David Mundell MP: speeches 2024

Speeches

• 18 Dec 2024 · BBC: Funding · Hansard source

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  I will regard that as your speech, Mr Bloore.

• 18 Dec 2024 · BBC: Funding · Hansard source

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  I remind Members that they should bob if they wish to be called. I do not intend to set a time limit, but if Members could stick to five or six minutes, everybody should get to speak.

• 18 Dec 2024 · BBC: Funding · Hansard source

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  I am surprised that nobody has mentioned BBC Parliament, on which this debate will appear. I understand that it is available over Christmas, when it shows highlights from parliamentary proceedings—of which I am sure this debate will be part. Question put and agreed to. Resolved, That this House has considered the future funding of the BBC.

• 18 Dec 2024 · British Indian Ocean Territory: Sovereignty · Hansard source

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  I refer Members to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests. Surely the Minister must accept, though, that the timing of this announcement was one of the biggest diplomatic gaffes of modern times. It came literally hours before a general election was called. There was a widespread perception in Mauritius that this Government were trying to give a leg up to a very unpopular sitting Government who subsequently scored zero out of 60 directly elected seats in the Mauritian Parliament. Does he not agree that it is wholly appropriate that the new Labour Mauritian Government would be wary of the intentions of his Government?

• 18 Dec 2024 · Immigration and Nationality Statistics · Hansard source

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  I call the Minister to conclude the debate. In these 30-minute debates, there is no opportunity for the Member in charge to respond; the Minister’s contribution will conclude the debate.

• 18 Dec 2024 · Immigration and Nationality Statistics · Hansard source

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  Order. This debate is for a fixed 30-minute period. I will call each of the three Members who have asked to speak, but I will apply a time limit of three minutes to their contributions. I call Richard Tice.

• 18 Dec 2024 · Immigration and Nationality Statistics · Hansard source

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  I will call Nick Timothy to move the motion and, later, the Minister to respond. I think it has been agreed that a number of other Members will make short contributions to the debate.

• 18 Dec 2024 · Creative Arts Education · Hansard source

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  Order. I am “you” and she is the hon. Lady.

• 18 Dec 2024 · Creative Arts Education · Hansard source

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  I call Munira Wilson, the Liberal Democrat spokesman, for five minutes.

• 18 Dec 2024 · Creative Arts Education · Hansard source

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  I call the shadow Minister to speak; you have five minutes.

• 18 Dec 2024 · Creative Arts Education · Hansard source

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  I call Jayne Kirkham. I am saving Mr Shannon for the finale.

• 18 Dec 2024 · Creative Arts Education · Hansard source

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  Order. I remind Members that they should bob if they wish be called in the debate. If Members are creative and stick to just over three minutes, I think we will get everybody in.

• 18 Dec 2024 · Creative Arts Education · Hansard source

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  Last, but definitely not least, I call Jim Shannon. I intend to call the Front-Bench spokespeople at 5.10 pm.

• 18 Dec 2024 · Creative Arts Education · Hansard source

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  Minister, I would grateful if you left a few moments at the end so that Jess Brown-Fuller can respond to the debate.

• 18 Dec 2024 · Commonwealth Parliamentary Association and International Committee of the Red Cross (Status) Bill [Lords] · Hansard source

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  I should declare that I am the treasurer and international representative of the CPA UK branch. The scale of the resentment, and indeed anger, among Commonwealth countries at the previous structure of the CPA is sometimes not clear in this House. A body had been set up to consider alternative structures, in particular the CPA leaving the UK and being based elsewhere, because of that concern and the many years that it had taken to bring the issue forward. I was therefore very pleased to be able to go to the interim committee, which had been set up to consider alternative locations for CPA International, and provide it with a copy of the Hansard report of the Second Reading of the Bill, which I am grateful that the Minister and the FCDO brought forward in a timely fashion that tied in, deliberately or otherwise, with the Commonwealth parliamentary conference. Given undertakings that had been given repeatedly by UK representatives, there was a demand for evidence that that would be done. The unanimous support that the Bill achieved on Second Reading went a long way towards doing that, opening up the opportunity for CPA International to start to focus on many other issues. The issue of the CPA’s structure and legal status has preoccupied it at an international level for many years. I attended the conference in Ghana last year and, at that conference, that was the dominant issue that took up virtually all the debate. This year, I was pleased that there was an excellent debate on climate change. We have a new international chair in Dr Christopher Kalila, who will visit London shortly. He has set out his wish to bring a renewed sense of purpose to the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association, which will focus not so much on structure and constitutional issues as on bringing together the Commonwealth parliamentary family on issues of importance across the Commonwealth. As the Minister knows, we cannot disguise the fact that there are difficult issues out there. The LGBT+ issue remains extremely challenging, and we cannot duck that. We have to look at ways in which we can take that forward. Certain Commonwealth countries are promoting the criminalisation of not just members of the LGBT+ community but their allies. That is not acceptable, and we have to take a stand and show leadership on it. We also have to acknowledge that other actors are at work. It will shock Labour Members that when I was in South Africa, I was condemned as a neo-colonialist by the Economic Freedom Fighters party, who wear fetching red boiler suits in Parliament to display that, in fact, they are ordinary working people and not part of the elite. They are not supportive of the Commonwealth or South Africa’s role in it. We know Russia and China are active in many Commonwealth countries, so we cannot just take it as given that everybody will proceed on the basis that we would wish them to. But I, like others who have spoken, regard the Commonwealth as a great force for good. There is huge opportunity at both parliamentary and governmental level to make a difference to those on the ground across the Commonwealth, and I hope that will be at the heart of the Government’s approach. There are one or two people who I would like to thank and acknowledge, not least my former colleague Dame Maria Miller, who tried to get the Bill through. Whether the arrival of the hon. Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme (Adam Jogee) was worth pausing the Bill for might be a matter for debate on another day. I praise our former colleague Ian Liddell-Grainger. Ian would have done well in the diplomatic service, if he had chosen to do so. He had to step in when the former chair of the CPA international died suddenly and there was a vacuum. Ian came in and steadied the ship, as well as pursuing the issue within this Parliament and identifying its importance. Of course, as has already been mentioned, our former colleague in this House, Stephen Twigg does a hugely important job as chief executive of CPA International. On his behalf, I ask the Minister to ensure that the subsequent orders that have to be brought forward are done so in a timely fashion and that we can continue to confirm to the Commonwealth family the momentum behind the process. The international executive committee of the CPA is due to meet here in London in May, and it would be helpful if the other parts of the process could have been completed by then. My final plea to the Minister is for the Government to make more use of the CPA by working more closely with it. As he has acknowledged, having been on many visits, the CPA UK—with Members of this Parliament— has the capacity to act in a soft power role for the Government. As he and others know, MPs can share and discuss things that it is not necessarily possible for our Ministers or high commissioners to discuss. In fact, when we were in Ghana last year, we had good discussions around the LGBT+ issue, which would not have been possible in more formal settings.

• 18 Dec 2024 · Commonwealth Parliamentary Association and International Committee of the Red Cross (Status) Bill [Lords] · Hansard source

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  I thank the hon. Gentleman for that and for his wider comments. The CPA UK in particular is a good way of bringing together colleagues from across the House. I know that Mr Speaker fully endorses and supports that. It has been a pleasure to attend many events over the years, both overseas and here, with colleagues from across the House. To return to my point, I hope that the Minister and the FCDO in its current guise will endorse and embrace the CPA, and the opportunity to use its soft power, to take forward matters that are in the interests of everybody across the United Kingdom.

• 9 Dec 2024 · Fireworks: Sale and Use · Hansard source

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  I will call Lizzie Collinge and then Patrick Hurley. If there is anyone else who has not been called and wishes to speak, please can they indicate that to me?

• 9 Dec 2024 · Syria · Hansard source

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  I have never regretted my vote in favour of military action in 2013, and I certainly welcome the fact that President Assad has been brought down. I welcome what the Foreign Secretary has to say on humanitarian aid, but there are myriad UN Security Council resolutions in place on humanitarian aid, and on rebuilding Syria in all its forms. What role does the Foreign Secretary see the UN—and indeed those Security Council resolutions—playing?

• 4 Dec 2024 · Economic Growth · Hansard source

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  With your indulgence, Mr Speaker, I wish Peter MacMahon well as he steps down as Scottish political editor of ITV Border. Peter has provided outstanding coverage of not just Scottish questions in this Parliament but Scottish politics more generally to my constituents and those across the south of Scotland. I am sure the Secretary of State will welcome, as I do, the fact that the life of Torness nuclear power station has been extended. That is good for energy security and for the Scottish economy. But given that energy is a reserved matter, what more can he do to bring new nuclear development to Scotland?

• 4 Dec 2024 · Farming and Inheritance Tax · Hansard source

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  No, I do not agree with the hon. Gentleman’s proposition. I do not think that viable prime agricultural land should be used for solar farms. I believe there is plenty of other brownfield land, or land that is not prime agricultural land, that could be used for solar farms. I am, therefore, not supportive of some of the huge developments proposed for my constituency. I will now touch on one or two other points that have been raised but not expanded on. First, a lot of this discussion has been as if the sole structure of a family farm is mother, father, son and daughter. Brothers and sisters, or cousins, are often involved in the farming business, and it is quite wrong to suggest that some of the reliefs that can be applied would work in that situation. I have constituents who are in exactly that situation. A family farm is not just mum, dad, son and daughter. It is brothers, sisters, cousins and extended family. The right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr Carmichael) touched on tenant farmers. Tenant farmers in Scotland, in particular, are in a very difficult position because they cannot sell a couple of fields to pay their inheritance tax. They will have to give up the whole of their business, if they cannot find the money in other ways to pay these bills. We need to understand the issues that face tenant farmers. I also commend the right hon. Gentleman’s suggestion that there should be a much wider debate about farming finance. The way to secure farming finance, and to secure our farmers, is not to destroy the family farm.

• 4 Dec 2024 · Farming and Inheritance Tax · Hansard source

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  I liked the honesty of the hon. Gentleman’s speech in setting out how the Labour Government had let down his voters by going back on their undertakings in relation to the policy. They should listen to what has been said in today’s debate, to farmers and to the hon. Gentleman, and they should change the policy.

• 4 Dec 2024 · Farming and Inheritance Tax · Hansard source

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  I commend my near neighbour, the hon. Member for Penrith and Solway (Markus Campbell-Savours), on his brave contribution. It is hard to come to this Chamber and tell the truth when the pressure from the Whips and the party is to defend the Government at all costs. He made it absolutely clear that this measure will have a devastating effect on farms and the farming industry in his constituency if it goes through as currently set out. The hon. Gentleman’s constituency and mine have something in common in that, in the 2001 foot and mouth outbreak, which devastated the farming industry, we saw for sure how important farming was to the whole community. Because farming was shut down, business was shut down. Shops were shut and lots of businesses including garages and all the services in rural areas could not function because farming was not functioning. That showed me the great importance that farming has. Ironically, however, the outcome for my constituency of this measure from a Labour Government will be the further acquisition of land by private equity companies. This is because, thanks partly to the Scottish Government’s lifting of restrictions on land that can be afforested, good farming land in my constituency is under huge pressure from private equity funds buying it up to plant trees for carbon capture reliefs. It often seems that it is a great thing to plant trees and that we should all be in favour of it, but the reality is that these trees are Sitka spruce trees that are planted very close together. There is no light or environmental content within these forested areas. No creatures can survive in them. They are not environmentally friendly or sustainable, but they are financially attractive. They employ nobody. There is no employment once the forest has been planted. When farmers come under pressure, as they will, to sell land to meet the inheritance tax, this is who the buyers will be. It will be these private equity firms, and if it is not them, it will in many instances be those who want to develop solar panels in a farming scenario, as other Members have highlighted.

• 4 Dec 2024 · Farming and Inheritance Tax · Hansard source

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  I do not know whether the hon. Member for South Derbyshire (Samantha Niblett) was here for the speech of the hon. Member for Penrith and Solway, but he set out exactly what happened to him as a Labour MP, having given farmers assurances about what Labour would do in government and the farmers finding that they had been betrayed. Now, the choice is not final, as he said, and hopefully this debate has shown the passion of both farmers and those who represent rural constituencies.

• 28 Nov 2024 · Business of the House · Hansard source

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  Will the Leader of the House join me in celebrating the 10th anniversary of the Annandale Distillery in my constituency? Built in the 1830s, it was abandoned in 1919, but brought back to life with much love and passion by Professor David Thomson and Teresa Church in 2014. It now not only produces excellent whisky, but has brought a huge economic benefit for the Annan area and the wider south of Scotland.

• 28 Nov 2024 · UK Leadership on Sudan · Hansard source

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  I very much welcome the statement and the increased focus on Sudan. Evidence given to the International Development Committee is clear that those in Sudan feel that the conflict has been forgotten and ignored, partly because it has received so little international media attention. Anything that can change that is welcome. I commend to the Minister the evidence that the Committee took this week, which sets out that the most effective way of delivering aid is through local groups on the ground. More widely, what engagement has the UK had with the United Arab Emirates in particular, given their huge influence in that conflict?