Cycling

Debate between Bob Stewart and Jason McCartney

Thursday 16th October 2014 Commons Chamber

[Jason McCartney (Colne Valley) (Con)]

I wanted to speak in this debate not only because, as a member of the all-party group on cycling, I sat on the report panel, but because I am a cyclist myself.

Cycling is booming in the Colne and Holme valleys and Lindley in my parliamentary constituency, not least because of the amazing spectacle that was the Tour de France in Yorkshire; it also went through Cambridge, of course. On a sunny Sunday in July, the world’s eyes were on Chris Froome and the peloton as they whizzed down into Huddersfield from Ainley Top and glided through the Holme valley before tackling the gruelling climb up Holme Moss. It was at the foot of that climb that my family watched the race outside my mum and dad’s house.

The tour legacy is clear to see. My local Kirklees council calculates that £10 has been generated in economic benefits for every £1 invested, but it is the cycling legacy I want to focus on. Holmfirth cycling club was set up shortly before the tour. It now has 259 members, a third of whom are women. It is the fastest growing club in the UK and it signed up more junior members than any other club during the Tour de France.

[Bob Stewart]

Such enthusiasm for cycling is also being generated by other sporting clubs. Beckenham rugby club now has the Beckenham rugby cyclists, which is brilliant. Let us keep encouraging that sort of thing.

[Jason McCartney]

I absolutely agree with my hon. Friend. Cycling is a great way to see our beautiful countryside and to keep fit, so perhaps it provides a bit of alternative training for those rugby players.

Holmfirth cycling club offers weekly mountain bike rides and midweek rides, and once a month there is a long weekend ride. There are also training sessions for young riders and adult cyclo-cross training.

Streetbikes in Lockwood, led by the inspirational Gill Greaves, works with schools and community groups, teaching adults and children how to cycle. It also fixes unwanted bikes and donates them back into the community. Its projects are growing week on week. Some 50 people regularly turn up to “rock up and ride” events, and 80 people attended a mixed ability session last Thursday.

NATO

Debate between Bob Stewart and Jason McCartney

Thursday 4th July 2013 Commons Chamber

[Jason McCartney (Colne Valley) (Con)]

I, too, thank the Backbench Business Committee for granting time for a debate on NATO in the main Chamber.

My first real awareness of NATO came when I was interviewed to join the Royal Air Force in the 1980s. I was asked how many countries were in NATO and who was the Secretary-General. Of course, all Members will know that there were 16 member countries at that time and that the noble Lord Carrington was Secretary-General. NATO has now grown to 28 member nations, with former Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen as Secretary-General. Like previous speakers, I now serve on the NATO Parliamentary Assembly, which brings together parliamentarians from the Atlantic alliance and contains 257 delegates from the 28 nations. I serve on one of the five committees, the defence and security committee. I am proud that a UK member, the hon. Member for York Central (Hugh Bayley), is the current president of the NATO Parliamentary Assembly and is well into the first year of his two-year term. Congratulations, el Presidente.

NATO’s essential core tasks and principles are summed up in the strategic concept, and I will run through them. The cornerstone of the alliance, of course, is collective defence. NATO members will always assist each other against attack in accordance with article 5 of the Washington treaty. That commitment remains firm and binding.

[Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)]

May I ask my hon. Friend’s opinion of whether French Guiana, in south America, might be defended under that collective security umbrella if it were attacked by Brazil?

[Jason McCartney]

My hon. and gallant Friend makes a good point. There are a number of anomalies, such as the situation of the dependency of the Falklands Islands and the tensions between Greece and Turkey, which of course are both member nations, in Cyprus. There are certain cases, of which he gave a prime example, in which article 5 perhaps has a little leeway.

Crisis management is another core task of NATO, and it has a unique and robust set of political and military capabilities to address the full spectrum of crises before, during and after conflicts. Of course, my hon. and gallant Friend was involved in one such conflict in Bosnia.

Another task is co-operative security. The alliance engages actively to enhance international security, through partnerships and by contributing actively to arms control, non-proliferation and disarmament. Other recently added facets of NATO’s work are cyber-security, which has been much in the news in the past fortnight, energy security and the threat posed by climate change.

NATO has been at the heart, and at the head, of command and control for current and recent western military interventions and operations. In many ways, it now delivers the military aspects of the United Nations’ work. I will highlight three examples. First, as we have heard, there is the international security assistance force, the NATO-led security mission in Afghanistan that the UN Security Council established in December 2001 under resolution 1386. Secondly, there was Operation Unified Protector, the NATO operation enforcing UN Security Council resolutions 1970 and 1973, concerning the Libyan civil war. Those resolutions imposed sanctions on key members of the Gaddafi Government and authorised NATO to implement an arms embargo and a no-fly zone and to use all necessary means, short of foreign occupation, to protect Libyan civilians and civilian-populated areas.

Thirdly, there is Operation Ocean Shield, which was referred to earlier. It is NATO’s contribution to the anti-piracy campaign off the coast of the horn of Africa, following the earlier Operation Allied Protector. Naval operations began early in 2009, having been approved by the North Atlantic Council, and primarily involve warships from the UK and the United States, although vessels from many other nations are also included.

That brings me to some of the challenges facing NATO, a big one of which is duplication. The operation against Somali piracy is a good example. I have been with the NATO Parliamentary Assembly to Djibouti, which is strategically placed on the horn of Africa, and there are clear signs of overlap and mission repeat. We have not only the NATO-led mission but an EU-led operation called Operation Atalanta, also known as European Union Naval Force Somalia. There is also an independent French air base, a US army camp and a Japanese air base. Time and time again, I ask the commanding officers how much liaison there is between the different operations, and I have never got a satisfactory answer.