Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Andrew Bridgen and Tobias Ellwood(5 years, 10 months ago)
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Andrew Bridgen (North West Leicestershire) (Con)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Defence (Mr Tobias Ellwood)
I am pleased to say that the majority of people make the transition into civilian life without a problem, but there are those who require our support, and we have provided a new programme through the mental health and wellbeing strategy to emphasise this approach. We are also focusing on the veterans strategy, which will provide for a consultation on what more we can do to support those affected by PTSD.
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Andrew Bridgen and Tobias Ellwood(7 years, 4 months ago)
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Mr Ellwood
I am grateful to the hon. Lady for calling me the Secretary of State; I hope that if enough people say that, it will actually—[Interruption.] I should not say that. I will say, however, that the hon. Lady raises the important issue of ensuring that service family accommodation is up to par. That forms part of our armed forces people proposals, which I will be speaking more about in the House. I hope that we will have the opportunity to review the contract in 2021, but I hope the hon. Lady understands that negotiations will take place and that we will we keep the House updated.
Andrew Bridgen (North West Leicestershire) (Con)
Will my right hon. Friend assure the House that there are no plans to eradicate single-living accommodation for service personnel?
Mr Ellwood
As far as I understand it, there are no plans to remove single-living accommodation, which forms part of the complex offering of service family accommodation. As we have heard, we need to rationalise the defence estate across the country, and we are returning officers and personnel from the Rhine, which will require building projects, including single-living accommodation.
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Andrew Bridgen and Tobias Ellwood(8 years, 6 months ago)
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Andrew Bridgen (North West Leicestershire) (Con)
Does the Minister agree that the money that this country spends supporting refugees in Iraq and Syria can support a far greater number of people far better than attempting to relocate refugees to the UK, and that it is right that the focus of our efforts is to support people in the region?
Mr Ellwood
My hon. Friend raises an important point. The Yazidis as a group are endogamous and have not grown as much as other groupings in Iraq. They want to stay together and they want to stay in the area. For every one person that we are able to support in the UK, we can support more than 20 people in location—clearly, on a different standard, but it means that our money can go a lot further and we can pride ourselves on being one of the largest supporters in Syria and Iraq.
Immigration (Bulgaria and Romania)
Debate between Andrew Bridgen and Tobias Ellwood(10 years, 11 months ago)
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Mr Ellwood
The best person to clarify that will be the Minister, but those are the figures that I have been presented with. Indeed, they were put forward by the Home Secretary when the Immigration Bill was read for the Third time a couple of weeks ago.
To return to a point on which I think there will be more common ground, given what my hon. Friends have already said, the EU needs to change. It needs to recognise that its rules are out of date. There is a disparity between the income per head of joining members and that of other member states. It is so large that it is not surprising that some people will choose to abandon their own country and move to a richer one.
Andrew Bridgen
My hon. Friend mentioned rough sleeping. What does he think the impact on the number of rough sleepers in London and our major cities will be of relaxing the transitional arrangements with Bulgaria and Romania after 31 December?
Mr Ellwood
In a way, that point has already been answered. There are those who get through the system and who are here already, which is why it was rather bizarre that the right hon. Member for Leicester East was going to go to Luton airport to watch people coming through. If people are determined to get through the system, they can already get here visa-free. However, the Prime Minister has made it clear that that will no longer be tolerated under the new rules.
It is important we take the lead in the EU. Some of my hon. Friends have no faith in what can be achieved, but I believe that, for the first time in many years, Britain is taking the lead in the EU, and British influence is increasing. Labour gave away our opt-out and our fishing rights, and it opened our borders when Germany, France and others decided to keep theirs closed. In contrast, this Government have managed to secure a trade deal with South Korea, and there is a trade deal with America in the offing. We have also had the first ever reduction in the EU budget, and there is an EU patent agreement—something that extends right across Europe.
Those things came about not just because of agreement in Europe, but because they were British-led initiatives. When we decide to step forward and we understand what is going on, other nations around Europe follow us. I am not sure Labour particularly understood that, and nor, if we are fair, did this Government. We can influence the direction of travel in Europe; we do not have to leave that to France and Germany, and we should not have an attitude that says we should. If we do leave things to them, and we do not affect the decisions that are made upstream before legislation is created, we have no right to complain about the outcome.
In conclusion, migration is a sensitive subject at any time, but thanks to the disastrous decisions taken by the previous Government, it has become very emotive indeed. We are overdue tougher migration rules, and I am pleased this Government are now producing them. However, the challenge posed by new EU immigrants could have been avoided had tougher decisions been taken further down the line.