying to provide basic food and humanitarian assistance to people living among the rubble, and be killed by the IDF. The seven World Central Kitchen workers were travelling in a clearly marked convoy and co-ordinating their movements with the Israeli military. Three of those killed were British. They were returning from delivering food and humanitarian assistance to people in Gaza when their vehicles were struck. Their deaths show the extraordinary danger faced by aid workers trying to feed civilians in a warzone. Israel acknowledged serious failures in the strike and dismissed two officers, yet the families of the World Central Kitchen workers have called for independent accountability—that call is falling on deaf ears. That is the treatment of journalists, aid workers and others whose very purpose is to help and bear witness. So where is the justice, the accountability and the protection of life for everyone in Gaza? God forbid you stand up and consistently speak out against the oppression, killing and destruction of the Palestinian people, and call for sanctions in line with international law and the position of successive British Governments for decades—the response is that Israel sanctions people like me.

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23. 14 Sep 2026·Parliament·Labour·Naz Shah

    Israel and Palestine

    My hon. Friend makes his point strongly, and I was coming on to reference China. If the intention of sanctioning me was to silence me, it will not work. Israel cannot call itself the only democracy in the middle east and then sanction British parliamentarians for speaking out. China previously sanctioned Members of this Parliament for speaking out over human rights abuses in Xinjiang, as my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham Hall Green and Moseley (Tahir Ali) pointed out. Those sanctions did not silence British parliamentarians, and nor will these. The justice and equality that I, and many others in this Chamber, fight for does not consider someone’s nationality, faith, ethnic background or who someone is. If more than 73,000 Palestinians are killed in Gaza; if Palestinian land in the occupied west bank is taken through illegal settlements; if Palestinians are being forcibly displaced and subjected to what many international experts and human rights organisations have described as ethnic cleansing; and if the viability of an independent state of Palestine, alongside a state of Israel, is being systematically undermined, eroding every opportunity for a two-state solution and lasting peace in the middle east, then I have a moral duty to speak up. And if innocent Jewish people are murdered, as they were by Hamas in the horrific attacks of 7 October, when around 1,200 people were killed, then I have the same moral duty to speak up and call that out. Outside of this conflict, I have stood shoulder to shoulder with the minority Christian community in Jaranwala in Pakistan against their persecution. The justice that I believe in means that I have a moral duty to stand with them too. Additionally, in response to the Government’s measures to prohibit trade with illegal Israeli settlements in the occupied west bank, the Israeli Government announced that they would close the British consulate general in East Jerusalem. The measures were taken alongside France and Canada, with other international partners also supporting action to protect the two-state solution. Yet Israel chose to direct its retaliation principally against the United Kingdom. That is not the conduct that we should expect from an ally. It looks like an ally lashing out because Britain has chosen to uphold international law. There is also a fundamental question about Israel’s legal authority to take that action. It is not the British embassy in Israel; it is the British consulate general, which represents the United Kingdom in Jerusalem, the west bank and Gaza, and conducts our relations with Palestine. We must see those three areas as one entity, because that is what they are. East Jerusalem is occupied territory. The International Court of Justice has confirmed that Israel holds the status of an occupying power there, and that Israeli sovereignty over East Jerusalem is not internationally recognised. Israel may exercise the practical power to force the consulate’s closure, but practical control is not the same as lawful sovereignty. By what legal right, then, do the Israeli Government seek to close a British diplomatic mission in occupied East Jerusalem? I also want to bring to the House’s attention today’s report by B’Tselem, an Israeli human rights group. It is the most comprehensive report to date on the west bank, gathering evidence from over three decades of Israel’s human rights violations and 2,000 testimonies since October 2023. The report is called “The Elimination Project”. It shows the correlation between the widespread destruction of homes and infrastructure, the network of roadblocks and checkpoints, the attacks by armed settler militias, the expulsion of communities and the unprecedented expansion of settlements, outposts and farms. B’Tselem says that these are not separate phenomena; rather, they are part of an Israeli project to eliminate the Palestinian collective, in order to establish permanent Jewish Israeli control over the entire area. The Israeli elimination project, according to B’Tselem, “did not begin with the current government,” but since late 2022 a new phase has been entered, with faster and much broader deployment. Given that report today, I ask the Minister whether the Government will expedite the measures announced last week—the ban on trade with the occupied west bank and illegally occupied areas. This is really important. The Foreign Secretary made it clear to this House last week that Britain is not powerless when international law is being torn apart. Once again, I commend the Prime Minister and the Government for demonstrating the power of international diplomacy, and for leading action, alongside France, Canada and other international partners, against illegal Israeli settlements and those who profit from them.

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24. 14 Sep 2026·Parliament·Labour·Mr Luke Charters

    Student Loans

    May I, too, pass on my condolences to the Prime Minister and his family? I declare that I am a plan 2 borrower, and I know from first-hand experience how unclear the loans were at the time. Will my right hon. Friend say a little more about how the Government are clearing up the guidance given to borrowers? How does she wish to overhaul the Student Loans Company?

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25. 14 Sep 2026·Parliament·Labour·Mike Reader

    Kinship Carers: Financial Support

    13. What plans she has to ensure consistent financial support for kinship carers in local authority areas outside kinship zones pilot areas.

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26. 14 Sep 2026·Parliament·Labour·Mike Reader

    Kinship Carers: Financial Support

    Will the Minister join me in thanking kinship carers in Northampton and across all our constituencies who give children a stable and loving home? Outside the seven zones that the Minister mentioned, funding is still means-tested. Will he therefore commit to publishing interim findings before the end of the pilot in 2029 so that families have an answer on parity before the next general election?

    Hansard source
27. 14 Sep 2026·Parliament·Labour·Matthew Patrick

    Israel and Palestine

    This weekend was Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish new year. Jewish families wished one another “Shana Tova”. They dipped apples in honey, in the hope that the new year ahead will be sweet. As Rosh Hashanah closed, families started a 10-day journey through to Yom Kippur, the Jewish day of atonement. It is a day when we seek forgiveness for our failings and vow to do better. Today is the first of those 10 days. It is a period of profound seriousness, and a chance to reflect on the past and to ensure that the future is brighter. Last year, on the high holy day of Yom Kippur, Jihad al-Shamie went to Heaton Park synagogue armed with a knife to murder Jews. As he stabbed one worshipper, he shouted, “This is what they get for killing our children.” It is no wonder that this is a sensitive time and a sensitive debate for the Jewish community, because as Mr al-Shamie’s actions show, there are those who would cloak their antisemitism in concerns about the actions of Israel—those whose murderous intent and racist ignorance is dressed up as a moral crusade. I choose to reflect on the past year, and I hope to use that to help build towards a brighter year ahead, because surely that is what each and every one of us in this House is here to do—to chart a way forward. Our job is not to amplify grievance, or to give in to hopelessness, but to do the hard yards of understanding, and the perhaps even harder yards of playing our role in getting us to a better place.

    Hansard source
28. 14 Sep 2026·Parliament·Labour·Matthew Patrick

    Israel and Palestine

    My hon. Friend makes a powerful point. Twinning offers an important opportunity to hear that dialogue and to make sure that we are not shutting out the people who are directly impacted. I certainly support that. At next year’s Yom Kippur, I dearly hope that we have an opportunity to look back on a year of progress. I hope that the threat of E1 settlements has ended, and with it, the violent expansion of settlements across the west bank that terrorise Palestinians. I hope that extremism no longer has any influence on the Government of Israel. I hope that the everyday leadership of Israelis and Palestinians, and of Jewish and Muslim communities, inspires people towards peace and towards love. I hope that the Palestinian Authority, often considered the best hope of leading the Palestinian people, end once and for all the abhorrent practice of paying terrorists each and every month based on the level of destruction and death they wreak upon the Jewish people. I hope that the Palestinian people and Palestinian children are not taught using textbooks that say I am to be hated because I am Jewish. I hope that those children are not brought up to believe that hating Jews is as necessary a life skill as learning maths or science. I hope that Hamas, an evil who have inflicted untold damage on the people of Israel and the people of Gaza, are no more. I hope that in their place is a leadership who see aid as an opportunity to feed their people and to build out infrastructure that might make the everyday life of Gazans better. I hope, as I have called for in this Chamber many times in the past, that Israel has increased the flow of aid into Gaza so that people have no worry about from where they might find their next meal or dose of medicine. I hope that those in Gaza who have stolen more than £1 billion of public money to build an underground terrorist tunnel network and ply it with weapons become marginalised voices, recognised for the malign influence that they are. I hope that the current Iranian regime, which exports terrorism right across the globe, including here in Britain, and without whom this conflict could never be sustained, is over. I hope that in its place are a Government who treat all the people of Iran—man or woman, gay or straight, Jew or Muslim—as equal people deserving of love and respect. I am an optimist. I cannot give up on the idea of a two-state solution, but—it is difficult to say this—I understand why some people have. I have spoken to lifelong peace activists in Israel who decided that the depravity of 7 October, and the celebrations that followed it, showed them that they would be fools to believe they could share peace with people who want them dead. I also understand that someone growing up in Gaza knowing war, hunger, destruction and death similarly might not see an alternative path. They may not see their neighbours as partners towards peace. However, my optimism does not dismiss these views, or simply wish that they would go away; my optimism is a belief that we can change course. It has been done before. In this House, we are rightly proud of what we achieved in Northern Ireland through the Good Friday agreement. That was anything but easy. Prejudices ran deep. Terrible injustices were inflicted upon people, and hurt reached into every corner and every community of Northern Ireland. More of the same was not an option, but that required change and courage. It placed a demand on those who wanted peace—an uncomfortable demand to see and pursue an alternative that hardly seemed possible. We can learn from them. It starts with us here, with understanding, with compassion, with humanity and dignity in everything we do. It requires us to listen, sometimes to views that we do not always like, and sometimes to people who are not “on our side”. It starts with ending a culture, here in the UK and around the world, in which we take sides on this issue as if it were a football match. That is not a path to peace. If we fail to start from the idea that even in the most intractable and bloody conflicts, children and non-combatants should be kept safe, we will never find that path. If we want to play our role, in this place, in building a two-state solution, we must not see this as a debate needing more heat, but as one needing more light. Where there is anger—understandable, justifiable anger—we must work to ensure that the words we speak do not entrench that anger and, in so doing, block any future chance of progress. The UK and our allies owe that to the people of Israel and Palestine, those who are doing the hard work of trying to find peace in the most difficult of circumstances. We owe them our solidarity. The alternative is that we risk looking back, in a year, at another missed opportunity.

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29. 14 Sep 2026·Parliament·Labour·Matthew Patrick

    Israel and Palestine

    I know that my hon. Friend speaks with great experience, and I am sure that those on the Front Bench have heard what he has said. Any opportunity to fund the people who, day in day out, are making the future of peace still possible is one that we must take. As I was saying, we owe them our solidarity, because the alternative is to look back, in a year, at more missed opportunities with more anger and more hate, and with peace ever further away. I do not want that on my conscience, so I commit myself to learning those lessons.

    Hansard source
30. 14 Sep 2026·Parliament·Labour·Mary Glindon

    Topical Questions

    T7. Earlier this year, Ravenswood primary school in Newcastle applied to the school rebuilding programme as surveys had deemed the school building to be beyond repair. A subsequent visit promised by the Department has not materialised. Can the Secretary of State expedite a meeting with the Department, the school and Newcastle city council’s cabinet member to discuss the current status of the application?

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31. 14 Sep 2026·Parliament·Labour·Luke Myer

    Speciality Steel UK

    I welcome this statement, which shows a Labour Government once again stepping in to protect jobs and protect our specialist steel industry. What steps will the Government take to get this steelmaking business back up and running, and what intervention will they be making with those in the downstream sector to support them to buy British wherever possible?

    Hansard source
32. 14 Sep 2026·Parliament·Labour·Luke Murphy

    Water Sector: Public Ownership

    On the hon. Member’s point about the failure to invest, in Basingstoke South East Water’s failure to invest in the Surrey hills pipeline has resulted in over-abstraction of the Greywell fen, which is destroying our chalk streams, holding up the local plan, which means that homes cannot be built, and risking water scarcity for existing residents. Does the hon. Member agree that investment is at the heart of the failure and that whatever model we choose must deliver investment to deliver change in all those aspects?

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33. 14 Sep 2026·Parliament·Labour·Lucy Powell

    Student Loans

    May I join in what you said, Mr Speaker? I am sure that the whole House will want to send our deepest condolences to the Prime Minister and to his wonderful mum Eileen, his brothers Nick and John, all the grandchildren and the whole family on this saddest of days. The student loans system we inherited is broken and unfair, and some graduates feel the weight of it more strongly. Going to university remains a fantastic opportunity, but I have been very clear that this issue is at the top of my in-tray, and I have been very clear in my views about it.

    Hansard source
34. 14 Sep 2026·Parliament·Labour·Lucy Powell

    Student Loans

    The hon. Lady has put that really well. I reassure her that we absolutely keep these things under review. I have said that this issue is at the top of my in-tray, and that remains the case. I am acutely aware of the cost of living pressures that many graduates in their 20s and early 30s are under, particularly those on plan 2, and that is affecting their decisions about work and life. That is why I will continue to push at this issue, and I hope to have more to say soon.

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35. 14 Sep 2026·Parliament·Labour·Lucy Powell

    Student Loans

    I thank my hon. Friend for his question and for all his campaigning on this issue, which I have followed closely. He is absolutely right, and in response to the excellent report of the Treasury Committee, we have committed to much clearer guidance for students before they make decisions about going to university, so that they can be much clearer about how the student loan system will work and possibly affect them in future. That is a really important piece of work. We have also capped the maximum interest rates this year, and we are reintroducing maintenance grants.

    Hansard source
36. 14 Sep 2026·Parliament·Labour·Lucy Powell

    Student Loans

    As I have said, I am determined that we get these things right. Two things can be true at the same time: I feel the system is unfair and in need of reform, but we also have to put that in the context of the wider public finances and all the pressures and priorities that fall on them. However, it is slightly audacious of the Conservatives to raise this issue, given that they introduced the plan 2 system and froze the threshold four times when they were in government—they are not independent campaigners on this issue today. It now falls in my lap to deal with this issue, and I will do so, unlike the Conservative party.

    Hansard source
37. 14 Sep 2026·Parliament·Labour·Lucy Powell

    Young People not in Education, Employment or Training

    I thank Alan Milburn for his commitment to our young people. This is one of our country’s biggest challenges, and I agree with him that education is “the faltering foundation”. Our current system is leaving too many behind. Countries that combine high academic standards with quality technical education boast low NEET rates, which is why I am determined to make this country a technical education superpower.

    Hansard source
38. 14 Sep 2026·Parliament·Labour·Lucy Powell

    Young People not in Education, Employment or Training

    I thank the hon. Lady for her question. I think she is one of the most frequent contributors to Education questions, as she was to business questions when I was Leader of the House, and I look forward to continuing to debate these issues with her. She is right that attendance, inclusion and—critically—engagement are pivotal to this issue, which is why we need to look not just at the curriculum and the new qualifications that young people can gain, but at ensuring they have the passport they need for life, and are engaged and want to go to school or college every day.

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39. 14 Sep 2026·Parliament·Labour·Lucy Powell

    Young People not in Education, Employment or Training

    Absolutely. Last week’s PISA—programme for international student assessment—results show the importance of those foundations in English, maths and science, which we have really motored on in England over the course of a 25 or 30-year consensus. Scotland, however, is not doing so well. My hon. Friend will know that Scotland’s education system used to be the envy of the world; that is not the case today, and I think it is about time that the Scottish Government took a leaf out of England’s book.

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40. 14 Sep 2026·Parliament·Labour·Lucy Powell

    Young People not in Education, Employment or Training

    I am delighted to join the right hon. Gentleman in thanking Allerton Steel for all the work it does supporting young people in and around his constituency with apprenticeships. He is absolutely right. I held a summit last week at No. 10 North—I am sure he will want to visit at some point soon—with school, college and business leaders. There is a real sense of galvanising the whole business community, who are determined to play their part in tackling this issue.

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