Clive Lewis MP: speeches

Speeches

• 2 Jul 2025 · Prevention and Suppression of Terrorism · Hansard source

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  Let me first associate myself with the very good comments of the Liberal Democrat spokesperson, the hon. Member for Hazel Grove (Lisa Smart). I agree with the proscription of the two far-right fascist organisations—I think they should be proscribed—but can we as a House accept that there are those of us present who have a different take on today’s proscription of Palestine Action? We do not have to agree with the behaviour or actions of Palestine Action to make the case today that this proscription is wrong. I ask hon. Members to acknowledge that the many of us here today who take a different view on this issue are as much a part of this democracy as those who agree with the proscription. It is just that our take on the delicacy of our democracy, on what this proscription does and on how it undermines our democracy happens to differ from that of other people. There are Opposition Members who have repeatedly said that they understand and empathise with constituents who have smashed and vandalised ultra low emission zone cameras and low emission zone cameras. Direct action is not just of the left; everyone in our democracy can partake in it. This is a judgment call about how we best protect our democracy and an acknowledgment that not all threats are external or violent. Some threats are based on the decisions that we take in this place. Sometimes, we might take decisions that fundamentally undermine our own democracy. I have no doubt that some of us will be called terrorist sympathisers by some who disagree with our position, but that would be wrong. Look around the world and watch as democracy and the rule of law are systematically smashed. Corporations and the wealthy have increasing power and wealth to influence our democracy. Look over the Atlantic at the United States. Our democracies are delicate; our democracies are precious. The decisions we take in this place determine whether those democracies will survive into the future. I look around the world and around this country—I look at the authoritarian right party that is 10 points ahead in the polls—and I worry about the future of our democracy. This Government—our Government—have to make decisions that take account of the possibility that we might not be in government one day. It may be the authoritarian right who are in government, and they will take this further, faster and deeper than we ever have, so we should be putting in fireguards now, protecting our democracy, and this measure does not do that. In conclusion, I understand what terrorism is. I was in London on 7 July 2005 and I watched my community—this city—attacked by real terrorists. At that point, rightly or wrongly, I decided that I was going to Afghanistan to fight the terrorists. I went because I love this country and I love our democracy and I want to see it protected. Today’s proscription order against Palestine Action undermines that, and I wish that my Government were not doing this.

• 16 Jun 2025 · Windrush Day 2025 · Hansard source

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  I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Dulwich and West Norwood (Helen Hayes) for opening this timely debate—she made a fantastic speech—and hon. Friends for their contributions. I want to touch on the story that Windrush tells of this country. Stories are important; the stories we tell ourselves define us as a country. It is right that we celebrate the Windrush generation and their contribution, but as other speakers have said, there is a dark side to this story. I do not want to be too negative, but I want to touch on some of that dark side, because it is important and instructive, given where we find ourselves, as a country and a world. I would not be standing here today as a black Member of Parliament if one of my ancestors in Africa had not been abducted and put on a slave ship. For generations after that, my ancestors were beaten and made to work in the most terrible conditions to make money for someone in this country, or for their slave master in the Caribbean. Yet because of those ancestors, I stand here today. History is complicated—I think we can agree on that—but that does not mean that we should not try to unpick it. Looking around at my colleagues, I must say that it is politically fashionable in some quarters to say that many of us are recipients of DEI—diversity, equality and inclusion policies—that we have been gifted our places, and that anyone who comes from the black community, is a women or has tendencies or sexualities that are not seen as the norm has been gifted their position. Anyone who understands the Labour party selection process will know that is not the case. In fact, many of us faced a double whammy—we are both working class and black. It takes a lot to get into this place, and yet we are here, and we are not going anywhere. I remember back in 2021, when the Conservatives, who were here on the Government Benches, under Boris Johnson, produced the disgraceful race report. I think they want to forget that. I would be interested to hear what the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Gordon and Buchan (Harriet Cross), thinks about that report now. It said that structural racism does not exist, it is a figment of our collective imagination, we have effectively been dreaming about it for 400 years, and there is no link between empire, slavery and the racism that stretches from that all the way to the Windrush scandal and beyond. Indeed, that notion of outsiders—of foreigners—figures in much of our immigration debate to this very day. What is racism? It is a hierarchy of worth. We see it all around the world in conflicts: “If you are from this part of the world with this ethnicity, your worth is this much, but if that is your ethnicity, your worth is that much and you can take that much suffering. And if you’re up here, you don’t need to suffer; you’re part of the elite.” That is what racism is: a hierarchy of suffering. We cannot forget that it is real and allow people to tell us that our history is something in which only good things happened, where things were shiny and nice, and that we had an empire to help and develop the rest of the world. I remember when I was going on the ITV breakfast programme, and I had to have a chat with the producer beforehand. He said, “Clive, you do realise that the railways in India have helped India to get into the 21st century and to industrialise? The British built those railways.” I replied, “You know, you’re right, but that is why it’s so complicated. Do you think for a second that the British built the railways in India for the benefit of the Indians?” The answer is no; they built them to extract vast wealth from India, and it just so happens that the Indians can now use that railway network to industrialise and make themselves richer. History is complicated. I will finish with this. There is a movement around the world; in Germany, in Europe and, dare I say it, in the United States, whose President believes that a genocide is happening in South Africa—really, he believes that, and he is coming here for a state visit. All around the world, there is an attack on history—on good history. Good history is complicated; it tells a complicated story about this country and its past. I have served this country knowing full well its history in empire, knowing full well its history in slavery. I have served it because I love this country, warts and all. I do not need to tell myself a story about this country being perfect in the past and only doing things for the good. I love it, warts and all, because it has given me and my family, friends and community so many opportunities. My dad was welcomed to this country by my mother’s English family. The trade union movement welcomed him. Our history is complex. The Labour party is complex. The country is complex. History is complex. Let us never forget that, as we go forwards. We must understand that history is complex for a reason because—and this moves me—we are all human beings, and human beings are complex themselves. That is why our history is complex and that is what we need to understand. As we move forward, talk about Windrush, celebrate Windrush Day, and pass legislation in this place about black people, about immigration and about asylum seekers, let us remember our complex history and try to do better in the future.

• 16 Jun 2025 · Windrush Day 2025 · Hansard source

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  I thank my hon. Friend for making a fantastic speech, and for securing this debate. It does seem sometimes quite unfashionable in this day and age to look at the discrimination that that community has endured for so many decades, and not to see it as structural racism. In other words, there is a thread from colonialism, empire and slavery all the way through to Windrush and what we still experience to this day. Would she comment on that issue?

• 5 Feb 2025 · English Devolution and Local Government · Hansard source

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  I congratulate the Secretary of State and her Ministers on the work they have done on this matter, and on the exhaustive consultations that have taken place between MPs, local councillors and stakeholders—no one is being forced on this journey. We in Norwich and Norfolk are happy to be on the express elevator to devolution. After 14 years of austerity and cuts to adult social care and children’s services under the last Government, will the Secretary of State promise us that she will encourage the new local authorities to engage in co-development and co-production of those services, and that they will be taken in-house, so that we can end the privatisation and outsourcing that has ruined those services for so many years?

• 28 Jan 2025 · Water (Special Measures) Bill [Lords] · Hansard source

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  That is my personal view; I put that on the record. These companies have legal obligations first and foremost to their shareholders, which means short-term profit maximisation. When water was privatised, to quote from Unison’s recent report on this matter, to “ensure the commercial success of the companies, the government wrote off all the existing debts of the RWAs”— regional water authorities— “(£6.5 billion in total) and gave the private companies £7.7 billion of public subsidies in tax relief on profits.” It has come to my attention that even some former chief executives of water companies fear for the future of the industry, because good investors have by and large exited it. It is now the Macquaries and vulture capitalists of this world that dominate shareholding. This issue goes far beyond regulation. Indeed, our own regulator, Ofwat, has been found wanting, as its own growth duty prioritises business as usual. In other areas, the Government have quite rightly recognised and embraced the value of public ownership, such as in rail and with Great British Energy. Unfortunately, when it comes to water companies there seems to be an inconsistency in Government policy. Many of us on this side of the House ran on a manifesto commitment to reduce the cost of living, and that commitment is one that I think every Labour MP believes in. However, the cost of corruption and of extraction by a private water company should under no circumstances, as is currently configured in the Bill, land on the heads of our constituents should any of these companies go bust or be taken into special administration. Water is a monopoly industry, which means that bill payers and taxpayers are the same. What message would it send to our constituents if they are asked to pay, via their bills or via tax, to make a payout for the mistakes and excesses of privatised water?

• 28 Jan 2025 · Water (Special Measures) Bill [Lords] · Hansard source

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  I do recognise that, and not for one second am I calling for nationalisation, which is the model the right hon. Member was talking about. There is a plethora of possibilities for public ownership, from mutualisation through to giving regional authorities more scope, and even working with the private sector. We must ensure that the public have a critical say over the future of water, and there are multiple forms that public ownership can take. I am not necessarily in favour of 1970s-style nationalisation, which is pretty much what they have in Scotland at the moment. I will, however, ask those on the Front Bench to consider new clause 8 and ensure that our constituents—the people we came into politics for—do not foot a single penny more for the failures of privatised water. Investors, shareholders and creditors should be the ones who take the haircut. They should be the ones who foot the bill because of what they have done to our water. This should not be landing on the heads of our constituents. This is a political choice, and I urge my Government to make it clear that we will always back the public, not the private companies that have got us into this mess.

• 3 Sept 2024 · Healthcare Provision: East of England · Hansard source

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  On the hon. Gentleman’s first point, yes, successive Governments have presided over the NHS, but with differing intentions. Until the mid-1970s, say, there was a broad consensus—I will come on to this—on what the welfare state was and how it operated. That has changed substantially in the past 60 years. The implementation of different policies by different Governments, including Conservative ones, has not always been in the best interests of the NHS. On enterprise, yes, a secure welfare state, good social security and the ability to give people good health—the NHS has been integral to that—have implications for our economy, as I have already pointed out. I am sure I am not the first or the last to suspect a direct connection between the rise of angry and anti-democratic right-wing politics and the demise of the NHS’s ability to look after us all effectively. The sheer far-reaching impact of the NHS and its crisis cannot be underestimated. One needs only to look at the US, where free universal healthcare does not exist, as the hon. Member for Mid Norfolk (George Freeman) just mentioned, to see the state of politics, crime, drug addiction and social breakdown there. The free market in healthcare provision and medicines has led to a country with one of the least efficient and most high-cost healthcare systems in the western world, and where millions are hooked on drugs that are as heavily advertised as if they were cans of coke. Let us not indulge too much in English exceptionalism, though. We need only to look at dentistry and adult social care in this country to see what happens to healthcare provision that is, to all intents and purposes, privatised or well on its way to being so—the consequences of which I hope colleagues will discuss later in the debate. The foresight of the 1945 Labour Government cannot be underestimated. When the NHS was launched in 1948, it was done in tandem with the advent of the welfare state, because Beveridge, Keynes and Bevan understood the three pillars necessary for a healthy nation. The first pillar—the NHS—would be there for people if they became sick, but it was the second and third pillars that meant the NHS would not be overburdened. They would work in tandem with it to prevent sickness. The second pillar was, of course, the welfare state, providing a network of social institutions that would protect citizens from the market risks associated with unemployment, accidents and old age. The third pillar was an economic system that prioritised full employment in secure, well-paid, unionised jobs—a system that sought to reduce all forms of inequality, from wealth to health. Over the last 60 years, the three pillars have been systematically smashed. The second and third pillars are in tatters, while the first—the NHS—is wobbling precariously. It is testament to the enduring nature of the national healthcare system that it has managed to survive as an almost solitary pillar for as long as it has. If a Labour Government are truly to fix the foundations of our broken healthcare system, they must acknowledge the nature of the three-pillar foundation, and acknowledge that the NHS cannot be fixed if we do not rebuild and replace the other two pillars as well. The situation in the east of England—from dentistry deserts to sky-rocketing rates of mental health referrals and some of the worst ambulance waiting times in the country—is beyond one malfunctioning organisation. Norwich and the wider region are experiencing a systemic crisis that is institutional, social and economic. Healthcare reforms such as devolution to the integrated care boards have become about devolving who gets to wield the axe to make savings—known to many people as cuts. I will give an example. Our ICB in the east of England, part of NHS Norfolk and Waveney, has been told by national health bosses to cut its running costs by 30% by 2026. My first question to the Minister is: how will our Government deliver improved healthcare outcomes while simultaneously implementing the previous Government’s frankly destructive cuts? We know that vast areas such as dentistry and social care are largely privatised, with spiralling costs, and that undermines the NHS’s central commitment to care being free at the point of use. Tendrils of the crisis extend into social care. It is often said that if social care is cut, the NHS bleeds too. Norfolk county council acknowledges a crisis in social care. With soaring demand and struggles to recruit staff, there is a backlog of hundreds of vulnerable people waiting to get their care needs assessed, and care providers fold on a regular basis. My second question to the Minister, then, is: what news can she give us on the last Government’s unimplemented cap on care costs? Is it being implemented, as the Secretary of State implied during the general election campaign, or being dropped? If it is dropped, what plans are there to help those facing ruin given their complex care needs? One consequence of the situation in Norfolk is that there are regularly hundreds of hospital patients who are medically fit to leave but unable to be discharged. It is clear that our healthcare system is struggling to respond to today’s crisis, but it is also unprepared for the challenges of the future. East Anglia is the UK region most at risk from early climate impacts, and there is clear evidence of the link between climate breakdown and ill health. For example, from 2022 to 2023 the number of flood reports in Norfolk doubled, and stretches of Norwich are predicted to flood year after year. Victims of flooding in the UK are nine times more likely to experience long-term mental health issues, and flooding is linked to a greater instance of respiratory diseases because of dampness. Prevention is better than cure—it is about treating the causes, not just symptom alleviation. We know that the Prime Minister is keen on the so-called preventive state and we have seen some early policy announcements, so my third question is: will the Minister elaborate on what that will look like? What does healthcare provision that prioritises prevention look like in the east of England?

• 29 Jul 2024 · Public Spending: Inheritance · Hansard source

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  I welcome you to the Chair, Madam Deputy Speaker. My right hon. Friend the Chancellor will probably not be too surprised to hear that when it comes to wasteful and expensive vanity projects, the Conservative party has not confined itself to national matters. Conservative-run Norfolk county council is attempting to push through a £300 million vanity road known as the Norwich western link, which measures 3.9 km at a cost of more than £70 million a kilometre. Will she look at that environmental and financial disaster, and work with those of us who know that there are more cost-effective and ecologically sound alternatives?