Report of the Iraq Inquiry

Debate between Lisa Nandy and Lord Cameron of Chipping Norton

Wednesday 6th July 2016 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

First, I thank those families for the service and the sacrifice of their children. We should genuinely praise the work that everyone in our armed forces did. We have to separate some of the decision making, the lessons learned and the problems from the military action. These people were serving their country in a cause that had been sanctioned by this House of Commons, so we should not in any way denigrate their memory, because they were doing what they believed in, which was serving their country. The most important thing we can do for all their memories is to digest the report, learn the lessons and put in place better decision-making procedures for the future.

[Lisa Nandy (Wigan) (Lab)]

It has been 13 years since Robin Cook returned to the Back Benches to campaign for a world order governed by rules. The worst possible tribute that this House could pay to him or, more importantly, to the very many servicemen and women and Iraqis killed and injured in this conflict would be to draw the wrong conclusions or, worse, to learn no lessons at all. As the Prime Minister prepares for his own departure to the Back Benches, what advice will he give to his successor to ensure that we restore to Britain a foreign policy with an ethical dimension?

[The Prime Minister]

I think that our foreign policy should always have an ethical dimension and always has. The advice I would give to my successor is to build on the processes and procedures that we have put in place, so that we better handle intelligence information and legal advice, better discuss and debate these things in the National Security Council, and listen to expert opinion in the proper way. The worst lesson to learn would be to say that, because these things are difficult, we should withdraw from the world, fail to intervene when it is in our interests to do so and retreat in the way that I have set out. That would be the wrong thing to do, and I do not think it is what Robin Cook would have wanted.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Lisa Nandy and Lord Cameron of Chipping Norton

Wednesday 11th March 2015 Commons Chamber

[Lisa Nandy (Wigan) (Lab)]

Q3. Does the Prime Minister share my admiration for The Brick, a Wigan charity that last year gave 6,000 food parcels to local families? Will he tell those families why, 30 years after the miners’ strike, yet again our community is having to compensate for its heartless and hopeless Government? I would be ashamed of that record; is that why he will not go head to head and debate it?

[The Prime Minister]

I shall tell the hon. Lady what we inherited in Wigan: since we came to office, unemployment has come down by 44% in terms of the claimant count. In the north-west, we have seen 124,000 more people in work. Those people are now able to provide for their families. That is what is happening. We have a growing economy because we dealt with the mess left by the hon. Lady and her party.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Lisa Nandy and Lord Cameron of Chipping Norton

Wednesday 7th January 2015 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I will look very carefully at this, because, as my hon. Friend says, not only the claimant count but the long-term youth claimant count has fallen—it has fallen by 50% in his constituency in the last year alone. I know how much his constituents want to see work on the Skipton flood defence project, which is a very high priority for York, North Yorkshire and the East Riding local enterprise proposal. We will make an announcement about this in the coming weeks.

[Lisa Nandy (Wigan) (Lab)]

Q12. In Wigan recently, my local nurses granted a dying grandma’s fairly remarkable last wish when they wheeled her hospital bed into the car park so she could be reunited for one last time with her much loved horse, just hours before she died from cancer. Those brilliant nurses sum up everything that is great about our national health service, but in a recent poll only 4% of them said they thought the Prime Minister was doing a good job. Can he tell us why?

[The Prime Minister]

I am full of praise for nurses in Wigan. I think they work extremely hard to provide a good service. I particularly applaud the nurse in Wigan who chased the Health Secretary down the corridor and told him a thing or two about how to run the health service. If we are judged on our record, however, there are 9,000 more doctors and 3,300 more nurses in our NHS because we made the decision to protect the funding of the NHS, which Labour told us was irresponsible.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Lisa Nandy and Lord Cameron of Chipping Norton

Wednesday 29th January 2014 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I am grateful for what my hon. Friend says about the business environment in Watford. We have helped businesses with taxes. We are helping with red tape. We are helping them with their exports. On red tape, this is going to be the first Government in modern history who at the end of the Parliament will have less regulation in place than at the beginning. I commend the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills for its work, and my right hon. Friend the Minister for Government Policy for his heroic efforts to get that legislation and those regulations on to websites so that people can tell us what we can remove. We are on target for scrapping 3,000 regulations under this Government, something of which we can be proud.

[Lisa Nandy (Wigan) (Lab)]

Q13. This month, Cabinet papers have revealed that the Thatcher Government sought to escalate the miners’ strike, close pits and undermine solidarity. The scars from that dispute run deep in communities such as Wigan, where some families have never recovered and where people have died while waiting for justice. Thirty years on, those communities deserve the truth and an apology. Why are they still waiting?

[The Prime Minister]

As the Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General said, we now have a system for releasing paperwork from 10, 20 and 30 years ago, and we should stick to that. I have to say that if anyone needs to make an apology for their role in the miners’ strike, it should be Arthur Scargill for the appalling way in which he led that union. While we are at it, if we want to ask about other people’s roles, there was the role of the then leader of the Labour party, who at the time never condemned the fact that they would not hold a ballot. So I think there are lessons for Labour to learn, and judging by their performance today, they have not learned any of them.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Lisa Nandy and Lord Cameron of Chipping Norton

Wednesday 25th January 2012 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend speaks for many people. We say that the proposal for a cap on benefits of £26,000 is fair. It allows people to receive £500 a day—[Interruption]—a week. His constituents, and many other constituents, ask themselves, “Is it right that my hard-earned taxes, when I am earning less than that, are going to support people on benefits?” I have to say how disappointing it was that, after the Labour party said that it would support a cap—the announcement was made on the BBC—it voted against it in the other place. What a complete act of hypocrisy!

[Lisa Nandy (Wigan) (Lab)]

Following today’s media reports, will the Prime Minister explain why ministerial advisers and senior civil servants continued to attend networking events with lobbyists who paid several thousand pounds to attend, despite the fact that the Cabinet Office deemed that to be a breach of the civil service code, and had previously issued a ban on attendance?

[The Prime Minister]

The point that I would make to the hon. Lady is that, unlike the position under the previous Government, there is now a proper system for declaring the interests of special advisers and Ministers. That used not to be the case: it is now the case.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Lisa Nandy and Lord Cameron of Chipping Norton

Wednesday 1st December 2010 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend is entirely right. The academy movement—just like the city technology colleges before it—has brought greater independence and greater authority to head teachers and has led to an improvement in educational standards. If Labour Members have got any sense, they will not back off from it, and they should tell their friends in the trade union movement to stop objecting to new academies.

[Lisa Nandy (Wigan) (Lab)]

Q7. I have recently come across workers in Wigan who were forced by gangmasters to work 12 hours a day, seven days a week, below the minimum wage, and were threatened and bullied when they complained. Why have the Prime Minister’s Government failed to take any action to tackle this issue? Will he join me in supporting the Gangmasters Licensing (Extension to Construction Industry) Bill and help to bring an end to this appalling abuse?

[The Prime Minister]

This is a problem, and it is not one that has arisen suddenly under this Government—it has been a problem for many years. There are problems with gangmasters not paying the minimum wage, and we need to make sure that this is properly policed.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Lisa Nandy and Lord Cameron of Chipping Norton

Wednesday 23rd June 2010 Commons Chamber

[Lisa Nandy (Wigan) (Lab)]

Q1. If he will list his official engagements for Wednesday 23 June.

[The Prime Minister (Mr David Cameron)]

I am sure that the whole House will wish to join me in paying tribute to Marine Paul Warren from 40 Commando Royal Marines, who died on Monday, and to the member of 40 Commando Royal Marines who died yesterday. We should constantly remember, and show our support for, the services and sacrifices made on our behalf by our armed forces and their families.

This morning I had meetings with ministerial colleagues and others. In addition to my duties in this House, I shall have further such meetings later today.

[Lisa Nandy]

The coalfield communities regeneration programme breathed new life into places such as Wigan after the devastation caused by the pit closures in the 1980s. Michael Clapham’s review is very welcome, but the decision to freeze the funding will devastate our economy all over again. Can the Prime Minister reassure my constituents that he is not simply seeking to close down the coalfields all over again?

[The Prime Minister]

Of course I can give the hon. Lady that assurance. Let me first of all congratulate her on her election to this House, and say how much we want to make sure, in spite of the difficult decisions that we have had to make in the Budget, that we go on helping and regenerating communities that face difficulties. I have visited the site in Wigan where the new Lads and Girls club is to be built. That is the result of excellent joint work between the private and public sectors, and we need many more projects like it. We will have more to say about that next week.