Draft Contracts for Difference (Sustainable Industry Rewards and Contract Budget Notice Amendments) Regulations 2026
I was trying to save time; I can intervene more if the Minister wants.
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Draft Contracts for Difference (Sustainable Industry Rewards and Contract Budget Notice Amendments) Regulations 2026
On a point of order, Ms Jardine. I do not mean to be difficult, but the Minister has not answered all the questions I posed—not least about the assumptions of the 16:1 leverage, which is apparently the big bonus coming in. I also do not know whether it is appropriate for us to vote on what is effectively an open-ended budget. Fundamentally, the impact I am most worried about is the one on my constituents—that I am not going to be able to tell them how much this will cost them; that is quite a significant hole in the Government’s argument. I am not aware of other statutory instruments where we vote for an open-ended budgetary allocation that our constituents will have to pay for, whether they like it or not. I have time this afternoon. If you, Ms Jardine, want to suspend the sitting while the Minister goes and finds the answers to those questions, I am quite happy for that to happen. It seems to me disrespectful for us to rattle through something that will have an impact quite soon on people’s electricity bills.
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Middle East
One of the most depressing things about the Foreign Secretary’s statement is that she seems to have failed to learn from the failure of her predecessors of both Governments, who were repeatedly warned that if the violence and cruelty in Gaza were left unchecked, it would spread out across the entire region and possibly consume it in flames. We find ourselves in exactly that position. I was struck by the passage of her statement concerning Lebanon, because it is almost completely the same as passages that were said about Gaza at the start of that conflict—“We are very concerned, we are protesting to the Israelis, and we are sending some aid, but there is really nothing we can do”. I have three questions. First, we have been supporting the Lebanese armed forces for many years now, so do we believe that the Lebanese have a right to self-defence, and if they do, how will we support them in the defence of their civilian population? Secondly, what will the Foreign Secretary do to prevent Lebanon from becoming a new Gaza—a phrase that has been used by Israeli officials about this conflict? Thirdly, if she is not willing to do either of those things, how many Lebanese is an acceptable number for us to see killed over the next few weeks?
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Rural Roads
It is always a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Mr Stringer. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for South Shropshire (Stuart Anderson) for securing the debate. The condition of rural roads is an ever-present issue for those of us who represent rural constituencies. In the Weald of Kent, where we have mile after mile of country lane used by massive lorries that have crossed the channel and are hoping to avoid traffic on the main routes, the situation is especially dire. I visited the Falkland Islands on a parliamentary trip last year, where many of the roads have not even been fully laid. When I explained to the officer driving the car where I lived, he said, “Ah! I know your constituency. It’s the only place in the world I’ve been where the roads are worse than here.” I sent a survey to every household in the Weald of Kent last year. Of the 1,500 responses I received, street works were mentioned more than 500 times. I do not have time today to talk about all the challenges that they pose, but the Transport Committee, of which I and the hon. Member for Didcot and Wantage (Olly Glover) are both members, published a report on that last year. I would love to hear an update from the Minister on the Government’s response to that report.
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Transparency in Court Proceedings
In February, the Government ordered Courtsdesk to delete the largest archive of court records in the country—an essential tool for transparency in the justice system. The Government changed their minds about that, which was incredibly welcome, but we do not yet have a clear sense of what they intend to do with that archive or how they intend to move forward. Could the Minister assure us today that Courtsdesk will not be compelled to delete its archive in the future and confirm whether it will be allowed to continue operating its services?
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Child Maintenance Service
I thank the hon. Member for being so brave in introducing this debate; many of us have dealt with this issue on a daily basis. There is an issue of fairness in the allocation of the rules. I had one father who tried to kill himself because he felt that there was no allocation of fairness in what he was trying to do for his family. The rules do not seem to be clear cut, and there does not seem to be a way through for families who want to work together. The system seems to disproportionately favour the spouse who is willing to lie and say things about the other, and that has to change. It is just not sustainable.
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Rural Roads
Not only have we lost all that funding for rural roads in places such as Beaconsfield, Marlow and south Buckinghamshire villages, but places such as Denham and Iver back up on to London and the ultra low emission zone. Transport for London gets a disproportionate amount of money for road paving, and all the London local authorities receive extra funding to get their roads paved. However, despite having rural roads directly outside the M25, we have basically no funding for the amount of road space we have to pave. That is disproportionate and should be equalised, to provide better funding to all rural counties.
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Youth Unemployment
The national insurance tax rise and the upcoming implementation of the Employment Rights Act 2025 are just two of the reasons why businesses are on their knees. I welcome the Government’s youth guarantee, but how can the Government guarantee jobs when there will not be any businesses to offer those jobs?
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Rural Roads
I want to highlight the fact that in Scotland we have a particular challenge. Scottish Borders council is responsible for maintaining 1,900 miles of road, which must be one of the biggest distances in the whole of the UK, but in Scotland, because of the decisions that the SNP Government are making, rural local authorities such as Scottish Borders council are being neglected for the sake of the central belt. Does my hon. Friend agree that local authorities need to be funded properly to allow them to fix these many miles of roads?
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Topical Questions
Grooming gang survivors have told us that they were trafficked between England and Scotland. Police were aware of those allegations of abuse but failed to do anything about them. Will the Minister explain how the grooming gang inquiries on either side of the border will work together to ensure that the perpetrators, and those responsible for the cover-up, are held to account?
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Youth Unemployment
I refer the House to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests. I share the concern of many on the Opposition Benches about the national insurance increase, but I am particularly concerned by what is happening with graduate unemployment, which we have seen increase by 46% over the past six years. I draw the Secretary of State’s attention to the work of upReach, a charity that I have been involved in over the past few years. It is a social mobility charity that offers workshops, work experience and career coaching to young people. Will he engage with organisations such as upReach and Nick Bent, the excellent CEO who runs it, to see what lessons can be learned? In a world where AI is already taking many graduate jobs, it is concerning that the trend will only accelerate further.
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Jury Trials
6. What assessment he has made of the potential impact of his proposed changes to jury trials on the criminal justice system.
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Jury Trials
The Justice Secretary has just told us that the reason he is cutting jury trials is to get the backlog down. If that is the case, why is there not a sunset clause, so that once the backlog is reduced, those jury trials can resume?
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Productivity and Economic Growth: East Midlands
I congratulate the hon. Member for Rushcliffe (James Naish) on securing the debate, and welcome the opportunity to speak on behalf of His Majesty’s Opposition about what is not only an important region but a great one, as he put it. As we have heard, the east midlands is home to world-leading manufacturers, a thriving logistics sector, pioneering aerospace firms and hundreds of thousands of small and medium-sized businesses. There is huge potential, as every Member who has spoken has attested to. These businesses, workers and entrepreneurs deserve a Government who are pursuing policies to help them to realise that potential and drive growth in the area. Concerningly, however, growth has been consistently downgraded; we need only look at the spring forecasts a couple of weeks ago to see that growth has been once again downgraded for the coming year, and that is before any impact is felt from the operations happening in the middle east. Today we have heard lots of ideas from Members across the parties on how to realise growth in the east midlands. That can be achieved, but will require the Government to change course. The region has many internationally renowned businesses. Members have rightly spoken proudly about Rolls-Royce, Toyota, Alstom and other businesses. The East Midlands Hydrogen zone is positioning the region at the forefront of clean energy transitions, and of course there is a strong university sector. It is a region with key strengths, and the last Government recognised that. Several Members referred to the East Midlands freeport, which was given the green light in 2023. The only inland freeport in England was backed by Government seed funding at the time and underpinned a projected 28,000 jobs coming to the area. If we look at the wider picture, the current Government have talked a lot about economic growth, but sadly growth has underperformed. As the Liberal Democrat spokesman—the hon. Member for Torbay (Steve Darling)—said, we cannot ignore the impact of the higher national insurance charges. We cannot ignore the higher business rates that many companies are about to be hit with, as well as higher wage and other costs. The Bank of England has pointed out the impact that these have had.
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Productivity and Economic Growth: East Midlands
We can trade statistics, but the context for that was the 2009 financial crash, which led to a deficit of 12% to 15%. [Interruption.] The Government who came in were the coalition Government, including our Liberal Democrat colleagues, and it was Danny Alexander, Chief Secretary to the Treasury, who drove those savings in spending, particularly in local government but also in other areas. We had to get the books to balance. That was the context that we had to deal with. People can deny the reality, but that was the situation at the time. The number of people who are unemployed is forecast to hit 2 million by the end of the year. I expect other Members are particularly worried, as I am, about the impact on young people. Youth unemployment has already moved above 16%, which is higher than the EU average. We are now in the bizarre position in which the Government are having to pay companies to take on young people whom the Government’s own policies have priced out of having jobs. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Melton and Syston (Edward Argar) highlighted, SMEs across—[Interruption.]
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Productivity and Economic Growth: East Midlands
If hon. Members want to intervene, they are welcome to do so. As my right hon. Friend said, small and medium-sized businesses across the east midlands and beyond are having to cope with those costs, making it harder for them to invest and grow. The Government should listen to them. Fundamentally, the problems that the east midlands and the UK face in relation to growth are around productivity. Investment has been too low. The UK has trailed the G7 average over the last 30 years, not just the last 14 years. Our infrastructure ambitions are often buried under red tape and excessive costs. Colleagues have spoken about energy costs. The hon. Member for Amber Valley (Linsey Farnsworth) spoke about Denby and the ceramics sector, and we hope that a solution is found for that workforce. But by linking us to the EU emissions trading scheme, the Government will be driving up costs for our industry. The sparks of business dynamism have dimmed. Office for National Statistics data shows that firm entry and exit rates have reduced, particularly compared with the United States. That leads to a less competitive, dynamic and innovative economy. The east midlands has consistently been ranked among the least productive regions in the UK, but that is not inevitable and nor should it be, because if it stays like that, living standards will not increase.
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Productivity and Economic Growth: East Midlands
I am looking at the House of Commons Library brief on the average productivity level. I cannot quite see the hon. Member’s point reflected in the chart that I am looking at, but I will look at it again afterwards, when there is more time, and see whether that is the reality. As I said, it is not inevitable that the productivity level is lower, and it cannot be accepted if we want living standards to rise. The Productivity Institute did a study looking particularly at the region, which identified some of the challenges around skills shortages, infrastructure and under-investment in research and development. Many Members have spoken about transport spending in particular. The briefing note for the debate from East Midlands Councils talks about a period of 20 years in which there has been a lack of investment. I understand the importance of improving investment; if I was speaking in an east of England debate, I and other colleagues would be pointing out that we also do not get our fair share. The east midlands is a region of makers, and manufacturing makes up a greater part of the economy there than in any part of the UK other than Wales. In terms of productivity, the 2023 output was 14.7% below the recent UK average. Boston Consulting Group has just published a report on productivity, which I commend to Members, that looks at the underlying factors for this national challenge. The sectors that historically have driven productivity—manufacturing, information and communication technology, and financial services—accounted for 84% of the positive increase in the pre-crisis decade, but since then, that figure has fallen to just 34%. While those are still key sectors that are important for the economy, they are performing less well than previously. What do we do to change that? We need to look at policies that boost productivity, including focusing on incentivising R&D spending in advanced manufacturing, reducing the barriers to commercialising innovation, and building on the full expensing introduced by the last Conservative Government to boost investment. Sadly, in the Finance (No. 2) Bill, which I have just gone through in Committee, some of the incentives on capital allowances have been reduced. We also need to promote a culture of enterprise, not one that is focused on regulatory compliance. We certainly need cheaper energy in order to compete. We need to scrap some of the bureaucracy around planning, and boost competition and skills. The east midlands is a region with assets, and it is a strong driver of national growth. It has the companies, the geographic position, the people, and the small and medium-sized businesses to make a change. By pursuing reforms—the hon. Member for Rushcliffe outlined a number of recommendations in the APPG report that seemed sensible and well worth considering—the east midlands can be helped to maximise its potential.
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Meningitis Outbreak
I thank the Secretary of State for his statement, and for his communications with me. Juliette was a schoolgirl in year 13 at Queen Elizabeth grammar school in my constituency. She died of meningitis this weekend. Her headteacher said of her: “She was incredibly kind, thoughtful and intelligent”, and that she had been “treasured”. I too am a parent of a year 13 student and my heart goes out to Juliette’s family, and also to the family of the university student who has died. Sixth-formers and university students mix in the same crowded venues in Canterbury, so the Government must fully consider the risk to schoolkids as well as the students in the universities. I am grateful to the NHS and the UKHSA for the action that they have already been taking locally, but many parents feel that they are not receiving enough information, and schools have also found themselves struggling to obtain guidance. May I ask the Secretary of State why there was no contact with schools until Monday, whether all school pupils who went to Club Chemistry have been identified and invited for treatment, and whether he will roll out the vaccination programme to local schools, including residential schools in the area?
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Youth Unemployment
The Government have lost control of welfare. The benefits bill is ballooning. Sickness benefits alone will cost us £109 billion by the end of the decade. Working-age benefits are costing £161 billion right now and rising. But instead of bringing forward welfare savings, Labour MPs have chosen to spend ever more on benefits. Just the other day, they backed an extra £3 billion spending on scrapping the two-child benefit cap. It is all paid for in the same way—by taxpayers, by hard-working people, and by the businesses that employ them. First the Government tax jobs, and then they wonder why there are fewer of them. Let me tell them: if you tax it, you get less of it. Under Labour, unemployment has gone up month after month. Our youth unemployment now rivals that of Greece, at over 16%. That is one in six young people out of work, wanting employment but denied the chance—and a university degree will not save them, either. Some 700,000 graduates are out of work, and nearly 1 million young people are not in education, employment or training. So many young people have done everything asked of them. They have studied hard, done their exams and got their grades, but now they are getting rejection after rejection to their job applications. The Government are letting down a whole generation, and the Secretary of State knows it. He said so himself this week on the radio. He talked about the “scarring effects” of youth unemployment: worse mental health, worse outcomes and even lower life expectancy. He is right, so why are his Government making things so much worse? Let us be clear about what this new policy is. It is not a jobs plan or a serious new deal for young people; it is a sticking-plaster, and an expensive one costing over £1 billion. These are state-subsidised jobs to replace the real ones that Labour has killed. The Secretary of State has laid into our record on apprenticeships, but he knows perfectly well that the drop he refers to happened because we raised the standard of apprenticeships to make them a qualification that would actually count, and to make them a meaningful alternative to university, not just a way for businesses to get cheaper workers. I warn him not to just chase higher numbers in his reforms; quality matters. And why are the Government doing nothing about dead-end degrees and mounting student debt? Why not adopt the policy we have announced of cutting back on low-value degrees, and using the saving to increase apprenticeships? This Government’s answer is to just go back, cap in hand, to the taxpayer. At the end of his statement, the Secretary of State talked about welfare reform, but why do we never hear the important word “savings”? I think we know why. The Government tried and failed to make welfare savings last summer. What has changed since then? The Prime Minister is only weaker and more indecisive, though the problem becomes ever more urgent. Today’s personal independence payment figures show that claims are up again. There are over 300,000 more people on PIP since Labour took over—a rise of 9%—and the number of young people claiming PIP has risen by 14%. There are nearly 150,000 more people claiming benefits for mental ill health and neurodiversity. I have been clear: this cannot go on. Benefits are not the right answer. Work is better for us. People who can work should work. The Secretary of State needs to answer some questions. Where exactly has the extra £1 billion that he has just announced for state-funded jobs come from? Will this latest plan actually bring down youth unemployment? Will it even touch the sides? How will he stop fraudulent claims for the cash? How will he make sure that no one loses their job because of his cash handouts? How will he make sure that all this spending makes a difference, and that he is not subsidising employment that would have happened anyway? Does he accept that taxing jobs on the one hand and subsidising them on the other is not an economic strategy, but the economics of the madhouse? Finally, can the Secretary of State at least agree that the benefits bill needs to come down? Perhaps he could take this chance to use the word “savings”. Does he see the irony? Does he understand my feeling of déjà vu? This is another plan from his party for welfare reform that spends more money, rather than saving it. When will he bring forward a plan to actually bring down the benefits bill? He talks about welfare reform; is this it?
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Rural Roads
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Stringer. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for South Shropshire (Stuart Anderson) on securing an incredibly important debate for all of us who represent rural communities. If there is one issue that unites motorists across our country, and certainly across Buckinghamshire, it is that our roads are simply not good enough. In rural areas, roads are not a convenience; they are a necessity. They connect people to work, school, healthcare and family, yet too often, as we have heard this afternoon, those roads are deteriorating before our eyes. The national picture is stark. As others have said, the backlog for road repairs now stands at £18.6 billion. Local rural roads are resurfaced, on average, only once every 90 years. That is not maintenance; it is neglect. The AA recorded over 613,000 pothole-related call-outs in 2025, an average of 1,679 every single day. The Royal Automobile Club has reported a sharp surge this year, with February alone seeing more than 6,000 pothole-related breakdown reports. Meanwhile, compensation claims to councils have risen by over 90% in just three years, yet the vast majority are rejected. Motorists are paying twice: once through their taxes and again through their repair bills. First, we must recognise the growing strain on our road network. Much of our local infrastructure, particularly in rural counties like Buckinghamshire, was never designed for the volume and type of traffic that the roads now carry. Many roads began life as literal cart tracks, without the deep foundations needed to withstand modern use. The state-mandated transition to battery electric cannot be divorced from infrastructure realities. Electric vehicles are significantly heavier than their petrol and diesel equivalents, particularly in goods vehicles. The physics is simple: as weight increases, the damage inflicted on road surfaces increases exponentially. Yet there has been very little acknowledgement from Government of how the increased wear will be managed, or how dealing with it will be funded. We must also consider the impact of major infrastructure projects, of which we are seeing the misery at first hand in my county. High Speed 2 has brought thousands of additional heavy goods vehicle movements on to rural roads that were never designed for such use. The result is roads being churned up at an alarming rate. Too often, the burden of repairing that damage falls on local authorities and local taxpayers, which cannot be right. Where infrastructure projects cause damage, they must fix it. It is incumbent on HS2, as much as other projects, to fix what it breaks. We have seen that it can be done: projects such as East West Rail have resurfaced rural roads where construction traffic has taken its toll. HS2 must follow that example. On the question of funding, in Buckinghamshire there is a £210 million road repairs backlog, alongside significant financial pressures on the council. Despite that, the council carried out over 30,000 repairs last year, and even released additional funding from reserves to try to tackle the problem, finding a highways repair budget of £120 million. But that is not sustainable as the Labour Government take £44 million of spending power away from Buckinghamshire. The situation in Buckinghamshire is not unique. As we have heard from places such as Oxfordshire, councils across the country are repairing millions of potholes each year, yet the backlog continues to grow. Even with increased national funding, the gap between what is needed and what is delivered remains substantial. We cannot continue to pile pressure on to a system that is already at breaking point, so what is needed is clear: we need honesty about the scale of the challenge and sustained long-term spending that matches the backlog, not short-term sticking plasters. We are beyond pothole repair and into an era when we need full resurfacing. We need fair funding for areas facing significant infrastructure pressures; all too often it is rural communities that are being let down. We need accountability so that those who damage our roads pay to repair them. For my constituents, and rural communities across the country, driving today feels less like a journey and more like navigating a patchwork obstacle course.
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Middle East
In answer to an earlier question, the Foreign Secretary rightly said that Ukraine’s security is our security. But in answer to the last question, she equally set out why the current regime in Iran is a threat to our security, both through proliferation—a level of enriched uranium to make a nuclear weapon—and the IRGC, which not only slaughters thousands in Iran but has been responsible for plots, which have been foiled, on our own soil. It is all very well the Foreign Secretary saying that she wants to see a swift resolution, but when diplomacy so far has failed and the Government will not join our allies in the attacks, how does she think this will end?
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Productivity and Economic Growth: East Midlands
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Dr Huq. I am grateful to my constituency neighbour the hon. Member for Rushcliffe (James Naish) for securing this important debate, and I look forward to welcoming him to my constituency later this week. I agree with much of what he said, particularly about flooding. This is one debate in which I can argue from the Back Bench, without fear of contradiction, that the east midlands is the best region in the entire country—[Hon. Members: “Hear, hear!”] This may be the only time I get such consensus on both sides of the House. As the hon. Member set out, we have all the core ingredients. We have a central location; we have good transport links, although they need to be better; we have great universities; we have great skills. Most importantly, we have great businesses and we have great people with ambition. The potential is clear but, as the hon. Member said, our region all too often appears to lose out. Perhaps that is because we are not demonstrative and we do not always shout about things. When it comes to funding for infrastructure or for our local authorities, the facts are clear. My local authority in Leicestershire has the lowest per-head funding in the country. Previous council leaders and councillors such as Deborah Taylor and Nick Rushton have fought hard to address that. We need fairer funding for our county. Network North was due to bring more money to Leicestershire. Among other things, that would potentially have helped to fund the completion of the Melton Mowbray distributor road. Sadly, when the Government announced the new funding, that was taken away. One challenge we face is that when the Government direct funding to our area, they all too often favour those areas with mayoral authorities, rather than counties without one, such as Leicestershire. Melton and Syston has a limited number of big businesses, but a lot of small and rural businesses. They are the bedrock of our local economy, but they face barriers to growing, including issues with public transport, with attracting people to work and with the ability to travel. The impact of national insurance increases and business rates in town centres, particularly for rural businesses and shops, makes it challenging for them to expand as they would wish to. A key challenge, as the hon. Member set out clearly, is in working together not only to deliver on our ambitions, but to break down the barriers to securing the additional investment bid for the A52, the A46 or even local roads and transport. We also need to break down the regulatory and taxation barriers that stop so many fantastic businesses growing and expanding. There is huge potential in our region, in my county of Leicestershire and in my Melton and Syston constituency. We need those barriers broken down and investment put in to ensure that that potential is unleashed.
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Meningitis Outbreak
I associate myself with the Secretary of State’s remarks: the thoughts of all of us in this House are with the families of those, tragically, who have died and all those who have been affected. While there are understandably questions about vaccination and antibiotic eligibility, it is important that decisions continue to be guided by clinical experts, and in this country we have some of the best in the world. I welcome the Secretary of State asking the JCVI to review the eligibility criteria, but will he please be unequivocal—I think he has alluded to this—in saying that he will continue to be guided by its expert clinical advice in any decisions he subsequently makes?
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Jury Trials
11. What assessment he has made of the potential impact of his proposed changes to jury trials on the criminal justice system.
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Jury Trials
The Government’s case for curtailing trial by jury is based on an impact assessment that rests on assumptions, rather than hard evidence. Is it not the truth that the Government are asking Parliament to give up and weaken a fundamental safeguard on the basis of hearsay alone?
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Meningitis Outbreak
I know from my time in medicine that all those involved in combating this outbreak will be working at pace, and they have our utmost respect. However, there will be concern about the report in The Independent in the last hour or so that certain pharmacies in the region are running out of or running low on the menB vaccine. Will the Secretary of State commit to looking into that personally and ensure that we get a robust supply chain?
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Violence against Women and Girls
Right now there are potentially thousands of rapists, paedophiles and perverts, who are responsible for some of the worst offences against women and girls, who this Government are going to let out of prison earlier. That is a disgrace, and at the very least the Government should be transparent about it. When I asked them to tell us what their estimates and modelling were on the number of people who were due to be let out, at first they denied they had any of that information; then they admitted that they did, but refused to publish it. Does the Minister not think that they should be transparent about the consequences of their own policies?
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Violence against Women and Girls
I wish that the Minister got as angry about the fact that her Government are releasing thousands of rapists, paedophiles and perverts from prison early. If the Government will not tell us about the reality of the consequences, surely they should at least tell the victims. One of the worst aspects of this policy is the fact that many of those victims will have been given an estimated date for when the perpetrators would be released. That date will now be brought forward, and the perpetrators will get out of prison earlier than the victims were led to believe. Does the Minister think that, at the very least, the Government should write to the victims in advance to let them know that they are letting the perpetrators of those horrendous crimes out of prison earlier?
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Rural Roads
I cannot possibly do justice to the frustration of my residents about their local roads in one minute, but I will try my best. They contact me all the time to say how appalled they are at the quality of their local roads. The Labour Government fail to understand the challenges in rural communities, making the situation all the worse with their funding decisions since they came into office. First, since my constituency has a lot of older people, the Government’s cutting off of our plans to reform social care spending have left us with huge financial burdens. Secondly, they cut the amount of money that was due to be given to East Sussex county council to pay for road improvements. Thirdly, to make it all the worse, they changed the funding formula to make it much harder for rural counties such as East Sussex and so many of the rural constituencies represented by Members in this Chamber to make ends meet and repair their roads. Will the Government finally start listening to rural MPs, councillors and councils, and sort these issues out once and for all?
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Rural Roads
Does the Minister accept that the changes to the funding formula have made rural areas worse off—yes or no?
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Middle East
The Foreign Secretary said that the situation in the strait is complex, and so it is, but it is not that complex. Her Government or military must have war gamed this in the past, because it was foreseeable. Can she say when a plan will emerge and who she is discussing it with? Will she please reassure the House that she is not simply talking to the United Nations, because if we expect the United Nations to keep the strait open, we will be here talking about this at Christmas?
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Ministerial Salaries (Amendment) Bill
Given the economic situation, the public expect restraint at the moment. They also expect leadership—and that means ministerial leadership. Does the Paymaster General seriously believe that the public will welcome this? The explanatory notes tell us that it will involve a payroll hike of between 13% and 19% for that group of people, plus superannuation and severance payments, which is not an insignificant sum. Has he considered perhaps reducing, rather than increasing, the number of Ministers?
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Immigration Reforms
It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Mr Stringer. I draw Members’ attention to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests: I host a researcher from an asylum charity in my office. I am sure that the Minister is glad to have a friendly face in this debate, so it is particular pleasure to speak and to congratulate the hon. Member for Perth and Kinross-shire (Pete Wishart) on securing it. I agree entirely with what he said about the timeliness of the debate. It has been a very broad-ranging one, so I will make a few observations on the debate and then finish with some questions, which I hope the Minister might address. It is clear that there is a degree of commonality between the official Opposition and the Government on many of the measures that are being brought forward. As the Leader of the Opposition said very clearly, the Government will have our support in implementing them, should they run into any difficulties in that respect. However, it is also clear that many of the challenges around asylum and migration, like many of the challenges that face our Government and our country more generally, are getting worse. The situation is deteriorating. My own entry into this area of work came because, as a local councillor, I saw the consequences for communities of the arrival of very large numbers of asylum seekers. Indeed, to this day, the Hillingdon part of my constituency has the highest per capita level of asylum seekers of any local authority area in the country, with more than 100 different first languages. Diversity and dealing with these issues at a local level are things with which my constituents and I are extremely familiar. Over those years, we have had many debates—I will touch on this in my questions to the Minister—about how we ensure a fair and appropriate dispersal of asylum seekers across the country. The hon. Member for Perth and Kinross-shire is now hosting some asylum seekers dispersed into his constituency—but for many decades local authorities in Scotland, for example, demanded a more liberal approach to our borders in respect of asylum seekers, while absolutely refusing to be dispersal areas for those people when they were here. While the 31 mostly Conservative authorities in south-east England volunteered to become asylum dispersal areas, the plea fell on deaf ears north of the border. It is clear that no party has a monopoly on practical compassion when it comes to support for those who seek refuge in our country. Indeed, we can thank my right hon. Friend the Member for Braintree (Sir James Cleverly), now the shadow Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, for the actions that he took during his time as our Home Secretary, which produced the significant fall in net migration into this country, which this Government have seen as a benefit. As my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Bedfordshire (Blake Stephenson) outlined in reference to his report, there remain significant concerns about putting the appropriate package of measures in place to ensure that our borders are robustly and consistently controlled. We need to make sure that these debates are happening. One thing that is very clear—I expect that most of us, as politicians, will have heard this while canvassing—is that voters tend to be very positive about all the migrants they personally know. They like the ones who run the local shop, who work in the GP practice, who drive the bus or who are their next-door neighbours. It is all the others they are worried about. There is therefore a big job of work about demystification. When we as Conservatives, in the previous Government, decided to open the door to large numbers of refugees from Hong Kong—people who were traditionally associated with our country and had a right to be here under that scheme—it gained very widespread public acceptance. The same was true of the Ukraine refugee scheme. We need to make sure that we have tough measures in place around illegal migration and an appropriate and compassionate response to those in need.
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Immigration Reforms
The hon. Member for Woking (Mr Forster) spoke about the absence of Members from certain parties from this Chamber. Those colleagues who we saw scuttling off to Reform have serious questions to answer about why, when given free rein in the Home Office, they failed to implement even the measures that this Labour Government have brought forward to address some of the loopholes that the hon. Member for Dewsbury and Batley (Iqbal Mohamed) highlighted. My right hon. Friend the Member for South Holland and The Deepings (Sir John Hayes) described some of the characteristics of illegal migration. I have been to Calais and I have seen the drone footage gathered by the French police of the boats on the beaches and the camps set up by the traffickers who are bringing people over, and it is clear that we should be robust and extremely cautious. I have watched footage of people in those boats who, seeing the police approach, pick up children and throw them in the sea, knowing that the police will have to rescue them rather than stop the migrant boat. We should make no apology for taking robust action to address those concerns.
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Immigration Reforms
I do not entirely share that view. I have seen the challenges that the French police face, with something like 1,000 members of their constabulary covering 10,000 km of coastline. The traffickers will sometimes send 50 or 100 boats to sea simultaneously, knowing that there is no way that the French police can possibly deter them. Each of those boats is worth €70,000 to €80,000-worth of revenue to their criminal enterprise, so they have a big incentive. The Minister is here in an honourable tradition of Labour Governments taking robust action on our borders. The first immigration controls that our country ever had were introduced by the post-war Labour Government in response to concerns about the exit from empire. No recourse to public funds, the first time that asylum seekers were taken out of the standard benefits system and eligibility for council housing, was introduced by the Blair Government. The asylum dispersal system was introduced by the now Mayor of Greater Manchester when he was the Immigration Minister in those years. On the Conservative side of the Chamber, we are broadly supportive of the measures based on the Danish model that are being brought forward by the Home Secretary. We remain very concerned, however, as my right hon. Friend the Member for South Holland and The Deepings and my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Bedfordshire have highlighted, that many of those measures will still fall short and that our constituents’ concerns will remain. In the spirit of a constructive approach, may I ask the Minister whether he has given any further consideration to the idea of an asylum visa, going beyond the simple prospect of safe and legal routes? If people wish to study, work, come to get married or live in the United Kingdom for any other reason, they have to apply for a visa, but we do not have any such measures in place for asylum seekers, and that is helping to drive the illegal traffic across the channel. What discussions is the Minister having across Government about avoiding cost shunts, which are an increasing concern and a consequence of speeding up asylum decision making—in particular, the rapid rise in the cost of temporary accommodation for local authorities as asylum seekers get status and turn up at the town hall seeking help or are left destitute in local communities? What consideration will the Minister give to using protocol 16 of the European convention on human rights, since it is clear that UK tribunals go well beyond the provisions of that protocol in many cases, to ensure that we are not doing more than we should be doing? Even with all those questions, I can assure the Minister that as the official Opposition we will be providing support in the Lobbies to ensure that those measures are implemented, even if we remain of the view that they should go further.
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Isles of Scilly: Transport
I appreciate the hon. Gentleman bringing this important debate to the Chamber. Exeter airport, which is one of the key transport nodes for the Isles of Scilly, is based in my constituency. My grandparents and great-grandparents on my dad’s side really enjoyed going down there on holiday, adding to that tourism economy. I have seen the price of travel to the Scilly Isles increase in recent years, which means fewer people are able to enjoy that. I would like to offer my support to the hon. Gentleman; if there is any way I can add in Exeter airport and work with him on some of these problems, I would be very happy to do so.
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Draft Grants to the Churches Conservation Trust Order 2026
It is a great pleasure to see you in the Chair, Sir Desmond. At the risk of dangerous levels of cross-party agreement breaking out, I echo what the Minister said about the important role that the Churches Conservation Trust plays in protecting some of our nation’s most significant historical churches. This debate is timely because the Culture, Media and Sport Committee, which I chair, is currently undertaking an inquiry into built heritage and how we protect it, examining the effectiveness of current heritage protections, funding structures and the current successes and challenges of organisations tasked with looking after our most important historical assets. Evidence we received during our inquiry has shown clearly that the Churches Conservation Trust plays an invaluable role in preserving our heritage, but is increasingly struggling to meet the growing challenges placed upon it. Witnesses told us that funding from the Church of England has not kept pace with the rising costs of conservation. What was also particularly concerning was that around 50 to 60 churches, some unused and deteriorating for over two decades, remain in limbo. Additionally, DCMS funding, which forms less than a third of the trust’s income yet provides an essential foundation for its other fundraising events, has effectively been frozen, meaning the trust has continued to take on new churches without any corresponding uplift. Although the Church of England has now agreed to increase its annual contribution, the combination of frozen DCMS funding and the loss of the listed places of worship grant scheme, which is worth more than £300,000 a year to the trust, means it is no better off in real terms. The new places of worship renewal fund is welcome, but we still do not know how it will be distributed, and there is understandable concern about eligibility for it and about its overall adequacy, as we have already heard from my hon. Friend the Member for Droitwich and Evesham. It is not clear how much the Churches Conservation Trust will receive from the new fund, or whether the new fund will make up for the money that it loses as a result of the old scheme’s being axed. The order before us will help the Churches Conservation Trust to continue carrying out the critical work of conserving and maintaining our shared historical assets, but it is essential that it can access new funding schemes and wider cultural support. Does the Minister accept that, as the amounts paid to the Churches Conservation Trust are frozen, the money being made available through this instrument amounts to a real-terms cut in funding? When will we get more updates about how the new places of worship renewal fund will operate? Above all, we need certainty and predictability, so will the Minister guarantee that the Churches Conservation Trust will be able to access the new fund and that it will not lose out as a result of the old grant scheme’s being axed? Finally, what assessment have the Government made of the number of churches that will close as a result of the listed places of worship scheme’s ending?
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Youth Unemployment
The Chancellor has spent the last 18 months pricing young people out of jobs, and now the Secretary of State has been asked to ride to the rescue by paying companies to get the same young people back into work. The Government are effectively robbing Peter to pay Paul. Why does he think that youth unemployment in my constituency is up by 15% since the general election?
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Ministerial Salaries (Amendment) Bill
First, I thank my right hon. Friend the Member for Stone, Great Wyrley and Penkridge (Sir Gavin Williamson) for his powerful remarks. I hope he did not spend too many hours trawling through 16 years of emails, but it is yet another example of his hard work and diligence in this place. I sympathise with his points, but I hope he is comforted by the opening remarks of my hon. Friend the Member for Brentwood and Ongar (Alex Burghart) that a future Conservative Government will reduce the number of ministerial posts and reduce the size of Government. As I am sure all Members would agree, it is only right that those who choose to serve the public as Ministers of the Crown should be able to receive a salary if they wish. Although the Government of the day must always be drawn from and ultimately accountable to the elected House of Commons, previous Governments of all stripes have benefited from the knowledge and wisdom provided by noble Lords who have served as Ministers or held one of the great offices of state. I am sure many Members will have had the privilege of working alongside them and know personally of their dedication and public service. All those who serve as Ministers of the Crown, whether they be Members of this House or the other place, give up their time and energy and take on an extra burden of responsibilities in doing so, both relating to their departmental work and in representing the Government in the Chamber. It is only right, therefore, that Ministers should receive equal payment regardless of the House in which they sit. It should also be noted that the impetus for ensuring that all those who serve as Ministers of the Crown can receive a salary came from the other place, which debated this issue at length during the passage of the House of Lords (Hereditary Peers) Bill. Although it remains a great disappointment that the Government chose to proceed with that misguided piece of legislation, at least some comfort can be taken from the fact that this debate emerged from that Bill. In particular, I pay tribute to my noble Friend Lord True, who so eloquently made the case for ensuring all Lords Ministers can receive a salary in the other place, and who laid amendments to the hereditary peers Bill to that end. While it remains disappointing that the Government did not support the Opposition’s amendments when they had the opportunity to do so, those Lords who have been calling for this change can take comfort in knowing that their efforts were not in vain. It is also further proof of the quality of debate in the other place, and the importance of its constitutional role in strengthening our laws through scrutiny, that we should be debating this Bill because of their efforts. To conclude, peers with the experience and expertise to serve as Ministers should not be prevented from doing so due to a lack of private means. I therefore join my hon. Friends in not opposing this Bill.
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Right to Protest
Clearly, the Home Secretary has the power to ban marches but no power to deal with static protests. This weekend we had the annual al-Quds hate demonstration, at which individuals regularly chanted antisemitic slogans, but the police could take no action. Will the Minister have discussions with the Home Secretary on what can be done to police and ban static demonstrations that will clearly lead to a contravention of the law? The big problem in London is that police are being sucked into the centre of the city and taken away from the boroughs where they should be doing their policing work.