Jeremy Corbyn
MP for Islington North · Your Party · United Kingdom
“In two minutes, I will do my best, Sir Desmond. I am proud to represent a very small urban area of Britain in which, over the years, we have managed to increase the number of parks and open spaces.”
“I grew up in a country area where we had a competition over who heard the first cuckoo in spring. It is that sort of change in understanding that we have to bring about if we are to win this debate on biodiversity and sustainability on our planet. The Government are pledged to the 30by30 target for the oceans.”
“We have to address the wider issue, which is the pollution emanating from our towns, cities and industries into our rivers and the water companies that do not deal with it. I have 13 seconds left, so I will simply say this: it is great that the House has come back to this issue and that so many Members want to speak today.”
“I congratulate the right hon. Member on becoming Prime Minister and on his stamina at taking questions for already even longer than the longest world cup match. He has said some helpful and useful things about housing, particularly on rough sleeping.”
“Surely the obvious answer is to bring in some kind of ceiling—a rent control of some sort—to the sector, and immediately look at not postponing the rise in the local housing allowance, but to bring real relief to people who are desperately up against it and subsidising their rent out of their benefits.”
“When the hon. Member for Harrow East (Bob Blackman) introduced the debate, he quite rightly drew attention to the huge work done by our constituency and parliamentary staff. It is right that we should thank them on this occasion and also thank all the parliamentary staff for what they do.”
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Every one of 8,612 lines we hold for Jeremy Corbyn, in date order, each linked to its source. Free to read, in full, without an account. Page 4 of 173.
“Those who suffered to get us universal suffrage and democracy did not do it so that we could develop a corrupt political system; they did it because they wanted an open, democratic, accountable system that benefited the poorest in society, as well as everybody else. Let us pass the motion today—no deals. We must inquire with real seriousness into the horror show that we have heard about.”
“I conclude by saying to the Government: do not come to some deal today just to get past today. Do not just get through today and think, “Wow, we got through that mess.” Members of the Government should not just put in their diaries, “Horrible day in the Commons, but tomorrow is another day. We’ll move on.” Let us have the open, public inquiry that is necessary. Let us have an understanding that we will turn the page on the era of patronage, and of close relationships between commercial pressure groups and lobbying—in the Lords, here, in the media and in our society. We should strive to build the open, fair, democratic society that we should all believe in.”
“I remember discussing all this with Tony Benn in the 1970s; his view was that the civil service was intrinsically conservative and reactionary, and that there needed to be voices in there who were prepared to speak up for an alternative policy. I understand that point, but there has to be some kind of limit to the role of the political adviser in running the civil service—that is the Rubicon they must not cross. It is reasonable for them to advise the Minister, and they may have a very strong view or a view that is very different to that of the civil service. That is fair enough, but they should not be running the civil service. If we believe in an independent civil service, we must practise what we believe, even though it is probably quite uncomfortable for Ministers at various times.”
“The right hon. Member makes a very fair point. Of course, the role of factions within parties is enormous—we have seen the role that Mandelson, Morgan McSweeney and others have played in sidelining, silencing and getting rid of very good, active people within the Labour party. Ultimately, it is the Labour party that loses as a result. I was extremely grateful for the role that Peter Mandelson played in the last election in Islington North: he came along and canvassed, and we won with 50% of the vote. That is the only useful thing he has done for a very long time that I can remember. As I say, the right hon. Member’s point is a very fair one. It is right that Ministers and Governments should be able to bring political advisers into government with them.”
“On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. Following the answer we have just heard, if the Intelligence and Security Committee comes across evidence of commercial misdemeanours as well as intelligence and international relations misdemeanours, what powers does it have to do anything about that? Where will it refer those concerns and where will those inquiries lead? The issues of lobbying and potential corruption in the handing out of Government contracts are massive, and I would not want that swept under the carpet on the basis that the Committee is dealing with international relations and national security.”
“Does the hon. Member agree that the House should be slightly cautious here? We should not just roll over and accept the Government’s manuscript amendment without clear assurances about how far the inquiries will go where they relate to commercial interests, rather than just security interests, as well as a very clear process of reporting and a timetable, so that this is not just a carpet-brushing exercise to get rid of an embarrassing day for the Government.”
“I mean no disrespect to the Intelligence and Security Committee, but the Minister will have heard the points of order that the right hon. Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell) and I made earlier. We need to know that there is a timetable for this inquiry, that it will not rule out specifically commercial interests such as Palantir and fail to investigate them, and that it will investigate the whole web of influence that Peter Mandelson had over so much in Government, which has brought about this dreadful position in which we appointed somebody who is a friend of a paedophile to be the ambassador to Washington. Many people watching today’s debate will not be happy that Parliament is merely shoving this issue off to one of its Committees, because they think there should be a wider public interest inquiry into the whole affair.”
“I absolutely welcome this Bill. It is an enormous step forward and will bring great relief to a lot of families. Does the hon. Lady recognise that the continuation of the overall benefit cap will mean that about 150,000 children will not benefit from this Bill and will remain in relative poverty? Would she welcome further legislation to remove the overall benefit cap in order to try to eliminate all poverty among children?”
“Does the hon. Member recognise that additional causes of child poverty include a tax threshold that has not been raised at all and the insufficiency of the minimum wage, which drives many working families into desperate poverty, with their children suffering as a result?”
“I compliment the hon. Member on the amazing work he has done on the Right to Food Commission and on food banks in Liverpool, supported by all the football clubs there. He must be aware—maybe he has figures—of the number of families with children who use food banks who are in work, and sometimes doing two jobs, but who are still so poor that they cannot afford to pay a weekly grocery bill.”
“I thank the hon. Member for giving way. I absolutely agree with her about those 50,000 families not getting any benefit. Does she agree that there needs to be a more comprehensive approach to child poverty, including raising the tax threshold to take the poorest families and poorest people out of taxation altogether, and looking at the extraordinarily high private sector rents in many places, which are way above the local housing allowance and mean that families on benefit end up subsidising their rent in order to keep a roof over their heads?”
“Does the Minister acknowledge that, ever since the brutal removal of Chagossians from their homes in the 1970s and 1980s, their one unifying factor has been their determination and desire to return? Will he also confirm that international law indicates that the Chagos islands—both the archipelago and Diego Garcia—should be, under decolonisation statute, handed over to Mauritius, and that the only way of guaranteeing the right of return of Chagos islanders is for the House to accept the treaty that the Government have negotiated, which is supported by the Chagos Refugees Group, largely based in Mauritius and the Seychelles, and some of the Chagos islanders who live in this country. [ Interruption. ] Of course there is debate—nothing wrong with that—but this guarantees a right of return.”
“The Israeli occupation of the west bank has resulted in almost 1,000 deaths over the past year and a half. We have seen the loss of villages, the loss of life and the continued enabling of settler violence against ordinary Palestinian people in their villages, and this morning there are reports that the Israel Defence Forces are now demolishing the United Nations Relief and Works Agency headquarters in Jerusalem. When are the British Government going to do something serious, with sanctions against Israel for its continued illegal occupation of the west bank?”
“I thank the hon. Gentleman for his kind comments. Fundamentally, I spoke about Diego Garcia and the Chagos islands for many years because of the injustice that was done and the islanders’ right of return. The whole point has been to gain the right of return, which has been won through this Bill for the outer islands and, in a limited form, for Diego Garcia itself.”
“The horrendous loss of life in Iran this week has to be mourned, as does the horrendous loss of life of Palestinians in Gaza over the past two years. The British intervened in Iran in 1952 and brought about regime change. Is the Foreign Secretary aware that external regime change attempts in Iran are very unlikely to work and will actually create a much worse situation? Will she give us an undertaking that Britain will not be involved militarily with either Israel or the USA if they try military activity in Iran now?”
“Has the Foreign Secretary had an opportunity to study the United States national security statement that was made at the end of November, in which it appears to give itself the right to intervene in any country in the western hemisphere in order to exploit raw materials and minerals? Is she not concerned about the overt threats that are now being made against Colombia and Cuba, as well as about the illegal kidnapping of Maduro? Is she going to make any representations to the USA about that as well?”
“I thank the Chair for his report. He will be aware that when we had a debate on digital ID, inspired by a public petition, there was a massive turnout and massive participation. It was very crowded, which was a good sign, but many of us thought that a debate of such magnitude and importance ought to be held in the main Chamber. Is his Committee making representations to get more time in the Chamber for debates that are inspired by a very large number of people signing a public petition? Certainly, when there are over a million signatures, we ought to be thinking about having a debate in here, not in Westminster Hall.”
“I am very well aware of the sub judice nature of this matter, and I will not stray into issues of the trial itself or of their guilt or otherwise. My contribution solely concerns their conditions in prison and the operation of the prison rules—a matter that I have raised several times in the House.”
“I join the House in wishing you a very merry Christmas, Madam Deputy Speaker. I thank all our office staff and all staff in the House for everything they do to assist us over the year. This morning, I was at a very well-attended press conference with my hon. Friend the Member for Leicester South (Shockat Adam) and the right hon. Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell). We listened intently to the families of a group of eight prisoners who are undertaking a hunger strike. They gave us harrowing accounts of the physical condition that those prisoners are in. I should stress that none of them has been convicted of anything; they are all remand prisoners and are all awaiting trial. Some of them have been in prison for a very long time and have at least a year to go until their trial may or may not be heard.”
“I thank him for that, but we still have not had a substantive reply from the Ministry of Justice. I hope that when it hears this debate, the Department will recognise that it has a responsibility for the welfare and medical condition of prisoners and for the way in which they are supported in every one of our prisons. That includes people who are taking protest action because of their very strong belief in what they are trying to achieve. When the Leader of the House replies to the debate, could he confirm that he will once again ask the Ministry of Justice to get involved and meet the legal representatives of the prisoners?”
“That is why all I asked of the Secretary of State for Justice, and all I asked of the Prime Minister yesterday, was an undertaking that the Ministry of Justice will meet the legal representatives of those in prison in order that their conditions can be discussed and considered. So far that has been absolutely refused. The media in general has not reported on this, despite the drama surrounding it and the importance of the issue. I urge Members to think for a moment about how desperate a situation someone must be in to have no alternative but to take hunger strike action to bring attention to it. I hope that the Government will hear this call. When I raised this issue last week in business questions, the Leader of the House very kindly and efficiently passed on my request to the Ministry of Justice and copied me into the letter he sent.”
“Member for Brent West (Barry Gardiner) and I have just written to the prison governor as follows: “We write to you jointly today with the utmost urgency requesting a meeting with yourself…to discuss the…delay in calling medical staff and ambulances when the prisoners are in clear distress and in increasing pain; inconsistent administration of essential daily nutrients, apparently due to a lack of supply…10 day delay in acknowledging the start of the hunger strike…non-association orders between prisoners; slow communication/no communication with the families.” The families are obviously desperately concerned.”
“My hon. Friend is right: there is a presumption of innocence, which is the basis of the British judicial system. We have prison rules that guarantee that prisoners are fairly treated and have access to medical services when they desperately need them. My concern is about what access those prisoners have had to medical support when they have desperately needed it. Last week, I visited Amu Gib, a prisoner from my constituency. She is still in prison and is desperately in need of medical assistance. The right hon. Member for Hayes and Harlington, the hon.”
“Yesterday, the Under-Secretary of State for Justice, the hon. Member for Rother Valley (Jake Richards), declined a meeting with the representatives of a number of hunger strikers in prison at the present time. These are all remand prisoners; they have not been convicted of anything. Since then, a further prisoner, Qesser, has been taken to hospital, as others have been. Many people are very concerned about the regular breaches of prison conditions and prison rules in respect of these hunger strikers. Will the Prime Minister make arrangements for the Ministry of Justice to meet representatives of the hunger strikers to discuss these breaches of the conditions that they are experiencing?”
“The Minister will be aware that a number of prisoners are currently undertaking a hunger strike. They are remand prisoners, and some of them do not have a trial date until 2027. Deep concerns have been expressed by them, their families and their legal representatives about access to medical treatment, as well as how they have been treated when taken to hospital. Would the Minister be able to meet their legal representatives, and their families if necessary, to discuss the situation and try to help with the safety of these prisoners?”
“Will this country be more robust with the UAE on its financial support for the RSF, the clear supply of weapons to the RSF, which have come from somewhere around the world, and the interesting similarity between the areas occupied by the RSF and those where there is a massive supply of minerals and oil that will be available to it in the future? Is this not just a grab for the natural resources of Sudan being undertaken by the RSF on behalf of bigger actors around the world?”
“Does the Minister not think that the Government’s response is extraordinarily low-key and acquiescent to a declaration by the US that it gives itself the right to interfere in the internal affairs of any country around the world with which it does not agree? This is an extraordinary state of affairs. Will she make any comment on what is actually an act of piracy in the Caribbean, where the US has seized and taken into custody an oil tanker with no basis in international law and without any kind of military threat being made to the US? This act seems to me to be wholly illegal within international law.”
“They are all remand prisoners—they have not been convicted of anything—and they are being held for an inordinately long time until the trial takes place. These are serious issues about justice within our society. The Secretary of State for Justice should come here and answer questions about them.”
“The Leader of the House will be aware of the points of order raised yesterday by the right hon. Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell) and me, and the question today from the hon. Member for Leeds East (Richard Burgon), concerning the situation facing the Palestine Action hunger strikers in prison at the present time. It is important that the Secretary of State for Justice comes to the House and gives us an opportunity to question him about what appear to be serious allegations concerning breaches of prison rules in respect of all the hunger strikers, difficulties in obtaining medical support and help when they desperately need it, and issues of association and activities in the prison.”
“Hundreds—actually, thousands—across the country have been evicted through that process. Can the Minister not do something to bring forward the abolition of section 21 and look at the real issue, which is rent control within the private rented sector, because we are subsidising it through taxpayers’ money?”
“I thank the Minister for the statement and for the aspiration to end homelessness, which is extremely welcome. I have two areas of concern. One is the insufficiency of council house building happening at the moment and the way in which almost every local authority seeks, in their terms, to balance a development, which includes properties for sale or properties for a rent much higher than a social level. That means that, in constituencies such as mine, a social cleansing of an entire borough ends up taking place as people cannot get council housing because so much is being built for other people to make money out of. The second issue is related to the private rented sector. Even though I welcome the end of section 21 evictions, they are still going on and will do so until May.”
“The idea that a beautiful place such as Kashmir, with such history and potential, should be divided and occupied by the military, and that resources go into the military and into what becomes a security state because of the tensions over the occupation of Kashmir is incomplete decolonisation. It is decolonisation that should have happened in the 1940s. Britain, because of its colonial history, has a very special responsibility to ensure that the people of Kashmir are able to decide their own future.”
“The Indian military presence in Indian-occupied Kashmir is now the biggest it has been for a very long time. Successive laws have been passed, particularly by the Modi Government, to reduce the special status of Kashmir—which at least gave a nod towards the idea that it was an international dispute to be settled—and, essentially, to try to fully annex it. I hope that, when the Minister replies, he will tell us that the Government recognise, first, that the issue should go to the UN, that the Government will push it at the UN as a permanent member of the Security Council, and that the Government will revisit the UN statements made in the 1940s and the many since. Secondly, I hope that the Government will do everything they can to encourage the self-determination of the people on both sides of the line of control in Kashmir.”
“They are from Kashmir themselves, or they have grandparents, parents and many relatives in Kashmir; there is a very close relationship. They feel angry—the hon. Member for Bradford East put this well—that at every election, when party leaders happen to descend on Birmingham, Bradford or parts of London, they are given a note by their offices saying, “Say something about Kashmir, because it’ll go down well.” They do, and it does go down well, and that is the end of the story. Absolutely nothing has been done, by any Government, for a very long time to promote the idea that the people of Kashmir should be allowed to decide their own future. That is not to say that there are not serious imperfections in both Azad Kashmir and Jammu Kashmir.”
“The partition encouraged massive levels of arms expenditure in both countries, doing enormous damage to the social infrastructure of both societies, in the ’50s, ’60s and ever since. It then encouraged both countries to develop nuclear weapons and to leave the nuclear non-proliferation treaty. The inadequacy of British behaviour in the 1940s led to the militarisation of the whole of the subcontinent; the loss of thousands of lives in successive conflicts between India and Pakistan, as well as with China; and, of course, the ever presence of nuclear weapons. If we look at India’s and Pakistan’s expenditure on defence compared with the expenditure that should be going on education and social needs, we begin to see the consequences of the issue. Many people in this country feel very strongly about this issue.”
“I will be brief, because a lot of colleagues want to get in. I compliment the hon. Member for Bradford East (Imran Hussain) on his superb presentation, which showed passion and knowledge of the issue. The fundamental issue, of course, is the one that the hon. Gentleman hit on many times: this is not a bilateral issue between India and Pakistan, but an international issue that comes from all that went on in the process of the decolonisation of British India in 1947-48. It was India that referred the issue to the United Nations for resolution, so India’s constant denial that it is a UN matter fits rather strangely with Indian political history ever since that time. The effects of the partition of Kashmir and the line of control have been beyond dramatic for both India and Pakistan.”
“What plans do the UK Government have to take the issue to the UN? We must ensure the UN is seized of the issue in a way that it has not been. It has obviously tried to bring about a ceasefire when there has been conflict between India and Pakistan, but that is not enough; there has to be a fundamental resolution to the basic problem, which is the lack of a right to self-determination for the people of Kashmir.”
“Further to that point of order, Mr Speaker. Thank you for what you just said in response to the point of order from the right hon. Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell). Is there any way you can ensure that a Minister comes to this House to give a statement about the hunger strikers in the prison? I visited one of them yesterday, and I am deeply concerned about what is going on in our prisons: people are being held for an inordinate length of time on remand, and their access to justice is being delayed.”
“It risks creating a two-tier Britain, where access to basic services—healthcare, housing, employment, even voting—depends on whether someone has the right app, paperwork, or digital trail.” The second states that such measures “entrench a presumption of suspicion, not trust, and put disproportionate burdens on the most vulnerable: migrants, the digitally excluded, the disabled, the elderly, and those without stable housing or documentation.””
“Thank you for calling me to speak, Sir Edward. The number of Members here and the demand for the debate show two things: first, it should be held in the main Chamber, not here, and secondly there are massive levels of public concern over the statement made by the Prime Minister. I will refer to two quotes that I have received from constituents and that summarise the situation very well. One states: “Digital ID is a deeply illiberal idea that threatens privacy, autonomy, and the open society we should be standing for.”
“Unfortunately, the Government are now making that available to private healthcare interests at the same time. There is a huge issue here about our data, our information and our privacy, which we would do well to remember. The last point I want to make is that the debate on this issue is being pushed by commercial interests that will make a great deal of money out of providing the necessary technical equipment to set up this surveillance system. They will do very well out of it, and we are being pushed into agreeing it by them. It is time for Members of Parliament to listen to what people are saying, listen to the concerns, have a proper debate in the main Chamber about this and say no to the Government, as we have said no before.”
“The right hon. Member makes an important point. The huge number of people who have signed this petition indicates to me that many in this country are deeply concerned about the direction in which we are travelling. ID cards are one thing; restricting jury trials is another. Facial recognition at tube stations and now even in supermarkets is something that people find deeply disturbing. Across the country there is a whole vein of thought where people are feeling a quite reasonable sense of paranoia about the levels of surveillance that they are under at the present time. Members of Parliament would do well to try to understand that. This attack on civil liberties—that is what it is—means that utterly vast amounts of information on all of us will be stored, as they are already in the health service.”
“Does the Minister accept that this is an incredibly dangerous, massive build-up of military force in the Caribbean, and that it can only be dangerous to the people not just of Venezuela but of every other country and island within the region? Surely there should be some move towards peace, rather than allowing this military confrontation to develop.”
“I compliment the hon. Member for Bicester and Woodstock (Calum Miller) on securing this urgent question. Could the Minister be very clear? What the US is doing, in bombing vessels at sea in both international and potentially territorial waters, is illegal, as is the harassment of Trinidadian fishing communities. The threat now of bombardment on the Venezuelan mainland is completely illegal within all sections of international law. Have the British Government made any representations to the US on this, and what role do the British Government play at the United Nations in the discussions about this issue?”
“This is, I think, the third attempt by successive Governments to reduce the right to trial by jury. It is a fundamental right in our system that should not be undermined, and particularly not because the Government have a current and, hopefully, temporary problem with capacity. In answer to the hon. Member for Liverpool Riverside (Kim Johnson), the Minister recognised that the Lammy inquiry of 2017 found that jury trials are more objective than judge-only trials, less likely to be racially biased and likely to give a fairer outcome. Is the Minister really content that we should be walking away from the jury trial system because of the current problems? Instead, is the answer not, as other hon. Members have suggested, to invest more in the system to deal with the appalling backlog, which she rightly says we have?”
“I have friends who send me stuff from the west bank and Gaza, and this weekend I was reading about one man who has been left looking after 26 grandchildren because all his children, his partner and his immediate family have been killed. He is an elderly man looking after 26 children, but that is not an unusual situation. He has no money or home, so he is trying to build a tent to house them all. That is the reality of what has happened because of this bombardment.”
“I will be brief, Ms McVey. I simply say this: anyone who has observed what has happened in Gaza over the past 18 months must be disgusted and appalled at what they have seen—the deaths of children, the deaths of adults and the continued bombardment—and at the role that Britain has played in supplying arms to Israel that have contributed to all that. It is an utterly disgusting situation. History will be very harsh on European and north American politicians who stood by and allowed those weapons to be supplied, knowing full well what was happening to them, while we were watching genocide on live television. Whole families have been destroyed.”
“If we believe in international law, as this Parliament and Britain always claim—we helped to write the European convention on human rights and the United Nations universal declaration of human rights—we must stand by it and ensure that the Israeli Government are taken to task for their breaches of human rights around the world.”
“Member and I have visited the International Court of Justice at The Hague, and I sat through the entire hearing when South Africa made its application—a moving and fascinating experience. The case was made brilliantly by South Africa, which was condemned by Members on both sides of the House for even bringing the case of genocide against Israel. While it put its case, I was looking at the wonderful ceiling in the Peace Palace and thinking back to when all South Africa’s current leaders were called terrorists and denounced for undermining and upsetting the apartheid regime. They finished apartheid, and then they gave their support to the people of Palestine—well done, South Africa, for having the bravery to do that. We need to understand the importance of international law.”
“Both the Conservative and Labour Governments have a pretty bad record on this, and I would have thought that the very least we could do now is say that there can be absolutely no arms sales of any sort or any military co-operation with Israel. The so-called ceasefire in the Trump plan basically ensures Israel’s continued occupation of substantial parts of Gaza. It does not say very much about the abominable behaviour of Israeli armed settlers on the west bank, who are destroying villages and killing people as we speak. Surely this House needs to send the strong message that we recognise the right of the Palestinian people to live in peace, as well as recognising the importance and primacy of international law—the hon. Member for Leeds East (Richard Burgon) made that point very strongly. The hon.”