Lincoln Jopp
MP for Spelthorne · Conservative · United Kingdom
“All my residents in Spelthorne and I are desperate to get Spelthorne’s five stations into the travelcard zone. The Secretary of State has looked at this in the past, but will she look again, with South Western Railway, at the financial modelling being used to say that it is not possible?”
“My residents in Spelthorne love their racecourse and have no desire to see it flattened and turned into housing so, as any Member would, I started a petition. It has received over 3,500 signatures so far. I also organised a public meeting in the Magpie pub in Lower Sunbury last week, attended by about 70 people.”
“Barratt Redrow told me on 20 March that it was going to put in a planning application by the end of this year. After I started campaigning vociferously for Kempton Park, it elicited a media statement from the company on Friday that it had no plans to put in a planning application during this calendar year.”
“In the centre, Jukebox Man; on the far side, Gaelic Warrior; and on the near side, Banbridge, in a classic renewal of the Ladbrokes King George.” The reason I focus on that is because I was there on Boxing day last year to watch the running of the King George.”
“The proposal had been seen off under previous planning rules. However, hon. Members will be aware that, under the new national planning policy framework, there is an assumed yes for planning purposes if a proposed development is within 800 metres of a train station with two departures an hour in the same direction.”
“Member for Liverpool Walton (Dan Carden), that it is “an internationally recognised venue and a major economic asset that, once lost, can never be replaced. Locally, it supports jobs and generates substantial spending for hospitality, retail, transport and many other businesses, while providing valuable green space.”
The complete record
Every one of 599 lines we hold for Lincoln Jopp, in date order, each linked to its source. Free to read, in full, without an account. Page 6 of 12.
“Q That is a very clear answer on the steps that have to be followed. Do you envisage that each regulator in, for example, the NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde will follow the steps from their perspective? The first one might produce 20 SMEs that need to be in scope, and the next one might produce another 20, and so on. There might be a bit of overlap. Is that the way it is meant to work, or are all the regulators meant to get together and say that they have looked at it holistically, done the step test, and now have the answer? Kanishka Narayan: The way in which I would envisage it is that each individual regulator assesses the critical nature of the risk posed to its regulated operators.”
“Q To be very clear, the three regulators we had here today were the Information Commissioner, Ofgem and Ofcom. If they thought that they had a locus because of something that that hospital did, all three would do the step test, they would come up with their bucket of SMEs that they wanted to bring into scope, and those would be added together and that would be the impact. Kanishka Narayan: Yes, I guess, added together in the sense that they would be separately regulated, but they would all come within the scope of the regulations. Where there is an overlap in the party being regulated, my hope is that the Bill provides for individual regulation, but is very much open to the prospect of a lead regulator engaging in a softer way with the other regulators, as long as each regulator feels that that has assured them of the risk.”
“I just want clarification on the Members of this House who were formally sanctioned. The Prime Minister said: “President Xi said to me that means all parliamentarians are free to travel to China”. Does that mean that they are no longer legally sanctioned, and did he get that in writing?”
“When the Prime Minister sacked Lord Mandelson as the American ambassador, Ministers came to the Dispatch Box and I pointed out to them that for the whole time he was our ambassador he had been subject to politically fatal kompromat, which left him open to leverage—as it finally played out. I said that if we had found out he was spying for Russia or China, we would be turning every single aspect of his time in office inside out, to find out the truth, and the Government said, “Well, he’s been sacked.” Does the Minister regret the fact that, following Mandelson’s sacking, the Government did not do the sort of due diligence and inquiries that might have unearthed the documents from the Department of Justice?”
“Defence and aerospace make up a huge element of our export business. As the Minister knows, plans without resources are hallucinations. The defence investment plan was promised to us in the autumn, and then by the end of the year, but it is still not there. When will the Government get their act together and stop dithering over the defence investment plan so that we can fuel our export economy?”
“I listened to the criteria that the Minister expressed before ratification is possible. Is American agreement one of the criteria that she considers essential?”
“Does my right hon. and gallant Friend agree that this could well be a case of, “If you can keep your head when all about you are losing theirs, it is possible that you have failed to appreciate the gravity of the situation”?”
“I thank the and hon. and incredibly loyal Member for giving way. Does he realise that, as the result of a UN judgment in 1965, the United Kingdom was required to enter into negotiations with Argentina over the future of the Falkland Islands? Those negotiations continued until 1982, when they were concluded in a rather different way from that envisaged by the UN.”
“My hon. Friend will have heard the Minister for the Indo-Pacific, the hon. Member for Feltham and Heston (Seema Malhotra), list the preconditions before treaty ratification can take place. I am pretty sure that I asked about America, and she said that there needed to be an exchange of letters. The position of the American Administration is that the Chagos deal as proposed by His Majesty’s Government would be “an act of GREAT STUPIDITY”. We seem quite a long way from getting American agreement and acquiescence. Does my hon. Friend, like me, foresee that we would need a protracted period of negotiation with the United States of America to get its acquiescence to this deal?”
“It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Romford (Andrew Rosindell). With his final words on self-determination echoing in my ears, I have no doubt he will be reflecting on whether he is going to afford the people of Romford the same rights that he is demanding for the Chagossian people.”
“Yours, the Bank Manager.” I simply leave that analogue there, to let my colleagues in so that we may wrap this debate up.”
“What I am proposing, sir, is that I give you, the bank, this house. I then propose to pay you, the bank, rent above the market rate not only for me, but for all the Americans who live upstairs. I would be very grateful for your advice on this issue.” The bank manager wrote back to Mr Powell: “Dear Mr Powell, are you okay? I am concerned for your mental state, because what you are proposing would appear to be an act of GREAT STUPIDITY.” [ Laughter. ] The bank manager went on to make the following four points: “First, you do not need to do this at all. Secondly, it will cost you a fortune. Thirdly, you do realise that at the end of all this you will have given away your house? Fourthly, on a personal note, were these arrangements ever to become public, I fear that your neighbours would laugh at you.”
“I am very time-constrained and a lot of points have already been covered. In search of inspiration I was wondering what I might add to the debate, so I will read out a piece of casework which, although not relevant to the Chagos islands, is an interesting comparator. It comes from a member of the public who had written to his bank manager. I suppose I owe it to him to anonymise him, so I need to come up with some sort of pseudonym. I will call him Mr Powell. Mr Powell wrote to his bank manager: “Dear Sir, a number of years ago, I inherited a large seven-storey home in Mayfair. I am incredibly lucky and I acknowledge that fact. It is far too big for me to live in. I live solely in half of the ground floor. For as long as I can remember, I have had Americans living on the other floors. I like these Americans, so they live there rent-free.”
“I thank the hon. and gallant Member for his intervention. If he wants to do so, I suggest that he takes it outside, as they say. I am very time-constrained, but I want to pay tribute to my hon. Friends on the Conservative Benches who have informed the debate with incredibly detailed research and knowledge. I have been delighted to see the Minister’s PPS running backwards and forwards from the officials’ Box, because I was rather hoping that the summing up would not simply be a reheating of the opening remarks made by the Minister with responsibility for the Indo-Pacific, the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, the hon. Member for Feltham and Heston (Seema Malhotra). There have been substantive points made from these Benches, which I hope will be answered in the summing up.”
“On Friday, I visited Primark in Staines, in my Spelthorne constituency, where the team, led by Luke, is doing a fantastic job in creating a vibrant retail experience. However, the British Retail Consortium has said that the Chancellor’s jobs tax is pushing up prices and raising the cost of living, and that the Employment Rights Bill will also be inflationary. When did the Chancellor stop listening to business?”
“Last time I checked, there were 404 Labour MPs. Why does the Minister think that his Whips could not come up with a single Back Bencher to come to the Chamber and support his position today?”
“We have had strong successes in recent years in delivering quality education for those who need it across the world, providing new opportunities for millions. Along with our key partners, the UK should continue to play a leading role, exercising our resources, leverage and expertise to improve educational outcomes and lift millions, globally, out of poverty and into a better future.”
“It’s incredibly risky.” And he said, “I will show you where the bombs are so that you can clear them, so that you can open the road and my daughter can go to Basharan school.” We all had a fitful night’s sleep, and, good as gold, the next day, at dawn, he turned up and we gave him a can of yellow spray-paint, and he hopscotched his way around a high-density minefield and sprayed paint on where the bombs were. It is so rare for the good that we enable off the security line of operations—namely education—to play so directly into local consent, in order to advance the cause and British interests. Under the UK aid flag, our support for education should be a sign of hope and freedom for those who receive it.”
“Cammy said—he did not ask me—“I’m going to tell him the plan for tomorrow,” and I said, “Crack on.” So he told him the plan: that we were going to go in the next day and take down the tax office, and that we were going to clear the bombs but knew it was very dangerous indeed. The man, who was known as the Muj—mujaheddin—said, “Well, I’m going to come with you tomorrow at dawn and I’m going to show you where the bombs are.” I asked him, “Why are you going to do that?”
“I want to start in the middle and clear out in two directions.” I said, “Right, okay.” Taking the Taliban tax office would send a signal to the area that there was greater control. This involved a lot of moving people and equipment around, which alerted the locals that it was happening. I was at the checkpoint nearest to where we were going to start the operation the next day, and a young lance corporal called Cammy sent a message saying, “Commanding officer to the front gate,” so I went there. My approach to counter-insurgency, which I told the battalion, was: “We need to take risks to be safer.” It is one of the paradoxes of counter-insurgency; it is incredibly dangerous but, nevertheless, it can bear results. Cammy introduced me to a fellow with a wooden leg—a local—who had come to the gate and asked what was going on.”
“Nevertheless, the men and women in his company of Welsh Guards continued his extraordinary work and the school got up and running. Fast forward to April the next year and I am the commanding officer of the Lashkar Gah battlegroup. We have Basharan in our patch, and very near one of the routes into Basharan was an impassable road—the Taliban had put a tax office on it and seeded it with a number of improvised explosive devices. I was given the mission to clear the road. I discussed it with the company commander and said, “It looks to me like we now need to start at one end and go to the other, or start at the other end and go to the other.” He said, “Let me have a think.” Then he said, “Right.”
“If the Chamber will indulge me, I, like the sponsor of this debate, would like to understand from the Minister what the Government are doing in terms of education in Syria, Iran, Gaza and the west bank and Sudan, but I want to tell a rather different story about international education. It is 2009 and we are in Basharan in the Helmand river valley of Afghanistan. There is a small village in Basharan with a defunct school. A young company commander by the name of Sean Birchall takes over that area and is determined that the school should open for boys and girls. He spends vast amounts of time going backwards and forwards, at great risk, to Lashkar Gah to try to get the education department there to provide teachers and school equipment, such as books and chairs. Sean was killed by a bomb, leaving a widow and an 18-month-old son, Charlie.”
“That strategy also focused on the three Es of educating girls, empowering women and girls and championing their health and rights, and ending gender based violence. But education is the essential first step. I ask the Minister, are the Government committed to implementing that strategy? With international development budgets understandably being reduced to support efforts to bolster our defences and national security, can the Minister update the House on the areas where the Government intend to focus resources for the rest of the decade? My team and I had prepared a rather different speech, but I have been very struck by the fact that four Members have mentioned Afghanistan.”
“It highlighted the wider societal benefits of improved education for women and girls in developing countries, including that “A child whose mother can read is 50% more likely to live beyond the age of five”, is more likely to be immunised, and is about “twice as likely to attend school.” Girls benefiting from higher levels of education are also less likely to be affected by violence from a partner, less likely to marry as a child and more likely to find employment and start businesses. One of the great untapped potentials in developing countries is the enterprise and entrepreneurial spirit of women. Better education can help to unleash that potential. That is something that Members in all parts of the House can agree on.”
“Members will be aware of the UN’s sustainable development goal 4, which focuses on quality education to “Ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all”. The previous Government focused effort and resources on this area, including expanding and improving access to education, especially for women and girls, who face particular barriers to securing a meaningful education and childhood in parts of the world. This led to 19.8 million children, including 10 million girls, being supported with a decent education since 2015. That made a profound difference to those lives. The international women and girls strategy launched in 2023 had a strong focus on education.”
“Whether at home or abroad, we know that education lays the foundation for young people to build better futures. Here in England, the last Conservative Government raised standards in our schools and lifted the UK’s standing in international league tables for literacy to first in the western world, and fourth in the world. We also increased the number of full-time teachers by around 27,000, which is about 2,000 a year on average—a higher annual rate of growth than the 6,500 over five years promised by the current Government. Internationally, we played our part in supporting initiatives to lift people out of poverty. With the United Nations International Day of Education approaching on 24 January, this is an opportune moment to reflect on the links between education and economic development, and the role that the UK can play.”
“Thank you for that welcome, Ms Vaz. It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship. I congratulate the hon. Member for Southgate and Wood Green (Bambos Charalambous), who is also the chair of the APPG on global education, on securing this debate and on his long-standing interest in this matter. I also thank the hon. Member for Romford (Andrew Rosindell) for his gracious words of welcome, particularly because he was due to be standing at this Dispatch Box. When I saw him walk into Westminster Hall, I have to admit that my blood ran slightly cold, worrying that perhaps our shared team had prepared the same speech for us both to give—I should have known better. We on this side of the House recognise the huge benefits that education brings to supporting aspiration and helping to fulfil potential.”
“The news has broken that overnight the first asylum seekers have been moved into Crowborough barracks in Sussex. The Minister for Border Security and Asylum stood at the Dispatch Box and told me that the Stanwell hotel in my constituency would not be kept open as an asylum hotel for a minute longer than necessary. Will the Leader of the House please use his good offices to encourage the Home Office to come here on Monday to make a statement, which I am sure would be of interest across the House, to find out where the asylum seekers that have been moved into Crowborough barracks have been drawn from?”
“This is all getting quite technical, so I want to come back to the fundamentals of justice. If the Secretary of State were able to, would he like to give immunity to our veterans?”
“As well as the self-licking lollipop of legislation and compensation, does my hon. Friend acknowledge that this is a proxy war? It is all about relitigating the question, “Who won?” Does he agree that we are allowing our brave servicemen and women, who served the nation incredibly bravely in Northern Ireland, to be used as pawns in a dreadful proxy game to relitigate the question, “Who won?””
“I hope I am not misquoting the Secretary of State, but he said the Government are using this guillotine motion to withdraw parts of an existing law before they have another one in place because of the urgency, and that that urgency was created by a desire to “build trust” in both the civilian victims of terrorism and the military victims of terrorism. In wanting to build trust, he seemed to miss out one group: military veterans, who will also come under consideration if he drops the guillotine on the existing Act today.”
“The shadow Secretary of State makes a very powerful point, but I think it is worth putting it on the record that it is pretty unlikely his words will carry the day on the basis that there are eight Labour Back Benchers here to hear this debate about applying a guillotine to gut a piece of existing legislation without putting anything else in place.”
“I am new in this place, but my sense of the hon. Member is that he a great parliamentarian, so I would like to understand how he has reconciled himself with this being the correct course for the Government to take—bringing in a remedial order that pulls a law out before we put a new one in?”
“I fear that the Liberal Democrat spokesman may have misspoken earlier in his remarks. I will quote from the Joint Committee on Human Rights report on the first draft: “A declaration of incompatibility has no legal effect and does not affect the ongoing validity of the incompatible legislation. It is merely a tool by which the courts can draw attention to an incompatibility; it is then for the Government and Parliament to decide what action, if any, to take.””
“As the hon. Member says, we are considering this order alongside the Bill. I am grateful to the Joint Committee on Human Rights, on which he sits, for producing this very good report, but I would like to try to get an answer that I did not get earlier. How is he reconciled with the fact that this remedial order is being used as a guillotine to gut an existing piece of legislation before his Government have put something else in place?”
“The hon. Member is describing the Bill, but we are not here to debate the Bill; we are here to debate the remedial order. I asked him why he was comfortable with the fact that the Government are guillotining a piece of law without putting something else in place, and he has not answered that yet. He has answered that they can, but he has not told us why they should.”
“I am grateful to the hon. and gallant Gentleman for giving way. He has glossed over another thing that he will potentially be voting for today: allowing Gerry Adams to claim compensation on the basis that his internment was illegal because the Minister of State signed the order not the Secretary of State. Would he like to tell his veteran friends and the people of Halesowen why he is happy to walk through the Lobby to vote to give Gerry Adams that right?”
“Member for South Antrim (Robin Swann) said, and they will come down and ask each other, “What are we voting on?” and they will say, “Oh, it’s a Northern Ireland thing.” What they will not realise is that this remedial order removes a law from existence before another one is put in place.”
“I want to make a couple of points, one about democracy and one about service and justice. I am deeply uneasy about this remedial order being brought in today. I will make no criticism of those who are here, but for major parts of this debate over the past three hours, the Government Back Benches were empty and yet 20-plus veterans have stayed in the Public Gallery to watch our proceedings and see justice being done. I find it worrying. It is 6.57 pm on a Wednesday. There will be Members in the Tea Room and the bars, and Members working hard in their offices. The bells will ring, as the hon.”
“But one of the things I find it very difficult to put up with is that when all the Government Members troop through the Lobby tonight, they will remove the prohibition on giving Gerry Adams compensation. I find that incredibly difficult because it is on an admin error: his internment order was signed by a Minister of State and not the Secretary of State. It is on that technicality that he will be able to get compensation for being interned and for trying to escape unsuccessfully—twice. He will get a triple whammy of compensation.”
“I haven’t got time. I do not think that we are doing the House, or indeed Parliament, justice by proceeding in this way. I was a soldier for 25 years and spent three and a half years in Northern Ireland. I once made the mistake of saying that to Ronnie Flanagan—he was the chief constable at the time—and he told me that I am only on my first tour. Soldiers put up with a lot. I was not given any more powers by this House than those of a private citizen—not really. They just slung a rifle round my neck and sent me off to do the Queen’s bidding. I happily did it and so did others. In my first of four Northern Ireland tours, two guardsmen—Guardsmen Fisher and Wright—were in a judgmental shooting situation, and they were convicted of murder by one man in a Diplock court and sentenced to life imprisonment, so soldiers put up with stuff.”
“I will not. I challenged the hon. Member for Halesowen (Alex Ballinger) earlier, asking him to speak to veterans and the people of Halesowen to justify why that triple whammy is okay, and why he is prepared to go through the Lobby to vote for it tonight. And he said, “The Prime Minister has told me that that’s okay, and that he is not going to allow it. I heard him here at PMQs.” Perhaps the hon. Gentleman, who I am delighted to see back in his place, is not aware that, immediately afterwards, the Prime Minister’s official spokesman said that he could not guarantee that compensation payments to Mr Adams and other former troubles internees would be prevented. The hon. Gentleman is completely free to wander through the Lobby in blissful ignorance of the fact that what the Prime Minister said does not amount to a hill of beans.”
“Has my right hon. Friend noticed, like me, that all the military veterans in the Government and on the Labour Benches—with one notable exception—seem to have abandoned their post today? I have counted about nine veterans on our Benches. If more veterans had been on the Labour Benches, perhaps they could have told the Front Benchers about the forlorn hope. The forlorn hope were the people who were sent out either to defend the indefensible or to go on suicidal attack missions. They were in search of either promotion or pardons for sins of the past. Does she agree that the Front Benchers have been sent out here to defend the indefensible?”
“Can the Minister not hear herself, and not see how absurd it is for the Government to insist that they should treat the decision on the embassy as a quasi-judicial, independent planning question? It is not a planning question; it is a question of national security, and if the Prime Minister had any backbone, he would own it, decide it one way or the other, and then talk to the House about it. I do not know how up to speed the Minister is on her Greek mythology, but before the Trojan horse was pulled into Troy after a 10-year siege, one priest, Laocoön, said that the horse should not be pulled in because it would spell the end of the city. That is the role that this House is playing today. Does the Minister think that the decision about whether to pull the Trojan horse into Troy should have been treated as a veterinary issue?”
“I associate myself with the Prime Minister’s remarks, particularly about Iran. Visiting schools in my Spelthorne constituency is one of the great joys of this job, so I was, frankly, appalled to hear that the Labour Member of Parliament for Bristol North East (Damien Egan) was prevented from visiting a school in his constituency because he is Jewish. This is antisemitism and it is happening in plain sight. With all due respect to the Prime Minister, I do not want to know how he feels about this; I want to know what he is going to do about it.”
“In my Spelthorne constituency, as a result of action taken by the independent, Labour, Liberal Democrat and Green-led borough council, we have not had a local plan for a couple of years. It was finally submitted to the Planning Inspectorate on 25 November, but there has been a planning wild west in Spelthorne for the last couple of years, which I am keen to bring to an end. Will the Secretary of State use his good offices to influence the planning inspector to try to turn around this local plan as soon as possible?”
“Military plans were drawn up some months ago, and I have updated the House in relation to that.” Figures are being briefed to the newspapers, but I do not know whether they are correct. The Secretary of State owes it to the House to brief us on the numbers that he is considering. I may wish them to be higher, and some other Members of the House may wish them to be lower, but I want this House to hear what his plans are.”
“May I welcome the Secretary of State’s statement this evening? I hope it is heard widely across the world, and I hope it is heard in Moscow and Washington. I hope it is heard particularly in Kyiv and across Ukraine, because I want the people of that country to understand that this House is totally united in support of their aims. I do not wish to see peace at any price; I wish to see Ukraine prevail. I hope that I speak for the whole House in that respect. Given that context, I will ask my question. The Leader of the Opposition asked the Prime Minister earlier today about the numbers that had been committed. The Prime Minister said: “Let me be very clear about what was agreed yesterday.”
“As the shadow Defence Secretary was reading out the letter from the squadron leaders and warrant officers that was published over the Christmas break, I looked across the Chamber, and was very surprised to see the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland and two Defence Ministers shaking their head. We have had feedback from numerous generals, squadron commanders and warrant officers, so can I just understand where the Minister is coming from? Why does he think he is right and they are wrong?”
“Last night in the Strangers Bar, I bumped into a very influential Labour Back Bencher who told me with great authority that digital ID simply is not going to happen. That is good news, of course, because it is going to 1.8 billion quid we have not got, and it is deeply unpopular in the country. Why does the Secretary of State not give us all an early Christmas present and simply announce that she is ditching the policy today?”