Tim Farron
MP for Westmorland and Lonsdale · Liberal Democrat · United Kingdom
“The hon. Member is making an excellent speech, as always. Given that there is some underlying positivity, is she concerned that although there is ongoing support for people with their energy bills, there is nothing for the tens of thousands of people in Cumbria, and the hundreds of thousands across the country, who are off grid and who re…”
House of Commons28 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. In Foreign Office questions earlier today, the Minister for International Development, the hon. Member for Midlothian (Kirsty McNeill), answered a question from the hon. Member for Mid Bedfordshire (Blake Stephenson). I have informed both Members that I would be mentioning them.”
House of Commons27 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The hon. Lady is being incredibly generous with her time, as ever. She will recall that the Defence Secretary told families last weekend to be ready for potential shocks that might come our way. Does she agree that, given what she was just saying, the UK as a whole needs to be far more ready to become food secure?”
House of Commons27 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“What can we do to ensure that the Minister and her officials are aware of these facts and come before the House to explain the extent of these conversations with the Eritrean regime, given that it would be an act of extreme wickedness to return any asylum seeker from Eritrea to Eritrea?”
House of Commons27 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I had the joy of spending time with the Kendal and South Lakes prostate cancer support group just a few weeks ago. Like the hon. Gentleman and me, its members are massively in favour of increased screening and making sure there is default screening for men over 50. Does the hon.”
House of Commons26 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Last year, there were 392,000 sewage spills across our country, 4,000 of which happened in the precious waters of Cumbria’s lakes and dales, and meanwhile companies rewarded their shareholders for that failure with increased dividends of £845 million. Isn’t it time instead to put failing water companies into administration?”
House of Commons22 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
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“But in truth, this debate is about more than one failing company; it is about whether a vital public service is to be run in the interests of customers, communities and the environment, or whether the public will once again be left to pick up the bill for corporate failure while the Government fail to grasp the opportunity to make lasting changes. Thames Water provides an essential service that none of its 16 million customers—those it is meant to serve—can opt out of. It is staggering that a company so central to public health, environmental protection and the decent stewardship of such a vital resource now stands on the brink of collapse. Thames Water is currently operating with more than £17 billion in debt, which it admits that it cannot repay.”
House of Commons6 January 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It is a pleasure to serve under your guidance this afternoon, Mrs Harris. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Oxford West and Abingdon (Layla Moran) for securing the debate, for leading it so brilliantly and for standing up for her community so well for so many years. I also pay tribute to those who have contributed to the debate from all sides, but I am bound to observe the concentration of Liberal Democrat Members present, which shows how well we as a group stand up for our communities—particularly those labouring under the yoke of Thames Water, which is, as has been demonstrated, a failing company, both financially and in its primary mission to serve its customers.”
House of Commons6 January 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Some 25% of the houses in my constituency were built before 1900. They are expensive to heat and very difficult to insulate. When will there be a bespoke plan for insulating those properties, using the right materials, and, crucially, for the insulation to be installed by specialists?”
House of Commons6 January 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Happy new year, Mr Speaker. Only one in 200 police officers in England and Wales is allocated to rural crime teams. In Cumbria, the situation is even worse: only five officers in 2024 were allocated to our rural crime team. Given what Members have said already today, is it not clear that people who live in very rural communities are subject not only to crime, but to an even more concentrated sense of the fear of crime, because they know that they could be 20 or 30 miles away from the nearest officer? Is it not time for the Government to think again about rural crime and make sure that every community, particularly rural counties like Cumbria, has a dedicated rural crime team that is bigger than five officers?”
House of Commons5 January 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Our farming and rural communities in Cumbria and right across Britain should be utterly proud of themselves, because this U-turn is their victory, and I pay tribute to them. However, the appalling emotional and economic damage done to farmers over the last 14 months has been cruel and will have a lasting impact. Will the Minister apologise to the farming community for the last 14 months, and recognise that many hill farms in Cumbria will still be hit by this tax, because they are worth more than £2.5 million, although their average income is less than the minimum wage? Does this tax not remain an attack on British farming and on food security?”
House of Commons5 January 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Britain is historically America’s best friend, and best friends tell each other when they are acting appallingly; they do not go into toadying mode. As my right hon. Friends the Members for Kingston and Surbiton (Ed Davey) and for Orkney and Shetland (Mr Carmichael) have mentioned, in 2003 in this House, a Labour Government voted, with Conservative support, to illegally invade Iraq. The consequences were the undermining of international law, the emboldening of despots around the world, and the massive degradation of Britain’s security, safety and significance. Have we learned nothing from that lesson of nearly 25 years ago? Have we not learned the one lesson above all of history—that those who appease bullies soon become their victims?”
House of Commons5 January 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Will she ensure that this time the money does not mostly go to the wealthiest, as the hon. Member for Bishop Auckland (Sam Rushworth) just referred to, and when will she stop making English farmers the worst supported in the whole of Europe?”
House of Commons18 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“If farm profitability is so important to the Government, I find it utterly peculiar that the review was released only today as a written statement at the last minute. It is an insult to this House and indeed the excellent Baroness Batters herself. England is now the only country in the United Kingdom, and indeed in Europe, that does not provide financial support to its farmers. England’s farmers, therefore, have been uniquely abandoned by this Government, by their Conservative predecessor and by those whose madcap ideology took us out of Europe without any kind of a plan. Will the Secretary of State tell us whether food security will be counted as a public good, as the Liberal Democrats propose, and funded through environmental land management schemes? When will the SFI be reopened, and how much money will be in it?”
House of Commons18 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Friend the Member for Barrow and Furness (Michelle Scrogham) and local council leaders, so we can work out an unusual solution to this wonderful but unusual council’s problems?”
House of Commons17 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Westmorland and Furness is an extremely well-run council and an extremely unusual one as well. It is England’s most rural council. It is the council that accepts the highest number of visitors—non-resident population—as we support everybody else’s constituents, who make up the 15 million who come to our district every year. The council has some of the poorest wards in the country. It is the host of Barrow, which is the centre of the UK’s defence industry, and it has the highest percentage of people in social care. This formula will leave us unusually crippled. We think it will mean a 13% cut to our budgets over the next three years. Given that we are so unusual, will the Minister unusually agree to meet me, her hon.”
House of Commons17 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“My hon. Friend’s communities are not dissimilar to mine; they are very rural and very mountainous, and upland farming is critical to his communities, as it is to mine. Does he think the Labour Government have failed to understand that wealth is not concentrated in the hands of famers in the way that they think? It is entirely possible to be an upland farmer in my hon. Friend’s patch or in mine and to be earning the minimum wage or, indeed, less—the University of Cumbria shows that the average upland farmer earns less on average than the minimum wage—and yet to be in a position, after inheritance tax is due, to be paying £20,000 a year or more while earning only £16,000. That is not right, is it?”
House of Commons16 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The maintenance of our nuclear deterrent, and the development of our wider defence capabilities in the United Kingdom, rests heavily on the town of Barrow, next to my own constituency, in my district of Westmorland and Furness. Does the Secretary of State recognise that investment into the town from the council is crucial to maintaining our peace and security, and will he have a word with his colleagues in the Cabinet? The local council is set to have a 13% cut to its budget, which will put at risk much of the investment in the town of Barrow that is meant to underpin the defence of our realm.”
House of Commons15 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Across Cumbria and Morecambe Bay, the teams working in A&E, on hospital wards and in our ambulance crews are doing a stunning job dealing with the winter pressures in a community where, in my constituency, the average age is 10 years above the national average. Their jobs are made more difficult by the fact that 25% or more of the beds in our local hospitals are occupied by people who do not meet the criteria to reside. On top of that, the local trust in Morecambe Bay is planning to make bed cuts for financial reasons alone. We hear about additional investment in the NHS, but it does not feel like we are having that in Morecambe Bay and Cumbria. Will the Secretary of State personally investigate that, so that we are not cutting beds at a time when we need them more than ever?”
House of Commons15 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“By 2050, the shortfall could reach nearly 5 million litres per day—equivalent to more than a third of the water that we currently rely on for public consumption. Outrageous water shortages have been experienced by South East Water customers, who have been referenced by hon. Friends and championed by our hon. Friend the Member for Tunbridge Wells (Mike Martin). Those water shortages could become the experience of people across the country, not just in the south-east region, if we do not radically reform our water industry urgently to ensure that we stop the leaking of billions of pounds of billpayers’ money into the pockets of shareholders and senior executives, when that money should be reinvested in a water infrastructure fit for the British people.”
House of Commons9 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The amount of water available at any time depends not only on natural supply—rainfall, rivers, aquifers—but on the capacity of the infrastructure maintained since privatisation by the water companies. Demands from households, industry and agriculture also play a significant part. In Cumbria, we have 20 million visitors a year. Those people are very welcome but that is a lot of drinking water, showers and flushed lavatories, and we need the infrastructure to provide that. On top of that, we provide fresh drinking water for millions of people in the north-west of England. Again, we are proud to do so but we are under pressure. The Environment Agency has projected national and regional deficits in water supply. Deficits will only worsen over the next 25 years as matters are scheduled.”
House of Commons9 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It is a joy to serve under your guidance this afternoon, Mr Stuart. I plan to be here for the next two debates, so we will have a lovely afternoon together as we have apparently just rejoined the EU on a tied vote. The tie means that we win on the away-goals rule, which is good to hear. All legislation should be settled like that in future. I give massive thanks and congratulations to my hon. Friend the Member for Horsham (John Milne), who not only secured the debate but led it superbly. All contributions from parties present have been excellent, focused on their communities and on trying to solve the issue. It was great to hear the affinity between the DUP and the Liberal Democrats; after all, we are both very fond of the colour orange. It is great to get a perspective from one of the devolved nations.”
House of Commons9 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It is not right that water companies that have failed to invest in adequate sewerage, drainage and water supply infrastructure are able to get away with telling the local planning authority that there is no need for further investment and, at the same time, gain the financial benefit of the extra water bills from new households, while not laying out the extra investment needed to provide for them.”
House of Commons9 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“That means sustainable drainage, new supply capacity and integration of water resilience into planning from the start. For instance, we should ensure that data centres are built predominantly at coastal locations and that desalination plants are an integral part of their design and key to their gaining of planning consent. Otherwise, we simply will not have the capacity to both provide clean water for our people and be the AI superpower that we desire to be. The Liberal Democrats have long backed an infrastructure-first approach to development. We cannot allow water infrastructure to remain an afterthought.”
House of Commons9 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The main drivers of this impending crisis are clear: climate change; population growth; increased housing demand; business expansion; the demands, which have been mentioned, for huge additional energy and water usage given the growth in AI; pressures on the natural environment; and the growing need to prepare for drought. Those drivers are compounded by historical underinvestment in infrastructure and insufficient demand management. Successive Governments have comprehensively failed to take climate adaptation measures seriously, guaranteeing misery for communities affected by flooding, wildfires and heat stress. If we are to build new infrastructure, including new homes and data centres—and we must—we must also ensure that water infrastructure keeps pace.”
House of Commons9 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The hon. Member makes an excellent point. All this afternoon’s interventions have been good and on the money. Talking about money, this is money leaking out of the industry and not being invested in it. Bonuses and dividends should reward success; clearly, Yorkshire Water and others have failed in their basic task, which is to provide clean water for their communities. To focus on the scale of the problem, since privatisation the water companies have amassed £70 billion of debt. Adjusted for inflation, they have paid out £83 billion in dividends. That means that on average 30p out of every pound that people pay on their water bills is to service the debt of the water companies, which was racked up to pay dividends. That is a moral outrage.”
House of Commons9 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Will that be set out in the water White Paper that we are expecting very soon following the Independent Water Commission report just before summer? Will the White Paper introduce resilience standards for water and support homeowners in installing adaptation measures against flooding and overheating? Will the White Paper restore agricultural permitted development rights, as set out by my hon. Friend the Member for South Cambridgeshire (Pippa Heylings), to allow farmers to build on-farm reservoirs with the support of the local community? Will the White Paper bring in a new clean water authority to replace the failed Ofwat and merge it into an authority with other regulators too?”
House of Commons9 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The Liberal Democrats stand alone as the only party in England calling for food security and resilience of food supply to be counted as public goods and therefore supported through the environmental land management schemes, which we would boost with an additional £1 billion per year. The lack of water through periods of drought is a fundamental threat to our food security, so we would ensure that farmers are actively supported to ensure that they remain able to put food on our tables no matter the weather. Before I close, we ask the Minister: will there be a comprehensive cross-departmental UK adaptation strategy that embeds climate resilience, including water resilience, across all Government policies and agencies?”
House of Commons9 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“That can only be the consequence of appalling levels of investment in our water network as we see good water leaking out of the system. The wettest place in England last summer had a hosepipe ban—that is barmy and outrageous. At the same time, we recognise that augmenting supply may become unavoidable. Options must include new reservoirs, especially in regions that suffer from lower rainfall, as well as greater water recycling, desalination where ecologically feasible and transfers of water between regions. It is vital that we support farmers and land managers as they struggle with extreme weather.”
House of Commons9 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“We see water levels rising today and recognise that it is so important that we invest in protecting our communities—in particular those who provide the food for our tables: our farmers. Water companies must be held to account. That means requiring them to reduce leakages, deliver on efficiency targets, expand uptake of water meters and embrace water-saving technologies. In my constituency, we do indeed have an awful lot of lakes, and they need topping up, so it rains rather a lot. We are the most beautiful part of England, I would argue, but we are also the wettest. Yet despite the fact that we get three and a half times more rainfall per year than even Manchester, we end up facing droughts and potential water rationing over the summer months.”
House of Commons9 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I agree with my hon. Friend. We made those points during the passage of the Water (Special Measures) Bill, now the 2025 Act, and we will of course try them again in the near future. Water scarcity and limited water storage capacity put acute pressure on farming and food production. There must be more support for farmers to manage water well and for the development of local resource options to secure and store water. Flooding and drought both threaten our agriculture sector and therefore threaten Britain’s food security. In the last few days we have been commemorating with great sadness and dark memories the 10th anniversary of Storm Desmond in Cumbria and elsewhere in the country.”
House of Commons9 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“If we do not act now with joined-up planning, proper investment, accountability, strong regulation and a better ownership model, then the shortfall of water forecast by 2050 will hit communities across our country, and Governments both past and present will rightly get the blame.”
House of Commons9 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Water scarcity is a real and growing challenge. The causes are in part natural, but in part they are political. We have a water industry that is structured to make a small number of people incredibly wealthy, not to meet the needs of our country. Will the White Paper address the outrageous and outdated ownership model to ensure that we tackle the problem? We will not deal with the issue by tinkering around the edges. It will only change when we have the kind of regulation that the industry cannot shimmy its way around, and when we have an ownership model that puts water supply and water users ahead of an amoral dash for profit.”
House of Commons9 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I have only a little left, but thank you, Mr Stuart. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend, who is a strong advocate for her communities and is echoing their anger at being overlooked for funding. It is worth recognising that, although it may be no fault of the Minister’s, DEFRA is one of the few Departments that got an actual cut in the Budget. Does that affect farming or flood investment? It is deeply concerning for all of us who live in habitually wet communities. I want to press the Minster on whether the White Paper that is coming will set out a single, powerful regulator that the water companies actually fear, rather than what we have at present: a whole range of weak regulators that the water companies play off against one another. Meanwhile, the companies continue to take people’s money and not provide adequate water infrastructure.”
House of Commons9 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving way and sorry to intervene so early in the debate. I want to make a point about outdoor education, which is also about enrichment and helping young people to be resilient and to have better outcomes. Is he aware that among state schools in wealthier postcodes, 52% of young people get an outdoor education residential opportunity while at school, while in the poorer areas, only 18% have this opportunity? Does he think that the Government need to be aware of this and fund access to outdoor education experiences for children, wherever they are from?”
House of Commons9 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It was not a laughing matter, and we were very grateful that no one was seriously injured, but that derailment has surely got to be a wake-up call for Network Rail.”
House of Commons9 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“If Avanti’s normal London timings had been maintained as far as Oxenholme, the connection with the Lakes line could have continued. Alternatively, TransPennine Express, which is still operating, could have taken over those timings, but it sadly declined. Even if its trains could not continue beyond Preston, a simple Preston to Oxenholme shuttle would have kept a reliable interchange in place and still provided four trains per hour to Manchester. With years of west coast main line upgrade work still to come, the lack of planning for rural connectivity cannot be allowed to continue, and the upgrades do not promise enough for the main line in the rural far north-west of England. I think it would be fair to conclude that we saw that most acutely with the derailment on the southbound track at Shap on 3 November.”
House of Commons9 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“An additional example of rural and northern communities being overlooked is the network closures in January during the Clifton bridge work—something that will impact pretty much everybody on the west side of the country. Passengers changing at Oxenholme between the Lakes line and TransPennine Express services to Manchester airport face waits of almost an hour in both directions, but that is not the half of it, because Avanti has chosen not to serve Oxenholme at all. This is hardly a surprise to many of us, because whenever there is a problem with the track in Scotland or Cumbria, Avanti almost always chooses to cancel all services north of Preston anyway. We are used to Avanti treating Cumbria, north Lancashire and Scotland as if we do not exist, but as predictable as this is, it is not acceptable.”
House of Commons9 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“On the Leeds-Settle-Carlisle line, villages in Yorkshire and Cumbria miss out because passenger services to rural communities have been downgraded. The 13.37 service from Carlisle to Leeds, which passes through my constituency, has been converted into a semi-fast service, so it misses out most of the intermediate stations. By working with local campaigners, we have thankfully secured additional stops at Garsdale and Ribblehead, but Armathwaite, Lazonby, Langwathby, Dent and Haughton are still bypassed, leaving those communities with a four-hour gap in southbound services in the afternoon. The Government would never tolerate this sort of thing in an urban community.”
House of Commons9 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“This has a negative impact on commuters, on school and college students, and on our vital visitor economy, which serves 20 million people, provides jobs for 60,000 and is worth £4.5 billion to the economy every year. Connecting to local buses, which hon. Members have mentioned, becomes precarious when even small timetable changes can blow apart entire journey plans. In Grange-over-Sands, buses and trains coincide at exactly the same time on each hour, and predictable lateness on both roads and rail mean that there can be no certainty of interconnectivity. People seeking to get home to Cartmel, Flookburgh, Allithwaite and Lindale live with the daily anxiety of not knowing whether they will make their connection.”
House of Commons9 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Although there are some exciting developments that I am sure the Minister will list, we fear that the changes will be overwhelmingly urban and intercity focused, just like those introduced in May. They offer far too little to the rural communities that the Liberal Democrats now represent so comprehensively from Wick to Penzance, with Oxenholme pretty much halfway. Rural rail routes suffer from limited frequency, infrastructure constraints and, ultimately, a lack of investment in tracks, stations and rolling stock. On the Lakes line, the Furness line and the Cumbrian coastal line, we see hourly services if we are lucky, whereas it is closer to every two hours on the Settle to Carlisle line.”
House of Commons9 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It is a joy to continue serving under your guidance this afternoon, Mr Stuart—I am thoroughly enjoying it, and I hope you are as well. I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk (John Lamont) for securing a very important debate, which I think would have been even better attended if it had not clashed with the Railways Bill. This issue matters hugely to so many of us, but I am sure it also matters to many Members who are in the main Chamber. He made a really strong case for rural rail services in his beautiful constituency, as did the hon. Member for South East Cornwall (Anna Gelderd), who made a really good speech that highlighted the issues affecting her lovely part of the world. The major timetable update that we expect on 14 December is a source of significant worry for many of us in rural communities.”
House of Commons9 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“We want to see smaller rural stations reopened and a UK-wide Network Rail railcard introduced, making rail travel more affordable, tackling regional inequalities and simplifying the system for passengers.”
House of Commons9 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“There is much to welcome—the Liberal Democrats welcome the expansion of contactless fares into more rural and suburban areas of the London commuter belt, as well as the improvements on some rural midland lines—but we are urging the Government to establish a nationwide tap-in, tap-out ticketing system, which would be simple, modern and fair. It is time to end the regional lottery that passengers face across our network. We also continue to campaign to reverse the cuts to the restoring your railway scheme, which was scrapped by the Chancellor in last year’s Budget. That scheme would have delivered genuine social, economic and environmental benefits to rural areas that are too frequently cut off from public transport.”
House of Commons9 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I am very grateful to my hon. Friend for making that point. The horror was even closer to happening than that: nobody was hurt and the train remained upright between the tracks, but it was about eight minutes off being hit by the northbound train going in the opposite direction, which would undoubtedly have led to catastrophic loss of life. I do not want to pre-empt the ongoing investigation by the rail accident investigation branch, but we cannot help wondering whether the failure of this Government and the previous Government to fund the upgrades necessary to ensure the resilience both of the line and of the embankment between Warrington and Lockerbie could have played a part in that terrifying near miss.”
House of Commons9 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The solutions are not beyond us. With the right priorities, the Government could transform the experience of passengers right across the country. We call for a nationwide tap-in, tap-out system to extend the planned best price guarantee across all digital and physical sales channels, to ensure that passengers are offered the most cost-effective ticket available. We call for electrification as standard for new line. We call for ambitious targets to expand battery and hydrogen technology, where appropriate, including for freight. The Government should also grab the low-hanging fruit and invest in passing loops, such as the one proposed for the Lakes line. That would be a relatively inexpensive way to double capacity on so many of our rural lines—”
House of Commons9 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Well, even the best timetabling is meaningless, Mr Stuart, if you cannot make it to the platform to catch your train. The Government have effectively scrapped the mid-tier section of the Access for All scheme, which is meant to end the barriers to access for people with disabilities and mobility issues. If the mid-tier scheme is scrapped, only mainline train stations will ever be made access-friendly for disabled people, which is outrageous. I have an example in my constituency: the platform at Staveley station on the Lakes line, which passengers have to stagger up 41 steep steps to reach. I ask the Minister to reopen the mid-tier scheme, to support not just Staveley but all rural stations. Rural communities deserve a railway system that recognises them as equal partners in our national network, not an afterthought.”
House of Commons9 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“And to ensure safe and reliable onward travel, Mr Stuart. The reality is that when someone’s train comes in, if they cannot get to their next destination they are utterly snookered. That is particularly the case in rural areas where stations are unstaffed. At night, that often creates not only inconvenience, but a lack of safety, particularly at this time of year, particularly with late-night services curtailed and particularly for those who are travelling on their own. I will finish by simply saying that railways should work for all, urban and rural alike.”
House of Commons9 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Access to banking is surely a key part of financial inclusion. The high street banks save £2 billion a year from having abandoned our high streets and town centres. Our post offices pick up the tab and we are glad that they do, but they are not funded by the banks anywhere near enough to be able to maintain their presence. In Westmorland, we have lost Hawkshead, Staveley and Grasmere post offices, and we are set to lose Shap and Tebay largely because the banks do not fund the post offices for doing their jobs properly. What is the Chancellor going to do to make them do that?”
House of Commons9 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Cumbria has a much higher than average number of unpaid carers, largely due to the much higher than average number of people who are older, and the situation is exacerbated by rural isolation. It is a community with a significant amount of seasonal and variable work. What is the Minister doing to ensure that carers can take flexible seasonal work without fear of losing all support?”
House of Commons8 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“What assessment has the Secretary of State made of the impact on child poverty of the Government’s rather blanket approach to changing local government funding and taking support away from rural councils? Westmorland and Furness council stands to lose 13% of its budget, which will not only exacerbate child poverty and reduce educational and life chances for children in my constituency —one in five children in Kendal already live in poverty—but undermine the Government’s plans to regenerate the town of Barrow, which underpins the UK’s nuclear deterrent and defence capability. Will the Secretary of State, at this last moment, urgently get involved and talk to Cabinet colleagues to prevent those deeply damaging cuts, which will exacerbate child poverty and put the country at risk?”
House of Commons8 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Member agree that neurodevelopmental and early years services must be properly resourced and protected, and not sidelined, so that such children are not left without support when they need it the most?”
House of Commons2 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I pay tribute to the hon. Member and his marvellous constituent Ivan, who he is speaking about so passionately and affectionately. Does he agree that support for autistic children and their families must be treated as a priority during and in the aftermath of pandemics and other crisis events of that sort? In my constituency, the parent of a three-year-old child who is showing clear signs of autism has been waiting for 18 months for a community paediatric assessment and just as long for dietetic support for suspected avoidant/restrictive food intake disorder. That delay is already affecting his development and nutrition at a critical stage. Does the hon.”
House of Commons2 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I would be grateful if the Minister took this matter up separately with his colleagues the Secretaries of State for Defence and for Housing, Communities and Local Government. This cut would be a colossal strategic own goal for the Government—one they would rightly get the blame for—but there is still time to reverse it. For this debate, though, the key point I want the Minister to focus on is that the closure of junction 38 southbound and then northbound, for three years in total, will be catastrophic for our communities. It can and must be avoided.”
House of Commons1 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The towns of Kirkby Stephen and Kendal are already at capacity and breaking point when it comes to traffic management and cannot withstand a motorway’s worth of displaced traffic; they cannot withstand it at all, but they certainly cannot withstand it regularly and for years on end. Westmorland and Furness council is set to lose £39 million a year due to the new, ironically-titled fairer funding 2.0 settlement—a staggering 13% cut to its budget. It will therefore not have the funds to expand traffic management in consideration of the volume of traffic to keep those roads safe and flowing securely. Incidentally, this is a financial settlement that puts at risk the council’s crucial investment in the town of Barrow, which is critical to the UK’s defence capability, including our nuclear deterrent.”
House of Commons1 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Having said that, the A685 is a winding, narrow, single carriageway running for 12 miles from Tebay to Kendal, and for 18 months, all local traffic will be dependent on it, meaning a huge increase in traffic going through Tebay, Grayrigg and Kendal in particular. My first ask of the Minister is to ensure that this traffic is managed along the whole of this route and that the A685 Lawtland House bridge is strengthened and kept safe through this time, when this already weakened bridge will be facing massively increased usage, carrying an enormous volume of traffic displaced from the M6.”
House of Commons1 December 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗