5G Network and Huawei

Martin Docherty-Hughes Excerpts

Monday 27th January 2020 Commons Chamber

[Matt Warman]

I absolutely agree with my hon. Friend. She has a background of real expertise in this area, and she is an asset to the House in that respect. We should of course put national security at the very top of the agenda in all cases, and we should consider the approaches that all countries take to their own critical national infrastructures.

[Martin Docherty-Hughes (West Dunbartonshire) (SNP)]

Let me first thank the hon. Member for Tonbridge and Malling (Tom Tugendhat) for organising what seems to be an unofficial hustings for the Foreign Affairs and Defence Select Committees. It was very good of him. I think that the importance of this issue to both Committees, and to those standing for election as their Chairs, is that the Government have put freedom of religion and belief at the heart of their foreign policy. How, therefore, can they justify granting their investment to a company owned by the Communist party of China, who have been complicit in the brutal suppression of an ancient minority religious group, namely the Uighur Muslims?

[Matt Warman]

I think that some candidates here will be disappointed that the hon. Gentleman thinks it is a hustings for just one Select Committee. However, he is absolutely right to focus on the incredibly important issue of human rights, which is a cornerstone of this country’s foreign policy and will continue to be so. In this instance we will, of course, put national security at the very top of our agenda, but we should never, and will never, forget the very important issues that the hon. Gentleman has raised.

Telecoms Supply Chain Review

Martin Docherty-Hughes Excerpts

Monday 22nd July 2019 Commons Chamber

[Jeremy Wright]

I certainly think that my hon. Friend’s description justifies his reference to difficult issues. As for whether they are insurmountable, if he will forgive me I will not answer that question, because it would predetermine the outcome of the review that still has to happen specifically in relation to Huawei. However, all the points that he has made are proper for consideration as we make that decision.

[Martin Docherty-Hughes (West Dunbartonshire) (SNP)]

May I take the question asked by the right hon. Member for Carshalton and Wallington (Tom Brake) a little further? A million Uyghurs are languishing in concentration camps in Xinjiang, and the people of that province are under constant surveillance with the connivance of Huawei in the regime. All of us—especially those of us who are members of the Select Committee on Defence—are aware of the security risks of the project, but the Secretary of State and the Government have yet to answer a more fundamental question. Why should they reward a company that has been complicit in creating an authoritarian, dystopian Xinjiang with such a large Government contract?

[Jeremy Wright]

As I said to the right hon. Member for Carshalton and Wallington, the UK Government are not uninterested in this subject; far from it. The hon. Gentleman will understand, however, that the parameters of the review that we are undertaking here relate to what measures it is sensible to take to protect our security interests within the UK telecoms network. Elsewhere in the Government, we continue to take a strong interest in the welfare of minorities in China and elsewhere, and to make strong representations thereon.

Free TV Licences: Over-75s

Martin Docherty-Hughes Excerpts

Tuesday 11th June 2019 Commons Chamber

[Jeremy Wright]

I think I am up to about an hour and 10 minutes’-worth of explanation so far, and I think it is important, as I have said, that we communicate what is happening to older people who will be concerned. It is important to do that with accuracy and to be straightforward about who will be able to retain this benefit, and it is important for the Government to continue to communicate with the BBC. As I hope I have made clear, I intend to do so.

[Martin Docherty-Hughes (West Dunbartonshire) (SNP)]

I always believe that there are three sides to the truth. There is the truth of the BBC, which I have much sympathy with; the Government’s truth of not fulfilling a manifesto commitment; and the truth of the 7,066 pensioners over 75 in my own constituency. There is also the truth of Josephine, who phoned GMTV yesterday morning to say that

“it means an awful lot to me, because that would be £25 a month coming out of our joint pension. We’re self-funding in a residential care home”—

luckily, that will not happen in Scotland—

“and he gets no pension credit. They’ve taken all his attendance allowance when he went in, so what happens to people like us?”

Would the Minister like to tell Josephine what happens?

[Jeremy Wright]

As I have said, it is important that we continue to discuss with the BBC what more can be done for people like that. It is important, as I have said, to be clear about who will continue to get this benefit, and it is important to have this continuing conversation with the BBC about what more can be done for those people, but I will not accept that this Government have not done anything to support people who are in difficulty. Quite the reverse: this Government have done a huge amount to do that, and it is important that when we communicate these things, they are communicated in the round.

Centenary of the Armistice

Martin Docherty-Hughes Excerpts

Tuesday 6th November 2018 Commons Chamber

[Martin Docherty-Hughes (West Dunbartonshire) (SNP)]

I pay tribute to the Minister and the hon. Member for West Bromwich East (Tom Watson) for their introductions to the debate. I also pay tribute to the contribution of my colleague and Chair of the Defence Committee, the right hon. Member for New Forest East (Dr Lewis). Other Members will speak at length. My hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow South West (Chris Stephens), who cannot make it to the debate—he and others are in either Westminster Hall or Committee—would like me to mention the commemorations taking place in Nitshill this weekend.

The eloquence of commemoration is often beset by flurries of grandeur and peppered with words of valour and heroism. Those words are often spoken with full generosity and belief, yet more often than not, speeches are bereft of names, ages and commemoration on a human plane. When spoken, personal commemorations are like stones thrown upon a loch, sending ripples through time itself. Indeed, the greatness of war is the greatness of loss, and only as time passes do we come to understand the profound and unintended historical consequences of those individual losses.

For many, 100 years is an age; for historians, it is a mere moment in time. Yet by its end, the great war had justified its name, at least in our minds. Some 6 million UK troops were mobilised, with a loss of 700,000. It was also a war fought on all fronts: a war of the industrial age on land, at sea and even taking flight to the skies. While some would state that it was an un-won war, there is no doubt that the allied powers in fact forced the Kaiser and his advisers, such as Ludendorff, to accept that surrender was the only way forward for Germany. They, at least at that point in history, recognised that a hopeless struggle to the bitter end would be in no one’s interest.

Some have said that it was the best of times and the worst of times. For one family, I know that it was indeed the worst of times. Far from the front at the age of 24, James Timlin, son of Barbara and Richard and brother to Anne, Bridget, Thomas, Sarah, Maria and Anthony, joined the 2nd Battalion, Royal Scots Fusiliers, in Kilmarnock in that great county of Ayrshire, and undertook a journey that would see him, by the age of 28, travel through the horror of conflict. Little did he know that his great-nephew Sean would join us in the Under-Gallery for this debate; nor could he have known that his sister Sarah and her husband John would settle in the great industrial burgh of Clydebank, and that his other great-nephew would, on these Benches, utter his name and have his medals at his side.

Unlike James, many did not make it to the front, for one of war’s best-known supporters rode into battle, in three waves that lasted beyond the war: plague, or as we now know it, the Spanish flu—a reflection of the truly global nature of modern war. Even as they boarded troop ships in the United States, troops were marching to a fate that they could not imagine. On reaching the ports of Europe, many would disembark not as strong, valiant soldiers, but as corpses to be buried at haste and with no commemoration. Those troop ships sailed the seven seas, and there is no doubt that global war saw the plague of flu grasp the opportunity to wreak havoc, with nearly 100 million human beings dying in every corner of the globe bar Australia. In modern-day Bangladesh, India and Pakistan, the global movement of troops back and forth condemned at least 20 million of some of the poorest people on earth to a death most terrible.

It was a global war that saw battles on all fronts: the western front, the Italian front, the eastern front, the Romanian campaign, the Caucasus campaign, the Serbian campaign, Gallipoli, the Macedonian front, the Sinai and Palestine campaign, the Mesopotamian campaign—in which my friend Anne’s grandfather, George Harvey, served—and the ill-named Africa campaign, which covered vast swathes of that mighty continent. It was a war that even reached to the skies. And how could we forget the loss of life among those in peril on the sea? How could the hon. Member for West Dunbartonshire not reflect on the role of the Royal Mail Ship Lusitania—built in Clydebank—the sinking of which shifted opinion in the United States towards supporting the allied powers?

The victory of war was no solace to those lost. It was also a war that saw—I must disagree with the hon. Member for West Bromwich East—a revolution, even in this state, with effective martial law being declared in the great burghs and cities of Scotland. Workers there demanded that at its end, they, and their sons and brothers returning from the frontline, would no longer live and work as they had—in slums, with early death at home and at work. This was also a world in which women would at last rightly demand equality.

By 1939, we had marched blindfolded toward a war that would shake the very foundations of the earth. Fascism, founded on hate, antisemitism, lies, fear and the targeting of the weak, had filled a vacuum in Europe that many would say the League of Nations had allowed, with the failed peace offering a false hope.

This was a war that James Timlin’s sister, Sarah, knew at close quarters, through her two elder sons—one was in the merchant fleet and the other in the RAF—and her husband, who was in the workhouse of the Parkhead forge in neighbouring Glasgow. Those workers were on the frontline, and it is often forgotten that they are the other veterans of war. On 13 and 14 March, hearing the siren along with her younger children, Kathleen, Mary, Irene, Joseph, Patrick and Francis—names are important, for it is individuals, people, who make up the communities we represent—Sarah sheltered from two nights of intense blitzkrieg by the Luftwaffe. As was testified to on the Floor of the House on 15 March 2016,

“proportionally, Clydebank lost more people and buildings than any other major community anywhere in the United Kingdom.”—[Official Report, 15 March 2016; Vol. 607, c. 928.]

Sarah was lucky. She and her children survived. She lived a long and eventually happy life, but she did not live to see her grandson Ronald, my brother, serve twice, in Iraq and Afghanistan. No doubt she would have known the terror a family feel when their loved ones are on the frontline; the human cost of war was known to Sarah. Her brother, James, born in 1890 in Ballinglen, just south of Ballycastle, County Mayo, Ireland, fell on 29 September 1918 during the third battle of Ypres. He lasted longer than most.

As other hon. Members have said, my constituents and I will soon gather in my constituency—in Clydebank, Dumbarton, Alexandria and the surrounding villages—to commemorate the fallen. War comes about for many reasons, but at the end of it are always the dead, military and civilian. For all our disagreements on these Benches, let us commit again to that word, peace, for without it we live in a world in which democracy cannot flourish.

Fixed Odds Betting Terminals

Martin Docherty-Hughes Excerpts

Thursday 1st November 2018 Commons Chamber

[Jeremy Wright]

I agree with my hon. Friend; there are examples we can look at around the world, and we will want to do that. The point he makes about advertising is important; there is a good deal we may be able to look at in the advertising field, and we intend to do that.

[Martin Docherty-Hughes (West Dunbartonshire) (SNP)]

At the end of this month, universal credit is being rolled out in my constituency, so I hope the Minister will inform my constituents that the decision to implement this legislation will come sooner rather than later, so as not to compound the poverty and aggravation that his Government are causing them.

[Jeremy Wright]

I do not accept the hon. Gentleman’s premise, but he has just heard me say that mitigating the effect of these changes is a cross-Government process, and the Department for Work and Pensions is fully engaged in it.

Passchendaele

Martin Docherty-Hughes Excerpts

Thursday 13th July 2017 Commons Chamber

[John Glen]

The hon. Gentleman makes a typically thoughtful representation of the challenge in getting these commemorations right. I hope he will recognise that a lot of thought and work has gone into trying to get that balance right. I hope we will begin to understand how it is being balanced when we hear from some of my colleagues, particularly my hon. Friend the Member for South West Wiltshire (Dr Murrison).

I will reflect, as I said I would, on the CWGC, which commemorates 54,000 of the missing on the Menin Gate and a further 35,000 on the memorial wall at Tyne Cot. When the names on other nearby memorials are added, the total comes to some 100,000 soldiers who have no known grave, numbers that are unimaginable in modern-day warfare.

Following the ballot for free tickets launched in January, I am delighted that around 3,900 descendants will attend the event at Tyne Cot. The content and staging of the event will evoke, I hope, a strong sense of place, making full use of the poignancy and historic significance of the cemetery. There will be readings by military personnel and descendants, musical performances by UK military bands, a choir and solo performances, and a formal act of remembrance. Readings of soldiers’ recollections, letters and diaries, as well as poetry, will tell the story of the third battle of Ypres and the experiences of men who fought there. Content will reflect the contribution of men from across the UK and Ireland, as well as from the Commonwealth.

In addition, from 29 to 31 July, the Passchendaele centenary exhibition will be held at Passchendaele Memorial Park in Zonnebeke. We have been working with Memorial Museum Passchendaele, and the exhibition will include contributions from a range of UK and Belgian museums and organisations. There will be artefacts, exhibition-style display boards and panels, living history groups and areas for historical talks and musical performances in open-air and covered areas. Memorial Museum Passchendaele will also have an exhibition entitled “Passchendaele, landscape at war,” which will be open to visitors.

I thank and acknowledge the help and support given to us by all the local organisations and local communities in and around Ypres and Zonnebeke during the planning stages over the last year. Their support has been invaluable, and my thanks go particularly to the mayors of Ypres and Zonnebeke, who have led that contribution.

We have also had a huge amount of support from the Commonwealth War Graves Commission, which is celebrating its own centenary this year. This organisation is one of our key partners, and it does outstanding work in ensuring that 1.7 million people who died in the two world wars will never be forgotten. The CWGC cares for cemeteries and memorials at 23,000 locations in 154 countries and territories across the globe, making sure that our war dead are honoured with dignity. The CWGC recently launched a new scheme for interns who have been welcoming and guiding visitors at major cemeteries and memorials this summer, including at Tyne Cot. Also, the Ministry of Defence is a key partner that is contributing military assets to these events. I am delighted, too, that the BBC will be broadcasting the events on both Sunday night and Monday.

Our key themes across the entire first world war centenary programme are remembrance, youth and education. On youth and education, I am pleased that the National Youth Choir of Scotland will perform at all three commemorative events and that around 100 graduates of the National Citizen Service, aged 16 to 19, will be part of the delivery team at the commemorations. The graduates have undergone an educational programme on the first world war in readiness for their roles in Belgium.

[Martin Docherty-Hughes (West Dunbartonshire) (SNP)]

I am grateful for what the Minister is presenting to the House. I completely agree that it is only right and fitting that we should commemorate the loss of life at Passchendaele. Will he talk about the role of the medical profession after Passchendaele and the trench warfare of the first world war? We are commemorating those who lost their lives, but many of those who came home suffered from shellshock, and so many advances in psychiatry were made by dealing with that on the frontline and with the impact on families. Will that play any part in the commemoration of those who survived?

[John Glen]

Given our understanding of many of the impacts of war, certainly psychologically, we will have those things in mind as we remember the events of Passchendaele, but it is very difficult to go back and reinterpret events as they were at the time and as they were experienced at the time. The hon. Gentleman makes a perceptive and worthwhile point.

The Royal British Legion’s National Memorial Arboretum in Staffordshire is also hosting a special service on 31 July, which will include a broadcast on large screens of our national event at Tyne Cot. Members on both sides of the House are encouraged to attend this free event, if they can. They should encourage their constituents to attend, too.

More Victoria Crosses were won on the first day of the battle of Passchendaele than on any other single day of battle in the first world war, and 61 VCs were awarded during the campaign as a whole. All 61 recipients will be honoured with a commemorative paving stone in the town of their birth on the anniversary of the action for which the Victoria Cross was awarded. The commemorative paving stone initiative forms part of the Government’s first world war centenary programme. In the case of those men born overseas, their commemorative paving stones have been placed at the National Memorial Arboretum.

Passchendaele also saw Captain Noel Chavasse, a medical officer, receive his second Victoria Cross. He was wounded on the first evening of Passchendaele but, under heavy fire and in appalling weather, he continued to search no man’s land to attend to the wounded. On 2 August, while he was taking a rest, his first aid post was struck by a shell. Although he had at least six injuries, he managed to crawl away and was picked up and taken to the 32nd casualty clearing station, Brandhoek, where he died on 4 August 1917.

We are also supporting Passchendaele at Home in partnership with the Big Ideas Company. There are over 400 graves in the UK that are very likely to belong to servicemen injured at the battle of Passchendaele who died of their wounds afterwards. The project will work with schools and communities across the country to identify graves in their area and to find out more about the brave men who fought at Passchendaele.

As the House has heard, and I hope Members agree, these commemorative events to mark the battle of Passchendaele will be both educational and poignant, and they will help us to reflect on this terrible war and battle 100 years ago.