Andrew Pakes MP: speeches

Speeches

• 28 Jan 2026 · Youth Unemployment · Hansard source

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  I thank my right hon. Friend for her great explanation of youth hubs. We have just opened one at the Peterborough United—Posh—stadium, bringing together all sorts of partnerships. A number of issues are raised by the young people I speak to there, which the youth hub addresses. One of those issues is an element of the Opposition’s record that they have not talked about, namely the decimation of in-work support, and of career services in schools to give young people advice and help. Opposition Members talked a lot about apprentices and undergraduates, but they did not talk about levels 2 and 3, and the engine-room apprentices we need. The youth hub will start getting us back to that in Peterborough.

• 28 Jan 2026 · Youth Unemployment · Hansard source

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  I appreciate the right hon. Gentleman’s knowledge and his passion for this subject. I would just suggest that he perhaps underestimates the impact that insecure work can have. In one of my brother’s last jobs, he had to get in the car and start driving to work each morning before he would get a phone call telling him whether or not he had a shift that day. Does the right hon. Gentleman not think it is reasonable that people like my brother should know their shift a day in advance? That is the issue we are really talking about with insecure work. I understand that he is making a political point, but we are talking about real people’s lives.

• 27 Jan 2026 · Business Rates · Hansard source

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  We in Peterborough are fond of a pint, so I thank the Minister and his team for their engagement today and in the months leading up to this decision. We are also proud of our independent beer festival, and we are home to Oakham Ales. Can the Minister reassure us that as he looks at the strategy for the high street and the rules on business rates, he will have due regard to the needs of the community sector—both the pubs that are going into community ownership, and the small businesses and others that provide communities on our high streets?

• 13 Jan 2026 · Iran · Hansard source

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  I place on the record my thanks to our diplomatic staff working around the world to support people during this difficult time. What conversations is the Foreign Secretary having with our G7 and European allies about what more we can do to use new technology to record, capture and document the horrific abuses of human rights that are happening, so that when the right moment arises, we can show our leadership by holding the current leadership of Iran to account for them?

• 5 Jan 2026 · Agricultural Property Relief and Business Property Relief · Hansard source

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  Happy new year to you, Mr Speaker, and to all your team. I welcome the Minister’s comments. I thank DEFRA and Treasury Ministers for engaging with farmers and National Farmers Union members in my constituency, and for listening to their views. Farming has had a terrible decade—much longer than 14 months—with rural services cut, farming budgets unspent, failed Brexit plans and trade deals that sold out British farmers. Does the Minister agree with me that with the changes that we have made to APR, the findings of the Batters review and the funding that this Government are putting in place, we can now turn a corner on that terrible decade for British farming?

• 17 Dec 2025 · Local Government Finance · Hansard source

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  The Conservatives have some brass neck when they blame councils like mine for being poor, given that they oversaw 14 years of austerity, underfunding and cuts. The initial figures suggest that by 2028-29 Peterborough city council will be receiving £65 million more from this Government, which will be a life-changer for many people. Can the Minister explain how we can use that money to transform the communities that people like me represent in this House?

• 8 Dec 2025 · Child Poverty Strategy · Hansard source

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  Representing a city that has 20,000 children living in poverty, I strongly welcome the crucial fact that the strategy is not just about the poverty of the family budget, but the poverty of ambition. Too many of those 20,000 children have parents who are in low-paid, insecure work. Will my right hon. Friend tell us what the strategy will do to lift ambition for apprenticeships and skills, changing not just the lives of those children, but the lives of those parents as well?

• 8 Dec 2025 · Employment Rights Bill · Hansard source

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  I represent a seat with one of the highest levels of zero-hours contracts and insecure work in the country. I am not sure how that compares to the hon. Member’s constituency, but if someone in my constituency requested a full-time contract, but that was turned down because they have only a right to request, how would that deliver them justice?

• 3 Dec 2025 · Engagements · Hansard source

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  Q8. At the weekend, I had the great privilege to join volunteers from Peterborough food bank at the Tesco in Werrington on their autumn food drive. I put on record my thanks to my constituents and those of other hon. Members who have supported that Trussell Trust initiative over the last week. One of the most significant challenges my food bank has consistently talked to me about is child poverty. Even though the Conservative party opposes our plans, nearly 9,000 children will be lifted out of poverty across Peterborough because of decisions that our Chancellor took in the Budget last week. Does the Prime Minister agree that that is not just the right thing to do for those children but an investment in our future and in growth?

• 1 Dec 2025 · Office for Budget Responsibility Forecasts · Hansard source

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  The report on the OBR leak makes deeply worrying reading. I welcome the resignation of the chair of the OBR, because leadership on these issues matters. It turns out that the leak was not unprecedented as we thought last week. It has leaked other documents, and it may need to go back further to look at that. Such leaks could have led to speculation and costs running into millions. Does my right hon. Friend know how many times this has happened before, and if not, does he know when we will know that information? More importantly, does he know how many times the OBR Budget report was viewed externally before the Chancellor delivered the Budget last week?

• 27 Nov 2025 · Right to Trial by Jury · Hansard source

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  I welcome the Minister’s serious approach to dealing with this difficult issue. Like many other Members, my inbox is full of heartbreaking casework. Some of the most heartbreaking is from victims of crime who are anguished, hurt and deprived of justice because of delays in the system and because the system is broken. Most of those delays started under the last Government, so the Opposition have some brass neck to talk about a broken system. Can the Minister confirm that when she and the Government consider reforms, they will put those victims in my constituency first and seek to end the delays, and that the motto of our Government will be that a justice system broken is justice denied, and it is our job to fix it?

• 19 Nov 2025 · Engagements · Hansard source

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  Q11. One of the worst legacies of the last Conservative Government was the collapse in apprenticeships for young people in places such as Peterborough, shutting a generation out of opportunity. My city is determined to turn that around, with places such as Peterborough College—like many of our colleges—leading the charge. While I welcome the Government’s reforms, I still talk to too many young people who cannot access the training they need to rebuild Britain. Will the Prime Minister set out what more we can do together to ensure that Peterborough’s young people get the good jobs and apprenticeships they deserve?

• 11 Nov 2025 · BBC Leadership · Hansard source

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  Like some other colleagues in the House, I often start my morning with Dotty on BBC Radio Cambridgeshire and end my days with Amelia on “BBC Look East”. I say that because it demonstrates that the BBC is much more than its editorial decision making at the national level. Every day, thousands of BBC staff are telling our stories, representing our communities and being part of the fabric of this country. As a former official of the Broadcasting, Entertainment, Communications and Theatre Union, I have spoken to many BBC staff and members of the National Union of Journalists and BECTU over recent days who are horrified by some of the coverage of this matter. They want accountability, and they want the BBC to restore its trust, but they also want to hear the message that their work is valued and that they are part of the future of the BBC and public service broadcasting. Does my right hon. Friend agree that it is the talent that makes the BBC an institution and that that talent needs to be nurtured, while dealing with the leadership?

• 11 Nov 2025 · Prisoner Releases in Error · Hansard source

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  As a Member who represents a prison constituency, I would like to put on record my thanks to prison and probation staff who work hard under difficult circumstances. In recognising that, I also know the pressure the prison system in under. It is shocking that the legacy of 14 years handed over to this Government was a paper-based system and a prison system that was breaking. The Conservatives like to talk about a farce. If they want to talk about a farce, I will hand them a mirror to look into, because the only farce here is the breaking system. What more can we do to support prison staff? Yes, there needs to be accountability, but we need to invest in technology and invest in solutions, and give our prisons the systems they need to stop these things happening in future.

• 5 Nov 2025 · Bronze-age Heritage: Cambridgeshire · Hansard source

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  I certainly welcome that, and I also welcome the number of Cambridgeshire MPs who are here to celebrate our county’s rich bronze-age heritage. Too often, young people are denied the chance to learn about their history because of the lack of public transport linked to places such as Flag Fen, and because of the pressures on school budgets restricting opportunities for visits and learning. We are beginning to turn that around, and I am proud of our record in Government so far, but there is more to do. A rich world on our doorstep is something that all students should be able to learn from, regardless of background or wealth. Flag Fen’s story began with its discovery in 1971, when excavations ahead of the construction of Peterborough new town revealed an almost intact bronze-age landscape running along the edge of the drained fen. Then, in November 1982, archaeologists surveying the depths of the basin came across the timbers of what proved to be an internationally important site, Flag Fen. The rich archaeological collection and remains there are important in understanding the wider prehistoric landscape of the Flag Fen basin, and what was happening in Britain during the bronze age. Almost since Flag Fen’s discovery, the management strategy has been to protect these remarkable remains by leaving them buried in the ground that has protected them for nearly 3,500 years. However, even then we knew that the land would not protect the archaeology forever, but that one day the precious vanished world would succumb to climate change and fen drainage, leaving nothing but dust. That goes to the heart of one of the challenges now: new evidence suggests that we have reached the point where, without intervention, we will move from protection to abandonment. We need a new approach to capture the value of places such as Flag Fen, and retain their special place in our community for the benefit of generations to come—a new mission, we might say, to create access on all levels through new interpretations and historical knowledge. Cambridgeshire is also home to Must Farm; I am delighted that this week Peterborough Museum has been awarded a £250,000 grant from the National Lottery Heritage Fund to support a two-year initiative centred on the internationally significant bronze-age archaeology at Must Farm in Whittlesey. The discovery in 2015 of the Must Farm settlement, dubbed the “Pompeii of the fens”, provided an extraordinary glimpse into everyday life in the bronze age due to the exceptional preservation of its artefacts. This newly funded project, entitled “My Must Farm”, will encourage communities to bring those discoveries alive in imaginative and exciting ways for visitors from Peterborough, Cambridgeshire and hopefully beyond. I thank the Government for their commitment to heritage in Peterborough and more widely, but I want to highlight a few threats facing our heritage sector. I have already mentioned accessibility and the rural nature of the sites that I have referred to, but there are also socioeconomic barriers. Deprivation is a huge issue for many places, including Peterborough; families who are worse off could be barred from accessing the heritage right on their doorstep. Improved access will help to develop a stronger pride in place and open opportunities that can seem unattainable to some families nowadays. The numbers of bronze-age wetland archaeology specialists are in decline, which puts future high-quality management of bronze-age discoveries in Cambridgeshire and elsewhere at risk. That speaks to career paths and pay for archaeologists. Increasingly, those entering the field are forced to make tough decisions about whether they can afford to be archaeologists or need to pursue other paths with better pay. Finally, there is the issue of heritage crime. Flag Fen has suffered two catastrophic arson events in the last five years. The first destroyed a building used as an education room for visiting schoolchildren, and the second, in July this year, destroyed a replica iron-age roundhouse. The effect of both fires was to remove spaces that are used by schools for learning and “outside the classroom” programmes. Heritage is our shared inheritance, and it is a privilege to represent a community in a county that has a rich bronze-age heritage.

• 5 Nov 2025 · Bronze-age Heritage: Cambridgeshire · Hansard source

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  I beg to move, That this House has considered Government support for Bronze Age heritage in Cambridgeshire. It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Twigg, and a privilege to speak in this debate on Government support for bronze-age heritage in Cambridgeshire. Before I start, I reiterate on the record, following the terrible attacks in our county this week, that my sympathy and thoughts are with the victims and with the first responders, police and others in Cambridgeshire, including in my constituency, who responded so valiantly and quickly on the night. Cambridgeshire is home to some our country’s most outstanding bronze-age heritage, with 79 recognised sites of archaeological interest. That history tells us about where we have come from as well as how to protect our future.

• 5 Nov 2025 · Bronze-age Heritage: Cambridgeshire · Hansard source

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  I will come on to talk about the importance of local museums. One great privilege of this place is to learn of the rich heritage of so many different parts of Britain and Northern Ireland—

• 5 Nov 2025 · Bronze-age Heritage: Cambridgeshire · Hansard source

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  Absolutely; that brings me on to some questions I have for the Minister. Can the Minister set out the ongoing support the Government are providing and their commitment to regional museums and heritage and smaller artefacts in places such as Flag Fen in Cambridgeshire? We have wonderful national institutions, but out in counties such as ours we also have nationally significant places that people can visit, and I am keen to understand the Government’s commitment to those places. What is his thinking on how that funding will develop in future and how the Government will support it? It is really important, not only for the heritage, but to bring people into a city like ours. There is a lot more going on in Peterborough than meets the eye, from Flag Fen and Must Farm to our majestic 900-year-old cathedral, and from Peterborough Museum, which sold over 17,000 tickets to its recent “Doctor Who” exhibition, to our art deco lido, which celebrates its 90th anniversary next year, and even our very own Oakham Ales, which just this weekend was rated one of the top taprooms in the country by The i Paper . These are all reasons why I love my part of the country, and why I honourably ask the Minister to set out the Government’s ongoing support for them. We value our heritage locally, but we also know the contribution that Cambridgeshire and bronze-age heritage makes to our national and international reputation as a centre of culture. It is why I am proud to have the privilege of being named chair of the Peterborough tourist board, which has just launched the Discover Peterborough website. Together, we are changing Peterborough for the better and, with Government support, we will succeed.

• 5 Nov 2025 · Bronze-age Heritage: Cambridgeshire · Hansard source

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  I will give way to the hon. Member to hear some more.

• 5 Nov 2025 · Bronze-age Heritage: Cambridgeshire · Hansard source

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  I wholeheartedly agree. Fundamentally, we are talking about our shared heritage—the heritage not just of Peterborough, but of Cambridgeshire and of Britain and Northern Ireland as a whole. In that light, I want to talk about access, because it matters that young people in our area can access and learn from these sites. In an age where we focus a lot on immigration, Flag Fen and Must Farm are evidence that people have been coming to Peterborough as traders and neighbours for more than 1,000 years.

• 5 Nov 2025 · Bronze-age Heritage: Cambridgeshire · Hansard source

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  It is always a pleasure to take interventions from the hon. Member. I hope he will hear that this is a speech of celebration as well as of questions for the Minister. Let us come back to Peterborough. Central to Peterborough’s story are the sites of Flag Fen and Must Farm, two of the most archaeologically and internationally significant bronze-age discoveries of our generation. Flag Fen is the only site in Europe where visitors can view a bronze-age causeway and a unique collection of bronze-age log boats, discovered in the lost course of the River Nene close to Must Farm. Peterborough Museum curates and has responsibility for the Must Farm collection. Flag Fen delivers the conservation and presentation of the River Nene bronze-age boat discoveries, and Must Farm is of both national and international significance. Peterborough Museum and Art Gallery and Flag Fen are held in trust for the benefit of local people and visitors to the city. That model matters, because it embeds civic pride and ownership in protecting our common heritage. However, it does not come without challenges, particularly around local government funding and public service support for archaeology and archaeologists.

• 3 Nov 2025 · Huntingdon Train Attack · Hansard source

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  May I associate myself with the comments about sympathy and empathy for the victims of this attack? The names of Peterborough and the town of the constituency of the hon. Member for Huntingdon (Ben Obese-Jecty) have flashed across the news here and around the world this weekend because of the terrible events of Saturday night. I do not want my constituency to be known just because of the acts of a single perpetrator, so may I put on record my tribute to the police, the train staff, the first responders and others who stepped forward when actions were needed? I pay particular tribute to my constituent, train driver Andrew Johnson, and his ASLEF and RMT colleagues on LNER, who went beyond the call of duty on that evening. They showed the best of British values, and the true face of the county I represent and its people. We do not know all the information yet, but there is great anxiety in Huntingdon and Peterborough, and this is also a national issue. Can my right hon. Friend confirm that we will go the extra mile to tackle knife crime and ensure that our streets and public transport remain safe for everyone for years to come?

• 21 Oct 2025 · Co-operative Sector: Government Support · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Turner, especially as some of my earliest co-operative meetings took place in what is now Kingston upon Hull East, your constituency. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton (Jim McMahon) for securing this important debate. One of the first visits that I undertook as a Member of Parliament was to 28 Long Causeway in Peterborough, home of my local Nationwide building society branch. It has been there since 1974 but it started its life in the city in 1954, a few doors down from its current location, as the Co-operative Permanent Building Society—at a time when Winston Churchill was the Prime Minister and the world was very different. For a post-war generation, building societies and co-operatives were part of the new social contract—if they worked hard, they could get on in life, get a home and make a future for their children. The co-operative and mutual ideal has always been strong in the UK, but the idea of a purpose-driven economy feels even greater in today’s world. Against a backdrop of division, short-termism and populism, mutuals offer purpose and social value to our economy and communities. The co-operative and mutual sector is a vital part of the inclusive growth agenda of this Government, worth £93 billion in gross value added and £180 billion in turnover. Building societies have more than 27 million members. Despite moves to demutualise the building societies in the UK—an act of economic vandalism by a previous Government—we still have more than 40 building societies holding nearly one third of UK mortgages. Nationwide, still standing strong in my city and many others, is the biggest lender to first-time buyers in the UK. My constituency is home to the English Mustard Growers co-operative, which I often talk about. My constituency and that of my hon. Friend the Member for Norwich North (Alice Macdonald) supply the seed that goes into Colman’s mustard—many people will know the brand. I am pleased we have an agricultural co-op in Peterborough and our surrounding fenlands. It is an illustration that the mutual drive covers a wide range of industries, not just retail, as many will know. More widely we see the return of co-operative ambition after a generation of consolidation. It is good to see that happening, with the Co-op Bank coming back into the mutual fold and merging with the Coventry Building Society; with Nationwide expanding with the takeover of Virgin Money; and with the Co-operative Group adding more members year on year. I join my hon. Friend the Member for Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton in paying tribute to my good friend Joe Fortune and also Shirine Khoury-Haq, chief executive of the Co-operative Group, for their sterling work on behalf of the movement. We should all remember that the movement started many years ago from co-operative principles. A few months ago I attended the Co-op congress in Rochdale town hall with my hon. Friend the Member for Rochdale (Paul Waugh). Rochdale was the birthplace of a movement, with the power of 28 pioneers organising against the odds and today still a living force for social and economic justice in all of our communities. The Rochdale principles still stand tall in the world. I am proud to be part of a Government with ambition for the co-operative sector: a clear commitment to double the size of the co-operative and mutual sector and to support social enterprises, as my hon. Friend the Member for Leigh and Atherton (Jo Platt) said. Such ambition has not been seen by Whitehall before. With ambition will come challenges. It is not the role of Government to build co-operatives, but it is the role of Government to ensure there is not a block to growth. Co-operative activity, as we have heard, spans many sectors and many Government Departments. With that ambition, we also know it will bring the challenges of how cross-Government working supports it. We know that sectors, which often work across Government Departments, struggle to find effective cross-Government working and effective time. So I welcome the announcement of a co-operative development unit as part of the Government’s pride in place plans. Like my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds Central and Headingley (Alex Sobel), who is no longer in his place, I am an old lag of the movement who spent many years working in co-op housing and co-op development, so I welcome the fact that we now have something that will look at co-op development in housing and local government. But I say to the Minister that the unit needs to work with the Treasury, the Financial Conduct Authority and other Government Departments to deliver the reforms we need to support it. Co-operation is living proof that our collective endeavour can be greater than our individual efforts. There is no stronger message for co-operation than the world we stand in today. We need to make sure that that message rings true in Whitehall, where all of these initiatives add up to something greater than their individual aims. These developments have happened as a result of the Government’s new focus, but it is up to all of us to ensure they deliver on those. Finally, why does this matter? It matters because it is about ambition for our communities and also the kind of world and economy we want to live in. If this is the co-operative moment, as I believe it is, we also need co-operative ambition. We need to create the conditions in which mutuals can flourish and succeed, where communities can come together and start up their own ventures, and where destiny for our families and communities is not determined by shareholders or Government alone, but by the people themselves. This truly is a co-operative moment.

• 21 Oct 2025 · Co-operative Sector: Government Support · Hansard source

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  On the subject of apprenticeships, is the hon. Lady aware that the Co-operative Group is doing pioneering work at Highpoint Prison in Suffolk using some of its share from the levy? It is working with employers to ensure that offenders get on to an apprenticeship framework so that, when they have served their time in prison, they have a job to go into. That shows that the co-operative movement is leading the way on innovation in apprenticeships. Does the hon. Lady agree that we need to see more in the apprenticeship levy aimed at reducing reoffending and giving opportunities to young people?

• 20 Oct 2025 · Post-16 Education and Skills Strategy · Hansard source

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  I warmly welcome this statement. One of the most shameful legacies of the last 14 years in Peterborough has been the rising number of young people leaving school with no qualifications and no hope, with NEETs up and apprenticeships down. Skills are not just good for growth, but good for hope, good for young people, good for their parents and good for communities. One of the most difficult parts in the whole vocational network is the navigation that employers and young people have to do with career services, which have been broken over the past 14 years. Can my right hon. Friend tell us more about how career services and good quality advice will be at the heart of reinvigorating vocational qualifications in Peterborough and the country?