Israel and Gaza

Tony Lloyd Excerpts

Monday 16th October 2023 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I thank my right hon. Friend for welcoming me to her constituency this morning, and for joining me on what was an incredibly powerful visit to one of her local schools. I praise the courage and eloquence of the students we heard, who were incredible in explaining how this has affected them and their families. She has my assurance that we will continue to stand with Israel, as I said this morning, not just today, not just tomorrow, but always.

[Tony Lloyd (Rochdale) (Lab)]

The Prime Minister is absolutely right to say that the unspeakable actions of Hamas mean that Israel has not simply the right but a duty to protect its own citizens. However, Israel also has a duty to protect innocent Palestinians. How does Israel cutting off food and water seriously bring the hostages home and help to defeat Hamas?

[The Prime Minister]

It is not right for us to prescribe how another country can best exercise its lawful right—indeed, it is a duty—to self-defence, but as a friend we will continue to call on Israel to take every precaution to avoid harming civilians.

G20

Tony Lloyd Excerpts

Thursday 17th November 2022 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. It is an issue that he has rightly championed on previous occasions. I can give him that reassurance. The NATO Secretary-General was in the United Kingdom just days ago, visiting the training that we are providing for Ukrainian soldiers. It is looked at favourably by many allies around the world, which is why Prime Minister Trudeau was pleased to confirm when he was with me an extension to Canadian support for that programme. Hopefully many more countries will follow.

[Tony Lloyd (Rochdale) (Lab)]

It is not so many months ago that any international conference such as the G20 would have been seized with the situation in Afghanistan. Afghanistan has now gone off the agenda, but the humanitarian crisis there is moving into absolute tragedy as people are facing starvation. Can the Prime Minister tell us what conversations took place about Afghanistan? In any case, will he now reconvene the kind of donor conference that could make a material difference to starvation in that country?

[The Prime Minister]

The hon. Member is right to highlight that Afghanistan continues to experience one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises. That is why earlier this year we co-hosted a UN pledging summit, together with Germany and Qatar, that helped to raise over $2 billion for Afghanistan, but he is right to put it on the agenda. I will make sure that we continue to do what we can to support the people there.

Oral Answers to Questions

Tony Lloyd Excerpts

Wednesday 7th September 2022 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

Cancer is a devastating disease, and it is particularly heartbreaking when children have cancer. We will certainly proceed with the strategy that my hon. Friend has mentioned, and I know that our new Health Secretary will do all she can to help those children with cancer.

[Tony Lloyd (Rochdale) (Lab)]

Q8. On the theme of children, the Prime Minister will know from her time as Children’s Minister that children whose young lungs are exposed to cold and damp housing are more likely to fall seriously ill and possibly die. Child poverty has been growing during her time in different ministerial offices. Will she give a solemn pledge—with no evasion—that no child will go to bed in a cold, damp house this winter and beyond because the parents cannot afford to put the heating on?

[The Prime Minister]

This is why it is so important that we tackle the issue of energy. I will make sure that people are able to afford their energy bills, at the same time as dealing with the long-term supply issues to ensure that we are resilient in energy and never get into this position again.

Oral Answers to Questions

Tony Lloyd Excerpts

Wednesday 20th July 2022 Commons Chamber

[Dame Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

6. What assessment he has made of the potential role of energy efficiency in meeting the UK’s climate targets.

[Tony Lloyd (Rochdale) (Lab)]

8. What assessment he has made of the potential role of energy efficiency in meeting the UK’s climate targets.

[The COP26 President (Alok Sharma)]

Buildings are one of the largest sources of greenhouse gas emissions in our country, accounting for around 22% of total UK emissions. Energy efficiency measures are, indeed, a vital lever to drive down emissions, energy demand and, ultimately, bills.

--- Later in debate ---

[Alok Sharma]

The Government will, of course, respond to the report on the green homes grant, but I point out that some elements of it—the local authority delivery element and the social housing decarbonisation fund—have provided significant amounts of funding.

[Tony Lloyd]

The COP President will know that the bulk of buildings that are around today will still be around in 2030 and 2050. Most of them are grossly inadequately insulated; even new buildings are not being built to an acceptable standard. When are we going to see some action on this crucial agenda?

[Alok Sharma]

I have set out the amount of funding the Government are providing over this Parliament—£6.6 billion on energy efficiency. I very much share the view that we need to be doing even more on this, particularly as we face energy security issues and energy prices are so high; more insulation in homes will deliver lower bills for households.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Prime Minister]

I heartily agree with my right hon. Friend. It is not just inequality; it is inequality of opportunity, and that is what levelling up addresses.

[Tony Lloyd (Rochdale) (Lab)]

Q5.   Very few people in the north of England believe that the levelling-up agenda has achieved anything at all. The Prime Minister has a few days left in office. Can he use that time to drive through the TransPennine rail system that we were promised would be finished in 2019 and will not be finished before 2030? It is a shambles, and he is responsible.

[The Prime Minister]

Actually, this Government are responsible for three new high-speed lines, including Northern Powerhouse Rail, which no previous Government have done.

Northern Ireland Protocol Bill

Tony Lloyd Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 19th July 2022 Commons Chamber

[Tony Lloyd (Rochdale) (Lab)]

The hon. Member is making a very good speech. It is not the EU that wants to change the rules; rather, we hear from some contenders for the Conservative leadership that they want to change the rules. They want to strip away regulation, as indeed do some members of the DUP. Is that not a concern for the agricultural sector?

[Stephen Farry]

Absolutely; I concur very much with what the hon. Member says. Regulation sometimes has a negative connotation, but it is there to protect everyone’s interests and it is there for often very good and valid reasons. It is noticeable that we do not have the Foreign Secretary with us today—or indeed for any stage of the Bill, apart from the first hour—even though she has been very keen to promote it, for whatever agenda she has.

Confidence in Her Majesty’s Government

Tony Lloyd Excerpts

Monday 18th July 2022 Commons Chamber

[Tony Lloyd (Rochdale) (Lab)]

I am delighted to follow my right hon. Friend the Member for East Ham (Sir Stephen Timms). Morality and probity in public life matters—it really does—and we need to establish that. I was proud to become a Member of Parliament, and I think we believed that and were right to believe it. During my lifetime there have been 10 Conservative Prime Ministers, the bulk of whom would have found the idea of lying to Parliament anathema. Yet I am afraid we have a Prime Minister who has broken that code, and that matters.

I have listened to Conservative Members extolling the virtues of the Prime Minister and the Government. There are things that I would agree with the Prime Minister about, such as Ukraine, on which this country now has a proud record. But across the world, we are now a laughing stock. This country, which was once the hallmark for probity, is now a hallmark for lawbreaking. We know there is potential lawbreaking in terms of the Northern Ireland protocol, because the Prime Minister has not got Brexit done. He has betrayed and made a fool of every Conservative Member of Parliament who stood up today, and in the past, and said, “We’ve got Brexit done.” Brexit has not been done.

There was the attempt to keep Owen Paterson in office, and the overriding of Sir Alex Allan, the Prime Minister’s ethics adviser, who declared that the Home Secretary had broken the ministerial code of conduct. Of course those things are important and matter, but it matters even more that nearly 40% of children in my constituency are living in poverty. In some wards the figure is as high as one in two children. That matters, and the Government are failing abysmally to deal with such things. They should be ashamed. It matters that climate change—the biggest issue our nation faces—hardly got a mention by the Prime Minister or anybody else on the Government Benches. Climate change makes a difference to the futures of children in my constituency, and to children across the planet. The Government are failing on those issues on a day-to-day basis.

In the end, what is ironic about this debate is that we could almost believe that it was not Conservative MPs who decapitated the Prime Minister. They got rid of him—not us—but one would not think that was the case today, given the way they describe their loyalty to the now outgoing Prime Minister. Of course, Cabinet Ministers did not resign. Only recently, when they saw their own futures at stake, did they make a decision to get rid of a losing Prime Minister. Before that, despite all his incompetence and failures, they stuck with him.

Northern Ireland Protocol Bill

Tony Lloyd Excerpts

Committee stage
Wednesday 13th July 2022 Commons Chamber

[Stephen Farry]

Amendment 24 would remove from clause 4 the measures that strip out the heart of the protocol, namely article 5, which relates to the management of the customs union and single market as they pertain to Northern Ireland, making it an excluded provision under domestic law. That, of course, would be a unilateral breach of the protocol, rather than working through negotiations to find durable solutions. The effect of that unilateral action would be to undermine Northern Ireland’s current unfettered access to both the single market and customs union for goods.

Fundamentally, there is no escaping the Brexit trilemma. When the Government decided to leave both the single market and the customs union, that required some form of interface to be put in place somewhere between the UK and the European Union’s economic zones, and that interface must be managed and mitigated as far as possible. The protocol offers relative opportunities for Northern Ireland compared with Great Britain, and they should be preserved and maximised. However, the protocol also poses challenges that need to be minimised.

The solutions must be mutually agreed, sustainable and legal. Northern Ireland businesses need certainty, and the only way through the process is negotiation. As someone who is at least a pragmatist or a realist on the protocol and who was a strong opponent of Brexit, I firmly believe that the European Union needs to be as flexible as possible, and that much more can be done in that regard—it is important that I put that on the record. At the same time, we must be brutally honest that the Government have been disingenuous in their approach to the negotiations over the past 12 months. Engagement has been extremely limited and, at times, counterproductive.

The Bill itself makes the prospect for negotiations even harder. Indeed, the passage of the Bill will probably make negotiations almost impossible. The European Union has been clear that it is tantamount to asking for negotiations with a metaphorical gun sitting on the table. By contrast, the key ingredients for progress are trust and partnership, but unilateral action undermines trust. Trust is central in two respects—first, to securing solutions in the first place; and, secondly, to ensuring their ongoing operation.

I want to highlight two particular solutions that are out there. A lot of Members have talked about them and, indeed, there has been a lot of commentary outside this Chamber as well. The first relates to red and green channels. On the surface, I think there is a lot of common ground between me and others from Northern Ireland, the Government and the European Union on something generally speaking along those lines. There is of course a major difference in the approach by which we get from A to B and reach such a conclusion, and I think that is the fundamental difference of opinion in relation to the Bill.

While Ministers keep saying that there is broad-based support for at least some aspects of the Bill, I am firmly opposed to achieving those through unilateral action, because that is not actually a genuine solution. We have to recognise that there may be some differences over the details of what this may look like in practice, and we need to be open, frank and honest about those. A green lane may not necessarily mean a fully open door; there may still need to be some degree of a risk-based approach to how that is managed. However, I think the essential concept remains that processed or final goods destined to remain in Northern Ireland should not be treated as something posing a risk to the EU single market or customs union.

The second aspect I want to focus on is a UK-EU veterinary agreement. It may be that we do end up with something that is very bespoke for the Irish sea interface, but I think we should focus on what should be the first preference, which is a UK-wide solution. The UK retains very high standards for agrifood, and they are de facto aligned with those of the European Union, but because the legal regimes do not align, we end up with barriers—frankly, needless barriers. That makes it much more difficult than it need be to manage movements across the Irish sea, but it also poses huge issues for the entire UK economy. In particular, the agrifood sector exports to the European Union—indeed, the European Union is by far the main export market for UK agrifood producers —and we are seeing a major shortfall in agrifood exports as a consequence of Brexit and the absence of a veterinary agreement.

People talk about what I suppose are the two polar opposite approaches to a veterinary agreement: first, there is the Swiss model, which is based on dynamic alignment; and, secondly, we have the New Zealand model, which is based on mutual recognition. The nature of New Zealand’s trade with the European Union, given the geography and a more limited range of products, will be different from that of the UK, which has its own requirements. Frankly, however, it is absurd that New Zealand has easier access to Northern Ireland for agrifood than the UK.

The Government face a choice between continuing to pursue the hardest of hard Brexits, especially on agrifood, when it makes no sense to diverge whatsoever, and being pragmatic and considering some form of veterinary agreement. That veterinary agreement may well end up being unique. It will be a UK-EU solution: it will not be the Swiss model or the New Zealand model, but something else. A veterinary agreement has the potential to reduce agrifood checks across the Irish sea by as much as 80%, and that would go a massive way to addressing the heart of the issue. Parallel movements could also address the pets issue, which has been a source of contention for many pet owners across these islands.

[Tony Lloyd]

On the veterinary agreement, an EU that has negotiated—in good faith, one assumes—with New Zealand and Switzerland, would negotiate in good faith with the United Kingdom. The point that the hon. Gentleman makes is a real one, but for many years, both the agrifood business and farmers have worked to the same common standards in the UK and the EU. We have not diverged so far, so could that not be part of rebuilding the trust that he spoke about?

Functioning of Government

Tony Lloyd Excerpts

Thursday 7th July 2022 Commons Chamber

[Michael Ellis]

I think my hon. Friend knows that I attended a meeting of the EU-UK Partnership Council in Brussels recently. The functions of Government, including in the international sphere, will continue apace.

[Tony Lloyd (Rochdale) (Lab)]

Before the House—before both Houses—there are two major Bills affecting Northern Ireland. The Northern Ireland Protocol Bill is about the Prime Minister’s own decision, while the Northern Ireland Troubles (Legacy and Reconciliation) Bill is very much the now-resigned Secretary of State’s province. Can we have absolute clarity, at this critical moment in the history of Northern Ireland and its relations with both the rest of the UK and Ireland, that we will get some sense from this Government about how we take these important matters forward?

[Michael Ellis]

I am particularly conscious of the Northern Ireland Protocol Bill, to which I think the hon. Gentleman is referring. The Leader of the House will be doing the usual business questions session soon in this House.

CHOGM, G7 and NATO Summits

Tony Lloyd Excerpts

Monday 4th July 2022 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I thank my right hon. Friend very much for his role as the UK’s envoy for trade with Japan. I can tell him that the opportunities are absolutely immense, and the Government of Fumio Kishida are determined to progress the alliance with the UK to new heights. He is absolutely right to talk about science and technology. As he knows, we have just lifted barriers to trade with Japan, but what we are also looking at is a partnership with Japan in defence technology that I think could be the foundation of immense future progress, particularly on science and technology.

[Tony Lloyd (Rochdale) (Lab)]

There is no doubt about the strength of support in NATO and the G7 for this defence of Ukraine and this defence of the legitimate freedom of Ukraine, but there are credible reports that it is now becoming increasingly difficult to get weaponry and ammunition across the globe.

[The Secretary of State for Defence (Mr Ben Wallace)]

indicated dissent.

[Tony Lloyd]

The Defence Secretary is shaking his head, but there are reports. Was this raised at all at NATO, and can we guarantee that the supply of armaments and the supply of ammunition will be available?

[The Prime Minister]

The hon. Gentleman raises an interesting point. As he knows, the UK began the Ramstein process, where countries commit substantial sums as well as matériel to Ukraine. I am not aware of any logistical problems that we are facing so far. We are still seeing great progress in getting arms into Ukraine, but there is a lot more to do.

Debate on the Address

Tony Lloyd Excerpts

Tuesday 10th May 2022 Commons Chamber

[Tony Lloyd (Rochdale) (Lab)]

It is a delight to follow the hon. Member for Southend West (Anna Firth) making her maiden speech. Like other Members, I strongly empathise with her remarks about David Amess, who was a friend to many of us. He was absolutely somebody who showed the best of this House of Commons of ours. He will be a tough act to follow, but the hon. Lady’s speech shows why she is now the Member of Parliament to take on David’s many battles. As a northerner I thought for a long time that Leigh-on-Sea was as credible as the Wigan pier, but I empathise with the visions of those mac-wearing people changing on the beach, because that happened in the rather cooler climes of Blackpool and Southport in the north of England. I wish the hon. Lady every success in her role.

For many of us, the Queen’s Speech was a tale of two countries. The Prime Minister sought to set out a vision of a country going forward, but the reality for many of our constituents is a country that is frankly in reverse gear. Over the course of the election campaign, many of my constituents and those in other areas where I knocked on doors told me that they are frightened: for example, the constituent whose husband had to wait for seven hours for an ambulance or my constituents who are on waiting lists, which seem to grow, not get shorter. They are frightened about their health and even the possibility of early death while they are on those waiting lists.

My constituents in schools are concerned about their future: the high-quality education that is in the brochure is not delivered on the ground because of underfunding—not lack of good teachers, but not enough teachers and investment in our education.

At the moment, my constituents are particularly frightened about issues such as housing. My hon. Friend the Member for Hackney South and Shoreditch (Dame Meg Hillier) talked about London. The London housing market is unique, but the lack of social housing and affordable housing is felt right across this country. There is a housing crisis in my constituency, but nothing in this Queen’s Speech touches on that.

Undoubtedly, the biggest issue in this country is the cost of living crisis. I have not personally had such a large number of emails on an issue. Again, we have a tale of two countries. Companies such as Centrica, BP and Shell are making record profits, much of which goes to their already well-heeled shareholders, and yet my constituents—and those of Members on both sides of this House—have seen a 50% increase in the energy price cap and are likely to see an equivalent increase later this year. Our constituents are frightened about what that will mean. People really are frightened to put on the heating or to use the oven. They simply do not know how they will make it through to the end of the month.

A woman wrote to me. She is a teacher and a single parent. She has been able to buy her own home, but is frightened that she may have to sell it because she cannot afford the upkeep. She is not among what we think of as the worst off. A professional teacher should simply not be in that position, but she is frightened—frightened for her children and frightened for her budget.

A wife has told me that, although she is in work, she is concerned that her husband will lose the car that he gets because he is disabled. This car, which gets him around, gives him his own life support mechanism. She is frightened that that will go, and makes the point that his 3.1% benefit increase for his disability is, de facto, a serious decrease in his income, as inflation is likely to hit 10% later this year.

Pensioners are also concerned about how they will make ends meet. They have seen the Government break their promise on the triple lock. They have seen only a 3.1% increase in their pensions, when they know inflation will hit levels way above that. These people are very concerned about the future of this country and cannot see these glossy brochure visions that the Prime Minister has given us. We must do something about that. We must do something about the fact that it is not just those in the lowest economic groupings in our society who are suffering; people across the piece are worried.

There are things that the Government can do. Even increasing the national minimum wage by 50p to £10, for which many on the Opposition Benches argue, would yield in the order of £900 a year. Even after tax, that uplift would go some way to paying the increased energy costs. Why did the Chancellor not do that? These are important issues. We could, even now, take those up. We could see a reversal in some of the tax increases that have been introduced for those on average and lower incomes who have been penalised by the Government. That would be the right thing to do in a responsible society. We should send a message to those who are better off in our society—to people such as me who are over retirement age but who pay no national insurance. That must be wrong in our society. Why should I, who get the benefits of working, not be making my contribution? Why should those on higher incomes not be paying national insurance pro rata? Let the strong look after those who are weaker. We say that to our police officers. We say, “You who are strong look after those who are weak.” We say that to those with the brains to run our hospitals. We say, “Those of you who are strong look after the vulnerable.” Why do we not say to the better off, “You help look after those most in need”? That is the mantra of a fair society.

However, there were other issues that I looked for in the Queen’s Speech. For example, what are we going to do about the climate crisis? This has already been mentioned, but there is nothing in the speech, or even in the Government’s puffing around it, to indicate that there will be investment in home insulation, which is fundamental if we are to tackle the climate crisis. There are many things the Government can do to create jobs and skills. It seems so obvious that a crash emergency programme of home insulation would be part of moving the nation in the right direction, but that is simply not there. It would be good for saving energy costs and great for saving this planet. Let’s do it! But it is not there.

There are many other things I could cover, but I turn to the situation in Northern Ireland. I say this to my friends from Northern Ireland, both here and elsewhere: Northern Ireland is in a political crisis; we know that. When the Stormont Assembly was not meeting, I spent time talking to many people about the need for a constructive and effective Executive in the north of Ireland. The needs of the people of Northern Ireland are very similar to the needs of people in my constituency. They face an underfunded and badly structured health system and the reality that the cost of living crisis is hurting people, and they have real concerns about investment in education in the north of Ireland. Those concerns are felt across the piece; they do not have tribal identities. I say to the hon. Members here that I understand that the debate about the protocol has to go on, and we will agree and disagree on aspects of it, but having an effective Executive matters.

The right hon. Member for Lagan Valley (Sir Jeffrey M. Donaldson) talks about “permanent political instability”; that is not a message about the constructive process that devolved government should be about. I believe in devolved government, because I believe it is good for the people of Northern Ireland, but as we see at the moment, we will not have that constructive devolution if we once again have a boycott.

[Ian Paisley (North Antrim) (DUP)]

My party believes in devolution very strongly; indeed, it has done a lot of the heavy lifting to make devolution work—more than many others—but I gently tell the hon. Gentleman that the cost of living crisis is accentuated in Northern Ireland by costs that are in the region of 27% to 34% higher because of the border in the Irish sea. The protocol has to be removed, or that crisis will go on and poison all relationships and the economy.

[Tony Lloyd]

I understand that the hon. Gentleman’s party is committed to devolution and has been part of making that devolution process work over the years. I know that that transformed the situation on the ground in Northern Ireland. The Prime Minister’s protocol is something that must be debated in this Chamber. Members of the Democratic Unionist party are here to debate that in this Chamber, and I hope they take that opportunity. However, reform of the health service, things that could be done about the cost of living crisis and education are issues in the here and now, and I implore DUP Members to think seriously about what stopping reform on those issues would do.

One thing that all parties in Northern Ireland can unite on—the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) made an important comment about this—is the legacy of the troubles. Over time, I have listened to many victims of the troubles and their families, and their common insistence is still that they want justice. I fear that this amnesty proposal, which would block inquests and other processes, will hinder that search for justice. That unites people across the political divide in Northern Ireland.

[Sammy Wilson]

I know the hon. Gentleman does not want his speech dominated by the Northern Ireland issue, but will he accept that the Northern Ireland protocol is not only adding significantly to the cost of living crisis in Northern Ireland and slowing down the Northern Ireland economy’s recovery from covid, but poisoning the very essence of the Belfast agreement, and therefore stopping the working of the institutions? It removes democracy, because not only Unionist Members, but all Members of the Assembly will have no say on 60% of the laws. It also removes the principle of consent, because although not one Unionist Member supports the protocol, it will be the role of those Members in the Northern Ireland Executive to implement the very protocol that the Unionist population are being damaged by, economically and constitutionally.

[Tony Lloyd]

We will, no doubt, continue to debate the protocol and its impact. As hon. Members know, there are those in Northern Ireland who say, “Business wants to get on and make the protocol work.” My central point is that delaying reform of education, important investment and the good governance of Northern Ireland is a very high price to pay for bringing the matter of the protocol before this House.

I have probably spoken enough, but I want to say two kind things about the Queen’s Speech. The first is that the potential to do something about victims is a major, important step forward. The second is that we are seeing some progress on the governance of football. That may seem peripheral to many people, but football matters. It is our national game. I look forward to seeing the detail on this, because it is important to get it right.