Oral Answers to Questions

Wayne David Excerpts

Thursday 10th September 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Streeter]

As usual, my hon. Friend is right: IER has been a long time coming, but it has been carefully and successfully introduced in the past 12 months. We must pay tribute to all the electoral registration officers all over the country for their hard work. As a champion of youth engagement in democracy in his constituency, he makes an important point about online registration. There is no question but that a lot of young people have exercised their ability to register online, so making sure that our register is as full as possible.

[Wayne David (Caerphilly) (Lab)]

What is the Electoral Commission’s view of the Government’s attempt to bring forward the date of the full implementation of IER to December 2015?

Oral Answers to Questions

Wayne David Excerpts

Thursday 30th October 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Order. We have a lot of questions to get through and we must make more timely progress.

[Wayne David (Caerphilly) (Lab)]

7. What steps she is taking to promote adaptation to climate change.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Dan Rogerson)]

We are building the nation’s resilience to a changing climate primarily through the implementation of the first “National Adaptation Programme” report, which DEFRA published last July. This sets out more than 370 actions across key sectors involving Government, business, councils, civil society and academia. The Environment Agency’s Climate Ready Support Service also helps a wide range of organisations to adapt.

[Wayne David]

It is clear that the Minister’s Department has a real problem with credibility. Will he unequivocally condemn the crazy ideas on climate change expressed by the previous Secretary of State?

Common Agricultural Policy

Wayne David Excerpts

Tuesday 18th June 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Heath]

As always, my hon. Friend is very well informed on these subjects. He is right, and that is something that we will be looking at in relation to the implementation phase.

[Wayne David (Caerphilly) (Lab)]

Reference has been made to Scotland in regard to the transition. Would the situation that the Minister has described apply also to Wales and England?

[Mr Heath]

Wales will have the same capacity as Scotland to apply its own CAP rules within the overall rules, although the rules that will apply in Wales will not be quite the same because Wales will not be starting from the same position as Scotland. There is already an increased degree of convergence in Wales. The situation is not exactly the same, but that freedom is in the script for the settlement that we have agreed so far.

--- Later in debate ---

[Huw Irranca-Davies (Ogmore) (Lab)]

We welcome this opportunity to scrutinise progress towards reform of the common agricultural policy. I was going to say to the Minister that it seems like we debated the CAP only yesterday, but then I recalled that we did so in Committee.

The Secretary of State and the Minister may regard it as a measure of success that they have not faced criticism from one side in their negotiations, but they have in fact faced criticism from all sides, including farmers, farmers unions, Ministers in devolved Governments—particularly, but not exclusively, the Scottish Government—and environmental groups. Perhaps the Secretary of State is attempting a divide and conquer strategy—splitting the competing interests in order to diminish their effectiveness and leaving him free to argue his own way in European Union negotiations—but such a strategy has real dangers that can only diminish the outcomes for the UK. Being surrounded by attacks on their negotiating stance leaves Ministers looking weak and vulnerable. I am sure that the Commission, the President and the European parliamentarians involved in decision making will have noticed that isolation at home and will continue to utilise that weakness in negotiations.

That is just on the home front. Likewise, in Brussels and Strasbourg, the days of the UK being at the vanguard of progressive, like-minded nations on CAP reform are, as in so many other areas of policy, a fond but distant memory. The Government are trying to lead and to build on the collaborative approach to previous negotiations, but they have alienated far too many former friends.

No one can have failed to notice the intervention today in The Daily Telegraph—my daily reading—of the Minister without Portfolio, the right hon. and learned Member for Rushcliffe (Mr Clarke), who draws an analogy between the Government’s approach to Europe and the heroic but doomed charge of the Light Brigade. The Secretary of State, like his Prime Minister, is boldly and valiantly galloping into the field of diplomatic battle: he and the Prime Minister are the Lord Raglan and Lord Cardigan of CAP reform and European relations, charging headlong into the cannons of Brussels and being scythed down, but nevertheless riding heroically into Eurosceptic mythology, mayhem and madness.

The Government have done their best to alienate potential diplomatic partners with their swivel-eyed lunacy—not my words, Mr Speaker—on the EU. That cannot but affect the negotiations on CAP reform and, as important, lessen the outcomes for UK farmers and consumers and for sustainable production here, in other nations and in the developing world.

[Wayne David]

On that fundamental point, does my hon. Friend agree that the idea that the CAP can be reformed in a big bang is nonsense? Reform must be predicated on sensible negotiations. The Minister without Portfolio, the right hon. and learned Member for Rushcliffe, says that there cannot be sensible negotiations if the British Government are confused about their position in Europe and send the message that they are essentially Eurosceptic.

[Huw Irranca-Davies]

My hon. Friend, who has great knowledge of this area, is right. It is as though the Government are playing with one hand behind their back. I have great sympathy for the Minister, because although he has great knowledge and wants to work in the best interests of UK farming, his colleagues are not making it easy for him.

Oral Answers to Questions

Wayne David Excerpts

Thursday 16th May 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

We are extremely grateful to the ministerial team and to colleagues.

[Wayne David (Caerphilly) (Lab)]

1. What progress the Electoral Commission is making on preparations for the full confirmation test in the transition to individual electoral registration.

[Mr Gary Streeter (South West Devon)]

The Government, not the Electoral Commission, are responsible for the set-up and delivery of the full confirmation test, which is likely to start in July. The commission will be evaluating and reporting on the process and providing electoral registration officers with guidance and tools to support them in the test. The commission’s evaluation will focus on how the technical system for transferring and handling the data has performed and it will then make an overall assessment of whether everything is in place for the successful delivery of individual electoral registration in October.

[Wayne David]

Does the Electoral Commission agree that there is real concern out there about the IT system that is being used in the process of confirmation, and that it is very important to allow sufficient time for the transition to IER to ensure that things are done properly?

[Mr Streeter]

The hon. Gentleman raises an important point. The IT system is extremely important. That is why a full and proper assessment will be made in good time before IER is introduced in 2014. I remind him and the House that, in any event, at the 2015 election all those on the register in 2014 will be automatically transferred, so there is some safeguard.

Horsemeat

Wayne David Excerpts

Thursday 14th February 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Heath]

That is very much the basis of our discussions with them over the past couple of weeks. Indeed, such discussions took place yesterday and earlier in the week. We are absolutely clear that retailers bear the legal responsibility. When I say retailers, that should be extended to all food businesses, such as caterers. They must be confident in the integrity of their supply chains. We will do everything we can to provide regulatory support for that, so that cases in which they are defrauded are brought to light. The crux is that they must have both assured provenance and a testing regime in their own companies so that they can, with confidence, tell consumers that the meat on their shelves is both what they say it is and safe.

[Wayne David (Caerphilly) (Lab)]

The Minister mentioned the work that is being done at a European level, especially through Europol. Does he agree, therefore, that it is deeply ironic—in fact, it is profoundly worrying—that at this very time the Government are considering a mass opt-out from European justice and home affairs provisions, including the work of Europol?

[Mr Heath]

I can only say that at the moment we have the services of Europol. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State is using those services very effectively. He is leading that request today and we will make sure that on a pan-European basis we deal with what is a pan-European issue.

May I reply to the question asked by the hon. Member for Penistone and Stocksbridge (Angela Smith)? She asked for a date, but I did not want to give her the wrong one, because my memory may be fallible. It was Monday 11 February.