Call for General Election

Debate between Patrick Hurley and Luke Charters

Monday 12th January 2026 Westminster Hall

[Patrick Hurley]

I will withdraw it, but does the right hon. Gentleman respect the vote in 1975 on the exact same thing—staying in the European Community, as it was—which was overturned 41 years later? In every Parliament, at every moment, some people want change and others do not. Some want more spending and others do not. Some want radical reform and others want stability. The fact of merely wanting something to happen does not constitute a constitutional imperative. If it did, the Government would be paralysed. We would lurch endlessly from one election to the next, just like we did at the end of the last decade, incapable of governing because the Government were perpetually campaigning. That is evidence not of a democracy that works, but of a democracy that is failing, just like it failed in 2017 and 2019, and just like it failed when the Conservative party was partying while members of the royal family were dying.

An election is not a comfort blanket to be demanded whenever politics becomes difficult or the previous Government’s chickens come home to roost. There is a tendency in debates such as this to treat an election as though it is some kind of harmless release valve. It is not. A general election is disruptive, expensive and all-consuming. It stalls legislation, freezes decision making and turns Parliament in on itself. That is necessary at the right moment, but it is not something to be done after 18 months simply because people have run out of patience.

[Mr Luke Charters (York Outer) (Lab)]

I am genuinely quite baffled that so many Conservative and Reform MPs are here, given that they have missed important debates in this House on things like employment rights. To be fair to the Conservatives, they went to the debates on VE Day and VJ Day; there were no Reform MPs at those debates. What does my hon. Friend make of that?

[Patrick Hurley]

It looks like Reform MPs turn out only when there is something in it for them.

We should be honest about what the petition represents. It is not a considered proposal for the better governance of this country. We can tell that by the way Opposition Members are giggling behind their hands on the other side of the room. The petition is not accompanied by a constitutional argument for changing this place to make it better, nor by any sort of legislative necessity. It is simply an expression of dissatisfaction at how long it has taken the new Government to fix the problems that were left behind after 14 years of chaos, division and decline caused by the Conservative party. There were years of economic stagnation, a referendum of such consequential proportions that the economy has barely grown since 2016, and a Tory Government who were more concerned with looking after themselves than with looking after the most vulnerable in this country.