Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Justine Greening and Paul Flynn

Wednesday 3rd June 2015 Commons Chamber

[Paul Flynn (Newport West) (Lab)]

2. What recent assessment she has made of the humanitarian situation in the Occupied Palestinian Territories.

[The Secretary of State for International Development (Justine Greening)]

I would like to start by paying tribute to Charles Kennedy, who died a few days ago. Like many Members of this House, I not only found him to be a kind and generous man but had a huge amount of respect for him politically, and I and many others will mourn his passing.

The United Nations assesses that the situation in the Occupied Palestinian Territories is a protracted crisis with humanitarian consequences. Even before the latest conflict in Gaza, 57% of the population were food-insecure and 43% were unemployed.

[Justine Greening]

The hon. Gentleman is right that we oppose that illegal building of settlements, and he is shining a light on some of the decisions that companies themselves have to make about whether they will be part of that activity. It is up to them to speak for themselves, but the Government’s position in relation to those settlements is very clear.

[Paul Flynn]

May I welcome the right hon. Lady back to her post, which she fulfilled with great distinction in the previous Parliament?

We are all aware of the terrible situation in Gaza, where more than 100,000 people have had their homes destroyed and not one of them has been rebuilt. Will she use her office to persuade the Israelis that, from the point of view of humanitarian need and future peace, provisions should be brought in to rebuild the houses?

[Justine Greening]

The hon. Gentleman rightly highlights some of the challenges in getting construction materials into the Occupied Palestinian Territories, particularly Gaza, to rebuild homes that have been destroyed. The Gaza reconstruction mechanism gives us a way to do that, and he will be pleased to hear that just under 90,000 people have now been able to get the equipment they need to rebuild their homes.

Ebola

Debate between Justine Greening and Paul Flynn

Thursday 12th March 2015 Commons Chamber

[Justine Greening]

I can reassure my hon. Friend that we are already working on that alongside prioritising work to get health care systems back up and running. Interestingly, as part of the response, we have had to improve water, sanitation and hand-washing. We now hope that some of the health care workers whom we trained to be part of the response who were originally teachers can take that into schools, so that as children get back into school we can keep embedded those positive behaviours that are good for health.

[Paul Flynn (Newport West) (Lab)]

The magnificent courage and professionalism of all those involved have earned the gratitude and admiration of all of us, and that includes the work of the Secretary of State herself. Are not the lessons that we must persuade the World Health Organisation to move away from its dominance by commercial interests and reshape our armed forces to concentrate on what we do so well in these humanitarian situations? The challenges in future will be more diseases; the need for clean water; all the impact of global warming. Should we not concentrate on a future not of warring tribes among the nations, but of one human family, which is in deadly peril?

[Justine Greening]

I am grateful for that wide-ranging question. The hon. Gentleman is right to say that what we have learned from this crisis is not to see problems such as Ebola as someone else’s. They are absolutely relevant to us. We can fly from that part of west Africa to the UK in under six hours. He talked about this new model of development, if I can call it that, particularly in response to humanitarian crises: the work that DFID has done with critical support from the Ministry of Defence and the NHS. This triumvirate departmental response shows that the Department can bring to bear a much broader UK offer in responding to these crises in future than we have ever been able to do in the past. I pay tribute to the willingness of both the Department of Health and the MOD in working with DFID. It is a fantastic working relationship, which has gone from strength to strength.

The hon. Gentleman also talked about the role of the private sector in global health security and the WHO. Some of the lessons that we are learning are as much about the WHO’s command and control, and its ability to drive projects from the centre down into the regions, but there is no doubt in my mind that the private sector does have a key role to play, particularly given some of the important ways in which we might more significantly combat Ebola, for example through the development of a vaccine. The key is to find the right role for the private sector. In my previous answer I referred to sanitation and hand-washing, and clearly companies such as Unilever have long played a role in helping to educate the public.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Justine Greening and Paul Flynn

Wednesday 3rd September 2014 Commons Chamber

[Paul Flynn (Newport West) (Lab)]

1. What recent assessment her Department has made of the needs of people affected by the humanitarian situation in northern Iraq; what steps her Department is taking to help people affected by that situation; and if she will make a statement.

[The Secretary of State for International Development (Justine Greening)]

Before I reply, may I welcome the Minister of State, my right hon. Friend the Member for New Forest West (Mr Swayne), to his role? May I also pay tribute and give warm thanks to his predecessor, my right hon. Friend the Member for Rutland and Melton (Sir Alan Duncan), who did an outstanding job in that role and is well known across the House for his expertise on the middle east?

The Department for International Development is deeply concerned about the situation in northern Iraq; the UN’s latest estimate is that 1.8 million people are displaced across Iraq. My Department has played a leading role in the response. I visited both Baghdad and Erbil last week and announced a further £10 million of funding, bringing our total UK support now to £23 million.

[Paul Flynn]

I did not hear an answer, but I would have been grateful if I had. I am sure we look forward to seeing the new Minister, and I hope we appreciate his performances as much as we have appreciated his silence over the past years.

The NATO summit will start tomorrow in the splendid city of Newport, and it will be followed by a Newport declaration. Will the Secretary of State give us an assurance that although the Newport declaration will contain some military recommendations, there will be an emphasis on soft power? Military power leaves a legacy of antagonism; soft power—the one she is mainly responsible for—leaves a legacy of good will.

[Justine Greening]

The hon. Gentleman makes a very good point. Clearly, in dealing with ISIL we need to look at all the measures necessary to make sure we can tackle the threat it poses. Alongside that work on stability in Iraq, not only does political progress need to be made in forming an inclusive Government, but, as he says, there needs to be humanitarian support for people who have been affected by this crisis on the ground. I met many of them last week, and many of them have awful tales of how they have had to leave their homes overnight, with almost none of their possessions. We are doing our best to support them, but that work has to line up with a military and a political strategy.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Justine Greening and Paul Flynn

Wednesday 23rd October 2013 Commons Chamber

[Justine Greening]

My hon. Friend raises an important issue. Female feticide is shocking, and I pay tribute to organisations such as ActionAid, and others that work and campaign on that issue. In too many parts of the world, women are treated as chattels or assets and are bought and sold, often through early forced marriage or trafficking. The lack of basic human rights for women underpins much of what my Department works on.

[Paul Flynn (Newport West) (Lab)]

T4. Many billions of pounds of taxpayers money have rightly been spent investing in schools and community centres in Afghanistan. What proportion does the right hon. Lady believe will remain open after the departure of our troops next year?

[Justine Greening]

The hon. Gentleman is right to point out that a huge amount of work through the Afghanistan Reconstruction Trust Fund has gone into education and building schools, including in Helmand. Given the work that is taking place in the run-up to the troop draw-down and beyond, I hope not only that those schools will continue, but that more schools will join them and extend education to more Afghan children.

Afghanistan

Debate between Justine Greening and Paul Flynn

Thursday 17th October 2013 Commons Chamber

[Justine Greening]

Ultimately, it will be having successful elections that can deliver a leadership in Afghanistan able to create a state that can keep itself secure. Without security, all our development work, including that on women and girls, will be undermined. Ultimately, what matters is having strong leadership in Afghanistan, which we hope to get following the 2014 elections.

[Paul Flynn (Newport West) (Lab)]

Does the Secretary of State agree with the secret Ministry of Defence document, published in response to a freedom of information request, advising the Government to conceal the news of deaths in Afghanistan and elsewhere in order to make future deaths more palatable? I do not know whether she has visited the facilities at Brize Norton, but it is clear that there are no facilities there to express grief, as there were on previous bases. Is it not right that the public understand the full effect of the grief of the relatives—a wound of grief that will never heal—rather than have a Government who try to conceal the true cost of war?

[Justine Greening]

I do not believe that there has been any such attempt. The UK has played a major part in the international security assistance force campaign and has played a correspondingly high price through the tragic loss and injury of UK servicemen and women. I know that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Defence is committed to ensuring that their memory will live on and that they can be commemorated appropriately.

Syria (Humanitarian Response)

Debate between Justine Greening and Paul Flynn

Monday 4th February 2013 Commons Chamber

[Justine Greening]

I certainly can. My right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary has a long-standing interest in preventing sexual violence against women and girls during conflicts. It is right that he is now pursuing that issue on the international stage. As I said earlier, we have provided specific support to ensure that there is not only clinical care but counselling for the many women and children who have been through horrific experiences as they have fled the violence.

[Paul Flynn (Newport West) (Lab)]

The right hon. Lady deserves gratitude for her statement and for her work in relieving suffering in Syria. Is she concerned about reports that the most merciless slaughter of women and children has been carried out by the al-Nusra Front, which is linked to al-Qaeda? Given that that group is part of the opposition, will she do all she can to ensure that the al-Nusra Front does not receive arms, comfort or support from us?

[Justine Greening]

I hope that I can provide the hon. Gentleman with that reassurance. We have been careful to ensure that the humanitarian agencies with which we work that offer support within Syria go through the appropriate due diligence to ensure that they are working with non-extremist groups. That is one of the complex factors that have made delivering support within Syria even more challenging. As he is aware, the opposition have been quite fragmented, so humanitarian agencies have had to assess whether they can work with individual groups on a case-by-case basis.

Afghanistan

Debate between Justine Greening and Paul Flynn

Thursday 13th September 2012 Commons Chamber

[Justine Greening]

My hon. Friend is right to flag up those understandable concerns. The NATO-led combat mission will come to an end by the end of 2014. One key outcome of the Chicago conference was that NATO now needs to consider post-2014 support. We need to ensure that the constitution, which enshrines women’s rights, works on the ground as well as on paper. That is incredibly important, and as I have said, I take a close personal interest in it.

[Paul Flynn (Newport West) (Lab)]

I notice that a motion contains the names of 425 of our brave soldiers killed in Afghanistan. Although it was put down last week, it is already out of date—it does not contain the names of the two fatalities since then or the names of the 2,000 of our soldiers who have returned broken in mind or body, and it cannot contain the names of the almost certain future deaths, such as those that followed the Falklands and Vietnam wars, when more soldiers took their lives after the war than died in combat. One Welsh soldier took his life this January. He is not recorded. How can we respect the self-deluding fiction in the report? It is another case of our brave soldiers—

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dawn Primarolo)]

Order. The hon. Gentleman has made his point, but I said that questions should be brief, however important.

[Justine Greening]

I think that many people across the country and the House believe that our troops are performing a vital role. It is the right thing to do not only for Afghanistan but for our country. The number of terrorist threats to the UK coming out of Afghanistan has already reduced substantially in recent years.

I take issue with the hon. Gentleman on another point. He referred to servicemen and women coming back battered and broken; I cannot remember the exact phrase.

[Paul Flynn]

Broken in mind and spirit.

[Justine Greening]

Broken in mind and spirit. The hon. Gentleman only had to watch some of the competitors at the Paralympics in recent weeks to see that they were amazing people who had done amazing things in the past and would continue to do amazing things in the future. We owe them our wholehearted support.

Rail Investment

Debate between Justine Greening and Paul Flynn

Monday 16th July 2012 Commons Chamber

[Justine Greening]

I think that it does. In the Department for Transport we are keen to look at how we can more efficiently and effectively leverage in private sector investment. We were able to do that recently on the local authorities’ major road schemes and we should look to do it also on rail schemes where we can. Interestingly, on the £500 million project that we are taking ahead for that western rail access to Heathrow, more than 90% of the benefits will go directly to businesses, so it is a real catalyst for growth in the Thames valley area.

[Paul Flynn (Newport West) (Lab)]

Does the Secretary of State’s announcement mean that the Ebbw Vale line will be modernised so that trains can run directly to the heart of Newport?

[Justine Greening]

That is a very good point. The electrification will open up a range of possibilities—[Interruption]—and it will massively improve journey times, as well as the quality of service. I can hear hon. Members on the Opposition Benches chuntering, as if somehow we have just made a bad announcement. It is a transformational one. It will drive growth and jobs in south Wales and we should all welcome it wholeheartedly.

M5 Motorway Accident

Debate between Justine Greening and Paul Flynn

Monday 7th November 2011 Commons Chamber

[Justine Greening]

I pay tribute again to members of the public who, in many cases, selflessly put themselves in the way of harm to help and save others. We have all read of the many acts of heroism that people instinctively performed to help those whom they saw in need. In a world in which there is a lot of discussion about a big society, the fact that people’s instinct when they saw such a tragedy unfolding was to run towards it and try to help says an awful lot about the spirit of local communities up and down our country, particularly in Taunton.

[Paul Flynn (Newport West) (Lab)]

Will the Secretary of State join in the heartfelt tributes paid to my constituents and neighbours Tony and Pamela Adams, who died in the accident? We can all empathise with them—they were on a journey that they had made many times before, but within seconds a normal situation descended into hell on earth. They were not just another statistic; they were two lovely people who had been sweethearts for 50 years. They were stalwarts of the Allt-yr-yn community and their local church, St Mark’s. In fact, Tony had organised the order of service for yesterday. No one is expecting any instant solutions from the Government, but may we take it that we as parliamentarians will understand the immeasurable loss to the family and friends, and say that we will do all we can to ensure by the decisions that we take that an accident of this kind is less likely in future?

[Justine Greening]

Yes. I once again send my condolences to that family. There is very little that anybody can say to their relatives at the moment that will provide any real comfort under the circumstances of this tragedy. As the hon. Gentleman points out, it happened instantaneously, which is a particular challenge for families who lose people in such circumstances. I can assure him that, as I have said to the House already, I take road safety and safety across our transport system incredibly seriously, and I will ensure that if there are any lessons to be learned, they will be acted upon, although we must wait for the outcome of the police investigation.