Oral Answers to Questions

John Milne Excerpts

Thursday 11th June 2026 Commons Chamber

[Keir Mather]

I understand that Chiltern Railways is leading negotiations on this important issue, but the hon. Gentleman is right to be impatient about the need to get people where they need to go in his constituency. The Government are committed to trying to deliver at pace in collaboration with stakeholders, and I will ensure that he is kept abreast of any developments.

[John Milne (Horsham) (LD)]

4. Whether she is taking steps to incentivise summer rail travel.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Keir Mather)]

While we bring passenger services into public ownership, we have frozen rail fares so that passengers can travel for less this summer—the first fares freeze in 30 years, saving passengers £600 million. Alongside that, our £3 bus fare cap and free bus travel for children in August will help families make the most of the holidays. For road users, we are also keeping costs down by continuing the freeze on fuel duty for the rest of this year.

[John Milne]

Train travel to the south coast increases significantly in the summer months, but Horsham sits on a line to the south that faces severe delays and cancellations. Govia Thameslink’s forecasts show demand continuing to rise sharply. Without a resolution to the notorious Croydon bottleneck, we risk undermining economic growth and confidence in public transport. Where does Croydon sit in the Government’s priorities, and will the Minister commit to finally advancing these long-promised, endlessly postponed works?

[Keir Mather]

I understand that some of these temporary changes reflect lower summer demand, which falls by around 6% overall and 15% in peak periods. Aligning services to that reduced usage enables a more cost-efficient timetable. It reduces taxpayer subsidy and it unlocks savings. The hon. Member is right to point to where that might be causing an impact for his constituents, so I would be glad to pick that up with him to see what more we can do to advance the pace of works that affect his constituency.

UK Bus Manufacturing

John Milne Excerpts

Tuesday 27th January 2026 Westminster Hall

[John Milne (Horsham) (LD)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Dr Murrison. I, too, thank the hon. Member for Falkirk (Euan Stainbank) and the hon. and learned Member for North Antrim (Jim Allister) for bringing this important industry to the attention of the House.

The latest figures tell us that just 17% of buses used in the UK are manufactured here, which of course means that 83% come from abroad. Those figures are very much the wrong way round. What can we do to reverse them?

A number of trends have come together to make what was always a challenging market much more difficult. In particular, we have seen the shift to low emission vehicles on environmental and pollution grounds. That has created a major inflection point in the market. It is an opportunity for companies if they can get ahead of the curve—a chance for them to displace established players—but potentially a major setback if other companies get there first. In this sector, the competitive advantage clearly lies with Chinese manufacturers.

Research published in 2024 by the professional services firm KPMG on the economic impact of local bus services found that the sector invests over £180 million each year in UK buses. KPMG also estimates that around 53,000 people are indirectly employed through the industry’s supply chain, including those working for manufacturers, fuel suppliers, maintenance, parts companies and technology providers. That amounts to a major contribution, both to the economy and of course to employment.

However, the only solution to a long-term strategic problem lies in a long-term strategy. Under the previous Government, there was no industrial strategy worthy of the name. One arm of Government did not seem to know, or care, what another was doing. The need for environmentally friendly forms of public transport was clear a long time ago, but the move towards such transport and the subsidies to support it seems to have been carried out in isolation from policy relating to UK manufacturing. The Liberal Democrats welcome the present Government’s move to a more strategic approach, and I hope the Minister will tell us more about those plans today.

As Liberal Democrats, our approach would be, first, to establish a comprehensive industrial strategy in partnership with business, civil society, including trade unions and academia. Secondly, we would ensure that the principles of tackling the climate emergency, boosting living standards, spreading prosperity everywhere in the UK and growing the economy are at the heart of that strategy. Thirdly, we would seek to provide a strategic framework for effectively addressing the needs of economically disadvantaged remote or rural areas by collaborating with local, regional and devolved authorities in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

Fourthly, we need to work towards four key business priorities: a positive business climate; leveraging technology to supercharge the green economy; empowering small businesses to create prosperity in local communities; and boosting trade. Finally, we need to enable businesses to achieve these priorities by enabling the workforce of tomorrow with a training and apprenticeship programme, investing in key infrastructure, scaling digital innovation and technology adoption, and creating financial markets that work for all businesses.

Although the solution has to be long-term, there is the short-term challenge of keeping the bus industry that we already have afloat in the meantime. The businesses at Wrightbus and Alexander Dennis play a key role in their local economies, as we have heard from the local Members. I hope that the Minister will give us an idea of how we can bridge the gap between what has worked until now and how we need to operate in the future. We have a fantastic workforce and an amazing history in automotive manufacturing. Let us make sure that the industry continues to prosper in the future.

Airport Drop-off Charges

John Milne Excerpts

Tuesday 13th January 2026 Westminster Hall

[Jim McMahon]

Many people ask their loved one to send them a message when they land or when they pass through the terminal ahead of collecting their baggage, but in Manchester airport there have occasionally been delays in getting the luggage off the plane and sent through to the terminal, or the conveyor belt has not worked in sending the luggage through, so faults with the airport or airline delays can lead to a penalty.

[John Milne (Horsham) (LD)]

Will the hon. Member give way?

[Jim McMahon]

I will make some progress, because I am mindful of the time.

On reasonableness, of course an app can be used if it is a convenient way to pay, but why not have a simple contactless payment system at the lay-by where the luggage is taken out, so that people can tap in there and then? Then they would not have to wait 24 or 48 hours to pay online. With a lot of these things, if the lived experience of those using the system had been thought about when it was brought in, it would have been designed very differently.

In November, we met the managing director of Manchester airport, Chris Woodroofe. We raised those points and put forward a number of requests. The first was for payment on site, so that people can pay not just on an app, but when they are at the airport.

Secondly, we asked for an end to the system that allows charges to be racked up. For example, there may be separate lay-bys for arrivals and departures, so it is very easy for someone not familiar with the airport to pass through the arrivals terminal drop-off point, realise that is the wrong place to be, drive around the block and eventually get to the correct location. If they do that, the system charges them twice because they have passed through one before they get to the other. That could be easily resolved using technology.

These organisations do not have the legal powers that local authorities have, but rely on contract law in enforcement. Many airports have confusing road networks that rely on roundabouts, with one-way systems through the terminals to drop off. In contract law, for a contract to be fair, those entering into it must have the right to decline it. How can they have the right to decline if they are charged at the moment they enter the place where the signs advising them about the contract are, with no way to reverse or pull out? Those dropping off should have the ability to say, “Now that I am aware of the charges, I don’t agree and will find a different way of dropping off.” Some airports have a bus that enables drop-offs further afield. Some people may not have been aware of that before they arrived, but may choose to use that.

Although I am personally sympathetic to the idea that charges can be realistic, Manchester should not follow Gatwick airport and go from £5 to £10, or even close to it. Most people would find an airport’s charging £10 to drop off completely unreasonable and unfair.

[John Milne]

Gatwick is precisely the airport that I was going to raise. It jumped to £10 in very short order, over a couple of years. That is an enormous amount of money for something that takes a couple of minutes. The objective is allegedly to cover the increase of business rates and to fund airport expansion. Does the hon. Member agree that the public should not have to bear the cost of an airport’s expansion? It benefits private companies financially, but puts pressure on public services, trains and transport and means that people are parking all around the airport. Does he agree that that is unfair?

[Jim McMahon]

Logic says that business rates are derived from the commercial value of the asset. The opposite is true of Gatwick—if it commercialises a lay-by, the business rate liability probably goes up—so I am not sure that that quite solves their problem.

This debate has been important, and I express my appreciation of my hon. Friend the Member for Bolton South and Walkden for securing it. We are very proud of Manchester airport and the airport group that it operates, but we are determined to see a revision to the ability to pay, how to pay and the grace period—from 24 hours to 48 hours—and I hope that we see progress.

Sustainable Aviation Fuel Bill

John Milne Excerpts

Report stage
Wednesday 15th October 2025 Commons Chamber

[Olly Glover]

Global demand for aviation continues to grow; it is projected to be two or three times bigger by 2050. In 2024, there was a record rate of increase in carbon emissions, according to the World Meteorological Organisation, and there was a new daily record for global aviation emissions in July 2025. Nearly half of all the carbon emissions to date from aviation have occurred since 2000.

Sustainable aviation fuel has been talked up for years as the solution, yet there has been a poor track record of unambitious targets not being matched by delivery. For example, in 2010, Boeing announced the target that 1% of aviation fuel globally should come from SAF by 2015, and in 2019, the International Air Transport Association set out hopes of reaching 2% by 2025, but today, globally, the figure is just 0.3%. The UK’s published figure this year of 1.29% is better, but it nevertheless shows how far we have to go.

The Conservative Government promised back in 2022 to have five commercial UK SAF plants operational by 2025, but there is still only one. It is therefore right of the Government to have introduced legislation to attempt to make sure that the latest set of SAF targets move from fantasy to realistic, credible and deliverable plans, although these will ultimately need to transition us towards the development of truly zero-carbon flight technology. I thank my hon. Friends the Members for Wimbledon (Mr Kohler), and for Sutton and Cheam (Luke Taylor), for their contribution to the Bill Committee, and I hope that Members from across the House will consider the Liberal Democrat amendments.

New clauses 1, 2 and 3 all increase the chances of the intention behind the Bill being realised. New clause 1 requires the Secretary of State to assess and report on the potential for disused oil refineries and similar industrial sites to be used for the production of sustainable aviation fuel. New clause 2 requires the Secretary of State to assess the measures being taken to encourage the supply of materials for production of sustainable aviation fuel, and has a focus on bioethanol plants. That is especially important in the context of the expected closure of the Vivergo bioethanol plant near Hull, following the Government’s decision not to provide it with financial support.

New clause 3 requires the Secretary of State to report to Parliament on the development of a strategy for analysing and maximising the potential of sustainable aviation fuels to contribute to reductions in greenhouse gas emissions.

I also speak in support of two new clauses tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for West Dorset (Edward Morello), both of which would improve the Bill by providing greater rigour and scrutiny of progress towards sustainable aviation fuel targets. New clause 4 would give the Secretary of State the power to increase SAF production obligations where necessary, and to ensure that reports on progress are laid before Parliament and relevant Select Committees. New clause 5 would introduce requirements for air travel providers to report on their use of sustainable aviation fuel, and to provide annual reports to the public via their websites. Collectively, new clauses 1 to 5 would strengthen the Bill and increase its credibility when it comes to SAF production and reporting on progress.

The Government’s SAF mandate requires just 22% of aviation fuel to be sustainable by 2040. That compares poorly with the European Union’s target of 32% by 2040. It is hard to square an objective of net zero aviation by 2050 with just 22% of fuel being sustainable a decade earlier, unless we put in place measures alongside SAF to cut emissions and make climate-friendly flight a reality. We urge the Government to clarify their plans for achieving their targets, particularly as hope for SAF progress is being used to state that Heathrow and Gatwick expansion are compatible with our greenhouse gas emissions reduction targets.

[John Milne (Horsham) (LD)]

As my hon. Friend says, sustainable aviation fuels are being used by the Government to justify major airport expansions. One such expansion would be at Gatwick, adjacent to my constituency. A target of 10% SAF by 2030 is optimistic in the extreme, as the Climate Change Committee said. If the Government’s own advisers do not believe in this target, why should we?

[Olly Glover]

My hon. Friend makes a good point about what the Climate Change Committee has said. That is why I hope the Government will consider these Liberal Democrat amendments, which are intended to strengthen the Bill, so that its provisions become reality this time, and contrast with the many missed targets in the past on sustainable aviation fuel.

Making aviation genuinely sustainable will require the Government to go beyond securing investment in SAF, and to ensure that in the longer term, the SAF measures complement, rather than detract from, investment in zero-carbon flight technology. I hope that the House will support our amendments, so that our country makes a bigger and more rapid contribution to decarbonising aviation.

Oral Answers to Questions

John Milne Excerpts

Thursday 11th September 2025 Commons Chamber

[Keir Mather]

My hon. Friend has championed Prestwick airport and the aviation sector in his constituency, and I agree with him that aviation is vital to the UK’s industrial and regional prosperity. In 2022, air transport and aerospace supported around 240,000 jobs nationwide. The Government remain committed to backing the sector to deliver high-quality, well-paid jobs from Prestwick to communities across the length and breadth of the United Kingdom.

[John Milne (Horsham) (LD)]

12. What recent progress she has made on the development of policy on pavement parking.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Simon Lightwood)]

The previous Government consulted on pavement parking rules back in 2020 but failed to take any action. We have had to pick up the issue from scratch since we came into office last year. A lot has changed in the UK political landscape in the past five years, and this Government’s genuine commitment to devolution has shaped our thinking on pavement parking. We will be able to say more about that, and finally publish a response to the consultation, soon.

[John Milne]

Will the Minister assure us that any enforcement powers will be extended to local authorities, not just the police, in order to make any regulations effective? Alongside that, will he reassure us that local authorities will have the power to make exceptions in areas where such restrictions would be impractical, as is the case in many streets in my Horsham constituency?

[Simon Lightwood]

We of course continue to engage actively with local authorities in the development of this policy. Local authorities already have the power to restrict pavement parking wherever there is a need by introducing traffic regulation orders, and we are exploring additional measures to help them to tackle the issue.

Bus Services (No. 2) Bill [Lords]

John Milne Excerpts

Report stage
Wednesday 10th September 2025 Commons Chamber

My constituents are already seeing the benefits of this Government’s choices on transport. The Bill will bring better bus transport closer to home. Equitable access to transport connectivity is the golden thread that weaves our urban and rural communities together, that keeps our families and friendships close, and that ensures that people growing up and growing old in my constituency can fulfil their potential.

[John Milne (Horsham) (LD)]

I will speak mainly to new clauses 32 and 33 in my name.

There is a lot to like in the Bill, but it is at its weakest where it touches on rural areas. That is a great shame, because if we could solve transport, we could also solve the rural productivity problem. Economic inactivity is nearly two-and-a-half times higher in rural areas than it is in urban areas, and that is directly related to transport issues. If we could boost rural productivity to urban levels, it would fix the Chancellor’s Budget deficit in one go.

The key freedom that the Bill brings is to support local authorities that want to establish a bus franchise or to set up their own municipal service. If we stand back to look at the scale of the challenge, however, do we really think that that will be enough to reverse the long-term decline in rural areas? The answer must be no. Given how cash-strapped and under-resourced most local authorities are, it is clear that most will be unable to take advantage of that freedom without additional support.

In my previous life as a West Sussex county councillor, I served on a committee considering a bus improvement plan, but the measures we were given to look at were all small and tactical. No one on that committee believed that the plan would change the curve. Too many local authorities long ago surrendered to a tacit acceptance of managed decline. That has to change—hence my new clause 33, which would set out a new duty actively to promote and increase bus usage.

The key paradox that must be solved is why, if public demand for bus services is so high, usage is always dropping. Clearly, price is one issue, but the service has also become increasingly mismatched with local need. In West Sussex, a 2021 survey found that 80% of residents had stopped using buses because of a lack of a suitable route or infrequency of service—that is a huge percentage of the potential market to give away. The problem, especially in rural areas, is that what we have left today is a legacy service—the ghostly outline of routes and frequencies that existed years ago. We have fought a long defensive war of attrition, and we have been losing. Individual routes have been salami-sliced to destruction. That is why I have tabled new clause 32 to require local authorities to consult in advance on significant service changes.

In my constituency of Horsham, residents of Partridge Green discovered they were losing their direct No. 17 service to town only when they saw the new timetable. In Slinfold, the No. 63 was removed altogether, also without any warning. The county council says that the changes are nothing to do with them, and they are the responsibility of the commercial operator, but the operator says that they are up to the council. There is simply no one left at the wheel of our local bus service.

When I looked at the huge public reaction as villagers fought to save their services after the axe had already fallen, I could not help but wonder what might have been. What might have happened if we could have harnessed that enthusiasm to create a service that met people’s transport needs? We have been beaten down, over many years, into accepting that it is impossible to fix the problem, yet Switzerland, Austria and Germany, in areas with far lower population densities than many areas of the UK, are providing all-day, every-hour services, seven days a week. We can do that too, if we have the will.

It is good to see bus services getting legislative attention, and I appreciate that, but I hope that the Government do not think that this Bill will be nearly enough by itself. I urge the Government to make a special study of the needs of rural areas, which have been a recurring theme during the debate, and work out what it would take to genuinely reverse decline.

[Peter Prinsley (Bury St Edmunds and Stowmarket) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to speak in the debate. I support new clause 22, introduced by my hon. Friend the Member for North East Hertfordshire (Chris Hinchliff), who is temporarily not in his place. It would require the Secretary of State to conduct a review into the minimum bus service standards required for communities in England.

What Members notice when they come to London from rural constituencies, such as my constituency in Suffolk, are all the red buses, all over the place. Routes run from early in the morning until late into the evening, in no small part because of the years of excellent Labour administration that Londoners have enjoyed. Out in Suffolk, we certainly do not have a fully integrated bus service. For a start, there are simply not enough buses. From 2010, a decade of declining public funding left the interwoven jumble of local bus maps looking decisively threadbare. From 2018 to 2024, 18% of bus services in my county council area simply vanished.

In Bury St Edmunds and Stowmarket, I have been supporting residents fighting to save local bus routes, and I am sure that many hon. Members will have been doing exactly the same in their areas. In Bury St Edmunds, we managed to get the 73 and 73A bus routes retained, which are essential for getting children to school at the Thurston community college. At Marham Park, where residents were in danger of being fully cut off, we did the same, thanks to £8 million of funding from the Government. In the years to come, we will further undo the loss of bus services: some 17 new or improved bus routes are rolling out just this month across Suffolk.

If people are lucky enough to live on a route that survived the last 15 years, the problem is that they will be hard pressed to find a bus that goes anywhere after 5 o’clock in the afternoon. Imagine a lady from the village of Honington, in my constituency, who has to attend a 4.30 pm appointment at the West Suffolk hospital about her dodgy knee. The 332 bus runs from Honington to Bury St Edmunds four times a day, so she catches the 2.40 pm bus and arrives in Bury St Edmunds with an hour to spare. She has her appointment and she gets out of the hospital after an hour, so at 5.30 pm she is standing outside the hospital and she cannot get home. She has missed the last bus and she is stuck in Bury St Edmunds. She cannot march 10 miles home, because she has a dodgy knee, and she has no friends, so she gets a taxi. A taxi is £35, but our imaginary lady has no choice—she has to pay that £35.

We capped the cost of a bus fare at £3, but we all know that for lots of real people in rural areas, inadequate bus service means that transport costs easily spiral out of control. That is why we need to critically examine the minimum bus service standards required across communities in England. Many Members have spoken about CPRE, which has mentioned that some countries such as Switzerland legally mandate public transport frequencies for communities of different sizes. The amendment tabled by the hon. Member for North East Hertfordshire —who still has not returned to the Chamber—will ensure that progress is made towards undoing some of the inequalities that have built up in transport, and will move us much closer to the unified transport model that we all know we need.

Bus Services (No. 2) Bill [Lords]

John Milne Excerpts

2nd reading
Monday 2nd June 2025 Commons Chamber

[John Milne (Horsham) (LD)]

For many years, rural bus services have been dying a slow death by a thousand cuts. In my constituency of Horsham, we have lost about a third of our services since 2010, and funding has fallen by as much as 43% in some areas. This is how it works: we cut the timetable, which means fewer people use the service, so we cut the timetable again—rinse and repeat. In many villages, it is simply impossible to live without a car. Even if we did put a bus service back into those villages, no one would use it because the only people who live there are car users. It is no wonder that economic inactivity in rural communities is nearly 2.5% higher than in urban centres. Good jobs and an education are literally out of reach. How can we reverse this downward spiral?

It is clear that if local authorities step back and rely on commercial operators to decide routes by themselves, it is not going to work, but that is exactly what we are seeing in West Sussex. Commercial operators have to keep to their timetables or face a fine, but to achieve punctuality on the No. 17 route meant that the village of Partridge Green had to be dropped altogether at certain times of day. Pensioners now have to walk over a mile to the nearest stop or pay for expensive taxis. Residents were not consulted about the cuts, and they found out only a few weeks in advance, with no time to make other arrangements. Half the village turned out to a church meeting to protest, and if only we could have harnessed that enthusiasm in time, we might have saved the service, but of course it was too late. Now the same thing is happening all over again, with cuts to the No. 63 bus through another village, Slinfold, which will make it impossible for local commuters to link to Horsham station. Again the excuse was punctuality, again there was no consultation and again residents had just a few weeks’ notice.

This gets to the heart of why our rural bus services have been in terminal decline. County councils, the bodies we would expect to have residents’ interests at heart, can all too easily hide behind a commercial bus operator and say that it is all out of their control. No one wants to admit responsibility. We all keep saying that we want to take traffic off the roads and cut pollution, but in reality, local councils such as West Sussex have been presiding over a policy of managed decline. Will the new Bill do enough to reverse it? The Bill certainly moves in the right direction by empowering local authorities to franchise routes, run their own bus companies and trial demand-responsive transport schemes, which are good building blocks for a more flexible, responsive system.

However, when I look at West Sussex, it is clear that these freedoms by themselves will not be enough, even if there was more dynamic leadership in the council. Setting up its own bus service is a high-risk, high-investment strategy for a council. I can see how big urban centres may have the wherewithal to take advantage of these new rights, but more rural authorities such as my own are already on budgetary life support and there is no way they can take on such a gamble. This is going to take something more from the Government, and that something is more funding to kick-start a revolution. So let us fund bus services properly, empower local councils to make the right decisions and ensure that affordable, accessible transport remains a lifeline for all our communities.

Oral Answers to Questions

John Milne Excerpts

Thursday 15th May 2025 Commons Chamber

[Simon Lightwood]

I am more than happy to meet my hon. Friend to discuss this further.

[John Milne (Horsham) (LD)]

Airports across the country are participating in the airspace modernisation review. However, there is a clear conflict of interest between environmental imperatives and profit motives. Will the Secretary of State undertake to introduce an independent member on each airspace review panel?

[Mike Kane]

The Government are pressing on with airspace modernisation and have set up the UK Airspace Design Service. I recently met the hon. Member in my office to discuss this issue. We continue at pace on this work and will be consulting widely.

Airport Expansion

John Milne Excerpts

Tuesday 28th January 2025 Commons Chamber

[Mike Kane]

I have to say, my hon. Friend is so tenacious on this matter that I sometimes go pale when I meet her in the Division Lobby, because every day she asks after it. She is such a campaigner on it. I saw her go around party conference lobbying the industry and airlines to do what her constituents sent her to Parliament to do and to try to come up with a solution for her local airport. I can only commend her tenacity to the House.

[John Milne (Horsham) (LD)]

Will the Minister confirm what compensating measures the Government will take, if airport expansion is to go ahead, to ensure adherence to carbon budgets? They must have already been agreed on by now.

[Mike Kane]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his considered approach in all these matters. I was pleased to receive him at the Department the other day to talk about a particular constituency issue that related to Gatwick. We do not have a development consent order, but noise and pollution are the tests to meet our climate commitments, and they will remain the tests. It will be up to the Chair of the Transport Committee, my hon. Friend the Member for Brentford and Isleworth (Ruth Cadbury), and Members across this House to hold the Government’s feet to the fire on this matter.

Road Safety: Young Drivers

John Milne Excerpts

Tuesday 28th January 2025 Westminster Hall

[John Milne (Horsham) (LD)]

I thank the hon. Member for Shrewsbury (Julia Buckley) for securing this important debate. Just a few weeks after my election, I received a letter from my constituent, Jane. She is a mother who has had to endure the unthinkable pain of burying her 17-year-old son. Will died in a collision in June. He was a smart and popular young man, with a passion for judo, maths and computers. My heart goes out to Jane and her family.

Jane’s son had passed his test just one month prior to his death. She told me:

“As a mother, I did everything I could to protect him. I persuaded my son not to drive with his friends in his car for the first month...I felt I could not request this for longer when his friends didn’t have such rules and it wasn’t law.”

I remember myself, when I passed my test and first went out with a group of teenage friends, how intimidating that was.

Why has the UK not taken action already? Under the coalition Government, the potential adoption of graduated driving licences was discussed, but various issues arose. One problem was the impact on less affluent young people, who may be more adversely affected by restricted driving hours—for example, working 17-year-olds who need access to a car to work at night or for early-hours shift work. How can young people who rely on carpooling to cut transport costs do so if there are passenger limitations? There are obstacles, particularly in rural areas such as the villages in my constituency of Horsham.

I support the hon. Member for Shrewsbury and my constituent Jane by joining their call for the Government to take action. We should see an impact assessment of the various graduated driving schemes, many of which are already in operation around the world, so we can make the right choice for the 60% of the public who, as polls suggest, already support them.

Finally, I thank Jane for bringing her heartbreaking story to me. It cannot be easy to campaign with a wound so recent. I would like Jane to know that it is only because of individuals such as her that we are able to have this debate, and perhaps because of them, change will come.