Oral Answers to Questions

Andrew Jones Excerpts

Wednesday 17th November 2021 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I appreciate that ambulance crews and ambulance services are doing an amazing job, particularly at this time of year, and I thank them for what they are doing. We are supporting them with more cash. Another £450 million was awarded to 120 trusts to upgrade their facilities, and as the right hon. Gentleman knows, we are putting another £36 billion into dealing with the backlog, which is fundamentally affecting the NHS so badly at the moment, through the levy that we have instituted, which I do not think he supported.

[Andrew Jones (Harrogate and Knaresborough) (Con)]

Q5. Domestic heating accounts for 30% of UK carbon emissions. I support the Government’s incentive scheme to replace old gas boilers with environmentally friendly alternatives. However, now that we are building more homes than we have been for many years, can we build on the success of COP26? What progress is being made on the standards for new-build homes, to make sure that they are fit for the future?

[The Prime Minister]

I thank my hon. Friend, who is totally right to focus on the issue of future-proofing homes and making them low carbon. By 2025, our future homes standard will ensure that new homes produce at least 75% fewer CO₂ emissions.

Oral Answers to Questions

Andrew Jones Excerpts

Wednesday 17th March 2021 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

The hon. Lady is quite right to stick up for peaceful protest, and I understand and sympathise with that, but there are a couple of points. First, we are facing a pandemic in which, alas, we have to restrict human contact—[Interruption.] Although the hon. Lady shakes her head, I think the people of this country do understand that and do understand the restrictions we are now under.

I think we also have to strike a balance between the need to allow peaceful protests to go ahead, and we do on a huge scale in this country, and the need to protect free speech and vital parts of the UK economy.

[Andrew Jones (Harrogate and Knaresborough) (Con)]

I want to see the fundamental right to protest protected, so that events such as the powerful vigil last Saturday on Clapham Common can proceed safely, including covid safely, but I also want to see measures so that people can go about their lives, get to work and get to hospital without being hindered. Can the Prime Minister reassure me that the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill, which we have been discussing today and which was before the House yesterday, strikes that balance while also taking action against the perpetrators of some of the worst crimes?

Oral Answers to Questions

Andrew Jones Excerpts

Wednesday 3rd December 2014 Commons Chamber

[Stephen Crabb]

Decisions on how the Welsh Government use Barnett consequentials are a matter for them, but it is true that a great many people in Wales would be baffled, bemused and hugely disappointed if Welsh Ministers chose not to use every single penny of the £70 million that we have made available to them by protecting and increasing NHS budgets here at Westminster.

[Andrew Jones (Harrogate and Knaresborough) (Con)]

3. What assessment he has made of the level of infrastructure investment in Wales since 2010.

[Jonathan Edwards (Carmarthen East and Dinefwr) (PC)]

4. What recent discussions he has had with the Welsh Government on investment in transport infrastructure in Wales.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Secretary of State for Wales (Stephen Crabb)]

For too long, Wales has suffered from under-investment in infrastructure, so I am proud to be part of a Government who are putting that right. By working closely with the Welsh Government and providing additional economic resources, we have been able to set out a long-term vision for how first-class infrastructure will make Wales a more attractive place in which to invest, benefiting the people of Wales for generations to come.

[Andrew Jones]

I thank my right hon. Friend for his answer and commend him on his work in securing the valley lines electrification. Does he agree that this project will have a transformative effect on those communities that were often left behind by previous Labour Governments?

[Stephen Crabb]

I thank my hon. Friend for his question and his kind remarks. He is absolutely right. It was precisely because we did not want to leave those valley communities behind that we worked so hard with the Welsh Government to secure the full electrification package, electrifying the great western line all the way through to Swansea, plus electrifying those valley lines, which, as he says, will have a transformative economic and social impact for many years to come.

Oral Answers to Questions

Andrew Jones Excerpts

Wednesday 25th April 2012 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Bedfordshire (Nadine Dorries) about many, many things.

[Andrew Jones (Harrogate and Knaresborough) (Con)]

Over the past two years, UK exports have grown by 23%, and even faster to the BRIC. Will my right hon. Friend join me in congratulating the 151 winners of the Queen’s award for enterprise this week on their success in international trade, particularly GSPK Circuits in Knaresborough and Boroughbridge in my constituency?

[The Prime Minister]

I certainly join my hon. Friend in congratulating that business on its export performance. When we look at some of the fastest-growing markets in the world—whether India, China or some of the south-east Asian markets I visited a few days ago—we see that our export performance in some of those markets, compared with 2009, is up by as much as 60%. As well as those markets, however, we also have to remember our old friends, as it were, and the fact that we still export more to the Republic of Ireland than to Brazil, Russia, India and China combined. So we need to expand our existing markets, but it is far harder work to get into the fast-growing markets of the world.