John Hayes MP: speeches 2025

Speeches

• 18 Nov 2025 · Northern Ireland Troubles Bill · Hansard source

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  The truth is, the Secretary of State has said there is no equivalence between those who fought us and those who defended us, but his Bill says the very opposite. Every investigation has a view to criminal prosecution. Everyone pursued will feel hounded, because they will be hounded.

• 18 Nov 2025 · China Espionage: Government Security Response · Hansard source

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  This is a welcome statement from the Security Minister, whom I hold in high regard, as does the House. He will be familiar with the report on China produced by the ISC—of which I was and remain a member—which dealt with exactly the matters that he has described: the widespread penetration of our universities, the theft of intellectual property and the attempt to compromise our democratic institutions. Will he add to his list a review of contracts with China—public sector contracts, Government contracts and so on—particularly those relating to sensitive matters? He said that he was a plain-speaking man, so, mindful of the collapse of the recent trial, will he do the simple task of saying from the Dispatch Box that China is a threat to our national security?

• 12 Nov 2025 · Public Bodies: Governance and Accountability · Hansard source

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  I will call Valerie Vaz to move the motion, and I will then call the Minister to respond. Other Members may intervene only with the permission of the Member in charge. As is the convention with these half-hour debates, there will not be an opportunity for the Member in charge to wind up.

• 12 Nov 2025 · Public Bodies: Governance and Accountability · Hansard source

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  I probably ought not to say so, Valerie, but that is music to my ears.

• 12 Nov 2025 · Carbon Budget Delivery Plan · Hansard source

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  Order. I see that quite a lot of people want to speak. I will not set a time limit, but if you can be disciplined in how long your contributions last, that would be very helpful.

• 12 Nov 2025 · Carbon Budget Delivery Plan · Hansard source

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  Well done for keeping to time. I am calling the Front Benchers at 5.28 pm. I call Jim Shannon—you have a minute and a half.

• 12 Nov 2025 · Carbon Budget Delivery Plan · Hansard source

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  Thank you, Minister; that leaves a moment or two for Abtisam Mohamed to complete our discussion.

• 12 Nov 2025 · Carbon Budget Delivery Plan · Hansard source

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  Order. There is a Division in the House. We will suspend for 15 minutes, and when we return Ellie will draw her speech to its conclusion reasonably speedily.

• 12 Nov 2025 · Carbon Budget Delivery Plan · Hansard source

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  I call Susan Murray—you have a couple of minutes.

• 12 Nov 2025 · Carbon Budget Delivery Plan · Hansard source

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  I call Sureena Brackenridge —you have two minutes.

• 12 Nov 2025 · Carbon Budget Delivery Plan · Hansard source

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  About six people want to contribute, so they each have about four minutes. I will not make it formal, but I know I can rely on you not to let me down.

• 12 Nov 2025 · Carbon Budget Delivery Plan · Hansard source

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  Order. Can you bring your remarks to a close, otherwise no one else will be able to get in?

• 12 Nov 2025 · Carbon Budget Delivery Plan · Hansard source

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  Order. I said four minutes a speech. This is partly a debate about targets and figures, Barry, and the difference between four and nine is five.

• 12 Nov 2025 · SEND Provision: Kent · Hansard source

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  Excellent. I call the shadow Minister, Saqib Bhatti.

• 12 Nov 2025 · SEND Provision: Kent · Hansard source

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  Before I call the shadow Minister, I point out to the hon. Lady the courtesies and behaviour in the House. If you are going to name another Member, you should notify them in advance. Did you do that?

• 12 Nov 2025 · SEND Provision: Kent · Hansard source

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  I remind the hon. Gentleman that interventions should be short—but I am a kind and generous Chairman.

• 12 Nov 2025 · SEND Provision: Kent · Hansard source

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  Order. I remind Members to bob if they wish to be called in the debate. I ask the hon. Member for Bexleyheath and Crayford (Daniel Francis) to forgive me; I should have recognised that the hon. Member for Poole (Neil Duncan-Jordan) is nowhere near as glamorous or youthful as him. The hon. Gentleman can put that on his leaflets if he likes.

• 12 Nov 2025 · SEND Provision: Kent · Hansard source

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  Right. I suggest you drop the hon. Member for Clacton a note to say that you raised him in the House and copy it to me. That would be wonderful.

• 12 Nov 2025 · SEND Provision: Kent · Hansard source

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  I call Neil Duncan Jordan.

• 29 Oct 2025 · Sentencing Bill · Hansard source

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  I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for his remarks about my experience in government, which are far too flattering. I agree that new clause 1 is precisely the kind of amendment that the Government could accept. He will know from his time in government, as I do, that no Act is the Bill as it began, for Bills metamorphose during their consideration. Wise Governments listen to arguments that are made during scrutiny, either on the Floor of the House or in Committee, and the best Ministers allow the Bill that they introduced to change over time. That is the purpose of Parliament. My hon. Friend the Member for Mid Leicestershire (Mr Bedford) has done a service to this House in tabling this new clause, thereby allowing the Minister to improve the Bill in the way he suggests. As we have debated this Bill over time, a distinct difference has emerged between practicalities and principles. The question remains: is this a Bill built on expediency—a necessary response to the unbearable tension between prison supply and the demand for prison places—or a Bill born of a distaste for incarceration as a means of delivering justice? The first is inexcusable; the second indefensible; but neither is inexorable. In practice, as the hon. Member for Chichester (Jess Brown-Fuller) said, if remand were treated in a different way—and that, essentially, is about more court sittings and more court time for faster access to justice—fewer prisoners would be kept on remand. If we do not believe that, we would have to assume that every person brought to trial would be found guilty or imprisoned, which cannot be true. If we dealt with the huge number of foreign national offenders more swiftly— [ Interruption. ] I know the Government are making those attempts, but it is not enough, any more than what the previous Government did. If we dealt with that issue more swiftly, we would alter the demand for places, for too much of the debate focuses on the supply of prison places and not on the demand-side drivers that absorb places, which could be eased. When we last debated the Bill, we talked about my ideas for supply-side change. I will not repeat myself, for you would not allow me to do so, Madam Deputy Speaker, in relation to the amendments and new clauses before us today. However, the Minister needs to think more laterally and creatively. I imagine that he is a bright man—or bright-ish, at least. If he did so, he could look at those demand-side drivers and deal with the practicalities. As for principles, it is time to end the liberal orthodoxy that has perpetuated the pervasive myth that crime is an illness to be treated, and not a destructive, deviant decision that warrants punishment. In the previous debate we heard many times the argument that everyone deserves a second chance, which I have no doubt underpins much of the resistance to the amendments proposed today. As I listened to the powerful case my hon. Friend the Member for Maidstone and Malling (Helen Grant) made, I asked myself this: can anyone in this place with a heart believe that those who terrorise and torture children persistently and who maim and murder innocent babes—sometimes their own—deserve a second chance? Can anyone with a heart really believe that those who killed two people dedicated to the service of others—Jo Cox and Sir David Amess, Members of this House—deserve a second chance? Does that awful self-deluded Islamist fanatic who plotted and planned and executed little girls at a pop concert deserve a second chance? The only second chance they all deserve is when they stand before their maker and beg for forgiveness. For us to forgive such extreme acts is to play God. Forgiveness at that level and to that degree is beyond any Member in this Chamber, for it is beyond any human being. That is what I think about second chances.

• 29 Oct 2025 · Sentencing Bill · Hansard source

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  It is early in my speech, but such is my regard for my right hon. Friend that I will.

• 29 Oct 2025 · Sentencing Bill · Hansard source

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  I simply say to the hon. Lady that when we delegate that kind of authority to those who are unelected and unaccountable, we are no longer doing our job. Her view, which has prevailed for a very long time, is not entirely the fault of Labour; it is a problem with the whole political class. We have created every kind of body imaginable in every aspect of government to do things that should be done by this House and by Ministers of the Crown. The Sentencing Council is just another of those bodies. Who knows who is on the Sentencing Council? Certainly most of the hon. Lady’s constituents and most of mine would not have a clue, and they certainly would not know how to influence them in any way. Of course, it is working people who are most disadvantaged by that, not the privileged few who occupy the social circles that the Sentencing Council no doubt occupies. It is the hard-working, patriotic and law-abiding majority in my constituency and hers who are frustrated by a criminal justice system that persistently excuses the worst kinds of crimes rather than punishing them as they deserve to be punished. There is a new future emerging in the post-liberal age as we build a new order. That order will be inspired by time-honoured truths, rooted in the will of the people and powered by a ceaseless determination to recapture our country for our people. Burke said: “Bad laws are the worst sort of tyranny.” The tyranny of the cruelty of crime and disorder will haunt places and people across our country as the vile and vicious are let loose. I urge the House to accept the variety of amendments that I have mentioned and the many others on the amendment paper that are attempts to rescue the Bill from that horror.

• 29 Oct 2025 · Sentencing Bill · Hansard source

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  As we return to consideration of this dreadful Bill, we debate amendments and new clauses that are designed to mitigate its worst effects, in particular new clauses 43, 21, 18, 19 and 20, which I have signed, and new clause 1.

• 28 Oct 2025 · China Spying Case · Hansard source

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  It is true that the Government have repeatedly expressed disappointment, but—still more disturbingly, in a sense—so has MI5. It is quite unusual for MI5 to intervene, by means of a speech by its head which made it very clear that MI5 was profoundly disappointed that this matter had not gone to court. Had it done so, it would have been the culmination of years of work done by MI5 to try to deal with Chinese espionage in Whitehall and Westminster.

• 21 Oct 2025 · Sentencing Bill · Hansard source

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  I do agree with my hon. Friend. Just stepping back a moment, Ms Ghani, I am mindful that the only female Speaker we have ever had once famously declared, “Call me Madam”, so I will from now on call you Madam Chairman rather than anything else. It is certainly true that we need a war against drugs, drug dealing and all the effects of drugs, but it would be quite wrong to separate that from the public desire to see people who do bad things dealt with appropriately. When those bad things are at their extreme, and as my right hon. Friend the Member for Tatton pointed out, we are speaking of extremes—acts of violence against women, minors and, let us face it, men—they need to be dealt with with severity. There is nothing wrong with saying that because it is what most people intuitively feel, and it is right that they do. Grotius, the jurist, once said that criminal justice was about “the infliction of an ill suffered for an ill done”, and that sense that the punishment must fit the crime rings true now, as it did when he made that observation. The Minister needs to explain whether the Bill is about practicalities or principle. I have yet to determine which position the Government have taken.