Israeli Settlements: Trade Ban

Debate between Kit Malthouse and Chris Bryant

Thursday 9th July 2026 Commons Chamber

[Kit Malthouse]

Strangely enough, I agree with the hon. Gentleman. This is probably the first time in our political careers that we have agreed. He puts his finger on the point that I am trying to make. This dispute involves our own security. We do not have to be pro-Palestine or pro-Israel to take that view, just pro-British, which everybody in this House should be, first and foremost. That involves being pro-international law, pro-peace and pro-justice; the dispute goes to the heart of that. He put his finger on the point that I was coming to. Nobody is buying the idea that the argument is practical, Minister.

[The Minister for Trade (Chris Bryant)]

I have not made any argument!

[Kit Malthouse]

I know, but I ask the Minister not to patronise us all by standing up at the end of the debate and pretending that this is all too complicated, which I am afraid is what his ministerial colleagues have said to us before.

We know that the argument against a ban is not a legal one; that has been proven time and again. Indeed, we have supported resolutions at the UN and used our position on the Security Council to say that it is not a legal issue. I am left with the only other option, which is that the decision must be political with a capital “P”. I am afraid that is the most appalling thing to contemplate. Either we fear consequences from other countries, such as the United States or whoever it might be, or we believe it is in our national interest to recognise that Palestinian self-determination and Palestinian lives are disposable in the face of that political decision.

Even worse, it may be that we just do not care. It may be that at the higher echelons of political command, whether it is in No. 10 or the Foreign Office, they really just do not care. They think, “If we squint a bit, make some statements from the Front Bench and have a couple of sanctions here and there, in the end, the caravan will move on, and nobody will care.” I am afraid that until Ministers realise that this is not some kind of complicated chess game across the world, but a matter of our security, our interests and our morality, we will not make any progress.

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[Chris Bryant]

Yes, I have asked officials to produce advice on how we might proceed.

[Kit Malthouse]

By when?

[Chris Bryant]

The right hon. Gentleman asks, from a sedentary position, by when? I think my timeline may be rather limited in this post, but as Tagore said:

“The one who plants trees, knowing that he will never sit in their shade, has at least started to understand the meaning of life.”

I have been trying to progress some of this work. We have not got to a place where we are able to announce anything yet, but that is why I am saying we are actively considering it.

Steel Trade Measure

Debate between Kit Malthouse and Chris Bryant

Thursday 25th June 2026 Commons Chamber

[Chris Bryant]

I am grateful for my hon. Friend’s comments, and I know that he has raised some of those issues with the Secretary of State and the Under-Secretary of State for Business and Trade, my hon. Friend the Member for Stockton North. It is probably best that we go through the granular detail of the particular company’s concerns.

Let me also correct the idea of there being an exemption. There is not an exemption; it is just that we are including some categories of steel in the trade measure and not including others. As the hon. Member for Boston and Skegness (Richard Tice) just said, nearly 75%—it is actually 74%—of steel imports are not covered by the trade measure at all.

[Kit Malthouse (North West Hampshire) (Con)]

I too am grateful to the Minister and his colleagues for the flexibility they have shown so far, and I will come and see him on Monday. First, could he be a little clearer about how dynamic he will be on quotas? At first look to me and the businesses in my constituency that are concerned, some of the quotas look a bit tight. If there was a sudden spike in prices following the imposition, can he move quickly and, if so, how quickly, because obviously decisions are made with a long-term view? Secondly, he said that without these quotas the UK would become a dumping ground for cheap steel. We may well now become a dumping ground for cheap fabricated products, so what will he do on fabricated products alongside this? Thirdly, this means that the Government will collect millions of pounds from British businesses importing steel that will still import above the quota. What will happen to that money?

[Chris Bryant]

The last question is a clever one—that is a matter for the Chancellor, however. On fabricated steel, the right hon. Member makes a good point, which I know several people made in the urgent question last week, or whenever it was—I was in Türkiye trying to negotiate a free trade agreement with it and, in fact, talking a bit about steel as well. It is a good point, and we will look at that. I do not want to overpromise on the idea that at the moment, if there is a fluctuation in prices that we as a Government will suddenly move in and change all the quotas, because predictability and continuity are often as important for business as anything else so they know the terms under which they are operating, so I do not want to overpromise. Our main point is that we will do a review after a year, and we will engage with everybody all the way through.

[Kit Malthouse]

So nothing will change.

[Chris Bryant]

The right hon. Member says from a sedentary position that nothing will change. I am just trying to moderate his expectations of change, but obviously, if there is a very significant, exceptional moment then we may need to act. The kind of thing I am talking about is speciality steel, for instance. When we started this process, we thought that it would be up and running again. It is not now, and that is one of the reasons that we have been able to change those categories’ quotas. But I do not want to give the expectation that the moment somebody experiences some concern that we will suddenly change, because in the end, as I say, there are difficult trade-offs here and we want to ensure that UK production of steel survives and grows.

Protection of Children (Digital Safety and Data Protection) Bill

Debate between Kit Malthouse and Chris Bryant

2nd reading
Friday 7th March 2025 Commons Chamber

[Kit Malthouse]

I am not convinced that the guidance created by this Bill will be any more authoritative than that created by the NSPCC or by Internet Matters. The point I was making was not necessarily that the guidance is going to be pivotal, but that we need to get to a critical mass of observance before guidance is likely to have any impact. The original Bill was likely to do that, not least through the ban in schools, which created a nucleus of clear space for children that could be translated into homes. Many Members may have heard on the BBC this morning a short piece on the Fulham boys school, which has an absolute ban on even bringing a smartphone to school. That ban during the school period has resulted in the periods before and after school also being phone-free, and therefore much more social and beneficial to those pupils.

[Chris Bryant]

I urge the right hon. Gentleman to be slightly less sceptical about the value of CMO advice. As he knows, I have campaigned for many years on acquired brain injury, particularly in relation to concussion or sub-concussive events in sport. It was a very significant change when, under the previous Administration, the British Government brought forward specific advice in relation to concussion in sport. That has changed practices in lots of sports around the country, and I am hopeful that authoritative advice of this kind could make a significant difference.

[Kit Malthouse]

I would be willing to accept the hon. Gentleman’s encouragement if this were advice to schools, but it is not; it is advice to parents and carers. If there were going to be authoritative advice for schools, as well as other organisations that have charge of children—scout troops, children’s clubs, and other publicly funded organisations that look after children—I would have said, “Possibly,” even though there is to be a 12-month delay before the CMO tells us stuff we already know, as the hon. Member for Whitehaven and Workington pointed out.

The second step is for the Government to publish a plan for research within 12 months. That is not the conclusion of research, and there is no time limit—just a plan, a vague aspiration that we should have a plan, with no commencement, no sense of budget and no idea of when it might come. I am sorry to say that the hon. Member for Whitehaven and Workington has been sold a cosmetic pup.

The third and final point is that the Government have to publish this “assessment”—whatever that may be—which, as far as I can see, is fundamentally to tell us something we already know, and which the hon. Gentleman has illustrated extremely vividly. We should all be furious about the delay and prevarication that is being injected into what could have been a huge step forward for parents and children.

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[Chris Bryant]

My hon. Friend makes an extremely good point. The use of a mobile phone as another form of aggression is a very disturbing part of the trend we have seen. She is quite right that we need to consider action in that field.

The hon. Member for Esher and Walton referred to services that are “inherently addictive by design”. I think there is actually a contradiction in terms there. They are not inherently addictive; they are addictive by design. Those are two quite different things. We should strive to achieve no services provided for children being addictive by design, which is precisely one of the things that the Government are determined about.

I should say to the right hon. Member for North West Hampshire (Kit Malthouse) that I indicated earlier that I had had no meetings with tech by making a zero with my fingers, but that is not quite true. I had a meeting a few months ago with Baroness Jones and TikTok, although I expressed as strongly as many Members have in this debate the kind of views that they have in relation to the operation of TikTok. It is not that I have been convinced by TikTok—if anything, we were trying to put the argument to it about the need for responsible activity in this field.

[Kit Malthouse]

I am grateful to the Minister for that clarification. In his negotiations with the hon. Member for Whitehaven and Workington (Josh MacAlister), he will have consulted and taken direction from No. 10. One of the concerns, given that he has instituted an investigation into the impact of UK legislation on American tech firms, is that President Trump might be upset if we were to take these kinds of steps. How much of that has been a consideration in him effectively filleting this Bill?

[Chris Bryant]

The right hon. Gentleman is beginning to subscribe to conspiracy theories. I have had no role in any negotiations with my hon. Friend the Member for Whitehaven and Workington or with Downing Street on these matters, and I have not taken into consideration anything in relation to what Donald Trump might think about this field.

My hon. Friend the Member for Chipping Barnet (Dan Tomlinson) said that he is 32, which is obviously very difficult to believe. He referred to smartphones in 2007, but 3G was launched in 2001. I am slightly conscious that when I was at school, the only thing we were rowing about was whether we were allowed to take electronic calculators into O-level maths exams, so I sometimes feel a little out of my depth with all these young expressions of interest.

[Kit Malthouse]

On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker.

[Chris Bryant]

I bet this is not a point of order.

[Kit Malthouse]

It is a point of order. Madam Deputy Speaker, I wonder if you could give us guidance as to whether we actually have the right Minister responding to this Bill. If there were negotiations with the hon. Member for Whitehaven and Workington (Josh MacAlister) about the Bill, one would expect the Minister who had conducted those negotiations, and who was therefore able to speak to the decisions that have been made, to appear at the Dispatch Box. Have we got the right person?

AstraZeneca

Debate between Kit Malthouse and Chris Bryant

Monday 3rd February 2025 Commons Chamber

[Chris Bryant]

Regional mayors have an important role to play in helping bring investment into key areas. I am happy to ensure that the meetings that my hon. Friend has asked for take place. This has to be a joint venture between everyone. I want to underline that it is not the case that AstraZeneca is leaving the United Kingdom, or that it does not have confidence in the United Kingdom, because it clearly does—it invests more than £2.5 billion every year into the UK economy. It is a key partner of the UK and will continue to be so.

[Kit Malthouse (North West Hampshire) (Con)]

What a shame the Minister has chosen to substitute aggression for what should be regret for what is, whichever way he paints it, obviously a terrible failure of negotiation. I chair the all-party parliamentary group for life sciences, and I can tell the House that this is a terrible blow not just for Speke and Liverpool—the city of my birth—but for our vaccination development environment generally. The lack of this production facility means that there will be no pull for vaccination development in the UK and the various technologies that come with it. What will he do to replace that?

[Chris Bryant]

Of course we feel regretful. We would have preferred to get this over the line but that was not possible, in large measure because AstraZeneca decided that it did not add up in whatever particular way for it. The right hon. Gentleman makes one very good point: we want a manufacturing provision in the country, and my colleague Lord Vallance is working on that very closely with the sector.