Patricia Ferguson MP: speeches 2025

Speeches

• 16 Jan 2025 · Church of England: Racial Injustice · Hansard source

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  The Church’s work to recognise the importance of diversity and on proactive anti-racism is very welcome, but what steps is it taking to address its historical links to the slave trade?

• 15 Jan 2025 · Engagements · Hansard source

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  This year marks the 850th anniversary of my home city of Glasgow. One of the key aims of the celebration is to speed up ambitions around the city council’s grand challenge of tackling poverty and inequality and increasing prosperity and opportunity—themes that chime clearly with this Government’s agenda. Will the Prime Minister join me in congratulating Glasgow on this milestone, and does he agree that people make Glasgow?

• 9 Jan 2025 · Business of the House · Hansard source

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  Will my right hon. Friend join me in congratulating the young women across the country who took part in the CyberFirst girls competition, and especially the winners in the Scotland section, Charlotte, Jess, Sania and Aoife of Hyndland secondary school in my constituency? Does she agree that it is increasingly important that girls are encouraged to pursue an interest and, perhaps, a career in cyber security?

• 9 Jan 2025 · Impact of Conflict on Women and Girls · Hansard source

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  I apologise in advance, Sir Jeremy; I am slightly under the weather today and have got a bit of a sore throat, so this might not come out quite as I intended. I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Norwich North (Alice Macdonald) for securing this important debate. Although we often focus on issues around conflict and violence, and what can be done to resolve them, we can sometimes miss the fact that conflict disproportionately affects women and girls. During times of conflict, existing inequalities are magnified and exaggerated, leading to further insecurity, homelessness and particularly violence and sexual violence against women and girls. We have already heard from my hon. Friend about the current situation in Gaza, which, as we know, is unconscionable. It is estimated that almost 50 mothers and their children are killed every day. According to World Health Organisation estimates, 183 women give birth every day and, as we have heard, many are enduring C-sections without anaesthesia or other medicines. Ironically, many of the supplies that could resolve that problem are probably sitting at the borders, in the convoys that we know have been sent by international agencies and Governments, including our own, and could be put to use. So desperate is the need that it is just outrageous that those supplies are not being allowed to reach the people who need them so badly. In Myanmar, women have borne the brunt of the military oppression in that country and have been subjected to a rise in intimate partner violence and sexual violence, too. Some 3 million people have been displaced, which in turn puts women at further risk of violence and abuse, because they are separated from those who would normally, one would hope, help to defend them—their fathers and brothers, and their husbands and partners. At the same time in Myanmar, women are shut out of any discussion or high-level debate about making peace—I will return to that point a little later. I was pleased to read about the Minister’s and the Government’s ongoing commitment and work, through the preventing sexual violence and conflict initiative, which I understand remains a real priority for our Government. I hope the Minister will say a little about that at the end of the debate. When it comes to peacebuilding—hopefully we will move to peacebuilding efforts eventually in some of these conflicts—women are often excluded from the efforts and discussions, which leads to further entrenched disenfranchisement. Women are often the people who hold together communities, and often have a deeper understanding of the whole-community needs in humanitarian emergencies in particular. As we know, in many traditions they still hold the major caring responsibilities and are very much integrated into their communities, but they are not well resourced or respected as international humanitarian actors. Our Government’s commitment to take forward resolutions to these conflicts is very welcome, and it is what we would expect, but I hope the Minister can give us some sense of how women will be involved in that work as we go forward. Women being affected by conflict is not a new phenomenon—it has probably been with us for the whole history of humankind—but now we know how wrong and unacceptable it is. Because of social media, television and all the other media channels that we have, we know for ourselves exactly what is going on. We cannot turn a blind eye to it. If we do not involve women in resolving conflict and in peacebuilding initiatives, we are destined to repeat the mistakes of the past—something I suspect none of us would wish to do.

• 7 Jan 2025 · Northern Gaza · Hansard source

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  I thank the hon. Member for Oxford West and Abingdon (Layla Moran) for securing this urgent question; it is indeed urgent. At the UN, the UK called for Israel to abide by UNSC resolution 2286 on the protection of civilians and healthcare. It is clear that Israel is not abiding by that resolution, so with the words having been uttered and ignored, what will the Government now do to ensure that Israel is held to account for its actions?