Mr Toby Perkins
MP for Chesterfield · Labour · United Kingdom
“The hon. Member for Bicester and Woodstock (Calum Miller) is absolutely right to say that what is behind this is the deep unpopularity of President Milei; it is not anything actually that the UK has done.”
“In Chesterfield, there will be unmitigated despair at the statement we have heard today from my right hon. Friend. For the authorities for which she is doing a review—the 14 that thought they had got their decision in July—could she clarify the basis of that review?”
“It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Desmond. I congratulate the hon. Member for Waveney Valley (Adrian Ramsay) on securing this debate.”
“The report spells out the link between degradation overseas and the impact here. The assessment lays out the consequences: food insecurity, economic insecurity, increased migration and refugees, increased interstate competition, conflict and geopolitical instability, all of which will threaten us here at home.”
“The Government are right to take their time and make sure that they get this right—we saw what happened when the previous Government did not do the work that was needed. This is a delicately balanced decision.”
“Thirdly, will the Minister consider bringing forward the fourth national adaptation programme? NAP3, published by the previous Government in 2023, was deemed ineffective by the Climate Change Committee. NAP4 is not due until 2028, but can we afford to wait two more years before we have an adequate plan?”
The complete record
Every one of 3,898 lines we hold for Mr Toby Perkins, in date order, each linked to its source. Free to read, in full, without an account. Page 2 of 78.
“I have already written to the Secretary of State about a manufacturer in my constituency that makes transport ramps out of steel, and three other companies in the constituency are more directly involved in steel stockholding and have products manufactured out of steel, and they are all deeply concerned about where we currently are on this. I know we have the current plan for 1 July—that is not far away at all. If we do not get this right, the consequences could be extraordinarily serious. I know that is on the Minister’s list and that it is prominent in his mind, but I add my call to all those others who say that we need to tread extremely carefully. With that, it remains only to say well done to the Minister and the Government for their continued backing of steel, and I look forward to seeing this—”
“We are—absolutely sensibly—taking measures on the tariffs to prevent the dominance of the Chinese steel industry, which sells steel at ludicrously cheap prices and is attempting to get all other countries to lose their steel industries so that we will then all be dependent on China. However, we have to be careful that we do not cause unintended consequences for British manufacturers that use steel and for our international competitiveness. We do not want to end up in the position of, for example, rolled bar, where we do not have reliable and strong provision of that here in the UK. We need to tread carefully with this. I know the Minister is on this, but I take this opportunity to come back to that point.”
“I agree 100% about the importance of protecting skills, which has been a huge priority of mine throughout my time in this House. The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right that skills have been lost from the sector, as we tragically and foolishly allowed the steel industry to be stripped away, as he rightly pointed out, by the Conservative party. That has been tremendously damaging to our national security, our economy, our industry and, as he rightly says, the skills base in this country. I am very supportive of what the Government are doing in this Bill. I would like to take the opportunity to speak, as I did a moment ago, to a question raised with me that is somewhat parallel to the narrow terms of the Bill, but is relevant to amendment 6 and to amendment 5, which has not been selected.”
“I will sit down now, but I tell the Government that they have my absolute support on this approach to the nationalisation of British Steel, and I ask the Minister to respond to the points I have made.”
“I absolutely agree with my hon. Friend, who clearly speaks with great knowledge on these subjects. He makes an important point, once again raising the importance of this whole area of legislation to the defence industry and to sovereign capability. The reality is that our defence industry is crucial economically, for jobs and for our national protection, but also for exports. We should absolutely welcome those British manufacturers making things here and selling them across the world. If we inadvertently cause them to be less competitive, we will rue the day, so we need to tread carefully. But his point about ore and those amendments is well made.”
“The hon. Lady is making a very important and interesting point. In the steel industry over recent years, we have seen foreign companies buying British firms, then closing them down and leaving us without this capability. Would anything in new clause 9 prevent that from happening again? Having forced the Government to seek this buyer, is there anything in it to stop that buyer coming in and just closing the business down, meaning we lose that sovereign capability?”
“I think the hon. Lady is in the same place as the Government, in that they want to see an excellent private sector partner at the earliest opportunity. The point I was trying to make is that she would be compelling the Government, in new clause 9, to seek this provider, and we have seen what has sometimes happened previously. Is she saying that, ultimately, we must do whatever the market decides, or is she basically supporting the Government’s position that this sovereign capability must remain in the UK and that we will work with other partners, but they will not be able to shut down British steelmaking as they have done in the past? Will there be any provisos in the new clause?”
“When I asked the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for West Worcestershire (Dame Harriett Baldwin), about this point, it was instructive that we heard her resort to saying, “It is just about being kept in touch.” The new clauses say that the private sector is always the way to go, but we know from our long history with the steel industry that that idea has often led to private companies coming in, mismanaging or indeed closing British steelmaking companies, and us seeing sovereign capability disappear overseas. Does my hon. Friend agree that we need to ensure that the Government can always act in the national interest by rejecting the new clauses?”
“Will the water Bill tackle the environmental failures and also put in place a regime that prevents the kind of appalling indebtedness that we saw with Thames Water, and the industry more generally, and the prioritisation of those debts ahead of delivering for customers?”
“My hon. Friend the Minister is absolutely right to say that we are united by our anger about the systemic failures in the water industry, in terms of both financial and environmental regulation, and the under-investment in infrastructure over a long period—although the fact that Welsh Water, a not-for-profit water company, is also a poor performer when it comes to the environment shows that it is simplistic to say that profit is the only issue here. The Government have rightly addressed one of the issues—the amount of investment going in—but we need to see results from higher bills, and we also need to see regulatory reform as soon as possible.”
“Only around 5% of young people with an education, health and care plan end up in permanent employment, so any plan to address this issue needs to be better on that. Supported internships are an incredibly good way of supporting young people with EHC plans and others to find work—we have a great example in Derbyshire—but we need more funding for them. What will the Minister do to boost supported internships and support those young people with EHC plans?”
“I welcome the Home Secretary’s fierce rejection of two-tier policing and of any suggestion that people should be judged differently according to their colour. The footage is one of the most sickening things I have ever seen, and my heart goes out to the Nowak family who had to witness it. The Home Secretary is absolutely right to say that we must wait for the IOPC investigation, but if it does turn out that some kind of misguided application of the culture of policing has led to the victim not being believed while the murderer was believed, what more will she do to ensure that every single police officer hears loud and clear her message that everyone deserves to be policed in exactly the same way, regardless of the colour of their skin?”
“and learned Member for Kenilworth and Southam (Sir Jeremy Wright) said: once she has demonstrated that this Government have got a grip of the costs and the timescales, can we be more ambitious and reopen discussions about extending the line beyond Birmingham, and up to Manchester and Leeds?”
“My Chesterfield constituents at one time hoped that they might be beneficiaries of HS2. That feels like many years ago. I share the Secretary of State’s fury about the incompetence that has got us to this stage. We would not have supported a programme like this, had we known that the line would go only to Birmingham. The line should be going to Manchester and Leeds, at the very least; any serious country that had high-speed rail would agree. I am glad that the Secretary of State has laid out how she will get a grip on this, but I would like to add to what the right hon.”
“The shadow Secretary of State said that for energy independence we need our own oil and gas, rather than investing in renewables. She will know that her Government paid £44 billion to subsidise our energy during the time of the Ukraine price spike. Will she tell us by how much our bills were reduced as a result of having our own oil and gas when the Ukraine crisis happened?”
“The shadow Secretary of State did not take my second intervention when I attempted to get an answer from her. We know that Conservative Members propose to get rid of the energy profits levy, costing the Government about £12 billion, and they want to get rid of VAT, costing about £5 billion or £6 billion. We know they have a plan for oil or gas that might be here in four or 10 years, although it is owned by somebody else, and they believe they will use that collection of policies to reduce people’s energy prices. Does my right hon. Friend see any credibility in the plans from Conservative Members that he can share with us, because we have not heard it from them?”
“I welcome the European partnership Bill, because it is important that we work more closely with our European partners, and I fully support what the Government are doing on apprenticeships, because apprenticeships and greater investment in adult education are absolutely crucial if we are to equip tomorrow’s workers with the skills they need to support industry. So there are many measures in this King’s Speech that can make a real difference—there is also the need to go further and faster—and I look forward to supporting it later.”
“Friend the Member for Sefton Central (Bill Esterson) on the need to reduce energy bills far more to help with the cost of living, but also to ease the green transition, benefit consumers and support industry in this country. The King’s Speech also has a clean water Bill, and alongside climate action we do need nature action. Nature is the foundation of our national economic security, and we cannot tackle climate change without restoring nature. The Government made a promise to clean up Britain’s rivers and seas, and I am delighted to see this clean water Bill in the King’s Speech—not only in tackling water industry reform, which is crucial, but in recognising the need to tackle agricultural water pollution and road-based water pollution.”
“Member for East Surrey (Claire Coutinho), who on the one hand said the Government have not done enough on nuclear in two years, and on the other hand said that the Government cannot blame the Conservatives for 14 years of inaction, because the previous Government got in the way of it. It was absolutely incoherent. The exchange of letters between the shadow Secretary of State and the chair of the Climate Change Committee, and I encourage everyone to look at them, made it clear that when she voted against allocation round 7, she simply did not understand what she was talking about in terms of the difference between an LCOE—a levelised cost of energy—and contracts for difference. So when she says that we should follow her advice, we should treat that with the greatest of scepticism. I should also say that I echo my hon.”
“The intervention that the Government made—politically, I think they had to make it because of the impact in the number of people who would have gone under—cost the British taxpayer £44 billion in a single year. The idea that the response to the further global insecurity of the Iran war is to reduce investment in renewables is quite mad. So I welcome the Government’s two further Bills, and I absolutely support the increase in nuclear that this Government are getting on with after the dither and delay of the previous Government. It was quite remarkable to hear the speech of the shadow Secretary of State, the right hon.”
“I would like to focus on some specific measures in His Majesty’s Gracious Speech that I particularly welcome. First, on the energy independence Bill, I very much welcome the Government’s action to protect households and industry from global instability by powering forward with clean, home-grown energy to create energy independence and get off the fossil fuel rollercoaster. Both the energy independence Bill and the nuclear regulation Bill will strengthen our resilience to energy price shocks for the long term and bring down the cost of bills for families. As has been said, during the Ukraine crisis the Government at the time paid to subsidise customers’ bills, because we were so dependent on global markets.”
“As for the achievements, there is a great deal that I could focus on, if I had more time, but I want to deal specifically with the national health service, migration—on which there have been very positive announcements recently—the minimum wage increase, and workers’ and renters’ rights. This is a Government who are delivering on their agenda. Despite the prophets of doom on the Opposition Benches, the most recent figures once again show unemployment continuing to fall and the fastest growth in the G7 in the last quarter. So many of the fundamentals are going in the right direction, but anyone who spent time attempting to persuade voters to vote Labour in the recent elections will have been left in no doubt but that our voters remain unconvinced that we are going fast enough or far enough to bring about the change they want.”
“His Majesty’s Gracious Speech set out a legislative programme for the Government, including plans to build our national security, our economic security and our energy security. I welcome this agenda, which is consistent with the manifesto on which my hon. Friends and I were elected. I urge all members of the Government to exhibit a relentless urgency, and a focus on delivery of that programme, to ensure that the ambition is matched by its impact. We were elected in 2024 on a mandate for change—for national renewal—after 14 years of decline under the Tories.”
“The right hon. Lady says that the hon. Member for Clacton (Nigel Farage) is a symptom of the problem, but does she agree that she and he have something in common? She very loosely agreed that we should race with America into war in Iran, then just a week later she thought, “Maybe that’s not such a good idea.” Does that not prove why she and he are totally unsuitable for speaking from the Government side of the House?”
“T6. I welcome what my right hon. Friends have been doing on public procurement. On car hire services, it is expected that around 20% of fleet industry vehicles will be electric, but less than 1% of Government purchases have been for electric vehicle hire. I know that the Government take this issue seriously, so will the Minister lay out what the Government are doing to ensure that they hire more electric vehicles?”
“In conclusion, I wish to place on record several thanks. I thank all the members of the Committee for their contributions and their thoughtful engagement with this inquiry; the community members, regulators and industry representatives in Bentham who took the time to meet the Committee to discuss this sensitive and important topic with great transparency and candour; and the staff of the Environmental Audit Committee, particularly Dr Misha Patel, Dr William Brittain, Jonathan Wright and Jacob Moreton, for their work and expertise in co-ordinating the inquiry, the visits, the communications and the report. With that, I place our report before the House.”
“The Committee recommended that the Government should explore the implications of an emissions levy for PFAS on the UK REACH—registration, evaluation, authorisation and restriction of chemicals—candidate list, to deter ongoing environmental contamination and hold polluters responsible. In cases where the PFAS contamination is not attributable, central Government must provide dedicated funding for local authorities to clean it up and provide clear guidance on remediation and destruction methodologies. The Committee’s investigation of PFAS pollution was complex and at times technical, but our conclusions are not: forever chemicals are still being emitted, they are building up in our bodies and in the environment, and we know that they are harmful. Waiting will only make the problem worse; now is the time to act.”
“Based on the “polluter pays” principle, those who released PFAS into the environment should be expected to pay for it to be remediated. We of course recognise that in some cases, the Government and the manufacturing industry will need to work together to ensure that costs associated with the clean-up of the past do not endanger the future of these companies. We also recognise that in some cases, the companies that polluted in the past no longer exist, so the cost of the clean-up will fall on the Government. However, we want to see the Government starting from the perspective that the polluter should pay and the taxpayer should not be expected to foot the bill.”
“The Government rightly mandated the guidelines for the level of PFAS allowed in drinking water; we would like to see statutory limits on PFAS in food and soils, and monitoring and enforcement by the Environment Agency to match. Protecting public health also requires long-term investment in biomonitoring and epidemiological research. The Committee recommended enhanced health screening for people with potentially high PFAS exposure. While monitoring and research are vital, they must not be used to delay action. Finally, there is an important set of questions around existing and historic PFAS contamination: how should it be cleaned up, and who should pay for it? Where the Government were not clear, the Committee was.”
“Lacking the same kind of action brings risks to our trade and economy, too; unnecessary regulatory divergence from the EU creates trade barriers in the UK—between Northern Ireland and the Republic and between the UK and the EU—which impacts UK manufacturing competitiveness. To research this issue, the Committee visited Angus Fire in Bentham in North Yorkshire and met directors of the firm, campaigners and villagers. It also visited Lyon and the French Parliament to learn about the regulatory actions in France, and about the state of the campaign and public opinion there. The Committee argues that clear limits on the acceptable level of PFAS must be set to enable enforcement and remediation.”
“In phasing out PFAS, the regulatory system should shift from a substance-by-substance approach to group-based regulation, to prevent the replacement of banned PFAS with structurally similar and potentially harmful alternatives. We believe that without such a broad, group-based restriction on PFAS, the Government risk a whack-a-mole approach whereby new substances emerge faster than they can be evaluated and banned. In the EU, more decisive action has been taken and chemicals are banned as a group, with firms having to seek a derogation from the law if the compound is either vital or irreplaceable.”
“The longer action to address the risks of PFAS is delayed, the greater the health, economic and environmental burdens will become. I will briefly highlight some of the Committee’s recommendations to Government in those three areas. Right now, PFAS are still being manufactured, put into consumer products and released into the environment. The Committee made several recommendations to prevent PFAS pollution at source. We are calling for restrictions on PFAS in non-essential consumer products, including food packaging, cookware, cosmetics and coatings on school uniforms. Where the use of PFAS is considered essential to protect the health, safety and functioning of society, exemptions could of course be granted.”
“Although the Government’s plan is a welcome starting point, it is short on the decisive action needed to prevent the harmful build-up of these chemicals in the environment. The plan focuses disproportionately on monitoring, rather than prevention and remediation. It also suggests voluntary action and industry self-regulation, which in our view will be insufficient to reduce PFAS emissions to the level we need to see. In the Committee’s view, tackling the scale of contamination requires a combined approach. First, we must prevent ongoing PFAS emissions at source; secondly, we must manage continued PFAS emissions; and thirdly, we must address remediation and disposal of PFAS. This must be supported by sustained research, funding, monitoring and public transparency.”
“Addressing PFAS pollution is therefore essential to protecting public health, preventing long-term environmental harm and reducing future remediation costs. Acknowledging the growing issue of PFAS, the Government published in February a PFAS action plan—the first of its kind, and a very welcome step. The Committee is grateful to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and to the Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, my hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull West and Haltemprice (Emma Hardy), for engaging proactively and constructively with us throughout the process, allowing us the opportunity to examine the Government’s plan as part of our inquiry. The Committee’s inquiry found that the UK faces a growing legacy of PFAS pollution alongside continued emissions.”
“PFAS are a class of more than 10,000 synthetic chemicals that are used in a high variety of applications for their water resistance and resilience, from non-stick frying pans to making school uniforms more water-resistant and from firefighting foams to cosmetics. However, it is that same quality—their resistance to breaking down—that means they accumulate in the environment and in the human body over time. It is for this reason that they are known as forever chemicals. PFAS are now widely detected in UK rivers, soils and wildlife and in the blood of most people, and a growing body of evidence links high PFAS exposure to serious health and environmental risks, including certain cancers, immunity suppression, and fertility and developmental impacts.”
“I am very pleased to present the Environmental Audit Committee’s ninth report of this Parliament, on addressing the risks from perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances, also known as forever chemicals. The inquiry was launched last year, at a time when the acronym PFAS might have been familiar only to a few experts. One year on, there has been an ITV and ENDS Report documentary about PFAS, the first ever Government PFAS action plan, and much more public awareness and scrutiny of PFAS pollution and contamination. For the benefit of those watching who are unaware, I will briefly outline the PFAS issue before turning to the substance of our report.”
“I absolutely believe that the Government need to be ambitious on this issue. We welcome the fact that we now have a PFAS plan, which we did not have previously, and we want to be right behind the Minister in ensuring that DEFRA is as ambitious as it can be. Water companies contributed to our inquiry—they were quite glad to be in the unusual position of not being battered over the head for polluting, since in this case, they are the victims of pollution. The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right that the Drinking Water Inspectorate needs to be held to account, although it is important to recognise that among the panoply of water regulators, it is more successful than others. Alongside drinking water, we want to see the same sorts of limits applied to food and our agricultural sector more generally.”
“I absolutely agree. We know that the firefighting industry is very much affected. In comparison to some industries, it has clearly made significant progress in finding alternatives to PFAS, but it has been a major polluter over the years. We also recognise, of course, that being able to put out fires is incredibly important. Firefighting is the kind of essential use where we would understand that there could be derogations, but when PFAS are being used in cosmetics and so on, I wonder whether we should not be aiming to be more ambitious in putting bans in place. I agree with the points that my hon. Friend makes, and I thank him for that contribution.”
“I agree with the right hon. Gentleman. I thank him for his engagement with us on behalf of his constituents and an important employer in his constituency. We do not want the message coming from this report to panic communities. We do not want to create the sense that Bentham or anywhere else is a community that is blighted and that no one should want to live there. At the same time, we want to recognise where these pollution contamination events have taken place. People need to be confident that the Environment Agency has not only the tools, capacity, resources and expertise, but the legislative heft to take action where there have been contamination breaches.”
“The hon. Gentleman raises an important point. In fact, his colleague, the right hon. Member for East Antrim (Sammy Wilson), is a member of our Committee. He made the point strongly that because we have divergence from the EU in this area, it potentially causes major problems for the agricultural sector in Northern Ireland. Effectively, it will have different rules from the Republic, which creates a major issue. The Committee debated the impact on Northern Ireland at considerable length. It is an important point in our report, and one that we will be taking to the Government. We have not yet communicated with the Northern Ireland Assembly, but we would be happy to do so following this report.”
“We look forward to working with the Minister. We will do everything we can to provide her with the support that she might need within the Department to get this issue taken as seriously as it should be. We recognise that there will always be people who push back. There are important reasons why we need to tread carefully, such as to support UK manufacturing, but we also need to recognise that this is a serious public health issue. We welcome the work she is doing and thank her for it.”
“The shadow Secretary of State has been speaking a bit tonight about parental choice. That is, until this amendment, where she does not believe parents are able to decide what their children should do. In fact, she believes that she is far better placed, as are many Members in the House of Lords who do not know how to take a photo on their phone, to tell people how to parent their children. Does she acknowledge that many parents recognise that their children have positive experiences on social media? Is it not sensible to have a consultation, as the Government have already announced, to hear from experts, from children and from all the people who have opinions on this issue, rather than legislating at great haste and making a huge difference to many young people’s lives?”
“Because renewables are cheaper, should we not look to benefit from that, rather than having a system that allows gas to set the price, even if it accounts for only 1% of our energy?”
“My right hon. Friend is absolutely right to expose the utter folly of responding to the situation that faces us by saying, “We need to stop with renewables and invest more in oil and gas.” It would be utter madness to learn that lesson. When we had the huge price spike as a result of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the fact that oil and gas was coming from the UK made no difference to the amount that our consumers paid, because it was all on the global market. Does my right hon. Friend agree that the marginal pricing system, which was set up at a time when 80% or 90% of energy was being generated by fossil fuels, is far less robust at a time when the figure for gas is down to 40% and shrinking the entire time, and more than 50% of our energy comes from renewable sources?”
“My right hon. Friend will hear a lot from politicians today—although it appears not from Reform Members, because they have all gone—but does she agree that the most important people to listen to are not those making the sound and fury in this room but those who lend money to the Government? They believe that her proposals are worth lending money against, and for that reason, the amount we will be spending on debt interest is falling. Unlike the Conservative party, they think the UK is a good credit risk in comparison with other G7 nations. Will she say more about how she can bring electricity prices down to support the growth that she is all about?”
“I very much welcome the leadership that the Government are taking on this important industry. How much sustainable aviation fuel does my hon. Friend anticipate that the UK will be able to provide, and after his amendments have gone through, is it still likely that we will depend on imports of sustainable aviation fuel, alongside the stocks we have in the UK?”
“I am very grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving way; I wish him a happy birthday. I am interested in what he has to say. I think the Government have to be given some credit for bringing forward this signal that pushes the industry, in terms of both support for it to produce here in the UK and the mandate. Will he clarify whether he supports the SAF mandate as currently legislated for, or is he saying that he supports only it if it will not lead to any additional cost?”
“I warmly welcome the Bill, which will boost home-grown production of sustainable aviation fuel. I also welcome the work done on the Bill in the other place and believe the amendments strengthen it. My hon. Friend the Minister should be heartened by the fact that the amendments he presents today are not being lambasted from all sides; instead, everyone seeks to claim credit for them, which is a nice place for him to be. The Conservatives, characteristically, have added this matter to the list of things they are now calling for but did not do during their 14 years in power. None the less, I welcome the comments from the hon. Member for Mid Buckinghamshire (Greg Smith).”
“However, the Committee has also demonstrated that that is not by any means inevitable, and that sustainable aviation fuel is one aspect that must play a growing role alongside a suite of other measures if the Government are to reduce carbon emissions from aviation while driving that passenger and economic growth. It is absolutely crucial that the Government take action not just on sustainable aviation fuel, but on the many other elements that will be necessary both to keep the Government’s promise and to keep them out of the courts and from being judicially reviewed. It is important that this is one of a number of measures.”
“I can neither confirm nor deny what the hon. Gentleman says. Frankly, I am not certain about that—he may well be right. I was not seeking to create great division on this, although I do think my general point remains. None the less, as I say, I thank him for what he has said and for his support for the Bill. We have plenty of things to argue about; let us not dance on the head of a pin in this area where we are all agreed. The Government are clearly committed to greater aviation expansion. The recent work of my Committee, the Environmental Audit Committee, has demonstrated that it is possible to achieve the Government’s ambitions to have that growth while protecting nature and the environment.”