5,779 spoken contributions under 12 words (interjections such as “Will the hon. Member give way?”) are hidden. Show them

1. 5 Jun 2025·Parliament·Mike Wood

   Battery Energy Storage Sites: Safety Regulations

   People in my constituency are worried. They are worried by the constant stream of applications for new battery energy storage systems in and around the villages across the constituency—from Kinver to Swindon, Hinksford, Wombourne, Lower Penn and the edge of Kingswinford. Their worries were not exactly alleviated by the response the Prime Minister gave to my question last month. He did not give the impression that the Government understand residents’ concerns and some of the reasons for those concerns. Lower Penn in South Staffordshire is a lovely village with a population of just under 1,000, and it felt like pretty much all of them were in the village hall for the public meeting in February. At least seven battery sites have been either approved or proposed in or close to that small village. The same is happening in villages across South Staffordshire. As I have been sitting in the Chamber for this debate, I have received another email from the planning authority inviting me to speak on one these applications, which are coming through at such a rate. That reflects the position across the country. There are 121 operational battery energy storage systems in the United Kingdom, but over 1,500 more are in the pipeline, so we really are at a tipping point, but the planning and regulatory systems have not yet caught up. That is why we need action. As has been said, such batteries have a low failure rate, but sometimes they go wrong, just as they do in mobile phones and electric vehicles. That is why airlines tell us we cannot charge our mobile phone battery while we are on a flight, and it is why Parliament has decided that electric vehicles cannot be charged in the underground car park. It is not because the risk is high; it is because the consequences of things going wrong can be catastrophic. Whereas a mobile phone may have a capacity of 15 to 18 watt hours and an electric vehicle battery perhaps 80 to 100 kW hours, the site in Tilbury—the site of the fire earlier this year, which I think the hon. Member for Horsham (John Milne) referred to—when completed will have a capacity of about 600 MW hours. To put it another way, that site will be the equivalent of 33 million iPhone batteries. As we see an increase in these sites, we know from basic statistics that there will be more fires on top of those we have already had this year in Tilbury, Cirencester and Aberdeenshire. We therefore need to ensure that our systems are properly adapted and modernised to reflect those risks. The risk of a fire is not only about the potential danger to human life—for both those who may be nearby and the firefighters who are sent to bring those fires under control over what may be 24 or 48 hours —but about our local natural environments.

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2. 5 Jun 2025·Parliament·Mike Wood

   Battery Energy Storage Sites: Safety Regulations

   My right hon. Friend is completely right. Part of the problem is that the planning applications that come in are often very vague about exactly what lithium ion-type chemical and technology will be used, because they are often made years in advance, and therefore before the products that will be on a site have been acquired. In those circumstances, it is impossible to assess the risk properly. When these fires run for 24 or 48 hours and millions of gallons of water are used to bring them under control, the chemical run-off has to go somewhere, and sadly many of these applications—including those in my constituency—are for sites near to our rivers and our canals. For example, in Wombourne and Lower Penn there are plans for two battery energy storage sites to be erected close to the Staffordshire and Worcestershire canal and the South Staffordshire railway walk. Not only is the canal a green corridor through our beautiful countryside—an area of outstanding local beauty—but it is close to the historical Bratch locks and Bratch pumping station. It is a popular site for canal users and anglers alike. The consequences of a major fire and the chemical run-off would be devastating for fish stock and other wildlife. The planning and regulatory systems must catch up with the realities before all the applications are approved and in use, by which time it may be too late. We need the National Fire Chiefs Council to update the guidelines, as well as their assessment of battery energy storage systems. Before that is done, however, we clearly need a minimum distance between battery sites and residential properties. We need the fire service to be made statutory consultees on planning applications for battery energy storage systems. Furthermore, the Government really must go back and make the changes needed to the Planning and Infrastructure Bill to ensure that local authorities and communities have a real and meaningful say on where such systems are and are not installed.

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3. 5 Jun 2025·Parliament·Matt Vickers

   Police Presence on High Streets

   It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Furniss. I thank the hon. Member for Birmingham Erdington (Paulette Hamilton) for securing this important debate and for her passionate work on this subject. In fact, I thank all hon. Members for their insightful contributions to this debate. I welcome the news that the brother of the hon. Member for Bermondsey and Old Southwark (Neil Coyle) has joined up to the police force, particularly as he has done so in Durham—on my streets, no less. We all know the brilliant work that our hard-working police officers, PCSOs and civil enforcement officers do to protect our high streets and local communities. The police put themselves in dangerous situations to stop the criminals who blight our communities and undermine the social fabric that binds them together. Although it is welcome that headline figures from the crime survey for England and Wales show that crime fell by more than 50% between 2010 and 2024, there is still much more to be done, and protecting our high streets is an integral part of that mission. I have the honour of representing Stockton, whose high street is a great place and home to some incredible businesses. I will always encourage people to support them, but I would fail in my duty if I did not acknowledge or try to tackle the many challenges they face. If my grandparents were alive today, they would be devastated to see what has become of our high street. Over decades, Stockton’s Labour council has allowed it to decline and to become home to unacceptable levels of crime and antisocial behaviour. Instead of employing more civil enforcement officers and street wardens, the council chooses to employ a huge number of managers on £100k-plus salaries—it recently came to light that it had spent £15.8 million on recruitment consultants in the last three years.

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4. 5 Jun 2025·Parliament·Matt Vickers

   Police Presence on High Streets

   It is incredibly important that whatever money councils have is put to good use. In Stockton, we have terrible examples: people being flown abroad to watch shows to scout for festival appearances, and the CEO of the council recruiting a chum of his on £900 a day, without it ever being seen and considered by the council. Councils have a responsibility to spend properly the money that is given to them, and in Stockton there are too many examples where that is not the case. Instead of the council using all the powers available through public spaces protection orders to clamp down on antisocial behaviour, its soft approach means that lots of antisocial behaviour has gone unchallenged. Moreover, Stockton’s Labour council volunteered as a dispersal authority, taking a completely disproportionate number of asylum seekers. For many years it has had one of the highest asylum seeker-to-resident ratios of any local authority across the entire country. Those asylum seekers are all housed near the town centre, creating challenges in accommodation, public services, and integration, and leaving huge numbers of lone men hanging around the town centre. The situation is made worse by the council’s approach to housing, which allows huge amounts of houses in multiple occupation, bedsits and bail accommodation to emerge around the town centre. I will continue to push the council and local police for more action to support Stockton’s fantastic high street and the incredible businesses therein. Before addressing the police’s specific role in protecting the great British high street, we must acknowledge the challenges facing our high streets as a result of this Labour Government’s actions. The Government’s jobs tax and the slashing of small businesses—well, of small business rate relief, though actually they are slashing small businesses—is putting the survival of many of our high street businesses at risk. Confidence has been sapped, and in April business confidence once again turned negative. The Government will always have the support of the Conservative party in backing our hard-working police officers. We need more officers than ever. It was interesting to hear, during Home Office questions, the Minister and the Home Secretary reading with some excitement a table listing the number of neighbourhood policing officers in each area. How many more police officers—those who can arrest the most serious criminals in our society—does the Minister expect to be in place by the end of the year? Will that number exceed the March 2024 figure? This discussion comes against the backdrop of six of Britain’s most senior police chiefs warning that important and laudable ambitions to tackle knife crime, violence against women and girls, and neighbourhood policing are all at risk because of funding shortfalls. The Government’s decision to let criminals out of prison early, many of whom will inevitably commit more crime, will put more pressure on our police. The proposed settlement for policing in 2025-26 is insufficient and risks causing job losses. The Metropolitan Police Commissioner, Sir Mark Rowley, has said that his force is facing the potential loss of 1,700 officers, PCSOs and other staff. I am keen to hear from the Minister whether she thinks that Sir Mark’s figures are correct. Special constables are invaluable, but we also need full-time officers to investigate serious crimes and secure convictions against the worst offenders on our high streets. That is critical; the public expect not only a police presence, but effective action. Although we were pleased to agree on stronger laws in the Crime and Policing Bill to address offences on our high streets, such laws are meaningless without proper enforcement and punishment. Having spent a long time campaigning alongside the likes of the Co-op, the BRC and USDAW, I am delighted to see the stand-alone offence of assaulting a retail worker on the statute book. On policing our high streets. I would be grateful if the Minister could comment on recent remarks made by the Mayor of London and his Drugs Commission. Within the mayor’s expression of support for the proposal to decriminalise possession of small amounts of cannabis, there were concerning references to police stop-and-search powers, in which he questioned the scope of their application. Frankly, that is extraordinary, reflecting a worrying disregard for public spaces such as our high streets, where all of us should expect to feel safe. I hope that the Minister will condemn those comments in the strongest possible terms and send a message to our hard-working police officers that stop and search is a vital tool in their armour, and that we entirely support them in using it. This week, I met representatives of the Federation of Independent Retailers, who shared their experiences of retail crime and the way that the use of in-store facial recognition and AI technology is making a real difference. They suggested that a grant scheme could help them to take the fight to criminals; I would be delighted to hear whether the Minister has given any consideration to introducing such a scheme. In conclusion, we should celebrate the work of the hard-working police on our streets and of the retail workers in our stores, but we must remember the challenges that they face because of the decisions of this Government. High streets are at the heart of our local communities. The Government must do much more to ensure that they are safe and thriving places that people want to visit.

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5. 5 Jun 2025·Parliament·Matt Vickers

   Business of the House

   Yarm is being battered by Stockton’s Labour council’s rush to build far too many houses far too fast in all the wrong places. It is placing unbearable pressure on our roads, schools and GP surgery. Will the Leader of the House grant a debate on how we tackle such irresponsible over- development?

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6. 5 Jun 2025·Parliament·Martin Vickers

   Business of the House

   Greenergy operates a biodiesel facility at Immingham in my constituency, but it has had to go into a cold shutdown and review the future of its operations. This is in part due to subsidised imports from the US and the need to review the renewable transport fuel obligation, which affects not just the Immingham plant but businesses up and down the country. Will the Leader of the House find time for a debate or an urgent statement on the renewable transport fuel obligation?

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7. 5 Jun 2025·Parliament·Mark Pritchard

   Topical Questions

   The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster will know that the UK has some of the best intelligence agencies in the world, and they have huge powers and huge budgets which they use to keep our country safe every single day of the week. He also knows that in any large organisation mistakes are made and public confidence in those agencies is vital. Given that the Intelligence Services Act 1994 is more than 30 years old—there have been some other Acts—is it not time for the Intelligence and Security Committee to have new powers of oversight and even new powers of sanction, so that the public can have confidence that our intelligence agencies have proper scrutiny and oversight?

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8. 5 Jun 2025·Parliament·Mark Garnier

   Bank Closures and Banking Hubs

   I also congratulate the hon. Member for Blyth and Ashington (Ian Lavery) and my right hon. Friend the Member for Tatton (Esther McVey) on securing this debate. A great strength of feeling about banks has been evident in this debate, and it is important to remember the importance of banks not just to our communities but to the wider economy. Banks provide services for businesses and individuals, but they also provide two other fundamental services. First, banks and building societies take money from where it has accumulated and distribute it to where it is needed for investment in infrastructure, businesses and jobs. Secondly, banks take overnight deposits and turn them into 25-year mortgages—so that our constituents can create a home and build a family—which is quite difficult for banks to do. The hon. Member for Blyth and Ashington made a couple of important points that I would like to address. The first was about the profits that banks make, and the second was about the policing of banks and the fact that banks apparently police themselves. Following the 2008 financial crisis, there was obviously a huge number of problems in the banking system. The Financial Services Act 2012 created two regulators, the Financial Conduct Authority and the Prudential Regulation Authority, both of which—and particularly the PRA—are responsible for making sure that our banking system is sound. Banks need to have strong balance sheets, and to do that they need to make profits to a certain extent. I agree that some of those profits look obscene, and perhaps some banks could put some of that money back into our communities. None the less, if banks spend their money unwisely, we potentially run the risk of another banking crisis. Along with the right hon. Member for Wolverhampton South East (Pat McFadden), I am one of only two Members left in this House who sat on the Parliamentary Commission on Banking Standards from 2013 to 2015. Our work on that commission underlines the importance of banks in modern life, about which we have heard so much today. The commission found that holding and operating a bank account is now essential to participate in society and the economy, whether it is receiving wages, paying bills or accessing benefits. But we also found that people’s views on banks are shaped by their direct experiences. The more a person knows their bank, the more likely they are to have confidence in it. That means that if banks want to retain their customers, they must provide good, wide-ranging services. An inability to access banking services risks eroding that trust and confidence, as we have heard today, especially among the most vulnerable.

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9. 5 Jun 2025·Parliament·Mark Garnier

   Bank Closures and Banking Hubs

   I agree 100%. My right hon. Friend is absolutely right. Let us be clear that the decline of our high streets and the decline of bank branches have run concurrently as behaviour has changed over the last couple of decades and retail activity has increasingly moved online. Banks are, of course, commercial entities, and their decisions to close branches are often driven by commercial imperatives, which is not necessarily what we want to hear in this debate. Falling footfall, the rise of digital banking and the need to be cost-effective are just some of those reasons. As we have heard so often, there are now just 3,000 bank branches remaining in the UK, and that number is expected to drop even further in coming years. ATM numbers, especially free-to-use machines, have also declined. Only 14% of payments in the UK were made with cash in 2022, and withdrawals from the Link network are down 50% on pre-covid levels.

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10. 5 Jun 2025·Parliament·Mark Garnier

    Bank Closures and Banking Hubs

    My right hon. Friend makes a good point. This is about face-to-face relationships, not something done through an app. Behind the statistics I cited are real people and real communities. The digitally excluded, older people, those in poor health and people with lower financial resilience mostly rely on cash. Small businesses and rural communities are hard hit. The question for Members who want to compel banks to keep branches open is how much digital-first customers should be charged to retain loss-making branches—notwithstanding, of course, that profit question. Of course, the answer cannot simply be to do nothing and to walk away from our responsibilities to those who are left behind. The previous Government recognised the importance of maintaining essential banking services as a foundation for public confidence in this sector. Through the post office network, we provided a system of free and convenient access to banking services, and the banking framework partnership between the Post Office and over 30 of the UK’s banks and building societies means consumers and businesses can access basic banking services through the post office network. The Post Office now has more branches than all the banks and building societies combined, and according to the Financial Conduct Authority, post office branches make up more than 66% of all branch-based cash access points in the UK. The last Government also introduced banking hubs, which we have heard a great deal about. I am conscious of time, and I do not want to incur your wrath, Madam Deputy Speaker, so although I have a lot more to say, I think it would be prudent for me to step aside and allow the Minister to face up to the passion about this issue from Members representing their communities.

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11. 5 Jun 2025·Parliament·Lincoln Jopp

    Football Governance Bill [ Lords ] (Third sitting)

    It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Turner. The shadow Minister is making a pertinent and important point. If the independent football regulator were inadvertently to cross lines into the jurisdictions of UEFA or FIFA, it could be catastrophic for English football. Clearly, that is not the purpose of the regulator. Given the success of many English teams in Europe, that would have serious ramifications. I genuinely think that the shadow Minister’s amendment is meant to be helpful and is incredibly important.

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12. 5 Jun 2025·Parliament·Lincoln Jopp

    Football Governance Bill [ Lords ] (Third sitting)

    I suspect that Government Members will oppose the amendment. Given that, does my hon. Friend think that it would be reasonable of me to ask the Minister the extent to which UEFA has seen the Bill and signed it off as something that does not constitute political interference either way?

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13. 5 Jun 2025·Parliament·Lincoln Jopp

    Football Governance Bill [ Lords ] (Third sitting)

    Mr Turner, you will have seen the declaration of interests that I made on Tuesday. I seek the Committee’s indulgence; this is the only gratuitous intervention that I will make. Can the shadow Minister remind the Committee of the identity of the only team who have won every major European trophy, having recently won the UEFA Conference League?

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14. 5 Jun 2025·Parliament·Lincoln Jopp

    Football Governance Bill [ Lords ] (Third sitting)

    I ask the Minister to respond to this simple question: has the Bill as drafted been shared with UEFA? Is UEFA satisfied that it does not represent political control?

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15. 5 Jun 2025·Parliament·Lincoln Jopp

    Football Governance Bill [ Lords ] (Third sitting)

    I rise as someone who currently has an invitation in my inbox to renew my season ticket for an eye-watering £950. I would love to know where all that money goes, as the shadow spokesman said, and why the price has gone in the direction it has. The amendment should not be seen as counter to the regulator. There was significant pushback from the Government Benches when we tried to amend the regulator in terms of size and pay, and we also discussed the budget. If, in a regulated environment, the ticket price went up from £950 to, say, £980, then this amendment would ensure that fans were made aware that that 30 quid had gone on being part of a regulated industry. That is a perfectly reasonable thing for us to want to communicate with the viewing public. Equally, it would create a relationship between the fan and the regulator that might not otherwise be there, so I support the amendment.

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16. 5 Jun 2025·Parliament·Lincoln Jopp

    Football Governance Bill [ Lords ] (Third sitting)

    The Liberal Democrat spokesman talks about dodgy owners. My season ticket is for a Premier League club; a season ticket for, say, Ashford Town (Middlesex) FC for the forthcoming season is £130. I think part of the function of this amendment is to make the regulator aware of the costs that it puts on well-run but smaller clubs. Simply making decisions and acting under this legislation without any sense of the financial impact and imposition that it is making on those clubs would be a very worrying way to do business, but the amendment would slightly redress the balance between club and regulator.

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17. 5 Jun 2025·Parliament·Lincoln Jopp

    Football Governance Bill [Lords] (Fourth sitting)

    I struggle to understand what might be contained in the Government policy statements. The Minister is steeped in this legislation, so must have discussed this in the past. Can she give the Committee an indication of what sort of thing might be covered?

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18. 5 Jun 2025·Parliament·Lincoln Jopp

    Football Governance Bill [Lords] (Fourth sitting)

    It is important for the House to understand that once an organisation is in the hands of the regulator, it has no choice. I was a director of a company that was applying for an operating licence from a national regulator. It cost millions of pounds, and we never achieved it—we tried three times, and never got there. As long as the regulator is doing its regulatory work, that is okay as far as it is concerned. There can be circumstances in which regulators, as long as things are being done by the rulebook, do not care about the growth of their industry. The amendment is a reasonable counterbalance to that, and would ensure that the regulator understands the financial burden it is putting on teams.

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19. 5 Jun 2025·Parliament·Lincoln Jopp

    Football Governance Bill [Lords] (Fourth sitting)

    What makes the Minister think that clubs themselves would not, as a normal matter of course, be noting their compliance costs?

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20. 5 Jun 2025·Parliament·Lincoln Jopp

    Football Governance Bill [Lords] (Fourth sitting)

    It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Butler. Subsection (3)(c) of clause 16 is an absolute Trojan horse; it gives carte blanche to the regulator to demand whatever it wants, regardless of whether a club produces such documents or information on a routine basis. Anyone who has worked with a regulator will know that means that clubs will have to employ lawyers, because they would never submit anything to their regulator unless it had been through lawyers first. The shadow Minister used the phrase “blank cheque”, but it is almost a blank invoice to the poor clubs that will simply have to comply. When a regulator says, “Jump”, they do not say, “Why?”; they say, “How high?” However high the bar is set, they have to get over it. It is completely reasonable, at this stage of the regulator’s development, to seek limits so that it can take some very well-defined steps in regulating football, prior to giving it the carte blanche that subsection (3)(c) represents. As the shadow Minister said, I fear that the unintended consequences of subsection (3)(c) will be considerable.

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21. 5 Jun 2025·Parliament·Lincoln Jopp

    Football Governance Bill [Lords] (Fourth sitting)

    Regulation does indeed evolve, but giving this football regulator carte blanche to evolve it without any recourse to Parliament is a key weakness of the Bill’s current drafting, which is why I support amendment 99.

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22. 5 Jun 2025·Parliament·Lincoln Jopp

    Football Governance Bill [Lords] (Fourth sitting)

    My hon. Friend the Member for Isle of Wight East and I were not here in the last Parliament, so what went on and the provenance of the Bill are not really our concern. We are being asked to contribute to the discussion and the debate on the Bill that has been placed before us. Neither of us saw the last one, so these are genuine points.

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23. 5 Jun 2025·Parliament·Lincoln Jopp

    Football Governance Bill [Lords] (Fourth sitting)

    The Minister just said something that I am not quite clear about; perhaps, given my hon. Friend’s experience, he could explain it to me. If a club gets promoted to the English Football League—the happiest day of the club’s history—it then has to apply to become regulated, but if it does not have that licence by the beginning of the next season, the Minister just said that it can play. Where should I look in the Bill to understand the latitude that clubs have to play in the English Football League without regulation?

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24. 5 Jun 2025·Parliament·Lincoln Jopp

    Football Governance Bill [Lords] (Fourth sitting)

    The Minister said that clubs would still be allowed to play in the absence of a provisional operating licence. How long would they be allowed to play for before being granted such a licence?

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25. 5 Jun 2025·Parliament·Lincoln Jopp

    Topical Questions

    Mr Speaker, “The only good Tory is a dead Tory. Kill your local MP”— so said the controversial Ulster rap band who remain on the bill at Glastonbury. Given that is the case, can the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster reassure the House that no Cabinet Office Ministers will be attending Glastonbury this year?

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26. 5 Jun 2025·Parliament·Lincoln Jopp

    Afghan Relocations and Assistance Policy

    I did serve in Afghanistan, including with the young major who is now the general that my right hon. and gallant Friend is referring to. He is an outstanding officer with unimpeachable credentials. My right hon. and gallant Friend is making a compelling moral case. I have seen at first hand the risks that those Afghans who supported us on operations faced alongside us, which only increased exponentially when the Taliban took over. We have a very moral case for doing whatever we have to do to fulfil our obligation, and if that means tearing up someone’s bureaucratic rulebook, so be it.

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27. 5 Jun 2025·Parliament·Lincoln Jopp

    Afghan Relocations and Assistance Policy

    The Minister’s civil servants will be proud of him. I think the point my right hon. Friend the Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Sir Iain Duncan Smith) was making was that when the computer says no and the Minister knows that the computer is wrong, does he not have an obligation simply to go away and change the system?

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28. 5 Jun 2025·Parliament·Lewis Cocking

    Bank Closures and Banking Hubs

    I commend the hon. Member for Blyth and Ashington (Ian Lavery) for securing this important debate. Like so many places across the country, bank branches have closed at an alarming rate in my constituency. Not so long ago, residents could pop down to a branch of every major high street bank in the towns of Waltham Cross, Cheshunt and Hoddesdon. Just last week, Halifax became the latest bank branch to shut its doors in Waltham Cross, while in Hoddesdon the former site of the Barclays remains empty, a scar on an otherwise vibrant town centre. In my town of Cheshunt, a town of 40,000 people, not a single bank branch remains. That simply cannot be right. The lack of in-person banking facilities is depriving people of access to vital services. For so many older and vulnerable people, it is causing huge difficulty and frustration, as they are forced to rely on digital services such as apps and smartphones.

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29. 5 Jun 2025·Parliament·Lewis Cocking

    Bank Closures and Banking Hubs

    I completely agree with my right hon. Friend. It is really important that we expand the rules to get banking hubs in more locations across the country. Not least of all, my nan does not do online banking. Every time I go and see her, she badgers me about it. She will specifically bank with someone where she can have face-to-face services, because she will not do online banking. It is a real struggle, because some banks say, “Well, you’ve got to telephone.” But even then, one has to have a smartphone to get a code on the app for security, so it is very difficult for our older and disabled constituents to access those vital services. When Barclays went from the high street in Hoddesdon, it did a “Barclays local”. Through the good work of my Conservative-run Broxbourne council, we managed to get it into the Spotlight, our local theatre, but it is cashless. That is nonsense! Its bread and butter business as a high street bank is to deal with cash and get people access to its cash and banking services, but it wants to run a service that is now cashless. We tried in Cheshunt—as I said, a town of 40,000 people with no banking services—to get the NatWest banking van at the car park of our Laura Trott sports centre, but again it would only offer a cashless service. This is bread and butter to the high street banks. They should accept cash and we should bring forward legislation to ensure that our constituents across the country have access to banking services. We need to look at the rules, because waiting until the last bank is in our high street does not promote consumer choice or solve people’s banking and access to cash needs. On buses, my constituents are lucky if the bus even turns up—we get one bus once an hour—so including public transport in analysis of banking hub locations is unreliable. We need to widen the criteria to enable more banking hubs to be opened up across the country.

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30. 5 Jun 2025·Parliament·John Glen

    Infected Blood Compensation Scheme

    I welcome the progress that is being made by IBCA. Of course, the Minister is not directly responsible for how quickly that is rolling out. I note that IBCA has announced that its plan is to prioritise those infected who are still alive; indeed, my constituent Daryn Craik was contacted last week. I suggest that the Minister set up a metric that IBCA could agree to for the time between when people are contacted and when they receive their payment. He could then report that interval back to the House, which would hold IBCA to account on the delivery for these infected people, who have suffered for too long.

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31. 5 Jun 2025·Parliament·John Cooper

    Bank Closures and Banking Hubs

    At the risk of disappointing the hon. Member for Blyth and Ashington (Ian Lavery), I rise not entirely to criticise the banks, which have done tremendous work on apps and the like, and many people—not all of them spring chickens—make great use of them. But as banks retreat from bricks and mortar locations, a problem is that even silver surfers who are comfortable with the technology may simply not be able to get the relevant app to work. In rural Dumfries and Galloway, we have too many notspots, where the mobile phone signal is sketchy at best and non-existent at worst. Similarly, there is a lack of decent broadband. The ground truth is that while it might be easy-PC for some to get online, sclerotic broadband and thick stone walls designed to keep out the Scottish damp make too many computers and smartphones expensive placemats. The need for access to face-to-face banking services remains high, as we have heard. As we have also heard, there are numerous issues with the current banking hub regime. Take Wigtown in my constituency: it is Scotland’s official book town, yet the current banking hub criteria fail to capture the significance of that. Wigtown is evaluated on its modest resident population, with no account taken of the huge influx of visitors when its famous book festival opens its covers. I have a stream of reports of the town centre cash machine running out of spondulicks outwith the festival and anecdotal reports of people gathering for a trip to the nearest hub in Newton Stewart to lift their pensions. That hub is 12 miles distant, and notwithstanding our positively balmy climate in Dumfries and Galloway—no, really—it is not walkable. As for the public transport system, let us just say that we need a calendar and not a stopwatch to time the buses. When Dalbeattie, the third biggest town in my constituency with a population of more than 4,000 souls and a slew of thriving businesses, struggles to get a banking hub, surely there is a compelling case for lowering the threshold for hubs. I accept that we cannot have an ethos of “wherever two or three are gathered, there shall be a banking hub”, yet equally, we cannot expect one ATM to carry the banking needs of hundreds, if not thousands, of people. Banking has come on in leaps and bounds since the days of little pens chained to counters and limited opening hours, but on balance, too many people are being left behind in the technological revolution. American banker Felix Rohatyn, who rescued New York from financial disaster, said: “banking is not simply about profit, but about personal relationships.” Even in this digital age, we need to capture some of that spirit via our banking hubs.

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32. 5 Jun 2025·Parliament·John Cooper

    Afghan Relocations and Assistance Policy

    I thank my right hon. and gallant Friend for giving way on that point. Is this not a case of the old adage that rules are for the guidance of wise men and the obeyance of fools? Are we not seeing a punctilious following of rules here, when a man’s life is at risk?

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33. 5 Jun 2025·Parliament·Joe Robertson

    Football Governance Bill [ Lords ] (Third sitting)

    It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Mr Turner. Amendment 97 is objectively reasonable; the Government, in setting up the independent football regulator, should want to do so in compliance with any FIFA or UEFA rules, in order to secure our national teams’ places in international tournaments. There is a genuine risk that the football regulator may conflict with FIFA and UEFA rules, not least in the political appointment of its chair. I know that the Government do not think that it is political to appoint a chair who, in the current circumstances, donated to the Prime Minister’s leadership campaign, but FIFA may take a different view. If FIFA takes a different view and seeks to ban our national sides, the Government will not be able to do anything about it. This is the moment to enshrine in law that the regulator must comply with FIFA and UEFA rules. We can delve briefly into what we think FIFA might deem political. In 2016, FIFA fined domestic teams, including England, for wearing an armband with an Armistice Day poppy because, in FIFA’s view, the poppy is a political symbol. I think that is madness, and pretty much everyone in this country thinks it is madness, but that was FIFA’s view, and it levied a fine. I think that, after negotiation, FIFA has since changed its mind—but if that was its view of the poppy and all sorts of symbols that most ordinary people would not think of as political, I am concerned about what it will think about a football regulator that has a chair appointed by Government, who in this instance also donated to the leadership campaign of the Prime Minister of the day, and who may then exercise a decision over ownership of a particular club in this country. I suspect FIFA may think that is political and conflicts with the ability of England and other home nations to compete in international events. The Government can deal with that very simply.

    Hansard source
34. 5 Jun 2025·Parliament·Joe Robertson

    Football Governance Bill [ Lords ] (Third sitting)

    No. The football regulator is not set up—unless the Government view otherwise—to decide what symbols the England national team wear on their arms. It is set up for all sorts of things such as financial viability and ownership models of teams within the English leagues. My point is about how FIFA views political interference and political symbols. It is clearly very sensitive to them and has a very high bar. I am concerned that, if the football regulator breaches that bar, England will be restricted from entering international tournaments. The Government will not be able to do anything about it at that point, but they can deal with it now by mandating the football regulator to comply with FIFA and UEFA rules. The football regulator will not be responsible for symbols on football shirts.

    Hansard source
35. 5 Jun 2025·Parliament·Joe Robertson

    Football Governance Bill [ Lords ] (Third sitting)

    The hon. Lady and I can debate all day what we think is political and our recollection of what FIFA has ruled or not ruled in the past. However, that is not relevant, because she and I will have no decision-making authority over the football regulator once the Bill is passed. It would be much better that we build into the system a requirement for the regulator to comply with FIFA and UEFA rules, whatever they may be, to secure the future of our domestic football teams in international tournaments.

    Hansard source
36. 5 Jun 2025·Parliament·Joe Robertson

    Football Governance Bill [ Lords ] (Third sitting)

    No, I do not accept that. All the amendment does is to seek the compliance of the football regulator, which this Government are trying to set up, with the major international governing bodies—FIFA and UEFA. Any arguments about political interference and political symbols and how decisions on them are made will be a matter for FIFA, UEFA, the FA and the regulator, but we should want to ensure that the regulator is required not to do anything that conflicts with the rules of FIFA and UEFA.

    Hansard source
37. 5 Jun 2025·Parliament·Joe Robertson

    Football Governance Bill [ Lords ] (Third sitting)

    I, and I suspect a lot of fans, would not be comfortable if there was a negotiation between FIFA and the Government—by the way, the current Secretary of State received money from the current preferred candidate—about the viability of the England national team playing in an international tournament, when what they were negotiating about was the suitability or decision making of a political donor to that Government. That is not healthy. It does not satisfy me. I would much prefer that there was a provision in the Bill that clearly stated that the football regulator—that is more than just the chair; it is the entire body—must not do anything that “conflicts with any regulations or rules of international football governing bodies”. By the way, this is about far more than just politics; I use the political issue as an example, but there are many other ways in which the regulator could conflict with FIFA and UEFA. I am sure that nobody here intends that it does, so let us build that into the Bill.

    Hansard source
38. 5 Jun 2025·Parliament·Joe Robertson

    Football Governance Bill [ Lords ] (Third sitting)

    I agree with the shadow Minister. I suppose there is a not-too-fanciful theoretical situation in which the football regulator makes a decision on the ownership of a club that has otherwise qualified for the Champions League, and that decision was made by a body headed up by someone who had donated to the Prime Minister of the country. I think that that would be a problem. However, if clause 7 were amended, he would have to recuse himself, or the body would have to deal with it in a different way. My hon. Friend demonstrates perhaps the most likely scenario and the most powerful justification for backing the amendment. I urge all Members to do so.

    Hansard source
39. 5 Jun 2025·Parliament·Joe Robertson

    Football Governance Bill [ Lords ] (Third sitting)

    I thank the Minister for seeking to provide clarification. Can she clarify what would happen in the scenario posed by the hon. Member for Cheltenham? If a club such as Manchester City were to negotiate a TV rights deal abroad, and it was a very good deal, should the football regulator have any role in seeking to redistribute that money in any circumstances?

    Hansard source
40. 5 Jun 2025·Parliament·Joe Robertson

    Football Governance Bill [ Lords ] (Third sitting)

    Once again, I am going to refuse the temptation to make a political point about back-of-a-fag-packet calculations by the Liberal Democrats. This amendment does not provide a get-out for clubs to blame the regulator for putting their ticket prices up. They could do that anyway. Clubs can, if they want, try to blame the regulator, regardless of whether the regulator has a power or a compulsion to assess its own impact on ticket prices. What the amendment seeks to do is just add a layer of transparency. Of course, it is up to the regulator to make its own assessment of its impact on ticket prices, and it may be that its assessment is that it has had a negligible effect. However, it seems entirely reasonable, in the interests of transparency, to compel the regulator to nevertheless make this assessment. At the end of the day, we should all be here in the interests of one group of people only—the fans—and it would be a great shame, indeed worse than that, if the regulator were to increase the cost of match tickets, which are already very high.

    Hansard source