Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Danny Kruger and Lindsay Hoyle

Monday 16th December 2024 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call the shadow Minister.

[Danny Kruger (East Wiltshire) (Con)]

It is good to hear Front-Benchers being so positive about their White Paper, much of which we are pretty familiar with. Let us look through some of the measures. The integration of employment and health support—we were doing that when we were in government. It was called WorkWell. My hon. Friend the Member for Faversham and Mid Kent (Helen Whately) led on it. What is the youth guarantee that we have been hearing about? According to the White Paper, it

“brings together a range of existing entitlements”.

It is a very familiar set of policies. The fact is that the Government’s White Paper is just a rehash of existing support, and a bit of money with no strings attached. There is, however, one thing that the last Government were doing that this Government are not: strengthening the conditionality for benefits. The Secretary of State says that she will continue the existing sanctions, but what new measures will she introduce to ensure that people who can work will work?

Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill

Debate between Danny Kruger and Lindsay Hoyle

2nd reading
Friday 29th November 2024 Commons Chamber

[Danny Kruger (East Wiltshire) (Con)]

I think you indicated that I could speak for a little longer than eight minutes, Mr Speaker.

[Mr Speaker]

Yes.

[Danny Kruger]

Thank you very much. I do not want to have too much grumbling at the eight-minute moment. I will take my 15 minutes, with time for interventions.

I start by paying tribute to the hon. Member for Spen Valley (Kim Leadbeater) for her very powerful speech and the way in which she has led this campaign—with great respect, sensitivity and, to use a contested word, dignity. She and I knew each other before we were MPs, when we both worked in the charity sector. I like and admire her greatly, and I know that we have more in common than might appear today.

All of us in this House have this in common: we all share a deep concern about the experience of people dying or fearing death, pain and suffering. I bear heavily on my conscience the people whose lives will be prolonged beyond their wishes if I get my way and this Bill is defeated today. I will not disregard those people or minimise their anxiety. We will hear those voices in today’s debate—we have heard many of them already—speaking through hon. Members in what I know will be very moving speeches.

If I voted for this Bill, I would have on my conscience many more people whose voices we cannot hear—the people who would be vulnerable as a consequence of the huge changes that this Bill would introduce in our society and in the NHS. My view is that if we get our broken palliative care system right and our wonderful hospices properly funded, we can do so much more for all the people who we will hear about today, using modern pain relief and therapies to help everybody die with a minimum of suffering when the time comes. We will not be able to do that if we introduce this new option; instead, we will expose many more people to harm.

I will go through the Bill in a moment, but first I will say a word about process, in response to the points made by the hon. Member for Spen Valley. This Bill is simply too big for the time that it has been given, and I implore hon. Members not to hide behind the fiction that it can be amended substantially in Committee and in its later stages. The remaining stages of a private Member’s Bill are for minor tweaks, not the kind of wholesale restructuring that we would need if we were ever to make this Bill safe. Members who vote for the Bill today must be prepared to see it become law largely unamended. I suggest that if they have any doubts, the only responsible choice is to vote no, and let the advocates of assisted dying bring back a better Bill at another time.

--- Later in debate ---

[Cat Eccles (Stourbridge) (Lab)]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. The hon. Gentleman is using incorrect language. It is not suicide. That is offensive. I ask him please to correct his language.

[Mr Speaker]

That is not a point of order.

[Danny Kruger]

I am sorry if offence is given, but the fact is that the value of having a Bill in black and white is seeing what the law really is. What the Bill would do is amend the Suicide Act 1961. It would allow people to assist with a suicide for the first time. I respect the hon. Lady’s concern, but I am afraid we do need to use the proper language here.

The Bill’s scope is very broad. Members who think that assisted suicide for people with anorexia or other conditions that would not be regarded as terminal could not happen here should consider the young people in the UK today who are given a diagnosis of terminal anorexia and put on a palliative care pathway—essentially, assigned to death. Of course these are extreme cases—

[Danny Kruger]

I am not going to give way again.

There are a great many of these cases, I am afraid, and I mention them to show how wide open the Bill is. [Interruption.]

[Mr Speaker]

Order. May I ask the hon. Member for Bath (Wera Hobhouse) to keep a little calmer? She has intervened twice already, and plenty of other Members who also need to be heard.

[Danny Kruger]

I think particularly of disabled people, many of whom require constant treatment to stay alive. All, immediately and by definition, will be eligible under the terms of the Bill for a state-sponsored death. I refer Members to the Equality and Human Rights Commission, which has made the point that the line between disability and terminal illness is very blurred. That is why the Bill’s title is, in fact, so dangerous.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Danny Kruger and Lindsay Hoyle

Wednesday 20th November 2024 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Sorry? We will have less of that as well, unless you want to go and have a cup of tea. Will we hear any more? Is that it, now? Yes or no?

[Danny Kruger (East Wiltshire) (Con)]

Are you talking to me, Mr Speaker?

[Mr Speaker]

Absolutely. You are the one who was mouthing.

[Danny Kruger]

I have not opened my mouth yet.

[Mr Speaker]

Well, I am sorry, but you must be able to do it like a ventriloquist’s dummy.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Danny Kruger and Lindsay Hoyle

Monday 11th November 2024 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

We come to the shadow Minister.

[Danny Kruger (East Wiltshire) (Con)]

The withdrawal of the winter fuel payment from 10 million households, including 70% of disabled pensioners, is a huge change, as is using pension credit to distribute the benefit to the minority of people who will still get it, yet the Government have rushed this change through without giving their own statutory advisory committee the chance to properly scrutinise it. Ministers have not even responded to the chair of the committee, who wrote to them several weeks ago with suggestions on how to mitigate the effect of the policy. On top of that, they have failed to provide a full impact assessment to show what the effect on poverty would be. Will they finally produce a full impact assessment of this policy, and when will the Minister respond to the chair of the advisory committee?

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Danny Kruger and Lindsay Hoyle

Monday 5th June 2023 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I have allowed some contributions to stretch, but we are on topicals, so you will not mind staying a while.

[Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con)]

Wiltshire urgently needs a lot more housing, and the good news is that we are getting it. For the past six years, we have met our house building target by 130%, with 4,000 new houses in Wiltshire every year, but because developers routinely underestimate their future building forecasts, we have a theoretical shortage in the five-year land supply. Because inspectors routinely declare that local plans are out of date, it means that developers can impose unwanted and ugly developments that communities do not want. Will the Secretary of State use the NPPF review to exempt—

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Danny Kruger and Lindsay Hoyle

Thursday 23rd June 2022 Commons Chamber

[Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con)]

Church education is quite rightly a priority for our Church, particularly for its leadership, but can my hon. Friend assure me that significant appointments to the Church, particularly to the House of Bishops, demonstrate that the Church of England is actively seeking to represent the breadth of opinion among its members, particularly those of a more conservative theological disposition?

[Mr Speaker]

Order. Sorry, but that is not a relevant question. [Interruption.] I know that the hon. Gentleman is shaking his head at me, but I cannot allow open supplementary questions on a closed question.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Danny Kruger and Lindsay Hoyle

Monday 14th March 2022 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Order. I think I will decide whether something is in order or not, but thanks for that little lesson for me. Just to say, I do laugh when you talk about policy when the Government have been in power, so I try to balance out the political issues and objections on both sides.

[Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con)]

The Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Bill is one of the most important Bills now before Parliament. When does my right hon. Friend expect the Bill to come back before the House?

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Danny Kruger and Lindsay Hoyle

Tuesday 14th September 2021 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I remind the Minister that the courtroom in Chorley is still available—it is back up for sale.

[Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con)]

2. What steps he is taking to implement the recommendations in Richard Oldfield’s report on the dynamic framework of the probation service, published in June 2021.