Bradley Thomas MP: speeches 2025

Speeches

• 18 Dec 2025 · Business of the House · Hansard source

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  Leo, a 16-year-old boy in my constituency, has just received the best news that he could receive before Christmas. He is a leukaemia patient who has been searching for a donor to alleviate his cancer, and after a search in which 700 people came forward, he has finally found an anonymous donor. This is fantastic news. Will the Leader of the House join me in wishing Leo a very merry Christmas and a prosperous and healthy new year? Will he also arrange for a statement in early 2026 on funding for leukaemia research and development?

• 17 Dec 2025 · Local Government Finance · Hansard source

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  Talking about local government finance, I was shocked to read in The Times yesterday that Reform-led Worcestershire county council has sought permission from the Government to increase council tax by a maximum 10%. Will the Minister take this opportunity to rule that out, and will she tell us if Labour is in cahoots with Reform to whack up council tax?

• 16 Dec 2025 · Planning Reform · Hansard source

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  The Minister has said that the Government want to double down on the brownfield-first approach, that they have a presumption in favour of development in urban areas and that they are committed to protecting the green belt. Neither I nor my constituents can square that with the reality of what is happening across Bromsgrove and the villages. My constituency is 89% green belt, but the housing target has increased by a staggering 85%, yet in adjacent Birmingham the housing target has decreased by over 30%. Local people are concerned not just about the erosion of the green belt, but about the lack of infrastructure. Over 5,000 local people have signed my petition expressing their concern about this approach. I want to work constructively with the Minister, so will he agree to meet me, together with the leader of Bromsgrove district council, to discuss the impact of this approach and forge a new path forwards?

• 15 Dec 2025 · NHS: Winter Preparedness · Hansard source

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  These strikes, at a time of peak seasonal pressure on the NHS, are reprehensible, and the BMA should be thoroughly ashamed of itself. Does the Health Secretary agree that we should use this opportunity to reassert our collective societal trust in vaccines, and encourage anyone who is vulnerable or eligible to get a vaccine, to mitigate the effects on themselves and on wider society? Given his comment that there is not much more that the Government can offer, does he at least acknowledge that the Government’s unconditional inflation-busting offer last year, just weeks after they came into office, must surely have emboldened the BMA?

• 15 Dec 2025 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  T10. Today the head of MI6 will say that “the frontline is everywhere”. Does that not mean that the entirety of the Government and the military need to be far more proactive in dealing with threats that we face now, and accelerate defence spending in excess of 3% of GDP before the end of the decade?

• 15 Dec 2025 · Employment Rights Bill · Hansard source

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  The hon. Gentleman misses the point that I am making. Currently, there is no financial incentive for very senior executives who cannot exercise any leverage over things such as pay and equity, and the Bill risks clogging up the system. The CEOs of large UK corporations earn a median salary of over £4 million, compared with the £118,000 cap on unfair dismissal claims, so high earners have little incentive to lodge claims. Remove the cap and that incentive becomes glaringly obvious.

• 15 Dec 2025 · Employment Rights Bill · Hansard source

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  The impacts of the Bill in its current form are already being felt: 71% of businesses have raised serious concerns, with over 90% of small business owners expressing deep worries, resulting in 67% of companies preparing to halt recruitment. We already know that the Government do not understand business. That has been demonstrated clearly through the string of damaging policies trailing behind them, from the national insurance changes that are crippling the hospitality sector to the family farm tax that is undermining our national food security. Aspects of this Bill are no exception, the prime example being the complete removal of the employment tribunal cap on unfair dismissal compensatory awards. As of June 2025, 515,000 open claims were in the system, and the numbers continue to rise. The employment tribunal system is inundated. It is overwhelmed and debilitated by cases, leaving thousands facing intolerable delays. Rather than addressing the issue through action that would significantly help working people—

• 15 Dec 2025 · Employment Rights Bill · Hansard source

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  I will make progress. The idea that removing the cap will lead to anything other than a surge in cases is pure fantasy. This lack of understanding shows why the Government must listen to those who know how business works and recognise the devastating consequences that the Bill will have for companies and, crucially, for workers, rather than branding themselves champions of working people while advancing policies that benefit only high-fliers.

• 15 Dec 2025 · Employment Rights Bill · Hansard source

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  I thank my right hon. Friend, who makes his point eloquently, as usual. The Government must abandon the measure. If they are really on the side of workers, the best thing they can do is abandon this measure—and abandon the Bill in its entirety.

• 15 Dec 2025 · Employment Rights Bill · Hansard source

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  I was just about to get to the point that I wanted to make: removal of the cap will make matters significantly worse. To put it plainly, it will open the floodgates for senior executives to pursue multimillion-pound claims that will further congest the courts. For many companies, the dismissal process for senior executives is fundamentally different from that used for other employees, in many cases as a result of strategic complexities relating to board involvement. Unlike the structured procedures applied to the wider workforce, senior leaders are seldom afforded opportunities such as performance improvement plans before removal. The Bill creates a significant liability and establishes a direct financial incentive for senior executives to pursue employment claims.

• 10 Dec 2025 · Seasonal Work · Hansard source

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  Would the hon. Gentleman give way?

• 10 Dec 2025 · Seasonal Work · Hansard source

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  Is my hon. Friend as concerned as I am that a typical pub in my constituency is paying around £2,500 per month more than it was 12 months ago? Let me briefly put that into context. Assuming that couples go in and spend £100, pubs have to clear 25 additional sittings, just to clear their costs. How are they going to survive?

• 10 Dec 2025 · Seasonal Work · Hansard source

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  Will the hon. Gentleman give way a second time?

• 10 Dec 2025 · Seasonal Work · Hansard source

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  I thank the hon. Member for giving way to me a second time. Some 89,000 hospitality jobs have been lost during the past 12 months. Youth unemployment is up, with 12% of 16 to 24-year-olds currently unemployed. There are an estimated 40% fewer seasonal jobs this year—the biggest decline in 15 years. Energy costs are up. Business rates are up. Confidence is down. Regulation is up. Does he acknowledge that it is not a coincidence that all that is happening at the same time, and that it must, at least in part, be related to the really poor choices made by this Government?

• 10 Dec 2025 · Seasonal Work · Hansard source

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  Does my hon. Friend agree that it is not just the tax rises and the additional cost burden that is causing a lack of confidence? That lack of confidence is in itself probably the most corrosive aspect of all, because once that is entrenched it is very hard to unpick, particularly when businesses repeatedly face a Government who are doing the exact opposite of what they pledged in their manifesto.

• 10 Dec 2025 · Seasonal Work · Hansard source

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  What would the hon. Gentleman say to the 89,000 people who have lost their hospitality jobs over the last 12 months?

• 8 Dec 2025 · Digital ID · Hansard source

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  Mandatory digital ID, abandoning trial by jury—neither is in the Labour manifesto. There is a whiff of authoritarianism about this Government, is there not?

• 4 Dec 2025 · Local Elections · Hansard source

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  Mandatory digital ID, abandoning trial by jury and now cancelling elections—these are the hallmarks of authoritarian regimes, aren’t they?

• 4 Dec 2025 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  T6. The Information Commissioner’s Office revealed that Lord Alli’s pass to No. 10 was requested by a staff member of the Labour party. Was it the Prime Minister’s then chief of staff who made the request?

• 4 Dec 2025 · Digital Exclusion · Hansard source

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  15. What assessment his Department has made of the potential impact of digital ID on levels of digital exclusion.

• 4 Dec 2025 · Digital Exclusion · Hansard source

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  I thank the Minister for his scripted answer. Digital ID is a terrible idea. If the Government are going to pursue it, what assurances can he give me, in a tiny bit of detail, about what the Government will do to ensure that people are not, through a lack of technological skills or financial exclusion, disadvantaged in accessing Government services?

• 4 Dec 2025 · Camden Nursery Sexual Abuse Case · Hansard source

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  This case is appalling, and it is right that the thoughts of us all are with the families affected and that the Government should do everything they can to prevent such cases from occurring in future. When does the Secretary of State expect the findings of the review to come forward? What additional steps are the Government looking at to ensure that parents and anyone with safeguarding concerns can report them much more easily?

• 4 Dec 2025 · Business of the House · Hansard source

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  The Severn Area Rescue Association, known as SARA, is a volunteer-led lifeboat and inland search and rescue charity. It does fantastic work in north Worcestershire, along the route of the River Severn, and in the constituencies of many hon. Members. Although I welcome the Government’s announcement in the Budget last week that the requirement for vehicle excise duty will no longer apply to these organisations, will the Leader of the House support me in my endeavours—I have written to the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs calling on the Government to reintroduce the flood team maintenance grant—to alleviate the pressure on such charities?

• 1 Dec 2025 · Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill · Hansard source

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  The hon. Gentleman is right that it potentially could flag up those things; equally, it could be another burden on local authorities that are under-resourced to fulfil the requirements. It also could place a burden on parents and families that feels like stigmatisation. The right balance must be struck between strengthening the safeguards for children and young adults and ensuring that the new legislation does not unintentionally harm thousands due to a one-size-fits-all approach. Rather than demonising all home educators and introducing measures that, in practice, will fail to improve many children’s wellbeing, the Government should redirect their focus towards improving support for SEND provision and children’s social services, ensuring better working relationships between home educators and local authorities, and fostering school environments that actively tackle bullying and rising classroom violence.

• 1 Dec 2025 · Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Barker. I thank the hon. Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross (Jamie Stone) for introducing this important debate. Home education is often misunderstood. Some dismiss it as children avoiding education. Others portray it as an isolating environment, and even a potential safeguarding risk. Although that may be the case in the smallest handful of instances, the reality is that the large proportion of home educating families are those who have been let down by the state education system and act in the best interest of their child. For them, home education is not the easy choice but, often, a lifeline—a vital alternative for children who do not “fit” within the confines of mainstream schooling. Families turn to home education for many reasons. We might be talking about children who have medical needs or anxiety and have been pressured out of school, those excluded because of unmet special educational needs, or those enduring unresolved bullying. Some parents make a philosophical choice to educate outside the mainstream system. This discretionary right, exercised by parents and guardians, allows learning to be flexible, personalised and responsive. Taking away the option to home school through a poorly designed policy that fails to recognise the context and individuality of each home education journey is yet another example of the Government refusing to listen to communities they do not understand. We saw that with the changes to agricultural property relief and business property relief for farmers, and we saw it with the unjustified housing targets imposed on rural communities. We now see it again—this time with thousands of home educators’ pleas being ignored. Despite the Government’s unwillingness to listen, I have had the pleasure of meeting numerous constituents and campaigners to discuss the potential impact of the flawed Bill and to listen to their individual stories. One has a child with Down syndrome and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, and another who is autistic, with global developmental delays and dyslexia. They were overwhelmed and dysregulated by the one-size-fits-all design of the school system, but now they are home educated and can truly thrive in a personalised learning environment. Another person I met has a child with ADHD, autism and dyslexia who was severely bullied in two separate schools, leading to serious mental health struggles. For the wellbeing of both the child and the wider family, the child had to be removed from school and is now home educated and safe from ever enduring that traumatic experience again. Those are just two families among the thousands who have exercised their discretionary right to home educate their children in their and their family’s best interest.