Oral Answers to Questions

Drew Hendry Excerpts

Wednesday 19th July 2023 Commons Chamber

[Owen Thompson (Midlothian) (SNP)]

1. Whether she plans to bring forward legislative proposals to regulate the use of artificial intelligence.

[Drew Hendry (Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey) (SNP)]

4. Whether she plans to bring forward legislative proposals to regulate the use of artificial intelligence.

[Marion Fellows (Motherwell and Wishaw) (SNP)]

5. Whether she plans to bring forward legislative proposals to regulate the use of artificial intelligence.

--- Later in debate ---

[Drew Hendry]

Following calls from the SNP, the Minister for the Indo-Pacific, the right hon. Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Anne-Marie Trevelyan), agreed that human rights must be at the forefront of AI diplomacy. Will the new UK laws on AI protect people by outlawing any collaboration or research with nations that seek to abuse human rights through, for example, facial recognition or social credit systems?

[Chloe Smith]

The hon. Gentleman also makes a thoughtful point, which is an important consideration in all our diplomacy and the work that my colleagues in the Foreign Office take forward. Specifically on AI technology, domestically we have set out our proposals in our White Paper, which as we have said will evolve over time, and internationally we are clear that we see a leadership opportunity for the United Kingdom, because we are already a global leader in this technology and care passionately about ensuring its safe and responsible deployment.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Minister for Science, Research and Innovation (George Freeman)]

My right hon. Friend has raised this before, and I will happily speak to him about it and support that space cluster. The UK is poised to lead Europe in the launch of low Earth orbit satellites over the coming decade, and we are building launchpads around the country for that very purpose.

[Drew Hendry (Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey) (SNP)]

T4. The Royal Society’s 2021 visa costs analysis shows that researchers entering the UK via the global talent scheme had to pay six times more than they would have paid under similar international science schemes. Does the Minister acknowledge the cost of Brexit in our failure to attract world-leading researchers and skilled workers?

[Chloe Smith]

The hon. Gentleman is on his own mission. He fails to see the strength of the UK science and technology sector, and he fails to see that it will be better for Scotland’s businesses, scientists and citizens to continue to be part of that thriving sector. That is what we are doing in making sure the United Kingdom is a science and technology superpower.

Infected Blood Inquiry

Drew Hendry Excerpts

Thursday 22nd June 2023 Commons Chamber

[Dr Philippa Whitford (Central Ayrshire) (SNP)]

I associate myself with the comments of the right hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull North (Dame Diana Johnson). I agree that it is important to keep the victims and their families at the heart of this debate. We should all take a moment to remember and to pay our respects to those who lost their fight and are no longer with us.

It is only due to the persistence of activists that the scale of the disaster and the cover-up began to be revealed in 2017. I pay tribute to their determination not to give up, despite some of them being in poor health. I particularly thank Sean Cavens and Bruce Norval, who have provided me with so much information and support over the years. Their effort meant that there was strong cross-party support for a public inquiry before the emergency debate on 11 July 2017.

In that debate, I explained how, as a young surgeon, the revelations of the early to mid-1980s shocked me to my core: to think that in transfusing a patient, I might have exposed them, while trying to save them from trauma or surgery, to HIV or hepatitis. It led me to totally change my surgical approach, and to use every technique available that could reduce blood loss and minimise the need for transfusion. That was 40 years ago. My entire surgical career has passed while the victims are still seeking justice.

[Drew Hendry (Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey) (SNP)]

My hon. Friend has worked tirelessly on this matter, and she is right to refer to Bruce Norval and his work. Bruce Norval has pointed out that up to 100 people affected by this scandal are dying each year, and they have not been able to access compensation. It is time to get on with this, isn’t it?

[Dr Whitford]

I absolutely agree with my hon. Friend.

I pay tribute to Sir Brian Langstaff and his team for their meticulous, forensic and dogged examination of all the evidence, and for their sensitivity to the witnesses. They have helped reveal the truth about 60 years of disastrous policy decisions and individual decisions, including the failure to ensure blood transfusion services are self-sufficient and the failure to switch to safer treatments more quickly. In particular, the inquiry exposed systematic attempts to cover up the scandal.

I am not sure whether the Minister attended any of the hearings but, if he did not, he should watch the video recordings, and maybe he would get the merest hint of the suffering of those infected by contaminated blood and their families. I attended a couple of sessions in London and Edinburgh, and it was harrowing even as an observer, let alone for those who had to recount their experiences and relive their pain. Their bravery and determination were humbling.

The inquiry staff did an incredible job of providing support to the victims who came to bear witness, while Sir Brian ensured that they and their representatives were involved in steering the inquiry to its conclusion, with the final report due in the autumn. While that report will seek to ensure that the lessons from this disaster are learned, one of the key aims of the inquiry is to achieve just compensation for the victims and their families.

G7 Summit

Drew Hendry Excerpts

Monday 22nd May 2023 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

There was no discussion at the G7, as he might expect, but illegal migration was discussed when I was at the Council of Europe last week. As my hon. Friend can see, we have started conversations with the EU about closer co-operation with the EU’s border agency Frontex. We can work together upstream to share intelligence and make sure that we break the cycle of the criminal gangs. He can expect further conversation and co-operation in that vein because, ultimately, this is a shared challenge. Illegal migration was up 50% to 60% in the European continent last year, so we are not alone in facing this challenge. We will work with others to constructively solve it.

[Drew Hendry (Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey) (SNP)]

The Wagner Group has already admitted to murdering 40 children and hundreds of adults sheltering in a basement in Bakhmut. Mere sanctions are not a strong enough message. What does that terrorist organisation have to do before the Prime Minister will take action to proscribe it?

[The Prime Minister]

We are ensuring that those who commit war crimes in Ukraine will be held accountable and brought to justice. That is why we took a leading role in supporting evidence gathering and providing both financial and technical legal support—we have recently provided more than £1 million for those efforts. We very much welcome the recent announcement by the International Criminal Court to bring to justice those who have committed war crimes, particularly those against children, and we will continue to play a leading part in the coalition, ensuring that those who commit those crimes are brought to justice.

Infected Blood Inquiry Update

Drew Hendry Excerpts

Wednesday 19th April 2023 Commons Chamber

[Drew Hendry (Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey) (SNP)]

The gut-wrenching truth of the matter is that people are decaying and dying while this Government dither and delay. The people concerned in this scandal will have heard nothing new today from the Minister. For their benefit, so that they know he is fighting for them, can he confirm that the recommendations to widen the scope of the payment should be agreed? Will he fight for those compensation payments to be made this year to the people affected?

[Jeremy Quin]

It would be wrong to characterise the circumstance today as one of no progress. The fact that Sir Brian Langstaff has produced this report is a huge step forward. It is fantastic that he has come forward with a second interim report specifically on compensation. I speak on behalf of the Government and, on their behalf, I accepted the moral case for compensation back in December. We now need to go through what Sir Brian has written, which has been the culmination of many years of work, take decisions on that and come back to the House.

Oral Answers to Questions

Drew Hendry Excerpts

Wednesday 29th March 2023 Commons Chamber

[Deidre Brock (Edinburgh North and Leith) (SNP)]

1. What recent assessment he has made of the adequacy of the operation of the devolution settlement.

[Drew Hendry (Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey) (SNP)]

6. What recent assessment he has made of the adequacy of the operation of the devolution settlement.

[Chris Law (Dundee West) (SNP)]

7. What recent assessment he has made of the adequacy of the operation of the devolution settlement.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Jack]

This is an important point and has had a lot of airtime in the media in Scotland. I can say to the hon. Lady that, while officials and civil servants spoke to one another over a period of time, the official request to Ministers came in the inter-ministerial group meeting, which the Under-Secretary of State for Scotland, my hon. Friend the Member for Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk (John Lamont) was at, on 6 March. That is all minuted. It is a fact, it is on the record and there is no question. The UK Government have published it. The official request was on 6 March. I would also say that the Scottish Government proceeded with a deposit return scheme that small businesses, consumers and others are very concerned about. Even the chief executive of Tesco, the UK’s largest retailer, said yesterday that it is not the right scheme and it is not fit for purpose. They are concerned about it and they are right to be concerned about it. The Scottish Government asked for their UKIM exemption after they put their scheme together. If I were building a house, I would get planning permission and then build my house, not do it the other way around.

[Drew Hendry]

The Secretary of State knows that the process for gaining an exemption to the United Kingdom Internal Market Act is through developing the appropriate common framework. He also stated that there had been no request by letter from the Scottish Government, yet the Deputy First Minister wrote to the UK Government on 31 January and even received a positive reply on 10 February. Is the problem here that the Secretary of State just has a very selective memory, or is it that he is so busy preparing for his seat in the House of Lords that his office does not bother keeping him in the loop any more?

[Mr Jack]

Let us be absolutely clear about this: the letter the hon. Gentleman refers to was a letter to the Chancellor about value added tax treatment of the deposit return scheme. The letter mentioned that an exemption request would be coming forward, but the official request was made on 6 March—there is no question about that—and the detailed arguments were laid out on 6 March at the ministerial meeting.

Papers Relating to the Home Secretary

Drew Hendry Excerpts

Tuesday 8th November 2022 Commons Chamber

[Stuart C. McDonald]

The hon. Member raises a very fair point. There are all sorts of things missing from the Home Secretary’s letters—both her resignation letter and her letter to the Chair of the Home Affairs Committee—which raises all sorts of questions, some of which I will come to.

The fact is that the Home Secretary took an incredibly blasé attitude to sensitive information. When the incident that prompted her resignation happened, unlike everybody else involved, she just carried on as if nothing of note had occurred. Her resignation letter downplayed the incident as “technical” and did not in fact present the full picture, as we have just heard.

[Drew Hendry (Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey) (SNP)]

My hon. Friend is telling it like it is. When I asked both the Home Secretary and the Minister responsible for national security if they would countenance an employee—a civil servant—being re-employed after such a breach, neither of them would answer the question. Is it not the case that they would not accept that in any circumstance, and it is just a disgrace that she maintains her position as Home Secretary?

[Stuart C. McDonald]

My hon. Friend makes an absolutely valid point, in that we are holding staff to a much higher standard than the standard to which the Home Secretary appears to want to hold herself.

The other point I want to make is the contrast between how others responded on the day of these events and how the Home Secretary responded. When the staffer who was the accidental recipient of the draft ministerial statement picked up the email, he or she understood that it was an important matter. That staffer flagged the issue both directly to the Home Secretary and to his or her boss. In contrast, the Home Secretary just asked them to delete it and carried on with routine meetings, alerting absolutely nobody.

When the Home Secretary’s colleague who employs that staff member saw what had been sent and how it had been sent, he too understood the significance. He emailed the Home Secretary directly to express concern about security and the ministerial code, and he made clear her response so far had been unacceptable given

“what appears, on the face of it, to be a potentially serious breach of security.”

He was concerned enough to consider a point of order in this very Chamber, and he approached the Government Chief Whip, yet while he was taking all these very significant steps, in contrast the Home Secretary had wandered off to Westminster Hall to meet a couple of constituents, still having alerted nobody.

When the Chief Whip heard what had happened, she understood the significance. She WhatsApped the Home Secretary and then, along with her colleague, seems to have gone to track the Home Secretary down. More than that, the Chief Whip notified the Prime Minister’s private office. In contrast, the Home Secretary failed to notify anybody, until of course it had been taken out of her hands. Only on being confronted did the Home Secretary do anything about it, and she went off to speak to her special adviser.

None of these events supports the Home Secretary’s claim of a rapid report to official channels. As one of her own colleagues expressed it, the evidence was put to her and she had to accept the evidence, rather than the other way round. Her sluggish response has only two explanations: either she was simply hoping to get away with her breach, head in the sand, or she totally failed to understand the significance of it. Perhaps it was both: she thought she could get away with it precisely because she thought it did not really matter. Indeed, I have heard almost nothing since to suggest that, if she had not been caught, she would not still be operating in precisely the same way today.

Not only did the Home Secretary’s actions at the time show little regard for the seriousness of treating sensitive information in that way—so did her subsequent attempts at an explanation. Her resignation letter totally failed to mention that a sensitive Government document had been sent to an accidental recipient, referring instead only to the “trusted colleague” she sent it to. She claimed in that letter to have reported the breach “rapidly” on official channels, when in reality she carried on as if nothing had happened until she was caught. She talked of a “technical infringement” and she has since been at pains to point out that this was not top secret information. However, at paragraph 28 of her letter to the Committee Chair, she acknowledges that “of course” a draft ministerial statement is sensitive. Indeed, it was so sensitive that she could not append it to the letter to the Home Affairs Committee Chair. What is more, it could not even be shared with the Chair, except on a confidential basis. Yet she was happy to batter that off from her Gmail account to a trusted colleague with a quick, “What do you think?” Extraordinary complacency.

To emphasise the point, next week, we will almost certainly pass legislation promoted by the Home Office that would see some people leaking protected information like that imprisoned for life, depending on the reasons they were doing it. I am not remotely suggesting that what the Home Secretary did is remotely comparable to the offences we will be passing in relation to the National Security Bill, but the fact that her own Department wants to protect that information from foreign state actors, with sentences of up to life imprisonment, puts quite a perspective on it. As has been pointed out, that is a double standard when compared with how other people would be treated in similar circumstances.

There are still many questions to be answered. In her letter to the Committee Chair, the Home Secretary said that the document was emailed to her Gmail account simply because No. 10’s proposed edits had come in “too late” to print them off. So why not just email it to her Government account? The letter also says there was no market sensitive data in the leaked document. Why then did No. 10 apparently repeatedly brief that there was?

The letter to the Committee Chair also reveals that a Home Office inquiry found six further uses of personal IT to look at sensitive Government documents. Despite efforts to downplay it, that is more than once a week. Is the Home Secretary really arguing that neither she nor the Home Office could come up with a better way to allow her to view documents while taking part in online meetings? As she notes in her letter to the Chair:

“The Guidance on ‘Security of Government Business’ makes it clear that you should not use your personal IT…for Government business at any classification; and the Government’s stated position is that Government systems should, as far as reasonably possible, be used for the conduct of HMG business.”

She knew all that, yet she deliberately and repeatedly sent those documents in breach of those rules. More importantly, how often did this happen in previous roles? The inquiry we have heard about clearly relates only to Home Office documents and her time at the Home Office alone. Are we really to believe this was the first time she had shared sensitive information with her “trusted colleague”?

Tributes to Her Late Majesty The Queen

Drew Hendry Excerpts

Friday 9th September 2022 Commons Chamber

[Drew Hendry (Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey) (SNP)]

I never had the pleasure of meeting the late Queen personally, but I have met her son, the new King, on several occasions and I can testify personally to his deep love for the highlands. I know that my constituents in Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey will want to join me in holding him in our thoughts as he deals with this most personal of losses, that of his mother.

But of course, as we know, the late Queen was also a grandmother and a great-grandmother. She acceded to the throne as a young woman at the age of 25, and was an inspiration and icon for many young women. As we have heard today, she became an inspiration and an icon for many older women, too. She was someone who, as we can see from the tributes internationally, was respected and admired far and wide. The vast majority of my constituents, whether they be monarchist, republican or anything in between, have never known a time when she was not our head of state. Our sympathy goes to her family and all those who are so deeply affected by her passing.

Referral of Prime Minister to Committee of Privileges

Drew Hendry Excerpts

Thursday 21st April 2022 Commons Chamber

[Ian Blackford (Ross, Skye and Lochaber) (SNP)]

On a day like this, we think of all those who made so many sacrifices over the covid pandemic and those who lost so many loved ones. Our thoughts and our prayers today are with each and every one of them. There is one reason why it is so important that this motion be debated and passed today. At the very heart of the scandal, there is one thing that needs to be said and heard, and it is the very reason why we all need to act. The reason is this: the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom is a liar. I genuinely do not say that lightly, and I do not say it loosely. I honestly believe that it is right that we are slow to use that word, but equally, I consider it right that we should never be slow to say it, and to call it out, when it is so obviously true. Members across this House know it to be true, and the public have long known it to be true. That is why it needs to be said today, and why we all need to act.

Every single day, motions come before this House that are complex and nuanced. There are usually two sides to the argument, and valid reasons for any position that is proposed, but I think we can safely say that this definitively is not one of those debates. The evidence in the motion speaks for itself. It is as clear as day. If there ever was an open-and-shut case, this is it.

Last December, the Prime Minister came to this House and denied that there were any parties in 10 Downing Street during the long covid lockdowns. Typically, and tellingly, he hid behind his staff in saying that. He told us that he was given firm reassurances that no parties had happened, and that no rules had been broken. Every Member of this Parliament witnessed that; the public saw it with their own eyes; and, shamefully, to this very day, it is still on the record of this House. But we know the truth, and the truth contains no ifs, buts or maybes. The House was misled, and so were the public. We were all misled deliberately, because the Prime Minister knew the truth. Not only were parties happening, and not only was the law broken, but the Prime Minister was at the very parties that he denied had even happened. The truth is simple: he lied to avoid getting caught, and once he got caught, he lied again. There is no other way to describe it. There is no other word for it.

I can understand that this may be a terrible truth for those on the Government Benches to hear, but it is a truth that they need to hear, and that they need to live with. I say to the Father of the House, for whom I have the utmost respect, that this has nothing to do with any elections. This is about the behaviour of a Prime Minister in office. Much more importantly, the uncomfortable truth that the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom is a liar is exactly why those on the Government Benches finally need to act and remove him from office. Other Prime Ministers, including all his predecessor Conservative Prime Ministers, would have been long gone by now. Members on the Government Benches put the Prime Minster in power; they have the power to remove him, and the public expect them to act. We have reached this point. A motion of contempt for a sitting Prime Minister is shocking, but unfortunately it is no surprise.

[Drew Hendry (Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey) (SNP)]

My right hon. Friend makes an important point about Conservative Members being here to listen and watch. Regardless of the number of flushed or drained faces on the Conservative Benches, what does he say to those who previously called for the Prime Minister to resign, but who, as things got worse, changed their position, and are not here today?

Appointment of Lord Lebedev

Drew Hendry Excerpts

Tuesday 29th March 2022 Commons Chamber

[Brendan O’Hara]

The hon. Member is absolutely right. This is about why the Prime Minister chose to ignore the advice of the security services, but there is also a hugely important back story about what got us into the position where he did so, and the implications of that.

[Drew Hendry (Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey) (SNP)]

My point is a rather similar one: if there was no problem with Lebedev being appointed as a peer and if the guidance from the security services was benign, what is the problem with scrutiny of that advice, which would put to rest all the concerns that people have?

[Brendan O’Hara]

That is right. A theme appears to be emerging on this side of the House. All we want to do is see what was there. All we want is to be reassured that the advice of the security services was not ignored, and that the appointment of Lord Lebedev was above board and beyond reproach. I do not think that, in a democratic system, that is too much for the House to ask.

As Putin’s army continues to commit its war crimes in Ukraine, we have to get to the bottom of how a man with such close connections to the Kremlin was parachuted into this Parliament. We have to establish exactly what advice was given to the Prime Minister by the security and intelligence services in the summer of 2020, and whether or not he chose to overrule that advice, or sought to alter it in any way, in order to get the outcome that he required.

We know that this was not a straightforward appointment. It could not possibly have been, particularly since, almost a decade ago, the head of MI6, Sir John Sawers, made it clear that he did not consider it at all appropriate for Mr Lebedev, then the owner of the Evening Standard and The Independent, to join him at MI6 headquarters for lunch. Advisers to the Prime Minister would have known for years of those security service concerns, and one would have hoped that an aspiring politician—or an aspiring Prime Minister—might be wary of becoming too close to Mr Lebedev, but that was not the case. It would appear that in return for favourable headlines in the Evening Standard, Mr Lebedev gained access to the centre of power in the Conservative party, and, particularly after 2019, the centre of the UK Government itself.

Surely Mr Lebedev’s very public utterings about the illegal annexation of Crimea should have set alarm bells ringing in the Conservative party. Did no one in the Conservative party hear or take notice of him calling on western Governments to “stop cold war rhetoric” when they condemned Russia for its aggression in Crimea? Did no one notice his justification that because Crimea had been Russian “for many years”, this was not something to get overly upset about? Did his claim in 2014 that Russia would not be making

“any further incursions into any land”

fall on deaf ears?

The clues were all there, if people chose to look for them. On Syria, Mr Lebedev said that Putin had “shown leadership” in the conflict, and urged the west to accept his offer of a coalition. He followed that up by saying, “Let us keep Assad in power”, because it would be the least worst option, and he doubled down on that by saying:

“On this point I am emphatically with Putin.”

The list is endless. Where was the condemnation of the events surrounding the poisoning of Sergei Skripal, and how in the name of the wee man did our Prime Minister end up having an off-the-record talk with Lord Lebedev—or Evgeny Lebedev, as he was then—48 hours after the Skripal poisonings?

Sue Gray Report

Drew Hendry Excerpts

Monday 31st January 2022 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

No. The hon. Gentleman is totally prejudging the whole thing. He needs to contain himself and wait for the police to complete their inquiries.

[Drew Hendry (Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey) (SNP)]

The Sue Gray update is not the report that this House deserves and it is not the transparency that the public were expecting, but it does make it very clear that there were “failures of leadership” at No. 10. The Prime Minister is the leader at No. 10, so will he now pack his suitcase, or will he leave it to his officials to carry his cans?

[The Prime Minister]

The hon. Gentleman just needs to look at the report again and to wait for the conclusion of the inquiry.