Richard Fuller
MP for North Bedfordshire · Conservative · United Kingdom
“I do not want to go too far off the topic, because I am a bit of a nerd on regulating regulators. We can find time later to talk about that. It was an important point, as was the point made by the hon. Member for St Ives (Andrew George).”
House of Commons22 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Furniss. We know that issues of injustice can take an awfully long time to reach a resolution in Parliament.”
House of Commons22 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“As a Member of Parliament myself for periods of that time, I have had a sense that this matter is unfinished business. I was interested to listen to some of the comments. One issue that was raised, most notably by the hon. Member for Brentford and Isleworth (Ruth Cadbury) and my hon.”
House of Commons22 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I would be interested in the Minister’s thoughts on that, but the point that I am trying to make is that this is a matter of choice for the Government.”
House of Commons22 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“When we hear the Minister’s response or read the statement made by the Minister’s colleague saying that there are no plans to reopen any decisions, it is important that it is clear that they are still open to consideration if the public finances change. I want finally to return to what the hon.”
House of Commons22 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“In the big scheme of things, it would be very helpful if the Minister could confirm that it is the intention that those moneys in that envelope will be reallocated to policyholders, rather than being swept back into general taxpayer money.”
House of Commons22 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
The complete record
3,180 held · 3,179 searchable for Richard Fuller. The searchable lines are below in date order, each linked to its source. Free to read, in full, without an account. Page 1 of 10.
This is not an official version of UK Parliament proceedings. It reproduces the published record and links to it; the official version is the one UK Parliament publishes.
“There is no annual review of each regulator that is performed as effectively as in other areas, so I would encourage the hon. Member to press that point to improve our system of regulating the regulators.”
House of Commons22 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“As a Member of Parliament myself for periods of that time, I have had a sense that this matter is unfinished business. I was interested to listen to some of the comments. One issue that was raised, most notably by the hon. Member for Brentford and Isleworth (Ruth Cadbury) and my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch (Sir Christopher Chope), was on regulation and the role of regulators. On the different perspectives and remedies, I think I am closer to the one suggested by my hon. Friend. The hon. Member for Brentford and Isleworth made the point that regulators are being hollowed out. I would say that on average they have greater scope, greater funding and more people. There is an issue with their focus, but more importantly, the structures to hold regulators to account are insufficient.”
House of Commons22 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Furniss. We know that issues of injustice can take an awfully long time to reach a resolution in Parliament. It is important that people who have or feel that they have suffered an injustice at the hands of the state should have worthy champions who have the doggedness and stamina to continue to make their case, so I am delighted to congratulate the hon. Member for Leeds North East (Fabian Hamilton) on securing today’s debate. As has been noted, the issue goes back through this Labour Government, previous Conservative Governments, the coalition Government, the Brown Government, all the way back to Blair. Let us take a moment to think about the individuals who have already been waiting two decades and more for what they would see is a full resolution.”
House of Commons22 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“In the big scheme of things, it would be very helpful if the Minister could confirm that it is the intention that those moneys in that envelope will be reallocated to policyholders, rather than being swept back into general taxpayer money. The last thing we want to come out of this debate is the Minister being unclear with Equitable Life policyholders, who in some cases have lost 80% of their pensions already, or suggesting that if there are moneys left in the envelope, which was set at a particular level at a particular time because of the state of public finances, any surplus moneys will be squirrelled away and given to the Government again. I would be very grateful if the Minister could answer those three questions.”
House of Commons22 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“When we hear the Minister’s response or read the statement made by the Minister’s colleague saying that there are no plans to reopen any decisions, it is important that it is clear that they are still open to consideration if the public finances change. I want finally to return to what the hon. Member for Leeds North East said in his excellent speech about unallocated and unspent moneys. He said that if funds have been allocated but are not needed to meet the liabilities for which they were intended, then they should be used to compensate people who have still not received full redress. That really is a question about what those unspent funds would do. That partly encompasses the reserve and partly encompasses unallocated moneys.”
House of Commons22 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Given that the Minister’s colleague said there are no plans to reopen any decisions, can the Minister confirm that it is still the case that considering the state of the public finances is a live factor that is encapsulated in that? What I mean by that question is, should there be a change in the public finances, would there then be scope for the Government to change their mind? That is an important point. I do not want to lay out a false hope, but the settlement amount was decided specifically in consideration of the public finances at the time. Times now may be better or worse, but they are certainly different.”
House of Commons22 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I would be interested in the Minister’s thoughts on that, but the point that I am trying to make is that this is a matter of choice for the Government. My second point leads from a quote given by the Minister’s colleague, the Financial Secretary to the Treasury, who said on this matter in September 2026: “There are no plans to reopen any decisions relating to the Payment Scheme or review”. That is an interesting phrase, because part of the conditions around those decisions are couched in different wordings of the phrase—that the settlement amount was determined in consideration of the “position of public finances”. That was stated way back in 2008 and also when the settlement was announced in 2011. It was alluded to again in 2016.”
House of Commons22 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“This is about mineworkers’ pensions. The incoming Labour Government made the choice in the case of the mineworkers’ pensions to move the surplus that had been accumulated in their fund to the mineworkers rather than back to the taxpayer—back to the Government. So it was a use of otherwise public funds that resulted in a boost to mineworkers’ pensions of about 30% to 32%. That was a choice. I just ask the Minister to consider this. It was a choice by the Government to boost pensions that were already being paid “in full”, and yet the Government seem to have no choice about people who had an 80% decline in their pensions. It might strike some as odd, with a different set of values, to treat one differently from another.”
House of Commons22 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I do not want to go too far off the topic, because I am a bit of a nerd on regulating regulators. We can find time later to talk about that. It was an important point, as was the point made by the hon. Member for St Ives (Andrew George). I am glad he did not make a party political point, but it is a relevant point that the Labour party’s position in opposition was that the compensation was not sufficiently substantial. I want to make three broad points in the lead-up to questions on each to the Minister. The first point I want to establish is that making changes to the settlement is not set in stone; it is a matter of Government choice. I want to give an example, which I raise solely for the purposes of talking about choice on pensions, not to talk about the decision that was made, because it is about choice.”
House of Commons22 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The Minister is making the case that the position when that settlement was made about balance between taxpayers and policyholders was a matter of fault and responsibility. Does he not also recognise that a substantial part of that balance was to do with the state of the public finances? Will he confirm that that is still a live consideration in the Treasury that could in future lead to the settlement being reopened?”
House of Commons22 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I understand that it may not want to take a decision, but it really needs to. Finally, in closing, as I look to the Minister, who I trust to be a courageous man and a good man, I want to ask him a candid question. If he was given a proposal to spend billions of pounds on a railway to which he could say yes or no, and he was told the railway would be lose billions and billions of pounds, and he was told that on value-for-money terms it would be the worst railway built this century, and he was told that after 20 years of operation the company had still not decided on how to power its trains, and he was told that two years after opening its railway it still had not carried a single passenger, would he really give the project the go-ahead?”
House of Commons20 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“That is two years of zero passenger revenue against expectations, which will surely have an impact on the business case. Will the Minister commit to publishing an assessment of the financial impact of the failure to run a railway for two years on the overall financial case for East West Rail? Originally, East West Rail was to run trains on diesel. Then it was proposed to be electric. Then it was proposed to be battery. Now, it is proposed to be battery, electric and diesel. Can the Minister confirm whether East West Rail has finalised what form of traction it will use on its railway? It seems to me to be critical to know how it is going to pull the trains along on the line. I am not a railway engineer, but even I think that that is kind of a basic requirement. East West Rail needs to be forced to make a decision.”
House of Commons20 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Frankly, I do not think East West Rail contributes very much—certainly not in the near term—to the growth of Tempsford, because that planning has been there for quite a long time. Will the Minister commit to ensure that the case for East West Rail is made to stand on its own merits, rather than trying, artificially and in my view wrongly, to claim benefits from other measures, such as Tempsford new town? East West Rail has built part of its railway. It has built the part from Oxford to Milton Keynes, which was opened to passenger traffic two years ago this month, in October 2024. As the Minister knows, since then not a single passenger has travelled on a train, because it cannot work out with the union whether or not there needs to be a guard to open and shut the doors.”
House of Commons20 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“That takes us back to the decision in 2020, when there was a straighter, more direct route south of Bedford, and there was going to be a station—a hub station—at Wixams. Now that Universal Studios is being built at Wixams, would it not make sense to look at creating that hub station for Wixams, rather than going into the town of Bedford and going north? This is a very significant change, and Universal Studios is going to have 10 million visitors a year. Tempsford may or may not be a new town, but taking a village of 300 people and building a town of 100,000 is big change. One of the problems is that East West Rail, desperate to justify its business case, may want to take credit for new housing growth at Tempsford.”
House of Commons20 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Will the Minister commit that when, and I hope it will be tomorrow, he publishes the current business case, the financial case or full cash projections—I do not mind which of those three options he chooses—he will in all those cases ensure he has provided the information so that a like-for-like comparison can be made? Basically, we need the numbers for the period in which he is discounting the costs and revenues, so that we can assess the impact of the change in the discount rate. Secondly, in coming to Bedfordshire the wonderful initiative of Universal Studios has an impact on East West Rail and vice versa. As I understand it, to handle the structural demand, Network Rail has lined up an estimated £650 million of funding to help with the track capacity extension required.”
House of Commons20 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I look at him and I think, “I am in with a fighting chance.” In that spirit, I have some questions for the Minister. As I said earlier, I do accept—I did not have the chance to brief the Minister beforehand—that he may not have the answers to hand, but I would be grateful if he wrote to me. First, when the last business case was produced, the Government used a discount rate of 3.5%. The Treasury has now decided to lower that discount rate to 3%. As the Minister will be aware, if we lower the discount rate from 3.5% to 3%, we will give more credit to revenues in the future relative to costs in the near term, which is clearly the profile for a rail project.”
House of Commons20 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“We really should have the courage—we need to have the courage in this House—and the Minister and the Government must have the courage to go back to first principles and say, “We just don’t want to be part of continuing something that has started to look completely wrong.” Year after year, I make the case to Ministers of all parties to have that moment of courage of going back to first principles. Their first principle is that they should look after public money as though it is their own, rather than just fritter it away because someone else in the past said it was a good idea, and perhaps that is the consensus, so we have to stick with it because someone said. That is no way to have our Executive run this country, because it just leads us into all sorts of mistakes. My hope is that the Minister will be that man of courage.”
House of Commons20 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“HS2 phase 1—the London to Birmingham part—had a benefit-cost ratio of 1.2 to 1.7, which is getting close, but is still four times the benefit-cost ratio of East West Rail. For Crossrail 2, it is 1.7 to 2.7—way ahead. For the Bakerloo line extension, it is 2 to 3, and for Sutton tram link extension, it is 1.3. I challenge the Minister to find a railway project that is such a grotesque waste of public money as East West Rail. I do not think he will. This matters, because being honest about public money matters. We should be honest when something sounds like a really good idea, but when we actually put our mind to it and do the detailed work, it starts to look like a really bad idea.”
House of Commons20 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“An argument may be made that there is a social benefit to railways that goes beyond the financial benefit-cost ratio. Governments of all stripes—not just this lot; it was my lot before—have, as it were, counted other things in already. Perhaps it is possible to stretch it and say that there is even more public benefit, and I will come to what that may be in a minute. This is why the benefit-cost ratio causes even more concern. Let us just take a wander down the benefit-cost ratios of Britain’s railway projects in the recent past, so we can see whether East West Rail is an outlier or part of the pack with the usual returns. The benefit-cost ratio of HS2 was originally 2.3; it is 1.5 to 2.3.”
House of Commons20 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Basically, this is a railway project that wastes 70p in every pound, which is clearly “poor”. The East West Railway Company then came up with something called the theory of change to push the figure up—we can understand that; like other things, employment changes, new houses are built and so forth—which boosted it from 0.3 to 0.6. It is clear from the last time the public were given sight of the business case that this railway line project is extremely poor value for money. I think that that should concern the Minister, and it certainly concerns me. Over time, the milestones for the benefit-cost ratio got worse. In 2019, the benefit-cost ratio was 1.1 to 2.4. Now it is down to 0.3, although potentially it could be raised to 0.5 and potentially to above 1, so it is not doing very well on an absolute basis.”
House of Commons20 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“If it was important for HS2, it is even more important for East West Rail, perhaps not in terms of scale but certainly in terms of relative lack of value. One of the ways in which the Government assess the value is through the benefit-cost ratio framework, and we do have information about that, dating back to 2023. Let me explain this to the House. A benefit-cost ratio of less than 1 is “poor”. There is nothing below “poor”. “Low” is 1 to 1.5, “medium” is 1.5 to 2, “high” is 2 to 4, and “very high” is greater than 4. When time is tight, public money is important, and one would hope that most of the projects are closer to the 4, 3 or 2. So where did East West Rail stand at the last count? Well, it did not stand at 4, or 3, or 2, or 1; it stood at 0.3.”
House of Commons20 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“He goes further, describing how the HS2 Board’s own information packs created ‘a veil behind which less good news becomes difficult to assess or even identify’—and that this was still true two years later, in 2021. The consequence, in his words, is that ‘the Civil Service failed to recognise the scale of the remaining intrinsic risk’ and gave ministers advice that ‘fails to give a good sense of the scale of the uncertainty.’” It is clear to me that the lesson from HS2 is that it is in the best interests of the Government to share information as a project is undergoing an evaluation of its financial costs, precisely so that the Government can avoid some of the mistakes that were identified in the HS2 project.”
House of Commons20 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It seems to me an unusual defence to say that providing the British people with information about how their taxes might be spent before those taxes are committed is somehow misleading—and what is the “chilling effect”? I do not see loads of private companies rushing up to provide competing rail services from Oxford to Cambridge. It does not hang together. According to one of the campaigners, “Lovegrove’s account of HS2’s Accounting Officer Assessments in 2019 describes a Department that kept spending money on an unaffordable project ‘on the basis that a process to determine its future was underway,’ while systematically failing to make clear to Parliament how immature the underlying costings actually were.”
House of Commons20 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I would be interested to know the Minister’s thoughts. In the Lovegrove report, there was a response to a request that was made by local campaigners in July for the Government to release the business case. Annex A of the letter from the Government refusing the release said that while the outline business case was still being developed, releasing it would “be misleading” and that disclosure would produce “a chilling effect” on discussions between the Department for Transport, Network Rail and East West Rail. So providing information about the business case would be “misleading”. Well, who is it going to mislead? Do the Government think we are not smart enough to understand that numbers may change, and inputs may not remain the same in terms of their costs? Do they think we will not understand the numbers?”
House of Commons20 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I would like him to say that he has been convinced by the arguments about public money and that he has been convinced that allowing transparency of the business case is the right thing to do. It is his right and ability to do that, and I will explain to him why he should do it. First, this point of transparency was surely at the heart of the reviews of the oh-so-disastrously-managed HS2 project. You will remember that, Madam Deputy Speaker, as do I. Frankly, the taxpayers of this country will remember it for a long time. Rightly, Governments of the day had two reviews—Oakervee and Lovegrove—to try to find out how we could improve governance of our very important rail projects. I would like to go through some of that, because, sadly, it does not seem that Government have got the message on these things.”
House of Commons20 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I do not think that it is right that the people of North Bedfordshire should be left in the dark. I also, by the way, do not think that taxpayers should be left in the dark. That is why my purpose tonight is to convince the Minister that he and the Government owe it to the people of North Bedfordshire and to taxpayers to provide right now—tomorrow will do—the latest updated business case for the East West Rail project. The Minister covers lots of other forms of transportation and covers for rail for Lord Hendy in the other place, but he must know the importance that has been attributed to financial transparency in our rail projects specifically, and know not to wait until the deal is done. This is my key request to the Minister.”
House of Commons20 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“If we are seeing a waste of public money, it requires as much additional scrutiny as can be done—certainly in government, but also beyond—and yet it has been a number of years since the last assessment of the economics of East West Rail was delivered by the company that was available for us to scrutinise. Incidentally, that assessment was pretty bad. When I say pretty bad, I mean bad, bad, bad from the point of view of public finances. Since then, there have been dramatic changes, and some that might help the case of East West Rail, but many—particularly with inflation—may move things the other way. My constituents are left in a position where they do not know whether this project will make any economic sense at all, and it started from a position where it clearly did not.”
House of Commons20 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“For North Bedfordshire, this railway will have a significant impact on the environment and on our rural life, but beyond that, the business case matters for a range of reasons. First, a substantial amount of public money—in the billions—will be invested to construct an entirely new rail route from Bedford through to Cambridge. As the Minister will know, we are just a week away from a Budget. It is perhaps the third Budget in a row where a Labour Government will come back for more taxes. He will know, as we certainly do, that looking after public money is a primary duty of us here in this House.”
House of Commons20 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The town of Clapham, just outside Bedford, will be cut in two by the development of the railway. The route takes a very sharp turn out of Bedford and goes up a hill, as part of the hilliness of this railway. Residents’ concerns about having a green tunnel to help somewhat with the environment stay in abatement. The villagers of Ravensden and Wilden are sadly getting increasingly resigned to the fact that a railway will carve through their rural landscape. At Chawston, which is a tiny little village, a substantial amount of land has been earmarked by East West Rail so that trains can pass. Finally, there are the villages of Roxton and then Tempsford, which is rumoured to be on the list to be a new town. Currently it is a village of 300 households.”
House of Commons20 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“That is partly due to the legacy of the former Liberal Democrat mayor of Bedford borough, who supported a route through the town of Bedford and then north through rural North Bedfordshire. That route is long, hilly and incredibly environmentally damaging, and despite protestations, it must surely be much more expensive than any alternative. It has left my constituents scratching their heads about why we would build a railway line in such a damaging way. Since that time, my constituents across North Bedfordshire have faced a series of questions that remain unanswered and that are increasingly a source of irritation. The people who work at East West Rail are good people, and I have nothing against them, but I do have something against the project and how it is being progressed.”
House of Commons20 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Through you, Madam Deputy Speaker, I thank Mr Speaker for granting me permission to speak on a matter that is of crucial importance to my constituents. The topic of this Adjournment debate is the impact of the East West Rail Bedford to Cambridge business case on North Bedfordshire constituency. I am very grateful to the Minister for being in his place; I have not have a chance to share some of my questions with him, so I would be very happy for him to write to me after the debate if he does not have answers to them tonight. What does East West Rail mean to North Bedfordshire? It is an opportunity that was lost. The concept of connecting Oxford through Milton Keynes to Bedford and Cambridge is a sensible one, but sadly it is a concept that in practice has gone very far off track.”
House of Commons20 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I do not think that the Minister has taken up my offer of releasing the business case tomorrow. If we go with the process that the Government are hiding behind, will the decision to go ahead by the Government, as well as the DCO from a planning point, have been approved by the time that case has been presented to the public?”
House of Commons20 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I think that the Liberal Democrats will be asking that question in reverse—about changes to the percentage that may occur—but those are matters that we can discuss in Committee. His Majesty’s official Opposition recognise the tremendous work that His Majesty the King and the royal family do on behalf of our nation. We understand the power that that provides our nation with in our international relations, and the comfort that it gives to the people of this nation, and we support the Second Reading of this Bill.”
House of Commons14 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I thank the Minister’s colleague the Exchequer Secretary, because on the 11th of this month, he wrote in reply to questions from my colleague, answering questions about some of the points that we may get into in detailed consideration of the Bill. One of the substantial changes of principle in this Bill is that the ongoing ratchets that were effectively put in place by the 2011 Act have essentially become a backstop of £99.9 million. In his answer to my right hon. Friend the Member for South West Wiltshire (Dr Murrison) about potential variability, the Minister has given us some confidence about the ability to plan; we know that there will not be an absolute reduction. However, questions remain about extraordinary circumstances in which the Treasury would be able to reduce the settlement in any one year.”
House of Commons14 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I thank the Minister for his speech. This follows a recent debate on ways and means that his colleague the Exchequer Secretary had with my hon. Friend the Member for North West Norfolk (James Wild). I do not wish to repeat the points that were made on that occasion. His Majesty’s official Opposition are supportive of this Bill. As the Minister laid out, the 2011 settlement has run its course; it did well for its time, but some aspects of it were due for reconsideration. As he said, the recent significant programme of upgrades to royal residences for public purposes has now reached its conclusion—I think this year is the final year of the additional funds—so it is timely for us to look for a change in structure.”
House of Commons14 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Friend the Member for North West Norfolk (James Wild) asked about powers to adjust the grant between reviews and the circumstances in which they might be used, the answer from the Treasury was: “These powers are intended for exceptional circumstances and are not expected to be used routinely”, which, of course, is the definition of exceptional. However, the letter does then go on to talk about major fire, flood and so on, saying that in those circumstances, “Any adjustment would require Parliamentary approval through secondary legislation.” Could the Minister advise on whether or not that approval will be subject to the affirmative procedure? I think that other Members may want to raise that as well.”
House of Commons14 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“There is an issue about to what extent that reserve, at 10% to 50%, is going to cover reasonable expectations of expense. That gets to the point that my hon. Friend the Member for Dumfries and Galloway made earlier about long-term plans. If significant capital expenditures are due, then the reserve, by its very nature, will be quite variable during the period. I would like some comfort from the Minister that the range of 10% to 50%—which sounds, on face value, to be reasonable—was correct in the modelling. There is just one slight concern about the Treasury’s thinking on this. When my hon.”
House of Commons14 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“In his letter, the Minister said: “The Household forecasts that this income will increase by around 25% over the review period, based on recent performance, detailed modelling and increased visitor capacity… If income were lower than forecast, there is no expectation that the Grant would increase above £99.9 million per year.” Can the Minister confirm that, essentially, the other income is being treated as supplementary to what we see as the duty of the sovereign grant? I would be grateful to the Minister for reconfirming what he put in his letter. In clause 3, I am interested in proposed new section 6(5) to the Sovereign Grant Act 2011, stating that the reserve fund will be: “no lower than 10% and no higher than 50%”. What is of interest there is the duty to change the amount of the sovereign grant.”
House of Commons14 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Will the Minister explain how those financial assessments were made? What discount rate was used to work out what the estimates might be? I am not questioning it, and I do not need a precise figure; what I am looking for is some comfort from the Minister that he feels that those financial projections, that model and the work of the trustees give him adequate confidence in the baseline of £99.9 million. That leads, in turn, to why we have 20.5% variability over the next five years. In the Minister’s response to my hon. Friend the Member for Dumfries and Galloway, I was also interested to hear about the use of other income.”
House of Commons14 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I thank the Minister for his clear exposition of the Bill’s clauses. He emphasised the importance of the 2026 royal trustees’ review. The interesting thing is that it is their forecast of their needs over the next five years on which a lot of the mechanism rests. Notwithstanding some comments made by Government Back Benchers, a lot of the intention of the Bill is about financial restrictions on expenditure, rather than there being excess expenditure in the future. I am grateful for the Minister’s letter to my hon. Friend the Member for Dumfries and Galloway (John Cooper); in his summing up, will the Minister give a bit more comfort and clarity on some of those matters? If I am right, the £99.9 million is the estimate of what is required this year, based on a review of what the forecast requirements may be through to 2031-32.”
House of Commons14 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I thank the Minister for presenting the Bill, but most importantly I thank His Majesty the King for his gracious service, on behalf of all Members of this House and all people of this country and the territories and nations overseas. I hope that he will use the sovereign grant as wisely and sagaciously as his governance over us allows. I support the Bill.”
House of Commons14 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The Government could have said that they would take up the offer from the Conservative Leader of the Opposition to work together on meaningful reform and reductions in welfare, so that we make work pay. But we did not hear any of that. Instead, we are heading to a Budget where a Labour Government have again run out of money and where a Labour Government will once again increase taxes to cover their fiscal incompetence—same old continuity Labour.”
House of Commons7 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Then, of course, there is the final cherry on the parfait: the Government will “identify and back” unicorns in this country. How will the Government identify those unicorns, and can the Minister explain how that is different from the discredited policy of Governments picking winners? The Minister then returned to common sense with the announcement that Mr Milburn will set out his recommendations to the Government. Will she please advise the House—many Members will be concerned about this—on what date Mr Milburn will make his recommendations? Today, the Government—the Minister and the Chancellor—had an opportunity to at least have mentioned the high cost of energy that is crippling British manufacturing. They could have ruled out tax increases, providing more certainty for businesses that they can invest.”
House of Commons7 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Can she confirm to the House what proportion of the country will qualify under that measure to be part of Labour’s largesse? My fear is that many parts of the country will not. The Minister did talk, smartly, about removing the thicket of consultation and looking at judicial review and the consultation culture. The Opposition will be supportive of measures that she comes forward with in that regard. But then, after a brief moment of common sense, the Minster talked about reducing the discount rate from 3.5% to 3%. Can she confirm that the cost at which the Government are borrowing is going up and up—5.9% for 30 years—yet she has chosen this moment to reduce the rate at which the Government expect to get money back from 3.5% to 3%? Can she explain how those numbers add up?”
House of Commons7 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The Minister talks about there being nothing progressive about spending £1 in every £10 on debt interest—well, amen to that—but why then did this Government choose to increase borrowing by £500 billion over the course of this Parliament? The Minister talked about the northern scale-up fund, which is an interesting initiative, but can she advise us who will be making the investment decisions and assure the House that they will not be subject to political direction? The Minister talks about a National Wealth Fund with new strategic partnerships and a permanent transfer of power and resources from Whitehall to the regions. Did she listen to the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government say that local government reform is on hold?”
House of Commons7 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I thank the Minister for her statement and for early sight of it. On a day when the country was listening for a message of change, it was the same old, same old: a continuity Chancellor, with continuity policies and a continuity team of Ministers in the Treasury. Does the Minister recognise the harsh irony that—given the Government could find plenty of money to hire 14,000 more civil servants in SW1—the Chancellor chose to go to the west midlands, just a few miles away from Jaguar Land Rover, but had nothing at all to say about it? The Minister talked about Government borrowing falling to its lowest levels, but I wonder: can she also talk about the cost of Government borrowing? Can the Minister confirm that the cost of Government borrowing for 30 years is now at its highest rate for 28 years?”
House of Commons7 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Is the Minister satisfied that the way the “know your customer” rules currently work is effective for maximising young people’s access to basic financing and banking facilities? Finally, I am sure that the Minister and I agree on the need to ensure that schools are teaching financial inclusion at both primary and secondary level. How satisfied is she that schools are complying with the compulsory rules on financial education? What can we do collectively, as constituency Members of Parliament, to ensure that schools are delivering the quality of financial inclusion and financial education that we would all like to see?”
House of Commons30 June 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Member for Hertford and Stortford made about microfinance. What assessment have the Government made of the use of microfinance platforms targeted at young people, to enable them to take the first steps in building up a credit record or potentially being small-scale entrepreneurs—another great thing that young people could do? Thirdly, what is the Government’s view of the merits of leapfrogging traditional financial systems in favour of educating young people on emerging fintech platforms? Is that something that might raise young people’s engagement with financial education, and that might ultimately be in their best interests? I have a small point on “know your customer” rules—I am not too familiar with this point, but the Minister may have a view.”
House of Commons30 June 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“On the other hand, if they fall into debt, compounding interest can drive them the other way and into a much worse situation. It is absolutely crucial that we teach people the power of compounding, both positive and negative. Let me move on to my questions. As I did not have a chance to advise the Minister of my questions in advance, I would be happy to receive a reply in writing afterwards. First, ironically, I want to ask about cryptocurrencies. What assessment have the Government done of the potential for cryptocurrencies to promote financial inclusion? I am sceptical, but there may be potential benefits as well as risks; cryptocurrencies can provide an easier way in than financial institutions and have lower transaction costs. I am interested in the Government’s view. Secondly, I echo the point that the hon.”
House of Commons30 June 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“That is good progress and is part of ensuring that young people understand numbers and can therefore get to grips with things. In the Government review by Professor Becky Francis, she commented on life skills and talked about the importance of young people learning about budgeting, interest, mortgages, pensions and financial planning. One thing that young people have to their advantage—the hon. Member for York Outer also mentioned this point—is the beauty of compounding interest. If they get the right start at a young age and are able to put some money aside, by the time they get to my age—perhaps even to your youthful age, Sir John—people will find it remarkable how compounding interest has worked on the savings that they have put aside.”
House of Commons30 June 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗