Sir Andrew Mitchell
MP for Sutton Coldfield · Conservative · United Kingdom
“In the discussions that the Foreign Secretary is holding with European countries, is he also emphasising the vital role that soft power and the international development budget play in promoting security?”
House of Commons27 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“If left unaddressed, this new legal principle could make it far harder for victims of police misconduct to obtain justice, even where the harm that they have suffered is severe and life-changing. The doctrine has been described as a form of police misconduct immunity.”
House of Commons13 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The victim of the abuse had given her confidential refuge address to the Sussex police, and that address was later disclosed in court, exposing her location to the abuser and forcing her to flee. The Court of Appeal answered the question by extending what is known as core immunity.”
House of Commons13 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“At the time, I was the Secretary of State for International Development and was engaged in the Government’s response to the kidnapping through COBRA, but we now know that Ali Kololo was innocent. A Kenyan court has since overturned his conviction, with the evidence showing that he had become a scapegoat in a deeply flawed investigation.”
House of Commons13 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I want to draw the House’s attention to new clause 22, which I have tabled with the hon. Member for Birmingham Yardley (Jess Phillips), my parliamentary neighbour, whose absence from the Government Front Bench is a matter of regret to all of us on the Conservative Benches.”
House of Commons13 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The Court’s ruling therefore raises serious concerns about whether victims will be able to seek redress when police misconduct, negligence, human rights breaches or serious errors occur. That is why the case of XGY matters far beyond the individual victim involved.”
House of Commons13 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
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“I thank the Foreign Secretary for her statement, but she will know that, in plain sight of the international community, a slaughter of immense proportions is taking place in El Fasher. There have been clear and present warnings and evidence that this is ethnic cleansing, far worse than anything that took place in Srebrenica, and as the Foreign Secretary made clear in her statement, it is spreading outwards. This is a specific UK responsibility at the United Nations. Does she agree that it is essential that she and the Prime Minister hit the phones, speak to those at the African Union and in senior UN countries, and use our position to lobby President Trump to act? On solemn occasions each year, we piously intone—including in this place—“never again”.”
House of Commons18 November 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“We need to harness the private and public sector together to maximise that funding. These two points seem to me to be two of the five key points that we are discussing in this debate.”
House of Commons17 November 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The “Movers and Shakers” podcast has made a huge difference to so many people, and I am extremely grateful to Sir Nicholas for agreeing to come to Royal Sutton Coldfield next April. There are just two key points that I want to emphasise today. The first is that we need more specialists and better access to specialists. We do not have enough neurologists in this country. People are supposed to have to wait for only 18 weeks to see a neurologist, but there is clear evidence of people waiting for between one and two years to see one, and of course most of those people will not have any medication in that period. There are 720 neurologists in the UK. There are 4,400 neurologists in Poland, which has half the UK’s population. The second point is that we need more support for research. Inevitably, that is about funding.”
House of Commons17 November 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Thank you for calling me, Ms Lewell, and many congratulations to the hon. Member for Colne Valley (Paul Davies) on securing the debate. As many Members have already said, a huge number of families have acquaintance with Parkinson’s. My old dad, who served in this House until 1997, lived with Parkinson’s and I am hugely honoured to be the patron of the Royal Sutton Coldfield and North Birmingham Parkinson’s Group, which does so much good and hard work in the royal town and elsewhere. I pay special credit to Movers and Shakers, which is led by people living with Parkinson’s. Some of them are in the Public Gallery today. Movers and Shakers was started by Rory Cellan-Jones and Sir Nicholas Mostyn.”
House of Commons17 November 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Does the Minister have any understanding at all of the impact of this incontinent briefing and leaking—the contradictory rumours about pensions, inheritance tax and housing—which is enraging so many of my constituents in the royal town of Sutton Coldfield? Does he not agree that normally an omnishambles happens once the Budget speech has been delivered, not while it is still being crafted?”
House of Commons17 November 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“May I tell the right hon. Gentleman that even the west midlands victims’ advocate, Natalie Queiroz, is herself living in fear due to the Government’s new release guidelines on open prisons? In 2016 she was stabbed in my constituency 24 times by her ex-partner. She was eight months pregnant. Her attacker was jailed for 18 years but is now moving to an open prison four years earlier than expected. Natalie is terrified of coming face to face with him. Will the right hon. Gentleman explain why those convicted of domestic abuse who cannot apply for early parole under the SDS40—standard determinate sentences—process are not also excluded from the Government’s dangerous policy of moving offenders to open prisons?”
House of Commons11 November 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“What is more, Tax Justice Network’s report, “The State of Tax Justice 2024”, shows that countries are losing nearly £375 billion to multinational corporations and wealthy individuals using tax havens to underpay tax, with over £1 trillion in profits being shifted into tax havens. Those are significant figures; they show why Parliament was absolutely right to vote for and implement the Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Act 2018. They show why today we need to hear the Minister say that his patience is running out, and that he will issue the Order in Council if the overseas territories do not accept the will of the British Parliament.”
House of Commons5 November 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Member spoke about Transparency International UK’s revelation that at least £5.9 billion-worth of suspicious funds have been used to purchase UK properties—an astonishing figure. Secondly, the Office of Financial Sanctions Implementation found that, since February 2022, over a quarter of all suspected sanctions breaches were made intermediary jurisdictions including the BVI and Guernsey. Finally, Transparency International UK’s research has linked to our overseas territories £250 billion-worth of funds diverted by rigged procurement, bribery and embezzlement in 79 countries, of which the British Virgin Islands accounted for 92%.”
House of Commons5 November 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I have recently seen senior representatives from Bermuda and the Cayman Islands who, in my judgment, were truculent and disrespectful of the will of the Westminster Parliament. As the hon. Member for Bolton West rightly said, the BVI is one of the key countries that needs to accept that, if these overseas territories and Crown dependencies want to use the British flag and to have our monarch and our laws, they must also accept our values. Although the hon. Member has admirably summed up the first of them, I will end my remarks by quoting three points in this excellent brief from the APPG, which I hope will be widely distributed. Backed by Transparency International, Tax Justice Network and others, the report deals with the impact of financial secrecy in the overseas territories on UK communities. The hon.”
House of Commons5 November 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Friend the Member for Goole and Pocklington (David Davis) and Baroness Hodge. It has still not been done. That is where we are now. I echo the questions that the hon. Member for Bolton West asked the Minister. It is very important that we get a definitive approach from the Government to implementing that measure. The Minister is a good bloke. He and I have been discussing development matters for nearly 20 years, so I know exactly what his view is. I hope very much that he will stiffen up the relevant Foreign Office officials, who like to ensure good and harmonious relations, and who do not like a row. He must remind them that officials advise and Ministers decide. Ministers are the servants of Parliament, and Parliament decided as long as seven years ago why these matters must be brought to a head.”
House of Commons5 November 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The opinion made it absolutely clear that the Westminster Parliament had the right, indeed the duty, to impose an Order in Council if the will of Parliament was not accepted in the overseas territories. It so happens that the Foreign Office, with the skill and dexterity for which it is famous, interpreted that measure as meaning not that an Order in Council would be imposed after a year, but that it would be drafted after a year for imposition after another year—thus giving the overseas territories an extra year. That was condemned in the House of Commons by two former International Development Secretaries—myself and the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, the right hon. Member for Leeds South (Hilary Benn)—and by two distinguished former Chairmen of the Public Accounts Committee, my right hon.”
House of Commons5 November 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“We should remember not only Britain’s leadership, but the fact that we have a dog in this fight. I also want to emphasise how we got here. The hon. Member for Bolton West rightly said that the Government gave way because otherwise they would have been defeated—an embarrassing moment for me, as a former Government Chief Whip, to have led that rebellion with Baroness Hodge. With the Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Act we made it absolutely clear that, if the overseas territories did not accept the will of Parliament, it would be imposed through the ancient and arcane process of an Order in Council. Baroness Hodge and I took a legal opinion from some of the best lawyers in the country, including one of the most brilliant former Directors of Public Prosecutions, Lord Ken Macdonald.”
House of Commons5 November 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“They may come after the overseas territories in the Government’s enforcement action but, like the overseas territories, they are on the frontline of this issue. As the hon. Gentleman said, we are not talking about all the overseas territories. Many of them have implemented, or are implementing, registers in good faith; it is just a pity that some of them have not. It is also worth saying that the UK has big questions to answer. From what the National Crime Agency said some years ago, we know that up to 40% of money laundering goes through London, the overseas territories and the Crown dependencies. That is one of the reasons why David Cameron made tackling corruption an important aspect of the G8 in 2016. Britain can be proud of leading that attack on dirty money.”
House of Commons5 November 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Closed registers enabled law enforcement authorities to dip into the details and, in the case of terrorism, get a response within 24 hours, but the publication of the Paradise and Panama papers showed definitively why we must have open registers of beneficial ownership. Without open registers, we cannot join the dots of who is doing what to whom. That is a very important point. The scales fell from our eyes when the Paradise and Panama papers were published—all praise to the BBC and The Guardian for doing so—as they showed precisely why open registers are absolutely essential. That is at the heart of this debate. Let us be in no doubt, either, that we are talking about the Crown dependencies as well.”
House of Commons5 November 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“We are talking about dirty money—money stolen from Africa and from Africans, money from the sex trade and money from the drug trade. Although Africa is my principal concern, because I believe that development is being held up by the enormous amount of money that is stolen from that continent, the hon. Member for Bolton West also made an extremely important point about tax. After all, in a few days’ time, the Chancellor will be looking for as much tax revenue as she can get. If she follows the hon. Gentleman’s advice, there is no doubt that billions would flow into the Exchequer, for the reasons that he set out. For many years, we believed that closed registers were doing what was required.”
House of Commons5 November 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“As vice-chairman of the all-party parliamentary group, I want to express my appreciation to the chairman, the hon. Member for Bolton West (Phil Brickell), for the brilliant way he has led the debate. He underlined that there must be an all-party approach, which he expressed with great eloquence and factual back-up. He made the point that we all have a constituency interest in this issue. We certainly recognise that in the royal town of Sutton Coldfield. I also thank his predecessor as chair, the hon. Member for Kensington and Bayswater (Joe Powell), who I note the Government have now neutered by putting on the payroll. As a former Government Chief Whip, I know exactly how these things work, and it is a recognition of his great abilities that he has now been put on the non-ministerial payroll. I want to emphasise why this issue matters.”
House of Commons5 November 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Although the hon. Gentleman may have been in a cartoon, Baroness Hodge and I were the subject of a demonstration in one of the overseas territories, with placards saying, “Let’s hang Mitchell and Hodge”.”
House of Commons5 November 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“On the point made by the hon. Member for Bournemouth East (Tom Hayes) about an Order in Council, will the hon. Gentleman confirm that his understanding is the same as mine, namely that an Order in Council is not a discretionary matter for the Government, and that it is there in the legislation that he just referred to? Parliament insists that if these territories do not comply and provide open registers, an Order in Council should be issued.”
House of Commons5 November 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“That is the nature of the constitutional arrangement, and the very clear legal opinion that Baroness Hodge and I secured underlines the point.”
House of Commons5 November 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Of course, the Minister is right about transparency—sunlight is the best disinfectant—but may I just pin him down on one point? He is heavy on collaboration and trying to get agreement, and he is right about that, but let us be absolutely clear that the constitutional relationship with the overseas territories and Crown dependencies is that Britain and Parliament are responsible for security issues and foreign affairs. These are security issues, and they relate directly to foreign matters. If the overseas territories do not agree to accept the will of Parliament, the Minister must make it clear to them that the Westminster Government will act via an Order in Council. That is not a voluntary thing; it is our duty.”
House of Commons5 November 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“We need to demand access for an African Union-UN delegation to El Fasher, so that they can meet the leaders of the RSF, and we need to prepare international sanctions to be visited on all its leaders.”
House of Commons5 November 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Thank you, Mr Speaker, for granting this urgent question, and underlining the importance of this matter by allowing further discussion on Sudan in the House. The Minister is doing a very good job, but the whole House needs top-level, prime ministerial involvement in this matter, just as Sir Tony Blair and my noble Friend Lord Cameron were involved when they were Prime Minister. We are witnessing wholesale slaughter. Today is not about money and humanitarian aid, but about impunity. These murderous thugs are bragging online about their part in the ethnic cleansing that is taking place. We need to keep very strong records, so that we can hold to account as many of these people as we can, and we need more action at the UN, where Britain holds the pen.”
House of Commons5 November 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The news overnight from El Fasher in Darfur is truly dreadful, with evidence of summary executions and undoubted ethnic cleansing. Given the pivotal role that Britain plays, as set out by the former Minister for Development, the right hon. Member for Oxford East (Anneliese Dodds), will the Foreign Secretary urgently review everything that we are doing, in order to prevent El Fasher from becoming another Srebrenica?”
House of Commons28 October 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I commend the Secretary of State for the tone and the clarity of her response to the urgent question. I echo what she said about the police making the decision in good faith, but it is, as she has said, the wrong decision. Can I also echo what she has said about this not being the sort of country to make such a decision? It is not the sort of city Birmingham is either. There are outstandingly good community relations there, largely because of the excellent work done by the faith communities across the city.”
House of Commons20 October 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“My right hon. Friend is doing a very good job of forensically demolishing the Government’s case, such as it is. May I just correct what the Minister has said from the Dispatch Box? There is a very great difference between carrying on and discussing negotiations, and doing a deal. As I was the Deputy Foreign Secretary under both my right hon. Friend the Member for Braintree (Sir James Cleverly) and my noble Friend Lord Cameron, I can tell the House that the then Government would never, ever have done this deal. Secondly, I do hope my right hon. Friend will probe the Minister further on where this extraordinary amount of money is coming from. Is it the defence budget or is it the development budget? Since the Labour party—a Labour Government—has slashed development spending from—”
House of Commons20 October 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“May I congratulate the hon. Lady on her new role, and, perhaps, strike a more slightly consensual note? In Sutton Coldfield we welcome this initiative. It is good that it builds on the towns fund set up by the last Government, and we in the royal town are very pleased to be part of it. I can tell the hon. Lady that we are undertaking extensive community consultation, led by Royal Sutton Coldfield Town Council and its leader, Simon Ward, and that our local board, under the chairmanship of Doug Wright MBE, is forging ahead and already making considerable progress. May I invite her—as I invited her predecessor—to pay a state visit to the royal town of Sutton Coldfield, where she can see how we will use this money to the best possible advantage?”
House of Commons15 October 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Was not yesterday an historic and much-longed-for day for which this Government and the last one worked tirelessly since the dreadful events of 7 October? Does the Prime Minister agree that, just as real progress at Oslo was made on the back of the intifada, so now we must use the exceptional connections and deep historical knowledge that Britain has throughout the region to help secure a definitive resolution for the middle east to problems that have disfigured the world and poisoned the well of international progress and opinion for so many generations?”
House of Commons14 October 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Do not the events of yesterday underline the critical need to secure a ceasefire and, above all, to move into a political process? Will the Minister—we are all pleased to see him continuing in his role following the reshuffle—commit to building on the important work done by Egypt, Turkey, Qatar and Saudi Arabia to effect that peace process? All of them have underlined the fact that there is no place for Hamas in Gaza or anywhere else in government following the events that have taken place.”
House of Commons10 September 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“May I ask two questions to the Minister and support what was said by the Chair of the Business and Trade Committee, the right hon. Member for Birmingham Hodge Hill and Solihull North (Liam Byrne)? First, can we have an absolute assurance that we will have full help from all the relevant agencies of the state, and that they are seriously and 100% engaged in all this? Secondly, will the Minister press for maximum transparency, so that the staff who are being sent home in very large numbers, and who are naturally very anxious and worried about this issue, can be reassured to the greatest extent possible?”
House of Commons9 September 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I thank the hon. Member for Widnes and Halewood (Derek Twigg) for seeking and securing this urgent question. It is good to see the Minister in his place, with his perennially cheerful, Tiggerish demeanour, following the reshuffle. In the royal town of Sutton Coldfield, we are extremely concerned about this incident. The Minister mentioned WHS Plastics, which is based in Minworth in my constituency. I spoke to the chief executive yesterday in some detail; he has 2,000 employees and eight plants, and the vast majority of his business goes to Jaguar Land Rover. The Minister will know that throughout the west midlands, there are probably more than 200,000 people in the supply chain who are directly affected, and I understand that all the factories globally have been shut down.”
House of Commons9 September 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“My right hon. Friend the Member for Goole and Pocklington (David Davis) did the House a service today in raising this important matter, but there are wider issues associated with the extradition treaty with America. The House will recall that the treaty was set up when Sir Tony Blair was Prime Minister to address terrorism, but in recent years, it has controversially been used for a much wider remit; from time to time, it has looked as though commercial and national advantage was sought from it. That suggests that the time may be right to review it. Will the Minister look at the matter carefully, and consider whether now is the time to do that?”
House of Commons8 September 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The NHS 10-year plan identifies antimicrobial resistance as “a critical threat requiring urgent action.” AMR kills 35,000 people in the UK every year and 5 million globally and rising. Why on earth are the Government covertly axing the Fleming Fund without telling Parliament? Will the Secretary of State publish an impact assessment of the effect of the Fleming Fund’s closure on our domestic health security?”
House of Commons22 July 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“My constituents—and, I have no doubt, those of the hon. Member for Birmingham Perry Barr—are counting the days until next May comes and we can get rid of this dreadful council.”
House of Commons22 July 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I commend my parliamentary neighbour, the hon. Member for Birmingham Perry Barr (Ayoub Khan), for bringing this urgent question to the House before it rises. I also pay tribute to Max Caller, whose retirement has been announced in the last few hours; he has dispatched his Herculean task with considerable distinction. The Minister will be aware that Labour is now imposing the contract, which the Conservative Opposition leader, Councillor Bobby Alden, urged the Labour leadership to do a year ago. Does he understand that my constituents in the royal town of Sutton Coldfield, who come under Birmingham for local government purposes, have had their patience tried beyond endurance by this bankrupt Labour council? Is he aware that recent polling suggests that only 5% of Birmingham residents are likely to vote Labour next May?”
House of Commons22 July 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“How are the Government supporting the local emergency response rooms? Secondly, can she confirm that the prevention of atrocities remains a key pillar of British policy and is unaffected by the recent cuts in the development budget? Thirdly, and finally, what are the Government doing to advance international efforts to protect civilians alongside their pursuit of a ceasefire? Are we to assume the Jeddah process is dead? What discussions has she had with her counterparts in the United States over recent weeks?”
House of Commons16 July 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“As fighting expands, the Kordofan states are the next deadly front. In the recent and welcome ministerial conference hosted by the Foreign Secretary, much-needed money was raised, but the goal of a high-level contact group to drive political efforts towards achieving a ceasefire and protecting Sudanese civilians met with an impasse. We must accept that despite our efforts the past two years have been a story of faltering international endeavour where world events have cast Sudan into the shadows as its people have faced only deepening peril. I ask the Minister three questions. First, what lessons have the Government learned from the siege of El Fasher and the overwhelming of the camp for displaced people at Zamzam to prepare for and protect civilians from the spread of violence across the Kordofan states?”
House of Commons16 July 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Thank you very much, Mr Speaker, for granting this urgent question today. I make no apologies for raising the dire and desperate straits of the Sudanese people again in this House, not least because Britain leads on the Sudanese situation at the United Nations on behalf of all other nations. As the Minister said, the people of Sudan are in the throes of the worst humanitarian catastrophe in the world and the situation is worsening, even if such things can hardly be imagined. Earlier this month, the United Nations and international organisations reported the mass displacement of tens of thousands of people following the combatant forces advancing across the Kordofan states. There have been months of increased mobilisation of fighters, including the recruitment of children from across Darfur.”
House of Commons16 July 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I hugely praise the rebellion last week by Labour Back Benchers. They have hopefully taught the Executive a most useful lesson: listen to Back Benchers with respect and close attention. As a former Chief Whip, however, I deprecate rebellions unless I am involved in them. It usually takes years for the Executive to get into the habit of treating their Back Benchers with contempt and derision as unelected Downing Street special advisers strut up and down Whitehall, but this lot—this Government —managed to accomplish it extraordinarily quickly. They have learned the hard way not to treat their Back Benchers and elected Members with so little respect.”
House of Commons15 July 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The first is that we cannot take away from poor people benefits that they are already receiving. I think I am right in saying that no Conservative Government have ever reduced disability benefits in payment. But Labour did not absorb that vital lesson, which is why they got into so much trouble last week. The second rule is that if a Government want to reduce the benefits bill, there are only really two ways of doing it. The first is to freeze the level of benefits; that has been done in the past, and it means not falling into the trap that the Government fell into last week. The second is to narrow the gateway into those benefits for future recipients. I urge the Government to absorb these important rules, because they will have to return to the issue of welfare expenditure if they are to make any progress at all on the economy.”
House of Commons15 July 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It is important to remember that as the former Chancellor my right hon. Friend the Member for Godalming and Ash (Sir Jeremy Hunt) set out clearly, had we been successful in winning the last election, we would have reduced the number of working-age welfare recipients to pre-covid levels, thus saving £49 billion by the end of this Parliament. The reason I focus on this welfare issue is that it is welfare expenditure with which this Government must get to grips, and they have failed to learn the lessons of the past. I was a very junior welfare Minister in what was then the Department of Social Security between 1995 and 1997. I learned two very important rules, which this Government would do well to consider. On both, it is clear that welfare reform is extremely difficult.”
House of Commons15 July 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I can make a very short speech today, Madam Deputy Speaker, because my right hon. Friend, the shadow Chancellor, in his brilliant speech at the beginning of this debate, set things out so clearly. There are common themes running through both Opposition debates today. The first is that the Government have lost control of expenditure and the second one, which I want to develop very briefly, is that the Executive have failed to listen with appropriate care to what people in this House have said. On the first of these points, my right hon. Friend the Member for Salisbury (John Glen) said in an eloquent intervention just a few minutes ago that the Government need to work out how to fix last week’s fiasco with the welfare Bill. Far from saving money, this is virtually now another spending measure.”
House of Commons15 July 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“We said in our election manifesto that we would restore development spending to 0.7%, and in the same way that we showed the Government Front Benchers that they could not proceed as they planned with welfare, they cannot proceed as they plan to with development spending.” I urge Labour Back Benchers to ensure that this rethink takes place in the autumn, when the folly of what has happened will be even clearer.”
House of Commons15 July 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The hon. Gentleman brings me elegantly to my final point. Having praised Labour Back Benchers and encouraged them to speak out, my one ask is that they now stand up for the election pledge, clearly set out in their manifesto, to restore development spending to 0.7%. I ask them to show the same zeal and enthusiasm as they did on welfare for bringing back the 0.7%. Inexplicably and astonishingly, their Prime Minister has cut the figure from the 0.5% they, alas, inherited from us down to 0.3%, and it is already causing massive difficulties, of which the hon. Member, with his background in Oxfam, will be fully aware. When the House comes back in September, I urge the hon. Member, particularly given his experience, to join other Back Benchers in saying to the Executive, “We will not put up with this.”
House of Commons15 July 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“This Minister well knows that, across the House, many colleagues for years now have raised deep concerns about what happened. I raised it myself on 10 June 2020, 5 October 2020, 27 April 2021 and 15 December 2021. Many colleagues years and years ago were citing the monstrous injustice and grotesque breach of human rights and civil liberties of our fellow citizens, but it took the ITV drama of 1 January 2024 for the earth to move. That rather begs the question: what is the point of Parliament and its elected representatives? Is it not about time that the institutions of the state got out the handcuffs and held the tax-funded villains who perpetrated this monstrous injustice to full and total account?”
House of Commons8 July 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I have to say that I think the Minister is right in making the judgment about whether to proscribe the IRGC. I support the comment made by the Chair of the Select Committee, the right hon. Member for Islington South and Finsbury (Emily Thornberry). The theocratic regime in Iran has never been weaker domestically, internationally or among its regional neighbours, so there is now a real premium on working with our European and regional allies to explore all avenues of progress through more reasonable elements within Iran.”
House of Commons7 July 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I thank the Foreign Secretary for his statement today. Although we clearly have differences with the Netanyahu regime, Israel is a close ally and friend of the United Kingdom. Iran is a terrorist-supporting state—Hezbollah, Hamas, the Houthis, Assad—that is destabilising the region, rejecting the IAEA and international proposals to prevent nuclear proliferation and limit uranium enrichment, and sponsoring terrorist actions on the streets of Britain. Does the Foreign Secretary not feel that Israel is now doing the world’s dirty work on behalf of us all?”
House of Commons16 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Will the Minister ensure that Britain properly replenishes Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, a brilliant programme that has benefited so much from British leadership as well as taxpayers’ money? When making his decision on how big that replenishment should be, will he remember that the polling shows that 83% of our constituents think this is a brilliant use of taxpayers’ money and that we should support it?”
House of Commons13 May 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Does she accept that she and her European counterparts must lift their ambition and move towards a modern-day equivalent of a Marshall plan if we are to solve this long-term and increasingly serious issue?”
House of Commons12 May 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Surely the most immediate challenge is illegal migration across the channel, which is enraging our constituents, but the Home Secretary’s Government have kicked away the tough deterrent measures that they inherited from the previous Government. There are three critical measures that she should take: the first is to work incredibly closely with all our European partners; the second is to look hard at international conventions, particularly the 1951 Geneva convention; and the third—and in many ways the most important—is to work on the upstream problems at source. Increasingly, people are migrating in large numbers from the Sahel in north Africa, fleeing violence, starvation and extreme poverty.”
House of Commons12 May 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The Minister has rightly underlined the fact that we face an incredibly dangerous moment, but that Britain has a uniquely deep, historical and influential relationship with both these great countries, which we must now deploy with great energy and skill. Does he agree that the Government of Pakistan must take more action against the terrorist organisations that operate from their soil? Does he also understand the outrage that Indian people, including the diaspora in Royal Sutton Coldfield, feel at these dreadful events?”
House of Commons7 May 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗