James Cleverly MP: speeches

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Speeches

26 Mar 2025 · Spring Statement · Hansard source
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The Transport Secretary failed to stand up to the transport unions, the Health and Social Care Secretary failed to stand up to the health unions, and the Work and Pensions Secretary failed to stand up to the Back Benchers of her own party. The Chancellor’s savings are predicated on getting rid of a whole tranche of civil servants. How can we have any confidence that she or the Prime Minister will stand up to the civil service unions?
25 Mar 2025 · Women’s Health Services · Hansard source
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Early diagnosis and treatment of breast cancer can make a huge difference to the women involved, and, of course, to the prognosis and the cost to the state of health provision. I welcome the reference in the cancer plan to early diagnosis, but what specifically will the Government do to encourage greater awareness of the full range of breast cancer symptoms, and to encourage women to get early diagnosis and treatment for better outcomes?
25 Mar 2025 · Asylum Hotels and Illegal Channel Crossings · Hansard source
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When in opposition, the Labour party talked tough about what it would do when it entered government. As my right hon. Friend the shadow Home Secretary has said, though, small boat arrivals and hotel use are both up, and asylum seekers are being waved through the system just to make the Minister’s numbers look good. This all reeks of arrogance and complacency, and we are now seeing the real-world impacts; for example, Wethersfield in my constituency has seen the number of asylum seeker users go up. While Labour talked tough before the election, it took things off the statute books before it replaced them with anything else, so when will the Minister actually come to the House with serious proposals to reduce the number of small boat arrivals, which have gone up by over 30% on her Government’s watch?
3 Mar 2025 · Ukraine · Hansard source
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I find myself in the strange and rather uncomfortable position of very much agreeing with the Prime Minister on everything he has said today. While I often take great delight in criticism of the Government, the Prime Minister did not really put a foot wrong this weekend. However, he does need to go further. The small increase in defence spending that he announced was welcome, but fundamentally, we need a gear shift on this. I echo the point made by my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition that when—and it will be when, not if—he has to make some really difficult decisions about balancing defence spending against domestic expenditure, we will not try to play politics. We will support him, because we need to send a message now to our friends in Ukraine and to potential aggressors around the world that we take our defence, the defence of our values, and the defence of our friends seriously.
26 Feb 2025 · British Indian Ocean Territory · Hansard source
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I genuinely appreciate the opportunity that the Minister has given me to speak about this matter, but I want to clarify a point. She has said this a couple of times now, and I want to understand. She keeps saying that if we do not pay, someone else will. Who would be the recipient of that payment, given that the Chagos islands are British sovereign territory? Is she suggesting that another country would pay us? Why would another country pay Mauritius? The Chagos islands do not belong to Mauritius.
26 Feb 2025 · British Indian Ocean Territory · Hansard source
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rose—
25 Feb 2025 · Topical Questions · Hansard source
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As I am sure those on the Treasury Bench know, soft power and diplomacy are most effective when they are backed up by hard power. When will the Government commit to spending 3% of GDP on defence, to make sure that we have a real voice at the international table to encourage European countries to increase their defence spending?
24 Feb 2025 · Ukraine · Hansard source
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We need to recognise that the environment in which we operate has changed fundamentally, and therefore our response must change fundamentally. I very much echo the calls of my right hon. Friend the Member for Witham (Priti Patel) to increase defence spending now, because we have to send a message to our friends and foes alike that we take defence seriously. I urge the Foreign Secretary to remember the commitments we made to the Ukrainian people when this full-scale invasion took place. Our support to them was not contingent on the support of others; it was absolute, and we should make good on that commitment, because we said things that encouraged the Ukrainians to put their sons and daughters in harm’s way. They have stood up their end of the bargain, and we should stand up ours.
24 Feb 2025 · Topical Questions · Hansard source
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The Home Secretary knows that raising the minimum income threshold has reduced net migration, which is why I introduced it while I was Home Secretary. If the Home Secretary wants to continue bringing net migration down, will she now confirm that she will introduce the further increases to the threshold, as I proposed?
10 Feb 2025 · Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill · Hansard source
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I cannot help but think that the Home Secretary thought that border control, reducing illegal migration and stopping the boats was going to be considerably easier than it has turned out to be. She spoke with great authority and confidence ahead of the election, and yet, as the shadow Home Secretary, my right hon. Friend the Member for Croydon South (Chris Philp), has highlighted, since taking office the Labour Government have seen almost every key metric go in the wrong direction. I therefore think it is right for us to look at what is actually in the Bill—not just the tone and the rhetoric, but the detail. What the Home Secretary says in general terms is quite welcome, but let us look at the example of the new Border Security Command. At the Dispatch Box and in the media studios, she has spoken about this new, powerful organisation that will bring a step change in the co-ordination of our national response to illegal migration, so when the Bill was published, I looked with great interest at the specific provisions for this new, powerful organisation headed by a senior former police officer and a senior former Royal Artillery officer—a wise choice of regiment—and I found myself saying, “Is that it?” Looking at the detail, we see, as my right hon. Friend set out, that this powerful new organisation will be able to write a plan, to present an annual set of accounts and then to ask nicely, but not compel, any other organisation to do its bidding. The headlines might sound great, but the detail is frankly underpowered. This Bill removes more power from the Government than it puts on the table—as my right hon. Friend said, the ability to seize and search mobile phones already exists—so when we come to the Division later this evening, we will be making our decisions on what is actually in the Bill, not on the rhetorical cloud that surrounds it. The simple truth is that the Government had an opportunity to make something different and to be courageous, but they missed the target. This Bill is massively underpowered. It does not have the kind of game-changing clauses that the current situation demands. People on both sides of the House may disagree with the detail of the Rwanda scheme, which this Bill repeals, but it was at least an attempt to do something significant in response to a significant situation. Ultimately, the Home Secretary will have to explain, or perhaps the Minister for Border Security and Asylum will do so in her summing up, where she envisages people being returned to if they fail in their asylum application here in the UK but their home nation is deemed unsafe to return them to—the Afghans, the Syrians and people from other parts of the world. If the Home Secretary is saying that they cannot go to their home country or to a third country, she is by definition saying that they can stay here, and that is a blank cheque for hundreds of millions of people around the world. She can be as critical of me and the Conservatives as she likes, but until she comes up with a credible alternative, her criticism is massively undermined, and this is not a credible alternative. This is a missed opportunity. This is words but not action. This is headlines but no substance. When this Bill is passed, as it inevitably will be because the Home Secretary has a majority, but then fails to achieve what she has promised, she will find that her party is punished at the ballot box.
10 Feb 2025 · Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill · Hansard source
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Is it clause 3(6) in part 1 of the Bill that lists the agencies that the Border Security Commander does not have authority over? If I know the Minister’s Bill better than she does, she should consider her position.
10 Feb 2025 · Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill · Hansard source
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To give the Minister a breather and for the education of the House, can she refer to the particular clauses in the Bill that give the Border Security Command any ability whatever to dictate the activity of other bits of Government to that end?
5 Feb 2025 · Chagos Islands · Hansard source
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The Minister, like the Prime Minister before him, keeps implying that if Members of this House were armed with the same information that they were armed with, they would come to the same decision. Well, I was armed with the information that the Minister has at his disposal; I did not come to the same decision, and neither did my direct successor, Lord Cameron of Chipping Norton. Do the Minister, the other Ministers in the Government and the officials who work on their behalf understand that the point of a negotiation is not to get any deal but to get a good deal, and that if you do not get a good deal you should walk away from the table, as we did?
4 Feb 2025 · National Cancer Plan · Hansard source
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Like many people in this House, I have seen up close and personal the devastating impact that a cancer diagnosis can have on people and families. I have also seen the difference between an early diagnosis and a later diagnosis, which is why I very much welcome the use of AI in early diagnosis. One positive by-product of having a long-standing national health service is that we have in the UK a very large database of historical tissue samples. Will the Minister consider using AI to do a retrospective analysis of those historical tissue samples to try to spot patterns that could inform future speedy diagnosis across a whole range of cancers?
28 Jan 2025 · Extremism Review · Hansard source
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In the early years of Margaret Thatcher’s Government, Lord Scarman was commissioned to write a report on what were—they did not use this phrase at the time—concerns among the black community about two-tier policing. In response to those concerns, the police listened, changed their procedures, and engaged in consultative work with those communities, so why is it that when communities complain about two-tier policing under this Government, they are branded far-right extremists?
28 Jan 2025 · Extremism Review · Hansard source
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Answer the question.
21 Jan 2025 · Southport Attack · Hansard source
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I am particularly drawn to the line in the immediate learning review where it concludes that “too much weight was placed on the absence of ideology, without considering the vulnerabilities to radicalisation”. Much of the challenge over the summer was because there was an understandable lack of public understanding of the distinction between a terrorist incident and a non-terrorist incident. Had this person done exactly the same thing but been driven by a desire to create a caliphate here in the UK, it would of course have been defined as a terrorist attack. The fact that it was not is of no solace to the families who lost loved ones. Is it not now the time—I appreciate this could be part of the review, but I urge the Home Secretary to ensure it is given particular emphasis in the review—to get rid of this entirely arbitrary distinction of motivation and to focus exclusively on the risks and actions?
20 Jan 2025 · UK-Ukraine 100-year Partnership · Hansard source
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I find myself thanking the right hon. Gentleman for the second time in quick succession for his gracious recognition of the work done by his Conservative predecessors, including me. I am reminded of conversations I have had with President Zelensky and, particularly, Prime Minister Shmyhal about our collective desire that when the scars and pain of the conflict have diminished, the bond of friendship between the UK and Ukraine is maintained. To that end, what can the Government do now to make it easier to de-risk some British-based businesses and potential investors going to Ukraine to start the rebuilding work now, in preparation for that glorious day when Russia is ejected from Ukraine sovereign territory and the Ukrainians can properly start to rebuild their homeland once again?
16 Jan 2025 · Middle East · Hansard source
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I would like to put on record my gratitude to the Foreign Secretary for his kind words about the work that was done prior to his party forming a Government. I echo the praise that he has given to the US State Department and the Egyptian and Qatari Foreign Ministers for the work they have done to get this deal over the line, but as he said, it is not there yet, so I want to ask two things. To ensure that the hostages are released promptly, what can we do to make sure this deal gets over the line? Sadly, we have seen too much aid diverted away from the Palestinian people in Gaza and used to facilitate attacks against Israelis, so what will the Department do to ensure as best it can that the aid gets to the people who need it and is not used to murder Israelis?
14 Jan 2025 · UK Support for Israel · Hansard source
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I invite the Foreign Secretary to welcome the appointment of Nawaf Salam and to comment on its implications for our relationship with Lebanon and Israel and for Iran’s influence in the region. What does he intend to do to ensure that that positive step improves our relationship with Israel, Lebanon and the countries in the eastern Mediterranean?
18 Dec 2024 · British Indian Ocean Territory: Sovereignty · Hansard source
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Will the Minister answer this with a simple yes or no? Did the Prime Minister, the right hon. and learned Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Keir Starmer), have any conversations with Philippe Sands KC about Diego Garcia without the presence of Foreign Office or other Government civil servants? Yes or no?
16 Dec 2024 · English Devolution · Hansard source
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If devolution means anything, it means giving local leaders the right to do things differently. If a future mayor of Essex wants to compete with London by creating a less heavily regulated or less heavily taxed business environment, would that individual have the power to do so under the proposals put forward by the Government?
11 Dec 2024 · Border Security: Collaboration · Hansard source
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I welcome the Home Secretary’s commitment to maintaining the relationships with the Calais group interior Ministers that I was developing when I was in her role, and to building on the UK Frontex agreement that I signed with Commissioner Johansson in February of this year. However, I want her to explain this to the House: if the role of the Border Security Command is so clear, if the division of labour between it and the small boats operational command is so clear, and if this issue is so pressing, why has it taken five months to give them a mission?
9 Dec 2024 · Syria · Hansard source
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Syria now presents a toxic mix. It is a large, heavily armoured but now ungoverned country. There are a range of militia groups affiliated to both state and non-state actors. It has a number of fragile neighbours, and we are at a fork-in-the-road moment. Rather than discuss talking about Syria with neighbours, what specific action will the UK Government take to ensure that we maximise the chance of success and minimise the chance of failure? For example, will we re-establish a diplomatic presence in Damascus, and if so, on what timescale? In the period before the inauguration of President-elect Trump, what action will we take with the American Administration to make sure that there is not a hiatus before the Trump Administration take formal office?
4 Dec 2024 · Farming and Inheritance Tax · Hansard source
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Will the hon. Member give way?

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