Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Andrew Bridgen and Richard Graham

Monday 17th November 2014 Commons Chamber

[Richard Graham (Gloucester) (Con)]

5. What recent steps she has taken to speed up the process of deportation.

[Andrew Bridgen (North West Leicestershire) (Con)]

13. What recent steps she has taken to speed up the process of deportation.

Welfare Benefits Up-rating Bill

Debate between Andrew Bridgen and Richard Graham

Monday 21st January 2013 Commons Chamber

[Richard Graham]

I am sorry, but we have no more time for further interventions—

[Andrew Bridgen]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Richard Graham]

The hon. Lady will have to wait, and so will my hon. Friend.

I reject completely the idea of moral divisions. This is not an argument between what the hon. Member for Gateshead (Ian Mearns) called a compassion-bypass Government and an economic-car-crash Government. It is about what is fair for the people who pay the taxes that pay for the services and benefits and what is fair for those who receive them. Many of us will have had letters from constituents who work for not very much money, contrary to what the hon. Member for Chesterfield implied, and who point out that their motivation for working suffers when they realise that those who do not work have received more than double the increase in their wage over the past year.

Measuring social justice entirely by how much we spend of other people’s money to generate a system where we now pay more in interest on our debt than we spend on the entire education budget—that is not moral compassion. It is wrong, and that is why we must make practical decisions that are sometimes tough. One of them is being presented to us this evening and I shall support the Bill.