Catherine Fookes
MP for Monmouthshire · Labour · United Kingdom
“I thank the Secretary of State for her answer, but over 1,500 people have signed my petition to make Chepstow station fully accessible. Currently, disabled travellers need to go east into England, cross over a road, get back on a train and travel back through Chepstow to go west to Cardiff, so Chepstow residents were incredibly disappoint…”
House of Commons29 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“T6. Most of us in Monmouthshire have to rely on our cars for every single journey, so I am over the moon that, following meetings with National Express, it will bring services back to the Monmouth area next week, with coaches stopping at Raglan services, so passengers can travel from Haverfordwest to Birmingham.”
House of Commons29 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Of course, we all want an efficient, fair, secure and sustainable asylum system. I thank the hon. Gentleman for acknowledging our really good success recently, but how would setting up a new Department help us to speed up those processes and get the asylum system back under control?”
House of Commons29 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I thank my hon. Friend for securing this important debate. I want to raise the really sad case of Sophie Brimble, which was brought to me by her sister. Sophie was killed as a passenger in a car with her boyfriend, who was driving at three times the speed limit.”
House of Commons28 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Communications with Capita did get better for a time, but I am afraid they have dropped off a bit now. Let me share with the House the sad case of a constituent who came to us in May 2026. She had spent two hours on the phone to Capita; she could not get through, and she had two pensions unpaid.”
House of Commons26 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Does the hon. Member not agree that we are currently a proud member of the European Court of Human Rights and, with that membership, we have still managed to deport 12,000 foreign national offenders to other countries that are signed up to it? It is absolutely no barrier and, in fact, it helps us to fulfil our obligations.”
House of Commons22 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
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“I must shout out about the work of mentoring programmes such as the Fabian Women’s Network mentoring programme, the Labour Women’s Network, and organisations such as Elect Her and 50:50 Parliament. It is thanks to them that we now have a House in which 40% of MPs are women. We still have a long way to get to 50% and true equality, so I pledge, as my second priority, to continue my work to ensure that we do get an equal Parliament. I will work with every single relevant Secretary of State and every parliamentarian across the House to ensure that we reduce all the inequalities that women face, from ending the gender pay gap, to halving violence against women and pushing forward the menopause mandate campaign.”
House of Commons24 July 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Perhaps it is not entirely a coincidence that many of our leaders in Monmouthshire are women, from our inspirational council leader—another female first—to the three women who bring such tenacity and passion to running our chambers of commerce in Monmouth, Chepstow and Abergavenny. Despite its great strengths, Monmouthshire is, I am sorry to say, one of the most unequal counties in Wales, with great wealth and great poverty existing side by side. As its MP, my first priority will be to support the Government’s drive for economic growth and keeping household bills down so that we reduce that inequality. Talking of the drive for equality, I am only here because of the incredible women who came before me and because of the support I have had from far too many individual women to mention.”
House of Commons24 July 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Monmouthshire has a proud history of fighting for democracy, as home to the Chartist movement of the 1830s. The Chartists made shocking and radical demands—how very dare they demand universal suffrage, secret ballots, salaries for MPs?—so that ordinary people, not just the super-rich, could enter Parliament. Those are now the pillars on which our democracy is based. The same spirit is alive and kicking in a constituency where, in 2024, I am proud to say turnout was 30% higher than the UK average. As a border county, Monmouthshire is instinctively a place of welcome. One of the early actions in 2022 of our incoming Labour-run county council, on which I have been proud to serve, was a formal application to become a county of sanctuary, welcoming and celebrating the contribution of refugees and asylum seekers.”
House of Commons24 July 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“We are also proud of our agricultural and farming traditions. Some 80% of the land in Monmouthshire is dedicated to farming, much of it carried out on small family farms. As a smallholder and a farmer’s daughter, I know the joys and the huge challenges of rural life, as well as the vital role played in food production and environmental stewardship by our skilled farming families. Monmouthshire is also a haven for tourists, home to the renowned Abergavenny food festival, the Wye valley national landscape, parts of the Bannau Brycheiniog national park, and the Offa’s Dyke long-distance path, not to mention our incredible historic border castles. I say to Members: please come and visit in the summer holidays. We have Raglan castle, Grosmont castle and many more.”
House of Commons24 July 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Technically, I have a third predecessor, because Monmouthshire was a constituency many years ago, and its last MP was John Rolls, a local man who took his seat in 1880. My hon. Friend the Member for Derby North (Catherine Atkinson) mentioned Rolls-Royce earlier, and I will mention it too. Rolls was father not only to Charles Rolls of Rolls-Royce fame, but to Eleanor Shelley-Rolls, a founder of the Women’s Engineering Society, an early campaigner for the electrification of Britain, and founder, 100 years ago, of the Atlanta Company, an engineering business with a real difference—it only employed women. That combination of the technological cutting edge and socially progressive views still represents some of the best of Monmouthshire today. Monmouthshire, particularly the Magor technology corridor, is in many ways a 21st-century economy.”
House of Commons24 July 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Despite our fundamental political differences, we have one thing in common: our children went to the same fabulous school, Monmouth comprehensive. I say diolch yn fawr iawn to David for his dedication to public service and to his constituents. With the redrawn boundaries, Monmouthshire has inherited parts of the Newport East constituency: Caldicot, Magor, Rogiet and Undy. That means that I owe a huge debt of thanks to my hon. Friend the Member for Newport East (Jessica Morden) for her legacy of service to those communities, and for the exceptional generosity and support that she and her team have given me, both during the campaign and as I start my journey in this place. She is a brilliant MP, and if I become half the MP she is, I know I will be doing exceptionally well.”
House of Commons24 July 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I think I am the first of the new Welsh MPs to make their maiden speech, so I hope I do our country proud. I want to give one more congratulation, to Eluned Morgan MS, who has just been announced as our new Welsh Labour leader—another strong woman leading us in the Labour party. I have the honour to represent the beautiful, glorious county of Monmouthshire, and I am its first ever woman MP. As former chief executive of the Women’s Equality Network Wales, where I campaigned to get more women into politics, I can finally boast that I am practising what I preached. I would like to pay tribute not to one predecessor or to two, but to three. David T. C. Davies, the former Monmouth constituency MP, served in four Parliaments.”
House of Commons24 July 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker, and llongyfarchiadau, as we say in Wales. It is wonderful to have you presiding over my maiden speech. I also thank the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon); it is a pleasure to follow him. I congratulate Members on the amazing maiden speeches we have heard this afternoon. I particularly enjoyed the story of such an inspirational maths teacher from my hon. Friend the Member for Harlow (Chris Vince). I am really pleased to speak in this debate about education, which is so important. I was a governor at my son’s primary school in Monmouthshire, Cross Ash, as well as at his secondary school. It is so important, as we come to the end of term, to say thank you to all the governors, teachers and headteachers at all the schools in Monmouthshire.”
House of Commons24 July 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗