Caroline Johnson MP: speeches 2025

Speeches

• 19 May 2025 · NHS and Care Volunteer Responders Service · Hansard source

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  On a point of order, Mr Speaker. Notwithstanding the response to the urgent question that you were kind enough to grant, we still have no idea how long the gap in the service will last, or what will happen to the most vulnerable people who are using it. What other parliamentary mechanisms could I use to secure the answers to these questions?

• 16 May 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill · Hansard source

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  rose—

• 16 May 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill · Hansard source

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  Will the hon. Lady give way?

• 16 May 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill · Hansard source

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  I rise to support the hon. Lady’s new clause 1. As a doctor, I am very aware of the trust that the public place in doctors and the seriousness with which they take what we say. If a doctor gives somebody information about assisted dying, it is quite reasonable for that person to think that the doctor is suggesting that they should take part in that process, or is hinting that their death will be dreadful and trying to be kind. If doctors are allowed to say, “This is a good process,” more people will take it up than would otherwise have wanted to.

• 16 May 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill · Hansard source

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  Persistence pays off. When considering the Bill, I had presumed that the doctor concerned would be a senior clinician—a senior doctor—but page 63 of the impact assessment refers to pre-registration doctors, who have just completed medical school and are on a provisional registration. Will the hon. Lady confirm that it is her intention that the provisions in the Bill may be carried out by the most junior doctors, as well as by more senior consultants and general practitioners?

• 16 May 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill · Hansard source

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  Will the hon. Lady give way?

• 16 May 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill · Hansard source

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  Will my hon. Friend give way?

• 16 May 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill · Hansard source

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  Will the hon. Lady give way?

• 15 May 2025 · Solar Farms · Hansard source

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  Further to that point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. My point was that under a Labour Government and Secretary of State, a Labour donor has been given permission to build a great big solar farm just outside my constituency. That is the point I was making: the Labour—

• 15 May 2025 · Solar Farms · Hansard source

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  The Minister says that this is not a competition between energy security and farming security. It should not be; the reason it is becoming one is that his Government are allowing our best and most versatile farmland, used for growing crops, to be taken over by solar farms.

• 15 May 2025 · Solar Farms · Hansard source

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  I beg to move, That this House has considered solar farms. I must first inform the House that my husband is a farmer and agricultural contractor. I am very grateful to the Backbench Business Committee for allowing me time for a debate on large-scale solar farms. There are some things that Members across the House can agree on: we all want cheap and reliable energy, we all want food security and affordable food prices, and we want to live sustainably and to protect our natural surroundings. Whether or not we agree on how we should achieve those goals, I think we can at least agree that these are desirable aims, so why is the issue seemingly so controversial? It is controversial because it is doubtful that large-scale solar farms on prime agricultural land can achieve any of those aims. First, how good are solar panels? In principle, solar energy is green, but the reality is murkier. The journey of a solar panel, from raw materials to installation, is far from carbon neutral. The production process demands substantial energy, often sourced from fossil fuels. It requires the mining of silver and zinc. It requires energy to produce the intense heat needed to melt quartz for polysilicon, and the transportation of components and finished panels across vast distances by diesel-powered trucks, trains and ships. What happens when the panels reach the end of their lifespan? Recycling should be the obvious answer, yet they are notoriously difficult to recycle. A constituent of mine who dedicated their master’s research to this issue found that most solar panels, once they finish their lifecycle, cannot currently be effectively recycled. Solar energy is not morally clean either. Most solar panels sold in the UK—an astonishing 97%—contain materials sourced from places where there are concerns about forced labour. Baroness May of Maidenhead, the former Prime Minister, did so much to champion the cause of combating modern slavery during her tenure, and we must not be complicit in human rights abuses in business supply chains. The Government’s decision to U-turn yesterday on the Lords message on the Great British Energy Bill is welcome, but it is shameful that it came only after so much pressure. Even if the challenges with production, transportation and recycling could be resolved, there are concerns about whether solar energy is the right option for the UK’s energy production at all. Solar energy is most effective in sunny places, where there is high demand for energy when it is sunny. But in the UK the highest energy demand occurs when it is cold and dark. That means energy must be stored, leading to the need for large battery storage systems, which bring their own problems—we would require another debate just to discuss those. In fact, the UK is ranked as second to last on a list of 240 countries in terms of its suitability for photovoltaic electricity production.

• 15 May 2025 · Solar Farms · Hansard source

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  I thank the hon. Lady for her intervention. I wonder if the average jumbo jet flying into Heathrow does a loop-the-loop on its way in. RAF Digby is the headquarters of the joint cyber and electromagnetic activities group. Any interference with that part of the defence estate could cause significant harm. My constituency of Sleaford and North Hykeham faces an acute burden from the most high-impact solar schemes. Colleagues will know that projects with a capacity of more than 50 MW are classed as nationally significant infrastructure projects. Four of these large-scale schemes are proposed for my constituency, at Springwell, Fosse Green, Leoda and Beacon Fen. Their combined size is 9,340 acres. For context, that land could support grazing for more than 74,000 sheep, produce 23.5 million loaves of bread and more than 700 million Weetabix. A fifth project, just outside my constituency—proposed by a Labour donor—was recently approved by the Secretary of State. What assurance can Ministers give my constituents that the Department is assessing cumulative impacts appropriately? We often hear that no more than 1% of land will be used for solar panels. However, as we have seen in my constituency, the application for one giant solar farm leads to a proposal for a new substation to accommodate it, which in turn leads to a deluge of further giant solar project and battery storage applications. The cumulative effect will be to destroy the area. With nearly 7% of land in my constituency proposed to be turned over to solar farms, 9% of the land in the neighbouring constituency, represented by my right hon. Friend the Member for Newark (Robert Jenrick), and 5% of the land in the constituency of my right hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough (Sir Edward Leigh), we can clearly see the clustering of applications on our best farmland. My hon. Friend the Member for Rutland and Stamford (Alicia Kearns) has the Mallard Pass solar farm in her constituency. I congratulate her on the birth of her child recently, which prevented her from being here; I know that this subject is a big concern for her. Indeed, it is a concern for many of us, including my right hon. Friends the Members for Newark, for Melton and Syston (Edward Argar), and for Louth and Horncastle (Victoria Atkins). As members of the shadow Cabinet, protocol prevents them from speaking in the debate, but I know that they would have wished to, and will keep campaigning. The national policy statement says that installations should, where possible, use “suitable previously developed land, brownfield land, contaminated land and industrial land.” Where farmland must be used, it notes that “poorer quality land should be preferred to higher quality land avoiding the use of ‘Best and Most Versatile’ agricultural land where possible.” Sadly, the evidence so far suggests that the Energy Secretary is so ideologically wedded to solar projects that he has not appreciated the damage that giant solar projects are causing to agricultural land. This debate will hopefully demonstrate that covering our best farmland with massive solar projects would be irreversibly damaging to the nation. I urge the Minister to listen to me, my fellow MPs and fellow citizens before it is too late.

• 15 May 2025 · Solar Farms · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend is right, but I do not believe that the land will ever be returned to farmland, and many of my constituents feel the same. It is worth noting that 99.1% of solar installations cover the best and most versatile land, but tests procured by the developers appear to suggest that soil is of poorer quality than maps from the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and local knowledge would have predicted. Will the Minister ensure that where soil testing is done, the results are independently verified? As my right hon. Friend the Member for South Holland and The Deepings (Sir John Hayes) said, Lincolnshire is the nation’s breadbasket, and produces 30% of the UK’s vegetables. The land in the county is also more productive than the UK average; the wheat harvest there, over the difficult past five years, was 25% above the UK average, and it is much more productive than global averages. This is the land that we can least afford to lose.

• 15 May 2025 · Solar Farms · Hansard source

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  My right hon. Friend is right. I will come on to the cumulative effect later in my speech. He will recall that the previous Government brought in measures to ensure that happened, but it does not seem to be happening. In my survey, 91% of respondents were concerned about the enormous scale of proposals, and 73% were concerned about the use of productive farmland. The scale of the proposed developments is really difficult to describe. I brought to the former Prime Minister, my right hon. Friend the Member for Richmond and Northallerton (Rishi Sunak), maps, with overlays, of areas with which he was familiar. He saw the problem, and to his credit, he took the action that I have described. If the Minister is prepared to meet me, I would like to provide him with similar maps, so that he can see for himself the scale of these potential developments. The developments go on for miles. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Stone, Great Wyrley and Penkridge (Sir Gavin Williamson) said, they encircle villages, preventing natural growth and home-building over time. They even encircle individual homes. One isolated rural home in my constituency may soon find itself surrounded by solar panels on all sides, like the hole in the centre of a miserable glass doughnut. Such is the wonderful nature of my constituents that the prime concern that they have expressed to me was not for themselves, their views or their wellbeing, but for the security of the country—specifically, food security. Let us be very clear that using our best farmland for solar puts us at risk, in a volatile world, of being unable to feed our citizens. The best and most versatile land is defined as land in bands 1, 2, and 3a, although land in 3b is a valuable and entirely useable resource for farmers. In Lincolnshire, 99.1% of solar installation area covers land in the best and most versatile land category.

• 15 May 2025 · Solar Farms · Hansard source

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  I agree wholeheartedly that we should not use our best agricultural farmland for solar panels. The previous Government took steps to establish a £50 million fund to incentivise rooftop installations on farm buildings. That is the right measure to maximise the efficient use of land. This Government’s approach, by contrast, is to concentrate ground-mounted solar on prime agricultural land. That is folly in the highest degree. There are 600,000 acres of unused south-facing industrial rooftops across this country. We should use those before we even consider industrialising our countryside; industrialising it comes with consequences. I will come back to farming in a moment, but first we should consider the impact on the wider community. Access to green space and exercise are good for wellbeing. Imagine for a moment walking your dog not alongside a hedgerow, but between two 3.5 metre-high metal fences with CCTV cameras on them. How many of us would prefer to run past miles of 4 metre-high solar panels than rolling British countryside? I listen carefully to my constituents and have conducted surveys in the affected areas. I have received over 2,000 handwritten responses to my solar farm survey, many of which contain pages of heartfelt comments from people who are deeply worried about the disproportionate number of applications for massive solar projects in our area.

• 15 May 2025 · Solar Farms · Hansard source

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  My right hon. Friend is of course right, as usual, and I will address that point in more detail later in my speech. Even if we could resolve all those production, recycling and transportation issues, and so accept that solar is viable for the UK, ground-mounted solar projects are not the right approach. Panels installed so far are relatively inefficient. Despite a currently installed capacity of 17.8 GW, the total output last year was less than 10% of that. Our current approach is also centred around technology that is outdated. If Members can cast their minds back to 1984, when the first Apple Mac computers were put on the market, and then look today at the present advances in technology, they will see that technology has evolved at a rapid pace. Solar panels planned for fields today are already being superseded by cleaner, more efficient technology that does not need farmland. Researchers in Japan are developing next-generation panels made from iodine. They are flexible and 20 times thinner than existing panels. They would make it realistic to build solar installations on urban infrastructure such as stadiums, airports and office buildings.

• 15 May 2025 · Solar Farms · Hansard source

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  Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. I hope the Minister has listened carefully to what has been said, and has understood that this is not about nimbys—it is not about “not in my back yard” and it is not even about the aesthetics of solar farms. It is about the overwhelming scale of the proposals and the fact that solar farms will take up a huge amount of good-quality farmland. If one had a sensible strategy and wanted to use ground-mounted solar, one would put it in places where there is not good food-producing land; one would not put it on the best food-producing land, but that is what this Government are seeking to do. Question put and agreed to. Resolved, That this House has considered solar farms.

• 15 May 2025 · Solar Farms · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend is right. As a farmer’s wife, I understand that farmers are being put under a lot of pressure by the various changes that this Government have made to taxation on cab pick-ups, inheritance tax, national insurance and much more. Displacing our farmland leaves us reliant on imports, which use more land, may have been produced to poorer standards, and require us to factor in transport emissions. The previous Government took action by publishing planning guidance that made it clear that the best and most versatile land should not be developed where alternatives are available—and those alternatives are available. I am pleased to have signed my name to new clause 47 to the Planning and Infrastructure Bill, which seeks to prohibit solar development on higher-quality land, and I urge the Government to support it. Let us not forget the tenant farmers, who are often on multi-generational tenancies. They suddenly find their whole family without home or livelihood. A 2023 report for the Welsh Government on the impact of solar panels on agricultural land found that solar sites risk causing soil compaction and structural damage, which in some cases may be permanent. This means that agriculture will suffer, even after the somewhat hypothetical end of these solar schemes. I also ask the Government to give due consideration to the three RAF bases local to my constituency: RAF Waddington, RAF Cranwell and RAF Digby. Glint and glare from reflective panels will cause problems for pilots flying over these areas. Our newest pilots undergo basic training at Cranwell, and RAF Waddington is home to the Red Arrows. It is a huge joy for me and many of my constituents to watch our nation’s iconic display team practise the loop-the-loop and roll into turns at high speeds, but the miles and miles of aligned panels creating glint and glare could lead to disaster.

• 15 May 2025 · Solar Farms · Hansard source

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  rose—

• 15 May 2025 · Solar Farms · Hansard source

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  Will the hon. Member give way?

• 15 May 2025 · Solar Farms · Hansard source

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  I think the hon. Member is making part of the point that I was trying to make in my speech. Some 7% of my constituency is the subject of solar panel applications. Does he agree that that is an obscene amount of solar panels to put on our best quality farmland?

• 12 May 2025 · Draft Medical Devices and Blood Safety and Quality (Fees Amendment) Regulations · Hansard source

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  Before the Minister concludes, could she answer my questions on national insurance and on below-inflation pay rises? If not, will she commit to answering my remaining questions by letter?

• 12 May 2025 · Draft Medical Devices and Blood Safety and Quality (Fees Amendment) Regulations · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Desmond. The draft regulations will make amendments to the Medical Device Regulations 2002, the Blood Safety and Quality Regulations 2005 and the Medical Devices (Northern Ireland Protocol) Regulations 2021. The core changes made by the draft regulations will include modifying the fees charged to manufacturers, suppliers and relevant stakeholders involved in medical device approval and blood safety monitoring. These amendments will align with updated economic assessments on the operational needs of regulatory bodies. They follow an impact assessment evaluating both the financial implications and the potential benefits for healthcare providers and patients. The fee amounts set out in the draft regulations represent increases of between 9% and 16% in the majority of fees, but some fees, primarily those relating to clinical investigations, will rise more. The fees are being set in line with the consultation document issued by the MHRA on 29 August 2024. I have a few questions for the Minister. First, the impact assessment states that the main benefit of the regulations will be the additional income gained by the MHRA, but can she elaborate further on the benefits for patients and innovators? The impact assessment also states that staff costs are the major cost for the MHRA. Will the MHRA pay the rise in national insurance contributions announced at the Budget, or will it be exempt? If it is exempt, will that mean that it does not pay the extra fees, or will it be recompensed after the fact? If it is to be recompensed after the fact, will that be based on exact figures or on an estimate? Where recompense has been based on an estimate, as has happened in schools, it has fallen very far short of what is necessary. It is critical to ensure that fees do not deter innovation, particularly among smaller medical device manufacturers, which rely on sustainable costs to continue to produce lifesaving technology. How will the Government ensure that the fee increases do not deter innovation, particularly for small and medium-sized medical device manufacturers? Could the Minister elaborate on how the fee adjustments compare with similar regulations in other countries? What measures are being taken to ensure that UK manufacturers remain competitive? The aim of the draft regulations is to increase the fees in line with cost recovery. What is the Minister doing to ensure that the MHRA is efficient and that costs are kept to a minimum? Is she satisfied that the regulatory service provided for the money is adequate? Page 3 of the impact assessment has caused me some confusion. It states that “the MHRA assumes a 2.2% pay increase for each of the next three years (2024/25 to 2026/27)”. I note that that is below inflation, which is currently running at 2.6%. Is it realistic to expect below-inflation pay rises, particularly with this Government? Does the Minister think that that figure will stand? If the fees do not provide for full cost recovery, who will foot the bill? Will the MHRA have to reduce services, or will the taxpayer have to provide more via direct grant to the MHRA? Finally, what provision is there for surveillance to monitor the impact of these fee changes on healthcare providers and patients, and whether they are enough, too much or not enough for the MHRA to cover its costs?

• 6 May 2025 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  I thank the Secretary of State for that answer, and I would be delighted to meet him to discuss it further. Unfortunately, when Labour negotiates, Britain loses. The Government capitulated to union demands with nothing in return. It is therefore of no surprise to anyone that within months, they are back in dispute with resident doctors and the British Medical Association has announced a ballot for strike action. What will the Secretary of State do to protect patients and taxpayers?

• 6 May 2025 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  Taking medicines on time is important, especially for those with conditions such as diabetes and epilepsy. Dr Acheson, an A&E consultant who has time-critical medicines for his own Parkinson’s disease, understands that well. He has been running a quality improvement programme to ensure that time-critical medicines are given on time in A&E. Will the Secretary of State lend that project his support and commit to reviewing how time-critical medicines are delivered on wards?