All 2 Debates between Caroline Flint and Yvette Cooper

Wed 3rd Apr 2019

European Union (Withdrawal) (No. 5) Bill

Debate between Caroline Flint and Yvette Cooper
Yvette Cooper Portrait Yvette Cooper
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Thank you, Mr Speaker.

The Bill deliberately does not specify that, because it should be for the Prime Minister to make a proposal. She has to go into the EU Council and do the negotiating. She also has to lead the process around indicative votes, so I think it is right that she should put this forward and that the House will then decide.

Caroline Flint Portrait Caroline Flint (Don Valley) (Lab)
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Will my right hon. Friend give way?

Yvette Cooper Portrait Yvette Cooper
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I am conscious that those on the Front Benches need to speak, so I shall make my final point.

It is really important for people to come together, both as part of this process and in how we go forward, because the challenges that we face from the threat of no deal are very significant. Three years on from the referendum, the biggest problem for all of us is that so little has been done to heal the national Brexit divide or to bring people together. This is a major constitutional change, and, to be honest, if we do not make the effort to bring people together, whatever we conclude today, tomorrow or next week will not last because we will not have done the work to build consensus. We all know that there is no consensus on the best way forward at the moment—we hope we can reach it, but at the moment there is no agreement—but let us at least sustain our agreement on ruling out the worst way forward. I commend the Bill to the House.

Transport for Towns

Debate between Caroline Flint and Yvette Cooper
Tuesday 19th February 2019

(5 years, 9 months ago)

Westminster Hall
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Caroline Flint Portrait Caroline Flint
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I absolutely agree. As a former Public Health Minister, I have always thought that we should not be confined to the clinical aspect of public health. It is also about housing and transport. So much of this debate is about air pollution, and given that our buses could run on green fuel, I would have thought that that is a no-brainer as a way to get people on to more sustainable, greener and affordable transport systems, which benefit not only individual travellers but the wider community by reducing air pollution.

Yvette Cooper Portrait Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)
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I congratulate my right hon. Friend on securing this debate about transport in our towns. Normanton in my constituency used to be at the heart of the national rail network. Now, we have only one train an hour into Leeds, even though it is only about a 20-minute drive away. We see that pattern across the country. Towns are losing their connections, and there is real resentment about the fact that such a high proportion of the investment and infrastructure is going into cities, while towns are getting an unfair deal. Does my right hon. Friend agree that the Government must change their pattern of investment across the country if towns are to get a fair deal in the future?

Caroline Flint Portrait Caroline Flint
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My right hon. Friend is right. It is unfair to blame people for not taking up some of the massive job opportunities that our cities offer when it does not make sense for them to do so. We must change not only the investment but the attitude to transport. It is not just about cities but our towns. My right hon. Friend is right that our communities are being not only left behind but bypassed. They are isolated and excluded by planners, operators and, I am afraid, policy makers, who see them as uneconomic.