Ben Spencer MP: speeches

Speeches

• 16 Sept 2025 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  T3. My team and I support many families navigating the special educational needs and disabilities system, and one of the challenges is delays in getting access to tribunal justice. As the Secretary of State gets to grips with his new role, will he make shortening those delays one of his priorities, and can he update the House accordingly?

• 10 Sept 2025 · Online Safety Act 2023: Effectiveness · Hansard source

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  I welcome the Secretary of State and the new ministerial team to their places, and thank the former team, who I have very much enjoyed sparring with over the past few months. In light of the report of the Department’s plans to review the implementation of the Online Safety Act, can the Secretary of State confirm the scope of that review, including whether it will address the apparent confusion in the media between the powers of the Online Safety Act and the Public Order Act 1986? Will the review look at age verification to ensure that people’s data is safe and secure, and that the pass schemes they use are trusted? Will it tackle the use of VPNs, particularly by children, to get around age verification?

• 9 Sept 2025 · Employer National Insurance Contributions: Economic Growth · Hansard source

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  I am not particularly interested in who the Minister is backing in the deputy leadership contest, but I welcome him to his place. Lebanese Please is a fantastic restaurant in Weybridge, but like many hospitality companies, it is struggling with the impact of national insurance increases. If the partly new Treasury Front-Bench team are considering going for a team lunch, I recommend the warm hospitality of Runnymede and Weybridge, where they can see for themselves the impact that this horrid, harmful tax is having on local businesses across the country.

• 9 Sept 2025 · Employer National Insurance Contributions: Economic Growth · Hansard source

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  11. What assessment she has made of the potential impact of increases in employer national insurance contributions on businesses.

• 2 Sept 2025 · Draft Online Safety Act 2023 (Qualifying Worldwide Revenue) Regulations 2025 · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Dr Murrison. Thank you for your guidance at the start of the debate. Given the narrow scope of this SI, I will make some very brief introductory remarks about the Online Safety Act before going into the detail of the SI. Nearly two years ago, under the last Government, the groundbreaking Online Safety Act was enacted with the purpose of protecting people online. Rightly, the strongest protections in the Act were designed for children. Every day, children are subjected to harmful content affecting their views of society, relationships and themselves. The Online Safety Act is an essential tool to address that. It has faced much opposition and still faces challenges today, but it provides the template for the most robust online safety framework in the world. It is a measure that I am very proud of, but we must now work to ensure that the provisions are implemented and enforced effectively. Realising the essential protections built into the Online Safety Act is dependent on high levels of industry compliance. I hope that we will have future opportunities to debate the wider provisions of the Act, including the effectiveness of age verification and the definition of “harmful content”, but today we rightly focus on fees and enforcement. The draft regulations set the parameters for how we define and calculate companies’ turnover in order then to then calculate both fees and maximum penalties, should they be incurred. The SI is therefore very technical in scope, but important. The Act requires that Ofcom’s operating costs for the online safety regime are covered by providers of regulated services through a fees regime, and it is vital that that is apportioned fairly. Fines are powerful sanctions available to Ofcom, but they must be proportionate to the company and the scale and breadth of the infringement, so that companies in breach of their duties under the Act can be held to account in a way that will not only penalise non-compliance but encourage a material change in operation.

• 1 Sept 2025 · Middle East · Hansard source

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  I am deeply concerned by the misery, suffering and death in Gaza. I thank the Foreign Secretary for the work he is doing with friends and allies in the region, which is a key part of solving the problem. I also support a two-state solution, but is he not concerned that the ultimatum regarding unilateral recognition of a Palestinian state risks entirely disincentivising Hamas from negotiating any hostage release or ceasefire over the coming weeks and months?

• 1 Sept 2025 · Borders and Asylum · Hansard source

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  The Home Secretary is right to talk about tackling the push and pull factors—something we worked towards tackling when we were in government, despite challenges with bringing forward the use of third countries. That is because we need both a deterrent and a place to send people whose country of origin we either do not know or we do not have a returns agreement with. It is no surprise to me that arrivals have increased since that scheme was scrapped. I understand that a period of reset is happening in Downing Street, so how long before we can expect her to come to the Dispatch Box to introduce a third-country scheme?

• 22 Jul 2025 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  Eight years ago, Weybridge community hospital burned down. After a long journey, the replacement finally received planning consent last week; all it needs now is for the Secretary of State to sign the cheque on the dotted line. Will he do so as soon as possible?

• 21 Jul 2025 · Independent Water Commission · Hansard source

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  The quality of a river is about not just the water that goes into it, but the maintenance of the river itself. My constituents have been failed over and over again by the Environment Agency in the maintenance of our waterways. Given the Secretary of State’s enthusiasm for breaking apart quangos, will he consider bringing powers away from the EA so that we can manage our rivers properly and effectively?

• 21 Jul 2025 · Victory over Japan: 80th Anniversary · Hansard source

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  On 8 May 1945 at 3 pm, Prime Minister Winston Churchill made a radio announcement that Germany had surrendered and the war in Europe had come to an end. In towns and cities across the nation, people gathered in their communities to remember those they had lost and, for so many, to rejoice that the war in Europe was over. At the same time, half a world away, thousands of British, Commonwealth and allied forces were still involved in bitter fighting in Japan and the Pacific. Although part of the same war, the conflict in Asia presented different and in many cases uniquely harrowing challenges. Troops fought in jungles drenched by monsoons, on snow-covered hills and in the scorching tropical heat of remote islands. Prisoners of war faced the harshest conditions of brutality, disease and malnutrition. Sadly, while 8 May is taught and commemorated across the country, too many remain unaware of the sacrifice and conflict in Asia, or even when VJ Day is. The Fourteenth Army, which fought in the campaign in the Pacific, is called the forgotten Army. In the face of regional and growing conflict today, as we once again face threats from powers increasingly hostile to our values and way of life, it is more important than ever that we remember them. In the Spencer family, the Army in Burma is hardly forgotten. My grandfather was a Chindit and fought in Burma. While he resisted talking much about his experiences, it is clear from what he did say what incredible sacrifices he and his fellow Chindits made for our country. The experiences of the war lived on with him not just in memory, but in his health. He was medically evacuated back to the UK, suffering from tropical sprue and malaria and, like many others, malnourished and incredibly underweight. Back in the UK he was treated with cigarettes, which we now know is not helpful, and with tonic, which—although it was helpful—he consumed so much of that he damaged his hearing. He continued to have relapses of malaria throughout his life. He died before I was elected MP, but I am proud to stand in this House to pay tribute to him and to all who fought in Asia for our freedoms. It is clear that, while the forgotten Army may have been forgotten, it is certainly not forgotten in this place this evening. I am grateful each and every day for the freedoms we enjoy in this country—freedoms secured because of the bravery and sacrifices made by those young men who fought and died in defence of our country and our way of life, and those who played the vital roles at home to make the war effort possible. Their sacrifice—their legacy—is our ability to have this debate this evening. We will remember them.

• 21 Jul 2025 · Magna Carta School · Hansard source

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  14. If she will provide a timeline for the completion of construction works at the Magna Carta school in Egham.

• 21 Jul 2025 · Magna Carta School · Hansard source

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  I thank the Minister for his answer. Can he clarify whether the Magna Carta school will have a full rebuild, due to the presence of reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete, or is it just the science and arts block that will be rebuilt? Will he meet me to discuss this issue and the work that will take place on such a fantastic local school?

• 17 Jul 2025 · Social Media: Misinformation and Algorithms · Hansard source

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  I thank the hon. Lady and the Select Committee that she chairs for delivering this important review. I also thank her for her statement to the House, which has highlighted the scale of the challenge we face in relation to the proliferation of misleading and harmful content online. I join her in putting out my prayers and sympathies to all those affected by the horrors in Southport last year. Given the report’s findings that young people are particularly susceptible to misleading and harmful content and online radicalisation, due to the stage of their cognitive development, does the hon. Lady consider that the Government should commit to conducting a review of the evidential case for raising the digital age of consent for social media platforms from 13 to 16?