European Union (Withdrawal Agreement) Bill
Gary Streeter ExcerptsFriday 20th December 2019
(5 years ago)
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Several hon. Members rose—
Mr Deputy Speaker (Sir Gary Streeter)
Order. In order for us to get everyone in before the wind-ups at 2 o’clock, the informal time limit on speeches is now five minutes.
Several hon. Members rose—
Mr Deputy Speaker (Sir Gary Streeter)
Colleagues, we are not doing terribly well on timing. We have 15 more colleagues to speak and 2 o’clock is when the wind-ups begin. My maths are poor, but I believe that that is four minutes each.
Daniel Zeichner (Cambridge) (Lab)
Sadly, we live in a very divided country. I have listened in vain to those on the Government Benches to hear whether they have any understanding of the 16 million people who voted to remain in the European Union—in my city last week, people voted 44,000 to 9,000 to remain. I have no sense that the Government understand those people, and that is a very dangerous situation, because people are proud to be citizens of the European Union. We do not welcome the erosion of the rights that we currently enjoy, so when there is celebration in a few weeks’ time by some, there will be real grief and anger from others. They will have a good reason to be angry, because in the previous Parliament there was a real prospect of securing a confirmatory referendum. The Prime Minister knew that, which is why he was so desperate to get to his election. He was on the ropes, but to everyone’s astonishment the Liberal Democrats came to the rescue—of course, they are not here. They took a huge gamble with the future of this country, and of course it failed and they have paid a heavy price, but sadly, so, too, has the whole country. What I will say is that their role in this will not be forgotten. [Interruption.] No, I did not vote for the election; I voted against it, which actually got the biggest cheer in the hustings in Cambridge—no elections in December ever again, please.
I am an optimist and I say to remainers: there is hope. We have seen that the Prime Minister, despite the bluster, folds under pressure. He folded when the Irish issue looked to be derailing his progress and, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Leeds Central (Hilary Benn) explained so well, he buckled and did what he and the previous Prime Minister said they would never do: create a border down the Irish sea. Less commented on is how he buckled under pressure from Farage when he threatened to put up candidates in every seat. That was when no deal was brought back: by that promise to not allow an extra extension of the transition period. We know it is all a stunt and negotiating ploy, but it shows that pressure works, so I say: keep the pressure on the Prime Minister.
A so-called skinny trade deal might keep goods flowing, and that is important, but so are the flows of people and research collaboration, and however hard we try, we will no longer be a voice in the room in those important negotiations. Instead, we will have an army of people in Brussels trying to persuade others to make the argument on our behalf—a delicious irony that we will come to see. We will have to follow rules over which we have no influence in making. That is the future. People will come to say, “Wouldn’t it be better if had some influence and a say?” That debate will come, but in the meantime we will have to live with what is a Brexit fiction, because in reality there is no Brexit. We always have to have a relationship with our neighbours. The question is how we manage and negotiate that: do we have endless negotiations and arguments, or do we live within a civilised set of institutions and rules that make it so much better?
Several hon. Members rose—
Mr Deputy Speaker (Sir Gary Streeter)
I am afraid that I must now impose a formal time limit of four minutes.
Debate on the Address
Gary Streeter Excerpts(5 years ago)
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Alex Chalk
I worry that the hon. Gentleman never seems ready to listen to what the Scottish people have said. In 2014, Scottish people said they wanted to remain part of the United Kingdom, but he refuses to listen to them. Respect the people of Scotland. Listen to them. Honour the referendum result,
On Brexit, the language of this one nation Prime Minister is that this is not the time when we become fortress Britain; it is the time when we become global Britain. We will be more open, more welcoming, more internationalist, more tolerant. That is the direction that we need to go in.
The second element of the Queen’s Speech—such an important, striking element—relates to the NHS. In the election campaign, so much nonsense was talked about privatisation of the NHS. The problem was that sometimes, mischievously, the word “privatisation” was used to mean two different things. It is important to emphasise that the principle of healthcare being provided free at the point of need, regardless of ability to pay, is sacrosanct. It is simply not up for discussion and it never was going to be up for discussion. It is an article of faith for this nation, part of what marks us out in the community of nations. I am so proud that I was able to stand in Cheltenham on the record of what the Government had achieved for Cheltenham and for Cheltenham General Hospital. We had had more money put into our A&E services and saved our A&E. We had delivered the new £2 million Apollo surgical theatre for the hospital, £1 million for Gloucestershire air ambulance, linear accelerators and so on and so forth.
What is exciting about the Queen’s Speech is the pledge to invest yet more in our hospitals and the NHS in general. I want to see in Cheltenham a Gloucestershire cancer institute, and I will support the oncologists who do such a fantastic job and provide health services not just in Cheltenham and not just in Gloucestershire, but as far afield as Wales, Warwickshire, Herefordshire and still further afield. The Queen’s Speech rightly focuses on recruiting more staff, and on ending the injustice of the parents of a small child who has to be cared for overnight, or people with disabilities, or out-patients who require repeated treatments having to pay car parking charges. The Queen’s Speech also addresses the issue of doctors’ pensions and the fact that too many clinicians, particularly senior clinicians, are feeling priced out of going back to work because of the law of unintended consequences and the way it applied to pensions. That issue will be resolved.
I am excited about what will happen to our schools. One thing that did not really surface enough in the election campaign is how standards in our schools have risen, and risen relentlessly. The situation we inherited in 2010 was that our schools were on a downward trajectory, and we were slipping down the league tables in respect of the international comparisons. That is no more: we are now heading up the league tables and are ahead of France, Germany and the United States in reading and mathematics. That is something to be celebrated and we should be paying tribute to our teachers, the parents who support them and the school governors who are doing it time and again. In Cheltenham in particular, the results being achieved in our secondary schools—in Balcarras, in Bournside, in Pate’s, in All Saints’ and in all the other schools—are absolutely fantastic.
The Government have indicated that we will provide more funding. It is a fact that schools have delivered services despite the fact that the cost base and cost pressures have been going up, not least in respect of teachers’ pensions and so on. Whereas in 2015 the schools in my constituency received about £4,200 per head as a minimum, that will go up next year to a minimum of £5,000 per head. In fact, the average in Cheltenham will be closer to £5,300 per head. That is going to empower and turbo-charge our schools to continue the fantastic work that they are doing.
One point ably made by my hon. Friend the Member for East Worthing and Shoreham (Tim Loughton) was about our environment. As I said when I introduced my private Member’s Bill on net zero carbon, we need a new radicalism, but although we need to proceed with our heart, we also need to proceed with our head. I was delighted to hear of the new independent office for environmental protection, which will provide legal targets, including on air quality. There are important measures on planting more trees—the great Northumberland forest—and on new national parks and areas of outstanding natural beauty, but also a clear and hard-headed commitment to phase out coal completely by 2025 and to ensure that newly built houses no longer have fossil-fuel heaters. As we build more homes in Cheltenham as part of the cyber-park project, on any view they should no longer have gas boilers—I think they should be carbon neutral. That is what we need to focus on and the Queen’s Speech does so.
In summary, I could talk for a long time, but this Queen’s Speech can deliver a future for our country that is healthier, with children who are better educated, a country that is cleaner and an environment that is better protected. I am delighted to support the Gracious Speech. The future for our country can be very bright indeed.