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
Every one of 6,092 lines we hold for Sir Edward Leigh, in date order, each linked to its source. Free to read, in full, without an account. Page 9 of 122.
“Why is Scunthorpe paying almost twice as much in energy costs as those in South Korea or in America? High energy prices make UK steel expensive to produce and uncompetitive versus that produced by our European counterparts. In 2024-25, the average price paid by UK steelmakers was £60 a kWh, compared with the German price of £50 and the French price of £43. We are making our own steel industry uncompetitive. We have to stop these green energy costs. We have to be realistic. The Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero has now left, but we need to get real. We can take steel into public ownership now, but if we go on loading costs on our industry, we will have to come back month after month and year after year. We will support the Bill, although we want a sunset clause. But we have to get real about China, too.”
“Friend the Member for Brigg and Immingham (Martin Vickers) has been raising this point; I was sitting beside him at the end of March when he raised it and called for nationalisation of the industry—but we have now got to work together to save our steelmaking capacity. We know, though, that this Bill is a bit of a sticking plaster. It is quite dangerous. Quite extensive powers are being taken by the Government, so there has to be a sunset clause. We are giving unprecedented powers to the Government. We can criticise them for not acting sooner, but this is a sticking plaster on a gaping wound. Let us be honest: steelmaking in this country is under extreme stress. And why is that? Why are we loading the most expensive energy costs on to our own steel production?”
“Member for St Albans (Daisy Cooper), achieved by constantly attacking the Conservative party on what is a very complex issue. Of course we can be criticised because we sold this company to Jingye—yes, I agree—but how many voices on the Liberal Democrat Benches were speaking up at the time? Were they speaking up when Greg Clark, our then Business Secretary, paid the wages of the Scunthorpe steelworkers for many months? Were they speaking up when we saved Sheffield Forgemasters? This is a highly complex issue and we should be working together, so I support the Bill. I know that we can be critical of the Government. Perhaps we should have acted sooner—my hon.”
“I have just come off the phone to Tom Smith, the trade union convenor at the blast furnaces, on behalf of my many constituents who work next door in Scunthorpe. My primary concern today is with the nearly 3,000 people who work in this plant. Let us be clear: we have been making the best quality steel in the world for 135 years in Lincolnshire, and we intend to go on doing it. We are not going to allow cheap, inferior Chinese steel to kill off our industry. The workers of Scunthorpe are breathing a sigh of relief. We can be party political. I have to say that I thought the Chairman of the Business and Trade Committee made an excellent speech—he was positive and talked in strategic terms—but I do not know what the Liberal Democrat spokesman, the hon.”
“Of course I am, because I just said that. I have just admitted that it was a mistake, but I ask everybody what they were saying at the time. Of course, there is silence. It is easy to be wise after the event, but I am worried about my steelworkers—I am worried about their future.”
“There we are: some of us apparently warned the Government. I do not know how many. We now know the true nature of our Chinese friends. We support the Bill. Let us make our steel industry really competitive again and let us make Great Britain great again.”
“T2. I am a simple soul, so I trust the Foreign Secretary completely. Will he assure me that nothing in the Product Regulation and Metrology Bill, which we are debating only this afternoon, will in any way nullify Brexit by limiting our ability to make our own decisions on regulation and to conduct our own free trade deals? Above all, as a great British patriot, will he assure me that nothing in the Bill will allow any Minister to ever abolish that most glorious of British symbols: the great British pint?”
“This is all very important. There has been some merriment about the pint, but in the novel “Nineteen Eighty-Four” by George Orwell, the hero goes into a pub, and somebody there laments the fact that the despotic regime has just abolished the pint and forced people to drink litres. The road to serfdom is paved by many steps such as this. By the way, when I was Minister for consumer affairs many years ago, we regularly banned things. We did not need this Bill.”
“Will the Home Secretary consider raising an obvious lacuna in the law in the Committee of Ministers at the Council of Europe? Under the refugee convention, we can automatically deport foreign criminals who enter this country illegally, but under the convention on human rights, we cannot. Surely we can address that in partnership with other members of the Council of Europe.”
“Scunthorpe neighbours my constituency, and many of my constituents who work there will be desperately worried today. This is a vital national interest—a crisis. For the past 150 years, wars have been won by states that can make virgin steel. Will the Government do anything—tariffs, or the Secretary of State going up to Scunthorpe now to negotiate directly with the company—to ensure that we keep our vital national interest going, which means blast furnaces?”
“I agree with everything that my hon. Friend is saying about smoking, but the elephant in this room is the dramatic decline in legal tobacco sales. According to HMRC, they have declined by 44% since 2021, while the number of smokers has declined by only 0.5%. We are reaching a stage at which we are taxing cigarettes so heavily that we are fuelling the black market and criminality, and we have to be aware that, as my hon. Friend says, these are unintended consequences.”
“Under the refugee convention, we can automatically deport illegal migrants who come here, but under the European convention on human rights we cannot. I had a probing new clause moved on my behalf in Committee on this subject, and, with your permission, Mr Speaker, I hope to move it again on Report. I know that the Minister cannot answer absolutely now, but will she look at that new clause in a constructive spirit? Surely we can all agree that we do not want criminals entering this country illegally.”
“When I visited staff at the much-loved St Barnabas hospice in Lincoln, which provides excellent palliative care, they told me that they are losing £300,000 a year. In the debates on assisted dying, we all agree that we want more palliative care. I just cannot understand the logic of what the Government are doing. I make one last appeal to them not to load this extra cost on to hospices.”
“Following that last question, can the Secretary of State give us an absolute assurance that nothing in our drive towards green energy and net zero will ever affect the sustainability and safety of our vital transport systems?”
“I will not impose a formal time limit, but there are eight people trying to take part in the debate, so please be considerate when you give your speeches. I know somebody who will definitely be very considerate, so I call David Mundell.”
“It is only a pity that nobody mentioned beautiful, bracing Skegness in this debate. Question put and agreed to. Resolved , That this House has considered Government support for the tourism industry.”
“I agree with everything the Foreign Secretary has said, in particular that we have to give hope to the Palestinian people. To be fair to the Israeli Government position, Hamas could solve the problem now by releasing the hostages. Having said that, does the Foreign Secretary agree that is quite wrong for any member of the Israeli Government to say that the Gazan people could rise up against Hamas? If they did that, they would be tortured, at best, and probably killed. The people of Gaza are victims of Hamas as much as anybody, and it is quite wrong for the Israeli Government to inflict collective judgment on the people of Gaza: that will bring death, destruction, more radicalism and we will never get the hostages home.”
“The Government say that only 1% of agricultural land will be taken up by solar farms, but in the pipeline around Gainsborough 10,000 acres have already been put aside for solar farms, with another 4,000 announced a couple of weeks ago—up to 15% of my constituency, which is the most arable and most fertile in the country. I make one quite reasonable request of the Secretary of State: will he consider applications in the round rather than individually, and look at their cumulative effect on food production and the local environment?”
“T7. The Secretary of State and I are near neighbours. Will he take a short car journey to Gainsborough to visit the new fusion site at West Burton? It is probably the most exciting development in green energy that we have ever had in this country, creating unlimited jobs and unlimited green energy. Will he join me in Gainsborough?”
“I remind Members that they should bob if they wish to be called in the debate. As we can see, a large number of hon. Members wish to take part, so if we are going to get everybody in, I must impose a five-minute limit on speeches. I ask Members to please refrain from interventions as much as possible.”
“Just to be constructive for a moment and to try to get a bit of consensus, surely no one is suggesting that anybody in Parliament wants to restrict the power of judges and their traditional right to sentence people according to their own lights. All we are questioning is whether a quango like the Sentencing Council should try to stack the deck against certain groups. All we are saying is that judges should impose sentences irrespective of people’s race, colour or whatever.”
“Obviously the Minister is working very hard, but he looks a bit tired, so may I offer him some Lincolnshire hospitality? Will he come and stay for a glorious weekend in one of our farm cottages, to enjoy our great skies and bracing air, and help our distressed farmers? Frankly, they need the income. The problem is that the Government have abolished the furnished holiday letting scheme, which was a tremendous encouragement for the countryside. I do not expect an answer now, but will he consider approaching his right hon. Friend the Chancellor to see if we can reinstate that in the Budget, to help our farmers and the countryside?”
“Will the Minister leave for a moment the hallowed cloisters of Cambridge and accept my invitation to take a rural ride through Lincolnshire, the breadbasket of England, to meet my farmers? Does he agree that sustainable farming is the key to food security, and therefore will he take up with his colleagues in the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero why they are covering 15% of Lincolnshire with solar farms in addition to taking away this grant?”
“Given the urgent necessity to promote growth, surely the acid test of a Bill such as this is whether it will actually make it more attractive for entrepreneurs to create jobs. What is the answer?”
“The Christian community in Syria is one of the oldest in the world. Up to the civil war, it was about 10% of the population; now, it is down to 2%. Aid to the Church in Need has described Friday as a “black and painful day” for Christians in the Latakia area, with Christians being murdered in their cars and in their homes. Will the Minister—representing, as he does, a Christian country—call out the new Sunni Muslim Government of Syria and say that they have an absolute duty of care to all minorities: Christians, Druze, Alawites or others?”
“When I climb the hill behind my home in the Lincolnshire wolds, I can see, 20 miles away, a wonderful array of wind turbines in the North sea. We love it locally—we love it for our economy—but nothing in that precludes oil and gas exploration. If we in Lincolnshire are doing so much for green energy, why are we allowing the bread basket of England to be covered with solar farms? We have 10,000 acres of them around Gainsborough, and there is another application for 3,900 acres at North Clifton. Will the Minister and her boss please look at such mass applications in the round so that there is not overdevelopment in the break basket of England?”
“People thought the Soviet Union would last forever. I am confident that, eventually, logic and peace will break out, and these two great peoples—Arab and Jew, Palestinian and Israeli—can live side by side in peace.”
“They were very reasonable and charming people. They knew all about us—fair enough. Of course, I raised the issue of settler violence—why would I not? They said, “Oh, it’s illegal.” Of course it is illegal, but the Israeli Government could stop it tomorrow. They choose not to. So many people make suggestions, but if I may make one, it is in the absolute interest of Israel to try to calm this down, to clamp down on illegal settlers, to stop all new settlements and to come to a settlement. I will end on that point. It is in our interest to go on encouraging this process, to have the moral courage to remember these people and to say that this debate is about peace. I know that everybody is depressed and full of doom and gloom that it will never happen, but people often thought that way in history.”
“There is no solution other than a two-state solution. As a young MP 40 years ago, I sat in the office of Abba Eban, a distinguished former Israeli foreign minister. He said, “It is completely absurd and ridiculous for us to hold down 5 million people.” That was his view, but unfortunately there are now people in the Israeli Government who actually believe that Palestinians can be ejected. There is a role for us, and it is not just moral. We had a very good meeting with our Foreign Office civil servants in the West Bank Protection Consortium. I say to the Minister that I hope he will give them more resources, because they are doing a tremendous job in calling out some of this settler violence. We were anxious to get both sides of this issue, so we also had a meeting with the Israeli foreign service.”
“It was moving, when we went to Ramallah, to talk to a grandmother—actually, she is a very distinguished banker—who cannot even see her grandson in Nablus, because although it is a very quick drive to Nablus from Ramallah, there are so many checkpoints that it takes seven or eight hours to get there. Everywhere in the west bank, there are checkpoints. Virtually every application—over 90% of them—to build or extend a settlement is granted, but virtually every application by Palestinians to build is rejected. This is totally one-sided. It is intolerable, and we should speak out about it in this Parliament. That is what I want to do today. I know that it has become unfashionable to talk about the two-state solution; people say that it is just western politicians going on about it and it is never going to happen. It must happen.”
“Because of the deployment of Israeli troops in Gaza and Lebanon, settlers have been drafted into the army to protect other settlers. As a consequence, some settlers have committed violence while in Israel Defence Forces uniform. A delegation of British rabbis organised by Yachad witnessed young settlers spitting at and kicking a Palestinian woman in Hebron. And so it goes on. We went to Hebron; again, it was unbelievably moving. On the main road, right in the middle of this ancient city, it is completely deserted. A small settler movement has moved into Hebron and there are 800 Israeli soldiers protecting them. The Palestinians are prevented from even walking down the main road in their own town.”
“The olive harvest in October and November has been a particular time of tension. Harvests have been interfered with and crops damaged. Often the police, army and armed settlers, organised as civilian security co-ordinators, are either physically present or alleged participants. Settlers and soldiers have attacked, beaten or threatened harvesters. There are even eight cases of live fire being directed at Palestinian farmers. Soldiers shot and killed a 59-year-old Palestinian woman from the village of Faqqu’a. Agricultural equipment has been stolen, property damaged, and crops taken or destroyed. The west bank is economically precarious, and destroying crops or preventing a harvest is extremely damaging. Hundreds of Palestinian-owned olive trees have been torched, sawed down or destroyed.”
“The purpose of this debate—and I agree that our influence is only moral—is to draw attention to what is happening on the west bank, because so many eyes are fixed on Gaza. I will not talk a lot about Gaza; it is incredibly important, but I have very little time and I want to talk about the west bank. Data from the United Nations Office for the Co-ordination of Humanitarian Affairs suggests that there were 1,800 incidents of settler violence on the west bank between 7 October 2023 and 31 December 2024, which is an average of four a day. With the whole world’s attention on Gaza, perhaps there has been too little attention on the west bank. The Nablus governorate saw 411 incidents. These incidents vary in nature; they include up-front violence but also other forms of harassment.”
“That is something that I know our Government and everybody in this debate will unequivocally condemn. On our visit, we spent time in the west bank. It was incredibly moving to visit a small Palestinian settlement on dry lands to see how they were coping. We saw a beautifully turned-out little girl, the same age as my granddaughter, living in those appalling conditions. In that very hot and dry climate, they traditionally sheltered in caves to protect themselves from the heat, and from the cold in winter, and extremist settlers had deliberately smashed the caves. We went to another village nearby where the hall had been deliberately smashed. The moment that we turned up, two young settlers—I can only describe them as punks—turned up with sub-machine-guns, in a clear act of intimidation.”
“We talked to a youngish Palestinian, whose father is very well known and has been imprisoned by the Israelis for a very long time, and they also talked of peace. We talked to the Prime Minister of the Palestinian Authority, who also talked of peace. The purpose of this debate, if we have any moral authority at all, is to convince our moderate Israeli friends that it is simply not in the long-term interests of Israel to hold down in occupation some 5 million Palestinians—2 million in Gaza and 3 million in the west bank. There are many moderate Israeli citizens—I would say a majority—who agree with that supposition. However, there are some extremist settlers who have the completely wrong idea that somehow they can expel people who have lived for centuries in the west bank from their ancestral homelands.”
“What was most moving about the trip was to be in a kibbutz listening to an 80-year-old lady. On that day in October she was cowering with her husband; her daughter was down the road. Next door to her daughter, people in their eighties were deliberately burned to death. What did that woman say to us? She said, “All my life, I’ve striven for peace, and I will go on striving for peace. I even took my driving test in Gaza. I have many friends in Gaza.” What an inspiring moment that was. Later, we talked to another Israeli woman, whose son had been shot dead by a Palestinian sniper when he was simply doing his military service. She too said, “I’m absolutely dedicated to peace.” We talked to the brother of a hostage who was a conscript dragged from his tank—he is still a hostage—and he also talked of peace.”
“I beg to move, That this House has considered Government support for Palestinian rights. It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir John. This will be a very personal speech. I declare that, with a number of colleagues from all parties, I have just returned from a trip to Israel and the west bank organised by Yachad, a moderate Jewish group that seeks to promote peace between Arab and Jew. I refer to my declaration of interests. We went to a couple of the kibbutzim that were attacked on 7 October, which was of course incredibly moving. I want to start, in order to have a fair balance, by unequivocally condemning Hamas and all their dealings, and the way they even killed women and babies. It is not my purpose to apportion blame or take sides. I am pro-Israeli and pro-Jew, and I am pro-Arab and pro-Palestinian.”
“Thank you, everybody, for taking part in what has been a very powerful debate. We are completely united. We condemn Hamas, but we stick up unequivocally for the rights of the Palestinian people. Everybody, from all parties or from no party, has made that point—it has even united the right hon. Member for Islington North (Jeremy Corbyn) and me. Question put and agreed to. Resolved, That this House has considered Government support for Palestinian rights.”
“T5. I hope that I will not damage the Chancellor if I commend the fiscally conservative way in which she is increasing defence spending. Given that if every European country matched our 2.5% commitment, we could release over £150 billion of defence spending, does she agree that we can crack this, because war and peace are always won, ultimately, by the size the economy?”
“Our enemies should know that our Prime Minister has 100% support from us. I noticed in Moscow that they are referring to the small size of the British Army. Perhaps the Prime Minister could remind them of what the Kaiser said in 1914 about “the contemptible little British Army”. Will the Prime Minister tell President Putin and other tyrants that our Army, the most professional in the world, is quite capable of giving as good as it gets? To continue the historical allusion, as in 1939, if we do stand up to the mark with the French, it is best to have a security guarantee from the Americans.”
“A week ago, I was in a Palestinian village with colleagues, including the hon. Member for Rochdale (Paul Waugh). We went to a school that had been demolished by illegal settlers. Immediately, two punks turned up with sub-machine guns, intimidating us—that is happening all over the place. We went to Hebron. It is completely closed down. This is appalling. The whole House should unite against the extremist Jewish settlers and the illegal settlements, because it is not in the interest of moderate Israeli opinion. It is directly contrary to peace and we must fight this. [Hon. Members: “Hear, hear.”]”
“When the Secretary of State finally steps in and knocks heads together and we get our Azuma train to Grimsby via Market Rasen, will she instruct the railway company to name the locomotive Margaret Thatcher to remind us all that the best way to reduce the cost of rail services is to end restrictive trade union practices?”
“Order. Before I call the hon. Member for South Norfolk (Ben Goldsborough) to move the motion, I should inform Members that during today’s debate the parliamentary digital communications team will be conducting secondary filming for its series on procedural explainers. Forty-nine colleagues have asked to speak in the debate, so if everyone is to get in, I have to impose from the beginning a three-minute limit on everybody taking part after the opener, apart from the winding-up speeches. Every time Members intervene, they will ensure that one of their colleagues will not get in at the end. If the hon. Member for South Norfolk, in his opening speech, takes too many interventions, or his speech goes on too long, he will prevent others from taking part. Let us all bear that in mind—short speeches of no more than three minutes, please.”
“That is a matter for debate, but I am sure that plenty of Members present will give the argument for the petitioners, so I would not worry much about it.”
“That, in my view, is unhealthy, and undermines our democracy as well as the public legitimacy of the system. The refugee convention was drafted in 1949, in tandem with the European convention on human rights—it is very old, even older than I am, and that is something—and it was drafted by the same people. It was never intended that the ECHR should apply to immigration at that time; it was only in the 1980s that judges in the European Court extended it. In 1996, in Chahal v . United Kingdom, it was held that there was an absolute rule to prevent the exporting of criminals. I am a delegate to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, and the Government should work with other members there to seek to revise the convention. All European Governments are struggling: we are all in the same mess.”
“Article 3 of the European convention on human rights is a very sensible and restrained one-sentence article prohibiting torture, but the European Court has expanded its meaning to interpret it as prohibiting Governments from returning individuals to countries where they could be subject to inhuman or degrading treatment. That is a massive extension of article 3’s sensible and reasonable intention. I am sorry to go into so much detail, but it is essential to understand what is going on. This is typical of the way in which judges have worked to undermine legitimate Government action undertaken by elected representatives. Two weeks ago, I sat in the hemicycle of the Council of Europe listening to Lord Hermer saying that he would always accept every interpretation of the convention.”
“I will not become involved in an argument about whether Rwanda is right or not, or how many people were or were not exported, and I agree that the Government should be commended for wanting to be seen to do something, but what they are doing is ineffective because it scraps the Rwanda scheme. The devil is in the detail, so let me deal with one detail to prove this point. Article 33 of the 1951 refugee convention forbids the return of refugees to countries where they may be at risk, but it creates a specific exception for those claiming refugee status who either pose a danger to the security of the country or have been convicted of a particularly serious crime. That exception exists regardless of the threat of being persecuted, so, under the convention, someone who is a criminal can be exported to Afghanistan.”
“This is a vital issue, and Labour voters feel as strongly about it as Conservative voters. Our inability as a country to control the people smugglers is utterly debilitating to the political process, and is causing tremendous unhappiness and angst in our nation. We can throw brickbats across the Chamber and blame each other, arguing about which Minister is or is not responsible, but until we solve this problem together we are simply feeding a vast populist movement that could be intensely damaging to both the Conservative and Labour parties, so we have to work together to solve it. I know that I will not persuade Labour to support the Rwanda scheme, but experience shows that the only effective deterrent is to detain and deport. We know that from other countries, such as Australia.”
“I am very critical of my own Government for allowing this mass immigration, and I was constantly raising these points from the Back Benches, but at least, albeit too late, the Conservative Government committed themselves to raising the earnings minimum to meet the average earnings in the UK. That must be kept up to date and enforced. Let me end by saying that it we are to solve this crisis, we need, ultimately, to get out of the convention, stop the boats, and stop importing low-paid workers legally.”
“There is precedent for issuing a temporary derogation, given that we are facing a crisis, but if that is not heeded, we always have the option to leave the convention altogether and opt out of the Strasbourg Court’s expansive rulings. That covers the criminals claiming asylum or entering illegally. For non-criminals, we need a programme like Rwanda, although it may not be Rwanda; I know that I will not convince the Government on that. As for legal migration, the Government—any Government—must stop subsidising legal arrivals undercutting existing workers in Britain.”