Ukraine: Military Equipment

Debate between Iain Duncan Smith and James Cartlidge

Tuesday 27th February 2024 Commons Chamber

[James Cartlidge]

My right hon. Friend the Minister for Armed Forces answered that in detail at oral questions. The key point is that we will not do a line-by-line breakdown of every aspect of the £2.5 billion. I can assure the hon. Gentleman that it is an incredibly important step forward in our support to Ukraine. As he knows, we have been able to confirm that that includes, for example, £245 million on artillery munitions and £200 million on drones. Those are incredibly important commitments, and they go with all the other efforts we have made, but we know that there is more to do, with our allies.

[Sir Iain Duncan Smith (Chingford and Woodford Green) (Con)]

Along with a group of colleagues, I went to the US before Christmas to try to persuade the Republicans there to vote this Bill through urgently—we had a marginal effect on them. The thing I said to them was, “You are facing an axis of authoritarianism; China, North Korea, Russia and Iran are all in league together and they are winning.” When I was in Ukraine, I saw the Ukrainians taking mines out with bayonets and not having the equipment they need. Does my hon. Friend agree that this has told us that none of us is ready for what war is really all about—barbed wire, minefields and artillery shells? Does he not agree that we need to do more?

[James Cartlidge]

I pay tribute to my right hon. Friend for his incredibly important efforts engaging with the US. Obviously, the positions the US takes and the decisions it makes on support are a matter for the US Government and legislature, but my right hon. Friend is right to make the wider strategic point. Surely we are united on the need to have a deterrent against all the adversaries and threats we face around the world. I sincerely hope it will not be the case, but if Russia were to make much more progress and succeed, it would embolden other adversaries. He is right about the horrors of warfare. That is why we need to invest in our own armed forces and conventional deterrent, but above all to keep supporting Ukraine as much as we possibly can.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Iain Duncan Smith and James Cartlidge

Monday 26th June 2023 Commons Chamber

[James Cartlidge]

That is an amusing way of putting the question but it is a serious point. Our plans have not been affected in operational terms because it was always planned that the Prince of Wales would return to flight trials this autumn, and that remains on schedule.

[Sir Iain Duncan Smith (Chingford and Woodford Green) (Con)]

Forty years ago, Sir Galahad was struck during the Falklands crisis, and many Welsh Guardsmen lost their lives and burned to death. I have just attended a meeting of the widows and children, and some of the veterans, who have been desperate to get to the bottom of exactly why that happened but have been blocked through “no releases”. I beg my right hon. Friend to allow colleagues from across the House to come and see him about the release of that information.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Iain Duncan Smith and James Cartlidge

Monday 1st February 2016 Commons Chamber

[James Cartlidge (South Suffolk) (Con)]

12. What assessment he has made of trends in the level of private sector jobs.

[The Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Mr Iain Duncan Smith)]

A record 26 million people are working in the private sector, up over 500,000 in the past year and by 2.7 million since 2010.

[Mr Duncan Smith]

My hon. Friend is right that universal credit provides the support and incentives that people need to get back into work. Evidence released a few weeks ago shows that universal credit claimants are more likely to have been in employment, spent a longer time in employment, done more job-search activity and earned more than those on jobseeker’s allowance. It is also important to note that, as part of the national roll-out, universal credit has now been rolled out across the whole county of Kent, which includes my hon. Friend’s constituency.

[James Cartlidge]

I very much welcome the fact that youth unemployment has halved in South Suffolk in the past 12 months and that long-term unemployment is down by over a third. Does my right hon. Friend agree that we cannot be complacent, and that there is an important role for community initiatives? Such an initiative is In2BK2, run by Kingfisher HR in Long Melford in South Suffolk, which takes local small business volunteers to help even more young people and the long-term unemployed back into work.

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I commend my hon. Friend for working for such organisations, about which he has spoken to me in the past. A huge amount of progress has taken place in this area, as he maintains. It is worth noting that, as a result of what we have been doing with the reforms and in working with organisations such as the one he mentions, the youth claimant count is at its lowest level since the mid-1970s, the number of those unemployed is down nearly 300,000 since 2010 and, most importantly, the unemployment rate for those not in education is 5.8%—pretty near the lowest it has ever been. We will carry on trying to get this right, but this is good evidence that welfare reform is working.

Child Poverty

Debate between Iain Duncan Smith and James Cartlidge

Wednesday 1st July 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Duncan Smith]

Those are the usual rather bitter and acrimonious remarks from the hon. Gentleman. I say to him, not for the first time, that I utterly disagree. More than that, I point out that all the figures that we would usually publish will continue to be published; there is no hiding anything in this report. If he is not going to be bothered to read them, I will direct him to exactly where he will find them. If we change life chances from the beginning rather than being obsessed about targets, as he is, we might change real lives rather than playing games.

[James Cartlidge (South Suffolk) (Con)]

In my experience as a small business owner, I was absolutely shocked to find that members of staff would decline pay rises that we offered them because they would lose so much in tax credits in this absurd system. May I assure my right hon. Friend that he will have strong support from my constituents in South Suffolk if he undertakes radical reform of tax credits, because they are a benefit trap and they hold back social mobility?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

We are already engaged in that. Universal credit is rolling out, replacing the current system. That will make it much easier for people to find work and then to work different hours, whereas at the moment, under tax credits, they are often penalised for making a decision to change their hours because they lose far too much of their earnings. That reform is under way, and it will change lives.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Iain Duncan Smith and James Cartlidge

Monday 22nd June 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Duncan Smith]

The hon. Gentleman should address his question to his Front-Bench team, as they apparently support our move.

[James Cartlidge (South Suffolk) (Con)]

21. With respect to the benefits cap, does the Secretary of State agree that the big picture is about getting people off benefits and into work? The people of South Suffolk feel that the fact that anyone can ever earn more out of work than in work is one of the great social injustices of our day.

[Mr Duncan Smith]

As I have said, the problem that we inherited was a tax credit system that rewarded people for doing the wrong things, and parked people who wanted to do better on benefits that allowed them not to do any more hours of work. Universal credit changes that: every hour of work pays. Labour has opposed that root and branch, but then it has opposed every other welfare reform that we have introduced, and all the extra jobs that have come about directly as a result.