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12,868 spoken contributions under 12 words (interjections such as “Will the hon. Member give way?”) are hidden. Show them
My hon. Friend and neighbour is absolutely right. There are many exciting nature-based solutions for which I have high hopes. In my role as chair of the all-party parliamentary group on climate technology, my focus today is mainly on the engineered solutions, but we need to consider all solutions to meet the challenge ahead.
I believe that we should back any and all solutions that help us face the challenge, and Northern Ireland is as well placed as any part of the UK to offer innovative solutions. Technology such as direct air capture and engineered removal methods will become an essential part of moving beyond net zero towards net negative emissions. Those technologies are nascent. The businesses that will develop them need to be founded today and to scale over the next decade. They need investment, certainty and confidence if they are to become globally competitive and properly supported. The encouraging news is that Britain already possesses almost everything needed to succeed. We have world-class universities that produce cutting-edge research, exceptional engineers, innovative start-ups and university spin-outs, globally respected financial services and investors, and advanced manufacturing capability. The UK’s GGR sector already contributes about £1.2 billion to the UK economy. It has the potential to contribute between £7 billion and £9 billion to GDP by 2050 while supporting more than 100,000 skilled jobs. The countries that build those technologies first will not simply reduce emissions at home; they will be central to global emission reductions for decades to come. Britain should aspire to become the global centre of carbon removal innovation, the home of future climate tech unicorns and a leading exporter of GGR technologies.
There is a lot of truth in what the hon. Member has outlined. We see the most rapid transformation and progress where innovation and expertise are clustered. British innovators are already developing world-leading GGR technologies. The problem is that many of them struggle to raise the long-term investment needed to move from successful demonstrations to commercial deployment. British companies have told me that they will be European or American by the end of next year if the UK does not do more to support them. The Whitehead review made that point very clearly. It recognised that the United Kingdom possesses many of the ingredients required to become a global leader, but that early-stage GGR companies continue to face significant barriers to scaling up. Many of those businesses require substantial upfront capital before they generate meaningful revenue. Private investors understandably look for long-term certainty and a return on their investment. Without that certainty, investment simply flows elsewhere. UK start-ups struggle to access patient capital at precisely the moment they need it most. Of all climate tech early start-ups that failed, 62% fail at series A, the start of the so-called valley of death. Britain has repeatedly invented world-leading technologies only to watch other countries commercialise them. We cannot allow that to happen again. If we get this right, GGRs could become one of Britain’s great industrial success stories. If we get it wrong, we will again become purchasers of technologies developed elsewhere. The Government can create the long-term policy framework that gives markets confidence. The publication of the GGR business model alongside the Whitehead review was an important milestone. The commitment to integrating GGR into the UK emissions trading scheme is another positive step, but companies developing GGRs are making decisions today about where to build their first commercial facilities. Those decisions will determine where future supply chains develop, where highly skilled jobs are created and where intellectual property remains. What the sector is calling out for are low or no cost policy changes that would make a real difference until the response to the Whitehead review finally stops gathering dust on the Minister’s desk. Solutions could be amending the sustainable aviation fuel mandate, improving access to finance from public finance bodies, voluntary carbon market changes, expanding UK GGR standards to wider methods or endorsing interim standards, a new UK buyers’ club, a regulations audit, departmental sandboxes and standards for the emissions performance standard. We must give the market the certainty it is asking for and the investors the confidence to unlock that potential. That brings me to what I believe is the single most important proposal that the Government should consider. The answer lies in creating a British carbon bank, a Government-seeded revolving fund that will crowd in private finance. A British carbon bank would provide long-term advanced market commitments for verified GGRs. That would de-risk the purchase for the offtaker as the credits are certified, provide the capital that the GGR project needs to start capturing greenhouse gases and generating carbon credit, and improve investor confidence because there is a guaranteed purchaser. Rather than the Government attempting to fund every project themselves, a British carbon bank would create guaranteed demand for high-quality removals over many years, allowing businesses to secure investment and scale their technologies with confidence. The Whitehead review recognises exactly this challenge. It concluded that demand certainty will be fundamental if GGRs are to develop at the pace required. Without reliable long-term demand, many technologies will simply struggle to reach commercial scale. One particularly interesting example is Terraset, a US charity. Rather than relying solely on traditional grant funding, Terraset uses philanthropic finance to early pre-purchase commitments to vetted projects, giving those projects the capital to actually remove greenhouse gases. Those advanced commitments provide early demand, giving companies confidence to develop technologies while demonstrating to investors that a future market exists. These projects deliver verified carbon credits to Terraset, which it then sells to buyers. Any revenue generated is then returned to the fund and gets deployed into new projects. For every $1 it deploys, it unlocks $5 in private finance and achieves a 15% mark-up for credits under this de-risk model. As a result of this profit margin, it is now attracting interest from institutional investors, including pension funds. A British carbon bank would take that principle and apply it at a national scale. It would provide a clear signal that Britain intends to become the best place in the world to develop, deploy and commercialise greenhouse gas removal. One strength of a British carbon bank model is that it addresses the greatest barrier currently facing the sector: risk. The bank would purchase future carbon removals in advance, holding those credits until they have been independently verified and certified. There is, of course, a risk for the Government that some projects may ultimately fail to deliver the promised removals or not achieve certification. However, that risk can be significantly reduced through robust due diligence and careful product selection, as organisations such as Terraset have already demonstrated successfully. Importantly, the model also overcomes the current “chicken and egg” problem in the market. Today, many buyers are reluctant to pre-purchase carbon removals because they bear all the delivery risk. By contrast, a British carbon bank would offer only certified verified credits to the market, making them far more attractive to businesses seeking high-integrity carbon removals while simultaneously providing developers with the up-front certainty they need to secure investment and scale their technologies. The market will determine which solutions ultimately prove effective, whether nature-based approaches, direct air capture or entirely new technologies that are yet to emerge. With a relatively small Government investment, we could seed this market, crowding in five or 10 times more in private finance. Terraset supported Graphyte, which needed early-stage capital to move from planning into commercial deployment. Private buyers recognised the value of the project, but were not yet ready to commit at the scale or speed required. Through its revolving fund, Terraset made an advance commitment of just over $100,000, providing the confidence and working capital that enabled the project to proceed. Once Graphyte had delivered independently verified carbon removals, those credits were purchased by a commercial buyer, with the proceeds going back into the revolving fund to support the next generation of projects. I believe that a British carbon bank could replicate this revolving model at scale, helping promising British companies bridge the gap between innovation and commercial success. Net zero is today’s problem, and net negative is tomorrow’s, but if we do not start thinking about it now, we will not be ready to meet that challenge. We should be ambitious. We should not settle for participating in the market—we should aim to lead it. Will the Minister confirm precisely when the Government intend to publish their full response to the Whitehead review, and whether that will be before the House rises for the summer recess? Will he confirm whether the Government are giving serious consideration to the proposal for a British carbon bank or revolving fund to provide the long-term market certainty the sector has consistently called for? If the Government are not yet in a position to introduce longer-term reforms, what interim measures will they take to ensure that promising new UK GGR businesses are supported and not lost overseas while policies are being developed? Finally, will the Minister commit to continuing to work closely with the sector over the coming months, listening to businesses, investors and researchers, so that the UK can seize the opportunity to become a global leader in greenhouse gas removals rather than watching others move ahead? Carbon does not recognise borders or respect international treaties; it is a global challenge that demands world-leading solutions. I believe that those solutions should be developed here in the UK.
Q8. My constituency is the ninth most sewage-polluted constituency in the entire country, with thousands of hours of sewage pouring into the Thames, Avon and Coln, but that metric of hours conceals the truth. It does not convey the actual volume, and clearly a trickle is very different from a gush. Will the Deputy Prime Minister arrange for me to meet the relevant Minister on requiring water companies to report on the volume and concentration of sewage discharges, as well as the number of hours?
My hon. Friend has just highlighted a point that was mentioned by the hon. Member for Tooting (Dr Allin-Khan). That kind of experience causes concern not only for its lack of dignity, but for infection control, antimicrobial resistance and hospital-acquired infections. That kind of treatment not only has a lack of dignity, but can be lethal. That is a huge public health issue, which my hon. Friend’s specific example highlights.
It is a great pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Sir John. I congratulate the hon. Member for Brigg and Immingham (Martin Vickers) on securing this important debate. I draw Members’ attention to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests. I had the great pleasure of visiting Gibraltar in July last summer, perhaps shortly before the hon. Member for Leeds South West and Morley (Mark Sewards), and, like him, I got to experience the new border control operations that will be in place. I had the great pleasure of meeting multiple representatives, who spoke positively about the experience and the way in which the United Kingdom Government had ensured that, at every single stage of the negotiation that led to the agreement, Gibraltarians were present and gave their consent. The Liberal Democrats welcome this agreement. It achieves the objective that matters above all others: preserving British sovereignty over Gibraltar while providing a practical solution to the problems that have hung over the territory since Brexit. I spent much of my academic career—I am a recovering academic—researching borders, sovereignty and contested territories, and I have spent time in Gibraltar recently and in the past and spoken to people who live with the consequences of the treaty, so I know all too well that borders are rarely just lines on a map. They are systems for managing movement, trade and security. When those systems fail, ordinary people end up paying the price. That is precisely what happened after Brexit. Gibraltar found itself excluded from the trade and co-operation agreement, leaving 38,000 people living with years of uncertainty. As we have heard, the people of Gibraltar did not choose that outcome. Not only have they repeatedly rejected the prospect of joint sovereignty, as they did in 2002, but they overwhelmingly voted to remain in the European Union in 2016. Whatever our views on Brexit, we should recognise that Gibraltar has spent the past six years managing the consequences of decisions that it did not participate in making. The treaty reflects one of the oldest truths in geopolitics: geography cannot be wished away. Gibraltar is politically British, geographically Iberian and economically dependent on the daily movement of people across the frontier. Good statecraft—of which these proposals are an example—reconciles those realities, rather than pretending that we can override them. The treaty deserves support—albeit not uncritical support—because it starts from the correct constitutional principle, which is that the freely expressed wishes of the people of Gibraltar are paramount. That principle is reflected in the agreement. Article 2 contains what many legal experts have described as the strongest “without prejudice” sovereignty clause ever included in an EU agreement relating to Gibraltar. Three independent KCs have concluded that the treaty makes no concession whatsoever on sovereignty. That legal certainty matters for all the reasons that the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) outlined. That is why the agreement enjoys such strong unilateral support from Gibraltar’s Chief Minister and other representatives in the Parliament. Gibraltar’s Parliament and all three living former Chief Ministers agree that this is an appropriate deal. That consensus is highly unusual—Westminster might take note. The agreement is equally clear on defence. The MOD has confirmed that the UK retains full freedom to operate from Gibraltar. British military capabilities remain sovereign and unconstrained, with Spain unable to impede British personnel or equipment. At a time of growing geopolitical instability across Europe and the Mediterranean, preserving Gibraltar’s strategic role in NATO is essential. However, the possession and preservation of sovereignty alone is not enough. Sovereignty must also work—it must be practical. We have heard observations today not only about Gibraltar’s strategic importance, but about the sheer intensity of everyday cross-border movement: 15,500 people cross the frontier every single day. Those people staff Gibraltar’s hospitals, restaurants, financial services, construction industry and public services. Almost all food and medicines arrive in Gibraltar by road through Spain. That is why a functioning border is not just a convenience but an economic necessity. Gibraltarians understand better than most what happens when borders cease to function. Many have spoken to me about their recollections of the years after 1969, when the Spain frontier was closed, severing families, disrupting livelihoods and isolating Gibraltar economically and politically. Even after that frontier fully reopened in 1985, political tensions have, at times, caused lengthy queues and disruption at the crossing. I have waited in those queues at various times. Gibraltar endured them for years, but its economy today is very different from the economy of the past. Thousands of workers now cross that frontier every day to sustain its economy and public services, which is precisely why this agreement matters so much. The treaty has become even more necessary because Europe itself is changing the way its borders operate. The EU entry/exit system requires biometric registration of third-country nationals entering the Schengen area. That may work tolerably at airports—actually, I am not sure that it does, given the words of the chief executive of Aeroporti di Roma this week—but at one of Europe’s busiest land borders, it risks creating queues measured not in minutes but in hours. Had this been left unresolved, Gibraltar would have faced severe disruption through no fault of its own. The agreement prevents that outcome and removes routine immigration and customs checks at the land frontier while keeping Gibraltar outside of the Schengen area. Gibraltar retains its own immigration laws and authorities. At Gibraltar international airport, British immigration controls will be carried out by Gibraltar officials before a Schengen check under the agreed arrangements. Spain has no unilateral power to refuse entry. Equally important are the safeguards for Gibraltarians. Residents and Gibraltar identity card holders cannot be refused entry into Gibraltar, detained under those arrangements or subject to the EES or ETIAS systems. Those guarantees are practical expressions of sovereignty. The economic benefits are also equally significant. Without an agreement, Gibraltar faces prolonged uncertainty and significant economic harm. With the agreement, estimates suggest about £200 million could be added annually to Gibraltar’s economy—that is about 6% of its GDP—while boosting investment and confidence at no additional cost to the UK taxpayer. The agreement also creates opportunities beyond the land frontier. Direct air services between Gibraltar and European destinations could strengthen tourism and economic connectivity. With more than 9.4 million visitors entering Gibraltar annually across the border, compared with around 184,000 by air, smoother movement would benefit Gibraltar’s economy while reducing friction for communities on both sides of the frontier. Concerns have understandably been raised about the Schengen 90/180-day rule for air arrivals. However, it is worth saying that visitors stay on average just 3.4 days in Gibraltar—a small fraction of the 90-day allowance—and many already continue into Spain and use part of that allowance there. For most travellers the practical impact is therefore likely to be minimal. There are, however, still issues that deserve scrutiny. Will the Minister clarify precisely how the Schengen 90/180-day rule will apply to British citizens spending time in Gibraltar? It is important that we avoid creating constitutional tests that have never existed elsewhere in the British family of overseas territories and Crown dependencies, with which the United Kingdom has never operated unrestricted freedom of movement. Territories such as the Falklands—as I know all too well—have long maintained their own immigration laws and entry requirements, reflecting their distinct constitutional status and circumstances. Gibraltar has likewise always controlled its immigration arrangements. The question is therefore not whether Gibraltar should have border controls, but whether those controls serve Gibraltar’s interests while fully preserving British sovereignty. Notwithstanding the clarification that I just sought from the Minister, the treaty strikes that balance. Implementation must be undertaken in close co-operation and partnership with Gibraltar’s Government and its business community. Ultimately, this agreement will be judged by whether the borders work smoothly for those who depend on it every day. Gibraltar illustrates a wider truth about Brexit. Like the Windsor framework, this agreement is an intelligent and pragmatic attempt to solve problems that Brexit created. Geography has not changed—Gibraltar remains politically British while being physically connected to the European continent, and good diplomacy recognises both those realities—but we cannot continue to resolve the consequences of Brexit one border at a time. I contend that the United Kingdom needs a broader reset with our European colleagues. If I may be so bold, I suggest a growth and defence partnership with our European neighbours—something I have spent a lot of time trying to fashion over the past few months. That would involve entry into the single market and a relationship with the EU’s customs union, which would restore and revive our relationship and solve many of the challenges that we have spoken about in the debate. I welcome this agreement, which protects sovereignty, Gibraltar’s economy and British strategic interests, and, above all, respects the wishes of the people of Gibraltar.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Jardine. I was recently in Iceland and have just been reviewing the text messages I received there. I am a customer of EE, which the Minister mentioned; I was told that I could enjoy up to 14 gigabytes of data abroad this month, in line with its fair usage policy. I take the Minister’s point that this is about wholesale charges, but as the hon. Member for Runnymede and Weybridge made clear, the consumer experience is already ahead of the wholesale cost in many ways. Although this change is incredibly welcome, I do not think that it will necessarily have a transformative effect on consumers, who have already experienced many of the benefits that the Minister talked about. I wonder whether this SI is indicative of a broader ambition to do more on roaming charges, and not just with EEA EFTA countries. I would like to hear a little more, if possible, about the Liechtenstein challenge, and about whether this approach may represent a model for wider expansion across the European Union.
It is clear that the delay to the UK-EU reset summit—it was initially scheduled for July, but has now been delayed till October—has not cancelled the problems which that summit was, at least in part, designed to address. Might the Minister suggest an interim emergency summit to deal explicitly with this issue, bringing together the French and the European Commission to try to resolve it before we hit peak summer season? If he is willing to organise that summit, could he also raise the case of UK hauliers, who are reporting inconsistent scanning of their exit from the Schengen area and real fears that their 90 in 180-day entitlement will artificially run down as a result? That is going to have a profound effect on our economy.
I associate myself and my party with the Deputy Prime Minister’s tribute to Sir George Howarth, and his remarks about the 7/7 bombings and all those who live with the consequences of that terrible day. I wish England good luck for Saturday evening. As the UK braces for its seventh Prime Minister in a decade, I also thank the Deputy Prime Minister for our exchanges and wish him well in whatever role he may have next. The hon. Member for Clacton (Nigel Farage) used to say, “Leave means leave.” But it seems that his latest stunt is to leave this place just so that he can return as a fully-fledged Member after not just one referendum on his behaviour, but possibly two. Will the Deputy Prime Minister join the Liberal Democrats in urging the Chancellor to delay the hon. Member’s resignation until the investigation is complete, so that the good people of Clacton have all the facts before they cast their votes? Failing that, will he support our “Clacton clause”, so that, even once the hon. Member ceases to be an MP, the investigations can continue?
It is clear that it is a two-horse race. [Laughter.] On a more serious and very sombre note, MI5 has defended in court an agent who they knew to be openly misogynistic and obsessed with violence. He used his position to coercively control his girlfriend, Beth, and attack her with a machete. To add insult to injury, MI5 gave false evidence to the court. Will the Deputy Prime Minister use this opportunity to offer Beth a full apology on behalf of the Government, and will he use his position to bring back next week a full Hillsborough Bill, which covers the security services, so that we can pass the law before the summer recess?
I thank my right hon. Friend the Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr Carmichael) for bringing forward this urgent question. My constituents in South Queensferry, where we have a lifeboat, have written to me in great numbers to say that they are concerned about the coastguard service. The service in South Queensferry is unlike many of the others that have been mentioned. It is not rural or in the highlands; it is largely suburban. It patrols an area under three very large bridges, and the CROs have to deal with a lot of tragic incidents. The coastguards there have told me that they are concerned about what might happen as a result of the changes. Will the Minister come to my constituency to hear what they and the community have to say as we hit peak tourist season?
I beg to move, That leave be given to bring in a Bill to require persons discharging functions on behalf of certain other persons to assess the mental capacity of those persons in specified circumstances; and for connected purposes. At issue is the devastating misuse of the Mental Capacity Act 2005, which has resulted in hundreds of preventable deaths. King’s College London found there were 160 of those deaths in 2023 alone. The Bill is in honour of Christopher Laskaris, whose mum Fiona is here. Christopher was not unlike many autistic children; he was a sensitive and intelligent boy, who once asked his mum to stop on the way to school to rescue a lamb stuck in a fence. I first met Fiona when I was eight. I had stayed in my bedroom and ignored her, perhaps because I was angry that she was buying my home off my dad. My mum had died a few months after I was born, and I was a sensitive boy. Well, they moved in. Christopher grew up in my childhood bedroom, and he loved the house as much as I did. As a young autistic man living alone in Leeds, Christopher was in danger. Despite Fiona raising credible doubts about his capacity on numerous occasions over eight years, she was never able to secure the mental capacity assessment that she needed to protect him. Horrifically, Christopher was exploited and murdered in his home by a man who had just been released from jail. Christopher was 24. Under this Bill, he would have been granted that mental capacity assessment, and he might still be with us. I have been working with Fiona for over two years to close this loophole. We have worked on a cross-party basis, with the Government, and with ITV, which has mounted a national campaign to expose this injustice across the county. I am grateful for all of that and for the result: that the Government have committed to review and reform the Mental Capacity Act. This Bill offers an opportunity to realise that commitment. The Mental Capacity Act states: “A person must be assumed to have capacity unless it is established that he lacks capacity.” Too often, public officials have used that presumption to not take action, failing vulnerable people, because if a person’s capacity is merely in doubt, but not yet established as lacking, then they are presumed to have capacity—and are too easily disregarded. The Bill has been drafted by one of the most prominent mental capacity lawyers in the country, Alex Ruck Keene, honorary King’s counsel. It has two key clauses: a duty to assess capacity where a person is reasonably understood to have any impairment or disturbance in the functioning of their mind or brain; and a duty to assess capacity where a person properly interested in a person’s circumstances has raised a concern as to their capacity. Although those safeguards are in the existing code of practice, they are too often ignored. The Bill seeks to bring those existing safeguards into law in order to mandate compliance. It will enhance the presumption of capacity by ensuring that it is not used against people to their cost or to the cost of others. Charlie Gooding’s mum Annabel is here in the Gallery. Charlie had Prader-Willi syndrome, which, in his case, gave him a genetic compulsion to overeat. Annabel repeatedly begged the authorities for help. They repeatedly ignored her. She locked the food cupboards but she could not prevent Charlie from buying food or going to food banks. Ultimately, his weight reached 30 stone, and he ate himself to death. Charlie was 35. Under this Bill, authorities would have had to grant Annabel that assessment, and Charlie might still be with us. Harley Watson’s mum Jo is here too. Harley was 12 years old when he died, after paranoid schizophrenic Terence Glover drove a car into a crowd of schoolchildren. Glover had told the police beforehand repeatedly in 999 calls that he intended to run over and kill schoolchildren. The police knew about his paranoid schizophrenia diagnosis and his impaired judgment, yet they took no action. Under this Bill, the police would have had to refer Glover for a mental capacity assessment, which might have saved an innocent 12-year-old boy. In 2014, a House of Lords Select Committee recognised the failures in the Mental Capacity Act. These past 12 years, Parliament has failed to act. The cost in lives lost is unimaginable. Among the hundreds of dead, Fiona lost her Christopher, Annabel lost her Charlie, and Jo lost her Harley. These three mums are here today not only in grief, but also with the highest of all hope: to save lives. I commend their courage and this Bill to the House. Question put and agreed to. Ordered, That Chris Coghlan, Ed Davey, Dr Danny Chambers, Sir Jeremy Hunt, Andy Slaughter, Florence Eshalomi, John Grady, Wera Hobhouse, Liz Jarvis, Vikki Slade, Manuela Perteghella, and Ben Maguire present the Bill. Chris Coghlan accordingly presented the Bill. Bill read the First time; to be read a Second time on Friday 29 January, and to be printed (Bill 114).
I have four coastguard stations in South Devon—Kingsbridge, Dartmouth, Brixham and Bigbury—and hundreds of volunteers, many of whom have written to me with their concerns about these changes. The Kingsbridge team have been out 34 times this year. Last Friday night, they were called out at 1 am and spent all night rescuing three people from a vessel that had got stuck in the mud. These people wake up in the middle of the night to go out to rescue strangers they have never met. The Minister says he has considered several options, but have the Government done a full risk assessment of the resilience—the long-term resilience—of the service if these changes go ahead? If so, will they publish it? Has he considered changing the law so that the call-out charge is classified differently with HMRC? CROs could then continue as volunteers while continuing to be remunerated for their dedicated service.
The hon. and gallant Gentleman is in a unique position to advise the House on his assessment of the DIP as published. Can he give us his view on whether the quantity of funds provided and the certainty of the period over which they will be provided are sufficient to achieve the kind of industrial step change that he is advocating in his excellent speech?
I sincerely thank my right hon. Friend the Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr Carmichael) for asking the urgent question. Highly skilled, experienced coastguard volunteers are being badly let down by the Government, and I cannot imagine other rescue service personnel being treated in the same way. No one could argue that £11 an hour was enriching these volunteers; it was merely enabling them to do their vital work. As one coastguard volunteer from my constituency put it, “I make significant personal and financial sacrifices to be available for emergency callouts—and I didn’t join the service to get paid.” Sadly, we did not need to get to this point. Did the Minister even speak to any of the CROs to hear what impact the changes would have on them before this rushed decision was made? Will he commit himself to a full risk assessment of these damaging changes? Finally, will he confirm that the Government are considering viable alternatives, such as a statutory stipend system, passing legislation to exempt CROs from worker status, or even just embracing their worker status?
As the Minister knows, my west Cornwall and Isles of Scilly constituency has almost 150 miles of coastline. In an earlier answer, he said that the model has to change, but it does not need to be trashed. He referred to the fact that the remuneration arrangements for CROs are bespoke, but so are the arrangements provided to special constables and retained firefighters. Surely the Minister and his colleagues can find a model that meets the legal obligations and remains a bespoke remuneration system for CROs?
I begin by thanking the hon. Member for Tooting (Dr Allin-Khan) for setting out so brilliantly, with her professional expertise and human touch, what it means for corridor care to be a normal habit across the NHS in all parts of the country—not just in the winter, with winter pressures, but throughout the year. She made many good points, and I hope I can add some context with the stories I have gathered in Mid Sussex, from constituents who have experienced corridor care first-hand, whether as patients or staff. They have shared some of the most frightening, painful and vulnerable moments of their lives with me. First, I thank them, and to those whose stories I cannot share today due to a lack of time, I apologise. Many of those people wanted the House to be told one thing before anything else: the staff who cared for them were extraordinary. They spoke of nurses who never stopped smiling despite being exhausted, doctors who apologised because they knew patients deserved better, and paramedics who stayed compassionate under impossible pressure. One constituent arrived at the Princess Royal hospital in Haywards Heath after falling and breaking both a shoulder and a kneecap. It was a Friday night, and A&E was overflowing. After X-rays, they spent hours on a trolley in a corridor beside the nurses’ station because there was nowhere else for them to go. They told me that the nurses were attentive and kind throughout the night. They checked in constantly and did everything they could. However, kindness cannot create another treatment cubicle, compassion cannot magic up another doctor, and dedication cannot create a bed that is simply not there. Another constituent, Chris Philpot, shared an experience that I found impossible to forget. Following a ruptured appendix and serious complications, he spent 19 hours on a trolley in the corridor at the Royal Sussex county hospital. During that time, he watched an elderly lady have her blood pressure taken while resting her arm on his leg because there was nowhere else to support it. No privacy, no dignity—that is not the standard of care patients should expect in modern Britain.
I agree with my hon. Friend. What we see time and again is that one problem becomes another until eventually the patient pays the price. My constituent, Catherine Jeater, has seen corridor care as a patient and as a relative of a patient. She watched her father being treated for appendicitis in an emergency department that was so overcrowded that patients were double-parked on trolleys, changing into hospital gowns in full view of strangers. Months later, while undergoing chemotherapy herself, she attended the Princess Royal hospital with a chest infection. Because she was immunocompromised, she should have been isolated. Instead, she received intravenous antibiotics sitting on a chair in a corridor, because no cubicles were available. She told me the staff were amazing, but she also made it clear that amazing staff should never have to work in those conditions Perhaps the most difficult responses I have received were from the healthcare professionals themselves. One doctor told me that they regularly examine patients in corridors. Another said that corridor care is not just an A&E problem, and that it is now normal for people to be on trolleys in non-clinical areas throughout the hospital. That means there are no curtains to provide privacy, no piped oxygen and no name above the bed, and patient safety is inevitably compromised. A senior nurse described to me the moral injury that they and their colleagues face every day, having to try to deliver the best care possible in terrible conditions, all the while apologising for something that is beyond their power to fix. They have to do that every single day. I am not personally enjoying this third heat wave, but imagine A&E departments without air conditioning: they become furnaces. Imagine trying to treat incredibly frail patients when the temperature in a corridor is 40°C. Another clinician wrote something that stopped me in my tracks. They said that corridor care had become so common that they were teaching medical students and junior doctors how to provide it—and that is not just during winter pressures, but all year round. This should trouble every single one of us. We are training the next generation of clinicians to adapt to something that should never have become normal in the first place. The real danger is not simply that corridor care exists, and not that we begin to accept it, but that we shrug our shoulders and tell ourselves that this is just how the NHS works now. The solutions are not easy—hospitals cannot fix this on their own—but we do need to get it right. We need to invest in capacity, in workforce, in social care, and in reducing waiting lists so that treatable conditions do not turn into emergencies.
I am sorry, but I will not, in the interests of time. This is happening not because our NHS staff are failing, but because they are being asked to deliver excellent care in circumstances that make excellence almost impossible. My constituents have not shared these stories because they have lost faith in the NHS; they have shared them because they believe that the NHS can and should be better than this. Let me therefore end with a plea that we never describe corridor care as the “new normal”, because there is nothing normal about receiving intravenous antibiotics during chemo in a corridor. There is nothing normal about waiting 19 hours on a trolley. There is nothing normal about losing your privacy, your dignity, and sometimes even your safety, simply because there is nowhere else to go. The NHS was founded on the belief that every person matters. We need to make that happen once again.
My hon. Friend is making a fantastic speech. Does he agree that as well as defibrillators, there should be bleed kits in the back of police cars? Yeovil town council has introduced bleed kits across the town, as well as defibrillators. Does he agree that we need both in police vehicles?
AI is increasingly being used to make cutting-edge assistive technology for people with special educational needs and disabilities, but the industry is a bit of a wild west, and access for young people in areas such as Yeovil is uneven. Will the hon. Member join me in urging the Government to publish guidance for schools on best practices for AI assistive technology for SEND?
My constituency neighbour will know that in Somerset and Dorset, we get older models of buses no longer used elsewhere. At the same time, rural bus depots, such as the one in Yeovil, are closing. If a bus breaks down from Ilchester on the way to Dorchester, passengers have to wait over an hour for a replacement bus. Does my hon. Friend agree that if depots for repairs are going to be closed, we need newer buses in West Dorset and Yeovil?
My biggest concern is that we have no electric buses in Yeovil. There is nowhere to charge them because other depots have been shut down. How will we cope with an electric future if First Bus is closing depots?
One of my relatives went into hospital to get intravenous antibiotics but later died in that hospital due to being stuck there. She was ready to move on to a community hospital, but she gave up because she was scared in the hospital—they did not keep an eye on her, she fell out of bed and cracked her head open, and she later passed away. Does the hon. Lady agree that we need a lot more investment in social care to ensure that does not happen and our relatives do not have to go into hospital in the first place?
The hon. Member is making a fantastic speech. On the topic of staff, one of the biggest problems in Yeovil hospital is bullying culture, as we saw in the Baroness Amos report in relation to maternity. Does the hon. Member believe that staff should be free to speak up without the worry of losing their job?
After amazing campaigners secured more than 900 signatures, I present this petition on the closure of the Hundredstone post office in Yeovil, which will leave locals with no in-person post office and banking services. The petitioners therefore request “that the House of Commons urges the Government to put pressure on the Post Office to ensure a replacement operator for the post office in the area is in place before the current site is closed; and to consider how to provide communities with more resilient in-person services.” Following is the full text of the petition: [The petition of residents of the United Kingdom, Declares that an alternative operator for the Hundredstone Post Office site in the Morrisons Daily on Glenthorne Avenue in Yeovil must be provided before the store’s closure 29 July 2026; and further declares that the current model for local services, whereby bank services often operate in post offices and post offices often operate in shops, means that local people lose almost all of their in-person services when shops, as is often the case in the current business and regulatory environment, don’t survive. The petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons urges the Government to put pressure on the Post Office to ensure a replacement operator for the post office in the area is in place before the current site is closed; and to consider how to provide communities with more resilient in-person services. And the petitioners remain, etc.] [P003221]
Our politics needs fixing fast. The broken, outdated first-past-the-post system has clearly failed to deliver stable government. We urgently need to rebuild trust in our democracy and ensure that everybody’s vote counts equally. Does the Deputy Prime Minister agree with the right hon. Member for Makerfield (Andy Burnham) that proportional representation is an idea whose time has come? Does he also agree with me and Members across the House that that time is now, before the next general election?
I thank the hon. Member for Tooting (Dr Allin-Khan) for securing this incredibly important debate. I have heard from literally dozens of my constituents about why this issue is so important. They have told me their individual stories about elderly relatives stuck in corridors and the terrible effect that has had on their treatment, care and health outcomes. I have heard from staff in my local hospitals, who have shared exactly the same concerns about the conditions in which they are forced to work. Patients tell me universally how proud they are of the NHS and how much they value the incredible care they get at the hands of the people who keep it going, but they also tell me universally that corridor care is shameful and should not continue. I recently raised this matter directly with the chief executive of my local hospital, Hereford hospital, in our regular catch-up, and was delighted to hear that Hereford is not just aiming to meet the Government’s target of ending corridor care by 2029, but that locally, we have a target of ending corridor care by this autumn. I am really pleased that this is being prioritised so much locally, and I will be keeping a careful eye out to ensure that that happens. I want to raise a particular issue that has been touched on by many colleagues across the House this afternoon, which is the integral relationship between the NHS—what happens in our hospitals—and the social care system. We simply cannot fix the problem of corridor care unless we fix the problem of social care. For too many years—for decades, in fact—social care has been a political football kicked down the road by Governments of all stripes because it is difficult, but we have to grasp this nettle. We simply cannot fix the NHS unless we fix social care. Lord Darzi said exactly that himself. Sadly, however, we have not given the necessary attention to fixing social care. Yes, we have the Casey commission, which I value very much. I am very pleased with the work that has been done by Baroness Casey, but insufficient political effort is being put into this issue. It took nine months for us to have the first cross-party meeting that the previous Secretary of State for Health and Social Care said he was going to call, and we have only recently had the second. We must put our shoulders to the wheel collectively to fix the challenges of social care and to have the difficult conversations about how we will fund it, because it does need funding; we do need those political conversations, and we need to find consensus. Unless we address the issues at the back door, too many people will be stuck in hospital when they would be better cared for elsewhere—better for them and their health; better for the national budget, because it would be cheaper; and better for our overall outcomes. It is shocking to learn that the Royal College of Emergency Medicine calculates that there were 15,000 excess deaths last year because of corridor care. That should not happen in our country today. I urge the Minister and her colleagues as strongly as possible to give the same attention to fixing social care as to fixing the NHS. Let every Member put in that effort too. It is notable that at Health and Social Care questions there is usually one question on social care and 19 on health. We must redress the balance collectively, put in the focus to fix social care, and thereby fix corridor care.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir John. I draw the House’s attention to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests: I visited Gibraltar as a guest of the Government of Gibraltar. I am very grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Brigg and Immingham (Martin Vickers) for securing this important debate at a pivotal moment for Gibraltar. It is somewhat extraordinary that, although the provisional application of the UK-EU Gibraltar treaty is expected in a little more than a week’s time, Parliament has still not been afforded a meaningful opportunity to scrutinise an agreement of such significance. Let me begin by making one thing absolutely clear: we welcome the fact that a deal has been reached. Businesses in Gibraltar and across the UK, frontier workers, and British citizens travelling to Gibraltar need certainty. Above all, Gibraltar deserves certainty about its future. This agreement helps to provide that by giving businesses, residents and those who rely on the frontier a clearer framework for the future. I am also proud of the work undertaken by the previous Conservative Government. Those negations were never straightforward, as I know from personal experience. They sought to balance Gibraltar’s prosperity with the practical realities of the frontier, our constitutional responsibilities as a sovereign power and our unwavering commitment to Gibraltar remaining British for as long as the people of Gibraltar wish. Welcoming a treaty does not mean dispensing with scrutiny, however. On 23 April, the Government of Gibraltar confirmed that the treaty had received unanimous approval from all EU member states, and that provisional application is expected to begin on 15 July. We know, because the Government of Gibraltar have helpfully kept parliamentarians informed, that the treaty will be formally signed before then, although even now no date has been publicly confirmed. We also know that the final sections of the frontier fence will be removed on 15 July, allowing fluid movement across the land border for frontier workers, residents and visitors, before the treaty proceeds towards full ratification in the following months. Those are constitutional, economic and practical developments of huge significance, yet it has been the Government of Gibraltar, rather than His Majesty’s Government, who have kept Parliament involved as events have unfolded. That should concern every Member of this House, regardless of their party, because Ministers are accountable to this Parliament for United Kingdom treaty obligations. Since the agreement was announced, Members of both Houses have had to rely on urgent questions, oral questions and written parliamentary questions simply to establish the Government’s intentions. I know that the Minister is aware of that. When the draft treaty was published on 26 February, the Minister assured the House that the Government welcome scrutiny, but the answers that we have received have too often amounted to little more than references to previous statements or generic replies that fail to engage with the substance of the questions being asked. That is not meaningful scrutiny, and it is not how Parliament should be treated. The question before us is no longer whether there should be a treaty; it is whether Parliament will be permitted to scrutinise it properly before it takes effect. The Government have repeatedly said that they are committed to transparency and respect for Parliament. If that commitment means anything, it must surely apply to a treaty of this constitutional significance. We are now only days away from provisional application, and fundamental questions remain unanswered. Parliament still does not know when the treaty will be signed, when it will be laid before Parliament under the Constitutional Reform and Governance Act 2010, whether elements of the agreement will begin operating before Parliament has completed its scrutiny, and what opportunities Members will have to debate it further. These are not procedural technicalities. The CRaG exists because Parliament recognised that international treaties should be subject to democratic scrutiny before they bind the UK. If substantial parts of the treaty are allowed to take effect before Parliament has had a meaningful opportunity to consider it, many will understandably question what practical value that scrutiny is intended to have. For those reasons, I hope the Minister will answer some straightforward questions today. Will the Government commit to providing time for a full, substantive debate on the treaty in both Houses before provisional application begins? When precisely do Ministers intend to lay the treaty before Parliament under CRaG? What assessment have the Government made of the constitutional implications of allowing provisional application before Parliament has completed its scrutiny under that Act? Do Ministers genuinely believe that the standard 21-day scrutiny period is sufficient for an agreement of this constitutional, economic and strategic importance? I believe those are reasonable questions that parliamentarians should not have to drag out of the Government. This debate is about more than process. As we have heard, companies involved in cross-border trade need certainty and clarity about customs arrangements, regulatory compliance and border procedures. Ministers have spoken about the opportunities the agreement presents, but opportunities must be matched by preparedness. Businesses cannot prepare for new arrangements if Government guidance does not arrive until implementation is already under way, and Parliament cannot properly represent those affected if Ministers do not provide the information necessary for proper scrutiny. The Government should therefore answer some practical questions today. Can the Minister explain in clear terms whether any new checks, controls or administrative procedures will govern the movement of British troops or military equipment to and from the military base? Given Gibraltar’s strategic importance, Members will rightly wish to understand exactly what arrangements are envisaged. Will the Government set out the precise process by which British goods will enter Gibraltar under the new arrangements, whether by land, sea or air, and explain how they differ from the arrangements that businesses operate under today? What engagement have the Government had, both before and since the treaty was announced, with British businesses that export or import goods into Gibraltar? What assessment have Ministers made of the readiness of those businesses for implementation, and what support is being provided? The Government have spoken confidently about the benefits of closer co-operation with Spain, but what contingency plans are in place should Spain seek to create difficulties or exert pressure once the frontier fence has been removed? Gibraltar’s scrutiny and prosperity should never depend on good will alone. The Minister should also explain the rationale behind the governance arrangements for Gibraltar airport in the treaty, including the proposed operating structure, and why Ministers believe those arrangements are in Gibraltar’s long-term interests. What discussions have His Majesty’s Government had with the Government of Gibraltar regarding the parliamentary lock that the Gibraltar Parliament has indicated it wishes to have over implementation of the treaty? How do Ministers intend to respect Gibraltar’s democratic institutions as the agreement process progresses? I would like to place on the record my appreciation for a significant recent development. The Government of Gibraltar have announced that Gibraltar has been removed from Spain’s list of non-co-operative jurisdictions, bringing to an end a designation that had remained in place since 1991. That is undoubtedly welcome news, and it represents another positive step in strengthening Gibraltar’s international standing. Once again, however, many Members first learned of that through media reports rather than from the Government. Gibraltar occupies a unique constitutional position, and the UK retains responsibility for its external relations. It is therefore entirely reasonable for Parliament to expect timely information from our Government on developments of such significance. No one in this House wishes to see unnecessary delay or to undermine the progress that has been made. However, supporting Gibraltar and scrutinising the Government are not competing objectives; they are complementary responsibilities. I hope the Minister will use this debate not simply to repeat previous statements, but to provide the timetable for scrutiny that Parliament has been seeking for many months. Please tell us, Minister, when the treaty will be signed, when it will be laid before Parliament, what opportunities Members will have to debate and vote on it and why the Government believe that Parliament should be expected to scrutinise a treaty only after key parts of it have already begun to take effect. Again, I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Brigg and Immingham for securing this important debate, which has provided an opportunity to discuss the treaty. But as I have set out, this debate should not take the place of the vital, detailed scrutiny of the treaty that this place deserves. I await the Government’s setting out the detail; now is the Minister’s opportunity to do so. If the Government are confident that the treaty commands support, they should be confident enough to subject it to full parliamentary scrutiny before its provisions take effect.
It was along those lines, but for absolute clarity, does the Minister envisage the treaty coming forward before we break for recess?
The hon. Member for Dunfermline and Dollar (Graeme Downie) has highlighted a number of pertinent questions that collectively pointed to the increased threat that we face. I also very much agree with the hon. Member for Macclesfield (Tim Roca). There is a lot of common ground in the Chamber today. One example of that is that I agree fundamentally with the comment from the hon. Member for Birmingham Selly Oak (Al Carns) that we “must not underestimate the level of change that is required.” None of that detracts from the point that the hon. Member for Tunbridge Wells (Mike Martin) highlighted in his opening remarks on the structural flaws in the funding allocated through the defence investment plan. The hon. Gentleman elaborated in more depth but, for example, less than half the headline figure announced is new money. Of the £15 billion announced, £6.9 billion over four years is new money, with £4.7 billion for the next budget, and £3.4 billion from asset sales and moving liabilities around. As he said, that is in addition to £10.7 billion of efficiencies. In addition to the hon. Gentleman’s remarks, I want to illustrate how the Government’s narrative contradicts itself with regard to the efficiencies; three Government documents, which the Government agree with, actually contradict each other. For example, on page 79 of the DIP we see the total resource departmental expenditure limit of £7 billion, from savings on staffing, and a capital departmental expenditure limit of £3.4 billion. Those are figures in the Government’s own annex, yet just last year on page 5 of the strategic defence review, the Secretary of State said, in no less than his own foreword: “We will unlock nearly £6 billion of new savings”. In a year we have gone from the Secretary of State saying, “We’re going to unlock £6 billion” to “We’re going to unlock over £10 billion.” As the hon. Member for Tunbridge Wells alluded to, there is no clear plan and confidence is low. Confidence is not just low because the defence investment plan states that it is low, although indeed its working states “of which remaining plans at lower maturity” with £5 billion on RDEL and £3.4 billion on CDEL—£8.4 billion of low confidence. Let us look, too, at the independent findings of the National Audit Office. It is stated on page 10 of one of its most recent reports, from December 2025, that the accounts were qualified in a number of areas and that: “Lack of effective departmental oversight of a number of these arrangements has meant that the MOD did not have appropriate information nor assurance to ensure that transactions and balances”— blah-de-blah. In other words, the Department itself does not have a grip. Quite rightly, the hon. Member for Birmingham Selly Oak pointed to the scale of challenge, but we have a set of efficiencies in a 10-year plan that fundamentally contradict the Secretary of State’s own assurances just a year ago. The main point I wish to highlight—I say this as someone who has spent time in the Treasury, and I keep raising this point with MOD colleagues—is that I continue to be baffled as to why the Department is not highlighting and prioritising the reserves more than it is. Again, I think an area of consensus is the value of the reserves in delivering scale, and the fact that they are value for money as an option. Page 61 of the DIP just states £4.2 billion for reserves over four years—there is no breakdown, no detail, and no information, and it is not even clear if the training days and reserve service days for this year are secured. Can the Minister give us an assurance? Can he say what equipment will be funded for the reserves over the next four years? Can he give any colour on that, and can he explain why the reserves are not being prioritised more than they are? My next point speaks directly to the issue of national resilience that the hon. Member for Birmingham Selly Oak correctly identified. Looking at the Red Book, £310 million has just been agreed for a digital campus in Manchester, and there is £1.196 million—£1.2 billion—on boiler upgrades over four years. But that is not enough, so the Government are extending that by £400 million this year, £600 million next year, and over £600 million the year after. I am not saying that those programmes are not useful—I am sure they are—but if the Prime Minister’s Munich speech is correct, and given comments from colleagues in the House, is this really the priority? Is £4.7 billion over four years on cycling and walking really this Government’s priority if we are to boost national resilience?
My right hon. Friend is right to highlight the broader point, which is the lack of detail on reserves, other than to say that it is all being parked until the next Parliament. That is a wasted opportunity. Reservists also need clearer communication from the Government, including on the training days and reserve service days this year. I hope that when the Minister winds up the debate, he will say a bit more about that. Finally, we know that a Government reshuffle is coming, and if issues such as national resilience are to be addressed, they quite rightly require an all-of-Government response. Yet there is very little detail. As the hon. Member for Dunfermline and Dollar said regarding the answer to his written question, the MOD is often reluctant to answer on national security grounds, and there is very little detail on how other Departments will prioritise their budgets and what the key performance indicators are, particularly when new Ministers are likely to be coming in. Will the Minister clarify whether there will be KPIs relating to the defence investment plan for those Departments, and if so, when will they be set out?
Could the Minister clarify why the efficiency target has gone up over 73% in a year compared with the strategic defence review? Was the SDR just too unambitious?
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what measures the Government have put in place to ensure that in the coming holiday season, travellers and business freight are not delayed at our ports, our international railway stations and our airports as a result of the imposition of the European entry and exit system.
As the Minister has indicated, over the spring bank holiday there was chaos at Dover, at St Pancras and at the channel tunnel because of the failure of the EES. The French authorities were quite simply not prepared or able to implement the facilities properly. Based on bookings for the coming season, which starts in 10 days’ time, the authorities are now predicting that there could be 12-hour delays to passengers and therefore to freight, which affects our businesses. That is simply not acceptable. Will the Minister, before it is too late, approach the French authorities again and suggest that a waiver must be put in place before the holiday season starts so that we do not again face the chaos that we faced in May?
This House has the capacity to criticise, but it also has the capacity to be fair. The Minister probably finds himself between a rock and a cliff face in a situation that he did not make himself. That does not absolve the MCA from the criticism that has rightly been levelled at it earlier today. Mine is one of those peculiar constituencies that have both a north coast and a south coast. Those two coastlines are served by dedicated volunteers who go out in all weathers to save lives, and I have heard from some of them. It is quite clear that unless this situation is resolved swiftly, those people will be lost—and if they are lost, they will not come back. Obviously I cannot speak for others on these Benches, but I will back whatever measure the Minister seeks to take in order to ensure that there is a timely resolution to this issue, so that we do not lose good people.
Having spoken on this very subject the week before last, I thought that I would, for once, sit and listen to what others have to say. Does my right hon. Friend agree that one of the reasons for the failure of deterrence at the beginning of both the second world war and the first world war was that the United States was detached from the future of security in Europe? The success of NATO has hinged on the knowledge that an attack on any NATO country would mean war with the United States from the outset. Does he share my concern that the United States is at present led by someone with insufficient regard for that history?
I congratulate the Minister on acceding to office, but he needs to appreciate that the cost of all Departments goes up in absolute financial numerical terms year on year, but the way in which we measure the investment in defence is by looking at it as a proportion of GDP. During the cold war, when the risk was almost as high as it is now, we were spending 4.5% to 5% of GDP. Vladimir Putin does not have nine years for us to spend 3.5% of GDP. Those are the measurements the Minister has to look at; we are nowhere near spending enough.
I rise in support of much of what the hon. Member for Poole (Neil Duncan-Jordan) has said. He has done a service to this Chamber, and Parliament more generally, by highlighting the threats that AI will bring. Perhaps I can set the scene by reminding Members present that it took 25 years for Parliament and successive Governments to recognise that the internet must be regulated. That is extraordinary. When I was in the IT industry back in the ’80s and ’90s, I became aware of the concept of the internet—before it was widely spoken about—and even then I knew the harm it might do. In 2000, at the beginning of the new millennium, I was privileged to be able to speak at the Spalding Gentlemen’s Society, with which I do not imagine you are familiar, Ms McVey, but suffice to say it is a learned society of the old school—it now does admit women, you will be pleased to know. It has a lecture programme on all manner of things, and I was pleased to be invited to give the first lecture of the millennium. Then, I warned of what the internet might do. Most of the audience, by the way, disbelieved what I said. It was a very civilised meeting—it was not raucous in any way—but they could not quite come to terms with what I predicted. What I predicted then has come to pass. What has occurred is the distortion of public discourse, the enabling of widespread fraud and the provision of the means for every imaginable form of harm, from hardcore pornography being available to children, to internet gambling addiction, suicide sites and much more. Now, the prospect of AI will make all that still more chilling. As the recognition of what is real and what is invented is increasingly blurred, it will become more and more difficult for people to navigate the inevitable vicissitudes that pervade every life. Imagine a future where the once secure certainty of what really exists is so undermined that people can no longer believe what they are told and have no place to go to establish that certainty—the basis on which we all gauge reality and are able to live reasonably productive lives. I see wellbeing being affected by that detrimentally; unless the Government take very urgent and extremely serious action, that will happen far more quickly than anyone here envisages.
I absolutely agree. That is why I began by describing what has occurred over the last quarter of a century and the misunderstanding—a pervasive one that affected all political parties and Governments of all kinds—that a dangerous fascination with novelty was more important than the certainty that I have just outlined. The hon. Member for Poole is right to issue a clarion call for action. Let me go into a little more detail. He is right, for example, that we have allowed a handful of multinational corporates, which have displayed a carelessness to the effects of what they do, to wield immense power—more power than national Governments. It is increasingly difficult for Governments to pull levers that affect these people, because they exist beyond the purview of this House or of any Government Minister. They have shown by their example that carelessness, and only when they have been prevented from doing harm have they ceased to do so. I am delighted that the Government are now taking steps to prevent children from accessing social media and mobile telephones; I would like to go much further, actually, and I hope the Government will. I called for the ban on phones in schools, along with many other Members of this House, a long time ago. But AI makes all that more serious, because the AI available through that technology, which has the ability to distort the very nature of reality, will be immensely difficult to control. And yet we must try to do so. Legislation is not always the only means of doing that but, as the hon. Gentleman set out, it certainly must play a part. Umberto Eco described the internet as the “empire of imbeciles”. Over time, it has become impossible to distinguish experts from idiots, and every bar-room bigot now has an audience of millions. Most people had a sense of proportion; my parents were working-class people who left school at 14, but they had a very good sense of what really mattered. Now we have elevated trivia to an extraordinary degree and, as a result, that sense of proportion, which was once taken as read, can no longer be guaranteed.