Oral Answers to Questions

Daniel Kawczynski Excerpts

Wednesday 23rd November 2016 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

Trying to ensure that those responsible for children actually pay for their children when a family has broken up has been a long-standing question which this House has addressed. There have been various ways of dealing with it through the agency that has been responsible. It is right that the changes that have been introduced are on a more level basis and more people are able to access the support they need as a result.

[Daniel Kawczynski (Shrewsbury and Atcham) (Con)]

Q3. The Government have rightly focused on economic growth, jobs and prosperity—something all of us on the Conservative Benches can get behind. With that in mind, will the Prime Minister back our highly competitive bid for funding for the north-west relief road in Shrewsbury, which will not only deal with the congestion our town is facing but dovetail into that narrative?

Oral Answers to Questions

Daniel Kawczynski Excerpts

Wednesday 12th October 2016 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

May I say very gently to the right hon. Gentleman that I answered two questions on that earlier? I suggest he should have listened to the answers I gave then.

[Daniel Kawczynski (Shrewsbury and Atcham) (Con)]

Q5. We have empowered local doctors to take real leadership over important reconfiguration proposals. In Shropshire, 300 doctors, surgeons and clinicians have been working on a vital reconfiguration of A&E services in Shropshire and in Wales. When they make their decision on that later this month, it is very important that the Government back them and provide the capital funding required for this vital change to enhance patient safety.

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend raises an important point. The configuration of services in his constituency and others is obviously a significant issue across the House. I am pleased to say that we are now seeing more people being treated in A&E. We will look at the proposals. The point about how this is being done is that local people should be able to have their voice heard and the decisions taken should reflect the needs in a particular local area. We all want to see that. A&E services are vital, and I pay tribute to all those who work in A&E in hospitals across the country.

Outcome of the EU Referendum

Daniel Kawczynski Excerpts

Monday 27th June 2016 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

The technical answer to the right hon. Gentleman’s question is that there are no countries today that have full access to the single market without contributing to the budget or accepting the free movement of people. Where we should try to seek some cross-party agreement is that I think it is in all our interests, whatever the eventual decision, to make sure we are as close as possible economically to our friends and partners in the European Union. That is obviously going to have to be negotiated, but my view is—the closer, the better.

[Daniel Kawczynski (Shrewsbury and Atcham) (Con)]

As somebody of Polish origin, I am very proud of the contribution Poles have made to this country not just during the battle of Britain, in which the Polish 303 Squadron was one of the largest, but in recent years. As chairman of the all-party group on Poland, I have invited the chairman of the Polish Social and Cultural Association to the House of Commons to show solidarity with the Poles following that appalling attack, and I very much hope that the Prime Minister might be able to join us for that meeting.

[The Prime Minister]

I commend my hon. Friend for his work with the Polish community here in the United Kingdom and for furthering relations between Britain and Poland. I spoke to the Polish Prime Minister this afternoon to say how concerned I was about the terrible attacks that have taken place and reassure her that we were doing everything we could to protect Polish citizens in our country. Poland is a country that is very sad to see Britain leave the European Union because we are like-minded on so many issues, including open markets and enterprise, and the Atlanticist nature of the EU. We must make sure that we work for the strongest bilateral relationship between Britain and Poland in the years ahead.

EU Council

Daniel Kawczynski Excerpts

Tuesday 5th January 2016 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

Such decisions are made independently, according to the asylum rules. However, let us be absolutely clear about the fact that we should do everything we can to secure the tunnel and make sure that it is not possible for people to access our country by breaking into it.

[Daniel Kawczynski (Shrewsbury and Atcham) (Con)]

NATO strategy and priorities must not be conflated with the EU renegotiation. Will the Prime Minister give us a categorical assurance that none of the discussions with the Polish Government will include giving them a permanent NATO base in Poland as part of securing their support for this agreement?

[The Prime Minister]

No one has talked about a base of the kind that my hon. Friend describes. However, I strongly believe that, as part of the NATO strategy that has already been agreed, we should be contributing to the high-readiness forces. I strongly support that. I believe that we should be taking part in the Baltic air policing mission, for example, and that we should be ensuring that British soldiers exercise on Polish soil, as they do. If there are proposals to do more of those things, I for one will welcome them.

ISIL in Syria

Daniel Kawczynski Excerpts

Wednesday 2nd December 2015 Commons Chamber

[Dr Liam Fox (North Somerset) (Con)]

It is very important that the whole House is clear about what this debate is not about. It is not about provoking a new confrontation with Daesh, given that it has already confronted peace, decency and humanity. We have seen what it is capable of—beheadings, crucifixions, mass rape; we have seen the refugee crisis it has provoked in the middle east, with its terrible human cost; and we have seen its willingness to export jihad whenever it can. It is also not about bombing Syria per se, as is being portrayed outside; it is the extension of a military campaign we are already pursuing in Iraq, across what is, in effect, a non-existent border in the sand. I am afraid that the Leader of the Opposition’s unwillingness to answer the question from my hon. Friend the Member for Enfield, Southgate (Mr Burrowes) will give the clear impression that he is not just against the extension of the bombing campaign into Syrian territory, but against bombing Daesh at all, which is a very serious position to hold.

To understand the nature of the threat we face and why it requires a military response, we need to understand the mindset of the jihadists themselves. First, they take an extreme and distorted religious position; then they dehumanise their opponents by calling them infidels, heretics and apostates—let us remember that the majority of those they have killed were Muslims, not those of other religions; then they tell themselves it is God’s work and therefore they accept no man-made restraint—no laws, no borders; and then they deploy extreme violence in the prosecution of their self-appointed mission. We have seen that violence on the sands of Tunisia, and we heard it in the screams of the Jordanian pilot who was burned alive in a cage.

We must be under no illusions about the nature of the threat we face. Daesh is not like the armed political terrorists we have seen in the past; it poses a fundamentally different threat. It is a group that seeks not accommodation but domination. We need to understand that before determining our response.

[Daniel Kawczynski (Shrewsbury and Atcham) (Con)]

My right hon. Friend will know of concerns that Daesh fighters are leaving Syria for Libya in greater numbers. Does he believe that when we are tackling Daesh in Syria, we will have to confront it in Libya at some stage as well?

[Dr Fox]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. As I said, we have not chosen this confrontation; Daesh has chosen to confront us—and the free world, and decency and humanity. It is a prerequisite for stability and peace in the future that we deal with the threat wherever it manifests itself.

There are two elements to the motion: the military and the political. On the military question of whether British bombing, as part of an allied action in Syria, will be a game-changer, I say, no, it will not, but it will make a significant and serious contribution to the alliance. The Prime Minister is absolutely correct that some of our weaponry enables us to minimise the number of civilian casualties, and that has a double importance: it is important in itself from a humanitarian point of view, as well as in not handing a propaganda weapon to our opponents in the region. Britain can contribute: we did it successfully in Libya, by minimising the number of civilian casualties, which is not an unimportant contribution to make.

We must be rational and cautious about the wider implications. No war or conflict is ever won from the air alone, and the Prime Minister was right to point out that this is only a part of the wider response. If we degrade Daesh’s command and control, territory will need to be taken and held, so ultimately we will need an international coalition on the ground if this is to be successful in the long term. There may be as many Syrian fighters as the Joint Intelligence Committee has set out, and they may be co-ordinating with the international coalition, or be capable of doing so, but we must also recognise the need for a wider ability to take and hold territory. To those who oppose the motion, I say this: the longer we wait to act, the fewer our allies’ numbers and the less their capabilities are likely to be, as part of a wider coalition. If we do not have stability and security on the ground in Syria, there is no chance of peace, whatever happens in Vienna.

On the political side, our allies think it is absurd for Britain to be part of a military campaign against Daesh in Iraq but not in Syria. It is a patently militarily absurd position, and we have a chance to correct it today. But we must not contract out the security of the United Kingdom to our allies. It is a national embarrassment that we are asking our allies to do what we believe is necessary to tackle a fundamental threat to the security of the United Kingdom, and this House of Commons should not stand for it. Finally on that point, when we do not act, it makes it much more difficult for us diplomatically to persuade other countries to continue their airstrikes, and the peeling off of the United Arab Emirates, then Jordan and then Saudi Arabia from the coalition attacking Daesh is of great significance. We have a chance to reverse that if we take a solid position today.

This motion and the action it proposes will not in itself defeat Daesh, but it will help, and alongside the Vienna process it may help to bring peace in the long term to the Syrian people. Without the defeat of Daesh, there will be no peace. We have not chosen this conflict, but we cannot ignore it; to do nothing is a policy position that will have its own consequences. If we do act, that does not mean we will not see a terrorist atrocity in this country, but if we do not tackle Daesh at source over there, there will be an increasing risk that we have to face the consequences over here. That would be an abdication of the primary responsibility of this House of Commons, which is the protection and defence of the British people. That is what this debate is all about.

Syria

Daniel Kawczynski Excerpts

Thursday 26th November 2015 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I am very happy to appear in front of the Select Committee. I cannot promise to do that before a vote in this House, but obviously, were there to be a vote in this House, I would appear in this House—at this Dispatch Box—for a full day’s debate. I will sit and listen to contributions, I will take questions, and I will take as many interventions as I possibly can.

I would say to the hon. Gentleman that I think the Select Committee asked good questions, and I would urge him to read our response in full; it is incredibly detailed. The Chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee has, I think, indicated that the answers are satisfactory. I ask the hon. Gentleman, as a member of that respected Select Committee, to look at it carefully. If there are other points that he wants to raise and write to me about, I am very happy to enter into a correspondence with him.

[Daniel Kawczynski (Shrewsbury and Atcham) (Con)]

The Prime Minister will know that some of the regional tensions in the middle east and Syria stem from the mutual hostility and antagonism between Iran and Saudi Arabia. During our Foreign Affairs Committee visit to both Tehran and Riyadh this week, we were given assurances that both countries are prepared to start constructive dialogue. Will he use his good offices at the United Nations to bring these two countries together to try to make sure that their hostility stops?

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right that dialogue between Saudi Arabia and Iran is going to be crucial to providing the backdrop to a political solution in Syria. We need to make sure that the potential conflict between Sunni majority nations and Shi’a majority nations does not overtake what is necessary, which is to identify the common enemy: this Islamist extremist violence, most notably through ISIL, which is of course a threat to us, as we have discussed, but also a massive threat to the stability and security of the region.

Syria: Refugees and Counter-terrorism

Daniel Kawczynski Excerpts

Monday 7th September 2015 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I agree with the hon. Gentleman that we should not take account of someone’s religion. We do not do that in our asylum processes, when we welcome and resettle people in what is—and let us be proud of it—one of the most successful multiracial, multi-ethnic democracies anywhere on earth.

I think we have to show some understanding of the difficulties that the Schengen countries have. Once people have crossed one external frontier into Europe, there is not really another border, unless they come to Calais, perhaps, so there are stresses and strains within the Schengen system. We are working with the Schengen countries as partners. We will not join the Schengen system—we are going to keep our borders—and we will not take part in their relocation system, but we need to show some understanding of the problems they have and perhaps help them with, for example, the external frontier to Europe, which is causing so many difficulties at the moment.

[Daniel Kawczynski (Shrewsbury and Atcham) (Con)]

I well remember when the Prime Minister came to this House to ask for authority to take action against President Assad. This Parliament decided to block him in that quest and has allowed President Assad to ethnically cleanse his own country. Does my right hon. Friend agree with me that his job in preventing Assad’s genocide is now much more difficult than it was two years ago, when he first proposed those measures?

[The Prime Minister]

I am grateful for what my hon. Friend says, but we have to deal with the situation that faces us now. No one is arguing that military action is the only answer to the problem. We need a comprehensive solution, but at the end of the day, I am sure, the removal of ISIL from Syria will be in this nation’s interests.