EU Council

Malcolm Wicks Excerpts

Monday 12th December 2011 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

Yes.

[Malcolm Wicks (Croydon North) (Lab)]

Is this the first case in recorded history of a proud premiership team relegating itself to a second division, cheered on by the new English Tea party?

[The Prime Minister]

Again, this is the same argument that we had at the time of the debate about whether Britain should join the euro and it is largely the same people making it. They were in favour of it and felt that not joining the euro meant relegating oneself to the second division. Frankly, I am glad that Britain is out of the euro. We are able to set our own interest rates and make our own decisions for the benefit of our economy here in Britain and we are better off because of it. It is the same arguments from the same people; they were wrong then and they are wrong now.

Public Disorder

Malcolm Wicks Excerpts

Thursday 11th August 2011 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

The hon. Lady is absolutely right, and any inquiry should certainly do that.

[Malcolm Wicks (Croydon North) (Lab)]

I, too, thank the Prime Minister for visiting Croydon earlier in the week, where he met our decent citizens who had become victims, had seen their buildings and businesses burnt down, and had seen their offices and shops trashed. The plea from people in that Croydon war zone—for that is what it was—was, “Where were the police?” For hour after hour after hour, people were free to pillage and loot, with no uniformed officers around.

This is not partisan. May I ask the Prime Minister, on behalf of the people whom I have met over the past two days, distraught and sad people, the people of Croydon North who have been the victims—may I plead with the Prime Minister, on behalf of my constituents—to think again about police numbers? The people of Croydon, and indeed the people of London, want more police in London, not fewer. Providing fewer would be precisely the wrong policy, at precisely the wrong time for our society.

[The Prime Minister]

The time that I spent in Croydon with the right hon. Gentleman was incredibly powerful. I heard about the immense frustration, and the anger, that those shopkeepers, householders and tenants felt. Let me say this to the right hon. Gentleman, however. The problem was that the police were not on the streets. The problem was not about police budgets in four years’ time, but about the availability of the police right now. There are 32,000 officers in the Met. We needed to get more of them on to the streets more quickly, and more of them to Croydon. It is about now: it is not about the budgets of the future.

Counter-terrorism

Malcolm Wicks Excerpts

Tuesday 3rd May 2011 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend makes an important point. Just because we are long-term friends and partners with Pakistan, as we should be, it does not mean that we cannot deliver a fairly tough message every now and again. When I went to Pakistan recently, one message I delivered was that it was unacceptable that so many people in Pakistan did not pay their taxes. It is not easy for us in the west to take money off our taxpayers to give to Pakistani education—vital though that is—if Pakistan is not collecting taxes from its own people. Dealing with corruption, making the country more transparent and ensuring that wealthy people in Pakistan pay their taxes should all be part of our bilateral agenda.

[Malcolm Wicks (Croydon North) (Lab)]

When the Prime Minister visited Pakistan recently, he announced various lines of co-operation, including technical co-operation on roadside improvised explosive devices. In the light of very recent events, will the Prime Minister review that co-operative agreement, lest technical knowledge gained could be passed rather quickly into the hands of terrorists in Afghanistan and elsewhere, with consequent threats to British and other lives?

[The Prime Minister]

Of course we consider all those things very carefully, but Pakistan has lost thousands of soldiers fighting extremists in south Waziristan and the Swat valley, where they are trying to root out a similar sort of Taliban to the one we are fighting in Afghanistan. We have to understand when we are talking to President Zardari that he lost his wife to extremist terrorists. Of course we must be careful in all that we do, but working with the Pakistanis so that they can combat extremism in their own country is clearly in our national interest.