Jamie Stone
MP for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross · Liberal Democrat · United Kingdom
“I am a Member who represents a part of the United Kingdom where government is devolved. Despite the good intentions of this Government, the money that goes north sometimes goes into the tube and what comes out the other end is sometimes rather different, particularly on housing.”
House of Commons28 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I do not know how many people in this place know this, but I used to work in the oil and gas industry—not for a holiday job, but for years on end. I worked at Kishorn, at Nigg, at Sullom Voe and in Aberdeen.”
House of Commons21 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Dounreay was an example, prior to 1954-55, of the tragedy of highland depopulation. Mr Stuart, if you drive up the A9 from Latheron to Thurso, you see cottages—crofts—without roofs; they are open to the skies. People had gone, and it was the curse.”
House of Commons14 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Some would have a croft; they would work at Dounreay in the day and go back and run the croft in their other time. The advent of Dounreay literally kept the lights on in the straths and glens of the highlands. None of us should ever forget that.”
House of Commons14 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Stuart, and I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Dunbartonshire (Susan Murray) on securing this debate. As regards the good-natured jibe from the hon.”
House of Commons14 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“All the bits of the jigsaw are in place—and yet we have heard repeatedly what the roadblock is. To show the nicer side of my nature—if there is one—could I just gently point out to the Scottish Government that Plaid Cymru has embraced the concept of new nuclear in Wales?”
House of Commons14 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
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“Every single job in oil and gas is crucial to remote highland communities. It is the people coming back from working three on, three off, or whatever, who keep the lights on in the straths and glens of some of the remotest parts of the highlands.”
House of Commons23 April 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Yes, we are putting them together and putting them into the North sea—the Beatrice field off my constituency is an example—but there is much more to do. In the minute and a half that I have left, let me echo the hon. Member for Aberdeen North in saying that the world has changed since Putin and Trump. Oil is a strategic asset. We are lucky enough to have it. We should not talk it down all the time. We should look on the new discoveries as cash in the bank for the future. Oil is not just about burning hydrocarbons, but about pharmaceuticals and many other uses. We should always remember how fortunate we are that the good Lord gave us this strategic asset. I will conclude where I began. So many of my class went away. In more recent decades it has been different: people have stayed.”
House of Commons23 April 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Safeguarding the industry is hugely important to me, which is why I made the journey there and back to vote in support. However, as the hon. Member for Brent West pointed out, far too many wind turbines are made of steel that is not made in this country. Far too many parts of those turbines are not made in this country either. Our great, shining hope is that one day we will be using the skills to which I referred to train young people to start building turbines, cells and blades here in the UK. We are not doing nearly enough as we should, yet at Nigg we have one the finest graving docks in Europe. It is a perfect site. Kishorn has been revived, yet we are still not making the bits and pieces that we should.”
House of Commons23 April 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Since then, as others have alluded to, the situation has changed. Today, like the hon. Member for Aberdeen North, I have many constituents who work offshore. However, the same opportunity or perhaps necessity is there for those who are considering moving abroad. It is the same story. Very often they move south because it is easier to get to wherever they want to work, which could be in Kuwait or wherever. We face that old dread demon of highland depopulation—people leaving again. We have an ageing population, and we do not have as many younger carers as we would like. Families are beginning to go, and that is part of the tragedy. The reason I came down on the Saturday when Parliament was recalled is that British steel means everything in constructing oil platforms, and possibly floating offshore wind structures.”
House of Commons23 April 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“My father said to me, “When you leave school, you’ll find your best employment chances down south, not up here in the highlands.” Then North sea oil came and everything changed massively. The Nigg oil fabrication yard was constructed near my hometown of Tain. There was one at Kishorn in Wester Ross, there was one at Ardersier near Inverness, and there were many other sites in Scotland and England. It meant that local people could find high-quality employment; they had not had that opportunity before. There were highly paid and skilled jobs. People learned skills such as rigging and welding, as the hon. Member for Aberdeen North referred to. I worked at the yard at Nigg. At the height of it all, no less than 5,000 people worked there, constructing the mighty Conoco Hutton production platform. Those were the great old days.”
House of Commons23 April 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“What a pleasure it is to see a fellow St Andrean in your august position, Sir Desmond. I am sure that the hon. Member for Brent West (Barry Gardiner) agrees. I congratulate the hon. Member for Aberdeen North (Kirsty Blackman) on her comprehensive speech. It is greatly encouraging that one of our colleagues understands the situation as thoroughly as she clearly does—well done her. I want to look at the historical perspective. I am of such great age that I can remember the time before North sea oil. Far too many in my class at Tain academy went south when they left school. They disappeared: they were part of the highland clearances, if you like, in latter years.”
House of Commons23 April 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“My hon. Friend talks, quite correctly, about a beautiful part of England. I, too, represent a very beautiful part of the world. Here is an unbelievable fact for him—I have written it on my hand: in 2023, there were no fewer than 1,439 sewage spills in the highlands. What a disgrace that none of the Scottish nationalists, the governing party of Scotland, are here today.”
House of Commons23 April 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I suggest to the Secretary of State that the problem may be more deep-seated than we realise. He mentioned algal blooms in the Lake district. Not only do those blooms turn the water a strange colour; they suck the oxygen out of the water, leading to the death of wildlife in the water. Furthermore, sewage contains heavy metals and other toxic substances that can kill fish or affect their ability to reproduce, so we may find ecosystems that have been damaged over a much longer term than we realise.”
House of Commons23 April 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The hon. Member is making a very good speech. With her permission, I might just broaden the concept of a political donation, because, in many ways, it is not always quite as simple as a cheque hitting a given political party’s bank account. Whatever one thought of him—he was a great man in Scottish politics, and is no longer with us—it is a fact that Alex Salmond, for a number of years, hosted a show in his own name on RT, a Russian television channel, on which he, on a regular basis, put forward views that were not always particularly helpful to the concept of a United Kingdom. That seems to me to be a subtle way of foreign Governments influencing decisions and trying to interfere.”
House of Commons31 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The very fact that the Committee, which I have the honour of chairing, gets the honour of a Government reply each time we have a petitions debate strikes me as a very good thing indeed. I will leave my comments there. As I said in my intervention, there are more subtle ways of influencing politics in any country than a cheque or cash in the bank. We need to be constantly vigilant.”
House of Commons31 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Thank you, Mrs Harris. I do not want to add much to what I said in my intervention. This is a very dangerous principle. I have people saying to me in the street, “It’s getting like America—you can buy political results, politicians and policies.” This strikes me as fundamentally dangerous. We call ourselves the mother of Parliaments, and we pride ourselves on the way we do democracy in this country. Every time such things are said to me, I feel that another little brick has been taken out of the edifice of what we do. As the Chair of the Petitions Committee, I thank the petitioners for bringing forward the petition, which expresses what an awful lot of people out there think.”
House of Commons31 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Mr Mundell, you and I both know that the European structural funds were fundamental to some of the remotest parts of the UK for investment in harbours, roads and other infrastructure. May I just say to the hon. Member that that was a benefit that we enjoyed when we were part of the EU and, whatever happens in the future, we hope that this Government or future Governments will seek to replicate and replace it?”
House of Commons24 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I thank the Minister for his answer. Clearly we have a particularly good relationship with the countries that make up the joint expeditionary force. The Minister and I have completed the armed forces parliamentary scheme and were both plunged into the snowdrifts in Norway at Bardufoss. Some of the kit that the Norwegians had was particularly impressive, as I am sure the Minister would agree. Could I press him on what work we can do with the countries in the joint expeditionary force on procurement, design and perhaps development of equipment?”
House of Commons24 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I know that a visit would mean a great deal to the local people.”
House of Commons18 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“In getting ahead with what we are doing now, we will be in the nick of time to train up new generations based on past generations’ knowledge and ability. I welcome that. This has been a well-tempered debate—apart from the conspicuous absence of some hon. Members—which sends a good message to everybody who cares about our shipbuilding industry. Everyone is singing from the same hymn sheet, which is to be welcomed because, as others hon. Members said, it was shipbuilding that made this country great. We have the skills and the people, and we can do it again, but this time with offshore and other similar structures. If a Government Member would like to visit my constituency to see what we are going to do, they would be more than welcome—to say the least. I may be in a different party, but I extend the hand of friendship.”
House of Commons18 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“For that reason, I am grateful to the Government for the announcement in the last few days that £55 million will be given to the port of Cromarty firth to develop an alongside fabrication facility to create and put together those modular structures that can then be taken out. I thank the Government for that very welcome decision. From that investment, we can do great things in future, but I also suggest that time is of the essence. The skills mentioned by the hon. Member for Glasgow West (Patricia Ferguson) are ageing. If they are lost, they could be gone forever, because they are clever skills such as butt welding and all the different sorts of fabrication in steel, aluminium or concrete.”
House of Commons18 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It was a shot in the arm to see, in my home town of Tain, people coming in from south-west Scotland and other parts. What that meant in terms of amateur operatic societies, and just doing things in the community, was a great change—very much for the good. I remember those days with great happiness: I married and I brought up my children because of the employment in those yards. That was why I did not move away and why I disobeyed my father’s instructions. More recently, as has been mentioned, we have seen the potential of floating offshore structures. As I have said, the Nigg yard where I worked was placed where it was because it was in one of the finest deep-water ports in the United Kingdom, where big structures could be built and moved relatively easily out to the North sea.”
House of Commons18 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Those skills moved north to build the mighty structures that we have today in the North sea. I worked in the Kishorn yard on the Ninian Central Platform, which in its day was the biggest concrete structure ever built, and in the Nigg yard for a number of years. At the height of North sea construction and fabrication, no less than 5,000 people worked in the Nigg yard. Hon. Members can imagine what a difference that made to the local economy of that remote part of the highlands—depopulation disappeared just like that. People moved in. We made jokes about them—no offence to hon. Members from the west of Scotland—and called them Hey Jimmys, because they all came in saying, “Hey Jim!” They got my name right, because I am James, which was rather charming.”
House of Commons18 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“When I was growing up in the highlands, there was a dismal litany of depopulation. When I was at Tain Royal academy, the brightest and best—and many others— went south. Indeed, my father said to me, “Go south, young lad, to work and to prosper.” But then the oil came. I give credit to the then Labour Government for seeing the potential of North sea oil and for lifting the ball and running with it, because those crucial decisions in the early 1970s created the industry that we have today. Because of where the potential yards were situated, and the need to get them to the North sea, it made sense to build them in the Outer Hebrides, Kishorn, Ardersier and Nigg. In the early 1970s, we saw the transfer of the skills that have already been mentioned from the Clyde and other parts of the UK.”
House of Commons18 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It is a pleasure to speak in any debate chaired by your good self, Ms Jardine. I, too, note that a certain political party from Scotland is not present today, which is a disgrace. Let us think about what it would be like to be working in Ferguson’s right now. Through no fault of the workforce—there is nothing wrong with their skills—they have been left out, which is pretty bad, and not one of those Members bothers to show up. I would not let them run a birthday party in a brewery, if I can put it that way. Nevertheless, we have had good news about the frigates that are going to be built in Scotland. I suggest that there will probably be a greater necessity to build more of them, and I imagine that that work could come to Scotland. We have the skills and we should be proud of that.”
House of Commons18 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I thank the Minister for giving way. On that point, I do not know how well I can put this. In building offshore structures, different bits can be built in different places, but they would come to Invergordon to be amalgamated, hence the £55 million Government investment. Could the same principle apply of looking at the rules, to ensure that the different bits are built in Methil or Ardersier, rather than being built abroad? Because that is our fear, that they may be made far away in somewhere such as Poland or Korea.”
House of Commons18 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“In conversation this morning with Trudy Morris, the CEO of the Caithness chamber of commerce, she outlined the sheer importance of tourism businesses to the local economy and the farmers in Scotland. The concern expressed to me is on the rate of VAT on tourism and similar businesses, and although we do not know whether the Highland council will impose a tourism levy, that could be a double whammy. I do not expect for one instant hon. Members on the Front Bench to say, “Jamie, you can have a cut in the rate of VAT”—well, I dream sometimes—but I would be grateful for a meeting to discuss the nature of the problem and how we could possibly tackle it.”
House of Commons13 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“During Business and Trade questions earlier, we heard mention of the fantastic value of the export of our food and drink to the United States, which was a sound point. The food and drink industry supports tourism all over the UK, and the whisky distilleries provide fantastic local employment in some of the remotest parts of Scotland. Mr Speaker, next time you travel on London North Eastern Railway, the biscuits you eat will have been made by Mr Gary Reid of Perthshire. I declare an interest because my brother is a cheesemaker. May we have a debate on the food and drink industry in the UK, which is one of our greatest achievements?”
House of Commons13 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I am not sure whether I picked up what the Minister said correctly, but I suggest that we try to collate their memories, perhaps through local government culture departments, and they can be encouraged to write things down or make a recording. It might interesting to publish a book of their reminiscences and memories while they are still here, because from history we learn for the future, and their accounts will be crucial to the generations ahead of us.”
House of Commons13 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I am sure that the same word comes to the minds of all of us who have witnessed what has happened in these past months. We pray for peace, but it has to be a peace that works with allies and, above all, it has to be a just peace. The events of 1940 were a very, very close run thing. Had Hitler come across the channel, which he might have done had he not decided to turn east and head towards Russia, we might still be in a German state today—who knows? It was miraculous that we got through and won that war. I close with a final suggestion to Ministers. There are precious few veterans, all over the UK, who still with us today.”
House of Commons13 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I associate my party with what is being planned—it is a great idea. I crave the indulgence of the House to mention my parents, both of whom served in the second world war. My father served in the aforementioned Fourteenth Army, led by Bill Slim, and was part of the second wave through Kohima. When I asked him what it was like, all he described to me was the terrible smell of corpses—that is what stayed with him. Completely to my family’s surprise, we discovered that my mother had worked at Bletchley Park. She was shocked and horrified when that came out, and she spluttered, “But I signed the Official Secrets Act.” My mother could never do a crossword, so we do not know how earth she got there. [ Laughter. ] When we think about the period before the second world war, the word “appeasement” comes to mind.”
House of Commons13 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Much has been said about the taxation, and I will not repeat it, but I will remark on one thing that has been said, which is that land prices in the Six Counties of Northern Ireland are much higher than in other parts of the United Kingdom, so the effect of the taxation will be rather larger there. To compound this, cuts to DEFRA’s day-to-day spending mean that many family farms and rural businesses will struggle. That is why my party is saying that we should raise the farming budget by £1 billion. If we can do that, perhaps we can help. We want to see a renegotiation of trade agreements to protect British farmers and a strengthening of the Groceries Code Adjudicator.”
House of Commons13 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr Carmichael) on opening the debate and on the thoughtful and knowledgeable speech he made. I also compliment Members on both sides of the Chamber for what they have said. I was brought up on a farm. I was the wee boy who shooed the cows home to the faraway field. I represent the biggest constituency in the UK. I have an awful lot of farms and crofts in my constituency. Farming is part of our way of life. It is about the food we eat. It is about the fight against climate change. It is about our heritage and, in constituencies such as mine, it is about the tourism economy. The change of Government has been difficult before. Brexit did not help—we all know that argument—and botched trade deals have not helped either.”
House of Commons13 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“My hon. Friend brings knowledge from the past, which is very valuable to the debate. My right hon. Friend the Member for Orkney and Shetland is also a champion of this cause, and what he says strikes a chord among farmers in my constituency. Getting a fair deal is fundamental to making farms viable for the long term. It is not that we want to do everything, but I hope that the Government will engage constructively with my right hon. Friend on this. It is too important to let this one go, and it could be an easy win for the Government and for all of us.”
House of Commons13 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“That needs to be looked at very carefully indeed. The second thing I am duty-bound to mention is the low price of malting barley. This is the highest-quality barley and is used to make whisky. It is low priced because not so much is being bought by the whisky distillers, a reflection of the fact that they are not selling so many bottles of whisky.”
House of Commons13 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I thank the hon. Gentleman for his contribution, and what a pity it is that our SNP colleagues are not with us at this point, because we both might have something to say about that. There has been a lack of knowledge north of the border—or a lack of understanding, I believe—of things that are fundamental to the way of life in the constituencies we represent at the different ends of Scotland. Time is short, but I want to conclude by mentioning three things that are causing my constituents some anxiety. In particular, I spoke with farmers this week and there has been recent publicity about what is known as lab-grown meat, produced from cells in a laboratory environment. It is thought that this could be upon us within two years. Yes, it is a way of producing food, but what does that mean for our livestock farmers?”
House of Commons13 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“That should be a worry not just for way farms are run presently but for finding new entrants into farming. I again commend my right hon. Friend the Member for Orkney and Shetland for his speech and for bringing this debate before us. Farming is absolutely fundamental to the country and the way we feed ourselves, and in a world that, as we have seen, is quite dangerous to say the least, the more we feed ourselves and the less we rely on imports, the better.”
House of Commons13 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It meant we could get our seed potatoes into Northern Ireland, but I know from talking to seed potato farmers that there are markets in Europe crying out to get hold of high-quality Scottish seed potatoes. They are the best, because they are some of the safest from virus, eelworm or whatever. I will be extremely grateful to the Government if they use every measure at their disposal to try to improve sales. Finally, I want to make rather a strange point. A number of farmers have told me that people who have worked on the farm, sometimes for decades, are now moving on to other jobs. People who drove tractors or used implements to cultivate fields are sometimes taking the option of going off to drive a digger for a builder, and a labour shortage is beginning to occur on some of our farms.”
House of Commons13 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“My right hon. Friend is indeed doing his bit and never ceases to do so, but this again goes back to an earlier point: that farming is intermingled throughout the entire economy. If we can have measures from the Government to increase whisky sales and to encourage exports, such as getting good-quality Scotch whisky into the Indian market, that will in the long term benefit the growers of malting barley, which will make farms more viable again. I am sorry that the hon. Member for Aberdeenshire North and Moray East (Seamus Logan) is not with us, because, in all fairness, he did make that point. The hon. Gentleman also made a point about seed potatoes. I welcomed the Windsor framework at the time and was thanked by the then Prime Minister for doing so.”
House of Commons13 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“My hon. Friend is making an excellent speech. One of the big problems that we have in my very remote constituency is the cost of delivery charges and surcharges. They are a lot higher than one would pay in cities such as Glasgow or Edinburgh. It is the same for the highlands of Scotland as it is for the rural parts of England. Does my hon. Friend agree that it would be good if the Government could look at this and try and take it down to a level playing field, so that people are not disadvantaged because of where they live?”
House of Commons12 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Mr Speaker, you will have seen the film “Skyfall”, in which James Bond and M travel up the A9. But the A9 is a killer road, and we have had a litany of broken promises from the SNP Government. That is hardly conducive to economic growth in Scotland.”
House of Commons4 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“My daughter lives in Donegal. When her two little boys were born, she had the choice of them being born in Derry or Sligo—on either side of the border. The Republic of Ireland has introduced an initiative called shared island. That is not a united Ireland, but it works in improving services. Will the Government look at its success, and consider how Scotland might work in a similar way to Northern Ireland, for the benefit of services?”
House of Commons26 February 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I thank the hon. Member for giving way; he is making an excellent contribution. The radio frequency network that, as the Minister is aware, controls what many people in remote areas pay for heating will be switched off in June. At present, the replacement infrastructure is not there, so many people could inadvertently end up paying through the nose. I find that very worrying, so will the hon. Member, and perhaps later the Minister, tell us whether they agree that the data communication company needs to speed up its roll-out of cellular coverage as quickly as possible? We are only four months away from June, and it is a deeply worrying situation for pensioners in my constituency and many other remote areas.”
House of Commons11 February 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“To return to my earlier intervention about the switch-off of the radio signal, on infrastructure, does the Minister agree that the data communication company must be exhorted and encouraged in every possible way to get on with the roll-out? Otherwise, people who are very vulnerable will pay more for their electricity.”
House of Commons11 February 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“This point has already been made, but once the farm is gone, it is gone forever.”
House of Commons10 February 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Bought by my great-great grandfather, Donald Fraser, it was in the family from the early-to-mid-19th century—a long, long time—but due to financial circumstances, my father had to sell almost all of it. Today, my brother and I own the princely sum of two fields. Here is the point: not a day goes by that I do not look toward the fields we used to own, on the shores of the Dornoch firth, and wish that we still owned them. The farm is in my blood. It is not like selling stocks and shares, or selling a holiday home in Spain; it is in the blood, it is in the family. Unless I were to win the lottery, I will never be able to buy back those fields. I am not likely to win the lottery and even then, land goes up in value. It is emotional, and that attachment makes it very different from other things one might own.”
House of Commons10 February 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Edward. As Chair of the Petitions Committee, I am delighted to see such fantastic attendance at this debate. I have two simple things to say. A week ago yesterday, I attended the farmers’ rally in John O’ Groats, at the other end of the United Kingdom. I was the only politician there. It was a cold, blowy day and the farmers and their tractors were out in force. I spoke to many of them and heard their concern. Even that far away from Westminster, it was exactly the same as we are hearing expressed in this debate: their fear of losing the farm. That takes me to my second simple point. I was brought up on a dairy farm.”
House of Commons10 February 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Resolved , That this House has considered the closure of high street services in rural areas.”
House of Commons5 February 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I beg to move, That this House has considered the closure of high street services in rural areas. It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Furniss. I am extremely grateful to have been granted the time to shed light on the impact that the closure of high street services continues to have on our rural communities. In recent years, exacerbated by the covid-19 pandemic, more and more shops on our high streets have closed their doors, leading to less vibrant town centres, reduced footfall to other businesses, job losses and, sadly, a diminished sense of community.”
House of Commons5 February 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“In my home in the highlands, those trends are compounded by rural isolation and limited access to alternative services. The closure of shops, banks, post offices and other essential services has left many residents in town centres feeling abandoned.”
House of Commons5 February 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“We have higher living costs, limited transport options and poor broadband connectivity. Rural areas such as mine have to contend with significant disadvantages compared with urban centres. We are all here today to talk about not just the loss of shops, banks and post offices, but the erosion of a way of life and a sense of connection, and a loss of public services and access to essential services that rural communities rely on. Over recent years, our rural communities have faced unprecedented challenges. Once bustling with activity, like my hometown, they are now marked by shuttered windows and “for sale” signs. The causes are many. We know that they include the rise of online shopping, changing consumer habits, economic pressures and, of course, the rise of large out-of-town centre supermarkets.”
House of Commons5 February 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I agree with my hon. Friend, and I will touch on that matter later in my contribution. I want to go back to when I was a boy—some time ago, I might say. My hometown of Tain in the highlands was a vibrant and bustling place. It was a short walk up Shore Road from where I lived, where my father had a small farm, to the high street, where we got everything we needed, from lavatory paper in piles and pyramids in Ross the chemists, via Lesley the grocer, where we could buy broken biscuits in brown paper bags, to Hamilton Cormack, the local solicitor, who played the piano beautifully but, happily, never seemed to send out a bill. We had everything. Tain was a totally self-contained, prosperous community—but, oh my goodness, how very different today. My constituency in the far north has long faced unique challenges.”
House of Commons5 February 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“My hon. Friend is right on the money, and I will return to that point shortly. Local businesses that once thrived now struggle to compete with online giants offering convenience and lower prices. This shift has not only impacted our economy but deprived our communities of vital gathering spaces—places where people can get together, where relationships are built and strengthened, and where we can have a good natter on the street corner.”
House of Commons5 February 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“But there have been some reassuring solutions to the issue of banks closing, which takes me back to those welcome words “banking hubs”. Run by the Post Office and Cash Access UK, the shared spaces have done amazing work in providing banking services in collaboration with an array of different banks.”
House of Commons5 February 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“We know there has been a shift towards digital banking in recent times, but for many in our rural communities, including the elderly, there is not good internet access for a start, and they cannot really use those services, let alone use them to their maximum power. I know of many old people who are totally bamboozled by them. I am not alone in these concerns. Lloyds Banking Group has recently announced the closure of 136 branches across the UK—that stopped even me in my tracks. The closures include several Bank of Scotland branches. I think that banks have a duty of public service to support local people with their financial needs, but that is a function that I fear many banks seem to have forgotten; I know not why.”
House of Commons5 February 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗