Ben Obese-Jecty

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1,047 held · 617 searchable for Ben Obese-Jecty. The searchable lines are below in date order, each linked to its source. Free to read, in full, without an account. Page 2 of 10.

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1. “The Deputy Prime Minister mentioned the meeting between the Prime Minister and Sanae Takaichi, the Prime Minister of Japan, with reference to £18 billion of investment coming into the country. Some of that will no doubt be for the global combat air programme, for which a funding deal needs to be in place by the end of this month—next week. Last week, the Minister for Defence Readiness and Procurement mentioned that that funding deal has been agreed. Can the Deputy Prime Minister confirm how much that deal is worth and whether it is a multi-year deal, or whether it is a three-month interim deal that runs out at the end of September?”

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2. “I appreciate the hon. Member’s position and have previously spoken to her about new clause 4, which I tabled. The Government have been in power for two years, and nothing has yet been done on delivering their pledge. Why should Labour Members not vote for new clause 4, given that it will deliver their manifesto pledge?”

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3. “I wish to speak to new clause 4, tabled in my name. I thank all those across the House who signed my amendment. Some 10% of MPs in the House supported the amendment. Although that is not exceptional, it is certainly unusual, and I wish to put on record my thanks to all those who put their name to it—particularly those on the Labour Benches.”

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4. “Today, at the start of Armed Forces Week, I ask Labour Members to consider how they will vote tonight. Do they want to vote against service families, against the Royal British Legion campaign and against doing the right thing in order to prop up a Government who have a lifespan we can now measure in hours? This is now about whether the next Government back this change. I ask them to support new clause 4, not to vote against it. Ministers should think very carefully about what they want their legacy to be. They should have the moral courage to do the right thing tonight.”

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5. “There may never be a more perfect set of circumstances in which to rebel: a Government with no authority trying to whip Labour MPs to vote against their own manifesto pledge and against the wishes of the Royal British Legion. I dare say there has never been safer, more fertile ground upon which to rebel. If Labour Members cannot vote in favour of the new clause, I beg them not to vote against it. When this issue was voted on three weeks ago, there were 102 abstentions. The Prime Minister has laid out the timetable for his departure. This Administration is in its death throes. How much do those on the Labour Benches feel they really owe the outgoing Administration? They should be asking what the right hon. Member for Makerfield (Andy Burnham) would do, because I am not really asking the current Government any more. What is the point?”

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6. “What is the worst that is going to happen? How whip-able do we think the parliamentary Labour party actually is right now, just a few hours after the Prime Minister has resigned? I ask Labour Members to have the moral courage to do the right thing, to vote in favour of new clause 4 and to deliver on the promise they made to service families when they stood for election. In a matter of days, they will find themselves jockeying for position in the leadership contest. People who are Whips today might not be Whips tomorrow. Nobody is going to lose the Whip as the Government collapse because they did not vote against this new clause.”

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7. “We price our service personnel out of being able to afford to live here as veterans while dishing out ILR to others like confetti, who have done nothing to earn it. There is perhaps no better example of a genuine two-tier system. Before Labour Members go into the voting Lobby and swipe their pass on autopilot, I ask them to think about why they became MPs—specifically Labour MPs—because if the answer was to clamp down on immigration so hard, with the bar so high that we do not even let the children of people who have risked their lives in the service of this nation live here without fleecing them for thousands of pounds, they will get a slow handclap for achieving their political dreams. If, on the other hand, they have the moral courage to do the right thing, they should not go into the No Lobby.”

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8. “This last one said: “the financial burden of applying for ILR and subsequently citizenship is not proportionate to Armed Forces pay, particularly in the context of the current cost-of-living crisis. Many serving personnel simply do not earn enough to comfortably meet these fees, even though they have complied fully with all rules and requirements. It is difficult to understand why those who have shown long-term commitment, loyalty and service to the United Kingdom must go through one of the longest and most expensive settlement routes, while others are supported through different schemes that include accommodation, financial assistance and fee exemptions. This creates a strong perception of unfairness among service members, who feel they are being penalised for following the rules.” That last one really sticks in the craw.”

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9. “Thank you.” Another said: “I have supported my partner’s service to the UK while facing many of the same sacrifices required of military families. This includes frequent relocations, prolonged periods of separation, disrupted employment opportunities, and the emotional and practical challenges that come with military life. For Commonwealth families in particular, these sacrifices are made alongside the added uncertainty of immigration status. Charging ILR and citizenship fees places an unfair financial burden on spouses who have already contributed significantly to the stability and wellbeing of service personnel. Military spouses play a vital role in enabling service members to serve effectively, yet are required to pay substantial fees simply to remain in the country their families serve with loyalty and dedication”.”

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10. “As a result, families who are committed to remaining in the UK long-term face unnecessary financial hardship simply to secure their lawful status and future.” Another said: “Speaking from experience it’s a struggle to get us and our kids to join our husbands here in the UK. We have to work 2 jobs in order to pay for the visa and travelling expenses. We have to bring our 3 kids over to the UK. Due to the expensive costs we have to apply for loans to cater for the expenses. With the high living standards and tight financial constraints, we have to save up for our ILR fee once our 5 years contract is done. It’s so hard to save, especially for us. Me and my 3 kids have to apply for ILR together as our visa expired the same date, so that’s a total of £12K we have to fork out to pay the fee. Can the home office look into this urgently?”

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11. “Earlier this year, that same armed forces community was surveyed by the Army Families Federation on the armed forces pathway to settlement in the UK, in response to the 2025 “Restoring Control over the Immigration System” White Paper. It had 1,424 qualifying responses and more comments on reducing the cost of indefinite leave to remain than any other topic. One of those responses stated: “the current level of fees for ILR—and the subsequent cost of citizenship—places a significant financial burden on Armed Forces families. Given the service and sacrifices made by Armed Forces personnel, and the vital role their families play in supporting them, these costs are prohibitively high for many.”

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12. “I appreciate what the hon. Member is saying. I am not putting the Minister under scrutiny here; I am merely highlighting the invidious position that he finds himself in and the situation as we find it. I spoke to the hon. and gallant Member, the Minister, earlier today, so he knows full well that I am going to say this. I very much want to put this front and centre as an issue that needs to be resolved, and to put some heat and light on it to encourage the progress that we are yet to see. The only reason to oppose this new clause is purely political, as the Government choose to play games with people’s lives rather than support our armed forces community and uphold the armed forces covenant.”

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13. “The Minister accepts that the new clause has been significantly redrafted to try to make it as watertight as possible. I appreciate what she says about primary and secondary legislation; it seems like a little bit of a convenient get-out-of-jail-free card for the Government. Can she confirm whether there is anything wrong with the new clause as it is drafted other than the change to primary legislation, and if there is not, what changes do the Government plan to push through a piece of secondary legislation in the very near future in order to implement the measures as drafted?”

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14. “The Minister will know that we have been stalling on signing the full international contract for the global combat air programme since last year, and in April we signed the interim funding contract for Edgewing, which was £686 million. That runs out in just two weeks’ time. Yesterday the Prime Minister met Sanae Takaichi, the Japanese Prime Minister, Japan being one of the partners in GCAP. Can he confirm that he has signed the full international contract, and can he guarantee that funding will be in place before the money runs out at the end of June?”

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15. “I congratulate the new Defence Secretary on his battlefield promotion. He will remember from his time in command that the best way to prove himself to his new team is to take them out tomorrow morning and thrash and phys, so I look forward to that. On the DIP, it was widely reported last week that the funding settlement is £10 billion of cash, plus £3.5 billion from, I assume, the in-year cuts announced back in April. What confidence does the Defence Secretary have that in the next two weeks—the length of the stay of execution that he has been given—he will be able to make that plan work better than the previous Defence Secretary, who ended up resigning over it, could in nine months? What will happen if the defence chiefs dig their heels in? Will the Defence Secretary end up publishing the DIP as it was before he took over?”

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16. “We already know that the Defence Secretary is going to make an announcement in Swindon on Friday morning. Given that the Japanese Prime Minister is going to turn up on Saturday, I suggest that some of that announcement will probably relate to global combat air programme funding, given that the Defence Secretary is under significant pressure to guarantee that the funding in the international contract will be signed immediately. The issue here is that the announcement will not be the DIP, which is desperately needed. The Minister will know that I speak to defence companies all the time. Over the course of this week, I have been made well aware that the Government have cancelled tens of millions of pounds-worth of contracts in the past few weeks. He talks about signing 1,400 contracts.”

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17. “Last week, the Government voted against my amendment to the Armed Forces Bill, new clause 5, which would have waived visa fees for the spouses and children of armed forces personnel and veterans. That was, of course, a Labour manifesto pledge—as it was a Conservative manifesto pledge— to ensure that the families of those who have fought to defend this country are allowed to reside here without being charged £3,229 per person just to remain in the country following service. I understand that the reason the policy has not been pursued is a Home Office issue, rather than a Defence issue, so will the Minister explain why it has not been progressed in two years? Could he give an update on whether the policy will be amended when the changes come out later this year?”

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18. “By now, the Secretary of State will be well aware of my opposition to the 1,900 acre East Park Energy solar farm in my constituency. We are now at the business end of the planning process; the application is before the Planning Inspectorate, ahead of a decision by the Secretary of State later this year. Will he outline roughly when he expects to have to take a decision on the application? Ahead of that, will he meet me and my hon. Friend the Member for North Bedfordshire (Richard Fuller) to discuss our concern that it is not the right solution for our area and our constituents?”

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19. “I welcome the introduction of the strategic reserve in the Bill, but I would like clarity on how it will be paid for. Will it be via separate funding or will it come from the money already allocated to pay for the active reserve in the MOD budget?”

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20. “The other day I had the opportunity to meet the Ministry of Defence Police and their chief constable at RAF Wyton in my constituency. I was impressed by the counter-drone capability that they are now equipped with; it is vastly in excess of what Home Office policing teams now have, and it is a simple solution to provide the counter-drone capability that we should have at all our bases. I urge the hon. Gentleman to put pressure on the Minister to roll out those new CPM-Wilson and CPM-Watson counter-drone weapons to all our bases, to ensure that that capability is as widespread as possible.”

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21. “It is a vote that tells Commonwealth personnel that this Government do not have their back, that joining our armed forces will still see them treated as second-class citizens, with limited options post service. Those Labour MPs with a military presence in their constituencies should ask themselves how they will spin it to the service member who has to pay £10,000 to live here with their family, instead of putting down a deposit on a house or launching a business. They should ask themselves whether, for the sake of playing politics this evening, it is worth holding somebody else back.”

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22. “I appreciate that the Government measure working flat-out in months, but this could be measured in continental drift. It simply does not appear to be a priority for the Government. However, my greater fear is that rather than do the right thing today, the Government will churlishly and spitefully vote against new clause 5, “because politics”. Not one Labour MP signed the new clause, despite every single one being asked twice. The Government have whipped their MPs not to support it, just as they will whip their MPs to vote against it. A vote against new clause 5 is not just a vote against the Labour manifesto that each Labour MP stood on. It is a vote against our veterans. It is a vote against those who have risked their lives to defend this great nation.”

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23. “Having spoken to Ministers individually, including the two on the Front Bench today, I do not doubt that the Defence Front Bench wishes to implement this policy, but there is clearly something that is causing it to stall, be that the Home Office or the machinery of government. There is an opportunity here to drive this policy forward. We should bear in mind that the Ministry of Defence does not even collate the information regarding the number of ILR applications submitted by family members of service personnel. It has literally no idea of the impact the failure to deliver this policy is having. After two years with no timetable for implementation on the horizon, I have little confidence this is a priority on the MOD’s to-do list.”

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24. “I think progress will be made, but I recognise his interest in that happening.” —[ Official Report , 26 June 2025; Vol. 769, c. 1290-1291.] That was a year ago. On 5 January 2026, the new Veterans Minister told me in a written answer that the Government are “working closely with the Home Office to deliver this commitment”. She went on to state: “it is not possible at this stage to provide an implementation date”. In April, she informed me: “This Government is committed to waiving visa fees for non-UK veterans”. In total, I have asked the Government for an update on the progress of the implementation of their manifesto pledge seven times and we are no closer to an implementation date after nearly two years than we were when the Government came to power. I am not seeking to apportion individual blame here.”

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25. “757, c. 22.] In June 2025, during the Armed Forces Day debate, I asked the then Armed Forces Minister, the hon. Member for Plymouth Sutton and Devonport (Luke Pollard), if he could provide an update “on the work being done to waive visa fees for families and dependants of our Commonwealth personnel”. He told me: “We have a manifesto commitment to deliver that. The Defence Secretary has spoken to the Home Secretory about this, and our officials are in dialogue about it. I hope that the Minister for Veterans and People, who looks after this area, will be able to announce progress in due course. The hon. Member and I share a strong sense that there is a wrong to be righted here, and those people who serve our country for a good period of time should be able to settle here.”

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26. “Going into the 2024 general election, the Conservative manifesto looked to correct this issue. As part of our pledge to veterans, we announced that a Conservative Government would: “extend the visa fees waiver introduced to cover Commonwealth personnel, to include their direct dependants.” The Labour manifesto, too, made that pledge, stating: “We will also scrap visa fees for non-UK veterans who have served for four or more years, and their dependents.” So where are we with that? I have raised the question on a number of occasions. In November 2024, I asked the then Veterans Minister, the hon. Member for Birmingham Selly Oak (Al Carns), what the timetable was for delivering that manifesto pledge. I was told: “We are working on that. It is in the manifesto, and it will come out in due course.” —[ Official Report , 18 November 2024; Vol.”

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27. “The purpose of the resettlement grant is to do precisely what it says: to give people a head start, be it through a trade course, a deposit for a house or the funds to set up an entrepreneurial new business. None of those options is available to those who need to spend the majority of the grant on just obtaining the right to live in the country. What on earth are we doing? Why are we fleecing those who have served this country, saddling them with a five-figure burden? The Royal British Legion and Poppyscotland lead the charge on this campaign. They have pushed for these changes consistently. They highlight that in delivering this manifesto pledge, the Government would fulfil their obligations under the armed forces covenant by removing those disadvantages and barriers to family life.”

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28. “From 8 April this year, when the cost increased once again, the base fee for applying for indefinite leave to remain is £3,226 per person. To put into context the speed of that increase, when we waived fees for service members just four years ago, it was £2,389 per person—a near £1,000 increase. That is just for indefinite leave to remain, not citizenship. In the US armed forces, a non-US citizen can achieve full US citizenship upon discharge for the price of the admin fee—just a few dollars. A service member, their spouse and two children now potentially face a cost of just shy of £10,000 for the right to live in the country they have risked their life to defend. I defy anybody to tell me that that is fair. It is not until the 12-year point that personnel become entitled to a resettlement grant of £15,047.”

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29. “Having campaigned for that long before I became an MP, it was hugely welcome to see the playing field levelled somewhat for Commonwealth veterans. While that was a welcome first step, I personally felt that it was not enough. We in this Chamber often recognise the sacrifice and the challenges of those families left behind when service personnel deploy. Being a military spouse or child is not easy. This situation is made even harder for the family of a Commonwealth service member, because while we waived the fees for serving personnel in 2022, we did not extend the right to the immediate family and dependants of that service member. That means many Commonwealth veterans are saddled with significant visa fees if they wish to stay in the UK as a family after leaving the armed forces.”

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30. “As a support weapons platoon commander, a quarter of my anti-tank platoon was Fijian. As hon. Members may expect from a fine rugby playing regiment such as the Duke of Wellington’s, it was unbelievably competitive to get a spot on the wing. I therefore know well the courage and the sacrifice shown by our Commonwealth personnel not only today, but alongside me on operations in Afghanistan and Iraq, and during operations across the globe long preceding that. We owe those men and women the right to make a life in the country they have risked theirs to defend. Over four years ago, in April 2022, the previous Government implemented a visa fee waiver for those who have served in the UK armed forces. That waiver also applied to eligible veterans who were yet to regularise their immigration status.”

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31. “I wish to speak to new clause 5, which I tabled. I start by thanking all Opposition Members—both in my party and across four other parties—who have supported this amendment. Let the record show that not one person on the Labour Benches supported it. We often speak in this House about veterans, our shared respect for those who have served and how best to support veterans in their post-military life, be it with careers, housing, mental health or simply the frailty of growing old. With that shared sense of society repaying our collective debt to those who have served must come the moral courage to do the right thing that we expect those who have served to show. During my Army career, I had the privilege to serve alongside and command soldiers from all over the Commonwealth—Australians and Canadians, South Africans and Jamaicans.”

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32. “and gallant Gentleman is trying to give the Government some wiggle room to get out of voting for the new clause this evening, but I am convinced that it should be voted on, and that we should push it forward in order to put some pressure on the Home Office.”

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33. “I do not disagree. I recognise the point that the hon. and gallant Gentleman is making and his passion for delivering what he describes. I am a member of said all-party parliamentary group, and I am happy to push in order to try and get this across the line. I also recognise the politics of this. Although I am not sure his party will welcome him apparently somewhat throwing the Home Office under the bus in this instance, I recognise that there are complexities around the ability to deliver from a Home Office perspective. I know that is something that the Conservatives encountered when we were in government, and I imagine it is very much the same situation for the Government now. I insist that new clause 5 is still a good new clause. It would come in the right place within the Armed Forces Bill. I recognise that the hon.”

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34. “No party has yet demonstrated that they have the right answer, but on this specific element of the debate, it is very simple: no matter how high a bar we set for the right to live in this country—whether that is for key workers or high net worth individuals—those who have risked their lives to defend the freedoms that we enjoy deserve to settle here with their families without penalty. That should always be above that high bar. At the heart of our security are the men and women who serve and risk their lives for this country. That is in the Labour manifesto. I urge Government Members to do the right thing today and support new clause 5.”

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35. “I agree that it is a broader topic than simply covering Commonwealth veterans and their family members from those same Commonwealth countries. There are a number of personnel living here are UK personnel but have spouses and children who may be from overseas, and the same rules apply to them. I do not disagree with the hon. Member; I think we are very much on the same page on a number of issues—it is literally just the technicality of politics that is getting in the way. We are squeamish when it comes to discussing immigration.”

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36. “I recognise that the Minister wants to deliver this manifesto commitment as much as I do. However, after two years we have made little progress, mostly due to the machinery of government within the Home Office. This new clause was tabled some time ago, and the Government have had ample opportunity to refine the detail of it in order to make it acceptable to be voted on this evening and passed by the Government. Why have the Government taken no steps to work with me to get this measure across the line, given that it is a manifesto pledge of the Government? Can he also give some indication of when the pledge will be delivered, if the Government choose wrongfully to vote against my new clause this evening?”

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37. “Last month, the Government announced that they had finally taken delivery of the 47th F-35B, thus completing our initial tranche of the order. However, that is not strictly true, because two of those planes, ZM177 and ZM179, are currently stranded in the Azores, where they have been since 9 March, which is nearly three months ago. Can the Minister explain why those planes are stranded there and who holds responsibility for completing their delivery: Lockheed Martin or the Ministry of Defence?”

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38. “I welcome the Secretary of State to his place. Hinchingbrooke hospital in my constituency is one of the new hospitals to be built as part of the new hospital programme—it is in wave zero—but it currently does not have an electronic patient record system, so we have the fragmented patient history that he has just mentioned. It desperately needs to increase its rating on the HIMSS—Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society—scale as a new hospital, but it does not have the funding required to install a patient record system. Will he guarantee that the hospital will receive the funding required to deliver a new electronic patient record system?”

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39. “I want to come back to what the Minister said earlier about the war in Iran. She knows full well that the Leader of the Opposition did not say that she would take us into the conflict, and she knows full well that it was a NOFORN—no foreign nationals—operation and that there was never an opportunity for the UK to be involved. If she does not know that, she should go and speak to the Defence team and get up to date with the details. She has some cheek, considering that the Government have just decided that they are going to row back on the pressure they put on Russia. Given that the Minister did not explain it in her media round this morning, will she now explain exactly why the Government decided to exempt oil and oil products that originate from Russia under commodity codes 2709 and 2710?”

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40. “Back in March, the Chancellor announced the £50 million crisis and resilience fund to help families with the price of heating oil, which is a big issue in rural constituencies such as mine. Does she have any plans to extend or repeat that scheme come the autumn, given that we are likely to have a similar crisis with the strait of Hormuz still shut? To what extent will the Russian oil that will come via a third country under commodity code 2710 form part of the fuel mix?”

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41. “As an MP whose constituency has a category C prison for male sex offenders that is almost at capacity—HMP Littlehey—I welcome the clarity from the Minister regarding paedophiles in the prison estate. We know that the Minister is on the hook to deliver thousands of new category C and D prison places. I want to ask him about the prison places he has made almost no progress on since the election because the contractor ISG went into administration in September 2024. I first highlighted the failure of that project last year. Can he confirm whether, since then, all those 12 prisons have had new contractors appointed? When will those prison places be delivered?”

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42. “I appreciate what the Justice Secretary wants to achieve on reducing the rate of recidivism. He said in his statement that “custody will always be necessary for the most dangerous offences”, but went on to say that there will be “an intention to reduce the use of short custodial sentences.” Will he add some more detail around the length of sentence that he considers to be a “short” custodial sentence? In relation to knife crime, he will know that the minimum sentence for threatening with a knife can be as little as six months. Young people already do not have much fear about being searched for a knife or facing the criminal justice system. If they know that they will not receive a custodial sentence at the end of the process, what deterrent will there be to their carrying or using a knife?”

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43. “The Secretary of State mentions crocodile tears; what would he say to the hospitality businesses in my constituency that have been impacted by the rise in national insurance contributions, the minimum wage rise and the business rates that he just talked so effusively about? What message would he give to them as they struggle to deal with the outcome of the Budget?”

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44. “The Secretary of State says that soldiers who complied with a lawful order have nothing to fear. I did not serve in Northern Ireland but I did serve in Iraq and Afghanistan. I know that if I were hauled before the courts to recount my actions from 20-odd years ago to acquit myself, I would be extremely worried about the pressure that would place on me and on my colleagues. The Secretary of State mentions that there will be changes to the Bill. For those veterans who were not privy to those conversations, will he outline some of the actions that he is prepared to take to address the parts of the Bill that he is not content with, so that they can have a better understanding of how this might change going forward? Members of this House would like to understand what those amendments are likely to be.”

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45. “I want to touch on state threats. I appreciate what the Minister said about the enhanced tier of the foreign influence registration scheme as it applies to China. Could he inform the House whether Bill Yuen and Peter Wai were registered on FIRS for their role as Chinese state employees? On Russia, on 5 May the Amur-class repair ship PM-82 was spotted around the Galloper wind farm. What steps is he taking to ensure that our offshore infrastructure is protected from Russian-state threats?”

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46. “The Secretary of State and many of his Front-Bench colleagues keep reiterating that point. He keeps saying that, but I do not believe it is true. Will he explain exactly what he thinks the Leader of the Opposition wanted to do in those circumstances?”

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47. “The laissez-faire attitude to Peter Mandelson’s appointment has illustrated the nonchalance, arrogance and incompetence of the Government under this milquetoast premiership. There is a key question that we come back to once again: why does the Prime Minister think everybody’s actions have consequences except his own? The public must be assured that there has been an investigation into whether the Prime Minister misled the House. The Privileges Committee must investigate the Prime Minister. Labour MPs must vote for the motion, for transparency and truth, not the defence of a Prime Minister who does not deserve their blinkered loyalty.”

    House of Commons28 April 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗

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48. “The Prime Minister deliberately directed that information to be withheld from the then Foreign Secretary; I suspect that is not the first time he has done that. Those two men with proximity to convicted paedophiles were both Labour peers and both key figures in the Starmer project—the Government’s cronyism is second only to their nepotism. Given what we know about the role that Peter Mandelson played in the last reshuffle, what confidence can the general public have that Ministers who owe their careers to him will vote honestly in the coming vote? It is not on the Opposition side of the House that we have to worry about whether Peter Mandelson paid for anybody’s wedding.”

    House of Commons28 April 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗

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49. “Even more damning in Sir Olly Robbins’ testimony was the Prime Minister’s dogged determination to reward the now Lord Doyle: “I was under strict instruction not to discuss that with the then Foreign Secretary, which was uncomfortable… I found it very hard to think how I would explain to the office what the credentials of Matthew were to be in an important head of mission role, when I was in danger of making very senior, very experienced diplomats leave the office.” The fact is that the Prime Minister put pressure on the FCDO to give Lord Doyle a head of mission role in the diplomatic service in March last year despite his complete lack of qualification for the role. That same individual later had the Labour Whip removed owing to his relationship with Sean Morton, a man subsequently convicted of possessing indecent images of children.”

    House of Commons28 April 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗

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50. “Would the US, for example, have given him visibility of TK-level imagery? What assessment have the Government made of the damage this debacle has done to the UK’s relationship with the United States? It is surely no coincidence that the special relationship has soured at the same time that this fiasco has unravelled, quite apart from the other faux pas that the Government have made in recent weeks.”

    House of Commons28 April 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗

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