Alex Brewer MP: speeches 2026

Speeches

• 10 Sept 2026 · Fathers and Positive Male Role Models · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Mrs Hobhouse. I congratulate the hon. Member for Bishop Auckland (Sam Rushworth) on introducing this really important debate. There is a contradiction between the widely shared agreement, certainly in this Chamber, about the vital importance of a positive male role model in shaping young lives and the lack of support, services and policy to support that. But let me say something equally important at the outset: a child does not need a father in the house to flourish. Children raised by single mothers, two mothers, grandmothers or kinship carers are not children with something missing. I represent many such families, and we have heard powerful testimony about them today. They do an extraordinary job, often with less support than they deserve. Children benefit from care, stability and good examples of how to be in the world. It matters whether every child has adults around them modelling something worth copying, but a good role model must first be a present one, and presence is a question not simply of character but of how we structure our society. If we want fathers to be there in the earliest weeks and years, we have to build a society that fosters that through policies, including paternity leave. The evidence on why this matters is strong. Research led by the University of Leeds found that children whose fathers regularly drew, played and read with them at age three did better at school by age five, and that fathers’ involvement at five improved key stage assessment scores at age seven. That effect held regardless of the child’s gender, ethnicity, age in the school year or household income. We know that couples separate. For separating couples, we can reduce conflict with better early support, perhaps via family hubs. On the Women and Equalities Committee, we have examined the impact of paternity and shared parental leave. We recommended raising paternity pay to the level of maternity pay for the first six weeks—90% of average earnings—and setting out a pathway to six weeks of paid statutory paternity leave over this Parliament. Unfortunately, the Government did not commit to taking up that recommendation. Last year, the Committee visited Iceland, where we had the opportunity to learn from and hear about one of the most progressive parental leave policies in the world. Iceland’s parental leave is framed explicitly around ensuring that children can receive care from both parents—or carers—and enabling women and men to combine family life with work. It is grounded in gender equality and children’s rights. Countries that provide fathers and co-parents with substantial, well-paid leave generally have better gender pay gaps—around four percentage points smaller than those that offer less than six weeks of leave. Increasing women’s workforce participation and earnings while reducing pay inequality should be a long-term priority, and it goes hand in hand with providing good male role models. I wonder whether, if that phrase was less awkward to say, we would talk about it more. Role modelling does not stop at the front door. Only around 24% of teachers in England are men; in primary schools it is 14%, while in early years it is only 3%. Those are professions built around care, patience and emotional literacy, and we have allowed them to become, in practice, “women’s work”. That says something to every child at school: it teaches boys that caring is not for them, and it means that the children who most need a steady male adult in their lives are even less likely to find one. Patriarchal values upheld by society have taught boys that care is weakness, that what is associated with women or femininity is worth less, and that asking for help is failure. Before I came to this place, I worked in a domestic abuse refuge. I saw what happens when the male role model in a child’s life is a violent one. Many children in the refuge had witnessed violence at home, usually directed by a father or partner against their mother. That is role modelling, too. To prevent the trauma from those circumstances affecting the next generation, we need to ensure that young boys in particular have at least one stable, secure, positive male role model in their life, and we need to enable a system that keeps children safe from violence in the home. As a society, we have spent over a century examining what it means to be a woman. We have barely begun the equivalent conversation about being a man, so others have stepped in with a much uglier answer. We tell girls that feelings are okay and that it is good to talk, but we tell boys the opposite: that strength is silence and the only acceptable emotion is anger. Talking is “what girls do”, and what girls do is weak, so when a boy has a question he is too embarrassed to ask his dad, he does not ask anyone; instead, he types it into a search bar. Movember’s research, which surveyed more than 3,000 young men, found that nearly two thirds of them regularly engaged with men and masculinity influencers, and those who did reported worse mental health, less willingness to prioritise their mental health, and higher rates of risk-taking behaviour such as steroid use. We have also, as a society, grown accustomed to male violence—in pornography, on television, in the street. That content, which is a feature of the manosphere, is landing because it offers men and boys a story about themselves. One in 10 girls aged 11 to 16 have missed or avoided school to escape sexual harassment, and that is more likely still for girls who are neurodivergent, disabled or LGBTQ+. The manosphere results in worse outcomes for everyone. When we build a country where men can be present, caring and visible in the home, nursery, classroom and youth club, we give boys something better to become, and as a result, we all gain.

• 10 Sept 2026 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  T7. Most fire responders in North East Hampshire are volunteers. After an unprecedented summer of wildfires, including in my constituency, will the Minister meet me and fire volunteers to hear about the pressures on the fire service at first hand?

• 7 Sept 2026 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  Last week, police and Trading Standards carried out co-ordinated visits, led by our local police officer, to retail premises on Fleet Road over suspected criminality, which is of increasing concern to me and my constituents. How is the Minister working cross-departmentally with the Home Office to keep our high streets safe and lawful?

• 4 Sept 2026 · Infants, Parents and Carers Bill · Hansard source

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  The first 1,001 days of a baby’s life are the single greatest opportunity we have to reduce inequality, improve health and educational outcomes, and thereby improve the life chances of future generations. The “1001 Critical Days” report came out in 2013 as a truly cross-party manifesto, and I believe it has been relaunched at least twice since then. I took a great interest in it when I worked in the domestic abuse sector a decade ago, because I saw at first hand the devastating impact that trauma can have on babies and young children. I wholeheartedly welcome the statutory protection for babies that the right hon. Member for New Forest West (Sir Desmond Swayne) is bringing before the House in this Bill. Reassuring words also need action, however, and sadly the actions of the party that he represents have moved in exactly the opposite direction. That has let families down year after year, with under-investment in all those areas that support our children. There has been a lot of talk of Sure Start and children’s centres, and Action for Children found that in just three years between 2015 and 2018, the average spend per child of children’s centres, and the number of children using them, fell by around one fifth, with the most deprived areas hit hardest. It is not just Sure Start; in North East Hampshire we used to have a drop-in health clinic—somewhere parents could weigh their babies, meet others, and build connections with other members of the local community. It made a real difference, but it stopped operating after the pandemic. Hampshire has 18 and a half constituencies, almost 70,000 children under five, and so far only one Best Start family hub. Today the nearest Best Start hub for the 5,000 children in my constituency is on the other side of Hampshire, and there is nowhere within my community offering a one-stop shop for early years support. When services are closed, others are stretched to breaking point. Families have nowhere local to turn to, and we miss a window of opportunity to invest in a child. That child might arrive at school without the basic skills they need; they might arrive at the GP surgery with avoidable health risks. They are more likely to need further help that is harder and more expensive to provide. Before becoming an MP, I ran a charity supporting children and young people with Down syndrome, working with families from the moment their child was born, and indeed sometimes before. My charity, and countless others, stepped in to provide the services that councils were cutting. I saw at first hand what early intervention does for a child’s health, skills and confidence, and what its absence costs. We saw the impact on families of speech and language therapy, occupational therapy, and other interventions that are life-changing, especially if provided in those early years. We also saw the impact of a lack of those services. Although we are of course focusing on babies, we must remember that the first 1,001 critical days are from conception, nine months of which is pregnancy. The Bill is not just about babies; it is also about mothers. Inquiries by the Women and Equalities Committee into medical misogyny, women’s reproductive health conditions, miscarriage and bereavement leave, paternity and shared parental leave, and female genital mutilation all found that women are routinely let down across those areas of health, maternity care and scientific research. Sadly, I expect that that surprises nobody, but the impact is felt by everyone, including men and boys, because if the mother’s concerns are ignored, it can result in her son’s health conditions worsening. A father who has little to no parental leave has less chance to bond with his children, to the detriment of both. Investing in the first days, weeks and years of a child’s life is the right thing to do not only for people but for the economy. Early intervention could generate an estimated £45.5 billion for our economy every year, and for every £1 invested up to £200 comes back in long-term benefits. Previous Conservative Governments have systematically eroded the services needed to provide the best start in life. I saw that at the coalface when supporting victims of domestic abuse and their children to flee dangerous and violent partners. They needed the support of a children’s centre, but also of social services and the health service. They needed public transport and a safe and secure roof over their head. They needed reliable maternity services, reliable nursery places, and a reliable legal system. Often they got none of those things, and watching the systematic removal of support for the country’s most vulnerable people was the exact reason for my journey into politics. We have an opportunity to repair and build. We have the evidence, we have the numbers, and we clearly have cross-party support. We have a country full of children with huge potential who need our support. We cannot afford not to invest in their future, so I heartily welcome the Bill as a first step, and call on the Government not to toddle but to take great strides in providing the essential cross-departmental support for parents, carers and children that is so clearly needed.

• 2 Sept 2026 · Employer National Insurance Contributions: Small Businesses in Hampshire · Hansard source

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  I wholeheartedly agree. That is the exact crux of the issue, and it is borne out in the data. The Bank of England decision-maker panel revealed that 46% of firms nationally have cut staff because of these changes, and that 20% have paid lower wages than planned. Nationally, small businesses account for 60% of private sector employment, so when they pull back it is not a footnote to the labour market; it is the labour market. Nowhere is that clearer than in the hair and beauty sector. Kerry Mather has run KJM Salons in Fleet for 36 years, employing around 20 people including six apprenticeships, training a new generation in a key town centre location. In the past decade, apprenticeships in the UK hair and beauty industry have dropped from nearly 19,000 to 3,000. If we are not careful, soon there will be no apprenticeships left.

• 2 Sept 2026 · Employer National Insurance Contributions: Small Businesses in Hampshire · Hansard source

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  I thank the hon. Member for his intervention and I agree that this is a matter for Government, which, of course, is why I am raising it today. The pressure compounds, of course, where a workforce is already stretched. Vehicle repair already loses around 1,700 workers a year. The Institute of the Motor Industry says: “Protecting that workforce is not just a matter for bodyshops and garages—it is a matter for insurers, fleet operators, and ultimately for every driver who needs their vehicle repaired.” Foster and Heanes, a name that is well known in North East Hampshire for providing MOTs and repairs, sits squarely in the path of that shortfall. Where there are no staff available to repair a vehicle, the consequences ripple out to every tradesperson who needs a van back on the road and every local supply chain that depends on vehicles moving on time. In a constituency with limited bus infrastructure, the school run is also affected, because for many families there is no alternative but to use a car. As my hon. Friend the Member for Winchester (Dr Chambers) and the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) have said, such business challenges are of course felt across the country. Some 69% of businesses cite employer national insurance contributions as one of the top three cost threats to UK labour market competitiveness, while business confidence has fallen—even since the market turmoil of autumn 2022, which is a really damning indictment of this policy. A quarter of firms cut back investment in the very quarter that these changes took effect, making it no surprise that growth under this Government has never once crept above 0.6%. The policy is just so hard to understand given the rhetoric used by this Government. There is talk of growth, talk of apprenticeships and talk of opportunities for young people, but the action seems to be the opposite—fewer jobs, fewer apprenticeships, less business investment and an economy that continues to stagnate. Small business owners need to understand how the Government can justify this policy. Nowhere is the policy harder to defend than in health and social care. This year alone, independent care providers have been billed an extra £940 million. Ministers point to additional social care funding, but for providers on the ground that funding is little more than a consolation prize, because the Government voted down every single Lib Dem amendment tabled in the House of Lords to exempt care and early years providers from this rise. It has landed on a sector that is already in profound crisis and that simply cannot reduce its workforce to cope. Hundreds of thousands of people are currently waiting for care, many of them stranded in hospital beds simply because the care they need is not available, which piles more strain on to the NHS. Liberal Democrat analysis found that almost 900,000 people had their request for care denied in the last financial year, while—tragically—a further 6,000 people died while waiting for their care to be approved. This policy does not simply squeeze care providers’ margins; it deepens a crisis with a real human cost. That gets to the very heart of the matter. At the centre of this situation, as local business owners in North East Hampshire have told me, are people. Good employers who pay their staff a fair wage, who train and invest in their teams and who contribute to the communities in which they operate are being squeezed to breaking point. Having barely recovered from the covid years, service and retail businesses no longer have the financial buffers they once had. That means their staff lose out not just on a pay rise but on a Christmas party or a team training day, or perhaps their equipment is not replaced as regularly or they do not get a bonus. Whatever the consequence, it is people who are impacted—the ones who this Government claim they want to support. Hampshire’s experience and the national picture are one and the same story, but none of this was inevitable. The Office for Budget Responsibility itself says that firms will pass on 60% of the higher costs, whether through reduced wages or higher prices. Coupled with five consecutive years of falling living standards, the changes to NICs are nothing short of regressive. There is no doubt that our public services need funding and that our country’s infrastructure needs urgent repair, and I am the first to call for those things, but there is a fair way to do this—and one that will not strangle the UK’s economic growth. The Government must focus on taxing those with the broadest shoulders so that they contribute more through a higher digital services tax, on overhauling the broken business rates system, on ensuring that enormous multinational corporations are paying their fair share for doing business in the UK, and on reversing the Conservatives’ banking tax cuts. Positive change is possible. The Government’s steps towards cross-party discussions on social care and the 20% cut in business rates for pubs, clubs and music venues are welcome, but we must go further. Any relief to those sectors cannot leave NICs off the table. Today and every day, I represent the brilliant North East Hampshire business community. Small businesses are the engine room of the British economy, so I call on the Government to give them the certainty they need to invest, grow and create jobs. Our businesses should be thriving, not barely surviving.

• 2 Sept 2026 · Employer National Insurance Contributions: Small Businesses in Hampshire · Hansard source

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  I beg to move, That this House has considered the impact of changes to employer National Insurance contributions on small businesses in Hampshire. It is an honour to serve with you in the Chair, Mrs Barker. I am equally privileged to be joined by a number of local business owners from North East Hampshire, who are in the Public Gallery. Soaring energy costs, a business rates system in desperate need of overhaul and, perhaps the most damaging of all, a rise in employer national insurance contributions: individually, any one of those changes would be hard for a small business to absorb, but together they are too much for many small businesses across Hampshire. When a small business’s costs rise, that cost moves on to workers through stagnant wages, to customers through higher prices and to the business owners in lower profits. When the numbers simply cannot add up, the cost also moves on to local communities, through weaker local economies and hollowed out high streets. In Hampshire, where almost 98% of businesses are small businesses, that is felt by an entire county. Small businesses cannot design their way around these tax changes. A big national chain can negotiate volume discounts, restructure its human resources or draw on a financial buffer; a beauty salon in Church Crookham or a care home in Ewshot cannot. That is why 35% of small firms say that they are planning to close or significantly scale back this year, and why these changes are, in plain terms, a jobs tax. This matters because these are precisely the employers we need. The Government’s own research has warned that without urgent action, one in six young people could soon be a NEET—somebody not in education, employment or training. Hospitality, retail, personal care and customer service are the sectors facing the steepest rise in labour costs, yet they are the very sectors that traditionally give young people their first, vital experience in the world of work.

• 16 Jul 2026 · National Planning Policy Framework · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Sir Desmond. I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Wells and Mendip Hills (Tessa Munt) for securing this debate. It is clearly essential to build homes. One reason why I am sitting in this place is my work to support victims of domestic abuse. For those, often with children, who are on a six-month stay in a refuge while fleeing the most dreadful violence, a secure home is the first step towards a new, safe future. However, the Government have introduced no targets for council or social housing, despite the Liberal Democrats making many calls for them to do so. The dreadful shortage left as the legacy of successive Conservative Governments is, at the very least, not being remedied by this Labour Government. That problem needs fixing, and the NPPF changes not only do not address it, but open up a raft of other problems. The Conservative Administrations that previously ran Hart district council and Basingstoke and Deane borough council failed to produce local plans. That left those areas subject to speculative development granted on appeal, resulting in the building of large housing estates on the edges of our towns and villages, with no accompanying infrastructure. To make the best of a bad situation, the Liberal Democrats on Hart district council introduced a local plan, which, crucially, meant that houses were built sustainably on brownfield land. When the Lib Dems took joint control of Basingstoke and Deane borough council, a local plan was prioritised and progressed. However, this Government’s new housing targets have rendered those new plans all but redundant. Those council areas are now easy targets for entirely inappropriate housing developments. When the balance tips in favour of appeal, it is not the people but the developers who benefit. In Basingstoke and Deane, planning permission for around 6,000 new homes has already been granted. In Hart, the major developer working on the biggest housing project has slowed down building: instead of building and selling 200 houses at a time, it is now building 50 to protect its profits. The new houses are no more affordable—in fact, properties in North East Hampshire are some of the most expensive outside London—but under the Government’s housing policies, developers are being allowed to land-bank: to push through application after application, despite the lack of infrastructure, and to hold on to land for years or decades as it increases in value. Applications come in for a raft of inappropriate places, and all the while, there is no statutory consultee for our most important resource. Water is out biggest concern, and it is absent from the Government’s plans. South East Water, which supplies fresh water to most of North East Hampshire, produced a five-year plan in autumn 2024 that is largely a work of fiction, citing a new pipeline that would supply new and existing homes that would come online in spring 2025. Nobody believed that that could be completed in six months, but Ofwat has no powers to compel South East Water to publish a plan that is in any way based in reality. The consequences of this regulatory and legislative failure sit with local people and the environment. Failure to supply local fresh water has obvious consequences, but the environment also suffers. We have heard already about how the Environment Agency has cancelled the supply of water in Greywell, yet South East Water continues to abstract from the site.

• 14 Jul 2026 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  The Basingstoke and North Hampshire hospital rebuild has been delayed by up to two decades. The buildings are in a dire state and becoming increasingly expensive to maintain. Land for the new hospital is secured, so what possible justification can there be for further delay in building this new hospital?

• 1 Jul 2026 · Early Years Funding: Hampshire · Hansard source

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  I beg to move, That this House has considered the adequacy of early years funding in Hampshire. It is an honour to serve with you in the Chair, Sir Alec. A Hampshire nursery manager recently told me: “Sometimes the funding arrives so late that we are genuinely worried about making wages.” That sentence has stayed with me, because it captures something that the national conversation about “free childcare” too often misses. The question is not simply whether Hampshire has enough childcare places on paper. It is also whether every family can access suitable, affordable and high-quality early education and childcare when they actually need it and whether providers have the funding and workforce to deliver that sustainably. Those are two very different questions, and today I want to address them both. Let us be clear about the scale of the pressure that the sector is under. Providers are being hammered by rising costs: increased employer national insurance contributions, rising energy costs just to keep the lights on, business rates and more. One nursery provider in my constituency of North East Hampshire told me that their liability insurance had risen by 19% this year alone, and that was on top of a 59% jump in business rates. Department for Education analysis published in May found that on average providers took in just £1.01 for every £1 that they spent in 2025, and nearly half of providers reported income that fell short of covering their costs. I am aware that one nursery in my constituency is required to subsidise the Government’s funded offer by more than £51,000 in this academic year alone. It cannot be right that a sector that is already operating on wafer-thin margins is left to absorb more and more tax rises.

• 1 Jul 2026 · Early Years Funding: Hampshire · Hansard source

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  Yes, I absolutely agree; that is a precise summary of the current position. When we think of early years, most of us automatically think of nurseries, but in many areas of the country, and especially North East Hampshire, many families rely on local childminders. Earlier this month, a constituent of mine, Lorna, told me that after almost 26 years of running her childminding business, she must close it because of mounting financial pressures. She has loved the job, but the lack of any promise of a better financial future has left her with no choice. Every ambition that we hold for this system—more places, better outcomes and proper support for children with additional needs—depends on a stable, skilled and well-supported workforce. Parents do not use the language of workforce policy, but they feel its consequences all the same, including in high staff turnover, longer waiting lists, reduced flexibility and the particular difficulty of finding a place for a child with additional needs. A Hampshire nursery manager put the underlying cause to me plainly: rising costs have not come with a matched uplift in the funding rate. Staffing alone accounts for three quarters of costs in the early years sector. That leaves early years settings particularly exposed to sudden changes, such as the increase in employer national insurance contributions. Providers cannot compete for the experienced senior staff necessary to deliver high-quality support, and high staff turnover leads to higher training costs. Every parent stuck on a waiting list is living with the downstream consequence of a workforce crisis that starts with underfunding, and Hampshire reflects many of the challenges in microcosm. It is a large county, spanning urban, rural and coastal communities. Hampshire county council’s childcare sufficiency assessment points to the same challenges: expanding supply to meet the extended 30-hour entitlement; tackling recruitment and retention; and ensuring that rising demand does not squeeze out children with special educational needs or from disadvantaged backgrounds—the very children who stand to gain the most from a good-quality early years setting. Free childcare makes for a great headline, but it has to be deliverable. As of September 2025, the county council projected that Hampshire would need an additional 2,100 childcare places in wards where supply is already limited just to meet the promise of 30 hours a week. This promise is not all it is made out to be. The figure of 30 hours is based on term-time care only, so for those parents who work full-time, that is spread out over 52 weeks, not 38. The rate for three and four-year-olds that is paid to settings is lower than the cost to provide the service, so those paying for additional hours are, in effect, subsidising the free provision. For those families who are barely getting by, with high living costs and stagnant wages for their own work, it is often more expensive for both parents to work. That is not good for our economy. As with any business, cash flow is key, and providers across my North East Hampshire constituency tell me that they are paid in arrears, with funding for a month’s care landing in the last three days of that same month, compared with other counties that pay before the month even starts. So Hampshire nurseries are covering an entire month of wages, rent and bills with private fees. When that is combined with low or no profit margins, it sets the scene for instability and uncertainty. Young children, working parents and childcare providers all need stability in the sector to thrive, but the circumstances are far from ideal for that. Nowhere is the funding gap starker than for children with special educational needs and disabilities. Before entering this House, I served as a school governor and ran a charity supporting children and young adults with Down’s syndrome and their families, so this is an issue I have seen up close from both sides of the school gate. Providers tell me that the pathway to secure support is long and difficult to navigate. By the time a child is identified, their needs are often already very high. What funding does arrive frequently pays for only an enhanced ratio, which is no substitute for the one-to-one specialist care that many children need, and staff often lack the specialist training required. Indeed, in my previous line of work, it was the charity that stepped in to provide the training—a service with the uncertainty of being funded solely through donations and simply not available everywhere in the country. A child’s future should not be a postcode lottery. Investing in our future generations is the best investment we can make, for them, for families and for society. That is why Liberal Democrats are calling for early years providers to be exempted from the rise in employer national insurance contributions. Hampshire’s early years providers are not asking for handouts; they are asking for the funding that was promised to arrive, to be enough and to be on time. A place on a spreadsheet is not the same as a place a family can use. A free hour that no provider can afford to deliver is not free at all. Our children’s futures, and those caring for them, deserve nothing less.

• 30 Jun 2026 · High Street Regeneration and Unlawful Storefronts · Hansard source

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  The small businesses that my hon. Friend is talking about make up 84% of store closures nationally. That trend is felt very much in my constituency, as I am sure it is in hers. Does she agree that the Government must urgently reform our business rates system before those independent businesses vanish from our high streets entirely?

• 17 Jun 2026 · Rural Pubs: Fiscal Support · Hansard source

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  Like my hon. Friend’s constituency, mine has beautiful countryside pubs but they are struggling. Pub owners have told me that this year is worse than the covid years. They face closure, despite being the only place for communities to meet in rural areas, as in many others. Does my hon. Friend agree that we must overhaul the entire business rate system to give pubs the support they need to thrive, not just barely survive?

• 10 Jun 2026 · Railways Bill · Hansard source

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  In North East Hampshire, thousands of London-bound commuters rely on trains as an extension of their office, especially when that train is delayed. Despite that, the UK’s onboard wi-fi speed was ranked 16th out of 18 major European and Asian countries. Does my hon. Friend agree that without a statutory passengers’ charter, passengers who spend thousands of pounds a year on season tickets have no reasonable way to hold the railways to account when basic standards, such as reliable wi-fi, are simply not met?

• 4 Jun 2026 · Home-to-School Transport · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Mr Twigg. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough (Tom Gordon) on securing this important debate. Connection and mobility are key to a social, happy and healthy society—and, as we are hearing, an educated one. The ability to build networks, reach community and simply get where we need to go matters, and it matters most in the early years of a child’s development. It councils’ responsibility to ensure that money allocated is properly spent, but it is Government’s responsibility to ensure that councils have adequate funding, including for home-to-school transport. That funding is provided through recurrent general funding allocations, and the Government must make absolutely certain that their funding formula matches local needs. When it does not, families and communities pay the price. I have a local example of exactly that. When Ancells Farm, a housing development in my North East Hampshire constituency, was built with the promise of a local primary school, families moved there in good faith. That school was never built. However, as part of a new arrangement, Hampshire county council promised a free bus to take children to their catchment school. That promise, too, has now been broken. What exists today is a bus service restricted solely to eligible students, with no spare seat capacity whatsoever. The decision to reduce the bus size, removing additional seats that parents were not only willing but actively prepared to pay for, has had real and serious consequences. It is the subject of a stage 3 complaint with Hampshire county council and has been referred to the ombudsman, but while complaints work their way through the bureaucratic channels, families are struggling today. Let me be specific about what that looks like. I am all in favour of children walking to school whenever practical and possible. Parents are doing the school run twice a day, every day. Even by car, that is still time taken away from work. For those in paid-hourly or shift-based employment, it means hours lost, and hours lost mean money lost. For those in salaried roles, it means arriving late, leaving early or relying on the good will of employers, which cannot be taken for granted indefinitely. Some parents have had to reduce their working hours; others have had to turn down responsibilities or opportunities at work. Those ripple effects reach into every corner of family life. Less income means less financial resilience. It means fewer after-school clubs, fewer activities and fewer of the enriching experiences that support a child’s development and wellbeing. The broken promise of a bus is not just an inconvenience. For the parents who do not drive, the situation is simply unworkable. The walk to the catchment primary school is 2.4 miles according to Google Maps—other maps are available—which is 54 minutes on foot. For a five-year-old, it would take considerably longer, as I am sure we can all imagine. For a parent doing the round trip twice—there and back in the morning, and again at the end of the day—that is close to four hours of walking every single school day. Those are four hours that cannot be spent working, caring for other children, managing a home or doing any of the other things that family life demands. The route crosses the railway station entrance with no pedestrian crossing, and runs along the town’s busiest roads at rush hour. Parents have raised serious concerns about its safety. They have paid out of their own pockets for an independent safety assessment, which has identified real hazards, while Hampshire county council has refused to conduct a safety assessment of its own. One school is 10 minutes closer, which is not nothing for a young child, but it is not in catchment, and there is no public bus as an alternative because rural bus services, even in semi-rural commuter towns, have been cut. Let me turn briefly to the law, because it is instructive. The Government’s own guidance on free school transport sets out clearly how children qualify. Rightly, they qualify if they cannot walk to school because of special educational needs, disability or mobility problems. They qualify when there is no safe walking route, but if the council refuses to undertake a sufficient assessment, who decides what is and is not safe? They qualify if the school is more than 2 miles away and they are under eight, or if the school is more than 3 miles away and they are eight or older. That often leaves families in the ridiculous situation of having to walk an eight-year-old to school while their seven-year-old is on the bus. It is arguable that, for families on Ancells Farm, every single one of those criteria is met for every child in one way or another, yet parents have been fighting for years to keep the bus service going. We must consider what more the Government can do to ensure that local authorities are adequately funded and meeting their statutory duties towards the children in their care. I urge the Minister to consider what families are facing in Ancells and elsewhere across the country.

• 2 Jun 2026 · Armed Forces Bill · Hansard source

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  Veterans’ mental health challenges can be significant, for obvious reasons—trauma, stress, spending a long time away from friends and family, and so on. As I am sure my hon. Friend knows, devastatingly, veterans under the age of 24 have a suicide rate that is two to four times higher than that for the civilian population of the same age. Given that mental health problems are so significant and less visible than physical health needs, does my hon. Friend agree that establishing the role of a veterans’ mental health oversight officer, as outlined in new clause 12, would ensure that mental health support is robust?

• 1 Jun 2026 · Health Bill · Hansard source

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  In my area, children waiting for ADHD assessments—many already on the standard pathway for years—have been told that they will have to wait until 2027 at the earliest. We know this is happening nationally, because Healthwatch told us in its 2024 report. Does my hon. Friend agree that abolishing Healthwatch—the only statutory independent body holding our NHS to account—will leave the most vulnerable patients without a voice and the NHS marking its own homework?

• 15 Apr 2026 · Cost of Heating Oil · Hansard source

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  I thank my hon. Friend for securing this important debate. As the representative for North East Hampshire, I know all too well the premium that many rural households face when it comes to bills and expenses. Rural households already have a really heavy burden, as he has outlined, including higher rates of fuel poverty, lower energy efficiency and a fuel poverty gap of £987 against their urban counterparts. More than 5,000 households in my constituency rely on heating oil. Does he agree that the Government have a responsibility to act, probably through a price cap, which would ensure that rural households are not penalised simply for where they live?

• 12 Mar 2026 · International Women’s Day · Hansard source

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  This year’s theme, as we have heard, is “Give to Gain”. That prompted me to think about feminism on a global scale, and how interconnected we truly all are. Our globalised world is far from being made up of isolated countries, bounded by iron borders; we exist in the physical space and online. Our geopolitical landscape is shifting constantly, and feminism must move with it. The experiences of women are shaped by overlapping factors of race, class, disability, migration status, sexuality, faith and geography. Feminism policy cannot be effective if it only reflects the lives of the most privileged. Some of the gravest injustices faced by women globally include physical violence, forced marriage and economic exclusion, and they fall hardest on those who are at multiple intersections of disadvantage. Progress for women is never a zero-sum game. When we lift up the most marginalised, we all rise. That is why “Give to Gain” is such an important theme. It has made me reflect that we as a country and a society must give overseas aid if we are to help build a more progressive, fair and stable world. Today, I want to raise one of the most difficult and taboo subjects in the area of violence against women and girls, but one that we must confront: female genital mutilation, commonly known as FGM or cutting. It is a sensitive and distressing topic, but to break taboos, we must start to articulate the problem. Female genital mutilation comprises all procedures that involve partial or total removal of the external female genitalia, or injury to the female genital organs for any non-medical reasons. It is steeped in misguided ideas of a woman’s virtue—ideas that are pervasive, and that manifest in all cultures in different ways, of which FGM is, I believe, one of the most insidious and violent. In January, I travelled to The Gambia as part of a delegation from the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association. FGM was made illegal in The Gambia in 2015, yet the practice continues. In fact, to avoid detection, cutting is now carried out on increasingly younger girls, and sometimes even on babies, with devastating and sometimes fatal consequences. The practice has no health benefits and causes lifelong problems, including severe bleeding, incontinence, infections, long-term pain, menstrual problems, complications in childbirth and an increased risk of newborn deaths. Beyond that clear physical trauma, many women live with depression, flashbacks and lifelong psychological scars. It is a form of torture. FGM is a serious violation of human rights and bodily autonomy, not a cultural inevitability, and more than 4 million girls are at risk every single year, yet in The Gambia, I also saw hope. I saw the profound impact of not-for-profit and grassroots organisations, who work creatively and sensitively in communities to remove economic and cultural barriers to change. Data gathering is difficult in a country with such severe poverty, but initial estimates suggest that the prevalence of FGM has fallen: it has gone from affecting around 76% of girls to around 51%. Non-governmental organisations and grassroots women’s organisations are uniquely effective, because they are trusted by families and embedded in communities. Those organisations are part-funded by British overseas aid, which this Government are now reducing. Those organisations’ funding runs out this year, just as the message is starting to get through. The reduction in aid tears holes in the safety net for the world’s most vulnerable communities, and leaves young girls more exposed. The Government’s decision to reduce the United Kingdom’s official development assistance from 0.5% to 0.3% of gross national income will have real-world consequences. It represents the lowest United Kingdom aid contribution as a share of gross national income since 1999 and diminishes our long-standing reputation as a global leader in humanitarian assistance. In our report on FGM, the Women and Equalities Committee was clear: the Government must protect funding for programmes that prevent FGM and set out their plans for future investment in that vital work. Instead, in their response, the Government confirmed that their flagship programme to end FGM will finish in October 2026, and that there are no plans at all for what comes next. That is not just disappointing; it is deeply irresponsible. When Britain invests in the freedom and wellbeing of girls globally, we gain a safer, fairer and more stable world. That is why, when the Liberal Democrats were in government, we secured a commitment of 0.7% of gross national income for overseas aid. FGM is, of course, illegal here too, but in today’s global society, British girls are being taken abroad to undergo cutting in areas with fewer protections. In the last decade, more than 41,000 women and girls have had FGM identified at an NHS appointment in this country, yet in the five-year period between 2019 and 2024, there was just one conviction under the Female Genital Mutilation Act 2003. Protection must not stop at the border. Intervention must happen before a child boards a plane and after she lands. Frontline non-governmental organisations in source countries are often best placed to prevent FGM. The practice of FGM is rooted in gender inequality, control of girls’ bodies and forced silence. True solidarity means recognising that their struggle is our struggle. By supporting global efforts to end FGM through aid and diplomacy, the UK helps to meet its international commitments and reduces the chance of FGM happening to people who live here. The Government must not be complicit in halting the progress on preventing such violence against girls, no matter where they are born. Understanding intersectionality is vital to feminism today, and I call on the Government to recognise that, in our interconnected world, solving violent crime against women and girls everywhere is everyone’s responsibility.

• 4 Mar 2026 · NHS Capital Spending · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend is giving a powerful and important speech. Half the residents in my constituency are served by Basingstoke hospital, which was included in the now infamous promise of 40 new hospitals by 2030. Now it seems completion could be as late as 2046. The delay means another 20 years of spending taxpayers’ money on a building with leaking windows, exposed wiring, an uninsulated roof and countless other physical problems, with a bill that goes up and up every year to maintain that crumbling building. Does my hon. Friend agree that asking taxpayers to pay twice is a waste of public money, and Basingstoke hospital and others should have their rebuilds brought forward?

• 23 Feb 2026 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  What measures is the Minister taking to protect communities from inappropriate, speculative development when effective and expensive local plans that were working have been rendered effectively useless by new housing targets?

• 9 Feb 2026 · Brain Tumour Survival Rates · Hansard source

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  I thank the hon. Member for Mitcham and Morden (Dame Siobhain McDonagh) and my hon. Friend the Member for Witney (Charlie Maynard) for bringing this important debate to the House. I want to talk briefly about two things. First, I want to acknowledge and put on the record the bravery of my very close, lifelong friend, Karin Buschenfeld. She, like 45% of those diagnosed with a brain tumour, received that diagnosis in A&E in a very haphazard manner last month—that is double the rate for other cancers. She and her family are now adjusting to a very difficult new reality. The other reason for my speaking today is to celebrate the amazing work of the Brain Tumour Charity. Founded and still based in my constituency of North East Hampshire, it was originally called the Samantha Dickson Research Trust, founded by Angela and Neil Dickson in memory of their daughter who died aged just 16 in 1996. The charity now supports thousands of people all across the country, including my friend. It also funds research, and the founders raised with me the unspent funding that languishes while survival rates remain stubbornly low. I call on the Minister to ensure that the Government work with researchers so that the best-quality research can help to change outcomes for future generations.

• 27 Jan 2026 · Rural Broadband: Installation · Hansard source

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  My semi-rural constituency is less than an hour from London, so people would think the broadband would be tip-top, but it is far from it. In some areas, speeds are less than 1 megabit per second. As we have discussed, this prevents businesses from holding online meetings and so on, but it also means that, for example, students cannot go home in the holidays to stay with their parents because they simply cannot complete their studies. Does the hon. Member agree that high-speed broadband is critical to this country’s infrastructure and that the Government have a duty not to leave rural communities behind?

• 21 Jan 2026 · Dementia Support: Hampshire · Hansard source

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  I am sorry to hear about the experience of my hon. Friend’s mother, and the experiences of my hon. Friend’s constituents. Many people in my constituency of North East Hampshire face similar challenges. I have personal experience with a relative who could not get a diagnosis in Hampshire despite many of us, as her family members, trying very hard to help her to do so. She ended up having to fund all her care herself, and did not get treatments that she might have needed. Does my hon. Friend agree that the Government must prioritise this care so that people with dementia can have continuity and the support that they need?