Phil Brickell
MP for Bolton West · Labour · United Kingdom
“The Prime Minister will not need reminding about Arsenal’s success in the premier league last season and my right hon. Friend the Member for Makerfield (Andy Burnham) will not want reminding that Everton, unfortunately for him, came 13th, but what neither of them might know is that the UK finished 20th in the corruption perceptions index,…”
“Westhoughton is home to a fantastic local veterans charity called the Darren Deady Foundation. Darren bravely served in the Duke of Lancaster’s Regiment, but, sadly, died following injuries he sustained on the frontline in Afghanistan. I had the privilege of visiting the foundation back in April.”
“I thank the Minister for her statement and I pay tribute to Philip Rycroft, who, as I am sure colleagues across the House will agree, is an exceptional public servant.”
“Member for Clacton (Nigel Farage), what assurances can the Minister provide to me that the measures the Government are introducing will prevent people—such as George Cottrell, convicted in the US of wire fraud, who we know has provided thousands of pounds-worth of benefits; or Ben Delo, who has been convicted for flouting American anti-mo…”
“Questions have also emerged about his lobbying the Bank of England for crypto-friendly policies, having himself invested £215,000 into bitcoin company Stack BTC, alongside former Conservative Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng.”
“I declare an interest as the chair of the all-party parliamentary group on anti-corruption and responsible tax. This week, the hon. Member for Clacton (Nigel Farage) declared that he is earning an extraordinary £22,500 per hour working for a gold bullion dealer.”
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“As we learned from Russia’s illegal invasion of Ukraine, the failure to deter a conflict in the South China sea will have a high cost for all of us in this place and for our constituents. In 2023, the then Defence Minister Baroness Goldie confirmed that the UK Government were analysing the prospective economic impact on the UK of escalation in the Taiwan strait. Will the Government publish that assessment, given the clear public interest? Beijing’s pattern of behaviour is clear. Each time we fail to respond decisively to China’s disregard for democracy and the international rules-based order, it emboldens Beijing to continue to act with impunity. Taiwan is now at the frontline.”
“Normally, a maritime and air blockade would be considered an act of war in international law. Can the Minister confirm that a maritime and air blockade by Beijing around Taiwan would be a red line for the UK Government? I want to underline the clear public interest in de-escalation in the Taiwan strait. We depend on Taiwan for microchips, especially for the advanced semiconductors on which we all depend for our critical infrastructure. Two thirds of chips, and almost all advanced chips, are currently produced in Taiwan. As my hon. Friend the Member for East Renfrewshire outlined, Bloomberg has estimated that the conflict would cost the global economy $10 trillion—more than five times more than the Ukraine crisis.”
“For decades, the UK has maintained a policy that not only is in favour of Taiwan's participation in international organisations, but reiterates our clear interest in peace and stability in the Taiwan strait, considering the Taiwan issue one to be settled through constructive dialogue, not force or coercion. However, China’s actions continue flagrantly to contradict that principle and threaten the stability of the wider Indo-Pacific region. Tensions are increasing, with recent estimates suggesting that there has been a 300% increase in grey zone activity across the Taiwan strait, as well as incursions into Taiwan’s air defence identification zone. Beijing’s grey zone activity in the strait is making it very difficult to establish red lines around its behaviour.”
“China’s deliberate distortion of United Nations resolution 2758 is a prime example of the way in which Beijing disregards the international rules-based system to push its own narrative. Let me emphasise that, crucially, the resolution did not address the sovereignty of the island of Taiwan, or preclude it from having representation at the United Nations or other international organisations. Yet Beijing has sought to change historic documents and records, including at the UN, to allege that the resolution claims that Taiwan is an inalienable part of China’s territory. The blatant misrepresentation of resolution 2758 is not just an attack on Taiwan, but an assault on the integrity of the international system that we champion. This behaviour also stands in direct opposition to the UK’s long-standing position on Taiwan.”
“Indeed, many of my constituents were effectively forced from their old homes in Hong Kong by the destruction of its democratic freedoms. Let us be clear: Beijing’s actions towards Taiwan do not exist in isolation. They are part of a broader pattern of behaviour, as I have described. We need only look at Tibet, where Beijing has systematically suppressed cultural and religious freedoms; at Xinjiang, where atrocities have been committed repeatedly against the Uyghurs; at Hong Kong, where the Sino-British joint declaration has been torn asunder; and, now, at Taiwan. Beijing has escalated its military posturing, imposed economic coercion and engaged in cyber warfare, all aimed at undermining Taiwan’s vibrant democracy and intimidating its people.”
“I thank my hon. Friend the Member for East Renfrewshire (Blair McDougall) for initiating this important and timely debate. I particularly welcomed his comments about the long-standing work of other Members in support of Taiwan, and his remarks about this being a global conversation. I also congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire North (Alison Taylor) on her maiden speech and her focus on driving economic growth across her constituency. China’s increasingly aggressive behaviour towards Taiwan is yet another alarming example of its consistent and blatant disregard for the international rules-based order. As one who is proud to represent a significant Hong Kong community in Bolton West, I have heard at first hand about the devastating effects of Beijing’s authoritarian rule.”
“As our armed forces and defence infrastructure were left to crumble during the last 14 years, a serious capability gap has emerged, particularly around defence against air threats and our ability to engage targets at extended range. Only in September, the House of Lords International Relations and Defence Committee warned that the Government must “pay greater attention to homeland defence”, particularly to “integrated air and missile defence…in close collaboration with our European NATO allies”.”
“The shadow cast by that period of constant existential fear is, unfortunately, a long one. The terrifying reality is that now war is not just something we read about in newspapers; it is on our doorstep. However we are not fighting on the beaches, landing grounds, fields and streets any more. The long distance missile capabilities of hostile states mean, regrettably, that war can now reach us in our own homes. All that is to say that sovereign capability for missile defences here in the UK has seldom been so important. As others have already noted, we are vulnerable to advanced missiles such as the one fired by Russia last week and the one fired by Iran on Israel earlier in the year.”
“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Dowd. I declare an interest as the Member of Parliament for Bolton West, which is the home of MBDA’s Logistics North production site. I also congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for North Durham (Luke Akehurst) on securing this important debate; I particularly welcome his comments on both the lessons to be learned from Ukraine and the need to ensure that our armed forces can protect us from a diverse range of threats. All of us will have constituents who are concerned about last week’s developments between Russia and Ukraine, including Putin’s use of an advanced hypersonic missile. This is a personal issue for me. My own father was stationed in Germany throughout the 1970s as the threat of nuclear war with the Soviet Union loomed.”
“Friend the Member for Stevenage (Kevin Bonavia) that MBDA represents the very best in ingenuity, working as a trusted partner throughout Europe and providing the air defence capability that we and our allies need to stand up to Russia’s unwarranted aggression. I therefore welcome the Secretary of State’s comments at the Farnborough International Airshow earlier this year, when he committed to “renewing important partnerships with industry and continuing to push technological boundaries”.”
“As the secretary of the all-party parliamentary group on Germany, I enthusiastically welcomed last month’s UK-Germany Trinity House agreement on defence. The Government’s shared objective with Germany to sustain effective deterrence against would-be aggressors by building credible, resilient defence forces and defence industries is vital if we are to work towards the vision of a peaceful and stable Europe and north Atlantic. Sovereign capability, as an enduring necessity, is something that I expect the Government’s forthcoming strategic defence review will attest to. To ensure adequate manufacturing capacity, industry must remain at the very heart of our missile defence system. MBDA employs 1,200 people in my constituency and almost 6,000 across the UK. I am sure that colleagues will agree with me and my hon.”
“I agree with my hon. Friend; I will come on to that issue in the context of the recent Germany-UK defence agreement, which was signed in Trinity House only last month. Over the weekend, there was also an intervention from former Defence Minister and former Chair of the Defence Committee Tobias Ellwood, who said that we are “woefully unprotected” and described London as “almost a sitting duck”. This issue can garner support from all sides of the House; I know that other Members will recognise the scale of the challenges ahead, which necessitate ever closer international relationships and collective defence within NATO and the European Union. With that in mind, I should say that I had the immense pleasure of talking to German counterparts as part of a delegation to Berlin in September.”
“I look forward to further measures from the new Government to show their resolve to stand up to Putin, invest in our defence capability and increase domestic manufacturing capacity.”
“The hon. Member makes an important point about the importance of the defence sector across all four nations of the United Kingdom. The Secretary of State also spoke at the Farnborough International Airshow about the importance of driving prosperity and creating skilled jobs across the country. But defence cannot be done on the cheap—we will have to put our hands in our pockets. It is an investment, not a cost, and I must urge the Government to reach the 2.5% of GDP defence spending target at the earliest opportunity so that the rogue states causing ongoing geopolitical instability know that their continued unlawful aggression will not and cannot win. To conclude, the threats we face are very real, as are the resourcing, production capacity and resilience needs.”
“I thank the right hon. Member for giving way. I did want to indulge him, but as he has now mentioned the OBR three times during the course of his speech, I wonder whether he would share with the House what conversations he had with former Prime Minister Liz Truss about respecting the OBR before she crashed the economy and sent inflation to 11%?”
“They are the first step in fixing the foundations of a broken economy after 14 long years of economic vandalism by the Conservative party. Let me be clear: the Labour Government inherited a difficult financial situation, with debt above 90% of GDP, millions of pounds of public money wasted during the pandemic, including via contracts awarded through the VIP fast line, inflation at 11%, and a cost of living crisis that bore down not just on the most vulnerable in my constituency, but on working families, young people and many businesses. That is the economic inheritance bequeathed by Conservative Members, and we should take no lessons from them on how to manage the public finances. To that end, I very much welcome the measures in the Bill.”
“It is a pleasure to speak in this debate on the first Labour Finance Bill in 14 years, and an even greater pleasure to respond to the very first Budget delivered by a female Chancellor. It is also an honour to speak on Lancashire Day, and I would like to put on record my congratulations to all my constituents in Bolton West and further afield who are celebrating this important day. As others have done, I congratulate the Chancellor and thank her for blazing a trail for girls in my constituency to follow. In response to the remarks from the shadow Chancellor, the right hon. Member for Central Devon (Mel Stride), I would say that having spent 14 years working in FTSE 100 companies, I believe that the measures in the Bill will be a turning point for our country.”
“This Finance Bill demonstrates that after 14 years of dither and delay, the Labour Government are taking the difficult decisions head on. With the measures announced last month by the Chancellor, I am confident that my constituents across Bolton West will be able to realise their full potential and that together we can build the healthier, more prosperous society that I want to see, with tax justice at its heart and those with the broadest shoulders paying their fair share to fix the crises in our schools, our hospitals and our prisons.”
“It calculates that that would put an average of £600 into the pockets of households in Bolton West and leave 96% of people in my constituency better off. Indeed, in total, Fairer Share reckons that that reform could save households outside central London and the south-east £6.5 billion a year, helping to level up communities and genuinely boost local economies. Finally, I would very much like to see the spending commitment to 2.5% of GDP on defence reached as soon as fiscally possible. I welcome the Government’s commitment to that effect. The increase of £2.9 billion for defence already announced by the Government is indeed welcome. We must continue to invest in defence to ensure that the UK will have the capacity to keep us safe in what is becoming an increasingly dangerous world.”
“For almost three decades, successive Governments have sat on their hands when it comes to reforming the levy, which is regressive and disproportionately targets the wealth of lower-income families and the young, as well as affecting local authorities. Bolton council finds that it does not provide an adequate funding base to provide critical services for my constituents. Last year, a modest property in Hartlepool worth £150,000 would have been taxed at over 1% of its value, while the owner of an £8 million mansion in Westminster would have seen a bill equivalent to just 0.02%. The Fairer Share campaign has called for a proportional property tax, which would see homeowners pay a flat rate based on current and annually updated valuations, not the absurdly outdated 1991 numbers.”
“As it happens, research published this month by Spotlight on Corruption—I hope the Minister will take note of this—found that just 17.6% of the £4 billion generated for the Government by law enforcement agencies and anti-money laundering supervisors between 2017 and 2024 was reinvested in those agencies or in crime reduction and community projects. If just 50% of those enforcement receipts had been reinvested, economic crime regulation and enforcement would have received an extra £233 million a year—nearly double the annual investment underpinning the 2023 to 2026 economic crime plan—at no cost to the taxpayer but with potentially substantial rewards. The second area of focus that I would like the Government to attend to during this Parliament is council tax.”
“Our enforcement agencies work incredibly hard to claw back billions of pounds that are lost every year to economic crime in the UK, but they do not have the resources to protect us from all manner of crimes from fraud to money laundering and tax evasion. It should be criminals who are made to pay, not the hard-working taxpayer, and for me, that would be a sensible way to both combat economic crime and bolster our public finances. We already know that every pound invested in the Serious Fraud Office returns three pounds to the Treasury—a 317% return on its budget—while every pound spent on the National Crime Agency’s international corruption unit results in £21 of illicit wealth frozen.”
“Imagine the transformative impact that could have on our public services, on education, on health, and on tackling crime. Simply put, working people in Bolton West are expected to pay the taxes they owe, so why should big multinationals and the super-rich be able to avoid contributing their fair share? The renewed focus on tax avoidance and evasion in the Budget is much needed, but we sometimes have to spend money to make money. We all know that tough decisions about public finances have to be made, but that does not have to come at the expense of boosting enforcement through our public bodies, including HMRC, which should be self-funding, with a greater proportion of cash raised from fines, asset seizure and the like returned to the relevant agencies.”
“I applaud the Chancellor’s commitment to delivering fairness into the tax system through the Budget and the Bill. In the light of the debate we have been having in the country at large over the past few weeks, I wish briefly to focus my comments on three key topics, which I hope the Government will soon revisit at some juncture during this Parliament. The first topic, tax justice, has been overlooked for far too long. According to His Majesty’s Revenue and Customs, the tax gap—the difference between what it should collect annually and what it actually collects—is almost £40 billion. Let me repeat that figure—forty thousand million pounds. Closing that gap by just 20% could pay for 60,000 nurses, 40,000 teachers, and 40,000 police officers.”
“I thank the right hon. Member for his contribution, but I will return to the point I mentioned earlier about inflation at 11%. Frankly, the work was not done by the previous Government to mitigate that. I very much welcome measures in the Bill that will increase stamp duty on those who own a second home. The blight of second home ownership in certain parts of our country has destroyed the housing market for local people, massively inflating prices and denying those otherwise invested in the local area the ability to put down roots. I am pleased to see the Chancellor delivering on our election promise to scrap the non-dom loophole, which has been abused for far too long by those who wish to enjoy all the privileges of life in this country without paying into the system.”
“I very much welcome the recent announcement of the UK-Germany bilateral defence agreement, which was signed at record-breaking pace by the new Government at Trinity House last month. It will bolster closer working with Europe’s largest economy on wider defence and security matters at a time of increasing Russian aggression across Europe. With that in mind, can the Minister therefore explain to the House how the Trinity House agreement fits into wider discussions with EU and NATO counterparts around defence and security?”
“That is why I especially welcome the measures in the Bill to provide the Secretary of State with powers to regulate vaping products, including their content, flavour, packaging and product requirements.”
“This is not harmless; youth vaping has more than doubled in the past five years, while Bolton council has been told that children as young as 13 are unable to go an hour at school without vaping. Just last Friday, I visited St Catherine’s primary school in Horwich and was shocked to hear children no older than 11 directly raise their concerns around vaping with me. St Joseph’s high school in Horwich, which I had the pleasure of meeting last week here in Parliament, has had to install vape sensors, while the headmaster Tony McCabe has said he has already seen a rise in young people acquiring vapes from the black market. I hope the Minister will consider how to tackle the already expanding black market for these products.”
“Vaping can be a genuine aid for those seeking to wean themselves off smoking, but while it is clear that vapes, in combination with behavioural support, can support quitting, the health advice is unambiguous: children and adults who have never smoked should never vape. What disturbs me is that vaping products are obviously marketed at children. Indeed, a number of vape stores in Horwich and Westhoughton in my constituency are not only garish eyesores but directly associate vapes with sweets and toys in their shop fronts. I have no doubt that many of my colleagues in the Chamber will be familiar with similar stores in their own constituencies. It is clear that bubble gum and candy floss flavours are not aimed at those adults genuinely trying to wean themselves off tobacco.”
“A generational ban on purchasing tobacco for anyone born after 1 January 2009, new regulations for the extension of smokefree areas to include our schools and hospitals, and new restrictions on oral tobacco products such as snus are hugely welcome in our fight against smoking-related illnesses. The Bill is hugely important, and I will focus the remainder of my remarks on vaping in particular. As my hon. Friend the Member for Bolton North East (Kirith Entwistle) noted, Bolton is regrettably one of the two vaping capitals of the UK, with over 20 vape shops registered per 100,000 people according to reporting in the Bolton News.”
“Eight in 10 Greater Manchester adults support ending smoking, according to the Make Smoking History campaign. I suspect that many have had family or friends impacted by smoking-related harms. Five years ago, the previous Government announced their ambition for England to be smokefree by 2030. Despite a stark warning from the Khan review in 2022 that “without further action, England will miss the smokefree 2030 target by at least 7 years”, I find it regrettable that the Conservatives did not get round to these literal life-and-death reforms before it was too late to legislate before the general election. I am delighted that just a few months in we are already delivering on our manifesto pledges.”
“I would like to place on the record my support for the Bill, which the Government are right to describe as the biggest public health intervention in a generation. As someone who grew up around the NHS, with my first job being at Bolton hospital, I have seen at first hand the huge cost of smoking and vaping in my constituency. In Bolton, smoking claims around 380 lives a year. Across the UK, that number is 80,000, and tobacco-related illnesses put tremendous pressure on the NHS, with smoking responsible for one in four cancer deaths. Indeed, every single minute someone is put in hospital because of smoking. The appointments, the scans, the treatment—it all adds up. Smoking costs the taxpayer over £3 billion each year in healthcare bills. The tide of public opinion has turned irrevocably.”
“I thank the right hon. Member for his contribution. I will take assurance from the Minister on that when he winds up. I place on record my enthusiasm for the separate ban on single-use vapes from June 2025, which the hon. Member for Newbury (Mr Dillon) mentioned. As other Members have noted, not only are they particularly cheap and therefore accessible to young adults, but they are an inefficient use of critical resources, difficult to recycle and frequently littered around the countryside. By introducing these world-leading reforms, we can create a smokefree generation and break the cycle of addiction and disadvantage. I am proud that it is a Labour Government who are delivering this legislation.”
“T4. I would like to share the experience of Northern Rail services of one of my constituents who commutes to work from Lostock to Manchester. On 30 October, the 1639 service leaving Manchester was cancelled, the 1708 was cancelled, the 1808 was cancelled and the 1839 was cancelled. The one running train, the 1739, was so overcrowded that no one at stations further down the line could board it. Does the Minister agree that my hard-working constituents in Bolton West deserve better?”
“I wholeheartedly welcome the Water (Special Measures) Bill as a package of reforms to end the systemic dumping of sewage into our rivers, lakes and seas by water companies, while huge sums are being paid out by the same firms to shareholders. However, laws are only ever as good as their enforcement, and effective enforcement requires adequate resourcing. Will the Secretary of State consider how the enforcement agencies might be self-funding to a degree, with money raised from fines levied on polluting water firms reinvested into the likes of the Environment Agency?”
“We heard representations from the hon. Member for Clacton (Nigel Farage) about upholding international law. Does the Minister agree that it is important that the UK fulfils its international law obligations? Does he recognise that in 2021, the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea confirmed that Mauritius has sovereignty over the Chagos islands? Does he agree that, notwithstanding that, the deal secures the long-term certainty of the base on Diego Garcia?”
“We made that point in the Labour manifesto earlier this year, which Opposition Members will no doubt note resulted in a resounding mandate across the country to deliver change.”
“I am sure there are some hereditary peers who undertake hard work and I have no doubt that many have a genuine commitment to public service, but the concept of hereditary peerages, hereditary privilege and being able to legislate for life merely by dint of birth belongs in the same breath as second jobs, lobbying scandals and the revolving door. It is an anachronism that needs to go. Contrary to the protestations from Conservative Members, the Bill is not about spite. Rather, it is about improving trust and accountability in our politics. The public expect high standards from our legislature, but the simple fact is that too many hereditary peers do not play a proper role in our democracy.”
“Time and again, I have seen how trust is developed only when those responsible for decision making are truly held accountable. I will focus on the word accountability, which is gravely lacking with the remaining hereditaries. Over the course of my working career, it has become clear that the UK has an important role to play on the global stage as a world leader on political integrity, but this country’s reputation as a well-governed and, frankly, clean jurisdiction has been degraded over recent years. Countries that previously welcomed our counsel with open arms now look on it with scorn. That is why this long-overdue reform matters to me and why I passionately support the Government on the Bill.”
“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Madam Chair. I would like to speak in support of the Bill, which I believe is long overdue. I thank the Minister for her contribution and welcome in particular her warm words on the importance of the Bill as a clear manifesto commitment to reform how the other place functions as “an immediate modernisation”. Since the groundbreaking House of Lords Act 1999 was passed by a Labour Government, there has been no substantive reform to the hereditaries in the other place despite an obvious public appetite to do so. Indeed, a study conducted by University College London’s constitution unit found that only 6% of respondents supported the current system. Before having the enormous privilege of representing the people of Bolton West, I spent over a decade tackling bribery and corruption.”
“I thank the right hon. Member for his contribution, but he will note that I did not mention activity or participation in the other House. I mentioned democracy and democratic accountability, which hereditary peers do not have.”
“I do not accept that a hereditary peer who is the son of a duke, an earl, a viscount or a marquess is any better prepared to scrutinise legislation than the daughter of a plumber or the son of a nurse.”
“We will come on to life peers shortly. This is an important change that was in our manifesto. As you will recognise, Madam Chair, it is important because we need equality of representation, which is vital if we are to retain confidence in the way in which both this House and the other place operate. It is 66 years since women were allowed to sit in the other place, but there are currently no women among the hereditary peers there, and I for one am embarrassed by that. It is a disgrace. As a member from the north-west, I should add that it has not escaped my attention, or that of my constituents, that individuals from my part of this great nation are under-represented in the other place—especially, again, among the hereditary peers. According to the Electoral Reform Society, 35% of hereditary peers live in London and the south-east.”
“They are further steps towards showing the country that it is vital to regain trust in politics as a means of improving lives for all.”
“Turnout in July was 60%, the second lowest in a UK election since 1885. At a time when autocratic hostile states seek to undermine us at every turn, democratic engagement has rarely been so important. I believe that that this Bill is a small but important step towards restoring that trust, as my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister promised we would do during the election campaign. The Committee will also note what I very much hope are the impending appointments of an ethics and integrity commissioner, an anti-corruption champion and a covid corruption commissioner. Those are all vital measures, alongside the Bill, to improve standards and increase accountability. I urge the Government to confirm those appointments as soon as possible.”
“I admire the right hon. Member’s penchant for House of Lords reform, but I will come to these points later, if I may. The consequences of not acting are no less than existential when it comes to trust in our politics, in this place and in the other House. Trust in politics is at an all-time low, which is a legacy of 14 years of cronyism and corruption from the party opposite. Indeed, polling conducted by the UK Anti-Corruption Coalition earlier this year— [Interruption.] I think that if the hon. Member for West Suffolk (Nick Timothy) listens to what I have to say, he will reflect on it. Two thirds of respondents—two thirds—felt the UK was getting more corrupt, and in 2023 only 12% of respondents told the Office for National Statistics that they trusted political parties. It all adds up.”
“I thank the hon. Member for his contribution. Hereditary peers are there by dint of birth, not by dint of their service or contribution to public life. He talks about decades of service, which may accrue over a period of time, but that is merely by dint of birth. We will shortly come to appointments to the other place, which touches on the point about accountability and trust. I want to talk about the various amendments tabled by the right hon. Member for Stone, Great Wyrley and Penkridge (Sir Gavin Williamson). As colleagues have said, it is a great shame that he did not discover that he had such a penchant for reform and modernisation during his 14 years as a Member of the governing party.”
“The Conservatives, including the right hon. Member for Stone, Great Wyrley and Penkridge, sat on their hands for the last 14 years. We have been in government for four months, and we are already delivering. I look forward to voting for the Bill tonight.”
“Let us talk about gerrymandering. Let me recall one statistic that is worth reminding the House about: for every one and a half days that former Conservative Prime Minister Liz Truss was in power, she created a life peer—a total of 32 during the course of her 49-day premiership. Much like the hereditary peers, those new legislators will have a seat in the House of Lords for life. How can that be right? Indeed, it is clear to me that the House of Lords Appointments Commission does not present a particularly high bar for appointments. Once the immediate first step is completed, a number of ambitious steps must be taken to deliver genuine, lasting reform of the way we do politics in this country. In summary, this Bill will help to wrench our political system kicking and screaming into the 21st century.”
“The meagre changes made under previous Conservative Administrations comprised nothing more than tinkering around the edges at a time when the other place needed to be urgently dragged into the 21st century. I will not support the amendments. If Members present are genuinely committed to modernising how our democracy works, I look forward to constructive engagement with the Government and the Opposition throughout the course of this Parliament. I commend the actions taken so far by the Government and will support further measures over time to modernise how the other place works. A mature democracy such as ours—centred around the mother of Parliaments, no less—simply cannot continue with an unelected, hereditary upper House. We heard earlier from the hon. Member for Brentwood and Ongar, who talked about, in his words, gerrymandering.”