Oral Answers to Questions

Peter Heaton-Jones Excerpts

Monday 16th November 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mrs May]

I have to say to the hon. Lady that she needs to have a conversation with her Front-Bench spokesman on those matters, because I seem to recall that she welcomed the fact that we were pulling the various powers together in one Bill.

[Peter Heaton-Jones (North Devon) (Con)]

T3. On behalf of my constituents, may I express our gratitude for the work of the security and intelligence services in protecting us from the sort of evil attacks that we have seen in Paris this weekend? Will the Minister for Security join me in publicly thanking those authorities whose work is usually done out of the public eye but is so important to our everyday lives?

[The Minister for Security (Mr John Hayes)]

My hon. Friend does the House a great service in drawing attention to that work. It is true that much of the work of our security services is, by its nature, secret and therefore they are not often enough given the sort of praise he has given them today. In what they do, they stand between us and chaos, and their work—alongside that of the police—is vital to our communal wellbeing and our personal safety.