Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Ellie Reeves and Lindsay Hoyle

Thursday 10th July 2025 Commons Chamber

[Wera Hobhouse (Bath) (LD)]

Yesterday, I met members of the Spanish Senate, with whom I discussed energy security and how to bring down energy bills for our residents on either side of the channel. It is clear that energy trading between the EU and the UK does not work properly. What can we do, and what progress has been made, to improve the interconnectors and make the investment that is so necessary?

[Mr Speaker]

Order. I am not quite sure whether it is relevant, but please answer if you are happy to, Minister.

[Ellie Reeves]

It is in the common understanding, and we want a deeper relationship with our partners in the EU on this issue.

[Mr Speaker]

I call the shadow Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster.

[Alex Burghart (Brentwood and Ongar) (Con)]

In their plan for change, the Government pledged to get the country the highest sustained growth in the G7—or back to where the Conservative Government left it. However, it seems that this Government are on course to fail. All respected international analysis—by the OECD, the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and so on—suggests that over the next four years, the UK economy will grow nothing like as fast as the United States or Canada. What analysis can the Minister point to that suggests otherwise?

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Ellie Reeves and Lindsay Hoyle

Thursday 24th April 2025 Commons Chamber

[Ellie Reeves]

The Minister for the Cabinet Office has been negotiating with the EU in the country’s national interest. We have been clear that there will be no return to the customs union or single market, but the reset in our relations with the EU is an important one.

[Mr Speaker]

I call the shadow Minister.

[Mike Wood (Kingswinford and South Staffordshire) (Con)]

Key to much of that plan is the Government’s target to make the UK the fastest growing economy in the G7. But with the International Monetary Fund joining the Office for Budget Responsibility and the OECD in massively slashing projections for UK growth and the IMF not expecting the UK to be the fastest growing economy in the G7 in any year between now and 2030, how confident is the Minister that the Government will meet that target?

--- Later in debate ---

[The Minister without Portfolio (Ellie Reeves)]

I am pleased to hear about the seven new free breakfast clubs in Carlisle, and I am delighted that Brent Knoll school in my constituency also has a new free breakfast club. With our plan for change, we will give children the best start in life, breaking down barriers to opportunity and putting money back in parents’ pockets by saving them up to £450 with the roll-out of free breakfast clubs.

[Mr Speaker]

I call the Liberal Democrat spokesperson.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Ellie Reeves and Lindsay Hoyle

Thursday 6th March 2025 Commons Chamber

[Ellie Reeves]

I am delighted to hear about the falling waiting lists in my hon. Friend�s constituency. Waiting lists are indeed falling. Last month we announced that we had met our first step pledge to deliver 2 million additional NHS appointments seven months early. We are determined to keep up the pace of delivering our plan for change, for which the public voted.

[Mr Speaker]

I call the shadow Secretary of State.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Ellie Reeves and Lindsay Hoyle

Thursday 5th December 2024 Commons Chamber

[The Minister without Portfolio (Ellie Reeves)]

It is shameful that child poverty increased by 700,000 under the last Government. Tackling child poverty is at the heart of this Government’s mission. The child poverty taskforce, which I sit on, will publish its strategy in the spring. Increasing the number of parents who are working, and their earnings and hours, plays a crucial role and that is why our plans to get Britain working and the Employment Rights Bill are important in tackling the scourge of child poverty.

[Mr Speaker]

I call the shadow Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Ellie Reeves and Lindsay Hoyle

Thursday 24th October 2024 Commons Chamber

[Ellie Reeves]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his question. As the Leader of the House has said:

“This new Parliament offers a chance to turn the page after the sorry and sordid record of the last.”—[Official Report, 25 July 2024; Vol. 752, c. 857.]

That is why we will be issuing a new robust ministerial code. As we promised in our manifesto, the House has established a Modernisation Committee, which will be tasked with driving up standards and addressing the culture of the House. That sits alongside the work the Cabinet Office is doing to improve standards and confidence in politics.

[Mr Speaker]

I call the shadow Minister.

[John Glen (Salisbury) (Con)]

The Opposition support the new Government’s aspirations for the highest ministerial standards, and we acknowledge the significant experience that the Prime Minister’s former chief of staff can bring to her role as envoy to the nations and regions. Why then, in breach of Cabinet Office guidance, have Ministers not published a word on her terms of reference, her new salary or her special adviser severance payment, and is she correct in her understanding that she is at the top of the list of new peers?

Reporting Ministerial Gifts and Hospitality

Debate between Ellie Reeves and Lindsay Hoyle

Monday 14th October 2024 Commons Chamber

[Ellie Reeves]

My hon. Friend is right to point out the VIP lanes for covid contracts. The fact is that Conservative Members had the opportunity to take a stand when Owen Paterson broke the rules, and they voted instead to rip up those very rules.

[Mr Speaker]

I call the Liberal Democrat spokesperson, Sarah Olney.

[Sarah Olney (Richmond Park) (LD)]

I must say that I am startled to see Conservative MPs acting as though they were defenders of standards in public life. Under the last Government, Ministers were subject to less transparency than Back-Bench MPs. We will never know the interests of some of the Ministers who served under Liz Truss, because their ministerial interests were never published. However, I say to the new Government that if Ministers do not treat the need to restore standards with the urgency that it deserves, there will be no sympathy for them from the public, either. The independent adviser on ministerial interests has made it clear that the current system produces a list of interests, not a full register. Will the Minister guarantee that we will now see a full register published, just as there is for MPs, and set out the timescale? Will the Government rectify the fact that we went months under the previous Government without a list of interests being published by retrospectively publishing those interests? Will the Government enshrine the ministerial code in law, and include in that law timescales for regularly publishing a register of interests, so that we can have confidence that it will be published? Finally, will the Government make the role of the ethics adviser truly independent by empowering the adviser to begin their investigations and publish their own reports?

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Ellie Reeves and Lindsay Hoyle

Thursday 25th July 2024 Commons Chamber

[The Minister without Portfolio (Ellie Reeves)]

I thank my hon. Friend for his question. I made a statement on the CrowdStrike IT outage in this House on Monday. There will be a lessons-learned process as a result of that, and also a Bill going before Parliament to ensure that we are resilient in relation to our cyber-security. That will strengthen our defences and ensure that more digital services than ever are protected.

[Mr Speaker]

I call Cat Eccles for the final question.