Oral Answers to Questions

Lord Harper Excerpts

Wednesday 21st July 2021 Commons Chamber

[Dan Jarvis (Barnsley Central) (Lab)]

What plans he has to bring forward legislative proposals to address Northern Ireland legacy issues. [R]

[Mr Mark Harper (Forest of Dean) (Con)]

What steps his Department is taking to address the legacy of the troubles.

[The Secretary of State for Northern Ireland (Brandon Lewis)]

Last week, in this Chamber, I set out proposals for addressing the legacy of the troubles, which will focus on reconciliation, delivering better outcomes for victims, and ending the cycle of investigations that is not working for anyone. These proposals will be considered as part of the ongoing talks process with the Northern Ireland parties, the Irish Government and representatives across Northern Ireland society, further to which we will bring forward legislation.

--- Later in debate ---

[Brandon Lewis]

As the hon. Gentleman rightly acknowledges, there is no moral equivalence here. Obviously there is a legal equivalence going back to the Good Friday/Belfast agreement, but there is a distinct legal difference between what he outlines and the statute of limitations that we are looking at. I assure him that not only have we been engaging with veterans groups but we will continue to do so across Northern Ireland and Great Britain, not least through the offices of the Veterans Commissioner, whom we appointed in Northern Ireland. That work will continue, as it already has been this week.

[Mr Harper]

I am sure the Secretary of State was closely following yesterday’s debate on his proposals in the Northern Ireland Assembly. The motion that was passed specifically talks about the process set out in the Stormont House agreement. Could he set out for the House, in a little detail, why that process is not working either for veterans or for victims?

[Brandon Lewis]

My right hon. Friend is right. I saw some of the comments made in yesterday’s debate and, as I said last week, we recognise the strength of feeling and the concerns that people have. There is, understandably, a range of views on legacy, as it is a complex and sensitive issue. We are committed to further discussions, as I have already said, and we remain committed to many of the key principles laid out in the Stormont House agreement.

To come to the core of my right hon. Friend’s question, the Stormont House agreement was in 2014. We are seven years on, and it has not been deliverable in its current format. Parts of it that were to be delivered by the Executive, such as an oral history by 2016, have not been delivered. We need to move on and get those things working.

We also need to acknowledge the reality that even the investigative body, the Historical Investigations Unit that was envisaged, would take, by a conservative estimate, between 10 and 20 years to complete its workload. On that timescale, many families would be timed out of any prospect of information or justice. We need to be honest about the reality of where we are today.

International Aid: Treasury Update

Lord Harper Excerpts

Programme motion
Tuesday 13th July 2021 Commons Chamber

[Keir Starmer (Holborn and St Pancras) (Lab)]

I start by thanking you, Mr Speaker, and hon. Members from across the House for ensuring that this debate took place today. In particular, I thank the right hon. Members for Sutton Coldfield (Mr Mitchell) and for Maidenhead (Mrs May). I think they are the “lefty” propagandists that the Prime Minister was talking about a couple of weeks ago. I have to say that if the Prime Minister had confidence in the arguments he is making to this House, he would have given way to them a moment ago so that his arguments could be tested. He does not have confidence in them, otherwise he would have done so—that is obvious already. However, we do welcome the chance to debate this motion.

The motion is broad and, if I may say so, from this Prime Minister it is typically slippery. The House should have had the opportunity for a straight up/down vote on whether to approve or reject the Government’s cut to overseas aid to 0.5%. This motion does not do that. But the Chancellor’s written ministerial statement is clear: if the motion is carried, the cut in overseas aid to 0.5% will effectively carry on indefinitely. I will expand on that point in just a moment—[Interruption.] I will expand on that point and take interventions on it.

[Mr Mark Harper (Forest of Dean) (Con)]

Will the right hon. and learned Gentleman give way?

[Keir Starmer]

I am going to develop that argument. When I get to it, I will give way so that that argument can be tested, in the usual way. But if the motion is rejected,

“the Government would consequently return to spending 0.7% of GNI on international aid in the next calendar year”.—[Official Report, 12 July 2021; Vol. 699, c. 4WS.]

Let me be clear: Labour will vote to reject this motion tonight and to return overseas aid to 0.7% of GNI.

[Mr Harper]

Will the right hon. and learned Gentleman give way?

[Keir Starmer]

I am going to summarise my argument—[Interruption.] I am going make my argument, and when I get to the relevant part, I will take interventions.

The case that we make is this: first, that the cut is wrong, because investing 0.7% on international aid is in Britain’s national interest; secondly, because the economic criteria set out by the Chancellor would lead to an indefinite cut that is likely to last beyond this Parliament; and, thirdly, because it matters that this House keeps its word to the voters who elected us. Every Member here—every Member here—was elected on a manifesto to retain the 0.7% target, and it matters that we keep our promises to the world’s poorest, particularly at such a time of global uncertainty.

[Mr Harper]

I am grateful to the right hon. and learned Gentleman for giving way. I agree with him about keeping promises, and Conservative Members were also elected to keep fiscal promises to reduce our debt and not to borrow for day-to-day spending. I hope in his remarks he will set out, given that he is not going to support this motion, which areas of spending he is going to cut to pay for it or which taxes he is going to raise. If he does not do either of those things, then I am afraid his promises and his vote today are hollow, and no one will believe him.

[Keir Starmer]

I have to say that it is a bit rich from someone who may break the manifesto commitment to say that the vote today and the words today are hollow, but just to take that straight on, it is a false economy, I am afraid. Cutting aid will increase costs and have a big impact on our economy. Development aid—we all know this—reduces conflict, disease and people fleeing from their homes. It is a false economy to pretend that this is some sort of cut that does not have consequences.

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[Hilary Benn (Leeds Central) (Lab)]

Since Ministers announced that the UK was going to be the only G7 country to cut its aid this year, despite all the other countries facing the same fiscal pressures, there is not one Member of this House who is not now aware of the consequences of the decision that Ministers have taken—a cut of 85% in the support that we give to the United Nations Population Fund to prevent maternal and child death and unwanted pregnancy; a cut of 95% to the Global Polio Eradication Initiative, at the very moment when the world is closer than it has ever been to eradicating that dreadful disease; and a cut of 50% in the support we give to the humanitarian mine action programme, which stops people losing their arms, their legs and their lives to unexploded ordnance. It is a very long list, and every one of those things harms our reputation and does not help us to persuade others, because other countries judge us not by what we say, but by what we do.

The choice before the House today is a very stark one: do we act to put this right, or do we accept the double lock that has been proposed? I urge the House to reject it, because there is a principle here. What is it about the level of Government spending on helping the world’s poorest people that means that it alone is going to be subject to these tests? No other area of Government expenditure is: just this one. If this is about protecting the public finances, why is this area of Government expenditure—the money we spend on getting children into school, or on vaccinating children so they do not die of diseases that our children do not die of—being singled out? I have great admiration for the OBR, but determining the level of our international aid spending is not part of its responsibility. It is the Government’s responsibility, it is a political responsibility, and Ministers should not try to pass the buck on to someone else, especially since the latest OBR forecast makes clear that it is exceedingly unlikely that the two tests would be met in the next five years.

[Mr Harper]

Can I just pick the right hon. Gentleman up on that point about other areas of expenditure? The Treasury and the Chancellor have set out these tests—promises that are in our manifesto, and which we mean to keep. The comprehensive spending review is taking place this year, and it seems to me that we will be judging all other areas of Government expenditure by these same measures. I see the Chancellor nodding, so it seems to me that we are being very consistent here, and it is important that we keep our promises about our fiscal responsibilities as well as getting back on track to meet our aid responsibilities.

[Hilary Benn]

I am afraid that I take a different view of the Government’s consistency from the right hon. Gentleman’s, because they have chosen quite specifically, knowingly and deliberately to break a cast-iron promise to the world’s poorest people that was also contained in that manifesto. As I said in my last contribution on this subject, most of those people probably have no idea that this House made that commitment together, but the Government have chosen to break it, and the choice we are making today is whether we think that is right or wrong.

The Chancellor might think that the double lock is a way out of this political problem, but I do not think it is, because the issue before us has not gone away. It is just the same as it was on the day when the original cut was announced, and the question before us is whether it is right—morally, practically or politically—to break our word to the world’s poorest people. I would argue that it is not: it is wrong in principle and it is harmful in practice, as we have heard from excellent speeches made by Conservative Members. It is not who we are; it is not the country that we should aspire to be; and I ask the House to reject this motion so that we can restore aid to 0.7% and keep the promise that we made to the people of this country and the people of the world.

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[Mr Mark Harper (Forest of Dean) (Con)]

I have listened very carefully to the speeches in this debate, and many of them focused on our manifesto promise on aid spending. That is entirely correct but, as I said in one of my interventions, we also made a commitment not to borrow money for day-to-day spending and to reduce our debt burden. All those commitments have been made more challenging by the global pandemic we have faced. The Treasury’s motion, which I will support, as I hope all my colleagues will, is an attempt to deal with the challenge of the pandemic and deliver on all our manifesto commitments in a way that reflects the reality of what has happened over the past year.

I have also heard many Members talk about the borrowing that we have had to make over the last year. I know the Chancellor and I am very proud of that borrowing, because it has helped us get through an incredibly difficult year, but one-off borrowing for a crisis is not the same as ongoing day-to-day spending. I am surprised by many of my colleagues who talk about the £5 billion a year that it would cost to replace this spending as if £5 billion was not a lot of money.

I can remember many difficult conversations when I was a Minister, and indeed when I was Government Chief Whip, about far smaller sums of money, sometimes involving many of the colleagues I have heard talk about £5 billion as if it were nothing. I am afraid that we are going to have to get used to the fact that there are certain realities in the world—that money we spend has to be paid for, and it either has to be borrowed or financed from taxation.

One of the problems we now have with the borrowing we have had to make over the last year is that we are very vulnerable to increases in inflation or interest rates. I heard someone say we are living in an era of low interest rates. We do not know how long that is going to last, and a 1% rise in inflation and interest rates would cost us twenty-five thousand million pounds, five times the amount we are arguing about today. Those are the realities that not just the Chancellor but all of us in this Parliament, and particularly those of us in the governing party, have to grapple with.

My final point is just to say to my colleagues that I fear that this debate is going to be repeated many times as we move through the comprehensive spending review. We are all going to have to face very difficult challenges. Governing is about choosing. It is about setting priorities for what we think is important. This is important, but so is keeping the fiscal measures on balance. All of them are important, and I am glad that the Chancellor has brought forward the measures that he has today.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)]

I am sorry that we have not been able to get more speakers in, but we now have to move to the wind-ups. I call the shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer, Rachel Reeves.

Security of Ministers’ Offices and Communications

Lord Harper Excerpts

Monday 28th June 2021 Commons Chamber

[Julia Lopez]

I think that will form part of the investigation, and it is something that the Government’s security group will actively look into.

[Mr Mark Harper (Forest of Dean) (Con)]

On the use of private emails for Government business, will the Minister confirm the legal position under the Freedom of Information Act? My understanding is that if a public authority—the Secretary of State clearly is a public authority—uses a private email for Government business, that private email and those emails are subject to the Freedom of Information Act, and the destruction of any emails in order to prevent them from being disclosed would be a criminal offence. That information will obviously be of some reassurance to people. Is she able to confirm that from the Dispatch Box?

[Julia Lopez]

Yes, I can confirm that official information held in private email accounts is subject to FOI.

G7 and NATO Summits

Lord Harper Excerpts

Wednesday 16th June 2021 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

We will continue with our efforts —we are 80% of the way there—and we will blow away the clouds of despondency that seem to hang over some Members here today. I think it was a highly successful summit, and we are going to get there.

[Mr Mark Harper (Forest of Dean) (Con)]

In the Prime Minister’s statement, he refers to the G7 combining our strength to defeat covid. Would it not be more accurate to say that we need to make sure we can vaccinate the world to protect people, but then we need to learn to live with what will be an endemic virus? Does he share my concern about the things that are going on in Government at the moment, with the warnings about the restrictions coming back in the autumn and the winter as cases rise, and can he rule out that taking place? That would reassure many colleagues on both sides of the House.

[The Prime Minister]

I thank my right hon. Friend. I did see something this morning about some paper or other that means absolutely nothing to me. Our objective is to go forward with the road map and bring back the freedoms we love.

Covid-19 Update

Lord Harper Excerpts

Wednesday 12th May 2021 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I do not think that “a summer of cramming” is exactly how I would describe our programme for educational recovery. It is generous and broad based and is intended to help students, pupils and kids across the whole spectrum of abilities to make up the detriment to their learning. May I say how warmly I welcome Cumbria’s outdoor education approach? The al fresco learning that the hon. Gentleman supports sounds magnificent to me and should be replicated throughout the entire country. I look forward to hearing more about it.

[Mr Mark Harper (Forest of Dean) (Con)]

I can tell the Prime Minister that other venues are available and that the Forest of Dean would be fantastically keen to offer itself as a place for outdoor education for children across the United Kingdom.

I welcome what the Prime Minister said about being able to say more at the end of this month about relaxing all restrictions by 21 June, and he will know that I will welcome that, but may I take him to what he said in his statement about the winter? It is inevitable, I think, that, as with other respiratory viruses, we will see an increase in covid, and that there will be some increase in hospitalisations and deaths, although, because of our incredible vaccination roll-out and the effectiveness of our vaccines, that will be at a much lower level and will not overwhelm the national health service. So can he confirm that work is under way in Government to make sure that, even with that small increase— because of the success of our vaccinations—we will learn to live with the consequences of covid, as we do with flu, and that we will not need to shut down the country again in the winter?

[The Prime Minister]

There is plainly a difference, as my right hon. Friend understands very well, between a disease such as flu, which, every year, sadly causes a number—perhaps thousands—of hospitalisations and deaths, and a disease that has the potential to spread exponentially and to overwhelm the NHS. We need to be absolutely certain that we are right in thinking that we have broken the connection between covid transmission and hospitalisation, or serious illness and death, and that is still the question that we need to establish in the weeks and months ahead. I am optimistic about it, but that is the key issue.

I just want to make one point that I should have said earlier to my hon. Friend the Member for Bury South (Christian Wakeford) about weddings. It is very important that, for the purposes of the banns, we will be making an announcement within 28 days of 21 June.

Budget Resolutions and Economic Situation

Lord Harper Excerpts

Wednesday 3rd March 2021 Commons Chamber

[Mr Mark Harper (Forest of Dean) (Con)]

The first thing I want to say, reflecting on the Chancellor’s excellent Budget speech, is that in an emergency—that is what we have faced over the past year—it is right for the state to use its fiscal firepower to support the people of our country and protect jobs and livelihoods. That will be welcomed across the country, but particularly in my constituency. Listening to the Chancellor set out the more than £400 billion-worth of spending that has been put in place to support jobs and livelihoods, we can see the pay-off. The independent Office for Budget Responsibility now thinks that the level of unemployment we will reach at the peak is considerably lower than it was forecasting just last November. That reduction in the level of unemployment and the jobs that have been protected will be welcomed in my constituency and across the United Kingdom.

I also welcome the specific help in the Budget for my constituency. I particularly welcome the £150,000 to help my local authority put in place the capacity to bid for money from the levelling-up fund. As Members of Parliament are integrally involved, I look forward to working with it to put in place an ambitious plan to help improve economic conditions in my constituency. I also welcome the continued reduction in VAT for hospitality and tourism businesses, and the extension of the business rates holiday. I know that that will be incredibly welcome to those businesses in my constituency that are raring to go to get back into business but are not yet enabled to do so.

We have had a big, one-off amount of borrowing to get us through this crisis, so we need to get the public finances back in shape. The Chancellor set out very clearly why that is essential. First, if debt continues to rise, we are very vulnerable to a rise in interest rates. A 1% rise in interest rates, modest by historical standards, would mean our having to find £25 billion a year in debt interest. That would mean making very significant savings elsewhere from important public services. Secondly, we have to get the public finances in good shape to prepare us for the inevitable future crisis. As the Chancellor set out, it was only the difficult decisions that we took on tax and spending from 2010 onwards that allowed him to have the fiscal firepower and borrowing capacity to get us through this crisis. It is right that he wants to leave the public finances in shape, either for himself in the future or for a potential successor, to deal with any crises to come. It is important that that cannot happen immediately, but over time.

I am pleased to see in the independent forecast that we will get the Budget back into balance by 2025-26, by three mechanisms. The first is growing the economy faster, and I welcome the mechanisms that the Chancellor set out today to increase investment, to get businesses firing on all cylinders. However, secondly, it also requires controlling the growth in spending, and I am pleased to see controlled growth in public spending in the numbers. That will mean some difficult decisions in the spending review, and I say to Members on both sides of the House, especially my colleagues, that it will mean making choices, setting priorities and deciding what we think is important. We cannot spend money on absolutely everything we want; as Conservatives, we have to live within our means and make those difficult decisions. I hope that, as those decisions are made by ministerial colleagues and our Treasury colleagues later this year, we can all support them.

Finally, it also means an increase in taxes, which is uncomfortable for someone like me who wants to see lower taxes. I do not think we are undertaxed, because the tax rises in this Budget will leave us with the highest tax burden in my lifetime. However, I hope that they will be temporary and that, once we have got the public finances back into shape, the Chancellor—as he says, he is a low-tax Conservative—will be able to look to continue increasing public spending in line with the growth of the economy, but also to reduce taxes so that people can keep more of their hard-earned income, which is central to being a Conservative.

This is a very well-judged Budget that gets the public finances back into shape, deals with the crisis—the emergency —we have faced, prepares us for growth in the years to come and leaves us in better shape than the Chancellor found the Treasury. I commend it to the House.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)]

I understand that the hon. Member for Brent North (Barry Gardiner) is having some technical problems, so we will go to David Mundell.

Covid-19: Road Map

Lord Harper Excerpts

Monday 22nd February 2021 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I am delighted to see the hon. Gentleman back on fighting form. Having enjoyed lively on-screen debates with him in the past, it is good to see him back in shape. He is right to draw attention to the long-term consequences of the disease, and we will do everything we can to alleviate suffering and to continue to invest in support for those who need it.

[Mr Mark Harper (Forest of Dean) (Con)]

First, I thank the Prime Minister for the measures to get our children back to school on 8 March, which is very welcome—it is something we have called for, and I think he should be congratulated on that—and also for the speed of the vaccine roll-out. Could I just press him a little on the thoughts behind vaccinating groups 1 to 9, which is everyone over 50 and those aged 16 to 64 with a health condition that makes them vulnerable to covid? Those groups account for 99% of deaths and around 80% of hospitalisations, so for what reason, once they have been vaccinated and protected from covid by the end of April at the latest, is there any need for restrictions to continue?

[The Prime Minister]

My right hon. Friend makes an excellent point. The difficulty is that, of course, there will be at least a significant minority who either have not taken up the vaccine in those vulnerable groups for the reasons that the House has been discussing or who, having had the vaccine, are not given sufficient protection. We believe that the protection is very substantial, but there will be a large minority who will not have sufficient protection. The risk is that letting the brakes off could see the disease surge up in such a way as again to rip through a large number or rip through those groups in a way that I do not think anybody in this country would want. I am afraid it is pure mathematics; there is still a substantial body of risk. We also need to wait and see exactly what the effects of the vaccine are. There is some promising data, but I think what the country would want at this stage is caution and certainty and irreversibility, and that is what we aim to provide.

Northern Ireland Protocol: Disruption to Trade

Lord Harper Excerpts

Wednesday 13th January 2021 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

We have.

[Mr Mark Harper (Forest of Dean) (Con)]

Can I ask the Minister about the issues raised by a number of Members about grace periods? How will he assess whether he thinks things are in a good enough state for him to press for those grace periods to be extended, which a number of Members have called for? It is fine for grace periods to expire if we are in good shape, but people will not understand if we are still having teething problems some way into this year.

[Michael Gove]

My right hon. Friend is absolutely right. The way of doing so is by working with supermarkets and other major suppliers in order to make sure that they are ready. Of course we will make it clear to the European Commission what the consequences would be if supermarkets were not in a position to carry on with the service they provide to Northern Ireland consumers.

Public Health

Lord Harper Excerpts

Tuesday 1st December 2020 Commons Chamber

[Mr Mark Harper (Forest of Dean) (Con)]

Covid is a very serious disease, and I take it very seriously, as I do the pressures on our national health service. It is disappointing that some people, when faced with different arguments or questions, always either accuse those of us who have a different view, pretending that we want to let it rip, or present, as the Government did yesterday in their economic analysis, a counterfactual, which is doing nothing. This is not about that; it is about doing the right thing that is going to be effective.

That is why I wrote to the Prime Minister with 70 colleagues asking for as much information as we could have about the effectiveness of the measures being proposed—not just whether they are too tough, but whether they will be effective enough. They definitely come with big economic costs, and if we are to pay those economic costs and those costs on people’s lives and livelihoods, I want to know that they will have the effect of suppressing the virus. We simply do not have that information. The modellers who work for SAGE are very uncertain about even the effects of tiers as a whole, let alone individual measures.

I am also concerned, from talking to my local NHS, about pressure on the health service, but again, I ask for the modelling and forecasting about NHS capacity. That was leaked before this lockdown that we are in at the moment, but it was never published—never substantiated—and the specific forecast in that leaked information turned out to be wrong. All I ask is that Ministers share with the House the modelling and forecasts that they have seen that have led them to come to the conclusions that they have reached, if they wish to take the House with them. Unfortunately, they have so far failed to do so.

I also want to say a word about the hospitality industry, which the Prime Minister, in his opening remarks, agreed was taking a disproportionate impact. There is very little hard evidence that covid transmission is high in those settings. If the covid-secure guidelines are to have any meaning, the Government should work with the sector to understand, if there are risks, how they can be managed.

I will give one example. In papers published at the end of last week, there were some concerns raised about ventilation. Two things: the Government have never discussed that with the industry subsequent to the publication of the guidance in the summer, and UKHospitality thinks that 80% of premises are up to the specifications that SAGE thinks are required. If there are issues, let us deal with them. Let those businesses open; do not just give them taxpayers’ money to keep them closed.

My final point is about what happens at the vote in January. Based on the fact that I do not think the Government have provided the information necessary to the House today to take decisions that are, by any normal measure, draconian, I am afraid I will not be able to support them. I say to my hon. Friend the Minister that if the Government want to maximise unity both in the House and in our party at the vote in January, they need to start treating Members of Parliament properly, and they need to start sharing with Members of Parliament the information that I hope Ministers are asking for but I fear they are not. If the Government were to do that, even though these are difficult decisions and the forecasts are uncertain, I think that people would be prepared to give them the benefit of the doubt. It is because they are not treating the House like that that I am afraid, on this occasion, I am not prepared to give them the benefit of the doubt and I will vote against the regulations this evening.

Covid-19: Winter Plan

Lord Harper Excerpts

Monday 23rd November 2020 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I do not know who the right hon. Gentleman means in his attack on those who do not encourage investment in science. He certainly cannot mean this Government, because we put forward the biggest ever programme of investment in research and development and in a creating an advanced research projects facility that we hope will rival that of the United States. We are investing in pure science and applied science at a scale undreamed of by any previous Government—I think it arrives at about £22 billion a year at the end of the spending review period. I really do not know who the right hon. Gentleman is talking about, but whichever right-wing foes he has in view, they cannot be this Government.

On the point about supporting the self-employed, this has been very difficult, and we are doing whatever we can to help the self-employed and the excluded. So far £13.5 billion—I think more now—has gone to support the self-employed. Those particularly in the artistic and cultural sectors are beneficiaries of the £1.57 billion investment in the arts and culture. There are many things that apply generally, such as the cut in VAT, bounce back loans of all kinds and grants that are available to everybody, but the best thing for everybody in all sectors is just to get the economy moving again, get the virus down and move forward. That is the objective of this winter plan.

[Mr Mark Harper (Forest of Dean) (Con)]

I thank the Prime Minister for agreeing to meet me and my hon. Friend the Member for Wycombe (Mr Baker) on behalf of 70 colleagues who wrote to him at the weekend, and we look forward to discussing that matter in more detail later. Many hon. Members will hold their judgment on this plan until we know which areas go into which tiers, and I think that areas that go into tier 3 will struggle to spot much of a difference from the lockdown. For each of these restrictions that have such an impact on people and businesses, will the Prime Minister set out the impact that he is expecting it to have on dealing with covid, as well as the non-covid health impact, and—importantly—the impact on people’s livelihoods, so that we know that each measure will save more lives than it costs?

[The Prime Minister]

Indeed; I would be delighted to meet my right hon. Friend and my hon. Friend the Member for Wycombe (Mr Baker), who have written an excellent letter to me. I hope that he agrees that many of the points in that letter were answered in my statement: about sport, the curfew, non-essential retail, gyms, personal—[Inaudible.]