Business of the House

Kevin Brennan Excerpts

Thursday 17th June 2021 Commons Chamber

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

My hon. Friend raises something extraordinarily troubling. There are problems sometimes within councils, and I understand that the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government is monitoring the situation at Sandwell Council closely following a recent report. Councils have an absolute duty to manage taxpayers’ money responsibly, and must be held to account when they do not. I understand that the Wragge report highlights that hundreds of thousands of pounds of public money were misused by a cabal of councillors. I know that the Home Office was alerted to its findings at the time, but I will of course pass on my hon. Friend’s concerns to the Home Secretary and the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government. It may also be something that the police ought to be looking into. This sounds like a really serious prima facie case.

[Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)]

Mr Deputy Speaker, I know you will be pleased at last night’s result, and I know the Leader of the House is very proud of his Welsh roots and congratulated the Welsh team earlier. Can he pass on my commiserations to the Prime Minister, who I know is equally proud of his Turkish roots, on the 2-0 defeat of Turkey last night? It was a good reminder to him that Wales is in the tournament, which of course he did not realise last week.

I want to raise the serious issue of my constituent Luke Symons, who is still incarcerated in Yemen by the Houthis. I have asked on behalf of Bob Cummings, his grandfather, for a meeting in the near future with the Foreign Office Minister concerned. Do the Government have any plans for further debates or statements on the situation in Yemen, and in particular the plight of this young man, who has done nothing wrong other than hold a British passport?

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his point about the Prime Minister’s Ottoman antecedents, although as the Ottoman Empire has fallen away, I have a feeling that he was probably more behind Wales than Turkey yesterday.

With regard to Luke Symons and the issue in Yemen, the Government are working closely with our partners in the region to ensure that Mr Symons is released and reunited with his family as soon as possible, and that work continues. I view it as part of my role to try to facilitate meetings between hon. Members and Ministers when they request it, so if the hon. Gentleman has any difficulty in that regard, I hope he will contact my office.