Philip Davies
Main Page: Philip Davies (Conservative - Shipley)Department Debates - View all Philip Davies's debates with the Northern Ireland Office
(7 years, 5 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Prime Minister
Yes, I was asked about Dewsbury A&E, and I can confirm that it is not closing. The service will be open 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and the majority of patients will see no change to their service.
Philip Davies (Shipley) (Con)
The repeated claim that spending ever increasing amounts of money on overseas aid keeps this country safe has been shown by recent events to be utter nonsense. May I tell the Prime Minister that spending more and more money on overseas aid each year makes us look not compassionate to the public, but idiotic when that money is much needed in the United Kingdom? Will she promise to slash the overseas aid budget and spend it on priorities in the UK? I hope that she does not have a strange political aversion to pursuing any policies that might be popular with the public.
The Prime Minister
I can assure my hon. Friend that I do not have that aversion, but on this issue I do take a different view. It is important that, given the position that we hold and the fact that our economy is one of the largest in the world, we recognise that we can help those around the world. We are seeing millions of people, particularly girls, being educated as a result of the action that we are taking. That is important. I recognise what my hon. Friend has said: we have suffered from terrible terrorist attacks here in the United Kingdom, and our services have also foiled a number of terrorist attacks in recent months and years. It is important that we are able to use our aid money to help ensure good governance in countries so that we do not see the creation of spaces where the terrorists are able to train and incite others.