Jess Brown-Fuller MP: speeches

Speeches

• 29 Jun 2026 · Home Office and Ministry of Justice · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to speak in today’s estimates day debate on criminal justice, and I put on the record my thanks to the three Chairs of the Select Committees that suggested this debate to the Backbench Business Committee: the Chair of the Public Accounts Committee, the hon. Member for North Cotswolds (Sir Geoffrey Clifton-Brown); the Chair of the Home Affairs Committee, the right hon. Member for Staffordshire Moorlands (Dame Karen Bradley); and the Chair of the Justice Committee, the hon. Member for Hammersmith and Chiswick (Andy Slaughter). I also thank all hon. Members who have stuck it out in the Chamber on a Monday evening, who clearly care about criminal justice. Politics is all about priorities, and so often the justice system falls a little short. Unless members of the public have had experience of the criminal justice system, have been victims of crime or have a loved one who has had the experience of going through the system, it does not necessarily appear in their top five priorities for the Government, but I thank all those who work to keep the criminal justice system functioning despite the lack of investment, the often crumbling infrastructure and the huge amount of pressure on them to ensure that justice is served. The system as it stands lets down victims and defendants alike. It fails to rehabilitate offenders, and so many never see the justice that they deserve. The Crown court backlog is clearly unacceptably high, and that opinion is shared across the House. It is the biggest challenge that the justice system faces, as the hon. Member for Bridgwater (Sir Ashley Fox) said in his contribution. Its exponential growth requires urgent action, but the fix does not lie in taking a sledgehammer to jury trials. Jury trials provide a fundamental safeguard of fairness and liberty, and they are not the cause of the backlog. We on the Liberal Democrat Benches do not fundamentally believe that the Government have successfully made the case that their reforms will reduce the backlog or make any cost saving to the Department. The modelling has still not been made available, and the estimates behind the claimed time savings have been widely questioned. Even accepting the Government’s own estimates, it will take a decade for the backlog to fall below current levels. Indeed, the backlog is currently predicted to continue increasing and to surpass 100,000 cases by the end of next year. What has been proven to reduce the backlog across the country is the very welcome uncapping of sitting days, and we are pleased that His Majesty’s Courts and Tribunals Service has been allocated a £143.1 million uplift, including the funding for uncapped sitting days. With the previous increases in sitting days that the Government announced in the last round, Crown court backlogs are beginning to fall. The Old Bailey reduced its backlog in 2025. In Chelmsford, it fell by 10%, and Maidstone saw a 5% reduction in its backlog. Across the country, the overall Crown court backlog in the last quarter fell for the first time in three years. So the truth is that proper funding for our courts and open sitting days are bringing down the backlog, and we are yet to see the result of the full uncapping of sitting days, which came into place only in April. Given the scepticism that the right hon. Member for Makerfield (Andy Burnham) has expressed about jury trial reform, I hope the Government will give serious consideration to changing course. He told BBC Radio Manchester that the Government should “pause…this and take a step back and have proper consideration”, as the hon. Member for Congleton (Sarah Russell) mentioned. On another area of the criminal justice system, we Liberal Democrats have put forward several amendments, such as training for court staff, so that the victim experience is better, because victims often report feeling unsupported or unheard. The Government must do more to continue their journey to ensure that the court system centres victims’ experience. Part of that experience is the processing after a criminal case, and access to court transcripts for victims. I acknowledge that the Government have made steps to improve access, after robust negotiations in both Houses on various Bills since July 2024, most recently the Sentencing Act 2026 and the Victims and Courts Act 2026. I put on record the exemplary effort made by my hon. Friend the Member for Richmond Park (Sarah Olney), who has been campaigning to ensure that court transcripts are made available for free to victims of crime, after a constituent of hers was quoted thousands of pounds to access the transcript of her own court case. Nobody should be priced out of seeing their own story in black and white after they have gone through a Crown court experience. Charlotte Meijer and the campaign Open Justice for All have been campaigning incredibly on this issue. They have published a letter calling on the Deputy Prime Minister to go further and faster, and that includes ensuring that magistrates courts are recorded and sentencing remarks are made available for free in all courts. We are not here to discuss the Courts and Tribunals Bill, but it does not seem to be progressing currently or coming back to the House in any rush. I would be quite happy for clauses 1 to 8 to never appear again, but other clauses that do really important things—introducing recording in magistrates courts, repealing the presumption against parental responsibility—are key to strengthening our justice system and our family courts. We repeatedly hear stories of failings in infrastructure such as roofs collapsing, IT systems not working, and evidence being shared on a memory stick and being lost during a hearing. The Ministry of Justice must get a grip of this chance to change that and to improve the environment for those working in the courts and those attending them. I will briefly move on to prisons, which continue to run very hot. They are overcrowded, understaffed and increasingly unable to rehabilitate offenders. Violence is rife, with an average of 28 assaults on staff every day across the prison estate. On the point made by the hon. Member for Bridgwater about higher sickness levels, I think that is in large part due to the stress experienced by prison staff. We see the same in the Probation Service, which has a much higher sickness rate than other civil service departments, and I think it is also largely due to stress. The Liberal Democrats believe that rehabilitation must be at the heart of any approach within our prison system. That means investing in better education, alongside introducing a through-the-gates mentoring programme to support prisoners as they transition back into society. Education is a key area. I recently raised it with the MOJ, because Government analysis shows a significant decrease in core education hours in public sector prisons. That has been felt most acutely in women’s prisons, where there has been a 30% fall in the number of hours for which women can access prison education. The Government urgently need to set out a plan to reverse that trend, otherwise the cycle of reoffending will simply continue for far too many people. Reoffending, as mentioned by the Chair of the Public Accounts Committee, is estimated to cost taxpayers £20.9 billion every year. I sat down with a group of ex-offenders earlier this year, working with the organisation Revolving Doors. One of the ex-offenders I was chatting to had been in prison 17 times on short sentences. He explained that drug addiction was ruling his life; when he was released from prison, in order to fund a drug addiction that was costing him £250 a day, he would commit theft to the value of £750 a day. He would re-sell the stolen items so that he could afford his drug habit. This shows that there is a cost to our businesses as well. If we do not get the criminal justice system working, and if we do not invest in people and stop the cycle of reoffending to fund addiction, those people get trapped in the criminal justice system. Nowhere in our system is the “investor save” principle stronger than in our criminal justice system. A well-functioning Probation Service is indispensable to rehabilitating ex-offenders. A dysfunctional Probation Service fails victims. Probation officers are expected to manage ever larger caseloads while receiving less training. Combined with poor pay, it is little wonder that many leave, despite wanting to help. A probation officer said to me, in one of my surgeries, that when she first started in probation 30 years ago, she spent 30 minutes with an offender she was managing. When she came out of the meeting, her boss said, “Why on earth did you only spend 30 minutes with that person? How on earth could you get to know them in just 30 minutes?” She said that if she spends 30 minutes with somebody now, she is told she needs to speed up because she has spent far too long with them and has far too many people to get through. She has stuck it out—she is still in the Probation Service—but so many people leave. We have a real retention crisis, because nobody goes into probation to tick boxes; they go in because they truly believe that they can change people’s lives. In February this year, the Public Accounts Committee published a report on the efficiency and reliability of the Probation Service. It concluded that “the Probation Service in England and Wales is failing”, that it is “teetering on the edge of collapse”, and that its performance has significantly worsened since the MOJ and His Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service brought probation under full public control in 2018-19. The failure of the system is epitomised by record numbers of prisoners being recalled to custody. At the end of March 2025, recalled prisoners accounted for 15% of the entire prison population—a 49% increase since 2021. I recognise that the Government will have invested £700 million in probation by 2028-29, but we are yet to see a significant step change to show that that investment has stabilised the service. It is not just about the investment, though; it is about the culture shift that is desperately needed in probation. I have had many conversations with the Prisons Minister in the other place on this topic and I know it is something he feels passionately about. Keeping the public safe also requires improvements to policing, a return to visible neighbourhood policing and an end to the scourge of officers stuck behind desks completing administrative work. Even though policing has received an uplift, cases are, as the hon. Member for North Cotswolds said, far more complex and require far more police time. This situation—alongside the alarming reduction in police front counters and stations—has left communities, especially those in my constituency, feeling abandoned. I should not see constituents turning around with shock when they see a police officer walking down the street with me in areas like Selsey; they are so not used to community policing people acted like they had never seen a police officer before when they saw us. The Government should commit, as part of their upcoming police force reorganisation, to embedding a dedicated rural and coastal crime team in every police force, ensuring that rural crime does not go unpunished.

• 29 Jun 2026 · Prisoner Early Release · Hansard source

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  I pay tribute to the victims and survivors of some of the most appalling, heinous crimes for their bravery in speaking out about the fear they have felt after receiving letters from the Ministry of Justice informing them that their perpetrators might be let out early. I understand that the purpose of the letters is to ensure that victims have the opportunity to engage with licence conditions, but what other support will be available to those victims who understandably feel retraumatised and let down by the justice system? In the other place, the Prisons Minister made a commitment that those released early would be subject to intensive supervision, supported by a significant programme of electronic tagging. The Liberal Democrats were clear that the Government could bring forward those measures only if the Probation Service was adequately resourced to achieve this in the community. The Prisons Minister agreed to an annual review of the state of probation and its ability to cope with the changes. When can we expect the first review? Finally, the Government inherited a prison system that was running so hot that they were at risk of losing the ability to lock up any offender. Can the Minister guarantee from the Dispatch Box that no victim will ever again be given just two days’ notice, or in some cases no notice, of their perpetrator being released, as they have suffered in recent years?

• 25 Jun 2026 · Draft Conversion Practices Bill · Hansard source

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  The Liberal Democrats welcome the draft Bill, because conversion therapy is not a thing of the past. One in six LGBTQ+ young people today have been offered it in an attempt to cure them. The Minister referred to the Galop report. That is an important piece of reading, and I recommend that all Members take time to look at those harrowing testimonies. It has always been a form of abuse, far too often carried out by those in positions of trust, whether family members, religious leaders or medical professionals who have been conducting this archaic practice. It is offensive and dangerous to suggest that sexual orientation or gender identity is a problem to be treated or cured. As far back as 2018, Baroness May, the former Prime Minister, promised to end these abhorrent practices, which can cause mental and physical harm. That position was adopted by the Labour Government, who promised legislation to address it in their first King’s Speech. Since those initial promises were made, individuals from LGBTQ+ communities have continued to face abuse and discrimination for years under the guise that they can be cured. We should all celebrate finally seeing the legislation that will end that horrendous practice, protecting vulnerable individuals and allowing people to live freely as themselves. The Liberal Democrats are ready to scrutinise the draft Bill to ensure that it is comprehensive and inclusive, and to work cross-party to ensure that legislation can be put into law as soon as possible. Will the Minister lay out a timeline for the legislation, especially given current uncertainty around the Administration? What engagement is the Minister having with representatives of the LGBTQ+ community, so that they can ensure the legislation is shaped with them, not for them? Does she agree with me that while France, Canada, New Zealand, Norway and many other countries have already passed legislation to ban the practice, the UK has significantly fallen down the inclusivity league tables, and that today marks an important step in reversing that decline and establishing the UK as a world leader in being a safe society for all to live in?

• 10 Jun 2026 · Local Government Reform · Hansard source

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  The hon. Gentleman is making an excellent argument for councils to be more accountable to local residents by being closer. The Government responded to Sussex’s proposals by redrawing the red lines they had originally set and putting forward a third proposal. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that that just throws communities into total disarray? They thought they had responded to a consultation that was going to form the next council, but now they have been told, “Oh, actually, you can’t have either of those things. We’re going to come up with a new solution for you.”

• 10 Jun 2026 · Local Government Reform · Hansard source

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  The hon. Gentleman makes an excellent point about local government finances. My constituency currently sits in two different district councils. The Government’s proposals would mean that my residents in Pagham and Bersted will end up in a coastal authority that will be bankrupt on day one; the rest of my constituents will be in an authority that should be on a sound financial footing. What will happen to my residents in Pagham and Bersted? Their council tax bills will go up overnight to manage the debt that is currently held in Adur and Worthing, when their current council is on a sound financial footing. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that it is an unacceptable position for my residents to be put in, when they did not ask for this?

• 2 Jun 2026 · Milburn Review: Interim Report · Hansard source

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  My first job was in a local café washing pots when I was 13, and then in my 20s, I opened my own restaurant in that same location, offering young people in my local community their first job. But when I am out in Chichester, all my businesses tell me that they are so squeezed at every single angle that they cannot take risks on young people any more. Will the Minister lay out what he will do to support hospitality, specifically looking at reforming business rates so that those businesses can offer the right path for our young people to cut their teeth in work?

• 18 May 2026 · Backing Business to Create Economic Growth · Hansard source

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  I am pleased to speak in today’s King’s Speech debate, with the theme “Backing business to create economic growth”. I know from meeting businesses across my constituency in all fields—be it hospitality and retail, manufacturing, haulage, technology, agriculture and horticulture, or the creative industries—that they are ready, willing and able to play their part in achieving economic growth for this country. However, right now it is hard to see how that will be achieved given that businesses are being squeezed from all directions. They are facing rising costs, additional employer national insurance contributions, sky-high energy bills and a workforce who are struggling to get to the end of the month with anything left in their bank accounts. Although my Chichester constituency is often described as “affluent”, the cost of living crisis is felt acutely there. In fact, last month a Resolution Foundation report entitled the “Slurp Index” looked at the ratio of average gross hourly earnings to Guinness pint prices. It concluded that in somewhere like Trafford, the average median hourly wage will earn someone just over four pints when they are getting a round in on a Friday, but in Chichester, it does not even stretch to two and a half pints, which would not make anyone popular with their co-workers. It’s halves for everyone in Chichester—I’m very sorry. The high costs in Chichester are compounded by the fact that desperately needed improvements to the A27 have been removed entirely from the Government’s road investment strategy. Without investment, the road will continue to strangle regional trade and competitiveness for Chichester. It feels more and more likely that it is quicker to get around by sea than by the roads in my constituency. That brings me to the clean water Bill, which aims to undo years of dissatisfaction with the water industry. Over the weekend, I joined the Surfers Against Sewage paddle-out protest. Ironically, we were told not to get in the water because a sewage outflow had discharged into the Solent and the water was not safe. It did not stop us from getting in and highlighting just how important our water is to us in the Chichester constituency, as Chichester harbour is a national landscape. The legislation that the Government are bringing forward must deliver an overhaul of how our water industry is regulated, starting with the scrapping of Ofwat—a measure that the Liberal Democrats have been calling for since 2022. In the legislation, I hope that we will see many of the 44 amendments that the Liberal Democrats tabled at Committee stage of the Water (Special Measures) Bill, and which the Government chose not to accept. One of those amendments included a statutory responsibility for water companies to measure the volume of spills they release, rather than the arbitrary measure of time, as doing so would accurately reflect the actual levels of pollution. This is vital, as the Environment Agency looks to enforce stricter targets at waste water treatment works around my constituency in sensitive areas that have seen high levels of pollution, like Bosham, Chichester harbour and the chalk stream River Lavant. There was discharge into the River Lavant for a total of 285 days in 2024—but that was counted as one discharge; we need to know the volume rather than the time spent discharging. This issue fills my inbox, because in Chichester are passionate about our rivers, coastline and national landscape. Another key issue that residents raise with me is the behaviour of rogue property management companies. Chichester residents are living in properties where the verge is not maintained and saplings are dropped into holes in the ground and left to die, before being removed six months later for the whole process to start again. Residents describe management companies as faceless, with non-existent customer service except when they are told that their service charge is increasing exponentially. In some cases, that has led to residents moving from the homes they fought so hard to purchase, because they can no longer afford to live there. In the commonhold and leasehold reform Bill, the Government have the opportunity to tackle this issue head on.

• 23 Apr 2026 · Business of the House · Hansard source

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  I had the opportunity to test out my hand-eye co-ordination recently by joining Chichester Centurions hockey club. We have a thriving hockey community in Chichester, and Chichester hockey club has more than 650 members. They are at risk, however, of losing their pitch provision because the pitches are coming to end of life and are being replaced with 3G pitches, which are far more favourable to football—hockey cannot be played on them. Will the Leader of the House please talk to the Sport Minister, the hon. Member for Barnsley South (Stephanie Peacock), and ask what she can do, because the picture in my area is happening nationally? Will he please ask her to meet me, so that she can tell me what she will do to protect hockey?

• 23 Apr 2026 · Courts and Tribunals Bill (Tenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  Rape Crisis has pointed out that current practice ignores the fact that women are often subjected to multiple instances of sexual violence in their lives. Survivors have told Rape Crisis that they feel disbelieved, blamed and retraumatised when they simply try to seek justice. SafeLives and End Violence Against Women are both in favour of the reforms in clause 10. It is worth pointing out that black and minoritised women are disproportionately harmed in the criminal justice system by misuse of bad character evidence. Office for National Statistics data shows that one in two adult survivors of rape have been raped more than once. The National Police Chiefs’ Council strategic risk assessment 2023 identified that 25% of victim survivors were repeat victims of violence against women and girls. The drafting of clause 10 reflects calls from a coalition of women’s rights groups for section 100 to be amended in this way. It was drafted and supported by the Centre for Women’s Justice, and the Liberal Democrats are pleased to support it.

• 13 Apr 2026 · SEND Provision and Reform · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend mentions under-resourcing. At West Sussex county council, the department just put an answerphone message on its system saying, “We are overwhelmed. We cannot take any calls today.” Does he agree that the parents who are navigating the system and often describe it as a “fight” do not have the opportunity just to put their answerphone on or not show up for their kids that day because they are overwhelmed, and that we need to do far more for them?

• 24 Mar 2026 · Women’s Safety in Rural Areas · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend is making a passionate speech about how we build in this country and the considerations we need to make. In my constituency, we have a large-scale development called Minerva Heights that was planned to be built in phases. Lighting down St Paul’s Road, which connects phase 1 to other centralised communities, was meant to be delivered before phase 2 was built out, but phase 2 is not yet coming because phase 1 homes cannot be sold. I have been contacted by many constituents who feel trapped in their community and unable to engage in other areas because they have no way of moving around the building that has already been done. Does my hon. Friend agree that this is why we need an infrastructure-first approach that comes with lighting delivered before the homes are built?

• 12 Mar 2026 · Business of the House · Hansard source

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  Developers building in Bosham, Earnley and Bracklesham in my constituency were given planning conditions that did not allow them to move residents on to the new developments until there was sufficient waste water treatment works capacity. Well—surprise, surprise—there is no extra capacity at the waste water treatment works, yet the developers are now going back to the council to ask it to remove from the planning conditions the commitment that got them the planning permission in the first place. Will the Leader of the House arrange for me to meet the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, so that I can talk to them about an infrastructure-first approach to development?

• 10 Mar 2026 · Courts and Tribunals Bill · Hansard source

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  I will make some progress. If the Deputy Prime Minister and the Courts Minister believe that this is fundamentally the right thing to do practically and ideologically, why did it not feature in the Labour party manifesto? Like many Members, I take issue with the Deputy Prime Minister’s messaging around the Bill. He chose to describe defendants as “offenders”, rather than applying the principle of innocent until guilt is proven. He also described a case that carries a sentence of up to three years as akin to having a grazed knee and seeing a consultant. I think most of the public outside this building would argue that three years’ imprisonment is a life-changing sentence. If I were tried for a crime that I was arguing that I did not commit, I would like that to be in front of a jury of my peers. I believe the Government are wasting severely limited political capital on something that will not shift the dial. They stated themselves that they expect all the measures in the Bill to show just a 5% decrease in the backlog by the end of this Parliament and a return to pre-covid backlog levels only in a decade. Instead of these drastic changes, we are urging the Government to look at alternative options to reduce the Crown court backlog. We should look at measures that have been tried and tested before, such as those piloted during the pandemic to supercharge the Crown courts, when extended sitting hours allowed am and pm trials. Used in select courtrooms, that method can funnel through cases that have been stuck in the backlog for years. In the original pilots, the approach cleared 3.5 cases per courtroom each week, compared to fewer than one in courts operating standard hours. That is how we can begin to reduce the backlog without removing liberties that we should all hold as sacred. Will the Government please give consideration to the Liberal Democrat proposals, which would not only boost efficiencies in the Crown courts but would make the experience for jurors, victims and judges better, and could attract retired judges back into the system to preside over half-day cases? Another glaring flaw in the Bill is that more serious cases will be heard in the magistrates court, where there is a higher income threshold to qualify for legal aid. Many more defendants who could be accused of crimes that carry sentences of up to 24 months will be unrepresented and defending themselves. That is very likely to drag out hearings, which will lower the overall savings that the Government claim to be making with these reforms. How will the Government respond when magistrates courts start pushing cases with longer sentences back to the Crown court as they struggle to absorb the additional work, as happened with the previous reform of magistrates’ sentencing powers? The Government are also proposing to abolish the right of appeal from the magistrates court. Why does the Deputy Prime Minister believe that should be done when 42% of appeals from the magistrates court are successful? If the Government are willing to include an important clause on the presumption against parental responsibility in the Bill, why will they not extend the scope of the Bill to address the fundamental reforms needed in the broken family court system? The Government’s proposals are opposed by the Criminal Bar Association, the chair of the Bar Council, the Law Society, the Four Bars, the Secret Barrister, Judge Rob Rinder, Jo Hamilton OBE, many Labour Members and 3,200 legal professionals, who have written to the Deputy Prime Minister today. If they will not listen to all those organisations and people who have spent their lives committed to making the criminal justice system, which has been poorly managed by successive Governments, as effective as possible for victims and defendants, who will they listen to? I have a huge amount of respect for the Courts Minister and for the Deputy Prime Minister, which is why I am disappointed to be here making this speech. It is not too late for them to change course.

• 23 Feb 2026 · Local Government Reorganisation · Hansard source

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  West Sussex county council should never have been offered the opportunity to postpone for a second year running, effectively gifting the Conservative-controlled administration a seven-year term. Now, with democracy restored, there are just 74 days until the polls, so will West Sussex still be expected to work to the original timescale for the creation of unitary authorities and a combined authority that will sit with the mayoralty, or will that also be delayed? How much additional support will be provided to the council, and specifically to the staff at West Sussex, who are now working to a very tight schedule to deliver elections for their residents?

• 3 Feb 2026 · Transport in the South-East · Hansard source

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  I thank the Minister for her comprehensive comments at the end of this debate. I also thank Members from across the House for contributing to a wide-ranging debate on all the topics that touch on transport in the south-east. I am especially glad that the hon. Member for Isle of Wight East (Joe Robertson) was here to talk about ferries; if I am ever in a room with him and he does not mention ferries, something does not feel quite right. I am glad that he had the opportunity to raise his specific concerns relating to the Isle of Wight. I reflect on how, when they talk about their frustrations, residents are often told that this Government are investing additional money. They talk in large figures that sound incredibly impressive, but when residents cannot see that investment—when they are still sat in traffic, day in, day out; when they are not seeing their local bus services improve or their county council deliver investment into active travel strategies—it leaves a bitter taste in their mouths. All those figures mean nothing when they still cannot travel from A to B and see their mum who lives on the other side of the constituency, get to work or drive their kids to school. When we talk about these transport issues, the figures can sometimes make us lose sight of the impact on people struggling day to day. Local authorities getting additional money is all well and good. However, we see councils such as West Sussex county council deciding to cling on to power with their very fingertips, cancelling elections twice—two years in a row—meaning that its cabinet will end up serving a seven-year term—that is incredibly frustrating for people in my local area, who do not get the opportunity to hold it to account when it has failed us in addressing the potholes crisis and active travel. Finally, the Minister mentioned that she would happily visit any constituency, so I extend an invitation to her and the new Roads Minister to come and sit in traffic with me around Chichester. She can come any day: I guarantee I will be able to find us some congestion so that she can see the impact it has on my constituents. Question put and agreed to. Resolved, That this House has considered transport in the South East.

• 3 Feb 2026 · Transport in the South-East · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend has shown me the photos of what has happened in her constituency, and I share her distress that a main road—an A road—has literally fallen into the sea. Our constituencies share the fact that we are low-lying coastal plains at the forefront of climate change. As we see more storm events, we are seeing the damage in our communities. That brings me on to paying particular tribute to my residents living on the Manhood peninsula, who get completely trapped in the summer months because of congestion on the roads and are unable to get out of the area. Today, they are trapped because all the roads in and out of the Manhood are completely flooded. Georgia, a constituent of mine, left her job as a nurse because her commute was taking two hours, with one hour spent travelling just the handful of miles from Emsworth to Tangmere. Chris’s son has school transport, and has to leave an hour before school starts due to the traffic on the A259 on to the A27; again, he is only travelling a small number of miles. Melanie is planning on packing up her successful mental health business because the gridlock is, perhaps ironically, negatively affecting her mental health. Shaun owns a funeral company, and he told me of the time he had to get out of the hearse to physically clear the traffic to get to the local crematorium on time. Daniel owns a home carers company, and he regularly reports that staff get stuck on the A27, which means that the people they care for in the community miss medicine times and hospital appointments, and the backlog means that people get seen later and later in the day. I am in no doubt that the congestion on the A27 is strangling the city and putting off investment from businesses. It is stopping people shopping in the city or business parks and is impacting people’s daily lives. The A27 Chichester improvement scheme has a long history dating back to the 2000 south coast multi-modal study. Following several iterations, the scheme was included in the 2013 “Investing in Britain’s Future” White Paper and the 2014 road investment strategy. The scheme went to consultation in 2016, when 93% of respondents to a National Highways survey said that congestion was a problem on the A27. However, in 2017 the Secretary of State removed the funding for any improvements along the Chichester stretch. There remains significant anger and frustration among residents that they were never given the opportunity to vote on a preferred model of road improvements, especially as the Chichester district has seen more than its fair share of house building over the past decade. If the Government expect areas such as ours to continue to sustain such an increased level of development, residents need to see the investment in infrastructure too. Instead, it seems that their local services, be it GPs, schools, roads or buses, are expected to manage the additional capacity with no extra resource.

• 3 Feb 2026 · Transport in the South-East · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend makes an excellent point and he allows me the opportunity to thank organisations that offer community transport, such as the Selsey Venture Club in my constituency or Contact 88, which help people get to the places they need to go when transport infrastructure is lacking. I have met representatives of National Highways on multiple occasions since being elected, and I know that the original proposals for the A27 still exist in a drawer somewhere ready to be brought back to the table to address a road that does not function and remains in the top 10 nationally for casualties. National Highways has agreed to fund a study into the Fishbourne roundabout, which desperately needs addressing. That is due to report in the spring and I hope the Government will be forthcoming with funding for the proposed improvements, as it is such a dangerous roundabout. I am one of many who have nearly been involved in an accident on that roundabout and I fear there will be a fatality before long. The A27 Chichester bypass remains part of a future road investment scheme and the Roads Minister has met me to hear my plea to fund its improvement. It would be great if the Minister here today could provide reassurance that funding will be attached to the A27 for that future road investment scheme—something all my constituents will be desperate to hear. If she is unable to commit to the level of funding required, will she please meet me and National Highways to explore alternative schemes to address how people move around in my area? The Government are keen to get more people on to public transport to reduce reliance on cars in particular, but the increase in fares from £2 to £3 has had a significant impact on constituents who are trying to do just that. Cristina’s children get the bus to school every day. She encourages public transport, but the cost is £26 for a seven-day child pass and the young people do not always get a seat—it is totally unacceptable. If Cristina chooses to take her three children into the city for the day, the cheapest option is a DayRider. That costs her £17 for two bus journeys that last approximately 10 minutes each way. All this makes travelling by car by far the easier and more sensible option. That is why we are calling for the reinstatement of the £2 bus fare cap and for fees to be halved for under-18s. At the same time, bus routes are being amended to cover new housing developments without any additional services being added, so routes take longer than they did and cost more—a perfect cocktail to disincentivise bus use. What steps are the Government taking to encourage more people to use buses and to ensure that in places with major developments, such as Chichester, adequate work is being undertaken to make sure that bus services for current residents are not affected? Importantly, what steps are they taking to make sure that public transport is a material consideration on new developments, rather than an afterthought? There are some great examples of active travel in my patch, particularly making the most of the disused railway lines along the Centurion Way into the South Downs. The issue that councils such as West Sussex county council face is that funding for those schemes is often linked to performance-related measures set by Active Travel England. That creates a self-fulfilling prophecy, with councils that are already delivering good provision being rewarded and provided with further funds, while those that struggle being left behind. Can the Minister say if the criteria linked to funding for active travel schemes will be reviewed by the Government so that areas like mine are not left behind with poor infrastructure because the county council has historically struggled to deliver them? There should not be a postcode lottery in active travel provision, and projects to create cycle lanes and footpaths take far too long from the ideas phase to the delivery phase. I will briefly touch on rail. Chichester is not endowed with services that are quick, punctual and affordable. Last year, one in five Southern Railway trains arrived in Chichester late, despite an annual season ticket to London costing nearly £8,000. The Liberal Democrats have long called for a freeze in rail fares, so we were glad to see the Government provide that last year, but my residents are still paying well over the odds for the service that they receive, which is severely lacking. The service to London is dreadfully slow relative to services from cities that are similar to ours and at a comparable distance. That is partly due to infrastructure issues that have been ignored for years, such as the Croydon bottleneck, where the Arun Valley line joins the Brighton main line. Network Rail has said that that causes a ripple effect of delays across the system, prevents future expansion of the line and creates delays across the entire network when there is a failure in service much further up the line. It does not go down well in my constituency when people ask, “Why are there delays in Chichester?”, and I say, “Oh, because of something happening in Croydon.” It is disappointing that there has not been a commitment to the relevant scheme, despite widespread campaigning by Members from across the House. Reliable services are vital if passengers are to see value for money and the benefits of choosing rail, but that is not currently being offered by Southern Railway. When the Government bring Southern Railway into public ownership, will they commit to reviewing a fast service for residents in Chichester and reconsider rail investment to deal with the Croydon bottleneck? I hope the Minister has heard my plea today on behalf of my 120,000 constituents in the Chichester area and the south-east region, because they do not ask for much. They are playing their part in the Government’s growth agenda and seeing large-scale development in their area. All they ask is to move around their community safely and easily, which is becoming less of a reality every day. I do not expect a magic money pot to appear suddenly, or even in advance of the next funding round of the road investment scheme, but I do expect fairness. I hope that, when those decisions are being made, the Minister will remember that the previous Government promised something to my constituents and then took it away. That is simply not fair.

• 21 Jan 2026 · Local Government Reorganisation: Referendums · Hansard source

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  The hon. Gentleman is right to highlight a democratic deficit. West Sussex county council, which is Conservative-led, has chosen to delays its elections for another year, which means that its county councillors will end up serving seven-year terms, without seeking a democratic mandate since 2021. Does he share my concern that the constituents of Romford did not elect a Reform MP?

• 21 Jan 2026 · Local Government Reorganisation: Referendums · Hansard source

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  Our mayoral election in Sussex has been postponed until 2028, but the statutory instrument for the creation of combined authorities is still going ahead, and two elected representatives from each local authority are going to form the combined authority. That means Conservative councillors who have not had a democratic mandate since 2021 will create the combined authority; does my hon. Friend agree that that is the reason why they are holding on and delaying elections?

• 9 Dec 2025 · Water Scarcity · Hansard source

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  I thank my hon. Friend for making a valid point. I am sure that for that reason, she agrees that the best way to address our failing water system is to make water companies into public benefit interest companies, so they are beholden to their customers and the environment before the needs of their shareholders. Although these companies may profess to care about the public, they are always looking far more closely at the bottom line and how shareholders feel. With confidence in water companies at an all-time low, Southern Water being one of the worst offenders, it is hard to believe that the Secretary of State will sign off on the Havant Thicket project without encouraging the company to prove that all other options have been exhausted. I would appreciate it if the Minister provided an update on whether the Government are in favour of the scheme. I understand that the decision has been deferred until spring 2026. That provides an opportunity for the Minister to meet local campaigners from my constituency and the neighbouring one who would love to share their thoughts on the project, which could end up providing a blueprint for the rest of the UK. Water scarcity is not just about supply. It is also about demand, which is rising exponentially with a projected deficit of billions of litres of water a day, as many hon. Members have mentioned. That is why I tabled an amendment to the Planning and Infrastructure Bill calling for all new developments to introduce dual piping at the build stage so that households could introduce grey water recycling into their homes without a huge cost. The cost to the developer would have been very small—we are talking in the single hundreds of pounds—and yet if households had decided to start using grey water in their washing machines, for example, or to flush their toilets, they could have made huge savings in the long run. Although the Government chose not to accept my amendment, there does need to be a serious conversation about the use of grey water to reduce demand on drinking water. We also need urgently to implement schedule 3 to the Flood and Water Management Act 2010, which is long overdue. Although local authorities can choose to make SUDS mandatory for all new developments—I know the Minister is passionate about SUDS, as she has told me in many a Westminster Hall debate—as my local authority, Chichester district council, has done, it is still not mandatory across the country, so I would appreciate an update from the Minister on the review of schedule 3. Portsmouth Water is undertaking a project in my constituency of Chichester to install meters on every property for which it provides water, which should mean that those that use more water pay more, and those who are conscious of their water use see a saving on their bills. With water bills going up exponentially across the country, I am sure that would be a welcome saving to lots of my constituents in Chichester.

• 9 Dec 2025 · Water Scarcity · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Stuart, as much as it was 15 minutes ago. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Horsham for securing this important debate. The south-east, where my constituency is, has been designated as water stressed since 2021. As reflected in many of the contributions, that sometimes feels quite hard to believe in such a wet country. Much of my constituency is a low-lying coastal plain, and weather volatility is causing severe conditions on both ends of the scale. Droughts and floods are a commonplace occurrence, whereas before they were less likely. I would like briefly to talk about chalk streams. I am very lucky to represent two of England’s 200 chalk streams, and over-abstraction on the River Ems over many years means that the point of constant flow has moved two kilometres downstream since the 1960s. That means that a large proportion of the river is drying up every summer when it never used to. Constituents have told me harrowing accounts of trying to rescue the salmon that migrate down the River Ems, and it feels like a total catastrophe when people are trying to save those fish. The Test and the Itchen, just outside my constituency, are also rare habitats and important chalk streams. They, too, are really impacted by over-abstraction. To address that, Portsmouth Water is building the first new reservoir in more than 30 years, the Havant Thicket reservoir, just on the border of my constituency. That was largely favoured by the local community, because it would create a new space and an exciting environment for people to visit and walk around. Then Southern Water got involved. It saw this brilliant idea that was popular among the population, and it put forward a proposal to invest in Havant Thicket with Portsmouth Water by introducing an effluent recycling scheme, the first of its kind in this country to supplement our drinking water supply. By investing in that technology, Southern Water can use clever accounting tricks to maintain its bottom line by describing the technology as an asset rather than investing in fixing its existing infrastructure, which is much less appealing to its shareholders. The cost of the scheme to introduce effluent recycling into the drinking water supply at the Havant Thicket reservoir is estimated to be £1.2 billion, but the costs are spiralling every year. There is also no lasting legacy to this project. The plant will become redundant in 60 years, but customers will be paying for it in their bills for far longer. It is also hugely energy intensive. At the same time, as many hon. Members have mentioned, Southern Water wastes 100 million litres of water every day from leaky pipes that it has failed to maintain.

• 27 Nov 2025 · Business of the House · Hansard source

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  The Chichester district council local plan was finally adopted this summer after years of speculative development in our area in the wrong places and without the right infrastructure to go with it. This robust local plan was hard fought for by local councillors, but this Government’s new housing targets are putting more pressure on areas such as mine to deliver more homes, and it could render the local plan essentially meaningless. Appeals are being won for development on greenfield sites and farmland that were not identified in this hard-fought-for local plan. Will the Leader of the House please make time to debate the effectiveness of the Government’s planning policy, which disproportionately affects constituencies such as mine?

• 27 Nov 2025 · Domestic Abuse: Children · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend makes a really important point about local government reorganisation. Voluntary and charitable sector organisations rely on local authority funding and Government funding—they rely on multiple streams of income. I plead with the Minister to make sure that the Government funding, at least, is secured beyond one year, so that these organisations have the reassurance during LGR that they will be able to maintain their provision in some sense. We also need a statutory definition of honour-based abuse, and better training for police, social care and education professionals. In every police force, we need specialist violence against women and girls taskforces, and every force should undergo training via Naturewatch on the links between domestic abuse and the abuse of animals. Perpetrators of domestic abuse identify the special bond people build with their pets and can use that to exert control over partners or children. Across the country, we have seen cases where warning signs were missed, reports were ignored and opportunities to intervene were tragically lost. The programme run by Naturewatch has been taken up by police forces across the country, including the Metropolitan police and Sussex police, but we should encourage every force to take it on, as there is a direct link between the treatment of animals and domestic abuse. We must set up support services so that they are in the ideal position to listen to a child crying out for help, no matter how hard it is to hear them. We in the Liberal Democrats are also extremely concerned by the chronic underfunding of children’s social care. After a decade of cuts to local authority budgets under Conservative Governments, many councils have been forced to scale back their early intervention services. I have been told by those working in the sector that they feel like they are firefighting every day, rather than spending the time they so desperately want to spend with the families they could prevent from entering crisis. Instead, they are dealing with mounting caseloads, burnout and an inability to resource their departments properly. This is short-sighted and dangerous. Tragically, too often, the consequences are felt too late. The report into the heartbreaking case of Sara Sharif is a damning indictment of Surrey county council’s failure to protect a young girl from her abusers. My hon. Friend the Member for Woking (Mr Forster) made a passionate plea for the recommendations of the safeguarding review to be explored by the Government so that lessons can be learned nationally. Early support does prevent crises from escalating, it protects children who witness domestic abuse in their household, and it identifies risks at the earliest opportunity. The Liberal Democrats have long called for greater integration between health and social care, with far more involvement from local authorities in the planning, commissioning and delivery of services. This must include education settings, which play a vital role in identifying situations where abuse may be present. We need to ensure that training and support for teachers is readily available, so that they can spot the signs and call for help. Teachers have an increasingly challenging role in our complex environment: they are not only teachers but, quite often, caregivers and social workers. They may be the only lifeline that a child has, so they need to be able to spot the signs of domestic abuse, be they misbehaviour, withdrawal or a failure to engage in the classroom. In addition, as the hon. Member for Dulwich and West Norwood (Helen Hayes) mentioned, it is so important to have education campaigns so that children understand and can spot the signs of what is not a happy household, and understand what is normal and what is not, and what they should and should not put up with. Another vital part of the picture is the family court system, which plays a key role in protecting children from situations where domestic abuse is present while also considering the importance of keeping families together. It is a desperately difficult job, yet there have been a number of situations where the system has failed and, frankly, we are only seeing the tip of the iceberg. I thank the Government for their recent steps, including removing parental responsibility from those convicted of the most serious sexual offences, as was mentioned by the hon. Members for Stafford (Leigh Ingham) and for Dulwich and West Norwood. Campaigners fought hard for that change, and it is welcome. Could we also consider removing parental responsibility from those on bail, to ensure that individuals capable of committing horrendous abuse are kept away from their children as early as possible? With that in mind, what are the Government doing to integrate health and social care services across the country to ensure that as much protection as possible is provided for vulnerable children and families? What are the Government doing to raise awareness of the warning signs of a child living in a household with domestic abuse? When will we see further legislation to deal with the rising issues in our family court system? Will the Government consider specific measures to keep those on bail on charges of offences against children away from their children? The Liberal Democrats stand ready to work with Members in all parts of the House to ensure that every child is protected, every survivor is heard and every perpetrator is held to account.

• 25 Nov 2025 · Level 7 Apprenticeships · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend is making an impassioned speech about the reason for keeping level 7 apprenticeships. She talks about construction, but has she considered the impact that the loss of level 7 apprenticeships will have on town planners as well? Arun district council has relied on the chartered town planner apprenticeship scheme to train its own generation of town planners, because it is incredibly hard to recruit into local authority planning departments. The council is really worried about the impact that the change will have on planning, a profession that we know is really important if the Government are to achieve their agenda of building 1.5 million homes.

• 18 Nov 2025 · Land Use Change: Food Security · Hansard source

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  I thank my hon. Friend for reflecting on the real and dangerous impact that the sudden closure of the SFI scheme had on farmers. One farm in my constituency was left in limbo by the announcement, having spent four months trying to switch to the SFI scheme. However, to do that, it needed to leave the community stewardship facilitation fund scheme—a process that took months, which meant that it could not complete its SFI application. It then found itself without SFI or the community stewardship facilitation fund. Does my hon. Friend agree that it is a totally unacceptable situation for any farmer?