Ellie Chowns MP: speeches

Speeches

• 2 Sept 2026 · Representation of the People Bill · Hansard source

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  I will move on to my amendments, Madam Deputy Speaker. Amendment 15 seeks to ban all corporate donations. Donations from companies are banned in France and Canada, among many other countries. According to research conducted by CenTax, about a quarter of donor companies are so opaque that it is not possible to identify who controls them, and almost £1 in every £10 given by companies comes, indirectly, from people who could not make donations themselves. This is a loophole in our politics. The Bill already accepts that a company has no independent right to donate, as it depends on the individuals who own it being on the electoral register, so it makes sense to complete the step and ban corporate donations altogether. If the House is not willing to go as far as a ban, it can still strengthen the Bill by strengthening clause 60. I have also tabled new clause 30, which calls for “a review of how campaign expenditure limits could apply on an annual basis”. The new clause would deal with another huge loophole. We recognise that money skews politics; that is why there are spending limits during the short campaign; but we know that politics does not happen just in that short period before an election. Politics happens all the year round, especially now that the online world is such a big part of our politics. Long gone are the days when elections were fought only in those short weeks. Political campaigning happens throughout the year, not just on doorsteps but also online, and it is therefore imperative to place limits on annual campaign expenditure to prevent our politics from being skewed out of all proportion by big money. That is why I support new clause 70, tabled by the right hon. Member for Oxford East (Anneliese Dodds), which would lower limits for campaign spending altogether. In her new clause 120, the hon. Member for Walthamstow (Ms Creasy) makes a clear case for a cap on all donations. Big money has been allowed to skew our politics for far too long. I would prefer the cap to be much lower, perhaps at £50,000 a year, and that view is supported by the majority of the British people, but any move in that direction would be an improvement. Moreover, some donations simply should not be allowed. I welcome new clause 22, tabled by the hon. Member for Leeds East (Richard Burgon): there is no place for fossil fuels in a sustainable future, and no place for dirty fossil money in our politics. I also welcome the new clauses tabled by the hon. Member for Milton Keynes Central (Emily Darlington), particularly new clause 43, which calls for “a repository of digital political advertising”. This is absolutely crucial: we have to guard against the use of AI to fuel disinformation. We have to take big money out of politics, take the poison of disinformation out of politics, and fix our political system once and for all.

• 2 Sept 2026 · Representation of the People Bill · Hansard source

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  I would like to speak to amendment 15 and new clause 30, tabled in my name, and to new clauses tabled by other colleagues from across the House. First of all, I welcome the new Minister to her place and I welcome the Bill. I always like to start where there is common ground. It is certainly true that there are steps forward in the Bill: the implementation of the Rycroft recommendations to tackle foreign influence in our politics; movements towards automatic voter registration; and dealing with crypto to some extent, although not enough. Those are all positive steps forward. I also warmly welcome the introduction of votes at 16, which is a long-standing Green party policy. But—there is a big but, I am afraid, Minister—the Bill could and really should do far, far more to clean up our politics. There are three big things that we need to do: get rid of the influence of dirty and big money in our politics; eliminate the poison of disinformation in our politics; and fix the fundamental structures of our politics that disenfranchise so many people. It is therefore frankly ridiculous that in a Bill about elections called the Representation of the People Bill we are not even allowed to discuss new clause 31 on a national commission on electoral reform. This is fundamentally important to our politics. The fundamental principle of democracy is that everybody’s vote must count equally. The Government, of course, do not need to legislate on a national commission on electoral reform. They could kickstart one anyway. I really hope that the Minister will take that back to the Prime Minister—who, after all, is supposedly a supporter of electoral reform—and strongly encourage him to put his action where his mouth is on this issue and demonstrate that, if he is serious about problem-solving, he needs to work to solve the problems in our democracy.

• 2 Sept 2026 · EU Membership Referendum: Impact on the UK · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure, Ms Butler, to serve under your chairship. Clearly, Brexit has been a disaster for Britain—the sooner we acknowledge that, the better our conversations will be, because we will then be able to move forward. It has been economically disastrous. As the hon. Member for Perth and Kinross-shire (Pete Wishart) said, it has been a slow puncture; in fact, it has been a huge slow puncture, taking 4%, 6% or 8% off our GDP, which costs every household in the country enormously in real terms. It makes us all much worse off. In North Herefordshire, business owners have spoken about the additional barriers they face when trading with Europe and the admin created by the supposed reduction in bureaucracy. Brexit has been an economic disaster, but it is not just economic: environmentally, we are diverging from Europe, and in 28 areas of law, we now have weaker protection for our natural environment. Socially, politically and culturally, Brexit has been poisonous. It has catalysed and reinforced a toxic political debate, leading to polarisation, the proliferation of disinformation, political short-termism, and a discounting of the rights, opportunities and needs of young people in particular. The UK is now poorer, weaker and more isolated in a context in which we have a completely unreliable and unstable partner in the US President, and we have war on the eastern border of Europe with Russia’s illegal invasion of Ukraine.

• 2 Sept 2026 · EU Membership Referendum: Impact on the UK · Hansard source

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  I am sorry, but because of time I will not. We are also facing the climate crisis barrelling down towards us. All of these issues require stronger co-operation with our closest neighbours. In that context, more than 10 years on from this disastrous wrong turn in British politics—this monumental act of self-harm—it is time to change course. I welcome the noises that the Government have made about resetting. That is certainly a start, but we need to be honest about what we have lost. We need to recognise the importance of co-operation and working together politically as well as economically. We need to recognise that the majority of the British people think that we would be better off back in the European Union, and that is why I believe we need to set out a path to rejoin. The best future for the UK lies within Europe. With the summit coming up, I hope that the Minister will be genuinely ambitious and deep in setting out the path forward.

• 1 Sept 2026 · West Bank: Illegal Settlements · Hansard source

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  I welcome the new Foreign Secretary and his team to their places. He is the third Labour Foreign Secretary in just over two years. We have had so many hand-wringing statements. He has just said that the time to act is now, but he is asking us to wait weeks more for a statement about banning settlement trade, which it is absolutely clear is essential. What is he waiting for? Will he ban trade in goods, services and investment in both directions immediately, because the facts on the ground are changing now, at pace and faster than ever before? What are the UK Government still waiting for?

• 1 Sept 2026 · Direction of Government · Hansard source

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  The climate crisis is hitting hard already, and I was glad to hear the Prime Minister acknowledge that in his statement. We have just had the hottest summer since records began, farmers are facing the worst arable harvest since records began and the Met Office tells us today that extreme summers such as this year’s have been made 130 times more likely by burning fossil fuels. In that context, will the Prime Minister remember his words of last year, when he warned against the “siren voices” taking us down the path of “dependence on fossil fuels”? Will he stick to the manifesto promise not to drill any more oil and gas, and will he rule out Rosebank and Jackdaw, because the climate damage they would create hugely outweighs any possible benefit and will lead to more disasters such as we saw on the Nepal-Tibet border just last week?

• 16 Jul 2026 · Road Repairs: New Technology · Hansard source

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  13. What support she plans to provide to local authorities to help them adopt new technologies for tackling potholes and road defects.

• 16 Jul 2026 · Road Repairs: New Technology · Hansard source

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  Potholes are the bane of all our lives, including for my constituents, but I have a cunning plan: we could fix potholes much faster by tapping into the superpowers of bin men and women. Bin lorries travel every road every week. Why not equip them with cameras and AI-enabled technology, so that they can spot, map and log potholes immediately, as soon as they appear? That would significantly speed up the process of fixing them. This has been done very successfully in Australia. Will the Department for Transport work closely with the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government to ensure that local authorities have the funding and co-ordination needed to adopt this fantastic technology nationwide?

• 14 Jul 2026 · NHS Buildings: Extreme Heat · Hansard source

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  Heatwaves, which are becoming more frequent and more severe due to the climate crisis, create a health crisis. We see that in excessive temperatures in our hospitals and other health buildings, and we see it in the huge, unprecedented demand on ambulance services. First, will the Minister support my colleague Hannah Spencer’s private Member’s Bill to set a maximum workplace temperature to help keep people healthy during heatwaves? Secondly, what conversations is the Department having with the Cabinet Office to ensure that we have a Government-wide adaptation and resilience plan to deal with the effects of climate breakdown?

• 14 Jul 2026 · Extreme Heat: Preparedness · Hansard source

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  It is so important to clarify that we are talking about 2°C of warming, not 2%. The average pre-industrial temperature was 14°C; it is way more than 2%.

• 14 Jul 2026 · Extreme Heat: Preparedness · Hansard source

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  I completely agree. To do that, we need to think long-term. We do not do well enough in this country at thinking long-term, or beyond the next election cycle. We need to think of the next generation. What sort of world do we want to bequeath to them? What sort of country do we want to bequeath to them, and how will we build the country that is suitable for the climate that will be here in a few decades’ time? As has been pointed out, this is the coolest it will be in our lifetimes: the climate will only become more extreme, with more extreme heat and more extreme floods. We need to change our ways as a country. Experts have been telling us this for a long time. The Committee on Climate Change has pointed out that we are not doing anywhere near enough to meet the adaptation challenge facing us. I call on the Government to grasp the nettle. This is investment in building a better future—it is a win-win investment. Building houses that are suitable for the weather conditions that we will be facing is much cheaper than having to retrofit them afterwards. If we use materials and building methods that enable us to cool buildings naturally, we can create urban areas that are not such huge heat islands as they currently are. By building in such a way, including with lots of tree planting in urban areas, we can cool temperatures locally using natural methods. We have a real opportunity here, and we should grasp it with both hands. Tackling the adaptation and the resilience challenge is not about just sticking our finger in the dyke or using a sticking plaster approach, such as patchwork retrofitting air-con in every building that is struggling with the heat; it is an opportunity to imagine and to build a better country for the future. There are things the Government can do right now. My hon. Friend the Member for Gorton and Denton (Hannah Spencer) introduced a private Member’s Bill yesterday to establish a maximum workplace temperature. We have a minimum workplace temperature, but we clearly need a maximum one. Minister, is this something that the Government will support? I hope they will. As we have seen, there is international precedent and huge levels of support across the country We also need to recognise that we must build the long-term resilience that we require. As a country, we do not yet have an adaptation plan that is fit for purpose, or the co-ordination that is needed. I raised that issue with the Minister a few days ago in a debate on national security and resilience and was told that Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs is responsible for resilience in farming, and that the Department of Health and Social Care is responsible for resilience in health. I raised this in Health questions this morning, but the issues we face are not solved just by retrofitting our hospitals. We have to enable everybody in the country to stay healthy in the extremes of heat that we are increasingly seeing so that they do not have to go into hospital in the first place. This is a cross-Government requirement and priority, so will the Government put in place adaptation plans that the Climate Change Committee will itself declare are fit for purpose? Finally, we must put the brakes on the problem at the same time. It is not an either/or between mitigation and adaptation; we still have more to do to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and the emissions that are causing climate breakdown, so that we save ourselves from the worst possible effects of runaway climate change. I call on the Government to go further and faster on real climate action, not least by holding the line on Jackdaw and Rosebank. We cannot on the one hand struggle with facing the consequences of climate change, such as extreme heat, and on the other hand continue to take more fossil fuels out of the ground and burn them. We need consistent Government policy across the piece. I hope the Government will provide that.

• 14 Jul 2026 · Extreme Heat: Preparedness · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Sir Christopher. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Waveney Valley (Adrian Ramsay) for securing this extremely important and highly topical debate. Having had three heatwaves in less than three months, we are all more than aware of the reality of extreme heat. We need to talk more about our preparedness, or rather our lack of preparedness, for extreme heat. We do not yet have the figures for the latest heatwave, but we have heard about the figures published this week on the thousands of excess deaths due to the heatwaves in May and June, which spell out in clear terms exactly what impact this has on human lives. Like Members across the Chamber who have spoken today, I have heard from constituents about the direct impact that extreme heat is having on their lives. I have heard from parents who are deeply concerned, both about school closures and about schools not closing when their kids are struggling to learn in conditions of extreme heat, and from people who are desperately concerned about our health infrastructure, social care and homes. They are all struggling to cope with the effects, which is particularly important for the very young and our older community members, who are particularly vulnerable to the effects of extreme heat. I represent North Herefordshire, an absolutely beautiful constituency with farming at its heart. Farmers are at the forefront of the impacts of climate change—not just extreme heat but other weather extremes such as flooding. As my hon. Friend the Member for Waveney Valley pointed out, we are facing a situation in which climate change, or climate breakdown, is driving the increasing frequency and severity of extreme weather events. As he pointed out, we have known about this for decades, but sadly Governments have effectively been asleep at the wheel on reducing climate-warming emissions to the level we need them at, and particularly on adaptation and building our resilience. Our farmers now face water shortages, and those working in public services, whether in health, education or public transport, are struggling to cope with conditions for which our infrastructure is simply not built.

• 13 Jul 2026 · Death of Ann Widdecombe · Hansard source

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  On behalf of the Green party, I would like to say how shocked, saddened and horrified I am by Ann Widdecombe’s horrific death—her brutal murder—and my sincere condolences go to her friends and family and all who knew her and loved her, including colleagues in this House. I welcome the points that the Home Secretary has made about reviewing security arrangements for those in public life, including former MPs and those outside this House. I very much agree with her about the responsibility that we all have, across this House and beyond, to avoid speculation, so that the police can hold their vital investigation and bring the culprit to justice. She has recognised the calls that have been made from across this House today for further action to tackle the proliferation of polarisation and hatred online. May I press her to set a timescale for taking that further action, to protect not only the safety and security of all those in public life, but the fundamentals of our democracy?

• 13 Jul 2026 · Embodied Carbon: Buildings · Hansard source

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  I could not agree more with the hon. Gentleman. Since I entered this place, I have been campaigning for homes and buildings that are truly fit for the future. We need to take this issue into account when we build and design buildings. We do not want to have to retrofit buildings at huge expense later on. We need to recognise that there are so many opportunities to deal with this at the design stage. The materials that we use in construction play a crucial role in reducing the need for active heating and cooling; they can allow us to incorporate passive elements. Measures to address the embodied carbon of buildings can also play a role in reducing the operational carbon impact of buildings. That is an excellent point, and I thank the hon. Gentleman for it. It is clear that the construction industry has a huge impact on both climate change and biodiversity loss. We rightly spend time discussing how efficiently buildings operate once they are occupied, but we spend remarkably little time discussing the emissions that occur before anybody even walks through the front door of a new building. Those emissions are known as embodied carbon—that is, the greenhouse gases emitted when we extract raw materials, process them into building materials and use them for construction. According to the UK Green Building Council, embodied carbon accounts for around 20% of the UK’s total greenhouse gas emissions and is expected to account for fully half of the built environment’s emissions by 2035. Bizarrely, though, it has so far been ignored by central Government policy. Building regulations only set limits on a subset of operational emissions. The Government’s new future homes standard ignores embodied carbon and only tackles energy use in new homes, which is a small fraction of the total emissions from the built environment. The standard is silent on material use, construction processes and embodied carbon. These are not marginal omissions—they are large gaps in UK climate policy. The Environmental Audit Committee pointed this out several years ago, as have experts for years and years. The huge irony is that the construction sector is crying out for UK Government leadership in this area. We know that we have a housing crisis in this country. We need to build more houses—the right houses, in the right place, at the right price—and it is crucial to ensure that when we build, we do so in a way that is genuinely fit for the future, as we have discussed. That means using a whole-life carbon assessment to minimise both operational and embodied carbon emissions. The hugely frustrating thing for the construction sector is that the absence of national regulation in this area is creating more bureaucracy, not less. As a result of the Government failing to provide national direction, local planning authorities are increasingly stepping into the vacuum themselves. Recent research led by the University of Sheffield found that 61% of local planning authorities now reference embodied carbon in their planning policies, and 7% are moving to mandate assessments. I commend those councils for their ambition—they recognise the urgency of climate action and are taking real, tangible action. However, the consequence is fragmentation. Different authorities are adopting different reporting templates, different thresholds, different assessment requirements and different policy wording. As such, national house builders and developers are being forced to navigate an increasingly complex patchwork of local rules. They have to learn a new set of rules every time they build in a different local authority. Planning officials are duplicating work, and local authorities are developing parallel systems. Everyone is investing time and money in solving the same problem dozens of times over. The Government would not leave local authorities to tackle other aspects that are fundamental to building design, such as fire safety or equality. Those areas have national minimum standards that authorities can build on, so why are carbon emissions not treated the same? Do we not take climate breakdown as seriously as safety or equality?

• 13 Jul 2026 · Embodied Carbon: Buildings · Hansard source

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  Absolutely. As we have discussed, we should reduce, reuse and recycle; let us make sure that every part of a building is reused in the best way possible. Demolition should be the absolute last resort, so it sounds like the hon. Gentleman’s planning authority is taking the right direction. Last year, I attended an embodied carbon industry summit, which was held just over the road from this House. At the summit, a simple question was asked of attendees: without Government intervention, will local embodied carbon rules become more consistent or more divergent? The response was absolutely resounding: the rules will continue to diverge without Government leadership. It is clear that national regulation on embodied carbon will reduce complexity for the construction industry, not increase it. It will replace fragmentation with consistency, create a national carbon dataset, and provide certainty for industry, while delivering meaningful carbon reductions. Surely that is exactly the kind of planning reform that this Government should want to achieve. As the Environmental Audit Committee highlighted in its 2022 report, “Building to net zero: costing carbon in construction”, regulating embodied carbon would be “the single most significant policy the Government could introduce” if they wish to tackle the reuse of buildings, the development of low-carbon materials and a reduction in these emissions. Why are we still waiting? The encouraging news is that the construction sector is not waiting for Government. For more than four years, more than 250 organisations from across the built environment sector have supported a campaign called “Part Z”, named after the various other parts of the building regulations. They have been calling for national embodied carbon regulation. Those companies are not asking the Government to invent something entirely new. Indeed, the same experts who developed “Part Z” have now produced the UK net zero carbon buildings standard, a ready-made framework that provides a practical route to compliance. It builds on the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors’ whole-life carbon assessment methodology, one of the most developed embodied carbon methodologies in the world. These documents could form the basis of future regulatory reporting requirements and, in time, a new approved document. The Government do not need to start from scratch; the construction industry has already done much of the hard work. Indeed, members of this Government used to be in support of such action. When a private Member’s Bill on embodied carbon was debated in 2022, Jonathan Reynolds, now the Government’s Chief Whip, and previously the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, said “We support it”—

• 13 Jul 2026 · Embodied Carbon: Buildings · Hansard source

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  The climate crisis is upon us. We in the UK are now in the midst of our third heatwave in less than three months. Communities have endured sweltering conditions that have put huge pressure on our NHS, our infrastructure and our natural environment. Our ambulance service has never been so busy. Tragically, lives have been lost as people have sought relief from the heat in rivers and lakes. Today, we have heard that it is estimated that there were 2,700 excess deaths due to just the May and June heatwaves. In my constituency, dozens of schools have had to close due to overheating. People are sweltering in hospitals, care homes and many other workplaces, and farmers and communities alike are facing critical water shortages. Extreme heat is no longer an occasional inconvenience, and neither are extreme storms and floods; they are now part of everyday life, and we know that things are getting worse. If we are serious about protecting future generations from climate breakdown, every sector must play its part in reducing emissions. Today I will focus on one sector that is rarely discussed, despite having an environmental footprint unlike any other. Globally, the construction of buildings contributes more than one tenth of the world’s carbon emissions—around four times the footprint of aviation. Here in the UK, the construction sector is responsible for fully 25% of the UK’s carbon footprint on a consumption basis. The built environment generates one third of the world’s waste—a figure surpassed only by food waste—and consumes nearly half of all the raw materials that we extract from the earth.

• 13 Jul 2026 · Embodied Carbon: Buildings · Hansard source

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  As the Minister has pointed out, there is a need for more consistency. Does she not recognise that Government is the institution that can provide exactly the consistency that the sector requires?

• 13 Jul 2026 · Embodied Carbon: Buildings · Hansard source

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  The Minister has outlined the complexities of regulating in this area as in any other area, and I am glad to hear her say that this does not mean the Government will do nothing. The Government would not say that fire safety is a complex area, and they therefore will not regulate. However, in this area, as I outlined in my speech, hundreds of industry experts have come together to create a framework that the Government could use as the basis for regulating. Does she recognise that so much of the preparatory work has already been done to address that complexity?

• 13 Jul 2026 · Embodied Carbon: Buildings · Hansard source

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  The hon. Member makes an excellent point from a position of great expertise. That is precisely what this debate is about: we need to recognise that we should be reusing buildings as much as possible. We should be reducing the destruction caused by a failure to reuse. We should ensure that regulations are put in place that enable those who are developing, as well as those who have sites and responsibility for them, to take account of the whole life-cycle carbon assessment in deciding how to deal with a building. Let us take the waste hierarchy—reduce, reuse, recycle—into account in the construction sector, which is such a critical part of our nation’s carbon emissions.

• 13 Jul 2026 · Embodied Carbon: Buildings · Hansard source

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  I am so sorry, Madam Deputy Speaker. I stand entirely corrected. The aforementioned right hon. Gentleman said: “We support it. I agree with his proposition that industry would welcome further regulation in this area”. —[ Official Report , 25 November 2022; Vol. 723, c. 620.] He was right then, and that statement is right now, because this is not regulation that industry fears; it is regulation that the construction sector is asking for. Industry is calling for this, because it provides a level playing field, creates local green jobs and boosts investment in lower-carbon materials. Good regulation rewards innovation, provides certainty for investment and gives British businesses the confidence to lead. The rest of the world is moving ahead in this area. The Netherlands has regulated embodied carbon for more than a decade. The EU requires reporting from 2028 and will have limits from 2030. Türkiye is requiring reporting from 2027. Several US states mandate reporting today. Meanwhile, Britain, despite having world-leading engineers, researchers and designers, risks falling behind. This is not simply an environmental issue; this is an industrial strategy issue. It is a planning reform issue and a housing issue. It is about whether Britain intends to lead or follow. Today, I ask the Minister for one thing above all else: national leadership. I ask for a clear pathway towards national regulation to measure and reduce embodied carbon, aligned with the direction already being taken by many of our international partners and by many in the construction industry. I ask that embodied carbon is finally recognised within national planning policy, replacing today’s fragmented patchwork with one coherent national approach. I ask the Government to consider using the UK net zero carbon buildings standard as the route to fast-tracking the compliance requirements, finally giving industry the certainty it has been requesting for years. When will the Government finally release their long-delayed circular economy growth plan, which could deal with embodied carbon at its core? Climate change is not hanging around, as we can see around us all the time, and embodied carbon is only making things worse. We can and must change that. We have the expertise, the methodology and the support from industry. Local authorities are crying out for consistency, and the standards have already been written—the only thing missing is national leadership. I call on the Minister to provide it.

• 9 Jul 2026 · River Wye: Pollution · Hansard source

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  My constituency has been devastated by water pollution. We are now nearly seven years into a planning moratorium that has decimated the construction industry, because of pollution in the River Lugg, a tributary of the Wye. We are 10 years on from the first court case that said the Government should publish a plan to clean it up, but that plan, last year, set out that the current measures will not get close to fixing the problem. We urgently need a water protection zone. Will the Minister come to North Herefordshire to meet local campaigners, citizen scientists and farmers to understand why we need that water protection zone, and make a commitment to bring one in to finally resolve this problem?

• 9 Jul 2026 · Iran Conflict: Ceasefire · Hansard source

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  Iran’s attack on commercial shipping in the strait of Hormuz is clearly a flagrant breach of international law, and incredibly dangerous and irresponsible. The escalating US response is also extremely dangerous, and it is not just tit for tat—it is a disproportionate escalation. Let us not forget that this war was started by the US and Israel choosing to launch attacks on Iran on 28 February. Can the Minister say what the UK Government are doing to maximise pressure on both parties to come back to the negotiating table—through sanctions and so forth, on Iran and on the US—to pull them back from the brink of this incredibly dangerous moment of escalation?

• 9 Jul 2026 · Israeli Settlements: Trade Ban · Hansard source

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  I warmly thank the hon. Member for Sheffield Central (Abtisam Mohamed) for securing this much-needed debate. It is much-needed, because despite the fact that we have discussed the need for a ban on settlement trade on numerous occasions in this Chamber, and despite the fact that colleagues from all parts of the House have repeatedly called on the Government to ban settlement trade, for the past two years we have heard nothing from this Government except excuses. That is simply unacceptable, because we in this country are complicit in what is happening. Failing to ban settlement trade means that money from Britain is actively supporting the perpetuation of the illegal occupation of Palestinian lands, and the clock is ticking. We debated just last week the E1 settlement expansion, which will put to death any prospect of a two-state solution and any prospect of lasting peace in Israel and Palestine if it is not stopped. The Government have an obligation to do everything in their power to pressure the Israeli Government to stop the illegal expansion of illegal settlements and the violence that goes along with it. There is a moral obligation. There is an international legal obligation, too. Two years ago, the International Court of Justice issued an opinion stating that very clearly. One of the excuses we repeatedly hear from the Government is that the opinion is only advisory, but we have UN resolutions and UN commissions of inquiry that state that there is a clear legal obligation on the UK Government to do everything possible to not provide material support to illegal occupation. There is a clear moral obligation, too. We hear two excuses repeated by this Government. One is that we cannot do this alone, and have to work in concert. We heard that yet again last week from the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, the hon. Member for Lincoln (Mr Falconer). We heard it in June last year, when I raised this precise issue with him in a debate that I led on tackling Israeli genocide in Gaza. He said: “at the moment no European power bans settlement trade in the way that she describes. It is something that we talk to our partners and allies about.” —[ Official Report, 17 June 2025; Vol. 769, c. 66WH.] Since then, as we have heard, Spain has implemented a ban, as have the Netherlands, Belgium and Ireland, and it is possible that the entire EU will. Our neighbours and partners are moving far faster than us, yet the UK bears a specific historical responsibility for this situation. How is it that our Government are abdicating that responsibility and enabling the perpetuation of a situation that will actively counteract their declaration last year of their recognition of the state of Palestine? One excuse from the Government is that we need to work together, yet others are way ahead of us. Is it not time for the UK at least to catch up, even if we cannot bring ourselves to show leadership? The other excuse we hear is that a ban is too difficult, but as colleagues across the Chamber have already pointed out, it was not too difficult when it came to Russia or Crimea. We have the legislation in place, the Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Act 2018. We could put the provisions in place now.

• 9 Jul 2026 · Israeli Settlements: Trade Ban · Hansard source

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  I absolutely agree with the hon. Member. One of the other excuses we hear from the Government is that settlement goods do not benefit from the preferential trade agreement that we have with Israel. That implies that it is already possible to distinguish between settlement goods and non-settlement goods, under existing provisions that we should be enforcing. Fundamentally, as has been pointed out, the shoe should be on the other foot. If Israeli exporters cannot prove that their exports do not come from illegal settlements, they should not be able to export to us. We should be absolutely certain. We must make it clear that it is unacceptable for British money to be at any risk of supporting the continuation of these illegal settlements. There is no excuse. We do not have the excuse that we have to wait for other countries to move, because they have moved ahead of us; and we do not have the excuse that this is too technically difficult, because the legal framework already exists, so what are the Government waiting for? Why will they not take this step? Will the Minister recognise the absolute imperative on the UK to take this step now, or will we hear yet more excuses from him when he sums up?

• 8 Jul 2026 · NHS Corridor Care · Hansard source

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  I thank the hon. Member for Tooting (Dr Allin-Khan) for securing this incredibly important debate. I have heard from literally dozens of my constituents about why this issue is so important. They have told me their individual stories about elderly relatives stuck in corridors and the terrible effect that has had on their treatment, care and health outcomes. I have heard from staff in my local hospitals, who have shared exactly the same concerns about the conditions in which they are forced to work. Patients tell me universally how proud they are of the NHS and how much they value the incredible care they get at the hands of the people who keep it going, but they also tell me universally that corridor care is shameful and should not continue. I recently raised this matter directly with the chief executive of my local hospital, Hereford hospital, in our regular catch-up, and was delighted to hear that Hereford is not just aiming to meet the Government’s target of ending corridor care by 2029, but that locally, we have a target of ending corridor care by this autumn. I am really pleased that this is being prioritised so much locally, and I will be keeping a careful eye out to ensure that that happens. I want to raise a particular issue that has been touched on by many colleagues across the House this afternoon, which is the integral relationship between the NHS—what happens in our hospitals—and the social care system. We simply cannot fix the problem of corridor care unless we fix the problem of social care. For too many years—for decades, in fact—social care has been a political football kicked down the road by Governments of all stripes because it is difficult, but we have to grasp this nettle. We simply cannot fix the NHS unless we fix social care. Lord Darzi said exactly that himself. Sadly, however, we have not given the necessary attention to fixing social care. Yes, we have the Casey commission, which I value very much. I am very pleased with the work that has been done by Baroness Casey, but insufficient political effort is being put into this issue. It took nine months for us to have the first cross-party meeting that the previous Secretary of State for Health and Social Care said he was going to call, and we have only recently had the second. We must put our shoulders to the wheel collectively to fix the challenges of social care and to have the difficult conversations about how we will fund it, because it does need funding; we do need those political conversations, and we need to find consensus. Unless we address the issues at the back door, too many people will be stuck in hospital when they would be better cared for elsewhere—better for them and their health; better for the national budget, because it would be cheaper; and better for our overall outcomes. It is shocking to learn that the Royal College of Emergency Medicine calculates that there were 15,000 excess deaths last year because of corridor care. That should not happen in our country today. I urge the Minister and her colleagues as strongly as possible to give the same attention to fixing social care as to fixing the NHS. Let every Member put in that effort too. It is notable that at Health and Social Care questions there is usually one question on social care and 19 on health. We must redress the balance collectively, put in the focus to fix social care, and thereby fix corridor care.