Martin Vickers MP: speeches

Speeches

• 2 Jul 2026 · Business of the House · Hansard source

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  The Chairman of the Committee sends his apologies, Mr Speaker. In addition to the business that the Leader of the House has announced, the Committee has agreed two Select Committee statements: one next Thursday from the Science, Innovation and Technology Committee and one the following Thursday from the Work and Pensions Committee. In addition, in Westminster Hall next week, there will be debates on UK aid policy in the context of global funding trends and on the humanitarian impact of conflicts on older people. On Thursday, there will be a debate on Government support for the Lobular Moon Shot Project. The following week, there will be debates on isolation and hidden deprivation in coastal communities, on the impact of the national planning policy framework changes and on capital funding for Changing Places. I urge Members to take part in the Sir David Amess debate, which the Leader of the House mentioned. It is an opportunity to raise any constituency matters and perhaps to avoid having to come to the Backbench Business Committee, where we have to find more time for those debates. In addition, will the Leader of the House give the Committee early notice of debating time in September, particularly if it is on the first day back? Moving on to my own question, I am sure the Leader of the House will be aware of the long-running campaign by the National Association of Retired Police Officers in respect of the injustice to widows and widowers, who can be deprived of their pension if they remarry. I have raised the matter in the House previously. Will the Leader of the House arrange for the Minister to come here and outline the Government’s plans? I know that would please many of my constituents and others across the country.

• 29 Jun 2026 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  I recently visited Grimsby jobcentre and met Nick Gregory and Jo Corney, two excellent officials. One piece of information they gave me was about the opening of a youth hub in Scunthorpe, which will serve many parts of my constituency, but many of the young people who go will be from rural areas. What new initiatives are the Government planning to help provide work for young people in rural areas?

• 29 Jun 2026 · NHS Breast Screening · Hansard source

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  Order. I remind Members that they should bob if they wish to contribute—as they are doing. I will not impose a time limit at this stage. If you stick to about five minutes each, we should accommodate everyone.

• 25 Jun 2026 · Ports and Port Connectivity · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Ms Jardine. I congratulate the hon. Member for Truro and Falmouth (Jayne Kirkham) on securing this important debate. As the Member representing Immingham, the UK’s largest port by tonnage, and whose constituency includes part of Grimsby—although not the dock estate—I know at first hand that ports are the lifeblood of our coastal communities and the driving force of our national economy. Immingham and the Humber ports are owned by Associated British Ports and have freeport status. On his visit a few weeks ago, I know the shadow Secretary of State, my right hon. Friend the Member for Basildon and Billericay (Mr Holden), was impressed by its size and the part it plays in the local economy. Around 85% by weight of international freight traded with the UK moves by sea. Nowhere is that reality more evident than in the Humber, the UK’s No. 1 gateway for trade by volume, handling around 17% of all UK port traffic, facilitating over £60 billion of trade and supporting 90,000 regional jobs. However, the national figures show a worrying trend: between January and March 2026, total freight tonnage through major ports decreased by 3%. If we want to justify and unlock further investment in port connectivity, we must see stronger economic growth. The constraint on our growth is not a lack of private capital or market demand. ABP has invested £1 billion across the UK over the last five years, and has billions more ready to deploy. Significant private investment is happening at scale right now in my constituency: in Immingham, the new £200 million Immingham eastern ro-ro terminal is under construction and, at nearby Stallingborough, the 227-acre Helm development is being built out. The pace and scale of those developments depend entirely on connectivity. While road links are vital—Stallingborough is a brilliant case study of how early local authority road investment successfully unlocked private capital—our future system-wide growth relies on energy and rail infrastructure. First, energy connectivity is critical. Delays in grid capacity and connection timings are harming investment across the UK. Green energy, hydrogen and carbon capture projects cannot proceed without timely access to power. I hope the Minister can outline what steps are being taken to accelerate progress on that. Secondly, we must address transport links—particularly since, with the new rail Bill, the Government make much of the fact that they will be taking direct control. Rail freight handles about 10% of port throughput nationally. While Immingham connects directly into national supply chains, rail constraints are limiting our ultimate geographic advantage. We must improve capacity, gauge clearance and network resilience across the northern networks if we are to increase economic growth in our port areas. It is critical to increase rail freight capacity serving ports alongside improving road links. Turning to the highway network, the M180 becomes the A180 at Barnetby, and the last few miles into Immingham are overcrowded and rely on an ancient concrete road, which causes great problems for both traffic and the local community. I will have to move on quickly, Ms Jardine, and skip a couple of pages of my speech, but I note that hon. Members are passionate about their coastal communities. We must do all we can to ensure that the economic growth that they can deliver is indeed delivered. Only with investment from both the private and public sectors can that be achieved.

• 25 Jun 2026 · Business of the House · Hansard source

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  As the Leader of the House and Members from across the House will be aware, when charities and voluntary groups arrange drop-in sessions in Parliament, we Members receive emails from constituents urging us to attend and support them. Yesterday, I attended the Leukaemia UK event in the House, and as is often the case, the main request of those attending was for early diagnosis. Could the Leader of the House arrange for a Health Minister to come to the House and give those people some reassurance about earlier diagnosis of this terrible disease?

• 25 Jun 2026 · Steel Trade Measure · Hansard source

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  Hundreds of my constituents work at Scunthorpe steel, so I am obviously supportive of any action that the Government take that will protect those jobs. I also welcome the adjustments that the Minister has announced, and I agree that it is preposterous that defence contracts do not ensure that we use British steel. Surely doing that is one of the benefits of not being tied to EU procurement rules. Does he agree that it is in the Government’s gift to ensure that the industry benefits from reduced energy costs? What will the Government do to ensure that the Scunthorpe works benefit from lower energy costs in the very near future?

• 24 Jun 2026 · Media Green Paper · Hansard source

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  I have been relying on the BBC to deliver news since the days when Jack de Manio was presenting the “Today” programme and John Snagge was reading the news, and I still rely on the BBC to a considerable extend, but it does annoy me intensely at times, particularly recently, when cuts were announced. The programmes that it seems to be cutting are public service programmes, not ones delivered by the commercial sector. On top of that, we see the demise of news coverage on local radio. Will the Secretary of State assure me that she will convey those views to the BBC? Hopefully, it will have a rethink.

• 24 Jun 2026 · North Sea Oil and Gas · Hansard source

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  The hon. Gentleman is making a compelling case for the domestic industry. Does he agree that, in this troubled period of world history, our refining capacity in the UK should also be maintained? As he will know, Lindsey oil refinery in my constituency was recently closed, although some operations continue. Does he agree that we have to maintain capacity across the industry?

• 23 Jun 2026 · Fly-tipping: Residential Areas · Hansard source

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  The hon. Member—my Member of Parliament—is being very generous in giving way. Her comment about the community is very relevant. To give one example, there was an action day in Immingham only two or three weeks ago, which involved not only local authority councillors but, in our case, Lincolnshire Housing Partnership. The important thing I want to stress is that the funding was made available by Phillips 66, so does she agree that the private sector can make a contribution by supporting community groups?

• 16 Jun 2026 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  Last month, along with other members of the all-party parliamentary group on Gibraltar, I visited the Rock in order to assess responses to the proposed treaty at first hand. Will the Minister give us an update? When does he anticipate that the treaty will be finalised?

• 10 Jun 2026 · Local Government Reform · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Dr Murrison. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Harborough, Oadby and Wigston (Neil O’Brien) on securing this important debate. Like the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon), I served for 26 years as a local councillor, 14 of them were on the former Grimsby borough council. I then served for another 12 years on what became North East Lincolnshire unitary authority. I tend to favour unitary councils on the whole, and I have some sympathy with elected mayors—I can see the value of them in the big cities—but how we balance their powers and look after the interests of provincial towns and larger rural counties is open to debate. I am not yet convinced of the need to have a mayor for a vast rural county such as Lincolnshire. The Minister will know that the Government, in proposing any form of local government reform, are opening a can of worms of local rivalries—civil war within the Labour party, I am sure, and other issues. The Minister is too young to remember the local government reorganisation of 1973-74; I think I am probably the only one who can remember it but, in many respects, it turned out to be a disaster. My former Grimsby council was pushed into Humberside county. County Humberside was a complete and utter disaster. The identities north and south of the river are completely different. If Humberside is mentioned on the streets of Grimsby nowadays, the response is—shall we say—not polite, to say no stronger than that. It was a complete and utter disaster. The previous Government tried to create a Humber local enterprise partnership, which failed because it was cross-river. We still have Humberside police and Humberside fire authorities and so on, but even now I would say to leave those well alone. We all tend to favour devolution because it means that local people are making decisions. That is good but, of course, it leads to a postcode lottery, because different councils will make different decisions. My appeal to the Minister is about local government finance. When I was first elected, way back in 1980, local government was still a really powerful force in the local community and could embark on some very important projects of great benefit; but over the years I have seen the powers and responsibilities whittled away, and local authorities, to a great extent, are tools of central Government. That will always be the case to some degree, because central Government relies on local authorities to deliver many essential services, but local pride and local identity play their part. I keep talking about Grimsby—I only have one ward of Grimsby in my new constituency, but I am a resident there, and that gives me some right to speak about it. We have had a mayor since 1201, apart from a few months when Grimsby was abolished and we merged into North East Lincolnshire, and we had a chairman. Thankfully, we got a new royal charter and ended up with a mayor, because local identity is important. People like the mayor turning up in the red robes and chains of office to open the church bazaar and those sorts of things. It creates identity, something that is sadly lacking. If we go into any northern town and look around the central square, we will see vast town halls and great civic buildings, mostly constructed in Victorian and Edwardian times. They knew how to project local identity, power and responsibility, and I would like to see something of a return to that. My particular plea is on the financial basis of local authorities. Many are in debt, and unless local government reorganisation is linked to reform of local government finance, we are in desperate straits. Many authorities have already issued section 114 notices, and others are teetering on the edge. As the hon. Member for Chichester (Jess Brown-Fuller), who is no longer in her place, mentioned earlier, many of the new authorities do not have a financial foundation on which to build. We urgently need local government finance reform. The poll tax—community charge—from the 1980s now frightens us. It was a mistake, but the fear of reorganising the finances lingers on. Unless there is a firm financial foundation, new authorities, as well as some of the existing ones, will flounder. North Lincolnshire council has an excellent Conservative-run administration. North East Lincolnshire council sadly now has a Reform leader, but that is hopefully only temporary. My plea to the Minister is this: “Please leave Lincolnshire as it is for the moment and look at the finance of local authorities.”

• 9 Jun 2026 · Steel Industry (Nationalisation) Bill · Hansard source

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  As Members will be aware, part of the Scunthorpe steelworks site falls within my Brigg and Immingham constituency. As such, hundreds of my constituents work there, and hundreds more are employed in the supply chain. With that in mind, I made it known to my constituents a number of weeks ago that I would support this Bill. It could have been improved, and the Opposition tabled some perfectly sensible amendments, which I supported. However, having got to this stage, I think it is only right that we give our full support to the business and, more importantly, to the workers employed there. I thank the Minister with responsibility for steel. We have had a number of meetings in recent weeks, and he has been extremely helpful. As I said in a previous contribution to this debate, it is not natural for me as a Conservative to support a nationalisation Bill, but the reality is that it is of course a restructuring. The existing position whereby the Chinese own the business and the Government in effect run it is clearly unsustainable, and we cannot allow that to continue, so it is a perfectly sensible move. I was reassured by what the Minister said in yesterday’s debate about the Government looking for private sector involvement, whether that be a wholesale sale or a partnership arrangement. I have met two or three groups that are interested in investing in the sector. Indeed, the hon. Member for Scunthorpe (Sir Nicholas Dakin) and I had quite an interesting evening a few weeks ago listening to what was, I think it is fair to say, quite an ambitious plan for steel, so there are organisations and businesses that are prepared to invest. Scunthorpe without steel would not be Scunthorpe. As a resident of Grimsby, I have witnessed what can happen to a town when it loses its core industry—in the case of Grimsby, it was of course the deep-sea fishing industry—and when that happens, it takes about two generations for the local economy to be able to sustain the jobs that are necessary. On that basis, I will certainly be supporting the Bill. The Minister was not quite 100% clear when challenged about the continuation of production in blast furnaces. I know the situation, and I recognise that a long-term move to electric arc furnaces is perhaps the only way to sustain the industry and the jobs in Scunthorpe. So I await developments with interest, but at this stage I welcome the Bill, which is a sensible way forward and has my full support.

• 8 Jun 2026 · Steel Industry (Nationalisation) Bill · Hansard source

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  I have already made clear to my constituents that I do not oppose the Bill, but I support the Opposition Front Benchers in trying to constrain its cost. Will the hon. Gentleman give a specific figure, or is the Reform policy just to spend, spend, spend?

• 4 Jun 2026 · Business of the House · Hansard source

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  I will be brief because my question has already been asked by the hon. Member for Great Grimsby and Cleethorpes (Melanie Onn). I met exactly the same group of hospitality business at Healing Manor in my constituency and Stallingborough Grange. The list of taxes, charges and levies the hon. Lady referred to reaches a total of 68, which is clearly unsustainable for many businesses. As well as the meeting with a Treasury Minister, which I understand has already taken place, may we have a debate on the subject—preferably in Government time—given that it affects constituencies across the country?

• 3 Jun 2026 · Small Towns: Transport Links · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair, Sir Roger. I congratulate the hon. Member for Rossendale and Darwen (Andy MacNae) on securing this important debate. My constituency has 11 railway stations, the largest port in the country and an international airport, so people might think that it would be of major interest to the Department of Transport, with the focus entirely on the Brigg and Immingham constituency. Sadly, it is not as easy to get around the constituency as people might imagine. In addition, five railway stations in the Great Grimsby and Cleethorpes constituency also serve my constituents. Nevertheless, getting around my area is not as easy as it should be. The Father of the House, my right hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough (Sir Edward Leigh), has outlined our long-running campaign—it has been running for 15 years now—to secure a direct service from Cleethorpes, through my constituency, to London. There are five trains a day from King’s Cross to Lincoln, and it would take a small amount of money to run those Azumas through my constituency before they finish their journey in Cleethorpes. However, as my right hon. Friend pointed out, the Department for Transport has made endless objections and said that such a service cannot be delivered. The Father of the House also mentioned the service from Gainsborough to Cleethorpes, which passes through Brigg. Brigg, a town of 5,500 people, should have better rail connectivity than it does. It has a railway station, and there used to be a roof over all of it. It was a fantastic station—very much like Gainsborough Central used to be—but sadly it is a pale shadow of its former self and now has only one platform, although, unlike Market Rasen station, it has a bridge to allow people to get over to the other platform, even if that other platform is out of use. Improving rail connections through to Cleethorpes is important. It would help the leisure sector considerably. The service from Cleethorpes through my constituency to Barton-upon-Humber is a two-hourly service. The Barton Cleethorpes community rail partnership, which is very active and takes a close interest in the operation of the service, has been campaigning to increase that to one service every hour. I urge the Minister to consider that proposal if he can. Let me return to the Brigg service. We hear much about the creation of Great British Rail, but Northern Rail, which runs the service from Gainsborough to Cleethorpes, has been in public ownership since 2020, so the Minister could have delivered on this. I acknowledge that previous Ministers could also have done so, but it is his job now. I challenge him to say, when he responds to the debate, that he will consider and deliver the proposal.

• 2 Jun 2026 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  Last Saturday, I met representatives from a number of well-established hospitality businesses in my constituency, one of whom is facing an energy cost increase of £70,000 this year. That is clearly unsustainable. What are Ministers doing to prevent unchecked energy increases from happening year on year?

• 1 Jun 2026 · Child Sexual Offender Data · Hansard source

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  Order. I remind Members not to address the Public Gallery, but to speak through the Chair.

• 21 May 2026 · Business of the House · Hansard source

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  I recently visited the North Cotes shooting club in my neighbouring constituency, where hundreds of my constituents gather every week to participate in their chosen sport. They tell me that there are proposals to merge section 1 and section 2 certificates for the licensing of shotguns and rifles, but they are very different. Will the Leader of the House arrange for the Minister responsible to have a look at this issue and perhaps report back to the House?

• 19 May 2026 · Energy Security · Hansard source

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  My right hon. Friend is making an excellent point about British Steel, where hundreds of my constituents work. Does he agree that in the short term, nationalisation may be the way forward, but in the longer term, we need to get private sector investment into the industry, and the way to achieve that is to reduce energy costs? That is absolutely critical, not just for steel but for so many of our heavy industries.

• 19 May 2026 · High Speed 2 Reset · Hansard source

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  Having chaired the all-party parliamentary group on rail for the last nine or 10 years, I have seen a procession of Ministers and officials come along and give reassurances such as those we have heard from the Secretary of State today. It is hard to believe that her successors will not come to the House in the distant future to talk about further resets of the project. Will the Secretary of State assure us that the spending on HS2 will not affect the announcement she made a few weeks ago about improving other rail services in the north? I know that she would be disappointed if I did not also mention the campaign by me and the Father of the House to improve services to northern Lincolnshire.

• 14 May 2026 · Business of the House · Hansard source

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  Last Sunday, along with the hon. Member for Great Grimsby and Cleethorpes (Melanie Onn), I attended the annual service for lost fishermen at Grimsby minster, organised by the Fishermen’s Mission. The timing was unfortunate because the EFL scheduled Grimsby Town’s play-off game for the same afternoon, and despite being only 10 minutes late to the game, I missed two goals—but that is by the way. Would the Leader of the House join me in congratulating the Fishermen’s Mission on the work that it does? Although it is over 30 years since the deep-sea fishing industry in Grimsby went into decline, there are still many families affected by the loss of brave fishermen who went out in all weathers.

• 13 May 2026 · Debate on the Address · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to take part in this King’s Speech debate. I join with others in congratulating the hon. Members for Bradford West (Naz Shah) and for Harlow (Chris Vince) on the way they spoke earlier. I want to focus in particular on the proposals to nationalise British Steel. My constituency takes in a part of the Scunthorpe steelworks site. Many hundreds of my constituents work in the industry, with many more working in the supply chain. It is worth noting that the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government estimates that closure of the steelworks could equate to a loss in economic output in northern Lincolnshire of £802 million over the next five years. As a Conservative, it is not natural for me to speak in favour of nationalisation; it is somewhat uncomfortable in many respects. However, the present situation—Jingye still owns the site, but Ministers and appointed officials manage it—is clearly not sustainable, and it is difficult to see any other alternative in the short term. The hon. Member for Milton Keynes Central (Emily Darlington) spoke about the privatisations of the Thatcher years, and it is certainly the case that some of them need refining; certainly they need better regulating. It is worth noting, however, that for 13 years, between 1997 and 2010, the Labour party was in power and could have done something about those privatised companies. I think the big fault with the privatisation process was not the actual process initially, but what followed, with many companies now in foreign ownership and poorly regulated. I want to comment on the EU reset that was proposed in the speech. I am an ardent Brexiteer. I am old enough to have voted to leave the EU—or the common market as it was then—in 1975, so my credentials in that respect are pretty good. I have no objection in principle to resetting our arrangements with Europe; clearly, we need to trade with Europe and we need good working relationships there. However, I would just warn Government Members that EU procurement rules and over-regulation will not be helpful to much of our industry. If we are to remain a manufacturing nation—I share the view held by Members across the House that that should be the case—we need a domestic steel industry. As I have said in the House on previous occasions when we have discussed the steel industry, if we are going to maintain a domestic steel sector, which we must, there will be a cost to the taxpayer. Whether that is through subsidy or through nationalisation, the cost will certainly be there. Scunthorpe thrives on the steelworks; as I have mentioned, 3,000 to 4,000 people work there, and many more work in the supply chain. Although I was born in Cleethorpes, I moved to Grimsby at the age of five, when my parents were allocated a council house, which they thought, quite rightly, was magnificent. In Grimsby, I lived through the decline of the deep-sea fishing industry, which means I am very aware of how such a decline can affect a town and its people. I subsequently went to work as the constituency agent for the current Father of the House in Gainsborough, which was in a similar situation at that time; the two big engineering companies had closed, and the inevitable downturn resulted. I do not want that to be repeated in Scunthorpe and the surrounding area. I am grateful to the Under-Secretary of State for Business and Trade, the hon. Member for Stockton North (Chris McDonald), for contacting me on Monday and going through the proposals. I hope that when Ministers wind up these debates, they will give an assurance not only that the Government are committed to the steel industry, but that they will ensure that the blast furnaces now in Scunthorpe remain operational until electric arc furnaces are up and running. I will move on to one or two other items. We heard from the hon. Member for Newport West and Islwyn (Ruth Jones) that the Great British Railways Bill will transform the railway network. I suggest that transformation will cost money and that taking the private sector out of the railway industry will mean the taxpayer has to find yet more money, which may well result from Government borrowing. The other hit that my local economy has taken recently has been the closure of the Prax Lindsey oil refinery at Killingholme, near Immingham. That, again, has led to the local economy taking a really serious hit in recent months. We have heard oil mentioned today. I urge the Government to look again at the licences for the North sea. I would also like to talk about local government, as I see no mention in the King’s Speech of how we are going to improve local government services. I was a councillor for 26 years; I worked for 14 of those years on Grimsby borough council, which was in the two-tier system, followed by another 12 years at the North East Lincolnshire unitary authority. I support the changes to unitary authorities as a gradual process, but I suggest to the Government that local government reform as it is proceeding at the moment is just rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic—it is not dealing with the serious business of the services that local government provides. The hon. Member for Dewsbury and Batley (Iqbal Mohamed) spoke earlier about basic council services—cutting grass, maintaining parks and libraries, and the like. I see no way in which this is likely to change. If we are to create a vision and make people want to be part of their local communities to a much greater extent, local authorities can play a major part in doing that, but they need resources. I remember the days when even the lamp posts in Grimsby had the coat of arms on them. Now we have street furniture all over the place, but it is just basic grey steel. The place begins to look a mess. If we are going to tidy up our towns and improve the public realm, it is vital that local authorities have resources, but I do not see the Government looking seriously at ways to improve that.

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

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  Yesterday I held a meeting with representatives from Hydrogen UK, a number of whose members have projects planned for my constituency. They expressed concern about the delay in the publication of the Government’s hydrogen strategy. The delay is costing these companies many thousands of pounds and may lead to them withdrawing investments, which would obviously be damaging for the local economy and the ambitions of the Government’s growth agenda. Will the Leader of the House arrange for an early statement from a Minister to announce the strategy to let us get moving with these projects?

• 16 Apr 2026 · Archbishop of Canterbury · Hansard source

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  Many rural areas are served by clergy who are responsible for multiple parishes. Will the hon. Lady urge the archbishop to focus on providing more priests for rural parishes?

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

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  Last Friday, along with the leader of North Lincolnshire council, I visited the carers support centre in Brigg, and met the staff and volunteers who do such an excellent job. I also heard from individual carers about the challenges they face, one of which, incidentally, is the complexity of the Government forms they have to complete for various benefits. Could the Leader of the House find time for a debate to explore how we can better support carers up and down the country?