Dr Andrew Murrison
MP for South West Wiltshire · Conservative · United Kingdom
“It is good to hear that the Government plan to replenish the dwindling stocks of Patriot missiles in Ukraine, which I suspect it will need this winter. However, Patriot is low volume and high cost. What the Ukrainians need is high volume and low cost.”
“Currently, the Royal Navy has an offshore patrol vessel permanently stationed in the Falkland Islands, but given the threat that is being faced and our need to demonstrate resolve—the sort of thing that, sadly, we did not demonstrate in the early 1980s, which led to miscalculation—will the Minister consider speaking to her MOD colleagues…”
“Since the Foreign Secretary is not going to get the co-operation, fulsome or otherwise, of the Israeli state in differentiating goods and services made in the settlements from those that are assembled, repackaged, produced and grown in Israel itself, how is he going to distinguish the one from the other?”
“The Government insisted on applying the social time preference rate to the disastrous Chagos deal to make an appalling deal look slightly better.”
“Will the First Secretary of State’s exercise in delivering democracy and local accountability and empowering local people include a look at large organisations that cannot be described as governmental or as quangos but that nevertheless exist firmly within the public domain, are established by statute, serve the public and are big employe…”
“I congratulate the Government on the hiring of Alistair Burt—he is a good hire and will do great things for some of these most complex of cases—but does the Minister agree that many of these cases are extremely difficult and exceptionally traumatic, and that it is far better to prevent them happening in the first place?”
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“The arrangements that my right hon. Friend has described are potentially good news for businesses and consumers in Northern Ireland and a great opportunity, but may I press him on what he describes as very minimal checks? Does he mean the 4% of imports that are currently checked coming into the United Kingdom and the 1% that are physically checked? Does he mean more or less than that? Clearly, the European Union thinks that substantial checks will be required, presumably exceeding those levels, because it is setting up a bureaucracy in Belfast to cope with it.”
“Quarantine at ports of entry is a useful public health tool for preventing diseases spreading from high-prevalence to low-prevalence populations. Sadly, the UK now has a relatively high prevalence of covid-19, especially in London. In the light of page 29 on international travel in the plan published yesterday, will the Secretary of State publish the evidence base for quarantining people travelling here, especially from relatively low-prevalence countries, which is to say most of the rest of the world?”
“We should not let our politics get in the way of making sure that we address the pandemic in different parts of the country in ways that are suited to where we are with the virus in those settings. I ask the Minister to focus very heavily on what is going on in care settings right now. That is actually where the action is, in terms of this dreadful virus. That is where the Government need to be focusing all their attention right now, to make sure that we drive down R at a granular level in those settings, and in so doing deal with R across our United Kingdom.”
“It is interesting, important and always beguiling, of course, to focus on a number that we can dish up on a daily basis, but it can confuse the picture. The Robert Koch Institute in Germany has been clear about this: it is a useful index but it is only one of several. I am more interested in the number of new cases a day. That particular figure has been declining but not as fast as modelling has predicted. We must expend all our energy on driving that down and make sure that we do not expend all our energy on chasing R, because I suspect that R varies greatly among communities and regions of this country, and settings in particular. It is very important to understand, as others have pointed out, that it may vary greatly among the nations of this United Kingdom.”
“I know that this has all been done at a rush and that the options open to Ministers are very limited, but we need to be careful about choosing trusted partners with a track record of service in the public sector and make sure that we do not put up with second best. Let me ask the Minister about the scientific basis for quarantine. It is traditional to quarantine people who are coming from high-risk countries, not those coming to high-risk countries, and we need to be selective about who we quarantine. Otherwise, it will simply completely close down our aviation industry—it will kill business stone dead—and I am afraid that it is going to hamper our economic recovery. I am also very cautious about the R value.”
“While I hope very much that Nightingale will not be used during this particular pandemic, we need to ensure that what we have learnt through the process on this and many, many facets of the response are not forgotten or shelved, but are there ready to be used in the future, because I fear we are going to have to come back to this again, and maybe again. It is all part of resilience and recognising that the No. 1 threat to this country is not Russia or terrorism—it is pandemic. We need to be alive to that and to prepare for it. I very much welcome the appointment of Baroness Harding to be our tsar for test, track and trace. I sound a cautionary note, though: many of us who are potential NHS returnees have not been impressed by outsourcing.”
“May I start by welcoming very much the powerful speech from my right hon. Friend the Minister, the statement from the Prime Minister earlier and the plan published today, which I most certainly support? I want to highlight the Nightingale hospitals. The construction and operation of them has been extraordinary —far better and far more impressive than anything we saw in Wuhan—and we need to be extremely proud of what we have achieved in respect of that part of our response. They may not have been used greatly, but as is pointed out in page 46 of the plan, we may very well have to come back here again, because this will not be the last pandemic and we need to be preparing for the next one.”
“I very much welcome the Minister’s comments about Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance. The Government’s leadership in this matter is extremely timely. Will the Minister say what part the Foreign Office played in Exercise Cygnus in 2016, and what exercises the FCO has subsequently run to test the UK’s ability to repatriate British nationals in the event of a crisis of the sort we are now living though?”
“I very much welcome the statement, particularly the news about the bounce-back loans, which will be very helpful for small businesses in my constituency. Selling milk and meat into the non-domestic market has largely stopped, as have farm diversification schemes that were necessary to cross-subsidise land-based businesses. What more can the Chancellor do, beyond that which he has announced today, to assist agricultural businesses—land-based businesses—across the country?”
“May we please have further clarity on how builders, plumbers, electricians and plasterers should be conducting themselves at work or, indeed, whether they should be at work at all? There seems to be some confusion as to whether they should be on site or in premises. A leading builders merchant contacted me this morning to say that it had to shut up shop because it feared that the collection of the builders outside its premises were failing to socially isolate, and it was concerned about what that would mean. It seems that there has been some confusion over the past 24 hours, so I wonder whether the Minister can clarify the advice for those crucial people.”
“I am very reassured to hear that by the end of the week care settings will all get PPE, which is not what the leader of my council was being told recently. I accept the Secretary of State’s reassurance: it is really good news. Can he further reassure me that the PPE, when it arrives, will be to the right specification, in particular FFP3 respirator masks and not simply paper masks, which are next to useless?”
“I commend the Health Secretary on everything that he and his team are doing. To ensure that returning healthcare professionals can do so at the right time, when the disease peaks around Easter, we have to move at pace to put the indemnity that he has cited in place, to ensure that people are physically and mentally fit to do this work and, crucially, to ensure that they are skilled or reskilled to do what we are asking of them. Can he assure the House that those three things are being put in place?”
“However, if we are going to base policy on behavioural science—it being fairly inexact and difficult to predict, as we have seen over the weekend —we need to have that margin of error and caution, which I think he is recommending.”
“As always, I am listening with great attention to what the hon. Gentleman has to say. Does he agree that part of the problem is that policy has to be based on behavioural science, but behavioural science is one of the most imprecise of sciences? The difficulty is that it is not like chemistry or physics. It means that we need a wider margin of error when designing policy, and what that means, in effect, is erring on the side of caution and safety, which I think is the burden of the direction that he is urging on Ministers. In a sense, it is about getting ahead of the curve by bringing in measures that we would all regret.”
“Does my right hon. Friend share my dismay at my being told just now that masks and PPE that were meant to be delivered to my authority, Wiltshire, tomorrow, will now be delivered on 9 April? I am not sure what the situation is in Surrey, but that seems extraordinary. Does he also agree that it has to be the right PPE—it cannot simply be a paper face mask from B&Q, as we heard earlier? It needs to be appropriate, and people need to know how it works. When they wear it, they are likely to have to work harder, because wearing PPE is not easy or straightforward.”
“The Northern Ireland economy is much more heavily based around the public sector than those of other parts of the United Kingdom, and covid-19 may make the situation even more acute. What further fiscal measures can be taken, in anticipation of a post-coronavirus future, to ensure that we redress that balance and make the Northern Ireland economy far more self-sufficient?”
“Q15. I thank the Prime Minister and his team for the sure-footed way in which they are approaching this crisis. Given what is unfolding in northern Italy, and the very real prospect of our brilliant NHS staff being overwhelmed in a matter of weeks, what age and comorbidity criteria are being drafted that will govern access to intensive care and ventilators?”
“The Iranian Foreign Minister has been issuing plaintive appeals on social media for medical supplies to assist in his sanctions-hit country. Setting aside Javad Zarif’s accompanying rant against America, what does my right hon. Friend think can be done to assist the people of Iran at this difficult time, particularly around sanctions, the joint comprehensive plan of action and the International Military Services debt?”
“I have listened with great interest to the hon. Gentleman. As a veteran, I defer to no one in my admiration of our veterans, or my desire to ensure that their mental health is promoted. However, for credibility, it is only fair to point out that many other public servants are at least as badly affected by some of the traumas to which the hon. Gentleman referred. If he is trying to create a system in which we prioritise the management of particular groups, he needs also to consider the police service, for example, which today loses more frontline people than the armed forces. Otherwise, his case kind of falls apart. I wonder whether he agrees.”
“The Minister is of course right that service in the armed forces is positive, generally speaking, in terms of mental health, and veterans probably have better mental health than a non-serving cohort would. However, does he agree that that slightly misses the point, because if PTSD is service-attributable, then in accordance with the military covenant and “no disadvantage” we have an obligation to do what we can to resolve any problems that may have been caused as a result of service? I pointed that out in my report, “Fighting Fit”, about 10 years ago.”
“May I commend my right hon. Friend for the sure-footed way he has approached this, and the hon. Member for Leicester South (Jonathan Ashworth) for his balanced and measured response? The Health Secretary knows well that the problem with intensive treatment units and intensivism is not so much the kit, as the people. What is he doing to ensure that clinicians within the service who are in non-acute specialties are given the skills they need to deal with what may be coming?”
“Traditionally, public health was about infectious diseases and sanitation. More recently, it has become about lifestyle issues. Given the epidemics of the 21st century, particularly covid-19, what measures will the Secretary of State be taking, in allocating the public health grant, to refocus on infectious diseases, both current and those that are likely to come?”
“Does the Minister agree that those who are so quick to lay into Turkey would be well advised to visit the Syria-Turkey border, as I did recently, to see the work Turkey has been doing on the part of refugees? Is it the Government’s intention to continue with the facility for refugees in Turkey, the EU programme, or will they be funding refugees through another vehicle, perhaps the German housing initiative, which plans to provide temporary housing for Syrian refugees who want to return and whose return can be guaranteed to be safe and dignified?”
“The Government are absolutely right to be putting a lot of public money into research on a possible vaccine, but the Secretary of State will know that research is no good unless we can produce vaccine at scale, and this country is not great at doing that. What can he do to ensure that we grow indigenous capacity very quickly so that the public, and particularly key workers in our health service, do not have to wait in line when a vaccine becomes available?”
“Given the likely effect of covid-19 on populations that DFID works with, what plans exist to establish contingency funding to deal with mitigation for those populations and to shift funding to the development of a vaccine, which is a global equity?”
“In his opening remarks, the Opposition spokesman mentioned smoking cessation just once, yet we know that over half the excess mortality between social classes is directly attributable to smoking. Does the Minister agree that we will not make progress on this important subject unless we get real about this vile poison that has, unfortunately, picked off the poorest for decades and decades? It must stop.”
“I always listen with great respect to what the hon. Member has to say, but given that the SNP has its hands on many of the levers relating to the things she has discussed this afternoon, I am assuming from what she has said that Scotland is in the wonderful position of having narrowed health inequalities. Could she perhaps compare and contrast what has happened in Scotland with what has happened in the rest of the United Kingdom? I rather think that the two are very similar.”
“This judgment will potentially simply export carbon emissions to our competitors, together with UK jobs and prosperity, and it is particularly bad news for the south-west. What analysis has the Minister done to determine whether regional airports—particularly Bristol airport—can now take up some of the potential that airport expansion offers?”
“The hon. Member for Hampstead and Kilburn (Tulip Siddiq) is right to raise the plight of her constituent and other dual nationals wrongfully detained in Evin prison. Can the Minister say how the welcome €5 million pledged by the E3 will be spent and indicate whether the authorities in Tehran are prepared to accept it?”
“Mercifully, nobody in this country has yet died of coronavirus, but every year 600 people die of seasonal flu. In the phase to which my right hon. Friend refers, is he redoubling our efforts to ensure that the elderly and the vulnerable in particular are vaccinated against seasonal flu, therefore perhaps mitigating pressures on our national health service in the event that coronavirus becomes more of a problem here and makes demands particularly on intensive care beds?”
“May I congratulate my successor on his appointment? In my opinion, it is the best job in Government. Apropos his recent visit to Munich, did he discuss with our German partners their ambition to think to the future and to start to build homes to which refugees in Turkey, Lebanon and Jordan can safely and with dignity return? While it is understood that we should not in any way do anything that will support the murderous Assad regime, backed by Iran and Russia, will he assure the House that we are thinking about what will happen when the war-fighting phase stops, mercifully, and we can look forward to a future in which refugees can return home voluntarily and with dignity?”
“The Berlin conference attended by the Prime Minister on 19 January showed wide international support for a ceasefire, resumption of UN-led political talks and an end to external interference. International actors agreed to freeze military activity on the ground, not to send reinforcements and to respect the UN arms embargo. All parties must honour their Berlin commitments and demonstrate their support for the UN-led political process.”
“My hon. Friend is right to say that this is a very busy region indeed. However, I disagree that the international community is taking its eye off the ball—witness the Berlin process and activities at the United Nations. I shall be going to Ankara tonight, and I will of course be talking about Libya, among other things, with my Turkish interlocuters tomorrow.”
“The security situation in Iraq is deeply worrying. The threat from Daesh remains, and the recent attacks by Shi’a military groups on diplomatic premises are unacceptable, as is the use of disproportionate force against demonstrators. We are committed to supporting the Government of Iraq to face its profound security challenges. The Prime Minister reaffirmed that with his Iraqi counterpart on 5 January, and we stand ready to work with the new Prime Minister Mohammed Allawi.”
“I thank the hon. Lady for her supplementary question. I spoke to the Prime Minister of the Kurdistan region of Iraq, Masrour Barzani, recently—last month—and we discussed this issue, among others. She is right to say that the security of the region is of vital importance, and we will do all we can to work with our friends to assure that, including helping to train the peshmerga.”
“As I said on 14 January, our strategic aims remain to de-escalate US-Iran tensions, constrain Iran’s nuclear development and hold Iran to account for destabilising activity in the middle east. We remain fully committed to the joint comprehensive plan of action. The Prime Minister, the Foreign Secretary, the Defence Secretary and I have all spoken to counterparts in the United States, Iran and across the region to underline the need for de-escalation on all sides.”
“My hon. Friend is of course absolutely right. The renunciation of violence and the return to the political process are of crucial importance in trying to get towards what I think we all want in this House, which is a peaceful and amicable settlement that respects the 1967 borders, with Jerusalem as a shared capital, and in particular a deal that gives refugees, of whom there are a huge number in the region, a proper future.”
“My hon. Friend is absolutely right. There are of course a large number of projects and initiatives, many of them funded by the United Kingdom, that are aimed at promoting peace. He will be aware that we are one of the major contributors to the humanitarian situation—we hope, of course, pro tem—before we get a definitive political process that enables a viable Palestinian state to live alongside the state of Israel.”
“I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman. We have discussed the case of Luke Symons at some length, and of course my door always remains open. We continue to do what we can in a very difficult and challenging situation with our interlocutors and partners to secure the outcome that I know the hon. Gentleman wants for Mr Cummings.”
“My hon. Friend is right, and she will be aware of the support that we give for health and education in the occupied Palestinian territories, pending the definitive political solution that we would like to see in the not-too-distant future, which remains a huge priority. She will also be aware of concerns about things such as teaching materials in schools, and of the active role that we have taken to ensure that no inappropriate material is used. I spoke recently to the Palestinian Education Minister. I know that this issue is at the top of his agenda, and in advance of the academic year in September, changes will be made.”
“The UK’s position has not changed. Our view remains that the best way to achieve peace is through substantive peace talks between the parties, leading to a safe and secure Israel that lives alongside a viable and sovereign Palestinian state, based on 1967 borders, with agreed land swaps, Jerusalem as the shared capital of both states, and a just, fair, agreed and realistic settlement for refugees. Our first priority now must be to encourage the United States, Israelis, Palestinians and our partners in the international community to find a means of resuming the dialogue necessary for securing a negotiated settlement. The absence of dialogue creates a vacuum, which fuels instability and all that follows from that.”
“I thank the right hon. Lady for her urgent question. As the Foreign Secretary made clear in his statement on Tuesday, the Government welcome the release of the proposal by the United States for peace between Israelis and Palestinians, which clearly reflects extensive investment in time and effort. A peace agreement between Israelis and Palestinians that leads to peaceful co-existence could unlock the potential of the entire region and provide both sides with the opportunity for a brighter future. Only the leaders of Israel and the Palestinian territories can determine whether the proposals can meet the needs and aspirations of the people they represent. We encourage them to give the latest plan genuine and fair consideration, and to explore whether it might prove a first step on the road back to negotiations.”
“She would have found, if she had bothered to take note of them—I have a gist of them written here—that the UK position, iterated by the Foreign Secretary in his statement on Tuesday, is right in the mainstream of international opinion on this document. At the moment, we have a vacuum in which there is no negotiation. We want to see a return to negotiation, and we need something that will get us going in that respect. If this plan, with all its faults and foibles—every plan has them—enables us to get around the table again, that has to be a good thing.”
“I thank the right hon. Gentleman—the right hon. Lady. Actually, I have made that mistake before, Mr Speaker. I apologise once again, since we are in the mood for apologies this morning, to the right hon. Lady. The right hon. Lady has made her points in her own way and I commend her for her rhetoric. I spent last night actually reading the plan. It is a large document. I do not know whether she has done more than just skim through it and read the remarks of her researchers, but I have actually read it. This has been years in gestation. America is one of our closest allies, and I think we owe America and its President at least the time to consider this plan. That said, this is not our plan. What the right hon. Lady should have done is consider the remarks of our international friends and partners on this plan.”
“It is clear that peace in the middle east needs to be negotiated by the parties concerned, and I think everybody understands that. My hon. Friend is quite correct; I have a list of countries from across the world that have commented on the proposal, and I have been road-testing our statement against some of those comments. We have comments from Saudi Arabia, Egypt—we will come back to that—the United Arab Emirates, EU High Representative Borrell, the E3, Spain, France, Germany, Sweden and Australia. They all welcome this as the basis for talks and negotiation.”
“The right hon. Lady can chunter as much as she likes, but she needs to understand where we sit in the mainstream of international opinion on this matter, which is as I have described.”
“The UK Government’s position on annexation is, as he knows, very clear, and it is completely compatible with what others say and maintain on this matter: annexation—that is to say, Israel commanding space that has not been negotiated and agreed internationally—would be illegal.”
“I wish that I was able to be at the hon. Gentleman’s Burns night supper. Indeed, I wish to God “the giftie gie us To see oursels as ithers see us!” We could go on. On the subject of annexation, which I think is the burden of the hon. Gentleman’s question, let us be clear. Annexation would be illegal under international law. Some of the rhetoric we saw in the aftermath of the release of this document “Peace to Prosperity” was perhaps overdone and overblown, and it has been reined back on overnight by a number of those who claimed that that would happen in the immediate aftermath of the release of the plan.”
“This clearly has to be the subject of a great deal of further work, but if it is the catalyst for negotiation, I suppose we have to welcome it in that stead.”
“May I congratulate my hon. Friend on his recent success? The UN General Secretary has made a statement that is in keeping with most of the comments made internationally yesterday and overnight. He welcomes this as a point of dialogue and is insistent—we have discussed this with him and others—that we need to get back around the negotiating table. I do not think that anybody really accepts—certainly not on the part of the UK Government—that this is a perfect plan by any means. It could be baby steps towards a negotiation, but it has to be a negotiated settlement that eventually falls out of this. Clearly, this has not been negotiated, so those who suggest that it is in some way a final settlement are way far of the mark.”