Emma Lewell MP: speeches 2025

105 published records · newest first.

Speeches

4 Sept 2025 · Procedure Committee · Hansard source
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I remind the hon. Member that these are brief questions.
4 Sept 2025 · Procedure Committee · Hansard source
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We begin with a Select Committee statement. Graeme Downie will speak on the publication of the second report of the Procedure Committee, “Proxy voting: Review of arrangements introduced in Session 2024-25”, HC 489, for up to 10 minutes, during which no interventions can be taken. At the conclusion of his statement, I will call Members to put questions on the subject of the statement, and I will call Graeme Downie to respond to these in turn. Questions should be brief, and Members may ask only one question each.
4 Sept 2025 · Procedure Committee · Hansard source
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Order. The sitting is suspended until 1.50 pm.
4 Sept 2025 · Adoption and Special Guardianship Support Fund · Hansard source
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Before I call the Liberal Democrat spokesperson, I remind the Opposition Front Benchers that if they take the full allotted 10 minutes, the Minister’s time to respond to the debate will be squeezed.
4 Sept 2025 · Adoption and Special Guardianship Support Fund · Hansard source
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Order.
4 Sept 2025 · Adoption and Special Guardianship Support Fund · Hansard source
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I was about to remind Members that they need to bob if they wish to speak in the debate, but I see everyone already has. I need to call the Front Benchers at 2.38 pm, so we will need to impose an immediate time limit of two and a half minutes. I call Helen Hayes, Chair of the Education Committee.
4 Sept 2025 · Adoption and Special Guardianship Support Fund · Hansard source
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Order. To ensure all Members get a chance to speak, we are going to have to reduce the time limit to two minutes. I call Josh Newbury.
4 Sept 2025 · Adoption and Special Guardianship Support Fund · Hansard source
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Order.
4 Sept 2025 · Adoption and Special Guardianship Support Fund · Hansard source
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Order. I call Lee Dillon.
4 Sept 2025 · Adoption and Special Guardianship Support Fund · Hansard source
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Unfortunately, we are going to have to reduce the time limit to a minute and a half. I call Martin Wrigley.
3 Sept 2025 · Duty of Candour for Public Authorities and Legal Representation for Bereaved Families · Hansard source
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It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair, Mrs Hobhouse. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool West Derby (Ian Byrne), who has spoken powerfully many times about his own experiences and has consistently pressed for justice for the 97. There is a longstanding, deep problem in this country that smacks of cover-up and of protection of the establishment and public bodies at all costs. We see it time and time again, with Hillsborough, Grenfell, the Post Office scandal, the infected blood scandal, covid-19 bereaved families and the longest-running scandal in British history: the fight for justice for our nuclear veterans. Those who are injured, suffering from ill health and deep trauma, and those who live daily with the heartbreak of missing their loved ones have to break every single sinew fighting the very people and the very institutions set up to protect and serve them. I know from my constituents who lost their children in the Manchester Arena terrorist attack about the financial and emotional toil and the feeling of powerlessness from being done to by those with more agency, more power, and deeper pockets. Grief is impossible when someone is locked in that battle. The daily, monthly, yearly, decade-long grind that families have to suffer just to be believed, while those responsible carry on regardless, sickens me to my stomach. When justice feels like it may be close, the public apology comes from Ministers at the Dispatch Box, followed by promises of lessons learned and change, and that it will not be allowed to ever happen again. Yet it does. Lessons are never learned. Meaningful change never takes place. People are tired of it, and tired of hearing empty promises. Trust in Government and institutions, and faith in our democracy are at the lowest levels I have ever seen. The Government promised to enact a Hillsborough law by April this year; they have not. There have been reports that the legislation has been watered down. It has been ready since 2017, yet we are being told more time is needed to get it right. Like many others, I struggle to understand what exactly the Government need more time for, and what they need to look closer at. The Hillsborough law as is, with no changes, tweaks or amendments, should be introduced to the House now. Nothing less will do. It matters to so many people.
3 Sept 2025 · Covid-19 Vaccination Harm · Hansard source
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I will call Sir Christopher Chope to move the motion and then the Minister to respond. I remind other Members that they may make a speech only with prior permission from the Member in charge of the debate and the Minister. There will not be an opportunity for the Member in charge to wind up, as is the convention for 30-minute debates.
14 Jul 2025 · Northern Ireland Veterans: Prosecution · Hansard source
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Order. Do not shout.
14 Jul 2025 · Northern Ireland Veterans: Prosecution · Hansard source
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Order. The shadow Minister has made it clear that he is not going to give way.
14 Jul 2025 · Northern Ireland Veterans: Prosecution · Hansard source
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If the next speaker keeps their contribution to four to five minutes, we might be able to get in two more Back Benchers before I call the Front Benchers for their contributions. I call Jim Allister.
14 Jul 2025 · Northern Ireland Veterans: Prosecution · Hansard source
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Order. Members will refrain from shouting out and having dialogue with the Secretary of State. Please intervene in the normal manner.
14 Jul 2025 · Northern Ireland Veterans: Prosecution · Hansard source
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I call Al Pinkerton, who I assume is coming to the end of his contribution.
3 Jul 2025 · Poverty · Hansard source
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11. What steps the Church of England is taking to help to tackle poverty.
3 Jul 2025 · Poverty · Hansard source
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For too long, charities, faith groups and churches such as my own, St Bede’s, have been supporting people struggling to get by. Does my hon. Friend agree that our child poverty taskforce needs to seriously consider scrapping the awful two-child benefit cap, because relying on charity to lift children out of poverty is simply unsustainable?
1 Jul 2025 · Universal Credit and Personal Independence Payment Bill · Hansard source
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I thank my hon. Friend the Member for York Central (Rachael Maskell) for her diligent and careful work over recent months. I am sad that we have ended up here. No matter what, and regardless of the concessions, a vote for this Bill today is a vote to plunge 150,000 people into poverty and to tighten the eligibility criteria for those who need support the most. Some of us have been here before. In 2015, when the Tories pushed through their Welfare Reform and Work Bill, I and other colleagues were persuaded to vote for it on the promise that we could change it in Committee. It did not change, and although we voted against it on Third Reading, the damage was done, because the nuances of the stages of a Bill are completely lost outside this place. The result was that the savings predicted never materialised and employment levels did not increase. Instead, there was an increase in poverty, an increase in suicides, strain on the NHS and other public services, and, in the long run, higher welfare spending and reduced growth.
1 Jul 2025 · Universal Credit and Personal Independence Payment Bill · Hansard source
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I remember well the UN rapporteur saying that the Conservatives were engaged in cruelty towards people in this country who needed help the most. What I cannot fathom is why a Labour Government are not first putting in the support and then letting it bed in, which is what will reduce the welfare bill and increase employment levels. The impact of any cuts would then not be as drastic. The starting point should never be cuts before proper support. The review led by my right hon. Friend the Minister for Social Security and Disability, who I have a lot of respect for, is starting to look a little bit predetermined as the change in criteria will happen at the same time as the review concludes. It remains unclear how existing claimants with fluctuating conditions will be assessed, and the impact that these changes will have on the carer’s allowance. However, we do know that disability living allowance claimants and those on other legacy benefits will be assessed under the new criteria, putting almost 800,000 disabled children at risk of losing support. The north-east region has the highest number of disabled people in England, and the number of people searching for work outpaces the number of available jobs. How on earth will cutting the health element of universal credit incentivise those people to go out and find a job that does not even exist? Since PIP is an in-work benefit, restricting the very support that could keep people in work will only help to increase unemployment. All of this for £2.5 billion of savings, when we know that savings can be made elsewhere and when we know that those with the broadest shoulders could pay more. Instead, we are once again making disabled people pay the price for the economic mess that the Conservative party left us. As it stands, we are being asked to vote blind today. There is no new Bill, no new explanatory notes and no fully updated impact assessment. There is no time for sufficient scrutiny, and no formal consultation has taken place with disabled people. The majority of employment support will not be in place until the end of the decade, and Access to Work remains worse than ever before. We are creating a two-tier, possibly three-tier, benefit system, and we know for certain that disabled people are going to be worse off. This is not a responsible way for any of us to legislate. It is predicted that disabled people will lose on average £4,500 per year, yet we know they already need an extra £1,095 per month just to have the same standard of living as those in non-disabled households. There is a reason why 138 organisations representing disabled people are against this Bill, and there is a reason why not a single organisation has come out in support of it. I am pleading with MPs today to please do not do this. For those on my own Labour Benches, staying loyal to your party today may feel good in this place, but once you go home and are in your individual constituency, the reality of this will hit—and it will hit very hard.
1 Jul 2025 · Universal Credit and Personal Independence Payment Bill · Hansard source
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I am sorry, but I am concluding my comments. Just as in 2015, constituents will never forgive us, and it will haunt those MPs who vote for this Bill. I, of all people, should know.
19 Jun 2025 · Social Mobility: Careers Education · Hansard source
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We will now have a formal three-minute time limit.
19 Jun 2025 · Social Mobility: Careers Education · Hansard source
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I remind Members that if they wish to be called, they should bob. I am imposing an informal four-minute time limit.
19 Jun 2025 · Priorities for Water Sector Reform · Hansard source
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We begin with the Select Committee statement. Helena Dollimore will speak about the publication of the second report of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee, “Priorities for water sector reform”, for up to 10 minutes, during which no interventions can be taken. At the conclusion of her statement, I will call other Members to put questions on the subject of the statement and call Helena Dollimore to respond to those in turn. Questions should be brief, and Members may ask only one question each.

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