Sir Edward Leigh
MP for Gainsborough · Conservative · United Kingdom
“Those of us who love the Jewish people and faith know that the reason why they have overcome all the empires that have tried to destroy them is that they are primarily people of the book and not the sword, but what is happening in the west bank is violent and egregious.”
“I am grateful to the Secretary of State for looking again at Lincolnshire. I made the point to her predecessor that the proposal for a Greater Lincolnshire authority was, in the eyes of many people, just a gerrymander. Will she look again at it and stop dividing West Lindsey and North Kesteven in half?”
“If the centre does not take action, nasty extremes will take over. The fact is that we are in acute danger. These people can now launch from anywhere on the north French coast and are escorted to our shores. Frankly, we are being invaded, and the public are completely fed up.”
“May I congratulate the Prime Minister on what he said about Ukraine and on how he conducted himself there? Our enemies should know that this House is completely and utterly united in standing behind the Ukrainian people.”
“What concerns me is the jobs of my constituents who work at Scunthorpe. That is all I am worried about; I have no ideological objection. If it is what is needed now, fair enough. As long as the blast furnaces are totally uneconomic because of high energy costs, however, it can only be a sticking plaster.”
“One of the poorest wards in the entire country is Gainsborough south-west ward. Why is the Secretary of State splitting West Lindsey in half? Why is he taking Scampton away from Gainsborough? It makes no sense. Why is he cutting away the nuclear fusion site from Lincoln?”
The complete record
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“Those of us who have concerns about the Bill are, of course, totally committed to humanitarian aid. However, as the right hon. Gentleman said, there are many competing demands on the Government. For instance, does he think that we should enshrine in legislation a commitment to spend 2% of our gross wealth on defence, which is vital to our security?”
“The right hon. Gentleman makes a very powerful emotional argument, which we can all understand and support. He will be aware, however, that serious academic studies, not least by the House of Lords Economic Affairs Committee and the Centre for Global Development, question the effectiveness of this target. For instance, they say that “the speed of the planned increase risks reducing the quality, value for money and accountability of the aid programme”, and “the right amount of aid for poor countries should not be based on the size of rich economies but on the needs of a particular poor country itself.” Will the right hon. Gentleman reply to those serious academic arguments?”
“The Minister and I have stood shoulder to shoulder for the last 25 years in this place arguing as Conservatives that we should be judged not by how much we spend on something, but by the value for money of what we achieve. Is that not a fair Conservative viewpoint? I and those who share my views on this Bill may be in a minority in this Chamber today, but many millions of Conservatives in the country support what we are saying.”
“Government is about priorities, and we are already achieving this budget. Is the shadow Minister surprised that in giving his wholehearted support to this Bill and ensuring its passage into Committee, the Minister is ensuring that the EU referendum Bill—the Government claim this is a passionate part of our belief that we are determined to bring forward—will never happen?”
“On a point of order, Mr Deputy Speaker. The debate will soon have been going on for two hours. Before the proponents of the Bill move the closure, you will want to have at least one speech against it, will you not?”
“Is not the most important point that if we fix a Department’s budget as a proportion of the nation’s income, we grossly distort the actions of that Department? Departments should spend what they can afford on what they want to do within the limits of what is in the national interest. This measure would be grossly distorting and un-Conservative.”
“In its first year, the society managed to bring more than 60 offences to the courts. It was awarded royal patronage by Queen Victoria in 1840. We all know of the vital work of the RSPCA, so it does not need to be underlined. There is already much legislation on the statute book. To name a few, we have the Pet Animals Act 1951, the Breeding of Dogs Act 1973, the Breeding of Dogs Act 1991 and the Breeding and Sale of Dogs (Welfare) Act 1999. No one can deny the inhumane conditions that exist in puppy farms—they have been well listed today—and nobody can deny that more should be done to eliminate them from existence. Through their licensing of pet sellers, local authorities have all the inspection powers they need. When they are not satisfied that suitable welfare conditions exist, they can refuse operating licences.”
“Therefore, everybody who has spoken believes that we have a duty of care to these creatures and it is no surprise that so many of our constituents have written to us. They rightly feel strongly about the cruelties that puppies and kittens are forced to undergo in puppy farms, especially being separated far too early from their mothers. The point that I want to make in this debate is that an extraordinarily wide scope of legislation is available to local authorities and Ministers already. We should be proud of that legacy of legislation in our country, which goes back well over 100 years. The Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals was founded in 1824 by a group of zealous reformers, including such illustrious Members of this House as William Wilberforce and Richard Martin—both of whom were, incidentally, good high Tories.”
“Obviously, this is an emotive and emotional debate, especially for those of us who have welcomed dogs and cats into our homes and included them almost as members of our family. I will not talk about my own dog because it would be too emotional. Sadly, he has just passed away. However, I will talk about the dog of the former Member for Birmingham Sparkbrook, Lord Hattersley. He has written eloquently of his love for his departed dog, Buster. We all have similar stories to tell. It seems to me that dogs have many of the virtues that us politicians lack—particularly silence and loyalty. Our sympathy for these animals reflects the comfort and companionship that they provide, particularly for elderly people, in our increasingly atomised society.”
“That is a fair point and it leads directly to the last point that I need to make. All too often in this place, when we see abuses continuing, we fly to the temptation to create new legislation. What we need to do is to enforce the existing legislation better and ensure that it is modernised and updated, because it is in place.”
“Secondly, we need to proclaim the message that the key to this problem—all the organisations and charities that are involved in this matter agree with him about this—is to inform the consumer. It is the consumer who must make the informed choice, as we did, to go to the dog breeders to see the puppy with the mother. They should not buy a puppy in some halfway location or go to a pet shop. They should do their research and work out whether they have the resources to look after what is a living creature. I hope that we can send that message from the debate, rather than calling for more and more legislation.”
“That point is absolutely right. We have to resist the temptation to legislate. I say gently to my hon. Friend the Member for North Swindon (Justin Tomlinson) that I am not sure that it would be wise to stop pet shops selling puppies through legislation in this place. That might be too heavy-handed. We have to be careful that we do not, because of our concern and emotion about these subjects, bring in more legislation that might be unenforceable. We must remember that enormous numbers of puppies are brought in from without the jurisdiction and from where we have very little control. My hon. Friend the Member for Gloucester (Richard Graham) makes an important point. First, we need to enforce the legislation that we already have. Local authorities have the powers.”
“That is a fair point, but we can send out the message that if people go to a responsible dog breeder rather than buy a puppy off the internet, they are far more likely to acquire a dog that will not have behavioural problems in the future and will have been raised with its mother in a healthy and proper way. We need to explore how better to enforce existing legislation rather than add to the already deep panoply of laws and regulations. The Government are committed to not increasing regulation unless absolutely necessary. They should consider how they can better help local authorities to work against puppy farms, and Members of all parties, working together, must ensure that we create safe and humane conditions for animals throughout the United Kingdom.”
“For all the reasons that have been given, if we were to lose the Union, it would be not only a disaster for Scotland, but a national humiliation of catastrophic proportions. I say gently to the three party leaders that perhaps we have been a bit complacent up to now. I urge them, over the next two weeks, to drop everything else and stand shoulder to shoulder to fight for the Union that we love and believe in. [ Interruption. ]”
“On a point of order, Mr Speaker. In my experience, if a democratic assembly is to function properly, it is absolutely vital to uphold the authority of the Speaker.”
“If Islamic terrorism is the greatest threat we face, as we must all accept, surely our best policy is to maximise the coalition of the willing in the world, not to fight a two-front war. Given that Islamic terrorism is also an existential threat to the Russian state in Chechnya, does my right hon. Friend think there is a role for a British Prime Minister who is not parti pris in the ancient disputes in this area to try to broker a deal based on any move of Ukraine to the EU or NATO being balanced by similar moves to Russia and a federal solution for eastern Ukraine?”
“There is no way that that can be considered ethical, whether in terms of purely rational deductive natural law, or by the system of Christian ethics on which we in this country have traditionally relied. I hope hon. Members on both sides of the House, and from every part of the spectrum from right to left, can unite on that point. I support the motion.”
“In this age of globalisation, we will be divorcing ourselves from the entire community of nations in terms of bioethics. Do we really want to become a rogue state in terms of bioethics? No one can deny the debilitations and hardships that these diseases cause. No one is seeking to downplay that suffering, but this is not about a cure. This will neither heal nor cure a single human being suffering from these diseases. What is worse, when we talk about pronuclear transfer, is that that effectively requires the creation of human beings for the sole purpose of harvesting their useful parts. Is that really the sort of society in which we wish to live, in which persons—individuals—are created, their parts harvested and then destroyed, merely to provide for other human beings?”
“Friend the Member for Havant (Mr Willetts) that mitochondria contain DNA. They are present in every cell in the body and just because they are not nuclear does not mean that they are any less an integral part of a human being. The mitochondria that contain DNA interact with the nucleus and many scientists therefore believe that they contribute material to the identity of an individual. Bioethicists have up until this point expressed almost universal consensus on germ-line genetic modification of our fellow humans, rejecting it as grievously immoral and completely unethical. The consensus is worth pointing out as we must know what the proponents of mitochondrial transfer are asking us to dissent from. They are asking us to dissent from opinion in every other country in the world.”
“There has been a great deal of controversy over the past few decades about genetically modified plants and crops. Through the march of applied sciences and advances in agriculture we have managed to feed billions of people, but I am sure that all Members will agree that we are dealing with entirely separate issues when we talk about genetically modified food and what we are dealing with now, which is genetically modified people. We have only in the past 100 years come to terms with the debilitating, restrictive and oppressive results of centuries of racism buttressed by pseudo-scientific notions that have since been proved entirely false. How much more of a problem will we be confronted with when humanity is divided between the modified and the unmodified? I say to my right hon.”
“It has been said in the debate that we are not creating three or four-parent families, but given that the cells of a second mother will be used, will a child have a legal right to know the identity of the three or four people who contributed to their creation?”
“As the first Back Bencher to be called, may I warmly welcome the First Secretary of State to his post? I hope he does not view this as a gentle full stop to a most distinguished career and that he will be a reforming and great Leader of the House of Commons. Will he, in his remaining year in politics, push the reform agenda forward and, in particular, may we have a business of the House committee? That would transform Parliament and ensure that Parliament was in control of the business. Will he do it?”
“My hon. Friend is doing a great service to this cause just by raising it, so he should be proud of himself. Surely the answer to Labour Members’ interventions is that it is a question not of state or private but of looking at each case individually. If a private school happens to be more appropriate, there should not be bias against the fact that it is a private school. We should look at what is best for the child, should we not?”
“When will both political parties be honest about the massive looming black hole in health funding, with an ageing population demanding ever better care? We cannot afford to pay for it out of general taxation, so are we going to be honest and have an open debate about moving to the French system of social insurance in which people are charged and repaid if they do not have the means, giving them an infinitely better health service?”
“I support the principle of what the Government are trying to do, but, like many people, I would try to avoid pushing Bills through in one day. Why was this Bill delayed? Did the Liberals delay it?”
“I would have thought that our fundamental duty was to protect the freedom of the individual. As it happens, I support the Bill. However, if I may say so politely to the Minister, he owes us a bit more of an explanation when he sums up. It is fair enough if the Liberal party, with its traditions, has objected to many parts of the Bill. There should have been long arguments and objections. Why can we not just be told about them?”
“I will finish my point. If it takes three months to agree to something in the coalition, the Government should come back to us honestly and say, “It has taken all this time. We have finally come to an agreement. Here it is.” What is the urgency? It seems extraordinary that, on a matter as fundamental as the freedom of the individual, we are rushing things so much.”
“May I refer the Minister back to the question that was asked by my hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Sir William Cash)? Does this debate not underline the importance of the report of the European Scrutiny Committee on establishing the supremacy of Parliament? I am afraid that the Minister’s response was not absolutely clear. I think he said that the Government are “confident”. Surely on matters as important as the freedom of the individual and national security, we should be more than just confident; we should be sure of the supremacy of Parliament.”
“I would be interested to know the Opposition’s view on the issue of our laws being trumped by section 3 of the European Communities Act 1972, as suggested by my hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Sir William Cash) in the report of the European Scrutiny Committee. Does the right hon. Gentleman believe that, in the event of a Labour Government, there might be a case for passing legislation to proclaim the supremacy of Parliament so that we can protect ourselves from European legislation?”
“Would this House of Commons not be in a shameful position if, having caused this murderous civil war between Sunni and Shi’a by our wrong-headed invasion of Iraq, we now washed our hands of the situation? Nobody wants to commit ground troops again, but is there not a case to be made for committing advisers and, if necessary, special forces—any means necessary short of ground troops—to show our moral support for the existing Government in Iraq?”
“T5. The Red Arrows based at Scampton in my constituency are one of the most popular public faces of the RAF, but unfortunately their Hawk T1 aircraft ends its service in 2018. Can the Secretary of State give me an assurance that RAF Scampton has a future with the Red Arrows and that they will be provided with suitable aircraft?”
“Can the Foreign Secretary give us a bit more insight into the thinking of his Israeli counterparts? While we all accept the need for Israel to defend and deter, when he talks to the Israeli Foreign Minister does he get any sense that it must be more difficult for Israel to defend and deter if it is holding an entire people in the largest prison camp in the world in appalling conditions? Does he get any impression that common humanity calls out for peace and justice for the Palestinian people?”
“Surely most members of the public would congratulate the Government and the former Labour Government for being so robust on these matters. In the context of the wider debate, will the Home Secretary resist the advice given to her by the Liberal party that we should have further legal impediments? For the public, if there is a choice between their children being blown up on the tube or those people’s conversations being listened to, it is a no-brainer.”
“These are serious matters. Nobody wants to protect criminals. However, there is a lot of concern about these matters in the House of Commons, not least because it is difficult to argue to our people that we want to take powers back from the European Union if we are giving it powers. Will my right hon. Friend give the House an assurance that although this is effectively an Adjournment debate on a one-line Whip, there will be a substantive vote after a proper debate so that the House of Commons is able to vote on these matters?”
“I normally agree with everything that my hon. Friend the Member for Aldershot (Sir Gerald Howarth) says, but I wonder whether this quad thing is a bit of a myth. It is a convenient myth that the Prime Minister, the Foreign Secretary and the Home Secretary find useful in explaining why they cannot pursue Conservative policies, but surely the Prime Minister or the Foreign Secretary can instruct their civil servants. I cannot believe it—I may be wrong; my hon. Friend the Member for Harwich and North Essex (Mr Jenkin) is the Chair of the Public Administration Committee—but it is an extraordinary way to run a country.”
“Oceans of print have been written about what caused the assassination and the catastrophe that engulfed Europe in the years following. A lot has also been said in the debate about the responsibility of the Dutch and the Belgian troops—what they did and did not do—but we miss the point if we focus too much on that. Ultimately, what happened was not the fault of the Dutch or the Belgian troops; it was the fault of the people who conducted the massacre—they were the evil ones. The debate is important because it acknowledges that, somewhere in our human condition, there is a streak of evil, which can spring up in the most unlikely places and in all people. The point of this debate is surely to affirm a very simple principle, which I can articulate and then sit down: we are all part of one humanity.”
“I want to speak briefly, because it is important that people reading the debate realise there is all-party support for the hon. Member for Glasgow North (Ann McKechin) and for what she has done today. This is an important debate, partly because it is a memorial debate—there is not much we can do about these incidents, but we can talk about them. Often in our debates, we ask for finance, for something for the health service or for education. Occasionally, however, it is right that we in the House of Commons remember what happened in the past, even though there is little we can do about it. In that way, we can, I hope, draw some lessons. I have been to Sarajevo and stood at the corner where Franz Ferdinand was shot, and it is extraordinary to be at that place, which is on the cusp of history.”
“In a spirit of fraternity with my right hon. Friend, would not the best way of improving our electoral chances, and indeed of improving the functioning of Government, be to end the coalition now and to let the Conservatives govern on our own?”
“We have seen on television, such as during the Iraq conflicts, and from our own experience how families that are often desperate and have nothing—owning nothing, surviving on nothing—still make the effort to dress their children in immaculate uniforms to walk through bombed-out streets to get school. Education is extraordinarily important for them.”
“The point I want to stress and focus on for the rest of my speech is that it is children and not adults who lose their opportunity for education. Once that opportunity is lost, it is lost for ever and can never be repeated. Education is essential for children and particularly for children in conflict areas. It is a life chance that comes only once and a reasonable level of education is even more important for children who will be expected to build a peaceful recovery from conflict. Education keeps children safe. Obviously, if a child is in a school or in an educational environment, it is less likely that they will be married early, raped, abducted or recruited by armed groups. All that is much more unlikely when schools are open. Actually, education is prioritised by families in conflict areas.”
“They have committed terrible things and terrible things have happened to them, sometimes when they are just 13 or 14-years-old. War destroys livelihoods, and children are often seen as a way for distressed families to get income. Girls can be married early for a price or used as sex workers and boys can be sent out to work in fields and factories or to collect rubbish from the streets. I occasionally visit the middle east, and we see the desperate struggle for survival, particularly for Syrian refugees in Lebanon or Jordan when there is no social security available to any significant extent. In conflict situations, families are desperate to survive, and we all know that children have to be used as part of that.”
“Imagine a child in a conflict situation witnessing their mother being raped or their brother being dragged off as a child soldier or witnessing murders or the appalling scenes that have happened in Syria. That trauma will live with those children for ever. Children are targeted in conflict situations for sexual attacks. Girls and boys make up more than half the rape cases in such conflicts and that is an appalling statistic. Imagine the appalling emotional trauma of that. Children are also targeted by military groups that are keen to expand their ranks quickly and we have seen that in particular over the years in Congo. As I know from my visit to the Congo and as we all know, it is appalling to talk to former child soldiers who have been dragged into these events.”
“When a three-year-old loses their parents in a bomb attack, it is virtually impossible for them to survive alone. If a 25-year-old loses a parent, it is a tragedy, but they can survive. It is right that the House should focus particularly on the appalling impact of conflict on children, which is much greater than its impact on mature people. Of course, children suffer appalling and severe trauma from witnessing events. They do not have the life experience or emotional maturity to integrate a particular scene into the rest of their life. We have been brought up in a very comfortable environment, but we all know how even quite small events from our childhood can have a traumatic effect later on.”
“I am speaking today because both my elder daughters work for charities in Africa and have worked in Kenya, Rwanda, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and the Central African Republic. They keep me informed of their work and what is going on and, a few years ago, I visited the Congo with War Child to look at the appalling privations that children faced, particularly because of the conflict and the use of child soldiers. My visit had a deep impact on me and I am sure that, even despite all the excellent work of my hon. Friend the Minister and other Ministers in the FCO and DFID, there is still more that we can do. As I say, I want to concentrate on education, but why are children particularly vulnerable? It is an obvious point, but they are vulnerable because they are young.”
“The whole House will be grateful to the hon. Member for East Lothian (Fiona O'Donnell) for initiating this debate on protecting children in conflict. She was right to deal with the Palestinian situation, but I will not follow her example in any detail as I do not want to get involved in the debate about the rights and wrongs of the Palestinian issue, except for noting the suffering of both the Palestinian people and the Israeli people in a very difficult conflict. I want to make some general remarks about how the British Government could try to improve the protection of children in conflict areas, particularly when it comes to education. Education is the subject on which I want to focus and I would be grateful if the Minister could deal with that problem when he replies. I should perhaps declare a family interest.”
“That seems to me to be very low, and I was surprised when I saw that. I cannot believe that the figure is so low, but that is what I have been told. Donors simply did not prioritise that part of the UN appeals.”
“My hon. Friend has made that point very movingly. We live in such a comfortable environment here where education is, frankly, of a fantastically high standard and is free—paid for by the taxpayer—that we simply do not appreciate the appalling sacrifices made in places where education is not free by parents who have nothing. They make that huge effort to try to educate their children, because they know, as we know, that education is everything. We can establish a case that education is absolutely vital, therefore, in terms of taking children out of conflict situations and giving them life chances. So, having made that case, we would expect it to be prioritised by humanitarian agencies and Governments, but analysis of the 2013 United Nations appeal tracking data shows that only 1.9% of UN humanitarian appeal funds went to education.”
“Organisations such as War Child and Save the Children are trying to address all these issues. I know that my hon. Friend the Minister, on behalf of the Government, will try to help them. Schools need to be safe spaces, with zero tolerance being shown if they are attacked or used by armed groups. Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker, for calling me to speak this debate. I am grateful to the hon. Member for East Lothian (Fiona O'Donnell), and I am sure we can continue to highlight these issues and ensure that in these desperate situations our children all over the world get a decent education.”
“In the Central African Republic where an appalling conflict is going on, most of the schools in the capital are not open. This is largely due to the collapsed Government’s inability to continue paying teachers’ salaries, and the humanitarian NGOs that are providing most of the services in the city cannot access enough funding for education in particular, so reopening schools is not the priority. As a result, in the capital city large numbers of children are not in school. It is not just a question of funding. Unfortunately, the reality is that aside from conflict, the quality of education on offer in these countries is incredibly low. We need to ensure that once in school, children actually learn. Levels of violence are also shockingly high, with corporal punishment widely used.”
“Let me sum up the arguments. To me, the education part of this debate is one of the most interesting and the most important. Sadly, humanitarian actors still often do not prioritise education programming at the start of an emergency. I accept, as I said, all the problems that they face, but education must be at the forefront of their minds. This is still considered something to pick up six months into or after a conflict. Instead, there is no reason why children cannot continue in school if authorities or humanitarian actors have the right support. Surely we can all agree that children have a right to education throughout their childhood. Schools can keep children safe and they are important environments for being able to provide other services such as social care to address trauma.”