Weather Events (South West England)

Debate between Jim Shannon and Ben Bradshaw

Wednesday 26th February 2014 Westminster Hall

[Mr Bradshaw]

I invite the hon. Gentleman, who serves on the Select Committee on Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, which sits this afternoon, to invite Professor Brazier from Exeter university to come and give evidence to the Committee. If the Committee is to publish a report on the lessons that could be learned from what has happened in the past few months, it is very important that it listens to the views of people who have conducted such important research.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I appreciate that the concerns being discussed today are specifically about the south-west of England, but we have also had concerns in Strangford. Does the right hon. Gentleman believe that this issue should be addressed in any way? There seemed to be a delay in responding, which was a big issue for many of my constituents at home, but also in the south-west of England. Does the right hon. Gentleman believe that the Minister should set up a group to consider how the Government can react quickly when flooding starts, rather than providing a delayed response?

[Mr Bradshaw]

I did not want this debate to be about how the Government handled the immediate crisis, but about how we move forward and ensure that we have a joined-up approach to dealing with flood risk management. However, having been Minister for the South West in 2007, when we had what were more serious floods in many ways, I do have some experience of how to manage a crisis. I also dealt with bird flu at DEFRA. It is very important that when something such as this happens, it is gripped immediately from the top. When the Prime Minister finally did grip what had happened, things started moving and changed, but it is only really when the Prime Minister gets involved, starts chairing Cobra and takes control that all the agencies and Departments come together and work effectively.

However, what matters to people in the long term is not how Governments manage immediate crises—although that is important, not least for their reputation—but whether that collaboration, that “joined-up-ness”, that strategic approach is continued in the long term, because it is long-term and sustained policies and investment that will make it less likely that we will have constantly to fight these crises and fires in the future.

I hope that the recent floods and storms and their impact will have served as a wake-up call to the Government, because the long-suffering south-west of England will judge not on words, but on actions.

Church of England (Women Bishops)

Debate between Jim Shannon and Ben Bradshaw

Wednesday 12th December 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Bradshaw]

I shall come on to that in a while.

I was making the point that back then, Parliament acted as a brake on women’s ordination, but in the intervening two decades there has been a huge change in attitudes in both Houses to gender equality in general and on the role of women in the Church in particular, as we have experienced and witnessed women’s ministry in practice in our communities. My assessment is that when a resurrected Women Bishops Measure comes before the House, the main danger for it is not that it will contain insufficient safeguards for its opponents but that it will contain too many and be deemed inconsistent with widely accepted views on equality.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

Figures that have just been released show that half of those who voted against the legislation to allow female bishops were women. Would the right hon. Gentleman care to comment on that?

[Mr Bradshaw]

The hon. Gentleman will have to examine the Church personship of those particular members of Synod, but it is not a secret that there are as many female members of the conservative evangelical and conservative Catholic wings of Synod as there are male members. We do not necessarily make choices and choose values based on our gender.