Luke Murphy
MP for Basingstoke · Labour · United Kingdom
“Those communities deserve not just respect but full and genuine engagement, shaping and driving the future of their own areas. That is at the heart of the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government’s 2016 guidance on estate regeneration, although I will go on to say that that guidance needs to be refreshed and strengthened.”
“I thank the Minister for her response. I particularly want to recognise the points she made about repairs and maintenance. I would welcome her passing on my request to the Housing Minister, and I acknowledge what she said about residential ballots.”
“I am afraid that we hear the story all too regularly: complaints ignored, wait times running into months or years, missed appointments, and wrong jobs or poor repairs that mean starting the whole process all over again.”
“Does the Minister agree that accountability for such schemes should be crystal clear? There needs to be clarity on which body is accountable, alongside greater democratic accountability.”
“Does the Minister agree that it is good practice to explain such decisions in an accessible way? On the point about uncertainty, the Sovereign Hill Partnership has acknowledged that wide-scale regeneration would take multiple decades.”
“Member for Taunton and Wellington (Gideon Amos), and his agreement with the point about minimum standards and what community consent can help to deliver. I thank the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Orpington (Gareth Bacon), for what he said about my speech.”
The complete record
Every one of 379 lines we hold for Luke Murphy, in date order, each linked to its source. Free to read, in full, without an account. Page 5 of 8.
“Q I thank our witnesses for coming. My question concerns growth and the timeline of the NSIP regime. We know there was a significant deterioration, as the Minister said, between 2012 and 2021, and the time taken to get development consent almost doubled. From 2.6 years in 2012, it rose to 4.2 years. Is there a target timeframe or average we should be getting to that you would like to see? One of the things my constituents will be most focused on is what this will do to growth in the economy. What impact do you think the Bill will have on overall economic growth? Sir John Armitt: There are two things there: what should the target be, and will the Bill deliver it? I think the target clearly should be to try to get back to what we were handling and seeing back in 2010 to 2012. That was just over a two-year period.”
“As for being able to expedite the investments in clean power and make sure we are reducing the amount we are spending on curtailment costs, that should mean that in the future, if we experience an energy shock again, we will not spend the £40 billion that was spent in 2022-23 to support people. That is why this is so important.”
“That is why this part of the energy industry is so crucial. In terms of the impact on bills, the reality is that, at one point, energy bills were four times what they were in 2019. We are now seeing bill debt of £3.8 billion and growing. It is also important to note, generally speaking, that households are under more pressure now than they have been for well over a decade. I think more than half of households who go to Citizens Advice have a negative budget. Households are really feeling the pressure, and the conversation about energy bills has not really been off the front pages for the last four years.”
“Q It was not that long ago that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine resulted in a massive income shock because our energy system is not that secure. Building on the Minister’s question earlier, what impact will the Bill have, in terms of expediting connections to the grid, on securing our energy supply in future? Can you also say a bit about what impact it will have on economic growth? Dhara Vyas: I think that the Bill is going to be crucial. It was as true for the previous Government as it is for this Government that clean energy and investment in clean power is seen as the safest and surest way to ensure the UK’s energy security. There is a programme of work for investing in clean power, but there is absolutely nothing to be gained from all of that net investment unless we can move it around the country.”
“So while we need to be having conversations about linkage with Europe, we also need to be having significant conversations here about how we can speed up demand and connections for demand—and have that conversation for both homes and businesses. More broadly, we also need to be having a conversation about how we support businesses to consider how they can move off their dependence on gas.”
“Q Very quickly, can you say something about the benefits, in terms of economic growth, of electrifying the economy? Dhara Vyas: I think it links neatly to the last question around demand. The reality is that we need to decarbonise business in a significant way. Right now, what businesses in this country are paying is among the highest of OECD countries, if not the first or second highest in that group. This is a big part of the discussion with the Department for Business and Trade around the industrial strategy. Energy and the price of energy is hugely significant to business users, as well as to households.”
“I would have looked again at the reform that was put forward by the previous Government, which would have totally disapplied habitats regulations when they related to nutrient neutrality requirements, so there would be no need to produce an EDP or for the developer to pay a levy. That would have been the quickest way to unblock the homes that are currently stalled by this issue.”
“The reforms the Government have brought forward in the national planning policy framework are much more radical and impactful, certainly in the short to medium term; ditto forthcoming reforms to the national development management policies, if they are done the right way. Policy changes by the Department have a quicker effect, and I would be looking to that in the short term. In terms of where I would go further, I agree with Sam on that part of the Bill. If I were a Government who wanted to deliver a lot of homes very quickly, I am not sure this is the reform I would have brought forward.”
“That is brilliant, but I fear that as things stand, the Government have not solved the bat tunnel issue, and they will need to come back to that. Jack Airey : Whether it delivers more homes and infrastructure is almost an unfair question, because legislative reforms to the planning system take so long to have an effect. While a lot of the things in the Bill are very positive and will improve the structure of the planning system, it will take a long time for them to have an effect and for the various bits of regulation to be laid. I worked on the Levelling-up and Regeneration Act 2023. So much of that has not been implemented and probably will not ever be implemented, and I fear we will be in that situation with this Bill, too.”
“We need to do that both to help us build the stuff quicker and to help us better protect nature. My fear with the way the Bill is currently written and how the environmental delivery plans will be implemented is that, because the habitats rules remain untouched and sit underneath them, if EDPs are not brought in, the habitats rules kick in as they do currently. It relies on Natural England bringing out all these EDPs and, indeed, those EDPs working for species. It is easy to see how they will apply in the case of, say, nutrient neutrality. We have basically already started doing that with the nutrient mitigation schemes that started two years ago. That is all to the good, and that should unlock lots of house building in the south of England.”
“It is important to make those points, because the ambition of the Bill is absolutely right: we need to make it much easier to build the homes, energy and transport links that we need. In many ways, the Government are delivering on what they are setting out to do, but there is one crucial area where they are going to need to go further, and that is on the changes to the application of the Conservation of Habitats and Species Regulations 2017. It is worth saying that while we are failing to build, we are failing to protect nature; all our key biodiversity indicators are in decline. The shift to a strategic approach to environmental protections is absolutely the right one: getting away from this site-by-site approach, which has led to the bat tunnels and the fish discos, is absolutely right.”
“Why is it so expensive? We used to build them more cheaply: 20 years ago, they were half the price; when we built the fleets in the ’50s and ’60s, they were a quarter of the cost of the ones that we are building now. Why is it costing so much more? In no small part, it is to do with the environmental rules that mean that EDF is currently wrangling with regulators, and has been for eight years, about installing an underwater fish disco—an acoustic deterrent to stop the fish from swimming into the exhaust pipes of the power plant. Millions of pounds are currently being spent on that. Fourthly, the planning application for a 3.3-mile railway line between Bristol and Portishead—reopening an existing line that was cut in the Beeching cuts—is 80,000 pages long, with more than 1,000 pages dedicated to bats, on what is an existing line.”
“First, the planning application for the lower Thames crossing—I see the relevant Member here—has cost more than £250 million. That is more than it cost Norway to actually build the world’s longest tunnel. That has been all in planning. That is all paperwork—not a single spade in the ground. Secondly, High Speed 2 is the world’s most expensive railway line, in no small part because we are doing things like building a £121 million bat tunnel to protect 300 Bechstein’s bats that live in a nearby wood—not actually the wood that the line goes through, but a nearby wood. I think most people would agree that that is a disproportionate response. Thirdly, we are currently building the world’s most expensive nuclear power plant, at Hinkley. It is the most expensive nuclear power plant ever constructed in the history of the human race.”
“Q You both worked for the previous Government in different roles, one in housing and the other in climate and the environment. Are there things in the Bill that you would have argued for then but that did not happen under the previous Government? Are there any areas where you would go further? Does the Bill deliver on the need to build more homes and get the growth that we need while protecting the environment? Sam Richards: For those of you who do not know, Britain Remade is a campaign, and 35,000 people across the country support us building the homes, energy and transport infrastructure that we need. It is worth briefly stepping back and remembering why we desperately need to streamline the planning system. I am going to give you four quick examples.”
“I think I have already said it, but I have this line: if somebody is going to benefit commercially from that compulsory purchase, the person from whom it is being purchased should also benefit, and it should enable them to have adequate funding to go and continue elsewhere.”
“Q Rachel, on the hope value, you used the phrase, “through no fault of their own”. Is that not the point of reforms to hope value? Hope value comes about through the granting of planning permission, which usually comes about because of a public infrastructure investment, such as a tube station or a train station, and that inflates the value of the land. Known left-wingers such as Winston Churchill and Adam Smith advocated these kind of reforms back in the day because it was through no genuine work that the appreciation had come about. Therefore, is there not some merit to reforming it? Rachel Hallos: I think there is merit to reforming it, but it is about making sure that the reforms are done in the right way and are fair to everybody.”
“Richard Benwell: There is good scientific evidence that the habitats regulations are the most effective site and species protections in the world, but we definitely still need to go further. Some of those strategic solutions, particularly for landscape issues like water pollution, air pollution and water availability, can be improved. You are right. There are loads of places where we could go further. We would love to see things like building regulations for biodiversity in the Bill, to help get nature built into the fabric of development as we go. To suggest that the habitats regulations are not working is wrong, but their implementation can definitely be improved and more use can be made of this kind of strategic approach if it is done well.”
“Q I am afraid that my questions are also to Richard, so apologies to the other witnesses. I want to go back to your original comment about nature and development not needing to be in conflict, with which I entirely agree. You also pointed out that we are suffering from significant species loss and environmental degradation. As someone who has worked on both housing and protecting the environment for the last 10 years, I support this approach because the current system is not delivering. Do you agree that the current system is not delivering for either nature or development? Notwithstanding the flaws—I think there can be some honest disagreement on what the outcomes might be—do you welcome the fact that a new approach is being proposed, given that the current system is not delivering for either development or nature?”
“Q I am grateful to the Ministers to for giving up their time. My question is really about whether there is a trade-off between nature and development. Given what has been said by previous panels, I want to give Matthew the opportunity to answer the suggestion that the Bill is somehow proposing that there is a trade-off. Also, to what degree are the Government listening to nature organisations, some of which we heard from earlier, and their suggestions on strengthening the Bill? Lastly, Richard Benwell specifically raised clause 64 and the viability test. Do you share his concern that subjecting the levy to the viability test could mean that the amount of funds that come from it are not sufficient to at the very least mitigate if not improve? How can we ensure that is not the case, even if it is subject to the viability test?”
“In January 2017, the then Conservative Foreign Secretary claimed that the UK would be “first in line” for a US trade deal; 2,722 days later, when the Conservatives left office, precisely nothing had been achieved. Incidentally, that is 37 times longer than the 73 days President Trump has been in power for his second term. Does the Business Secretary agree that it is hard to take the Conservative party’s criticisms of our trade approach seriously, given its appalling record on meeting its claims to be able to achieve trade deals? I urge him to continue with his calm approach to this, in the interests of businesses in Basingstoke and across the country, and to take those decisions in the national interest.”
“Q11. Too many of my constituents are struggling to obtain an appointment with a GP. The GPs are trying their best, but they too are struggling, with capacity issues, outdated buildings and outdated technology, all because the Conservative party broke the front door to the national health service. Can the Prime Minister reassure my constituents that our plan for investment and reform will ensure that they can see a GP when they need one?”
“Growth is not a luxury—it is how we raise living standards, improve public services and restore pride in every part of this country. Let us give regulators a clear foundation. Let us bring forward a new legislative framework that reflects the ambitions of a dynamic, pro-growth Britain. Let us regulate for growth. I commend the Bill to the House. Question put and agreed to. Ordered, That Luke Murphy, Mr Luke Charters, Uma Kumaran, Lola McEvoy, Chris Curtis, Sonia Kumar, Gregor Poynton, Kanishka Narayan, Mike Reader, Ms Polly Billington, Rachel Blake and Anneliese Midgley present the Bill. Luke Murphy accordingly presented the Bill. Bill read the First time; to be read a Second time on Friday 4 July, and to be printed (Bill 207).”
“It is confusing for businesses, inefficient for regulators, and a barrier to growth. That is why today I urge the Government to go further and begin the work of legislating for a core set of statutory duties, including growth, across the regulatory landscape: duties that promote long-term growth and investment, protect consumers and the environment, and embed a culture of speed, clarity and accountability in decision making; and a system where regulators remain independent, but the expectations placed on them are consistent, transparent and aligned with our national priorities. We will continue to protect what matters: safety, fairness, the environment and public trust. However, we must also deliver on what moves us forward towards innovation, economic renewal and growth.”
“That means: every regulator must consider the impact of their decisions on investment, innovation and prosperity; and regulators must work together, ending duplication and aligning around shared national priorities. Growth would become a statutory objective, not an afterthought. This is not theory; it is delivery. Regulation is not confined to the corridors of Whitehall. Its effects are felt in constituencies across our nation. The Bill is a call to action for the Government to bring forward a full review of regulators’ duties and objectives, with the ambition of creating a simpler, smarter framework fit for the modern economy. Too many of our regulators are operating under a patchwork of outdated or overlapping mandates. The result is duplication, drift and decisions that lack co-ordination or clarity.”
“The Bill would force us to ask: “How we can repeat those successes in other sectors?” For too long, regulators have been left without that kind of strategic guidance, forced to make politically sensitive decisions in a vacuum. That is not fair on them, and it is not good for the country. The Bill gives regulators the direction they have been missing. It does not ask them to stop doing their work; it asks them to do it better, together, and with a shared focus on creating prosperity. Because when regulation drifts, so does the economy. Yet right now, there is no formal mechanism to align regulators with the Government’s growth strategy. The Bill would provide it. It enshrines one simple principle: regulators must not only regulate for risk, they must regulate for growth.”
“The Government are not tearing up the regulatory rulebook, but rewriting it for a new era. We can and must learn lessons from home and abroad. Take Japan’s Top Runner programme, a pioneering regulatory approach that sets energy efficiency standards based on the best-performing products on the market, pushing industries to innovate and improve. By combining ambitious targets with industrial flexibility, it has successfully driven technological advancement and economic growth, while also reducing energy consumption. Or take the push by UK financial regulators to require major banks to open up their customer data, with consent, to third parties. That has helped to create a globally leading fintech ecosystem, with investment in UK fintech soaring.”
“Take the Government’s new deal for working people. Opposition Members claim that our proposals—to raise the minimum wage and end exploitative zero-hours contracts, introduce day-one rights against unfair dismissal, and expand access to sick pay and parental leave—are somehow misaligned with the Government’s wider approach to regulation. But they fail to recognise that for too long, the UK has operated with a labour market divided between secure, well-paid jobs and a growing share of insecure, low-paid work. The result is a low-wage, low-productivity doom loop. Our new deal for working people is regulation with a purpose, making work more secure, businesses more productive and the economy stronger. These policies are not just good for workers; they are good for business, too.”
“The Bill would support the Government’s broader regulating for growth agenda. The Chancellor and the Business Secretary have now published a radical new action plan, backed by businesses, to create a more agile, investment-friendly regulatory environment. As part of that work, the Chancellor secured 60 pledges from regulators that will deliver real, tangible change within the next 12 months. The CBI rightly called it: “a shift towards more proportionate, outcomes-based regulation.” This is practical, pro-growth reform: delivering for businesses, supported by businesses. But we must be clear that regulation can be both pro-growth and pro our other priorities, too. Balanced, purposeful regulation can support growth, and support the environment, strengthen public trust and raise living standards.”
“That meant three sets of rules, three sets of processes and three sets of conversations to deliver just one service. For major firms, it was frustrating. For small or scaling businesses, it was a serious obstacle. That is why the Prime Minister announced its abolition, with its core responsibilities to be folded into the Financial Conduct Authority. This is not about deregulation for deregulation’s sake. It is about smart simplification: removing duplication, reducing cost and creating clearer points of accountability. In short, it is about regulating for growth. But let us be clear: one example is not enough. The problem is systemic. The entire regulatory landscape needs to be reviewed, streamlined and refocused around a shared mission of economic growth. That is what the Regulators (Growth Objective) Bill would deliver.”
“The 17 key regulators the Prime Minister wrote to in December collectively employ 36,000 staff and spend £5.4 billion a year. That is a significant national investment, but one that too often lacks strategic co-ordination. Instead of working together, many regulators operate in silos duplicating work, slowing decisions, and creating unnecessary costs and confusion for businesses. Their powers and duties have expanded over time, without any overarching framework to keep them aligned. The result is a fragmented, sometimes contradictory system that no longer serves our national economic interest. A clear example is the Payment Systems Regulator. Firms operating payment systems like Mastercard or Faster Payments were forced to engage with three different regulators just to function in the UK.”
“It is a system that frustrates ambition and slows down investment. This Government are determined to change that. Under the leadership of the Prime Minister, the Chancellor, and the Business Secretary, the Government are committed to smarter regulation: regulation that is pro-growth, pro-innovation and—yes—pro-worker. We recognise that regulation, when designed and implemented well, is not an obstacle but a tool. It is a tool to unlock private investment, tackle systemic risks, protect the environment, and deliver better outcomes for people and communities. Britain’s businesses, large and small, are ready to drive economic growth, but they can only do so if the regulatory system enables them. There are now more than 100 regulatory bodies, many with overlapping mandates and responsibilities.”
“I beg to move, That leave be given to bring in a Bill to provide for the inclusion of economic growth as an objective for certain statutory regulators; and for connected purposes. For too long, our regulatory system has been tangled, inefficient and disconnected from the mission of economic growth and prosperity. Instead of fostering investment, encouraging innovation and delivering good jobs, regulation has too often acted as a brake on progress: too slow, too risk-averse and too unpredictable. The previous Government hid behind regulators, deferring decisions, creating unnecessary bureaucracy and allowing inefficiencies to flourish. Too many businesses today face an overlapping, complex regulatory environment, with too many regulators, too many conflicting duties and too little co-ordination.”
“The hon. Member talked about missed targets, and about affordability. In 2010, the first of 16 housing Ministers under the previous Conservative Government boldly claimed, as did many of his successors, that the Government would improve affordability of housing overall. While they were in power, affordability, as measured by the ratio between median house prices and wages, reduced from 6.85 to 7.7. Can he explain that failure to the House?”
“The point I was making was about outcomes. The previous Government committed to improving affordability and abjectly failed to do so. Can the hon. Member explain why?”
“What impact does the hon. Gentleman think the 68% cut to the affordable housing budget under the coalition Government had on the delivery of affordable housing?”
“There was not a greater cut in the affordable homes budget at any point between 2010 and 2024; the largest cut—nearly 70%—was under the coalition Government.”
“In my constituency, affordability has massively decreased; when the previous Government came to power, the median house prices to earnings ratio was 6.8, but it was 8.8 by the end of that Government. George Osborne promised a major change in how we build infrastructure in this country. What he failed to mention was that the average consent time for nationally significant infrastructure projects would nearly double.”
“My grandparents spent most of their lives living in council housing—in fact, my nan and grandad on my dad’s side were low-wage cleaners, with my nan working into her 70s and living in a council flat in Battersea for the best part of 50 years. That council flat offered my grandparents the foundation to be able to bring up my dad—the same was true on my mum’s side—and, later on, to provide security and a better life for me and my sister. Too many people in low-wage jobs, wherever they are in the country, can no longer afford to buy or rent a home. That is fundamentally what this Bill is about. To say that we would not start from here is an understatement. In 2010, the then Housing Minister boldly claimed that the Conservative Government would radically improve housing affordability.”
“I congratulate the Secretary of State and the Minister for Housing and Planning, my hon. Friend the Member for Greenwich and Woolwich (Matthew Pennycook), on bringing this Bill before the House, not least because I really believe it is potentially the most important Bill to be brought forward in this Parliament. As a country, we have not been building enough homes or infrastructure, and our planning system does not deliver for nature. This is about more than just homes, infrastructure and nature: this is one of the root causes of our falling productivity. It has been undermining growth and jobs. However, this is also about the home and the roof over people’s heads: it is fundamentally about people. My parents grew up in council housing.”
“Contrary to what has been said by Conservative Members, CPO reform is essential to delivering the housing that we need. As my hon. Friend the Member for Milton Keynes North (Chris Curtis) highlighted, it was backed by Winston Churchill, who recognised that hope value did not belong to the landowner but was the result of Government investment in infrastructure. That was also recognised by known left wingers such as Adam Smith. To go back to where I started, this Bill is fundamentally about delivering affordable homes for people who badly need them, wherever they live. I want to be able to look my constituents in the eyes and say that they are going to have access to an affordable home, just like my grandparents did so many years ago.”
“The Bill also streamlines and improves our processes for transport infrastructure, as well as improving the roll-out of electric vehicle chargers, a technology that Conservative Members now apparently oppose. I really welcome the changes to planning fees—not just the changes in this Bill, but those announced previously by the Government. One of the key reasons why developments have been gummed up in the planning system is the lack of capacity within that system to deliver on them. The Bill should restore the role of the planner, not just as a tick-box exercise but to genuinely plan the places in which people live. As someone who was a political adviser to the Labour Opposition between 2010 and 2015, I also highly endorse the proposals on development corporations and compulsory purchase.”
“The previous Government did none of those things. I will mention a few measures in the Bill that I particularly welcome. First, the commitment to cut the timeline for nationally significant infrastructure projects by 50% is incredibly welcome—internationally, this country has become a laughing stock when it comes to our ability to deliver significant infrastructure. The measures to overhaul connections to the grid for the electricity network are also incredibly welcome; in a poll by Cornwall Insight, 75% of those involved in clean power said that the grid connection issue was the biggest barrier to us delivering on our clean power ambitions.”
“I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention —it is no surprise that he is raising the issue of nuclear, for which he is a doughty champion in this Chamber. I very much agree with him about the need to build new nuclear, and I recognise the previous Government’s failure to do so. Fundamentally, this Bill is about building more homes, building infrastructure and protecting nature. My constituency of Basingstoke is a growing town—no change there. We have been a growing town for many years, since the 1960s, as a London overspill town. We have grown significantly, but I want this Bill to bring about a different approach: one that builds the homes that are so desperately needed, but also ensures that they are more affordable, builds the necessary infrastructure alongside them, and protects nature.”
“Members on the Conservative Benches have said that they do not think Richard Branson should have been receiving the winter fuel payment. They talk about those above £13,000. If the Conservative party had been so concerned about the very poorest pensioners, pension credit would not have been the most underclaimed benefit in the welfare system, with 700,000 people not claiming it. If they really cared about the most vulnerable pensioners, would they not have done more about that?”
“The motion talks about ensuring that “those eligible for Pension Credit receive it”. To return to the point I made earlier, if Conservative Members were so concerned about vulnerable pensioners, why was there absolutely no movement in the take-up of pension credit under the previous Government? Some 700,000 pensioners are eligible for pension credit, but I do not remember a big campaign on that by the previous Government that made a difference—”
“Now that the Conservative party opposes large-scale solar, net zero and onshore wind, I am tempted to ask the Minister what he makes of that party’s new energy policy, which is to take us back to the past, rub two sticks together and hope for the best. Instead, will he update the House on the progress of Great British Energy in delivering our clean energy mission?”
“On a point of fact— [ Interruption. ] I am reading from a mobile phone but, talking about quoting, they are important for research. On 19 February 2024, when the right hon. Gentleman was the Minister of State for Schools, a press release issued his Department said: “Mobile phones are set to be prohibited in schools across England”. On the right hon. Member’s website on 29 February, there was an article that said, “This latest article”— by the right hon. Gentleman— “for the Herald and Post follows the decision to ban mobile phones in schools”. I raise that point because, previously, Conservative Members made the argument that they were already banning mobile phones in schools. Is it not the case that they were posturing then, just as they are posturing now?”
“It was not just any website; it was the right hon. Member’s website, and it was a direct quote. My point—it was not necessarily to do with the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Chatham and Aylesford (Tristan Osborne)—was that when the right hon. Gentleman was Minister of State for Schools, he described the move on his website as an outright ban. No if, no buts. It was described by the previous Government as an outright ban. It was posturing then, and it is posturing now.”
“One of my constituents has endured prolonged financial abuse due to drawn-out divorce financial order proceedings, which largely ignore domestic abuse except in rare cases. Will the Minister commit to reviewing financial settlement proceedings guidance to ensure that the impact of domestic abuse is properly considered, and to prevent the legal system from being used as a tool of continued coercion and control?”
“He eventually evicted the newly formed community club from the Camrose in April 2019. That stadium now stands in ruins. A once iconic stadium that brought pride and opportunities to our town has been reduced to a distant memory. In that time, it is the fans of the club, including those in the Gallery today, who have fought the injustice that went on and continue to power the club now. One such example is Jack Miller, the chairman, as well as all the volunteers who keep the club going. Basingstoke Town is a non-league club. Those clubs also need protection. Could I ask the Minister to put on record what the Government plan to do about that?”