Andrew Murrison MP: speeches 2025

Speeches

• 29 Oct 2025 · Asylum Seekers: MOD Housing · Hansard source

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  Will the Minister ensure in future that Members are given some notice of the Government’s plans relating to MOD accommodation? Will he ensure that the gross discourtesy that has been visited on the hon. Member for Inverness, Skye and West Ross-shire (Mr MacDonald) in this particular case is not repeated, and that communities may even be able to suggest to the Government alternatives, where alternatives exist? As for the pull factors to which he rightly alluded, will he ensure that accommodation that is offered up by the Ministry of Defence is at the more austere end of the spectrum? It is certainly the case that the men and women of our armed forces, families and veterans are heartily fed up with seeing people not being put in accommodation that apparently is not fit, but that apparently was fit to hold soldiers, sailors and airmen.

• 29 Oct 2025 · Gaza and Hamas · Hansard source

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  The Minister quite rightly said that Hamas must disarm and that there can be no place for Hamas in the future of Gaza, yet the White House appears to be licensing Hamas to conduct internal security operations. What conversations is he having with his US counterparts to reconcile the UK position, which he clearly outlined, and that of the US?

• 29 Oct 2025 · UK-Türkiye Typhoon Export Deal · Hansard source

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  The news is welcome, but the future is unmanned, as the Minister knows. With that in mind, what UK equity have the Government secured in the drone joint venture that was signed in June between Leonardo and the Turkish company, Baykar?

• 28 Oct 2025 · Stamp Duty Land Tax · Hansard source

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  The average price of a property in St Albans is £642,000 a year. Under the proposals of the hon. Lady’s party, how does she think her constituents would face paying ever more taxes, either through stamp duty land tax or the council tax reforms that she and her colleagues propose?

• 28 Oct 2025 · Stamp Duty Land Tax · Hansard source

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  I will be interested to hear what the Minister intends to do to un-gum the housing market. I think he will accept that it is an important part of our economy and he says that he is very keen on growth, so what will he do to un-gum it? And what does he say to those legions of tradespeople—electricians, plumbers and kitchen fitters—who are all looking to the Government to provide them with some relief in the months ahead?

• 28 Oct 2025 · Stamp Duty Land Tax · Hansard source

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  rose —

• 28 Oct 2025 · Stamp Duty Land Tax · Hansard source

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  Does my right hon. Friend agree that we also see hypocrisy? An example would be Cabinet Ministers who say “Build, baby, build” while at the same time writing letters to the Mayor of London trying to block homes in their constituency.

• 28 Oct 2025 · China Spying Case · Hansard source

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  The National Security Adviser has spent a great deal of time visiting various Chinese entities before and after his appointment. One appointment that he does not appear very keen on taking up is with the Joint Committee on the National Security Strategy, which has requested—quite legitimately, under the Osmotherly rules—that he appears before it, but Ministers appear to be blocking that. Why does my hon. Friend think that is?

• 20 Oct 2025 · Asylum Seekers: Support and Accommodation · Hansard source

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  I remind Members that they should bob if they want to be called in the debate—I see that most colleagues are doing so.

• 20 Oct 2025 · Asylum Seekers: Support and Accommodation · Hansard source

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  Order. I have not imposed a time limit, but the hon. Gentleman has been going on considerably longer than other colleagues. He may wish to reflect on that.

• 16 Oct 2025 · Official Secrets Act Case: Witness Statements · Hansard source

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  The deputy National Security Adviser is clear in his evidence that China is the greatest state economic threat to the UK. Does the Minister agree with that? Is he seriously trying to suggest that the deputy National Security Adviser, given what he has said in his evidence, did not clear what he was doing with the CPS with his superiors, Jonathan Powell or Ministers?

• 15 Oct 2025 · Northern Ireland Troubles (Legacy and Reconciliation) Act 2023 · Hansard source

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  The Secretary of State said yesterday that his new legacy commission will not relitigate previous investigations involving veterans unless there are “compelling reasons” to do so. That is reinforced in clause 30 of the Bill that has now been published. To remove scope from opportunistic lawyers, would he consider defining far more closely than he has done up to this point precisely what he means by “compelling reasons”?

• 15 Oct 2025 · Pride in Place · Hansard source

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  The future high streets fund worked well, because to get any funding, areas had to demonstrate that they had a plan, and that the money would be used effectively, in accordance with local priorities. Pride in place is structured in a very different way. I accept that the Minister’s intent is to ensure that redundant premises are repurposed and reused; that is really good, and as chairman of the Trowbridge Place Partnership, I certainly welcome that. However, how will she ensure that the whole thing is not just bunged up with endless legal challenges, as her unelected boards make diktats that will be subject to endless review?

• 14 Oct 2025 · Middle East · Hansard source

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  The Hamas leadership are making it clear that their fighters, many of whom will have been involved on 7 October, will not disband but will merge into the nascent army of a Palestinian state—a state which the Prime Minister unwisely and prematurely recognised. Is he comfortable with that?

• 14 Oct 2025 · Northern Ireland Troubles · Hansard source

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  The young men sent out to do the state’s business during the troubles are now old men, often sick, often disabled. Some of them are my constituents. They will be listening carefully to the Secretary of State and will be hearing honeyed words. They will be reading those words in this framework document, even as the protections given by the legacy Act are stripped away from them and they listen for the metaphorical knock on the door as activist, left, liberal human rights lawyers construct, open and reopen cases that will do them in in their failing years. Is that what the Secretary of State wants? Is this not a beanfeast for lawyers? Is it any wonder that no veterans groups have come out to support the framework that he has announced today?

• 13 Oct 2025 · Security Update: Official Secrets Act Case · Hansard source

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  I have to say to the right hon. Gentleman, whom I respect very much indeed, that his answer to the question put by my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Kenilworth and Southam (Sir Jeremy Wright), the former Attorney General, raised more questions than he gave answers. Is he seriously suggesting that the National Security Adviser, with all his links to the 48 Group and to the Grandview Institution, had no involvement whatsoever in the advice that went to the Crown Prosecution Service? While he is about it, will he clarify that apparent conflation of this country’s economic ties with China, which he appeared to give in mitigation for the mess that the Government appear to have got themselves into?

• 13 Oct 2025 · Manchester Terrorism Attack · Hansard source

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  I congratulate the Home Secretary on an excellent statement, in which she said early on that the police officers involved are being treated as witnesses. That is absolutely right, but does she understand that many members of the security forces involved in this kind of work fear that they will be hung out to dry? Many of them will not have their fears assuaged by the written ministerial statement today on the legacy of the troubles, on which more anon. Will she reassure me that everything is being done by the Greater Manchester police to put an arm around those officers who were directly involved in this incident, and that they will be given every support necessary?

• 13 Oct 2025 · Digital ID · Hansard source

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  Why does the Minister think that a staggering 3 million people have already signed a petition against her expensive and intrusive plans? Does she perhaps think that those people want her to get on with fixing things that matter to them, like illegal immigration and smashing the gangs, which this measure will do nothing to fix, as the construction of her statement seemed to suggest she understands? Will she spend her time trying to sort things that really matter to people, rather than trying to create problems to which there is no obvious solution?

• 16 Sept 2025 · Ambassador to the United States · Hansard source

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  The Chairman of the Select Committee is being very generous. She is elegantly describing due process and is implying—at least I think she is—that due process may have been set aside for other purposes in this case. However, we know that due process was done because the Prime Minister stood at that Dispatch Box last Wednesday and said that it had been done—unless he is using the Bill Clinton defence, and it turns out that due process was done, but set aside. Where does that leave the Prime Minister?

• 16 Sept 2025 · Employment Rights: Impact on Businesses · Hansard source

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  Order.

• 16 Sept 2025 · Employment Rights: Impact on Businesses · Hansard source

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  Minister?

• 15 Sept 2025 · Official Secrets Act · Hansard source

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  The Minister euphemistically described our relationship with China as “complex”. It is not complex. It is characterised by espionage, malign behaviour and a massive trade imbalance. How is that complex, and why do this Government persist in opposing the views of their advisers and permitting—even facilitating—this massive centre for espionage close to the centre of our financial quarter?

• 15 Sept 2025 · Employment Rights Bill · Hansard source

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  In opposition, those now in government probably rightly criticised the Conservative Government for introducing Henry VIII powers, yet the Bill is absolutely riddled with them. Does the Secretary of State agree with the Attorney General that such powers strike at the heart of the rule of law?

• 10 Sept 2025 · Qatar: Israeli Strike · Hansard source

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  Several of our partners in the region—in north Africa and the middle east—have expended a great deal of political capital in trying to achieve a rapprochement with Israel in recent years. The Minister will be aware, for example, of Morocco and its work and leadership in achieving the Abraham accords. What does he think this attack has done to them, and what confidence can they have that Israel is now truly embarked on a quest for peace in the region?

• 10 Sept 2025 · Russian Drones: Violation of Polish Airspace · Hansard source

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  President Zelensky has been consistent in his argument that the invasion of his country is just the beginning and that we are all in the crosshairs. He made that argument forcefully—and famously—in the Oval Office. Does the Minister not agree that what has happened with this violation of Polish and NATO airspace completely vindicates President Zelensky?