Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Lindsay Hoyle and Edward Leigh

Thursday 9th May 2024 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

We will try Lincolnshire: I call Sir Edward Leigh.

[Sir Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)]

T2. In response to my earlier question, the Secretary of State said that food security was of urgent national concern. Has any Agriculture Minister ever met a farmer who has denied that 3b land is just as good for growing arable crops as 3a land?

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Lindsay Hoyle and Edward Leigh

Monday 29th April 2024 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Final question, Sir Edward Leigh.

[Sir Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)]

For 14 long, weary years I have been arguing for an end of the faith cap, which is preventing the opening of new Catholic schools and has no proper effect. Does the Secretary of State think that I should keep campaigning and be patient for a bit longer?

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Lindsay Hoyle and Edward Leigh

Tuesday 20th February 2024 Commons Chamber

[Sir Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)]

T3. There was an interesting debate in the House of Lords last night, in which Lord Hoffmann confirmed my understanding that the European Court of Human Rights was wrong to impose a rule 39 injunction to stop flights to Rwanda, and that we could safely ignore such an injunction. Will the Secretary of State confirm that that is his understanding of the law, and if we get the Bill through Parliament and have flights on the ground, will he ignore such an injunction? And would that not be a good issue on which to fight the election?

[Mr Speaker]

Order. Sir Edward, you should know better. This is topicals. You are a member of the Panel of Chairs as well; you are meant to set an example, not abuse your position.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Lindsay Hoyle and Edward Leigh

Thursday 8th June 2023 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

We now come to a person who will have done 40 years tomorrow, I understand. I call Sir Edward Leigh.

[Sir Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)]

Thank you, Mr Speaker. Under the old British Rail, we used to have a direct train to London from Grimsby and the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Cleethorpes (Martin Vickers) through Market Rasen. I have been campaigning for that train to be reinstated for 40 years—ever since I was elected as a Member of Parliament. Sometimes I wander down from my home in the wolds and wait forlornly on the platform at Market Rasen, but the train never comes. Will the Secretary of State oblige an old campaigner and give us our train back, please?

Departure of Previous Home Secretary

Debate between Lindsay Hoyle and Edward Leigh

Thursday 20th October 2022 Commons Chamber

[Sir Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)]

Can the Minister assure us that the resignation was entirely due to a technical breach of the rules and that there was no policy disagreement between the Prime Minister and the Home Secretary? Many of us had great confidence in the former Home Secretary’s determination to ensure that we meet our manifesto commitments and that we should not replace mass migration from Europe with mass migration from the rest of the world. Can the Minister assure us that the policy remains exactly the same as it was under the previous Home Secretary and that we will stop mass migration? [Interruption.]

[Mr Speaker]

Order. We cannot have conversations between Back Benchers and officials in the Box. [Interruption.] I know but, please, it is very distracting. Can we just make sure that it does not happen?

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Lindsay Hoyle and Edward Leigh

Wednesday 20th July 2022 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Final question: Sir Edward Leigh.

[Sir Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)]

On behalf of the House, may I thank the Prime Minister—[Interruption.] On behalf of the House, may I thank the Prime Minister for his three-year record of service? On behalf of some of the most vulnerable people in the country, can I thank him for his insistence on rolling out the AstraZeneca jab, which has saved thousands of lives around the world? On behalf of the 17.4 million people who voted Brexit, may I thank him for restoring people’s faith in democracy? On behalf of northern towns, may I thank him for his commitment to levelling up? And most of all, on behalf of the people of Ukraine, may I thank him for holding high the torch of freedom and ensuring that that country is not a vassal state? For true grit and determination, keep going and thank you.

Points of Order

Debate between Lindsay Hoyle and Edward Leigh

Monday 14th June 2021 Commons Chamber

[Sir Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)]

Further to that point of order, Mr Speaker. Have you heard from the Prime Minister this afternoon, because I am astonished that he is not coming to the House to make this statement? I entirely join my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough (Mr Bone) in what he has said. It would have been perfectly possible for the Prime Minister to come to this Chamber at 3.30 and inform Parliament of what is going on. I quite understand that it is much easier for the Prime Minister to have a few patsy questions from Laura Kuenssberg and her colleagues than to sit here for a whole hour and be grilled by MPs, but are we a presidential system or are we the House of Commons? Who runs this country? Is it the media or is it the House of Commons? I repeat what my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough (Mr Bone) said: in future, we must make it clear that if there are any Government announcements, they are made here first, to the elected representatives of the people.

[Mr Speaker]

First, may I say that I am grateful to both gentlemen for giving notice of the point of order? I have repeatedly made it clear how important it is that announcements should be made in this Chamber first. As you are both aware, the Secretary of State will be making a statement at 8.30 pm on covid. That will give Members of the House an opportunity to question him on the Government’s policy. However, it is not what I would have expected, which is a statement to the House before an announcement to the press. It is not acceptable. The Government determine when Ministers make statements, but in doing so they must show respect to this House.

May I just say that we were not going to get a statement until I got involved with Downing Street? The fact is that this has been forced— to actually get a statement today; it was going to be left till tomorrow, which would have been totally unacceptable. The fact is that I understand that the Prime Minister, at the moment, is at NATO—there is a big conference going on—and he is not here. That is why I insisted that somebody come to make this statement. The timing of it is 8.30 pm. I thought that was better than waiting for the Prime Minister to make a statement tomorrow.

This House needs to know; it needs to know first. I find it totally unacceptable that, once again, we see Downing Street running roughshod over Members of Parliament. We are not accepting it, and I am at the stage where I am beginning to look for other avenues if they are not going to treat this House seriously. What I would say is that I think it is time for me to have a meeting with the Prime Minister to put on the record—here and now, but with him—that this House matters.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Lindsay Hoyle and Edward Leigh

Thursday 10th June 2021 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Right, let us try the next challenge.

[Sir Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)]

What progress she has made in securing a free trade agreement with Australia.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Lindsay Hoyle and Edward Leigh

Tuesday 18th May 2021 Commons Chamber

[Sir Edward Leigh]

For 600 years, the House of Lords and, latterly, its Appellate Committee did a superb job of being our Supreme Court. Nobody has ever given a proper cost-benefit analysis of what has been gained by abolishing it, apart from spending so much more extra public money. I doubt that the Government, or any Government, have the guts to abolish this wasteful institution, but will the Secretary of State and Lord Chancellor make it clear that we do not have a written constitution? We are not America. The Queen in Parliament —in other words, this House of Commons—is supreme, not the Supreme Court. That is particularly important if the Scottish National party should ever carry out its threat of a unilateral referendum against the wishes of this House of Commons in an Act of Parliament. Will the Secretary of State—

[Mr Speaker]

Order. Sir Edward, you should know that it is not supposed to be a speech; it is a question. You have been here so long you should know that.

Covid-19 Update

Debate between Lindsay Hoyle and Edward Leigh

Monday 19th April 2021 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I think we might have to move on.

[Sir Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)]

Scott Morrison, the Australian Prime Minister, has just announced that he has no plans to open up his borders. Of course, he is absolutely right. I am speaking—I apologise—completely with the benefit of hindsight, but I am sure everybody would agree that if we had done what Australia had done, we could have opened up our economy months ago. It has had only 910 deaths and only 29,000 infections. What I want to hear from the Secretary of State is that he will resist the very powerful lobbyists from the travel and airline industries and from airports, and that he will be absolutely determined to follow the evidence, not allow unnecessary travel—we do not know what variants are out there in the world—and be really tough with the red list.

Business of the House

Debate between Lindsay Hoyle and Edward Leigh

Thursday 11th March 2021 Commons Chamber

[Sir Edward Leigh]

Follow that.

[Mr Speaker]

We are about to.

Points of Order

Debate between Lindsay Hoyle and Edward Leigh

Thursday 11th March 2021 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for giving me notice of his point of order. I confirm that he was given the correct advice, and that under Standing Order No. 55 no amendments can be proposed to the roll-up motions. The matter is therefore not a point of order for the Chair, but the right hon. Gentleman has put his comments on the record, and the House has heard them. As he knows, this has been the longstanding way that the House has dealt with issues, and I gently say to him that he was the Chief Whip and he did not complain too much when he was in charge at the time. There are ways that we can change things, but at the moment we will carry on with the way we are.

[Sir Edward Leigh]

Further to that point of order, Mr Speaker. When I was on the Procedure Committee, I was instrumental in getting that committee to ensure that we had proper debates on estimates days. On a previous occasion, when I tried to speak about the estimates on estimates days, I was ruled out of order by your predecessor. We have made progress, but I would have thought that the whole debate to which my right hon. Friend the Member for Sutton Coldfield (Mr Mitchell) alluded, shows that we can continue to make progress on this and improve parliamentary scrutiny on estimates. In particular, we should follow up the recommendations of the Procedure Committee in the previous Parliament that we should have a proper Budget committee. I appreciate that you are constrained by present rules, Mr Speaker, but I hope you will forgive me if I make that point.

[Mr Speaker]

As you well know, Sir Edward, that is not a point for me, but I am sure the Leader of the House has managed to hear what is being said. I think we will leave it at that. I will suspend the House for three minutes to allow preparations to be made for the next item of business.

Public Health

Debate between Lindsay Hoyle and Edward Leigh

Tuesday 1st December 2020 Commons Chamber

[Keir Starmer]

Tier 2, crucially, depends on all other factors falling into place at exactly the same time. Although we all welcome the chance to see our loved ones at Christmas, I am not convinced that the Government have a sufficiently robust plan in place to prevent a spike in infections over the new year.

Of course this is difficult, and all systems would have risk, but that brings me to my third point. The risks we face in the decisions we make today are much higher because the Prime Minister has failed to fix the major problems with the now £22 billion track and trace system. Before the Prime Minister simply brushes the point aside again, let me remind him and the House that one of the major reasons that the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies advised a circuit break back in September was that track and trace was only having, in its words,

“a marginal impact on transmission”.

The great thing that was going to control the virus was not working then. If we are to control this virus, that really matters, and the Prime Minister having his head in the sand is not helping.

I know that the Prime Minister will say, “We’ve made advances in testing.” I recognise that, and I genuinely hope that it helps to tackle the virus, but let me quote the chief scientific officer, who said that

“testing is important, but of course it only matters if people isolate as well.”

That is blindingly obvious, but only a fraction of people who should be self-isolating are doing so, and the Prime Minister still has not addressed the reasons for this, including the huge gaps in support.

I know that there has been an announcement about the change for those notified by the app—a ridiculous omission in the first place—but it does not affect basic eligibility. Only one in eight workers qualify for the one-off £500 self-isolation support. Anyone not receiving that has to rely on statutory sick pay, which is the equivalent of £13 a day. That is a huge problem that needs to be addressed. People want to do the right thing, but for many there is a real fear that self-isolation means a huge loss of income that they simply cannot afford.

I think—I cannot prove this—that one of the main reasons that people are not passing on their contacts in the way we want is that they fear that those they pass on contacts for will not be able to afford to self-isolate. That is a real problem, and we cannot carry on ignoring it.

[Sir Edward Leigh]

The right hon. and learned Gentleman is doing a very good job—it is his job to criticise the Government, and of course mistakes have been made—but a credible Opposition would have a plan of their own. What is the plan of the Labour party?

[Mr Speaker]

Sir Edward, that is your second bite of the cherry; there are other people as well—please.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Lindsay Hoyle and Edward Leigh

Thursday 26th November 2020 Commons Chamber

[Sir Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)]

No!

[Mr Speaker]

Sorry, is someone shouting at the back? Sir Edward, silence a little more—come on.

[Sir Edward Leigh]

I apologise, Mr Speaker.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Lindsay Hoyle and Edward Leigh

Monday 18th May 2020 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

We now go, with audio only, to Sir Edward.

[Sir Edward Leigh [V]]

Mr Speaker, I am sorry that you do not have a picture because the broadband in rural Lincolnshire is so bad. That is why it is even more important that we get our through train from Grimsby and Cleethorpes down to London, which we have been promised again and again. It is a huge catchment area. All the Government have to do is to kick-start this project. Given that they are spending £100 billion on HS2, if they just give us £1 million, LNER will give us the through train. Will the Government fulfil their promises and kick-start the through train to London from Grimsby and Cleethorpes?