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 7 of 173.
“Two Israeli officials are now wanted by the International Criminal Court for crimes against humanity. Britain has played a highly influential role in Israel’s military operations. First, Britain has been supplying weapons to Israel that are being used to bomb the people of Palestine. This, of course, started with the previous Conservative Government, but it has continued with the current Labour Government. In fact, between October and December 2024 alone, more arms export licences were granted than were approved by the previous Government for the whole of 2020 and 2023. In September ’23, the Government suspended some licences but continued to allow the supply of F-35 components to the global pool.”
“Over the past 18 months, human beings have endured a level of horror and inhumanity that should haunt us all forever: entire families wiped out; limbs strewn across the street; mothers screaming for their children buried under the rubble; human beings torn to pieces; doctors performing amputations without anaesthetic; and children picking grass and dirt from the ground, thinking that they might find something edible. The survivors will face lifelong mental health consequences that will go on for generations. Home by home, hospital by hospital and generation by generation, we are not just witnessing a war; we are witnessing a genocide—this time being livestreamed all over the world. Today, the death toll in Gaza exceeds 61,000, and at least 110,000 people—one in 20 of the entire population—have been severely injured.”
“However, they could not prevent the inevitable, and in 2016 we had the publication of the Chilcot inquiry, which Sir John Chilcot had undertaken over several years. The report found serious failings within the British Government, who ignored the warnings of millions of ordinary people who had been protesting on the streets against the invasion. I was the leader of the Labour party when the report came out, and I apologised on behalf of the Labour party for the catastrophic decision to go to war in Iraq. History is now repeating itself.”
“I beg to move, That leave be given to bring in a Bill to make provision for establishing an independent public inquiry into UK involvement in Israeli military operations in Gaza; to require the inquiry to consider any UK military, economic or political cooperation with Israel since October 2023, including the sale, supply or use of weapons, surveillance aircraft and Royal Air Force bases; to provide the inquiry with the power to question Ministers and officials about decisions taken in relation to UK involvement; and for connected purposes. In the aftermath of the Iraq war, several attempts were made to establish an inquiry surrounding the conduct of British military operations. The Government of the day spent many years resisting those attempts and demands for an inquiry.”
“I find it deeply depressing to hear the Secretary of State say that somehow or other there is a market solution there for Thames Water. We have had 35 years of excessive profits, pollution and rising bills. He knows he will have to take Thames Water into public ownership at some point. He quotes this strange figure of £100 billion in compensation, but surely if we took it into public ownership, Parliament would set the price at which we would purchase the company, taking into account excessive profits, pollution, damage and the destruction of so many people’s lives through the way Thames Water has behaved. Will the Secretary of State be tough with it for once and say that water is a human right, and that it should be publicly owned and publicly run?”
“It was a Labour Government led by Harold Wilson in the 1960s that initiated the nuclear non-proliferation treaty, and it was during the cold war that the number of nuclear warheads was reduced by the five declared nuclear weapon states. This announcement by the Secretary of State, and today’s talk of increasing nuclear warheads, is in breach of the nuclear non-proliferation treaty and is at variance with the global nuclear ban concept of getting rid of nuclear weapons. How is the world made safer by the ability to destroy it more times over than exists at present? Where is the strategy for nuclear disarmament? Where is the strategy for peace?”
“Surely we could be doing things in a way that brings about a more peaceful world, rather than just pouring more and more money into weapons.”
“The world is in the midst of an arms race. Last year, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, $2.7 trillion was spent on arms—a 9% increase on the previous year. The Secretary of State is proposing a substantial increase in defence expenditure by this country. I find it sad and disappointing that in the review there is no analysis, documentation or process for how we reduce tensions around the world, bring an end to existing conflicts, and enhance and empower the world’s institutions, such as the United Nations, to avoid conflict in future, so that we can deal with the real issues of insecurity—poverty and hunger—that force so many people around the world to become refugees.”
“When the right hon. Member has finished denigrating every community that has made its home in this country, will he reflect for a moment on the massive contribution made in education, in health, in transport and in many other industries by people who have come to this country? When he goes into a hospital, does he criticise those people who have come from another country and are working in our hospitals, looking after us and the health service, or is he interested only in denigrating people because they were born speaking a different language and they look different from him?”
“Can the Foreign Secretary tell us exactly what arms have been supplied to Israel over the past six months? What arms are being supplied now to Israel? What is RAF Akrotiri being used for? Is it supporting the Israeli war machine? Can he inform the House categorically that no component part of an F-35 jet made in Britain is being supplied to Israel, for it to continue its bombardment of Gaza?”
“Even if the Minister cannot condemn what is obviously an act of genocide, will he tell us in clear terms whether we are still supplying parts for F-35 jets that find their way to Israel and take part in the bombardment of Gaza? Are there still flights going from RAF Akrotiri over to Israel that are carrying military equipment that can be used either to bomb Gaza or to undertake military action against the people of the west bank?”
“95.] Do you agree, Madam Deputy Speaker, that this kind of language, innuendo and inaccuracy is unbecoming of this place and not fit to be uttered in this building, and that Members when they speak in Parliament should show respect for each other, rather than risk bringing our whole political process into disrepute? I have no problem with debate, but people should not stoop to abuse, fundamental inaccuracies and conjecture, as the hon. Member did, and I have informed him so already.”
“On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. I have given notice to the Speaker’s Office and the hon. Member for Ashfield (Lee Anderson) of this point of order. I refer to column 95 of Hansard on Monday 12 May. In an intervention on the Minister in the debate on border security and immigration, the Member claimed that “more than 600 illegal migrants have entered this country today. They could get up to all sorts of mischief, and commit crimes and maybe even acts of terrorism. Does she agree that these young men crossing the channel should be immediately detained and deported, along with the right hon. Member for Islington North (Jeremy Corbyn)?” —[ Official Report , 12 May 2025; Vol. 767, c.”
“Could the Home Secretary explain why, in the introduction of this White Paper, the language of Enoch Powell was used by the Prime Minister? There has been no speaking up about the enormous value of migration to this country, which has kept our NHS running, our education service running and so much more, and that there are already 130,000 vacancies in the care sector. Does anything in her White Paper do anything to improve community relations or deal with the labour shortage now in the NHS and the care service, or is it all about trying to please these people—Reform Members—who unfortunately sit in front of me?”
“I thank the Minister for the remarks she just made. Would she accept that people who make an incredibly dangerous journey and are exploited in doing so are often totally desperate, are victims of human rights abuse and war, and have been through horrendous journeys to get there? One day, they will find somewhere where they will be able to live their lives and make a contribution to our society. As a world, do we not need to look at the plight of refugees as a whole and do much more to try to bring an end to the conditions that force people to seek these desperate journeys in the first place?”
“In the past year, 100,000 tonnes of bombs have been dropped on Gaza, which is the equivalent of five times the power of the nuclear weapons used over Hiroshima and Nagasaki some 80 years ago. That action in Gaza has resulted in the deaths of at least 60,000 people, and on top of that we are now going to have the complete invasion of Gaza by Israel. At what point will the Government cease all arms supplies and military co-operation with Israel, cease the use of RAF Akrotiri and, above all, stop the export of any parts for F-35 jets, which have been complicit in the killing of 60,000 people in Gaza? Surely it is time for the British Government to say no: no more, no weapons, no co-operation, no support, and to save lives in Gaza and the west bank. Now is the time to say and do that.”
“In reply to an earlier question, the Secretary of State talked about the devastation in Yemen, with 11 million people in desperate need of help and support, and the civil war conditions that pertain there. On the armed intervention that Britain made yesterday, we all need to know where it will lead, what the end game is, whether we are involved in an internal war in Yemen, and what the long-term implications of our involvement are. Ultimately, there has to be some kind of peace process in Yemen, just as much as there has to be in Gaza and elsewhere in the region. Does this action bring peace nearer, or does it exacerbate the danger of a widening conflict?”
“Can I invite the Minister to bring a greater sense of urgency to the situation? There are children starving to death in Gaza and dying for lack of medicines. There is no water and hardly any power going in. The hospitals are not functioning. That is all a disaster made by the deliberate action of the Israel Defence Forces. What action is the Minister taking to ensure that the blockade ends and that food, medicine and all the necessities for life go in? Those people who are dying of starvation can see food over the fence in Israel, but they are being deliberately starved to death.”
“I thank the Secretary of State for his statement. He quite rightly drew attention to the huge number of losses of Russian troops in the conflict, and the equally huge number of losses on the Ukrainian side. After the unsuccessful attempt at a ceasefire over Easter, does he see any prospect of anyone else intervening to try to bring about talks between Russia and Ukraine that could lead to a lasting ceasefire and ultimately a settlement? The late Pope Francis tried to intervene, as did the African Union and a number of Latin American leaders. This war cannot go on forever. Somebody has to intervene to try to bring about a process that will lead to a ceasefire that will stop the tragic loss of so many lives.”
“I agree with the right hon. Member that we need a steel industry in Britain and that we need to invest in it. Does he not think that we could be going a bit further today and, instead of this temporary measure, taking the whole steel industry into public ownership so it can be what it has always been—the bedrock of manufacturing industry in Britain—and give us security for the future, free from market forces?”
“I take this opportunity to thank the Minister for supporting the hon. Members for Earley and Woodley (Yuan Yang) and for Sheffield Central (Abtisam Mohamed), as well as any other Member attempting to make the same journey in order to acquaint themselves with the situation. Could he bring us up to date on what is happening regarding the supply of arms and weapons to Israel? Can he assure the House that the Government will suspend the sale of parts that make up the F-35 jets that are being used to bomb and strafe Gaza, kill so many people, and destroy schools and hospitals by targeting them? Will he also tell us exactly what RAF Akrotiri is being used for, and why there are so many flights from that base into Israel? Is it delivering weapons?”
“I hope that she will look at the existing licences and see where we can reduce incineration to a much lower level, although I recognise that it is difficult to get rid of it straightaway. Finally, I hope that there will be a big Government initiative on recycling rates. That will mean looking at household as well as industrial collections. Too little is recycled, and too much food waste goes into landfill or to incineration when it could and should be composted. But if we have 45 different systems to collect household waste, we are bound to get confusion. Let us have a simpler system, much better composting and recycling, and an attitude that is about working with our environment, not destroying it.”
“We need a different and better approach to waste in this country. Incineration is a sort of faux recycling. People say, “It’s okay—it’s burned; it’s gone.” It is not gone. It is burned, and pollution comes from it. Yes, we generate electricity from it and get some road-building materials from the ash, but surely we should look at recycling rates instead. The Government’s own estimate is that 55% of all waste is readily recyclable, quite a bit more is partially recyclable and only 8% to 10% is absolutely impossible to recycle. Our society needs a different approach and a different attitude. I hope that the Minister will tell us that there will be no new licences for new incinerators in this country.”
“The problem is that we are stuck with a private finance initiative-type incinerator that needs a vast amount of rubbish to keep it going.” Geneva has to truck burnable waste from Milan through the Alps to keep the incinerator going. This is the economics of the madhouse. I recognise that we cannot immediately end all incineration, but the fact is that the Edmonton incinerator, which produces 700,000 tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions every year, is being expanded. The recycling rates of north London boroughs are better than they were, but none of them is very good. The Minister will probably remember the occasion when she and I were both in Islington—she was a councillor—and we discovered that some Islington waste had turned up in Indonesia, which is obviously a handy place to take waste from Finsbury Park. It is utterly absurd.”
“The modelling even predicted that it would import waste from Europe to keep the incinerator going, because the design was far too big. I can see hon. Members nodding in agreement, because exactly the same kind of nonsense has been talked elsewhere. When the Government are represented at the UN plastics treaty convention in Geneva this August, they might, if they have a moment, have a chat with the mayor of Geneva. I spent an interesting evening with him some years ago, and I asked him what problems he had. I complimented him on the levels of recycling in the city, which are very high—it is well run. He said, “Fantastic.”
“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Lewell. I welcome this crucial debate, the way it was introduced by the hon. Member for Derby South (Baggy Shanker) and the excellent intervention by the hon. Member for Derby North (Catherine Atkinson). We have had debates in the past in Westminster Hall in which, unusually, the right hon. Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Sir Iain Duncan Smith) and I joined forces— [ Laughter. ] Yes, it is true. We joined forces to oppose the expansion of the Edmonton incinerator for a number of reasons: first, that it would create high levels of pollution; secondly, that it is in quite a poor area of north London; and thirdly, that the exhaust gases would descend over Essex and land there, causing all kinds of problems. We opposed it because it was over capacity.”
“On recycling, does the Minister agree that one of the problems is that there are too many collection systems that operate differently in different boroughs and different places? Secondly, people living in flats often find it very difficult to store waste for weekly collection, and the levels of compostable waste recycling are very low in those places. Does the Department agree, and is the Minister prepared to take any action to improve those rates of recycling?”
“The previous Government undertook secretive trade negotiations with the USA that included health. Will the Secretary of State assure the House that in any bilateral discussions with the USA, there will be no question of US private healthcare interests coming into Britain to undermine our national health service or, indeed, take over sections of it?”
“Can I ask the Minister to bring a sense of urgency to this? The people of Gaza are starving. Every bakery is closed. There is insufficient water. There is no power. No schools are open. No hospitals are fully functioning. It is an utterly desperate situation, yet I believe we are still allowing RAF Akrotiri to be used as a staging point for Israel and still supplying parts for F-35 jets, which are bombing the people of Gaza and bombing the rubble there. What are the Government doing to ensure that Israel stops the bombing and that food aid gets through very, very urgently for the people of Gaza, merely to help them survive?”
“I compliment the hon. Member on his Bill. To help his argument, there was overwhelming opinion poll support for public ownership of water in 2017 and 2019, and there still is today.”
“The hon. Member is making an important point about river pollution, and she is absolutely right. Would she agree that there is also a planning issue? There are too many paved spaces, and not enough run-off is available to go into the ground water. We need a holistic approach that includes much more assertive planning policies on drainage. Otherwise, we end up with sewage in our rivers during periods of heavy rainfall.”
“Even the Ted Heath Government in 1971 brought Rolls-Royce into public ownership and created Rolls-Royce (1971) Ltd because the company was failing. The agreed share price was set by Parliament—it was not set by the market in all those cases. We can do the same in this case.”
“That makes sense, because that is where the primary water supply comes from. That would be managed through a commission that includes the workforce, trade unions, all the local authorities in the area, local businesses, because they use water and supply services locally, and others who can be appointed from elsewhere. We would have public buy-in to the structure, which would give us a much better and more democratic system. I urge Members to look with some imagination at what the hon. Member for Norwich South has put forward. Some say, “We can’t possibly bring this into public ownership because it might cost money.” The 1945 Labour Government started by nationalising the Bank of England in 1946 and went on to bring many other industries into public ownership.”
“It is in tax havens all over the world. We are subsidising tax havens all over the world on the back of our polluted and privatised water industry. Clause 2 relates to the commission on water, which is a fascinating proposal. The commission would include representatives of water companies—which are privatised at the moment but would hopefully be publicly owned—union representatives in the water industry, environmental or conservation groups, water users, which would be local businesses, and local authorities. I strongly support public ownership of water, but I do not envisage a situation in which the Prime Minister, as a gift to his friends, puts them all on a British water board. I would like to retain the existing system of managing river basin areas—Thames, Severn Trent and so on.”
“Surely we can do much better. I therefore welcome the Bill, and I invite Members to look seriously at clauses 1 and 2. Clause 1 sets out the measures that will be required in the Secretary of State’s strategy, including measures on prioritising investment, collaborating with local authorities and using natural flood management techniques, and a requirement for local authorities to take into account the need for conservation—all incredibly sensible measures that can only be delivered by public authorities. Privatised water companies do not have as their top line the conservation of the natural world and the environment. They have as their top line, their middle line and their bottom line the profits they can take out of it. And please, nobody tell me that the £72 billion paid out in dividends has been reinvested in the British economy.”
“That amounts to £2 billion a year not invested in water—not invested in new pipes and in protecting the system we have. Those profits are extraordinary. The hon. Member for Hackney South and Shoreditch (Dame Meg Hillier) rightly talked about the amount of pollution flowing into our rivers. I cannot get my head around the fact that 300,000 hours-worth of sewage was pumped into the Thames in the last year alone. When we add that to the amount being pumped into the Severn, the Trent, the Humber, the Mersey and all the great rivers across this country, we realise the scale of the problem we are dealing with. We then realise what happens to that—the sewage goes into the sea, and it comes back in fish. It pollutes water, which does not stop at the river’s mouth; it goes into the oceans, creating further global water pollution.”
“We also pointed out that the water infrastructure we enjoy—the reservoirs in Wales, in Scotland and all over England, the piping, the sewage works, and all the other hugely complex elements of infrastructure—was, for the most part, built by public enterprise and public investment. We all laud the work of Bazalgette in producing a sewage system for London. That was not done by the private sector; it was done through Victorian investment in a public structure to bring about proper treatment of sewage and provide clean water for the people of London. We should be proud of the public investment that brought about the water system that we have, and should recognise that since 1989, when water was privatised, £72 billion has been taken out in dividends by the water companies.”
“Most countries around the world do not even countenance the idea of privatising water; they say, “It is our public responsibility to ensure that we can provide clean and safe water for everybody.” When the Government of Margaret Thatcher and others privatised water in the 1980s, many of us strongly opposed it—I think I am the only Member in the Chamber who had the privilege of voting against privatisation at the time. We predicted that it would lead to a rip-off of the public sector, and to asset stripping of the land and other resources that the water boards had built up.”
“I compliment my good friend the hon. Member for Norwich South (Clive Lewis) on his passion, commitment, knowledge and determination. If I may say so, I am also grateful that he mentioned the late, great David Graeber in his introduction. He was a good friend to both of us, an amazing young man and an amazing philosopher sadly taken from us too soon. I think his family will be really chuffed that the hon. Member has included him in his speech on something so fundamental as the right to fresh, clean water for us all. This Bill seeks to protect that right; it recognises that water is an essential and basic need, and therefore something so universal and so essential surely ought to be completely in public hands.”
“It gives an opportunity for randomly selected ordinary citizens to put forward a point of view. That was done a lot in Scotland when we were talking about devolution. It has been done in other places; in Chile, it was done to develop a new constitution, some of which was ultimately rejected in a referendum. Do these assemblies take away from or diminish the principles discussed? No. I believe they do the very opposite.”
“I do not resile from what was in that manifesto, because it was put there by people who worked in the industry. The GMB and other unions took part in the consultation that brought about that policy on water. I urge the hon. Member to consider the Bill put forward by my friend the hon. Member for Norwich South, and to recognise that it is an opportunity to do something different. There has been a lot of to-ing and fro-ing about having a commission, or a citizens’ assembly. Why is everybody so scared of a citizens’ assembly? What is the big problem with it? Is it something in Members’ heads? What is going on? Why would anyone be so worried about it? Citizens get together and put forward a proposal. We do not have to agree it or accept it, and it does not take away the powers of Parliament.”
“I thank the hon. Member for that incredibly friendly and helpful intervention. I am most grateful to him for the collegiate way in which he put that; I could not put it better myself. That manifesto included public ownership of water and other services because those industries needed to come into public ownership; they were failing. The policies in that manifesto were all well in the plus category—more than 70% supported public ownership of water. This might be uncomfortable for him, but the Labour party actually received more votes publicly and nationally in 2019 than it did in the recent general election. We have an electoral system that is unbelievably unfair, and which brought about an enormous majority on a very low total vote. We can all play with the numbers.”
“Since the hon. Member used to live in Islington, he is well aware of how great the connectivity to the area is. Obviously, we live in a country where the capital, London, is in the south-east. That is maybe not an ideal geographical location, but I do not think it is going to change any time soon. If we have a national commission, it has to meet somewhere—it does not have to be in London. Do we have to pay the cost of getting people to the meetings? Yes, of course, obviously we do. I envisage a more localised form of consultation in regional water areas, such as Severn Trent, Humber and so on. I think that would meet the concerns that the hon. Gentleman legitimately raises about the overly centric nature of our political structures in this country.”
“I do not think there is a contradiction at all. I think it is mature, grown-up politics to say, “We have the objective of public ownership. We want you to consider what the best form and structure of it would be.” It could be that people do not agree with it at all; we would then have to discuss and debate the matter with them. Obviously, ultimately Parliament has to make the decision. I know everyone in the House is brilliant; the intellect is superb, and the knowledge amazing, and they are infallible in all their judgments, but is it just possible that there are some people who are not Members of Parliament who also have enormous knowledge, experience and ability? Perhaps we should listen to them, too.”
“Some people would not require any training or skills development at all; others might, and of course a short period would be needed for that. This is more a question for the promoter of the Bill. If the hon. Member for Norwich South wishes to intervene, I would be happy to give way on this point.”
“I thank the hon. Member for Norwich South for that helpful reply to the hon. Member for Bermondsey and Old Southwark (Neil Coyle). I am just doing my best to facilitate debate here, and I hope that you, Madam Deputy Speaker, will appreciate the congenial atmosphere that I am trying to create. I do not know whether it is working; please let me know later.”
“We will stop polluting our rivers and seas, and we will have river basin management to ensure that flooding, if not ended—we are not going to end it completely—will at least be under control through natural as well as other means. Let us end the waste and start investing in a sustainable future for all of us. That is what the Bill does.”
“That is the irresponsibility of Thames Water not investing in the network, wasting money in the short term by digging up short sections of road, replacing the pipe, filling it in again and coming back the next month to dig up another bit of road 100 metres away to do exactly the same thing. We need a much more coherent and comprehensive approach. The Bill put forward by the hon. Member for Norwich South gives us the chance to do something better and do something different: to make our water a public asset and a public resource; and to take it away from those who have done so much damage to it. Instead, let us do something better and say that we are going to provide all the people of this country with good quality clean water.”
“The commonality was: clean water; ownership and control; the cost of water; and anger and irritation at Thames Water’s lack of investment in the pipe network, including the lack of re-sleeving of the Victorian mains in so many places. We have had major floods on Isledon Road, Stroud Green Road, Holloway Road and Seven Sisters Road in the recent past, not to mention one in the constituency of Hackney North and Stoke Newington—not the constituency of the hon. Member for Hackney South and Shoreditch (Dame Meg Hillier), who has been speaking today—which flooded into our area. The Sobell leisure centre, near where I live, was flooded out. It is now two and a half years later and the restitution works for the damage done are just being completed.”
“Every day I walk up Seven Sisters Road and outside every shop is a great stack of plastic bottles of water, because people do not trust the water. Would it not be nice if we totally trusted our water and did not feel the need endlessly to buy plastic bottles of water to keep us going through the day? Last Saturday, I took part in a local people’s forum in my constituency. We invited people to come to discuss water and the water supply. The hall was completely full and the forum was also followed online by a number of other people. We had two excellent speakers: Johnbosco Nwogbo from We Own It, and Laura Reineke from Friends of the Thames. They both spoke with passion, knowledge and interest. We then threw open the discussion for questions and asked each table to come up with their ideas.”