Business of the House

Andrea Leadsom Excerpts

Thursday 11th March 2021 Commons Chamber

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

I am delighted to clear it up. Her Majesty’s Opposition voted against the Queen’s Speech at the beginning of this Session. The increases that this Government proposed in NHS funding were a centrepiece of the Gracious Speech, and their votes against the Queen’s Speech were an attempt to stifle the Government’s agenda before it had even begun. The Queen’s Speech made clear our intention to establish in law for the first time the NHS’s multi-year funding settlement, a testament to how seriously the Government take funding the NHS. We have delivered a 12.8% increase in nurses’ pay over three years and we are seeing a 34% increase in nurses’ applications. The right hon. and learned Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition did not ask about a Bill. He asked about a document, and it seems to me that the Queen’s Speech is a document because it is printed, on very fine paper normally—it used to be on vellum.

We have to live within our means. Everyone recognises that. There is not a single person in this country who does not recognise the phenomenal contribution made by the NHS over the last year, by doctors, nurses and all those who work in the NHS, but the Government—the taxpayer—have an enormous deficit, one of the biggest in our history, and what is happening is reasonable within the context that nurses have already received a 0.7% increase. They will receive a further 1% increase in the next financial year, as will all NHS workers. It is worth bearing in mind that the last time there was a 1% increase in NHS pay, it led to an average 2.7% increase for the average worker in the NHS because of grade increments. So actually, the situation is considerably better than is being painted by the Opposition, and the admiration and appreciation of what people who work in the NHS have done is shared across the whole country, but the country has to live within its means. That is a hard truth that the Opposition seek to run away from.

[Andrea Leadsom (South Northamptonshire) (Con)]

My right hon. Friend will see that the restoration and renewal sponsor body’s latest report, out today, recommends exactly the same as the report in 2014 and the report in 2016, and draws the same conclusion as the Parliamentary Buildings (Restoration and Renewal) Bill that I introduced in 2018. My right hon Friend must surely see that the risks of a major asbestos leak, a sewage failure, or, indeed, a devastating fire, such as we saw at Notre Dame, are very high and remain very high, and we have virtually no contingency for this place. My personal motto is JFDI, and I would like to offer that to my right hon. Friend to gird his loins to make some progress.