Schools White Paper

Debate between Jonathan Gullis and Nadhim Zahawi

Monday 28th March 2022 Commons Chamber

[Nadhim Zahawi]

That is exactly what this White Paper will do and it is why the issue of teaching is so important to our plan. I will certainly have a look at the children’s university the right hon. Lady mentions. Anyone who wants to join us on this journey is most welcome, and we want everyone to come along because, if we deliver for every child, we will have done something great for the future of our country.

[Jonathan Gullis (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Con)]

I warmly congratulate my right hon. Friend on his White Paper and thank him for the fact that Stoke-on-Trent is now an education investment area priority, which comes with additional investment for our local area. I also thank him for the fact that the levelling-up premium to recruit and retain some of the best teachers across the country has been adopted from the Onward and New Schools Network report that I did on levelling up education. Most importantly, we want some of the best multi-academy trusts, which for too long have been clustered in the south, to come up to Stoke-on-Trent. How does this White Paper enable that to happen?

[Nadhim Zahawi]

My hon. Friend has always been a great champion for his schools and speaks with real experience as an accomplished teacher in his own right. He is right that we need our best, highest-performing multi-academy trusts to lift their ambitions. This White Paper will deliver that, including additional funding of £80 million to get that momentum going again. We are about to announce our 10,000th academy and we have 22,000 schools in England. I am ambitious for every part of the country, and we will deliver that ambition in Stoke-on-Trent as well as in other parts of the country.

Education: Return in January

Debate between Jonathan Gullis and Nadhim Zahawi

Wednesday 5th January 2022 Commons Chamber

[Jonathan Gullis (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Con)]

I welcome my right hon. Friend’s statement and thank teachers, lecturers and support staff across Stoke-on-Trent North, Kidsgrove and Talke for their heroic efforts in getting kids tested on the first day back as well as for promoting getting the vaccine and I join them in those calls. I wait by the phone to be called into the classroom on either a Thursday or a Friday sometime soon.

I am delighted to hear my right hon. Friend’s reassurance about exams. Can we hear from the Secretary of State one more time that there is no plan B for the summer, just plan A, so that teachers, parents and pupils have the confidence that exams will go ahead as normal, and that we will get back to the exam structure to which everyone is so desperate to return?

[Nadhim Zahawi]

I can absolutely give my hon. Friend that assurance.

Covid-19 Update

Debate between Jonathan Gullis and Nadhim Zahawi

Thursday 22nd July 2021 Commons Chamber

[Nadhim Zahawi]

I am grateful to the hon. Member for his excellent question. It is incredibly important, because we pledged to deliver 100 million excess doses, beginning with 5 million immediately and 20 million by the end of the year, and then the balance next year, as well as the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine being delivered around the world at no profit to AstraZeneca or Oxford. To update him, we have sent out our first deliveries of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine, as per the Prime Minister’s pledge, and speaking to the Serum Institute of India, they are now not producing 100 million doses a month of that vaccine but are up at 200 million doses a month. It really is an extraordinary achievement by Sarah Gilbert and her team and AstraZeneca in saving the world from this awful virus.

[Jonathan Gullis (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Con)]

We were very grateful to the Minister for helping us to secure the Tunstall mass vaccination centre, which has delivered over 50,000 jabs into the arms of people and is the city of Stoke-on-Trent’s mass vaccination centre. As part of the autumn roll-out, when we will be getting a third dose into the arms of many residents, will the Minister confirm that the Tunstall mass vaccination centre will stay in place over the autumn and winter this year?

[Nadhim Zahawi]

I thank my hon. Friend for his effort in getting 116,657 jabs into the arms of his constituents and offering them that protection. I will certainly have a look at the vaccination centre as part of our infrastructure. We have a very ambitious programme to deliver to about 15 million people in the first phase and, with the second phase, a cumulative 32 million people. So we will be doing that at scale as well as, of course, flu vaccination wherever possible.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Jonathan Gullis and Nadhim Zahawi

Tuesday 3rd March 2020 Commons Chamber

[Jack Brereton (Stoke-on-Trent South) (Con)]

19. What support his Department is providing to help energy-intensive industries decarbonise.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (Nadhim Zahawi)]

We have schemes worth nearly £2 billion operating, or in development, to support our vital energy-intensive industries to decarbonise. We will also invest in building the UK’s first fully deployed carbon capture, usage and storage cluster, and we are progressing carbon capture and hydrogen business models, both of which are crucial technologies in decarbonising our industry.

[Jonathan Gullis]

Achieving net zero is a considerable challenge for energy-intensive industries like ceramics, given the twin requirements of decarbonising without reducing international competitiveness. However, it is a challenge the sector can and will rise to, provided the UK puts supportive policies in place. Are the Government prepared to work actively with the ceramics industry, like Churchill China and Steelite, to help incentivise decarbonisation without, critically, undermining its international competitiveness?

[Nadhim Zahawi]

We must work together with industry to help our vital manufacturing regions benefit from clean growth opportunities. Stoke-on-Trent North is lucky to have such a Member championing its cause. We have a number of schemes in place, such as the transforming foundation industries challenge fund, the industrial heat recovery scheme and climate change agreements, to support industries like ceramics to cut bills and save carbon. In addition, we will be opening the industrial energy transformation fund to applications for phase 1 this spring.