"We should all recognise that carbon emissions from shipping are a significant contributor to global warming. Is there any possibility, given the difficulty of global agreement, for any sort of regional agreement and regional enforcement on a European scale for vessels that pass through the channel or visit European ports …..." Lord Wallace of Saltaire - View Speech
"My Lords, would it not be slightly easier if the Government’s approach to the reset with the EU was a little less timid? We could then begin to tackle some of the unnecessary bureaucracy and delays. There is a customs union that we could be renegotiating, and we could move …..." Lord Wallace of Saltaire - View Speech
"My Lords, I welcome the Minister reminding us that the original scheme had a diversity element, which was abolished by the Conservative Government in 2023 in a rather Trumpian attack on the whole idea of diversity. Does the Minister recall that when Oxford and Cambridge introduced similar diversity schemes for …..." Lord Wallace of Saltaire - View Speech
"My Lords, I will focus on two themes in the SDR: the commitment to “NATO first”, and the concept of “whole-of-society” defence and security. NATO first now means sharing European leadership within NATO to keep the US committed, not standing half-in and half-out of Europe through our beloved special relationship …..." Lord Wallace of Saltaire - View Speech
"My Lords, I note that the strategic defence review lists “efforts to manipulate information” among the methods of attack in any future security crisis. Clearly, the question of foreign influence by hostile states—or “unfriendly” states; they may not necessarily be entirely hostile—is a real issue that the MoD is flagging …..." Lord Wallace of Saltaire - View Speech
"I have just been reading the newly published English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill; I have not yet got through the full 300 pages but I am puzzled by the term “community empowerment”. The Bill empowers mayors and strategic authorities and gives mayors the power to appoint up to seven …..." Lord Wallace of Saltaire - View Speech
"My Lords, I was very struck by the article in the Times the other day by Paul Johnson, former leader of the Institute for Fiscal Studies, in which he said that we have an entirely illusory debate about tax and spend. There are calls from a substantial number of newspapers …..." Lord Wallace of Saltaire - View Speech
"My Lords, I declare an interest: for five years, I was an unpaid Lords Minister and Whip in the coalition Government. When we have a coalition Government—we may very well find ourselves with a rather messy coalition after the next election—there may be an argument for having a larger number …..." Lord Wallace of Saltaire - View Speech
"If I may also correct the noble Lord, I pointed out that the consequence of this would be a reduction in the number of Ministers in the Lords, which would be extremely bad for this House...." Lord Wallace of Saltaire - View Speech