Phil Brickell
MP for Bolton West · Labour · United Kingdom
“On the occasion of the then Mayor of Greater Manchester, now the Prime Minister, visiting my constituency, I was proud to host him in Blackedge’s Brewery Tap on Market Street in Westhoughton.”
House of Commons27 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“My hon. Friend has spoken very passionately about the experiences of her constituents. My constituents have faced issues in which they have had mail only once every three or four weeks; one constituent did not receive 14 items of post.”
House of Commons26 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“My hon. Friend is making a passionate contribution about the experience of her constituents and the real-life impact of Royal Mail’s failures. Does she agree that this is yet another prime example of why it is important to properly regulate a public service?”
House of Commons26 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“With about 800 peers— 800—the House of Lords is larger than almost every comparable second chamber in the democratic world. When people talk about a bloated state, perhaps they should start by walking through Westminster Hall and turning right at Central Lobby.”
House of Commons20 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Sir John. First, I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud (Dr Opher) for securing this critical debate. He has been a champion in pursuing long overdue reform to the upper Chamber.”
House of Commons20 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Elsewhere, what progress has been made on the Government’s three other manifesto commitments: first, introducing new participation requirements; secondly, delivering a national and regional balance for the upper Chamber; and finally, and most importantly, reforming the appointments process?”
House of Commons20 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
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“I wish to confine my remarks to the responsible, resilient and transparent use of taxpayers’ money. I say that as the chair of the all-party parliamentary group on anti-corruption and responsible tax, a role which sees me engage with ministerial colleagues from across Government on a whole swathe of issues. I push Government constructively to increase transparency, improve controls and increase enforcement when those who seek to defraud the taxpayer are identified. Public sector fraud and error is estimated to cost taxpayers between £55 billion and £81 billion annually. That is not sustainable when we are asking taxpayers to shoulder a large burden and when our public finances are already squeezed, at a time of increasingly turbulent geopolitical headwinds.”
House of Commons29 June 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“My hon. Friend is a passionate advocate for tackling this issue. I echo the remarks from her and my hon. Friend the Member for Halesowen (Alex Ballinger) about the need to learn the lessons from our colleagues in Holland. We have all talked about the perverse issue of frankly playing whack-a-mole, whereby shops pop up and bad faith actors hide behind a smokescreen, whether from trading standards, HMRC, the National Crime Agency or local police forces that are responsible for addressing enforcement. Will she echo my calls for the Home Office to work closely with colleagues in HMRC, the Treasury and the Department for Business and Trade to make sure that we are addressing the cumulative impact of the harm caused to local areas?”
House of Commons17 June 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“My hon. Friend is speaking passionately about enforcement in Birmingham Erdington. Does she agree that key organisations in the private sector have a lot of information? All these shops are banked by someone. The Government can drive down the barriers to information sharing between the private and public sectors to identify suspicious activity so that enforcement agencies—be they the police, trading standards or the National Crime Agency—can have the greatest possible impact when they conduct these sorts of raids.”
House of Commons17 June 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Secondly, somewhat at a tangent, after some concerning reporting by Bloomberg about the potential return of golden visas, can the Minister reassure me that his Department will work with the Department for Business and Trade and the Home Office to ensure that this Government never introduce a loophole that allows oligarchs and kleptocrats to buy their way into the UK?”
House of Commons9 June 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Therefore, set against the backdrop of a new anti-money laundering and asset recovery strategy, a new economic crime plan being published later in the year and the Crown dependencies implementing greater transparency around their company registers in the coming month, I have two asks for the Minister. What can he say to reassure me that the rescheduled illicit finance summit will be the genuine cross-Government priority it deserves to be, and that this Government will drive global leadership on the all-encompassing issue of illicit finance?”
House of Commons9 June 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Unless we tackle the issue both here in the UK and in the Crown dependencies and overseas territories, we will not address it in the full manner that it deserves to be addressed by all of us in this Chamber in order to do the right thing by my constituents. Let us recall the figures I mentioned at the start: each year, £788 billion flows through UK-linked systems, £10 billion is laundered and £33.4 billion is lost in UK tax revenue. The Minister knows those statistics and has heard me mention them time and again, but I am repeating them to drive home just how important this summit is, both to our country and around the globe, and to reiterate how crucial it is that we get the appropriate buy-in across Departments at the very top of Government.”
House of Commons9 June 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It is also a transparency issue: £190 billion-worth of property has no clearly identified beneficial owner. We heard of the Norfolk cottage, but we all have properties in our constituencies up and down the country that are affected by this issue. There are 236,500 properties across England and Wales that are held through opaque trusts, and there have been £6 billion-worth of suspicious property purchases made via overseas territories shell companies, of which more than 90% went through the British Virgin Islands. That speaks to the scale of the issue at hand. Illicit finance damages our global reputation, too.”
House of Commons9 June 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Some £10 billion is laundered through the UK each year, by people traffickers, drug gangs and organised crime groups, and £6 billion of trade with Russia has been facilitated by UK overseas territories companies since 2022, including through sanctioned goods. It is also an economic issue, though. Let us remember that £325 billion is linked to corruption cases involving UK-connected services and that, each year, £33.4 billion is lost by the UK and almost $500 billion is lost globally to tax abuse. Illicit finance also distorts our property market, as we have already heard. Some £11 billion of suspicious wealth has been identified in UK property, and £1.5 billion of that was linked to individuals accused of financial crime or with connections to the Kremlin.”
House of Commons9 June 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It will be an opportunity to harness the private sector’s technical expertise as a leading financial services hub. It will be a chance for our law enforcement agencies to share their knowledge, whether the National Crime Agency, the Serious Fraud Office or the City of London police, who I had the pleasure of visiting in their Guildhall offices only last week. On crypto, it will be an opportunity to encourage like-minded partners to roll out sanctions packages similar to the one that the Foreign Office recently launched for the A7 in Kyrgyzstan. I must commend the Minister for his leadership on that. Illicit finance touches more or less every facet of our lives and is a national security issue.”
House of Commons9 June 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Sir Roger. I start by congratulating the hon. Member for North Norfolk (Steff Aquarone) on securing this vital debate, and on his comments about opaque property ownership. I said that this is a vital debate, but let us remind ourselves of the figures: £325 billion flows through the UK in illicit finance every year, which is more than 10% of this country’s GDP, and that figure rises to £780 billion annually when the Crown dependencies and overseas territories are included, according to the Finance Innovation Lab. In the short amount of time available, let me say this: when the summit comes, it will be a measure of our convening power with global south countries as we look to build to chairing the G20 in 2027.”
House of Commons9 June 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Our high streets are where this country lives. They bind our communities together and they are where the next generation of British entrepreneurs will cut their teeth. Businesses like Hive, Serendipity and Blackedge Brewery are proof that there is still enormous pride, creativity and resilience in our towns. They are worth fighting for, so let us do so.”
House of Commons4 June 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Secondly, we should move to mandatory licensing for barbers, vape shops and the other high-risk sectors that have become criminal franchises in plain sight on our high streets. If someone needs a licence to sell a pint of beer, someone should need one to open a barber shop or a vape store. Thirdly, we should extend closure powers so that persistent offenders are shut down for good. Members of the Chartered Trading Standards Institute overwhelmingly back the idea: 98% support extending closure orders and 97% support permanent closure for repeat offenders. And let us remove, in a single line of legislation, the absurd £1,000 cash seizure threshold that lets criminals wave goodbye to trading standards officers with fistfuls of notes in their hands. Let officers seize every pound of ill-gotten gains from the till.”
House of Commons4 June 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The criminals hollowing out all our communities have to know that they are no longer welcome, and that must mean three things. First, we should adopt a British equivalent to the Dutch Bibob regime. The officials in the port city of Rotterdam I met earlier this year told me how they have spent 14 years dismantling the organised criminal infrastructure that we are struggling against in the UK. Dutch officials in one Rotterdam suburb told me how their integrity screening regime reduced the number of firms from 111 to 65 without recourse to a single criminal prosecution, removing suspicious businesses en masse. We should learn from our Dutch counterparts and give our local authorities similar powers to refuse permits to applicants linked to criminal intelligence and to look through nominee directors for the real money behind them.”
House of Commons4 June 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Measures announced include a new £30 million high street organised crime unit, which I was proud to lobby the Chancellor for before last year’s Budget, and 75 new officers in the worst-affected regions, including the north-west of England. Trading Standards will receive £6 million, after a decade of cuts that halved its capacity. Other measures include a new cross-Government taskforce, 350 new His Majesty’s Revenue and Customs investigators, a new abusive phoenixism taskforce and a consultation on extending closure orders. All that shows real progress, and the APPG that I chair has campaigned hard for many of those measures, so it would be remiss of me not to thank the Minister and his colleagues across Government for their work over the last two years. But money alone will not finish the job.”
House of Commons4 June 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The nearby Texaco service station on Chorley New Road was prosecuted in December 2024—the first prosecution of its kind in the north-west of England—with more than 7,000 illegal vapes seized across four visits. But let us be honest: Operation Machinize has visited more than 2,500 premises across two waves, and its initial wave produced only 10 permanent closures—that is 10 out of 2,500 businesses. Organised crime will absorb that figure as an operating cost and shrug it off by the end of the week. After years of austerity and inaction under successive Governments, I know that this Government understand the severity of the situation facing our country.”
House of Commons4 June 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Representatives from the banking sector told me that they hold significant data on suspicious cash flows but lack the legal architecture to share it usefully. Legitimate hard-working barbers being driven out by criminal operators told me that their trade is being tarnished in plain sight. Officials in local government told me that they watch shops close one week and reopen the next under a new name and a new nominee director, with the unpaid business rates simply written off. The NCA’s Operation Machinize has shown what is possible. In my constituency, Horwich Mini Market on Lee Lane was closed for three months last year after the seizure of almost 20,000 illegal cigarettes, hundreds of illegal vapes and 7 kg of illegal tobacco.”
House of Commons4 June 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The number of barber shops per 10,000 people in the UK has more than doubled in the same period. Meanwhile, the National Crime Agency assesses that at least £12 billion of criminal cash is generated in this country every single year, and our high streets have regrettably become a primary route for washing those proceeds. Behind some—not all—of the cheap shop fronts sits drug money, trafficking money and money stripped from the most vulnerable in society. The proceeds of human misery are being cleaned through card machines on high streets in every town represented here today. The all-party parliamentary group on anti-corruption and responsible tax, which I chair, has spent the past year speaking to individuals on the frontline with responsibility for tackling the explosion of cash-intensive businesses.”
House of Commons4 June 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Despite all the pressures that our high streets face, brilliant independent businesses—whether new ventures like Hive in Westhoughton in my patch, or long-standing local favourites like Serendipity in Horwich, run by Chris and Kath Parbery—are still choosing to invest in our communities. But millions of us no longer recognise the high streets where we grew up. The bakery, now a barber shop, is somehow always empty. The greengrocer is now a vape shop. The pub on the corner is boarded up for the third time in five years. The Woolworths is long gone, replaced first by a pound shop and then by something called an “American candy store”. Now, just like all the empty barber shops, vape shops and mini-marts, the high street is silent. The number of vape shops in England has grown by nearly 1,200% in a little over a decade.”
House of Commons4 June 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Ms Lewell. I congratulate the hon. Member for Didcot and Wantage (Olly Glover) on securing this debate. I want to focus on an important lever that the Government should pull to regenerate our high streets: tackling the illicit financial activity that is hollowing out towns and undercutting legitimate local businesses. That matters because these streets are the soul of our communities; they are where local traders serve their regulars, and where the greengrocer, butcher and corner café have always been part of who we are as a country.”
House of Commons4 June 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The Secretary of State may know that I am a passionate white water kayaker and a firm believer in the healing power of time spent in, on and around water. England and Wales have some of the most restrictive rights of access anywhere in the world; less than 4% of inland waterways have an uncontested public right of navigation. Can the Secretary of State say a bit more about when her Department will bring forward the Green Paper on access to nature?”
House of Commons4 June 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“May I take this opportunity to commend the Minister and her colleagues in the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office on the continuing ratcheting up of sanctions, whether it is on Russian hydrocarbons, crypto-networks or other illicit financial flows? I was not a Member of this House in the last Parliament, but I was proud as a British citizen to see that there was consensus across the political parties about the need to stand up to Putin’s barbaric and unlawful war of aggression and to support Ukraine for as long as it took. Regrettably, that is no longer the case in this place. Will the Minister and other colleagues join me in condemning the remarks by the Reform UK candidate in the Makerfield by-election, when he said that Putin’s Russia was “well within their rights” to annex Crimea?”
House of Commons4 June 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Madam Deputy Speaker, I hope you and the Leader of the House will join me in congratulating Bolton Wanderers on their promotion to the championship after beating Stockport recently 4-1 at Wembley. Bolton’s promotion has been a huge effort by the players, the staff and the fans, and the Wanderers’ turnaround has been made possible by the fantastic stewardship of Sharon Brittan, after the previous owners nearly drove the club into the ground. That is why I am proud that this Government have established the Independent Football Regulator, to make sure that what happened to Wanderers can never happen again. Will the Leader of the House join me in recognising the vital contribution that clubs such as Bolton make to our social fabric?”
House of Commons4 June 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“7. What assessment he has made of the potential implications for his Department’s policies of the Supreme Court judgment in the Dillon case [2026] UKSC 15.”
House of Commons3 June 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“As the proud son of a Northern Ireland veteran myself, I wish to put on the record my eternal gratitude to the brave men and women of our armed forces who served our nation in Operation Banner. With that in mind, can the Secretary of State reiterate to the House how many veterans have been convicted for offences committed during the troubles and how that compares with the number of paramilitaries who have been successfully prosecuted?”
House of Commons3 June 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I congratulate the Chancellor on this ambitious and comprehensive package of measures, supporting families across Bolton West. As a long-standing proponent of a fairer taxation system, I thank her for the measures she has put forward to close the tax loopholes that have been used by oil and gas firms to structure their affairs and avoid paying hundreds of millions of pounds into the Exchequer. That money will finance this package of proposals to support families. She mentioned the Competition and Markets Authority. Can she say a little more about what engagement she envisages having over the coming months to make sure that we do not see profiteering, going forwards?”
House of Commons21 May 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“As someone who has been sanctioned by the Russian state and worked on tackling financial crime in British business for more than a decade, it was apparent to me after only a cursory review of the gov.uk website that this is a new general licence to allow the roll-out of the new regime that the Minister has mentioned today. I thank him for coming to the House to set the record straight, but can he also assuage my constituents’ fears and say that, although we have heard a lot of rhetoric and bluster in the Chamber today, this really will be a new regime and it will be strengthened?”
House of Commons20 May 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The shadow Minister talked about his party’s ambition for new nuclear in this country, but can he remind the House how many new nuclear plants his party opened during their tenure in charge?”
House of Commons19 May 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Will the Leader of the House make Government time available for a debate on the merits of extending first refusal rights to homeowners?”
House of Commons14 May 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I know that you will join me in wishing Bolton Wanderers all the very best in the second leg of the play-off semi-final at Bradford tonight, Mr Speaker. Solicitor Andrew Milne has been arrested by South Yorkshire police after allegations of fraud and blackmail from leaseholders up and down the country. In Horwich in my constituency, Milne bought freeholds on the cheap and threatened to take my constituents to court if they did not pay him thousands of pounds. After repeated engagement with me and my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield Hallam (Olivia Blake), the Solicitors Regulation Authority has now imposed interim conditions on Milne’s licence after a separate stalking conviction. Regrettably, my constituents were never given the opportunity to buy their own freeholds before they were purchased by Milne.”
House of Commons14 May 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“What assurances can the Minister give me that the activities of the Hong Kong Economic and Trade Office are being properly monitored and that the UK Government will not allow for that institution to be misused by Chinese or Hong Kong authorities to engage in that form of transnational repression?”
House of Commons14 May 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I thank the Minister for his careful and considered remarks and for setting out very clearly in his statement that the safety and security of Hongkongers in the UK is paramount. I also thank him for his remarks about new legislation announced in the King’s Speech to tackle hostile state threats and about the two convictions under the National Security Act last week, which regard the activities of two individuals on UK soil who leaked to the Chinese foreign intelligence service. Hongkongers in my constituency live with the threat of transnational repression day in, day out, and they are petrified of the activities of Beijing and Hong Kong authorities on British soil.”
House of Commons14 May 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“We all know, deep in our hearts, that it should not matter where children are from or how wealthy their families are, yet all too often the current system bakes in inequalities at a young age that stay with children for the rest of their lives. Alongside that reform, another vital commitment featured in the King’s Speech yesterday: our offer to young people, including this Government’s youth guarantee. For too long, too many young people have been locked out of work, training or opportunity, which is why the Government’s industrial strategy and apprenticeships plan matter so much. It is this Labour Government who are removing the barriers to economic growth that stifled innovation and creativity, and it is this Labour Government who are creating the much needed pathways into secure, highly paid jobs for the next generation of Boltonians.”
House of Commons14 May 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“For years, families navigating the special educational needs and disabilities system have felt exhausted and ignored. At a roundtable that I held recently with concerned parents, I was told about the endless battles to secure assessments, support and specialist provision for children. Frankly, teachers and schools have been asked to do more with less, and children with enormous talent and potential have too often been denied the support they deserve. That is not acceptable, and it is not sustainable for this country. The education for all Bill represents an important step towards the meaningful SEND reform that is vital because, as Labour Members believe, every child deserves the opportunity to go as far as their talent and effort can take them.”
House of Commons14 May 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Families in my constituency are feeling the pressure of rising bills, stretched public services and insecure work, which is why I was proud that in the previous parliamentary Session, this Government passed landmark legislation on workers’ rights, protections for private sector renters, bringing rail back into public ownership, rolling out clean energy and achieving much-needed reforms to our policing system. This Session’s programme shows that the Government are prepared to act with urgency and purpose in order to build on the good work that has already been done. One of the most important priorities set out yesterday is ending the opportunity crisis facing so many young people and families across our country. I will focus most of the rest of my remarks on that topic.”
House of Commons14 May 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Yesterday’s King’s Speech showed that, despite all the noise from Opposition Members, this Government are determined to get their heads down and get on with the job that the British people sent us to Westminster to do. After years of drift, decline and short-termism under the Conservative party, this Labour Government are choosing a different path—one that restores hope to towns like Westhoughton, Horwich, Blackrod and Bolton in my constituency. As the electorate told us last week, and as the Prime Minister has acknowledged, the challenges we face need to be met with substantial systematic reforms.”
House of Commons14 May 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The hon. Member makes a valid point about artificial intelligence and the world of work, which is increasingly changing and facing threats but also facing opportunities. I would like the Government to continue to work strongly with our further and higher education sector, to think proactively about what opportunities are coming down the line for work in the sectors that he is talking about, five or 10 years in the future. We have to be creative in thinking about what those opportunities look like, although artificial intelligence is not just about threats.”
House of Commons14 May 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“We must be honest about the trade-offs and investments required to rebuild our country. I am proud to support a King’s Speech that shows that Labour is getting on with the job for my constituents across Bolton West.”
House of Commons14 May 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“That is why this Government’s EU reset is about acting pragmatically in Britain’s national interest to secure the very best for our country. Taken together, this Government’s programme will build national resilience, spread opportunity and restore confidence that the future can be better for working people and their families: a Britain with stronger public services; a Britain where children in Bolton West with SEND receive the support they deserve; a Britain where young people in Westhoughton, Horwich, Bolton and Blackrod all have the chance to succeed; a Britain with clean, home-grown energy and stronger economic security; and a Britain that rebuilds its place in the world with confidence and purpose. There are no silver bullets after 14 years of decline.”
House of Commons14 May 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Friend the Member for Rhondda and Ogmore (Chris Bryant), to cut through some of that duplicative bureaucracy, but the European partnership Bill should be the vehicle to clear away the very burdens imposed by the Conservatives, aided and abetted by their colleagues in Reform UK. What we saw under previous successive Conservative Governments, whether they were supported by the UK Independence party or the Brexit party at the time, was common sense sacrificed on the altar of ideological purity by a Government then more focused on pithy three-word slogans than on doing the hard yards to negotiate the best deal for Britain. My constituents know it, the members of my party know it and my colleagues on these Benches know it too.”
House of Commons14 May 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The King’s Speech recognises a simple, inescapable reality: Britain is stronger when we work closely with our European partners. Businesses across Bolton and the north-west know the importance of strong European ties. Manufacturers, exporters and local employers all benefit when Britain has stable, constructive relationships with our nearest neighbours. The Conservative party wrecked our ties with Europe, damaged trade flows, hindered growth and frustrated co-operation. Businesses faced unnecessary barriers, opportunities were lost and relationships that took decades to build were neglected. Take the trailer supplier Indespension, located in my patch, a pioneering company snared up by Brexit-related red tape. I have been working with the Minister for Trade, my hon.”
House of Commons14 May 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“My hon. Friend makes an extremely valid point about Charminster library. I know that he is a terrific campaigner for his local community assets and I wish him all the best for success in that campaign. As a former Erasmus student, may I put on the record my heartfelt support for our re-entry to that programme? My time on the Erasmus programme in Hanover opened up a world of possibilities that were unimaginable to a young lad growing up in Bolton, expanding my horizons, teaching me new skills, preparing me for the world of work and giving me the confidence to go out and get full-time employment after I graduated. It is only right that the kids of today have the same access to the opportunities I had when I was growing up.”
House of Commons14 May 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I thank the shadow Minister for giving way, but he seems a little confused in his remarks. In the same breath, he is urging the Government to bring the Bill to tackle the broken SEND system before the House as soon as possible, and saying that the consultation has not run its full course and has not brought enough people in. Which is it? It cannot be both at the same time.”
House of Commons14 May 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I mention all that not to advance a political argument but rather to warn Conservative colleagues that the country has not forgotten what took place the last time the Privileges Committee convened to consider a PM’s conduct, and to advise them to take heed of that history.”
House of Commons28 April 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“10, in breach of the rules, while we all made daily sacrifices to contain the virus; denying that he had breached the rules; and then doubling down on his denials. Reading back through the Committee’s 108-page final report from 2023 gave me flashbacks, especially in recalling that Johnson misled the House on no fewer than six occasions, that he misled the Privileges Committee, that he breached confidence, that he impugned the Committee and undermined the democratic processes of the House and—perhaps most importantly—that he was complicit in a campaign of abuse and attempted intimidation of the Committee.”
House of Commons28 April 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The PM made an error of judgment. For that, he rightly apologised in the House last Monday and sought forgiveness. As I will set out, to suggest that he has in any way misled the House is a political fabrication anchored not in truth but in a smokescreen of political mendacity that supposes a cock-up somehow equates to a conspiracy. The Opposition moved a motion to have the Prime Minister referred to the Privileges Committee—something that has not happened since Boris Johnson’s referral back in the early part of 2022. That case and the matters being debated today are like chalk and cheese. Johnson was referred to the Privileges Committee for the most egregious of lockdown breaches: partying in No.”
House of Commons28 April 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Secondly, I will confine my remarks to the specifics of the proposed referral to the Privileges Committee in the motion today. Mandelson’s appointment, what was recorded in the proprietary and ethics team’s due diligence report, and the UK Security Vetting process have all been debated on numerous occasions in this place already, and there remain live reviews under way that I do not want to preclude in any way. Thirdly, the Prime Minister has rightly recognised that appointing Mandelson as ambassador to Washington was a mistake. Mandelson’s behaviour has been contemptible, and we are in no doubt on the Government Benches that he should never have been appointed. It was a mistake for which the PM has faced significant opprobrium, and there have been consequences for him—let us not forget that. The honest truth is that we are all fallible.”
House of Commons28 April 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I also speak as a recently departed member of the Foreign Affairs Committee, who sat in Portcullis House only in November and quizzed Sir Chris Wormald, the former Cabinet Secretary, and Sir Olly Robbins, the former permanent under-secretary at the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, when they gave oral evidence to the Committee in the light of the sacking of Peter Mandelson as UK ambassador to Washington. Let me say first that my thoughts are with the victims of Jeffrey Epstein’s terrible crimes. Nothing we say or do today can take away from the unimaginable hurt and pain that that man caused and continues to cause for victims, survivors, and their friends and families. Today and all days, we must remember them and do all that we can to support them in their continued fight for justice.”
House of Commons28 April 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I speak in this debate on privileges with a unique perspective—one garnered from almost 15 years of experience working in a highly regulated sector, with responsibility for managing financial crime and reputational risk at two FTSE 100 firms, accountable for decisions made in managing conflicts of interest, promoting ethical codes of practice, training staff on when to do the right thing, testing the effectiveness of whistleblowing regimes and completing enhanced due diligence on individuals who posed heightened risk. That experience was gathered in the UK, the US, India, the UAE and elsewhere.”
House of Commons28 April 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“May I start by saying that I take serious exception to the remarks made by the hon. Member for Beaconsfield (Joy Morrissey), who I see is just about to leave the Chamber? She complained about us spending an afternoon talking “laboriously” about process. It is process that is on the face of the motion that the Leader of the Opposition has brought to the Chamber today, and that is what we are debating. That is because of the hon. Lady’s party. I am more than happy to spend an afternoon talking about process, because that is what we are here to do.”
House of Commons28 April 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“After that, the PM’s chief of staff discussed Mandelson’s relationship with Epstein and noted that the PM’s director of communications was satisfied with Mandelson’s responses to questions about contact. Importantly, this was before further information came to light in September of last year, when it was identified that those responses were not truthful.”
House of Commons28 April 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗