Oral Answers to Questions

Stephen Crabb Excerpts

Wednesday 28th April 2021 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

The third runway at Heathrow, as the hon. Lady knows, is a private sector venture, and it is up to them to produce the capital to do it. I do not see any immediate sign of that particular project coming off. I think what we should look at instead, and what we are looking at, is the prospect of jet-zero aviation and flying without emissions, or with far lower carbon emissions. It is in that area that the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy and the Department for Transport are working together with manufacturers so that this country leads in guilt-free flying.

[Stephen Crabb (Preseli Pembrokeshire) (Con)]

Right now, in every part of the country, levels of business optimism are higher than they have been since the start of the pandemic, with many firms planning to hire more staff and create more apprenticeships for our young people. There is one factor, more than anything else, that underpins that optimism—the success of the UK vaccination programme. Does my right hon. Friend agree that there has never been a more important moment for voters in Scotland and Wales to reject the negativity and divisiveness of the nationalists, and instead look forward to a brighter and stronger future as one United Kingdom?

[The Prime Minister]

Absolutely. I do not know why the Leader of the Opposition’s PPS, the hon. Member for Swansea East (Carolyn Harris), is shaking her head, because surely she would agree with that. We want to work together across the whole of the UK, and I pay tribute, as I have just said, to the incredible work of the Wockhardt factory in Wales, but there is also the Valneva factory in Scotland, and the whole of the United Kingdom coming together, represented by our armed services and, above all, by our NHS helping to deliver that vaccine roll-out to protect the country and take it forward.