Business of the House

Conor Burns Excerpts

Thursday 23rd May 2024 Commons Chamber

[Penny Mordaunt]

The hon. Lady mentions some very important legislation, and she knows that it will be partly the subject of the negotiations that are going on. I hope to be able to update her soon. I will ask the Department to provide her office with an update on the regulations, so that she knows where the Department is in that process.

[Sir Conor Burns (Bournemouth West) (Con)]

May I associate myself with earlier remarks about your pending retirement, Madam Deputy Speaker?

Ever since I first rose to speak from this very spot 14 years ago, I have tried to champion my constituency in this place. The impending Dissolution brings to mind unfinished business. In that light, may I raise with my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House again the tragic and brutal murder of young Thomas Roberts on the Old Christchurch Road in my constituency, just over two and a half years ago? The perpetrator of that murder should never have been in the United Kingdom. He is now rightly serving life behind bars. He lied about his age: he said he was 14 when he was in fact 18, and he was placed in a secondary school in my constituency. He was reported to social services and the police, but little action was taken. There was a litany of failures by public institutions, leading to that senseless and needless murder two and a half years ago.

Replying to an Adjournment debate, the then Minister for the Home Office, my right hon. Friend the Member for Newark (Robert Jenrick), told me he could not go into the detail while a Home Office investigation was proceeding. Twice now the Home Office has refused to publish even the headline findings of the inquiry that it commissioned. I spoke recently to Thomas’s father Philip, who does not understand why internal processes are preventing the Home Office from bringing into the public domain the findings of that report, what lessons have been learned and which individuals will be held to account. Even at 10 minutes to midnight in this Parliament, can my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House think of any mechanism to draw the matter to the attention of the Home Office? I hope that I and other Members will not let it go in the next Parliament.

[Penny Mordaunt]

I thank my right hon. Friend for all the work he is doing on behalf of Thomas and his family. It was a tragic situation, with layer on layer of failure leading to an appalling outcome. I will write to the Home Office following this business statement and ask that a Minister or senior official updates my right hon. Friend on the situation. I will do all I can in the remainder of this Parliament to help him make progress on this extremely important matter, as I know is necessary to bring some comfort to Thomas’s family.

--- Later in debate ---

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

It is goodbye from me and it is goodbye from her.

[Sir Conor Burns]

On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. Before you took the Chair, numerous Members paid tribute to the right hon. Member for Doncaster Central (Dame Rosie Winterton). I have been looking at the Twitter machine—something that would not have been allowed when I was first elected to this place—and I have seen that you, Madam Deputy Speaker, have also announced you are leaving the House of Commons when we dissolve. May I be the first to wish you all happiness and success and thank you for your many years of service to this Parliament?

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

Thank you very much indeed. I will not say too much in reply, lest the tears come back to my eyes again. My fellow Madam Deputy Speaker and I have carried out quite a double act these last few years. I will miss all of you, and her, very much indeed. Thank you.

Business of the House

Conor Burns Excerpts

Thursday 19th October 2023 Commons Chamber

[Penny Mordaunt]

First, I thank the hon. Lady and join her in remembering our late colleague, Sir David Amess. His legacy lives on, not just in city status for Southend; the many charities and projects that he fostered are going from strength to strength, and they are a daily reminder of the work he did and the effect and impact he had.

I add my voice to those of many in this Chamber who have expressed their horror, sadness and sympathy with all those caught up in the situation in Israel and Gaza. My thoughts are particularly with those who have lost loved ones in the most barbaric terrorist attack, and with those taken hostage and their families who await news of them. At times like these, we in this place may feel that we cannot directly help, but we all can. We can all make judgments based on facts, promote those facts and debunk deliberate disinformation campaigns, keep informed and wide-eyed about the realities of the situation, and reassure communities here in the UK.

On behalf of all colleagues, I thank the armed forces, the Royal Fleet Auxiliary, our diplomats and humanitarian experts, and the police for all that they are doing to protect and secure people’s safety in the middle east and at home. I join the hon. Lady in saying that all of us in this place are united against hate. She will know that the Prime Minister and Foreign Secretary are currently in the region, and I am sure that they will want to update the House. I am sure that many colleagues will want up-to-date information, particularly about some of the situations that have happened in Gaza and the facts behind those situations. As such, I can also tell the hon. Lady that my office has been in touch with the House of Commons Library to ensure that what information is available is given in a timely way to Members of the House.

The hon. Lady criticises me very robustly about my role as this House’s representative in Government. I hope to be able to reassure the House of my record on that front. First, I hope that Mr Speaker would support me in saying that I have always followed up any criticism that this House has made of any Government Department —more, I think, than anyone else who has held the role. My noble friend Lord True and I have also introduced training programmes for Government Departments to ensure that they know what their obligations to this House are. Her complaint against me might have had more effect had the letter she wrote to me complaining about this issue not been received by myself only after it had been briefed to the Daily Mirror, which is where I found out about it.

I did cheer our announcement on net zero, unlike the Labour party, whose path to net zero would include immense burdens on working people. We have chosen a different path to alleviate that burden. The hon. Lady invites me to contrast our parties’ records on infrastructure, and particularly rail. I remind her that in the 13 years we have been in power, we have electrified 1,220 miles of track. In the same time period, Labour managed just 70 miles. I am not going to apologise for standing up and fighting for this country; even prior to taking this role, I think my record has been one of standing up and fighting for this House. Hon. Members will know that, in the first year of the pandemic, I spent every single day on the phone, to all Members of this House, in my role as Paymaster General, updating them on what was happening. I take my responsibilities to this House very seriously indeed.

I will always stand up and fight for this House and for my country. I will not be lying down with Just Stop Oil and damaging our energy security. I will not be potentially lying down with the Liberal Democrats—I note the hon. Lady’s encouraging words about proportional representation. I will not be lying down with the SNP, which the hon. Member for Edinburgh North and Leith (Deidre Brock) will be pleased to hear, and contemplating assisting that party on a second referendum. Those are the facts, and I can understand why Labour does not like them. That is perhaps why it has chosen to ban some news programming available on Freeview to anyone operating in the Senedd.

Further business may be announced in the usual way, or by His Majesty the King on 7 November.

[Sir Conor Burns (Bournemouth West) (Con)]

I associate myself with the words about our late colleague Sir David Amess. I was privileged to serve with him on the all-party parliamentary group on the Holy See, of which he was a dedicated chairman.

In considering future business, may I draw the Leader of the House’s attention to the collapse of a company in my constituency, Initiative Property Management, which manages a large number of residential blocks in my constituency and more widely? Since the collapse, many residents have seen building works on their blocks cease, and have been unable to access tens of thousands of pounds of their own money in management fees. While the matter is now being investigated by Dorset police—and I do not invite my right hon. Friend to comment on that—may I suggest that there may be a regulatory gap here? It appears that management companies of this style do not fall under the regulatory framework of the Financial Conduct Authority. I invite the Leader of the House to make Government colleagues aware of the fact, and perhaps ask them to take a look at it.

[Penny Mordaunt]

First, I thank my right hon. Friend for all the work he is doing at what must be a very worrying time for his constituents who are affected. He will know that the Government are currently considering the recommendations in the final report from my noble Friend Lord Best’s working group on the regulation of property agents. Of course, the Financial Conduct Authority currently has a limited role, and although we are not seeking to expand its role, we want to ensure that it can be a more innovative, assertive and adaptive regulator.