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Julian Lewis MP: speeches

396 published records · newest first.

Speeches

  • 8 Jan 2026 · Human Rights Abuses: Magnitsky Sanctions · Hansard source
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    Will my right hon. Friend explain to the House who actually does the research that leads to people being identified for sanctioning, whether there is resistance in such places as the City of London, which no doubt could make enormous financial profits from having illicit money deposited there, and whether such places are incentivised to turn a blind eye when attempts are made to camouflage the real sources of the dirty money flowing in?

  • 8 Jan 2026 · Human Rights Abuses: Magnitsky Sanctions · Hansard source
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    In support of what the hon. Gentleman is saying, does he agree that it is significant how important even a single ship of this fleet is to the Russian authorities that in desperation yesterday, in a final attempt to stop it being seized, they allowed the Russian flag to be put on one of the vessels, in the hope that that would deter the Americans from gaining control of it? Fortunately, it did not.

  • 8 Jan 2026 · Subsea Telecommunications Cables: Resilience and Crisis Preparedness · Hansard source
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    I congratulate the Committee on its report, and I know that it took evidence from authoritative experts, such as the excellent Elisabeth Braw. Can the Chair explain to the House whether his findings were compatible with the alarming headline in today’s Daily Mail about another report from the Council on Geostrategy think-tank, which claims that cutting just 60 cables going in and out of the UK could affect 99% of our data? Is there more resilience in the system than that would seem to suggest?

  • 7 Jan 2026 · Jury Trials · Hansard source
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    I would like to say, in support of what the hon. Lady has been saying, that surely a distinction of which we need to be aware is that, whereas the judge is a specialist in deciding what the law says and how it should be applied, he or she is not a specialist in deciding whether someone is telling the truth or not; and in that sense, we are far more likely to get the right answer from a group of people considering it together, as a collectivity, than from an individual, no matter how eminent in the intricacies of the law.

  • 7 Jan 2026 · Ukraine and Wider Operational Update · Hansard source
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    Do the Government accept that if you will the ends, you must will the means? The end of the cold war has been mentioned a number of times. It is a fact that at the end of the cold war, we were spending 4.3% of GDP on defence—that was 3.5% under the old way of calculating it—and in the early years of the cold war we were spending in excess of 7%. Can the Secretary of State at least indicate to the House: what is the earliest year in which a Labour Government anticipate spending 3% of GDP on defence?

  • 6 Jan 2026 · Cyber Security and Resilience (Network and Information Systems) Bill · Hansard source
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    I do not think I heard the Minister mention anything about the risk of cyber-attacks on local government. Does my hon. Friend agree that that is another potentially juicy target for people who wish to cause major mischief?

  • 6 Jan 2026 · Cyber Security and Resilience (Network and Information Systems) Bill · Hansard source
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    I am extremely grateful to the Minister for giving way. On the point about regulators, the industry has issued a brief, which points out, quite sensibly, that these regulators are going to have a lot of extra duties to perform and they will therefore need extra resources to be able to perform those duties, but the extra resources they require will only be unlocked when the Bill has passed. Is there not a danger of a transition period where duties will be laid on regulators to fulfil their role before they have the resources to carry it out?

  • 18 Dec 2025 · 15th Anniversary · Hansard source
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    Has my hon. Friend and his Committee considered whether anything can be done to encourage more media interest in the subject of the debates that his Committee grants? I have in mind a particularly outstanding debate on Ukraine, which was initiated by my hon. Friend the Member for Harwich and North Essex (Sir Bernard Jenkin) on Thursday 4 December. Every speech from every participant —with the possible exception of my own—was outstandingly good, yet afterwards I could detect no coverage whatever. Is there anything that can be done to persuade those whose responsibility it is to report on the proceedings of this House that sometimes it is worth taking note of what Back Benchers have to say?

  • 18 Dec 2025 · Ukraine · Hansard source
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    May I endorse what the hon. Member for Portsmouth North (Amanda Martin) and the Minister have said about Lance Corporal George Hooley, who sounds as if he was a fine individual and a great soldier? On 29 December, it will be the 85th anniversary of President Roosevelt’s famous fireside chat radio broadcast, in which he defined his country, which was not then at war, as the “arsenal of democracy” in support of those countries that were at war. He did not say that Churchill had no cards to play. He did not say that Adolf Hitler should be rewarded with recognition of the countries that had been occupied. By the end of the war, the Americans had seen the importance of standing in alliance with the other democracies, and when Germany was divided, they made certain that the western part of Germany was not a military vacuum. Does the Minister agree that if Ukraine is divided by force, then we democracies must make sure that western, free Ukraine is not a military vacuum either?

  • 18 Dec 2025 · Local Government Reorganisation · Hansard source
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    Can I explain to the Minister why this U-turn is worrying? She said that there would have to be strong reasons for elections to be cancelled, and then cancelled them on the basis of not very strong reasons. Her predecessor said that there would have to be very strong reasons why boundary changes might happen during local government reorganisation. We are extremely concerned that Southampton city council wants to split off the sensitive waterside that looks towards the rural New Forest and amalgamate that under its power structure in the future. Can we now be confident that those very strong reasons that would have to be adduced for any boundary changes really amount to any sort of guardianship of the situation at all?

  • 17 Dec 2025 · Puberty Suppressants Trial · Hansard source
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    The Secretary of State deserves our sympathy for having to negotiate such an ethical minefield. Will he tell us whether the data exists from all the people who had puberty blockers under the old regime? He mentioned having met one person for whom they had worked well and one person for whom they were a disaster. Surely it should be possible to do a systematic survey of the dozens, if not hundreds, of people who went through that. Might that be a more constructive and less dangerous way forward?

  • 17 Dec 2025 · UK-EU Common Understanding Negotiations · Hansard source
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    May I thank the Minister for the work he did in another capacity on behalf of the victims, and the relatives of the victims, of the infected blood scandal? He did a very good job, and he reached out to us in a much-appreciated, non-partisan way. This statement is entitled “UK-EU Common Understanding Negotiations”. Is it his understanding, as the Minister for EU relations, that the people with whom he is having dealings are still bent on the creation of a federal United States of Europe? [ Interruption. ] Do I detect some chuntering on the Government Benches to suggest that some people in this House might want to be a part of that?

  • 17 Dec 2025 · Northern Ireland Troubles: Legacy and Reconciliation · Hansard source
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    May I ask the Secretary of State to clarify whether his earlier remarks mean what I think they do, which is that even if it had not been for the guidance of the Joint Committee on Human Rights, the Government would have wanted anyway to have repealed the legislation of the legacy Act? It is a political decision. Given that he said that he did not believe that there would be convictions at the end of the process, does that not mean that there will be several, if not many, trials? If no one is convicted at the end of the process, how does that help anyone? How does that avoid just torturing the people put through a trial?

  • 16 Dec 2025 · Electoral Resilience · Hansard source
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    I hope that the Rycroft review will take account of the fact that the giving of money is by no means the worst aspect, or the main aspect, of treacherous behaviour, because very often these people do what they do out of a genuine belief in a potential enemy’s point of view. It would be interesting to know whether the crime would have attracted such a large sentence as it did if, instead of just money being given, it had been a matter of clandestine contact because the person was willing to spout the Russian line anyway. Let us not be overconcerned with the giving of the bribe, which is often a bonus to people who want to betray us to a potential enemy in any case.

  • 16 Dec 2025 · Africa: New Approach · Hansard source
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    Following on directly from that, what can the Minister tell us about any military advice or assistance that our experts in counter-insurgency are giving to the Governments of friendly Commonwealth countries like Nigeria that face vicious jihadist extremist attack from organisations such as Boko Haram?

  • 16 Dec 2025 · Chagossians: Trust Fund and Resettlement · Hansard source
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    Is, in the Government’s opinion, Mauritius a free society, and what is the Government’s assessment of the nature of its relationship with communist China?

  • 15 Dec 2025 · NHS: Winter Preparedness · Hansard source
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    I hope that the Secretary of State will give a little more consideration to the rather important point raised by the hon. Member for Walthamstow (Ms Creasy) about 16 and 17-year-olds not being able to be vaccinated. If any junior doctor—whether or not a member of the BMA, but particularly if a member of the BMA—decides on ethical grounds to go into work during the period of the strike, and then faces sanctions from the BMA, will the Government protect them?

  • 15 Dec 2025 · Violence against Women and Girls Strategy · Hansard source
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    Is the strategy going to emphasise in any way the role of parents in trying to protect their sons from a torrent of online violent abuse of women, which inevitably is going to distort their attitude to relationships? Schools can do some things, but some things, surely, have to be done within the family?

  • 15 Dec 2025 · Jimmy Lai Conviction · Hansard source
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    Like every other communist regime that has ever existed, the Chinese Government behave with ruthlessness, impunity and unmitigated mendacity. I therefore welcome the strong words in the statement from the Foreign Secretary, but what Members on both sides of the House wish to see is stronger actions. It is not so much a case of one country, two systems, as of one Government and two faces. If our Government cannot even say that a country that poses so many strategic threats is itself a threat, we have an awfully long way to go.

  • 15 Dec 2025 · NATO: European Security · Hansard source
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    Having sat through the debate on Ukraine on 4 December, has the Minister taken on board the important message for our NATO colleagues that if there is a forced division of Ukraine, just as there was of occupied Germany at the end of the war, it will be essential that unoccupied western Ukraine is fully manned with deterrent allied troops? Nothing could be more destabilising than a vacuum in western Ukraine, with a heavily militarised occupied eastern Ukraine under the control of the killer in the Kremlin.

  • 15 Dec 2025 · Topical Questions · Hansard source
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    I welcome the Government’s commitment ultimately to spend 5% of GDP on defence—as we used to do in the cold war years of the 1980s—but not the target date of 2035. Do the Government really believe that there is no threat of attack from Russia on a NATO country for the next 10 years?

  • 10 Dec 2025 · Resident Doctors: Industrial Action · Hansard source
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    I find it rather shocking that when the Secretary of State for Health has offered the BMA leadership an opportunity to strike a few weeks later, they have turned it down, presumably because they prefer to strike at Christmas, when, frankly, lives will be lost as a result. Am I missing something here? Why is it, according to the Secretary of State, that the BMA leaders seem to be so determinedly militant? Does he think that in reality, they simply do not represent the views of their own membership?

  • 9 Dec 2025 · Northern Ireland Troubles: Operation Kenova · Hansard source
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    I am sure the Secretary of State will agree that running any double agent inside a murderous organisation is bound to be a moral nightmare. The justification for such action is always—as it should be—that many more lives will be saved as a result, even if the agent is implicated in illegal and, indeed, murderous activities. What is unusual about this case is that it appears that more lives were not saved by this particular operation. Can the Secretary of State say whether the agencies accept that this particular operation was counterproductive, even in its own terms, and if he cannot share that with us openly, could it at least be shared confidentially with the Intelligence and Security Committee of Parliament?

  • 9 Dec 2025 · Grooming Gangs: Independent Inquiry · Hansard source
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    Few of us here today were present in 2003 when the then MP for Keighley, Mrs Ann Cryer—a courageous Labour Member on the left of her party—spoke out about the grooming gangs. For her troubles, she was smeared as a racist, she was shunned and she was threatened to the point at which she had to have safety devices and emergency alarms installed in her home. Will the Home Secretary join me in paying tribute to her courage belatedly—it has never received any recognition, of which I am aware? Does she not think that Ann Cryer might even now have some insights to share with an inquiry as to what it is like when those who are supposed to be protecting people close ranks to protect the offenders instead?

  • 8 Dec 2025 · Ajax Armoured Vehicle · Hansard source
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    It is hard to think of a comparable disaster without going back to perhaps the early 1960s and the cancellation successively of Blue Streak and Skybolt. I worry that if and when the decision has to be taken that this platform is not fit to be issued to our armed forces, there will be a huge legal stand-off between the MOD and the company as to who is responsible for picking up the bill. Has thought been given to sharpening the pencils of the MOD lawyers?

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