YouSaid · the spoken record
Steve Barclay
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On the record 2012–2026
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“The Minister justifies that inconsistency by saying she needs to consult more, including with the judiciary, as if the Government have been ambushed by their own legislation. They control the timing of this Bill and they brought it to the House, but then they say, “Oh, actually, the timing’s not right, and we need more time to consult.” They themselves are legislating and they control the time, so if they needed to consult, they could have done that in a timely fashion. The Minister said she accepts the challenge of the pressure that the 14-day period puts people under, especially given the interplay with the 28-day window for the unduly lenient sentence scheme. Just to explain that in lay terms, if people want to appeal a sentence that they feel is unduly lenient, they have to do so within 28 days.”
House of Commons25 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I gently say to the Minister that her speech did sound a bit like an episode of “Yes Minister” in that her remarks were, “I fully support giving victims more rights, and that is why today I’m going to vote against every one of the amendments to do so.” As she was speaking, I wrote down some of her phrases. She said that this is “a Bill for victims”, as if the amendments made in the Lords are not meant to empower victims, when they clearly are. She said that she wants to “go further”. It is no wonder her own colleague, the hon. Member for Rotherham (Sarah Champion), said she was “confused”, and she was not the only one confused by a Minister saying that she wants to go further by voting against amendments that would enable us to go further.”
House of Commons25 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It would be easy for anyone watching the proceedings, with not many Members in the Chamber to discuss these Lords amendments, to think this is about some technical issue or minor point of debate, but the votes today really do matter. They matter to victims, who are currently charged often thousands of pounds for the transcripts of the court hearings in which they were involved. They matter for the transparency and openness of our legal system. They also matter to the public, because on this very issue over 200,000 people signed a public petition, which was debated in Westminster Hall on Monday this week. Although people may think these are just Lords amendments, this is an important set of votes.”
House of Commons25 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The point I was highlighting was the inherent contradictions in the Minister’s remarks. Even now, in her summing up, she has said that the Government are going to go further in 2027, but in her opening remarks she said that they cannot go further because there are technical impediments. The point is that there are inherent contradictions in the Government’s narrative.”
House of Commons25 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Does my hon. Friend agree that one way to respond to a crisis and to deliver mass quickly would be to scale up the reserves during this Parliament? Does he find it surprising, as I do, that the relatively small cost—in a £60 billion budget—of scaling up the reserves would help to deliver some of that response?”
House of Commons24 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“My hon. Friend is making an excellent speech. I fully support the case that he is making for full transparency, but in the spirit of “I’ll start by starting”, he touched on witness statements that would have been prepared beforehand but were still not available. If the Minister accepts the principle around greater transparency, does my hon. Friend agree that certain aspects could immediately be made much more available, while some of the other technical discussions are taken in parallel?”
House of Commons23 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“He has an opportunity during his tenure in the Ministry of Justice to move quickly, to take advantage of the cross-party support and—at a time when his own Government are restricting access to jury trials—to do something that will be hugely helpful to victims, and something that the public have signalled they want very much.”
House of Commons23 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The cost is prohibitive, and people are not able to get the information they seek in a timely fashion ahead of the deadline. My sense is that the Government want to move in that direction, so I hope the debate today has signalled the cross-party consensus to do so. When the Minister sums up, I encourage him to clarify exactly where the blockages are. If he reads the Institute for Government reports, he will see that Ministers have a habit of moving very frequently. Those on the Government Benches who are seen as talented often move very frequently indeed.”
House of Commons23 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It strikes me that much more could be done to make those available, particularly to the victims of crime, than is the case now. What assessment has been made of which parts of those court bundles could be made available? Thirdly, what exactly are the technology constraints? Again, looking at the progress in other areas of Government and commitments made by the Prime Minister about AI in No. 10 summits recently, why can we not move more quickly than the slow pace at which the Ministry of Justice appears to be operating? That is particularly pertinent because of the point my hon. Friend the Member for Keighley and Ilkley made about the 28-day time limit for appeal. That is a hard deadline, and yet, as he sets out, decisions often take a while to come.”
House of Commons23 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“That is why it is important that in this debate we support the Minister and the direction of travel that I think he wants to go in, while understanding where the blockages are. I have a few quick questions. First, given the Government’s support, as I understand it, for the recording of proceedings in court, to what extent could audio clips, either in whole or in part, be made more quickly available? If there is some concern with the accuracy of the AI, for example, are there other ways of solving that? Where can we start, rather than waiting for the whole thing to be resolved? Secondly, as my hon. Friend the Member for Keighley and Ilkley touched on, witness statements and huge numbers of documents are produced as part of the discovery process in court. Court bundles—a huge number of documents—are prepared in advance of court hearings.”
House of Commons23 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“If it is contractual, I suspect that the sums are relatively modest, given the prize on offer. It would be helpful to understand what the contractual costs would be if one were to try to terminate or to vary the agreement. Indeed, where there is significant cross-party political pressure, it is surprising how suppliers, perhaps with a view to other contracts in future, may be willing to amend a contract. If the restrictions and difficulties for Ministers are technological, we saw in the covid period that, with a clear enough demand signal from Government, it is surprising how quickly technology improvements can be put in place when there is the will to do so. But I fear that what is at fault here is not this Minister, but the slow pace at which Whitehall is in the habit of operating.”
House of Commons23 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“My sense from the Government’s comments today has been that they are broadly sympathetic to the direction of travel—I think the Minister is nodding his head to indicate that, and I have no reason to believe otherwise. It would be helpful, given that he and the Government are sympathetic, to understand how the House can support them in moving more quickly, and in particular whether the constraint is one of legislation. As we know from past debates in this place, this House can move very quickly on legislation when it so desires, particularly if there is cross-party agreement. Indeed, the hon. Member for Richmond Park indicated there was agreement in the House of Lords as well. If, then, the constraint is legislative, there are ample opportunities for us to address that at pace.”
House of Commons23 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It clearly is a burning concern, given the volume of respondents to the petition—has more than 200,000 signatories, which signals how much this matters. I do not want to divert away from today’s debate but, given the restriction of access to jury trials and that direction of travel from the Government—a direction that I regret and indeed many on the Government Benches appear to regret—the opportunity for the Government to move more quickly on transparency and transcripts is even more pertinent that it would otherwise be. I am speaking in this debate because I am keen to hear from the Minister about where he sees the sticking point.”
House of Commons23 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Over the years, I have often found that when the Members on each Front Bench agree on an issue, there are dangers for Parliament, not least because legislation is often insufficiently scrutinised. Conversely, when the Back-Bench Members of each of the parties agree, it is often—it certainly was when I was a Minister—a warning sign that the Government of the day need to move. What has been uplifting about the debate we have heard so far, with evidence from those on the Government Benches—the hon. Member for Warrington North (Charlotte Nichols), who spoke very powerfully, and the hon. Member for Hartlepool (Mr Brash)—as well as from my hon. Friend the Member for Keighley and Ilkley (Robbie Moore) and the hon. Member for Richmond Park (Sarah Olney), has been the consensus that this is a burning issue of concern to our constituents.”
House of Commons23 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It is not surprising that the Minister is setting out the concerns that MOJ officials have no doubt raised with him about reporting restrictions and accuracy in the text, which are all valid. However, there is a danger that the perfect becomes the enemy of the good. I have two specific points. First, to what extent could the judge, as the trial proceeds, earmark packages of documents, audio recordings or other information that could be made more readily available, rather than the perfect being the enemy of the good? Secondly, the Government have made a lot of passing a duty of candour. Is the duty of candour complied with if the cost of obtaining a transcript is so high that the victim simply cannot afford it, or if it arrives after the 28 days that my hon. Friend the Member for Keighley and Ilkley (Robbie Moore) spoke about?”
House of Commons23 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The Government are making top-up payments to asylum support enablement cards, but have refused to answer my written parliamentary questions regarding how many payments have been made and how much is being spent. That is even though that is information the Department must have. It is held digitally, and the accounting officer under chapter 3 of “Managing Public Money” has a duty to demonstrate that such payments constitute value for money. Can the Home Secretary say why she is covering up this information?”
House of Commons23 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“There is a glaring contradiction between the Defence Secretary’s statement, which refers to “taking the necessary action to strengthen our collective defence,” and announcing to the House that we will have another recess without the defence investment plan. Does he recognise that last year the Defence Committee, which has a majority of Labour Members on it, said that “demand signals will not exist until the Defence Investment Plan is published”? At a time when so many of our allies have invested in defence, does he not recognise that delaying the plan is likely to stoke inflation, undermining the spend as and when it comes?”
House of Commons23 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“After a serious pollution incident, the Environment Agency produces a help report, which is shared with the Secretary of State’s officials, so she would have been notified of the category 1 pollution incident—the most serious rating—that occurred in September 2024 at Stanground, near Whittlesey in my constituency. No prosecution has been made, however. Why not?”
House of Commons19 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“May we have a debate on whether this is the latest Government U-turn that they have not yet announced, or are health bosses free to ignore the strategy and do the exact opposite locally?”
House of Commons19 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“On Tuesday evening, a car with five teenagers left the road near Wisbech in my constituency and entered the river. Tragically, only three of the teenagers exited the car. I am sure the whole House will join me in sending our condolences to the families affected by this tragedy and the emergency services who are performing the distressing recovery. In “Fit for the Future: 10 Year Plan”, the Government set out three big shifts for the NHS. The first is in care services moving from hospital into the community, yet the exact opposite is happening in Fenland, both at the North Cambridgeshire hospital site and the Doddington site, where services are being reduced and moved to hospital settings.”
House of Commons19 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Does she accept that this is yet another example of the Government saying one thing in opposition and doing the exact opposite in office, ignoring the concerns raised by the Chair of the International Development Committee and others about the trade-offs that are quite normal to make in government?”
House of Commons19 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I support prioritising hard power over soft power to protect our national security. In her statement, the Secretary of State drew a direct link between additional defence spending and reducing the development budget, but that was the exact opposite of the position put forward by the Prime Minister when he was in opposition. In Hansard , on 13 July 2021, when the previous Government were reducing aid from 0.7%, he made the exact opposite case, saying that reducing overseas aid made us less secure and that we needed to continue with 0.7% to keep us safe.”
House of Commons19 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I also commend my hon. Friend for raising this hugely important topic, and she is right to highlight the importance of local voices. Local voices know best where the flood risks are. They are most at risk and have real skin in the game, but they often feel that bodies such as Natural England and some parts of the Environment Agency are not responding. There are also the internal drainage boards, particularly in the east of England—in Norfolk, Cambridgeshire and Lincolnshire. Does my hon. Friend agree that we need to see more from the current Government about how they are going to work proactively with the drainage boards, particularly on some of the capital funding requirements that they face?”
House of Commons18 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The Minister invited hon. Members to present pain points, so perhaps I can share one from my time in her Department. Natural England’s gold-plating of some of its statutory objectives often seemed at odds with the ministerial steers that were given. Does she feel she has sufficient control over the direction of Natural England in delivering the sort of actions that I am sure she discussed at the taskforce?”
House of Commons18 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Can the Minister confirm that the new head of propriety and ethics was appointed without a fully open, competitive recruitment process, and that the outgoing head of propriety and ethics was promoted to permanent secretary also without a fully open recruitment process? If so, he will know that both those appointments were in breach of rules put in place by the last Government—by myself as Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster—unless an individual Minister signed off a waiver from the process. Can he say which Minister signed off such an exemption, and why patronage is preferred to open recruitment for such sensitive roles?”
House of Commons23 February 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“As the Minister is getting into the detail of the funding package, will she accept two broad points? First, the overall number of police officers in England has fallen on Labour’s watch. Secondly, because of cost pressures on police forces from other decisions taken by her Government, the Association of Police and Crime Commissioners has said that there is a £500 million shortfall in the allocation of funding from this Government to police forces.”
House of Commons11 February 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Can the Minister explain why his impact assessment says opposite things on the same page? In respect of the £92 million direct net cost to business, on the one hand, it says: “our working assumption is that all costs are incurred to business, with no indirect impacts to households.” In the very next paragraph, it says: “we estimate that cost-pass through for most sectors could feasibly be at 80-90%”. Both those things cannot be true, can they?”
House of Commons27 January 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Further to the previous intervention, the covenant is predicated on veterans not being disadvantaged by their service, as the Secretary of State will know. However, Northern Ireland veterans will be subject to records that do not apply to civilian terrorists. Will he confirm that there will be no disadvantage to Northern Ireland veterans, and that the covenant will apply to them as originally intended?”
House of Commons26 January 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Friend said about the funding steps being taken by other countries, let us put that in context. How much money are we talking about? Spending on reserve pay last year, 2024-25, amounted to £135.3 million, with a further £32 million for bounty payments. The Department’s budget is over £60 billion. A 20% increase in pay and bounty payments would be £33.6 million. We have Government Front Benchers saying that this is critical, central and urgent, but we cannot find low tens of millions until the 2030s.”
House of Commons26 January 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It is worth pointing out what that cross-party Committee said just a few months ago, in September: “The Strategic Defence Review (SDR) sets out the Department’s ambition to significantly expand the reserves’ role, including a 20% increase in numbers from the current 32,000 reserves when funding allows, most likely in the 2030s. However, the Department does not currently have funding or a detailed plan for how it will achieve this expansion.” That is a report from a Committee with a majority of Labour Members of Parliament. Let us be honest: it is not just on the issue of reservists that there is no action and little transparency on the funding. To give another example, we do not even have the defence investment plan published—it was promised last year. Given what my right hon.”
House of Commons26 January 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“If we want to see what other countries are doing, we can look at the action the Germans are taking, as my right hon. Friend talked about, or at Poland’s defence spending We have a very weak target of 20% on a low threshold. What is worse is that the funding commitment to that is almost non-existent. The strategic defence and security review has no hard deadline, and it has the caveat “when funds allow, most likely in the 2030s.” Some might say, “Well, isn’t that just my view?” It is actually the view of the cross-party Public Accounts Committee. There are 10 Labour Members on that Committee.”
House of Commons26 January 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“There might be those on the Government Benches who say, “Well, perhaps our record so far hasn’t been great, but don’t worry—the strategic defence and security review promises a 20% increase in our reservists, so perhaps it will improve in future.” First, that starts from a very low base of 32,000, so a 20% increase is around 6,500. Let us put that in context. Even the French—the French, Madam Deputy Speaker!—are more than doubling their number of reservists, and from a higher starting point. They are going from 46,000 to over 100,000 in the next decade. Many other countries have already taken action. The US has half its army and over a third of its air force in its guard or reserve units. Scandinavian and Baltic countries have also taken action.”
House of Commons26 January 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The number of training days has also fallen, from 1.3 million in 2023-24 to 1.17 million in 2024-25. The Minister for the Armed Forces, the hon. Member for Birmingham Selly Oak (Al Carns) said that our reservists “are critical” and “absolutely central”: “Without them we cannot generate mass, we cannot meet the plethora of defence tasks”. If that is his view—and my right hon. Friend the Member for Tonbridge (Tom Tugendhat) spoke about increased risks and the action being taken by other countries—then why is the number of reservists not increasing significantly?”
House of Commons26 January 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The Defence Secretary opened the debate by talking about the Bill taking significant steps to improve service lives, but the reality is that the rhetoric is not matched by the record. Let me take as an example the significant section of the Bill that is devoted to reservists. There are measures that I have no objection to: it allows the recall of those in their early 60s; it aligns the provision across the three services; and it has a new, lower threshold to recall based on warlike conditions, although it does not explain to employers what “warlike” constitutes so that they can know on what basis their staff might be called up. But the reality is that under this Government the number of reservists has actually fallen. It was over 32,000 in October 2023 and under 32,000 in October 2024.”
House of Commons26 January 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Will he confirm that for the duration of this Parliament the current level of manpower available in our reserves is sufficient to meet article 3 and cover all our critical national infrastructure, and that in reaching that judgment, he is not double counting reservists—such as those who are police officers, doctors, nurses or work in our NHS—who could be counted as essential in those tasks as part of our article 3 requirements?”
House of Commons26 January 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Just last month, the Minister told journalists that the UK is “rapidly developing” plans to prepare the country for war, and he warned that: “the shadow of war is knocking on Europe’s door once more”. How is that aligned with the approach of the Government in terms of failing to scale reserves, and in allowing their numbers to stagnate or even fall? I have a specific question to ask the Minister with regard to the article 3 commitment under NATO, on our ability to defend the UK.”
House of Commons26 January 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“From that £1.5 billion, if I was back in the Treasury I would be asking why tens of millions cannot be prioritised for this, if it is indeed a priority? If we do not want to look at the MOD budget, we could look at the £27 million the civil service spends on diversity and inclusion officers, or some other areas, such as the over £100 million a year those on the Government Benches voted to spend as part of the Chagos islands giveaway. My point is that these are relatively small sums, which give us scale in terms of our ability to respond at pace. Ministers are right to say that the reserves are critical, but their record is one in which they have failed to act, and there is no timescale to address those points.”
House of Commons26 January 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The hon. Gentleman is one of the most astute commentators on the Finance Committee, so I always genuinely listen to what he says. However, the point I am making is on the urgency to address this now and the relative modesty of the sums we are talking about to significantly increase the reserves. We are talking about tens of millions in a budget of over £60 billion. Therefore, if the rhetoric that this is central to our national security is meant, why is the action being delayed? To the hon. Gentleman’s point on funding, as a Former Chief Secretary to the Treasury, I know that pages 141 and 142 of the Red Book deal with the resource departmental expenditure limit, which I think is at £1.1 billion this year in cash terms, and the capital departmental expenditure limit is at £0.4 billion—so there is more money.”
House of Commons26 January 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“If so, was it published, and if it was not, why not and will it be published before Committee stage? In his summing up, can the Minister explain how a Bill that speaks so much about the importance of the military covenant is consistent with removing protections from our Northern Ireland veterans? On the issue of veterans, the Minister announced Operation Valour last May. The Department took six months before it put out a job advert, and it has still not appointed or announced anyone in that post. Can the Minister advise the House why it has taken nine months to appoint someone and when that appointment will be made? Finally, where are the incentives in the Bill? Where are the incentives for employers to recruit reservists —where are the tax incentives and the join-up across Departments?”
House of Commons26 January 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The report itself says: “The Department designed the schemes in a way that exposes it to both poor quality work and fraud…There was virtually no attention from senior officials and the Department did not know whether the scheme as a whole was or was not working for at least two years”. It therefore seems a surprise that just three months ago, the Defence Ministers appointed the permanent secretary of that Department to be the permanent secretary of the Ministry of Defence, in charge of its flagship programmes, including a housing programme. I ask the Minister, had he read the National Audit Office report when the permanent secretary was appointed? I have a specific question for the Minister regarding clauses 28 and 29. Can he confirm whether any review has been conducted of Army discipline since the general election?”
House of Commons26 January 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“One could perhaps take comfort at least from whom the Government have put in charge of the housing improvements, as they have appointed a new permanent secretary, but the cross-party Public Accounts Committee published a report just last week—I have not had to go through the archives—in which its Chair, my hon. Friend the Member for North Cotswolds (Sir Geoffrey Clifton-Brown), says: “I have served on the Public Accounts Committee for twelve years. In all that time a 98% failure rate in a public sector initiative amounts to the most catastrophic fiasco that I have ever seen on the Committee”.”
House of Commons26 January 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“In fact, the last Armed Forces Bill took a year to pass, so this quango will not be in place until more than halfway through the Parliament, on an issue which Ministers themselves could be making decisions on. The Prime Minister is telling his Cabinet one thing, and the Bill is doing the exact opposite. More importantly, the hon. Member for Lewes (James MacCleary) spoke about how Ministers will have oversight of the new body in terms of the targets. I am afraid I have some news for him: I struggle to find any targets in the Bill. I asked the House of Commons Library what the targets were for this Parliament on housing, and the answer came back that there were none. There are no targets, and yet housing is apparently a huge priority.”
House of Commons26 January 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“When I was in the Cabinet we were also responding to a global pandemic and to the energy inflation as a result of Ukraine. What I am highlighting is that we have an Armed Forces Bill under the hon. Gentleman’s Government in which the Minister is saying that reservists are critical. I am simply pointing to their record and their future plans. I am conscious of time, so I will move on to housing, which is covered in clause 3. Colleagues will know that just last April The Guardian reported the Prime Minister as telling the Cabinet that he wanted to stop outsourcing decisions to quangos, so it will come as no surprise to colleagues across the House that the Bill sets up yet another quango.”
House of Commons26 January 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Does the Minister not accept that the number of reservists and the number of training days have both fallen on his watch, and that the sums of money to significantly increase them is modest relative to the £60 billion-plus that the MOD spends?”
House of Commons26 January 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Indeed, the House has not even decided about such matters as what will happen to the education centre under the R and R programme. The importance of remembering the unbelievable horror of the Holocaust cannot be overstated—”
House of Commons20 January 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I think the Minister opened the debate extremely well and I agreed with much of what she said, but it seemed to me that she is giving the trustees quite a lot of discretion, so I simply want to say how important it is, on this programme, that there is very real transparency about some of the challenges that I fear will emerge with the design, the construction, the risk of cost overruns, the constraints and the compromises. Can I bring that alive with one example? This site was constrained, and Parliament, as is its right, chose to vote to remove that constraint. On the R and R programme, I am told that the children’s education centre has to move because of an identical constraint. I suspect that the interaction of this programme with the R and R programme will come before the House in due course and raise some challenges.”
House of Commons20 January 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“However, it is fair to say that when the House is agreed on an issue, there is a danger that that issue is not sufficiently scrutinised. As I have said, the current Father of the House, like the previous Father of the House, has raised concerns. He speaks as a former Chair of the PAC; I currently chair the Finance Committee. The Finance Committee is not responsible for restoration and renewal—the House will come on to debate that—but I have already seen very serious concerns emerging around the challenges of the programme. You, Madam Deputy Speaker, have huge experience of the programme. Indeed, the programme has been repeatedly delayed and seen significant cost overruns. The design before us includes a significant proportion of construction underground in a very constrained site.”
House of Commons20 January 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It may be that somewhere between Parliament, which is obviously heavily secured, and MI5 would be an appropriate location for a site that will always carry security risks. It may be that other sites are better, and I defer to those with far more expertise than me. I note that the current Father of the House—like the previous Father of the House— has spoken about his concerns with the design of the memorial, which I think reflects the fact that he is a former Chair of the Public Accounts Committee, but I always have a slight concern. We obviously all agree on the principle, because it is important, and as the Member for Chelmsford said, after 11 years there is a need to make progress. I am not calling for delay—I certainly am not—because this is important, and we need to get on with it and to deliver it.”
House of Commons20 January 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I rise briefly because I agree with both the tenor of the debate and the tone in which colleagues across the House have quite rightly highlighted the sheer horror of the Holocaust, the importance of remembering its sheer scale and the challenges particularly, as the hon. Member for Chelmsford (Marie Goldman) highlighted, in the context of rising antisemitism, and as the hon. Member for Eastbourne (Josh Babarinde) mentioned, in having fewer survivors with lived experience here to share their stories. I want to address two points raised by the Father of the House, my right hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough (Sir Edward Leigh). First, he raised a point that I surmise was on security, and I say to him that I simply do not know where the best site would be from a security perspective.”
House of Commons20 January 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“If the hon. Member will let me, I would like to finish. When all in the House agree on something, the question is whether the designs have been sufficiently scrutinised. Therefore, my plea to the Minister is to make a commitment to transparency and to communicating the pressures, which I foresee will emerge, in a very timely way.”
House of Commons20 January 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗