Neil Duncan-Jordan
MP for Poole · Labour · United Kingdom
“It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Ms Vaz. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield Central (Abtisam Mohamed) on securing this timely debate. My constituency does not have a university, but many of my constituents study and work at the two nearby universities in Bournemouth.”
House of Commons28 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“We saw that decline greatly during covid, when I was working as a trade union official, and it has not yet been able to come back. Coupled with changes to visa restrictions, international students are being put off from coming to the UK.”
House of Commons28 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The Government cannot secure the future of the HE sector simply through further fee increases for students. I believe we need an immediate cap on student numbers for each institution, rather than allowing the larger institutions to hoover up all the available students in an area.”
House of Commons28 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The financial risks, however, are not evenly spread across the sector. Institutions with smaller reserves, limited international recruitment and weaker balance sheets are particularly exposed. The most invidious result of these financial pressures is the move to make staff pay for the failure of the system.”
House of Commons28 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I rise to present a petition signed by hundreds of my constituents, which calls for urgent action to ease the cost of living pressures that many families face and for greater support for the many local businesses that make Poole the place it is.”
House of Commons28 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons urges the Government to implement a strategy for coastal communities that supports affordable housing, coastal economies, lower household energy costs, cleaner waterways and stronger representation for coastal communities within Government.”
House of Commons28 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
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“While the role of member representatives within the LGPS is a great strength, they are largely absent from pool governance structures at present, and this legislation does not specify a role for those people. Given that pension funds are the deferred wages of the workforce, we must ensure that there is greater member engagement and democratic oversight by those involved in the scheme. Not only should this stretch to having guaranteed places on boards with full voting rights, but it must ensure that scheme members can have their say as to where their money is invested. There will undoubtedly be occasions when members are concerned about investments in particular industries, or, I would add, in particular countries, and they should have a mechanism by which those views can be expressed.”
House of Commons7 July 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Turning to the local government pension scheme, governance structures vary widely across the existing pools, and reporting has been inconsistent. Pooling arrangements have not always provided the power to influence investments, which is why the TUC, for example, is calling for a thorough review of the performance of existing pools to identify best practice in the relationship between funds and pools, as well as in governance arrangements, and for the introduction of clear and consistent reporting requirements before any acceleration and further consolidation takes place. It is also important to point to the democratic deficit that exists within the scheme as a whole.”
House of Commons7 July 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I think that what the hon. Member raises is the creativity that we need on this issue, so that we look beyond the obvious investments towards some that perhaps have more social worth. I hope that the Bill will allow for that. For pension savers to have a secure future, we will need to phase out investments in fossil fuels. As the Chancellor has recognised, all financial sector regulation and legislation should integrate climate and nature. I would be grateful if the Minister could therefore address whether there will be legislative action, not just voluntary commitments, to phase out the destructive environmental investments that pension funds currently make, and to introduce an element of the Bill that acknowledges the connection between green investments, environmental protection and decent pensions.”
House of Commons7 July 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I hope the Government will therefore consider legislating to provide inflation protection on pre-1997 benefits, and to give the PPF greater flexibility to use its surplus to give discretionary improvements to members. In conclusion, the idea that workers’ pension funds can be used to build much-needed social housing and invest in green technology and jobs is something that a progressive Labour Government should be proud of, and I hope we can ensure that the Bill delivers a win for pensioners, a win for our environment and a win for society as a whole.”
House of Commons7 July 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“My hon. Friend is quite right. Trade unions do sit on many of the LGPS committees. I was making the point that it is on the pools where there is less representation for those member voices to be heard, and that is extremely important. Finally, I want to talk about the pre-1997 pensioners. We know that those who have seen the biggest drop in income are those who built up pensions before 1997. They have not received an annual inflation-linked increase to their pension and, over time, particularly when inflation is high, the value of their pension is eroded. Some 80,000 Pension Protection Fund members, mostly older people and disproportionately women, including some of my constituents, find themselves in this position.”
House of Commons7 July 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I thank the Secretary of State for her statement. I wonder if she will reflect on whether the Bill before us tomorrow is the best way of making welfare policy. Would it not be better to withdraw the Bill and wait for the Timms review to complete its important work?”
House of Commons30 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I beg to move, That this House has considered Government support for disabled people in poverty. It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Ms Jardine. Most hon. Members present will be aware that this debate takes place in the shadow of the publication of the welfare Bill, probably tomorrow, which could usher in some of the deepest and most severe cuts to disability benefits since 2010. We already know that the current benefits system is not working. Some 700,000 families with a disability are already living in poverty, and 75% of people who turn to food banks are disabled or live in a disabled household. Figures from the Department for Work and Pensions in March this year revealed that 4.7 million people in disabled households are facing hunger, and unsurprisingly, women make up the majority of those disabled people and carers.”
House of Commons17 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Yes, I agree, and later I will talk about disabled people and how employment may be a route out of poverty. Any losses through changes to benefits will overwhelmingly fall on those who are already the poorest in our society. The Government are right that the social security system is in need of reform, but benefits are far from generous, and they often fail to cover the essentials of living. The process of claiming support can also be extremely complicated and confusing, and that often leads to individuals incorrectly filling in the forms or finding the process too difficult to even start. The assessment process, which is outsourced to five private companies, can be slow and is often open to appeal.”
House of Commons17 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I absolutely agree with the hon. Member. All the things I described need to be addressed, but the fear among disabled people is that the changes outlined in the “Pathways to Work” Green Paper, which may or may not find their way into the Bill, amount to piling more cuts on to an already broken system.”
House of Commons17 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The domino effect of tightening PIP eligibility will be severe, because it acts as a passport to other support—150,000 people are set to lose their carer’s allowance if someone they care for no longer qualifies. That could mean a loss to a household of £10,000 a year. We know that having a disability is expensive: on average, households that have someone with a disability need over £1,000 a month more to have the same standard of living as non-disabled households. The proposed changes to the health element of universal credit will freeze the benefits of over 2 million people, and an estimated 730,000 new claimants will get a lower rate of £50 a week.”
House of Commons17 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“We absolutely have to look at our taxation system and ensure that those with the broadest shoulders carry the biggest burden, rather than saving money on the back of disabled people. Even the Government’s own assessment shows that the changes are likely to have a significant financial impact on claimants. For example, tightening the eligibility criteria for personal independence payment so that individuals will be required to score four points in at least one category will mean that 800,000 people lose the daily living element of PIP, with an average loss of £4,500 a year. The points system is already deeply flawed, especially for those with dynamic disabilities such as multiple sclerosis or myalgic encephalomyelitis.”
House of Commons17 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“A recent freedom of information request revealed that 1.3 million people who currently get the standard daily living award will no longer qualify, which is significantly higher than the Office for Budget Responsibility’s estimated 800,000 people. As a result, 350,000 people will be pushed below the poverty line. In total, over 3 million households will lose out, with as many as 100,000 children being pushed into poverty. I have heard Ministers repeat the claim that only one in 10 PIP recipients will be affected by the proposals, but that is based on the false assumption that people will get better at filling in the claim forms and that more people will be successful in scoring four points. There is absolutely no evidence to show that that will be the case.”
House of Commons17 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I agree. I will come on to that later in my speech. Those individuals I mentioned—the 730,000 new claimants who will get the lower rate of universal credit—will see an average loss of £3,000 a year. The health element of universal credit will also be cut for those aged under 22, removing vital support that helps young people into work, education and training. The Government cannot claim to want to help young people into work while taking away their safety net. People in all those groups are already struggling to make ends meet so, in reality, the figures are likely to be an underestimate of the scale of the pain being proposed.”
House of Commons17 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Members know, PIP is not an out-of-work benefit, so cutting it is likely to undermine efforts to get people into employment, rather than supporting them into gainful work. Too often, the attitude of employers is the real barrier to disabled people finding a job. Reluctance to offer flexible working patterns, harsh sickness absence policies and disability discrimination are the blockers that many disabled people face. Tackling those would be an important place to start.”
House of Commons17 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It has been suggested in the media recently that the transitional arrangements for someone who loses their PIP will be extended from four to 13 weeks, but that only delays the fact that the Government will be making people permanently poorer. It is right for Ministers to say that work can be a route out of poverty, and that disabled people should be supported to find a job, but the proposed £1 billion of support comes in only at the end of the Parliament—three years after the cuts have been introduced. The Learning and Work Institute estimates that only 45,000 to 90,000 people might find work through that proposed employment support, which cannot possibly offset the 3.2 million people who are having their benefits cut. It is a completely false equivalence. As hon.”
House of Commons17 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I have not seen that evidence, but what I have seen points me in a different direction. We already know that PIP is an underclaimed benefit, as I think my hon. Friend would acknowledge, and that fewer than half of the disabled people who are eligible to make a claim do so. I would therefore argue that the recent increase in the number of claims is largely the result of declining public health in this country combined with the increased financial hardship that disabled people are facing. The Government have suggested there has been an unsustainable rise in the benefits bill, but as a percentage of GDP, we are spending the same amount on working-age benefits as we were in 2015. Cuts to social security are not an economic necessity; they are a political choice.”
House of Commons17 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I absolutely agree with my hon. Friend. We make a mistake if we say that we can do only one thing and not the other. We can tackle discrimination in the way that he rightly argues, but we do not have to make people poorer in the process. A false argument is being put forward. There is also a misguided view that cutting expenditure and tightening belts brings savings. We know that that approach shrinks the economy and leaves everybody worse off.”
House of Commons17 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I am sure that I am not the only one who believes that the Government are rushing these proposals through, with MPs being asked to vote in a couple of weeks’ time, before the OBR’s estimates of the employment impact, the review of the PIP assessment, and the Keep Britain Working review into tackling health-related inactivity have been published. Recognising that the benefits system needs to change, we should halt any proposals for cuts, redesign the system with disabled people and their organisations, and provide up-front investment to support those who can get into meaningful work.”
House of Commons17 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The hon. Member has foreseen what I was about to say. According to the New Economics Foundation, the Government’s projected savings could be entirely wiped out due to depressed economic demand in local communities. Cutting disability benefits will also inevitably lead to increased costs elsewhere through rising pressure on the NHS and local authority social care. Most of all, people who are already under financial pressure will be even worse off. That is why virtually all major disability organisations are critical of the Government’s proposals.”
House of Commons17 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Veterans, like every disabled individual, should get the support they deserve. Labour created the modern welfare state, underpinned by universalist principles, to provide dignity and fairness to people when they need a helping hand. That, in my view, is what we should be doing now.”
House of Commons17 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I welcome today’s statement. As one of the MPs who spoke against the decision to means-test the winter fuel payment last year, I pay tribute to all the campaigners who have lobbied hard for a change in policy. Does the Minister agree that means-testing has once again failed and that effectively what we are seeing today is the return of Labour’s commitment to universalism and to using the taxation system to get money back from those who are better-off?”
House of Commons9 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Amendment 69 offers practical improvements, ensuring that environmental delivery plans achieve their stated purpose of making developers pay to offset damage to nature. It ensures that plans result in an improvement to the specific feature being harmed, so that the Bill does not give a green light to degrading irreplaceable habitats.”
House of Commons9 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I rise to speak in favour of amendment 69 and new clause 32, which were both tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for North East Hertfordshire (Chris Hinchliff). I commend him for his work on the Bill. I believe the Government have got it wrong with their changes to nature protection. I appreciate that Ministers will say that they come from a genuine desire to address the housing crisis, but the Bill removes the foundations of our nature laws, including the mitigation hierarchy that requires developers to avoid harm. Nearly every major conservation group opposes the Bill and the Government watchdog, the Office for Environmental Protection, says that it degrades nature protections.”
House of Commons9 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Yes, I wholeheartedly agree. Amendment 69 also mandates that improvements be delivered before harm occurs. Without that, we risk species being pushed closer to extinction before their habitats are replaced. Worst of all, the Bill still will not deliver the affordable homes we desperately need.”
House of Commons9 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I do not have a specific answer to that point. I cannot give my hon. Friend an answer to that. The Government’s own impact assessment provided no data that environmental protections are a blocker. Nature in the Bill is being scapegoated to distract from a broken developer-led model.”
House of Commons9 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Developers continue to drip feed developments into the system, prioritising properties that maximise profit and are far from affordable for local people. It is time, therefore, to move away from the failed market dogma and, I believe, to return to Labour values. The post-war Labour Government built millions of homes supported by the planning system our party created, and it is time we did it again.”
House of Commons9 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“If we are serious, as I believe Labour is, about getting families out of temporary accommodation and off waiting lists, local authorities need the power and funding to lead a new generation of council house building. We also cannot ignore the fact that the developer-led model creates conflict with nature, as under-resourced councils are forced to accept whatever sites developers propose, regardless of how suitable or unsuitable they are for sustainable development. There is no amount of killing badgers or red tape bonfires that will fix that. It is too simplistic to argue that this is a debate of builders versus blockers. The overwhelming majority of planning applications are approved, which is why we had more than a million planning permissions approved in the past decade that have yet to be built.”
House of Commons9 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The current system is broken, absolutely, but I do not think that hard-pressed planning officers are the problem. I think developers are the problem, and that is the point that I am coming on to make. Last year, less than 2% of new homes were social rents delivered through the planning system. Private developers prioritise maximum profit with high-end luxury builds, particularly in constituencies such as mine. At the current rate, we would need to build over 5 million homes to deliver just 90,000 social rent properties, yet there are over 1 million people on waiting lists. That is why I signed new clause 32 to introduce binding quotas for affordable and social rent homes.”
House of Commons9 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I want to return briefly to the socially necessary services that the Secretary of State mentioned. Two issues in my constituency are of great importance: the first relates to the fact that school-only buses are often more expensive than regular services; and the second relates to operators, who tell me that the current SEND transport model is unsustainable and that children with special educational needs and disabilities are being left with a poorer service. Will the Bill seek to address those concerns?”
House of Commons2 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Most commentators would understand that that is not beyond the realms of possibility. It would be a significant step not only in showing that the Government are on the side of older people who have made a contribution to our country, but in unravelling a long-standing anomaly that the public simply cannot understand. Finally, the Government should also consider that with changes to the overseas voting rules, as was mentioned earlier, many of the UK pensioners affected by the frozen pension scandal are now in fact registered voters in the UK.”
House of Commons20 May 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The scandal therefore has a number of parallels with those behind other campaigns, such as that affecting women born in the 1950s, who argue that they saw their state pension age increase without due notice. Such measures only end up hurting the most vulnerable in our society. Taken alongside recent decisions to means-test the winter fuel allowance, which was mentioned earlier; the refusal to pay compensation to the WASPI women; and the proposed cuts to disability benefits, it could appear that the Government are trying to balance the country’s books on the back of some of the poorest members of our society. Although there will always be a cost to Government decisions, I ask the Minister to consider that beginning to uprate the frozen pensions at a future date would cost only around £55 million a year.”
House of Commons20 May 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“We have heard that the blight of frozen pensions affects nearly half a million British citizens living overseas, despite the fact that they paid national insurance contributions for much of their working lives. The impact of this arrangement is absolutely shocking. We have already heard that four in 10 frozen pensioners report that they struggle to afford items such as food and fuel. In my view, our state pension system is already insufficient to meet the needs of millions of existing and future pensioners, but let us imagine how inadequate it would be if the pension failed to rise at least in line with inflation or earnings for more than 20 years of someone’s retirement. Most pensioners in this position were never informed that their state pension would be frozen in this way.”
House of Commons20 May 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Dowd. I congratulate the hon. Member for Farnham and Bordon (Gregory Stafford) on securing this important debate on an issue that is often overlooked, as I think we would all agree. It is fair to say that successive Governments have ignored this issue for decades and, understandably, many UK citizens are unaware of what would happen to their state pension if they were to relocate to one of the countries affected by this regressive arrangement. It seems completely arbitrary that someone could emigrate to America and continue to receive an annual uprating in their state pension, but not if they went to Canada.”
House of Commons20 May 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Yes, I wholeheartedly agree that now is the time to grasp an issue that successive Governments of all shades have failed to grasp. This is the Government’s chance to do something positive for older people by ending the injustice once and for all, and I urge them to do so.”
House of Commons20 May 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Helping those who can work to find meaningful employment is an important way to tackle poverty among disabled people, but it will require investment in employment support programmes, incentives for employers to recruit disabled people and enforcement of anti-discrimination rules. Given the importance of these measures, is it not appropriate that Members are asked to vote on any changes to the benefits system only after all the information about the impact of the proposals has been provided?”
House of Commons12 May 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The Bill rightly seeks to tackle organised crime and online fraud, but worryingly it also ushers in dangerous new powers compelling banks to trawl through financial information.”
House of Commons29 April 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I rise to speak in support of amendments 10, 11 and 12, which stand in my name. I would like to start, though, by placing on record my thanks to the Minister for Transformation, my hon. Friend the Member for Stretford and Urmston (Andrew Western), including for his willingness to engage in a discussion on the terms of this Bill. It has been extremely helpful, so I wanted to place that on record. I also make it clear that my amendments do not in any way seek to undo or frustrate the Government’s legitimate aim of recovering public money from fraudsters and criminals. We absolutely need to do that to ensure that criminal behaviour does not undermine the benefits, legitimacy or standing of our welfare system.”
House of Commons29 April 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I thank my hon. Friend for his contribution. It is the very poorest in our society who will be most affected by this legislation. Banks will be able to trawl through financial information even when there is no suspicion of wrongdoing—that is the key point in this debate. The very poorest, including disabled people on PIP, older people on pension credit, carers and those on universal credit, will effectively have fewer rights to privacy than everyone else. I am also deeply concerned about the slippery slope of compelling banks to act as an arm of the state.”
House of Commons29 April 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Yes, and I am going to address that point shortly. It is not the purpose of banks to act as an arm of the state, and compelling them to do so sets a very dangerous precedent that we in this House need to be aware of. We also know that organised crime groups, which are responsible for more than £7 billion of large-scale fraud, will evade detection by spreading funds across multiple accounts, beyond the reach of the algorithmic scanning that will be used to flag overpayments. It will be welfare recipients who are caught up in the net of bank surveillance, regardless of whether they are suspected of fraudulent activity.”
House of Commons29 April 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I have heard the claims that this measure will be a last resort when the debtor has failed to engage over a period, but that overlooks the fact that non-engagement can be a symptom of hardship rather than wrongdoing. Many welfare recipients, including those with mental health conditions and caring responsibilities, find it difficult to navigate the complex bureaucracy of our social security system, and may be unfairly deemed not to have engaged with the DWP.”
House of Commons29 April 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“That proportionate and necessary safeguard would prevent the corruption of our welfare system, which will turn it from a safety net—meant to offer dignity and support to those in need—into a punitive system, where accessing help comes at the cost of someone’s privacy and civil liberties. The Bill grants the Department draconian powers to apply to a court to have people stripped of their driving licence if they have an outstanding debt, whether for overpayment, fraud or error. Amendments 10 and 12 would remove that power from the Bill. There are fairer and more effective ways to enforce the law. Analysis of the Bill has shown that where assessment deems that a financial deduction would cause hardship, the debtor can face losing their licence. That is not justice in my view, but a penalty for being poor.”
House of Commons29 April 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The right hon. Member brings me to my next point, which is the risk of a Horizon-style scandal on a massive scale, given the sheer volume of accounts that will be scanned. That is glaringly obvious. These new powers also strip those who receive state support of that fundamental principle of British law, the presumption of innocence, as the hon. Member for Birmingham Perry Barr (Ayoub Khan) said earlier. Amendment 11 would ensure that the Government can tackle fraudsters, but would limit the use of an eligibility verification notice to cases where a welfare recipient is suspected of wrongdoing and not merely of error.”
House of Commons29 April 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The last Government stripped our welfare state to the bone during 14 years of deep cuts—disabled people are already far more likely to be in destitution and to rely on food banks—but spying on millions of people or piling cuts on to a failed system will not repair our welfare model. The Government must pause for thought, meet representatives of disability organisations, and build a fairer system with their consent and confidence. Our welfare state needs to provide support for those who need it, and the change that we promised as a Government must lead to a more compassionate and caring society—one that enables rather than penalises. These are the values that make us different from the last Government, and we should not forget that.”
House of Commons29 April 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I agree. I think that the complexity of our system lends itself to errors on the part of individuals who find it extremely difficult to navigate. In Committee, several witnesses explained that people avoid repayment for a variety of reasons, including not knowing where to get help, simply being overwhelmed by the whole process, or facing multiple debts. I hope that the Minister will provide further reassurance on that specific point relating to amendments 10 and 12. All these challenges will only be made worse if the Government proceed with the planned cuts in disability benefits outlined in the recent Green Paper, which will affect more than 3 million families.”
House of Commons29 April 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Analysis from a number of disability groups shows that the “Pathways to Work” Green Paper will have a detrimental effect on more than 3 million people, while polling from Oxfam shows that 77% of the public would rather the UK Government increased taxes on the very richest than cut the benefits of the poorest in society. Should we not be looking at raising funds from those with the broadest shoulders?”
House of Commons8 April 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“T5. As has already been mentioned in the Chamber this morning, a year ago today, my constituent, John Chapman, was murdered by the Israel Defence Forces while working for World Central Kitchen, delivering humanitarian aid in Gaza. His family now want to know when the Israeli Government will bring criminal charges against the perpetrators, when the family will be awarded compensation for their tragic loss, and what our Government are doing to ensure that justice prevails.”
House of Commons1 April 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“My hon. Friend is making a powerful case. While a pledge to ban trail hunting is welcome, I fear that it could be insufficient. If legislation focuses solely on the term “trail hunting”, hunts may adopt new euphemisms to exploit existing loopholes to continue their activities. Does my hon. Friend agree that effective reform must go beyond a symbolic ban and address the entire framework that enables illegal hunting to carry on?”
House of Commons1 April 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Paragraph 1.14 of the OBR report outlines that the planned cuts to disability benefits will reduce personal independence payments for 800,000 claimants, and cut health-related universal credit for 3 million families. Is it not time that we asked those with the broadest shoulders to carry the heaviest burden, rather than the poorest in our society?”
House of Commons26 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“For the past 30 years, successive Governments have attempted to deliver affordable housing through the private sector, and they have failed. Does my hon. Friend agree that it is time for a publicly funded council house building programme?”
House of Commons24 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I would appreciate it if the Minister explained why we are unable to compromise on this issue and find a way to exempt SEND school transport from the changes he proposes.”
House of Commons19 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗