Paul Holmes MP: speeches 2025

Speeches

• 18 Dec 2025 · Local Government Reorganisation · Hansard source

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  I thank the Minister for advance sight of her statement. The question many will be asking out there today is: what does this Labour Government have against democracy? Only two days ago, when asked, the Secretary of State said that all local elections were going ahead. He either hid his decision until today or has changed his mind in the past 48 hours. Which was it? Voters will now potentially be denied the right to elect their own representatives, and not for the first time under this Labour Government. This is the second year in a row that Ministers have scrambled to postpone elections. Now, while many people gather around their screens to watch movies like “How the Grinch Stole Christmas”, we are sitting here discussing how Labour is trying to steal the elections. There is no mandate for the Government’s botched reorganisation plan, and they have behaved as the sole actor, forcing local council leaders to reorganise, with little regard for local people and their democratic rights. Has the Electoral Commission been consulted on these latest changes, or has it been ignored once again? Just as the Speaker’s Committee on the Electoral Commission noted when mayoral elections were previously cancelled, the commission exists to protect the integrity of our electoral system, but time and again the Government seem content to brush aside its advice when it becomes inconvenient. Do the Government still believe in the Gould principle—the long-standing agreement that election rules and practices should not be changed within the six-month period of a scheduled election—or is that expendable whenever Labour finds itself politically vulnerable? The Opposition accept that there is a precedent for a single-year delay, but that is not what we face. Do the Government accept the clear advice of the Electoral Commission that further delays are unacceptable? It said that scheduled polls should be postponed only in exceptional circumstances —what are the exceptional circumstances in this case? We know the answer: Labour’s rushed, chaotic and flawed local government reorganisation plan. It is the Government’s fault, not local leaders’ fault. Have the Government undertaken or commissioned any up-to-date research into the costs of restructuring? Again, we know the answer, and it is a resounding no. What assessment has been made of the paralysis that the restructuring risks causing in local plan preparations? At a time when the Government claim they want to speed up planning, how does freezing governance structures help? Will this disruption not make the Government’s beleaguered 1.5 million homes target even harder to achieve? What about social care? What assessment has been made of the impacts of breaking up counties on adult and children’s social care provision? The broader narrative is clear. Yes, some councils have expressed an interest in restructuring, but Labour’s process has been rushed and deeply flawed, local residents have not been properly consulted and this Labour Government have put a gun to the heads of local council leaders. The Opposition support council leaders who have engaged with the process, such as Kevin Bentley, the leader of Essex county council, who has stated clearly in the public domain that he will not ask for elections to be delayed in Greater Essex. I am pleased to say that my authority, Hampshire county council, does not support the move, either. In December 2024, the Conservatives set out several clear tests; Labour has failed every single one of them. Is this a genuine choice for councils and communities, or are councils being compelled and punished if they do not comply? Will they be more accountable as a result? Will this reorganisation keep council tax down and improve services or simply add new layers of cost? Will it avoid disruption to social care at a time of immense strain? On all counts, the answer is no. Earlier this month, Labour cancelled mayoral elections because it was worried it would not win them. Now it is doing the same with local elections, pausing the democratic process to serve its own political interests, creating for itself a true nightmare before Christmas. The process has been a mess from start to finish. It is not wanted, not in Labour’s manifesto and centrally dictated. It should be scrapped today.

• 17 Dec 2025 · Housing Development: Cumulative Impacts · Hansard source

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  The hon. Gentleman is absolutely correct. My right hon. Friend the Member for East Hampshire and my hon. Friend the Member for Farnham and Bordon made that point, I was about to make it, and the hon. Gentleman’s Liberal Democrat colleagues also made it, so there is universal acclaim for his claim, but it is also absolutely correct. I hope the Minister addresses that. As the amount of housing increases, community infrastructure and resources must be expanded accordingly. That means more schools, GP surgeries, train and bus stations, hospitals, paved roads, bin collections and street lighting, to name just a few of the essentials. The list goes on and on; those are just some of the things we need to consider when looking at where to build. We must get better at prioritising those vital services, while recognising that not every development is right for the area it is proposed for. We all know that under section 106 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990, as amended, local authorities can secure investment to fund new services and infrastructure in the local area, but the system is struggling to keep up with demand. Over a third of all section 106 agreements took longer than 12 months to finalise. Some 76% of local authorities reported an average timeline exceeding a year, and in over a third of councils it was over 500 days. In 2024-25, 45% of local planning authorities had agreements finalised that had taken over 1,000 days to complete. Dose the Minister agree that in order to unlock some of the housing that is needed, we need a simplified and standardised method for section 106 notices across the country? [ Interruption. ] He says yes from a sedentary position. I look forward to his affirming that in his comments shortly, but we would support that.

• 17 Dec 2025 · Housing Development: Cumulative Impacts · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Twigg. I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Member for East Hampshire (Damian Hinds) on raising this important issue for debate today. He and I—as well as our hon. Friend the Member for Farnham and Bordon (Gregory Stafford) —represent stunning Hampshire constituencies, with renowned countryside walking routes and picturesque towns and villages. I still reckon I have the better deal, as my constituents have the “Costa del Hamble”, but I know that my right hon. Friend would definitely say the same about his patch. May I briefly respond to something that the Liberal Democrat spokesman, the hon. Member for Taunton and Wellington (Gideon Amos), said? I do not know whether he planned it as an early Christmas present for me, but the hon. Member for Surrey Heath (Dr Pinkerton) walked in while he was speaking. That was a good thing to see. My right hon. Friend the Member for East Hampshire has instilled in me a sense of déjà vu, which demonstrates the length of time that he has been campaigning on these issues for his constituency. We had a Westminster Hall debate before, and he is right that he cross-examined the Minister, who gave a very pithy response yesterday in the NPPF statement. I know that my right hon. Friend works very hard for his constituents, to make sure that he can get them the acquiescence that they seek from the Government. I congratulate East Hampshire council on developing a local plan and, now, taking the responsible step of renewing it. That shows the kind of leadership that is needed. However, my right hon. Friend raised a number of important points, and I hope that the Minister will answer them. First, he asked about affordability, and about the rise in speculative development because of the lack of five-year housing supply, but the new targets have completely ripped up and undermined the plan-led approach to spatial planning, which the Government are rightly seeking and which I would argue forms the backbone of the planning system. My hon. Friend the Member for Farnham and Bordon said that planning is a huge issue in his postbag. I, too, have that issue, and I suspect that Members from across the House who made brilliant speeches this afternoon also have that issue in their constituencies. It is love of our communities and respect for their unique characters that brought us all here to the Chamber today. My right hon. Friend the Member for East Hampshire and I know that our constituents are not against building more homes in principle—there is a clear need to build many more houses up and down the country; that is a simple fact—but people are asking for the right houses to be built in the right places, and for community resources and infrastructure to be invested in to sustain a growing population, a point that my hon. Friend the Member for Farnham and Bordon made in his contribution. That is why it is so important that we properly assess the impacts of housing development. When multiple housing developments are lumped together, they overwhelm communities, stretch scarce resources and dilute the character of our towns. Over time, people begin to lose their vital sense of belonging and communities lose their identity. The house building sector makes a substantial contribution to the economy. In 2023, new house building generated £53.3 billion in economic output across Great Britain, supporting hundreds of thousands of jobs in house building firms and their contractors, as well as the wider supply chain. But economic benefit depends on stability, confidence and deliverability, and an approach that relies on unrealistic targets, rising costs and declining affordability risks undermining the very industry the Government claim to champion. The impacts of housing developments manifest in numerous key areas. One huge concern, which I receive countless emails about from my constituents—no doubt all Members present can say the same—is the environmental impact of housing developments. The Government had the chance to address such concerns through Lords amendments 38 and 40 to the Planning and Infrastructure Bill, which my Conservative colleagues in the other Chamber supported. However, the Government chose to ignore them, leaving unanswered questions about the environmental harm of their planning process. We know and agree that ripping up the green belt is not the answer. Once the green belt is lost, it is lost forever, and that is why my Conservative colleagues and I have called for the swift redevelopment of brownfield sites, something that—to give the Minister credit—he did address yesterday in the NPPF update. The Campaign to Protect Rural England’s “State of Brownfield” report showed that we have more brownfield land now than in previous years. It highlighted that in a substantial number of local authorities, there is enough brownfield land with planning permission to meet the housing targets set by the Government’s standard method for calculating housing need for at least the next five years. The Government’s plan for new homes disproportionately places the responsibility on rural communities to reach their target, as my right hon. Friend the Member for East Hampshire outlined. The 2024 reforms to the national planning policy framework, introducing mandatory housing targets and a new standard method for calculating local housing need, redistributed top-down housing targets to rural areas from urban areas by Government diktat. As my right hon. Friend outlined, East Hampshire council’s targets doubled, while London’s housing allocations were cut by 11%, Birmingham’s by 38% and Coventry’s by 55%. In Eastleigh in my constituency, which has already built more than is required, the allocation is up by 42%, and in Fareham in the other half of my constituency, it is up by 62%. That is particularly concerning given that, as my right hon. Friend outlined, many younger people whom we want to achieve and get on the housing ladder want to live in metropolitan urban centres. I am pleased that the Government listened to the calls of the Conservative Opposition on the English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill Committee. We called for an incentive for densification in urban centres; it was rejected by the Under-Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, the hon. Member for Peckham (Miatta Fahnbulleh), but now the Government have come forward with one, which we welcome. The point that my right hon. Friend made is that Government regulations and Government legislation are competing against each other. I hope that the Minister will answer my right hon. Friend’s challenge. The new NPPF will designate and allow urban densification, but housing targets in rural areas have massively increased, acting as a competing objective. Which is more important—the NPPF or the housing targets? If housing in towns, in which it is much easier to regenerate and to increase housing numbers, is to be increased, housing targets cannot be uplifted greatly in rural areas but reduced in urban centres.

• 17 Dec 2025 · Housing Development: Cumulative Impacts · Hansard source

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  I disagree with the hon. Gentleman slightly. I remember that in the last Parliament, under the Conservative Government, there absolutely was a commitment from Planning Ministers and Secretaries of State to prioritise brownfield development. That was announced during our time in government by the former Prime Minister but three, and by a number of Ministers in the MHCLG.

• 17 Dec 2025 · Housing Development: Cumulative Impacts · Hansard source

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  Well, I believe the hon. Gentleman will have watched the news. I would be the first to acknowledge that we had quite a few in the last Parliament, but there absolutely was prioritisation of brownfield sites first. We prioritised building houses where they were needed, not where they were not. What steps do the Government plan to take to protect rural communities feeling the adverse effects of increased housing development? If the Government are serious about building homes and maintaining public confidence in the planning system, they must take cumulative impacts seriously, plan infrastructure properly and ensure that developments work with communities, not against them—something that the Liberal Democrats and my party have been very clear will be removed by the Planning and Infrastructure Bill and the English devolution Bill. I have been very clear about my concerns regarding the Government’s housing targets and the credibility of the 1.5 million homes ambition, which is now being questioned by a number of experts. If the Government are serious about supporting the house building sector and securing its economic benefits, they must ensure that housing delivery is realistic, properly planned and supported by the necessary infrastructure. Crucially, this requires a far greater focus on the cumulative impact of development so that growth is sustainable, communities are supported, and the long-term economic and social benefits of house building are not undermined. Finally, Mr Twigg, I wish you, the Clerks and staff, the Minister, and even the Liberal Democrats a very merry Christmas and a happy new year.

• 16 Dec 2025 · Quarries: Planning Policy · Hansard source

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  Will the Minister give way on that point?

• 16 Dec 2025 · Quarries: Planning Policy · Hansard source

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  Will the Minister give way on that point?

• 16 Dec 2025 · Quarries: Planning Policy · Hansard source

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  Will the Minister give way briefly before she concludes?

• 16 Dec 2025 · Quarries: Planning Policy · 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 South Leicestershire (Alberto Costa) on securing the debate, which is vital to me and my constituents. Over the past six years, since being elected in 2019, I have been fighting against a proposal for an aggregate quarry down Hamble Lane in my constituency, which was recently given permission by the planning inspectorate on appeal. In the four minutes that I have to speak, I want to get across to the Minister that the planning system is fractured, disjointed and weighted against local communities. It does not take into account the true nature of quarries or the stuff that they produce; it does not take into account air quality or water run-off that will go into the River Hamble. The Planning Inspectorate is also culpable in not looking at regulations set down by locally elected planning authorities. In my case, it has been acknowledged in local planning authority notices that the Hamble Lane highway—which has one lane going in and out that 200 lorries a day will have to use—is already oversaturated and at capacity, and yet the minerals and waste authority has granted that permission. We have a slightly strange process in Hamble that I want to outline briefly. As I said, we will have 200 lorries a day, but there has been a lack of consultation by Cemex, the company proposing the quarry. I will go as far as to say that Cemex are cowboys and bullies of local communities. There was not one physical consultation with people during covid, the company treats the community with utter disdain, and it treats the planning process as one of its personal toys that it can afford to challenge and manufacture. The Minister needs to be aware of that. The quarry in Hamble is being proposed 50 metres from a primary school and 100 metres from a secondary school. That was not taken into account at all by the planning system. Physical highways data has not been taken account of since covid, but since then hundreds of houses have been built on Hamble Lane. That was not taken into account. Even more concerning is what happened after the regulatory committee of the minerals and waste authority refused the quarry: when 300 of my constituents turned up to attend the final meeting, the minerals and highways authority chose not to defend the reasons for refusal of democratically elected councillors without telling me or a single person in the community. That meant it went to an appeal. My local residents group, the Hamble peninsula residents group, has done a fantastic job in raising funds to defend the appeal, but it was based on flawed data. At no time in my six years as an MP have I been consulted and no one on my local council—I have been working very closely with the Liberal Democrat administration on Eastleigh borough council—has been consulted. That is not good enough.

• 16 Dec 2025 · Quarries: Planning Policy · Hansard source

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  The hon. Gentleman is absolutely correct. His situation sounds very similar to mine. I do not blame the Minister, as she has inherited a system that has been in place for decades, but what confidence can local people have in maintaining high standards when they are not in the guidance? What confidence can local people have in challenging the impact of quarries if the democratic body that refused permission in the first place is overturned by an unelected inspector, with the rug pulled out from under the local authority? Will the Minister commit to meet me to discuss the circumstances of this case? There is a clear democratic deficit in the way in which this has been granted. It was handled by officers who superseded locally elected councillors. We are going to seek a statutory review, but that is now at the cost of the local community. That is not good for local people. People feel absolutely let down in Hamble, as they do across the country. I would be grateful if the Minister would commit to meet me in the coming months to discuss this case specifically.

• 16 Dec 2025 · Quarries: Planning Policy · Hansard source

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  I thank the Minister for giving way. She will recall that in my speech I did not attack the Government at all, so I am not sure why her tone this morning is quite dismissive of other Members of Parliament. I think she should reflect on that. I asked specifically whether a Minister in the Department would meet with me about my case and she has not answered that. I wonder if she could, please.

• 16 Dec 2025 · Quarries: Planning Policy · Hansard source

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  It is actually worse than that, is it not? In my case, the quarry is 50 metres from a local school. Parents are already talking about taking their children out of two very successful schools, which adds to the pressure on communities and the associated infrastructure.

• 16 Dec 2025 · Quarries: Planning Policy · Hansard source

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  On a point of order, Dr Murrison. I am desperately sorry, and I am not usually this kind of politician, but a number of Members have raised specific issues and contributed lived experiences, which relate directly to what the Minister is saying, yet she is not giving way. I seek your advice on how we can interact with the Minister and get some answers from her.

• 16 Dec 2025 · Electoral Resilience · Hansard source

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  I thank the Secretary of State for giving me advance sight of his statement. Let me begin by saying that protecting the integrity of our democratic system from foreign interference is not a partisan issue. It goes to the heart of public trust in our elections. Interference in our elections by foreign actors is something that we must all be vigilant against. I concur fully with what he said about Nathan Gill, and join the Secretary of State in giving sincere thanks to the CPS and the police. Any such crime deserves full condemnation from all Members of this House. The Government announced their election strategy back in July, a strategy that affects all of us in this House. However, there was no consultation of political parties before the strategy was released. There has also been no formal consultation since it was announced. December marks the first time that the Government have engaged with the parliamentary parties panel. We do, however, welcome the announced independent review led by Philip Rycroft, and we wish him well in his work. Will the Minister commit to all parties being consulted during the new independent review’s work? Does he also accept the long-standing convention that Governments should not unilaterally impose changes to the law affecting political parties without proper consultation and cross-party engagement? On electoral resilience, last week the Speaker’s Committee on the Electoral Commission noted that the commission was not consulted at all on the cancellation of the 2026 mayoral elections. Will the Secretary of State update us on whether council elections are going ahead, or will he cancel more elections at the last minute? Will he give electoral officials plenty of notice, whatever he chooses to do? Delving into the Government’s statement, I note that the Government have signalled their intention to introduce “know your customer”-style checks on political donations, but political parties are not banks or the taxman. During the passage of the National Security Bill, the last Government committed to looking at greater powers for information sharing between relevant agencies and with political parties, precisely to identify irregular funding sources. Does the Secretary of State agree that such information sharing would help political parties to meet these new duties? I welcome the Secretary of State’s announcement on cryptocurrencies, and the clarity that they will be in scope of the independent review. The Secretary of State is absolutely right to mention Russia. The last Government legislated for a foreign influence registration scheme to stop covert foreign influence. Can the Minister explain why the Government have repeatedly refused to extend the scheme to China? What reasons are there for leaving such a gap in our national security framework, and will China be included in the scope of the independent review? Unfortunately, that decision sits uneasily alongside the Government ramming through the planning application for the Chinese embassy. How is that meant to convince Members of this House that the Government take seriously foreign interference from all malign powers across the globe? There are clear loopholes that the Government need to address. Loopholes created by the Scottish and Welsh Governments allow Chinese residents in Scotland and Wales to make donations to UK political parties and politicians. What steps are the Government taking to close those loopholes, and to ensure that safeguarding is consistent throughout the whole United Kingdom? Finally, protecting our democracy requires transparent cross-party discussion. Centralised power that bends the knee to the Chinese does not have the United Kingdom’s national interests as a priority. The Secretary of State now has an opportunity to set the record straight, and reassure the House of this Government’s commitment to taking seriously foreign interference by any malign influence. I hope that the concerns I have outlined are directly addressed today.

• 10 Dec 2025 · Seasonal Work · Hansard source

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  Like me, the shadow Secretary of State will have been out in the constituency speaking to small businesses, and I am sure that Labour MPs will have been doing the same over the weekend. A local publican told me that that she would have to lay off staff in January because of the extra taxes that the Chancellor had come back for—more taxes, though she said at the last Budget that she would not introduce more. I wonder whether the shadow Secretary of State has had the same experience when talking to hospitality businesses, which particularly employ young people.

• 10 Dec 2025 · Seasonal Work · Hansard source

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  I thank the hon. Lady for giving way; she is being characteristically courteous. She is entirely correct in outlining the choices and some of the policies that her Government have made, but does she not agree that those choices and policies will be delivered on the back of higher taxation? As a result, employers have less money to employ people, so the proceeds of growth do not mean that there will be better public services. The hon. Lady is right that her Government are spending more money, but that is on the basis of taxation, because of the policies that her Government are advancing, and not on the basis of growth or entrepreneurship.

• 10 Dec 2025 · Conduct of the Chancellor of the Exchequer · Hansard source

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  As usual, the Chief Secretary to the Treasury is out here defending the Chancellor. I feel quite sorry for him. He has reeled off a number of policies that his Chancellor and his Government have made a choice about, but before the election, the Chancellor said that those choices would be on the back of a fully costed manifesto. Instead, taxes have gone up to pay for those choices, and that means that the manifesto was not fully costed. The motion therefore is correct, is it not, that the Chancellor misled the country before the election and in this Budget?

• 3 Dec 2025 · Engagements · Hansard source

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  Q7. In 2020, the Justice Secretary said:“Criminal trials without juries are a bad idea”,and the Prime Minister himself has said that there should be “a right of trial by jury in all criminal cases”,but now they want to scrap trials by jury. With a Chancellor who cannot count and a Justice Secretary who has lost count of the number of people he has let out of prison, is it any wonder that the people of this country cannot ever again trust a single word this Prime Minister or Government say?

• 3 Dec 2025 · Oxford to Cambridge Growth Corridor · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Jeremy. I congratulate the hon. Member for Cambridge (Daniel Zeichner) on securing this important debate on the Oxford-Cambridge growth corridor, an area of enormous potential, world-class institutions and a genuine capacity to drive innovation and national prosperity. He is a dedicated campaigner and champion for his constituency—he has been for a number of years—and that emanated from his speech this afternoon. I would like to mention a few speeches from Members on both sides of the House who have spoken passionately on behalf of their constituencies. The first is my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Bedfordshire (Blake Stephenson), who gave us a wonderful tour of his constituency. I know that the Minister will take away, through officials, his plea for junction 13 of the M1 to be upgraded. We know that north Bedfordshire, like many areas in the community in which he serves, has had a huge expansion. Whatever the hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire (Pippa Heylings) had for breakfast, I would like some too, because we had a very rapid constituency tour, quite rightly explaining to us why her constituency is special. She was right about the infrastructure needs, and particularly the nature and environmental concerns. Her party and mine have been very concerned about some of the retrograde steps that the Government have taken in terms of planning and infrastructure regarding nature and the environment. The hon. Member for Oxford West and Abingdon (Layla Moran) quite rightly gave her view, as she is perfectly entitled to do, on local government reform. In this Chamber we actually heard a disagreement between two Members; I know that my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Bedfordshire has strong concerns about LGR when it comes to a Milton Keynes–Bedfordshire–Luton mayor. That is something that we, again, are concerned about, where local authorities are being forced to reorganise come what may. Projects such as the one we are talking about today suffer as a result and come secondary to a needless reorganisation. The Liberal Democrat spokesman, the hon. Member for Ely and East Cambridgeshire (Charlotte Cane), managed to bring up Brexit in this debate, which I was slightly surprised by. I am never astounded by the tenacity of the Liberal Democrats, even if it does make me wonder why “Democrats” is in their party’s name. The Oxford-Cambridge growth corridor, sometimes called the Oxford-Cambridge arc, is not a new idea, as the hon. Member for Cambridge said. Its origins go back to the early 2000s when three regional development agencies came together with an ambition “to create one of the most successful knowledge-based economies in Europe.” That ambition was renewed in 2016 when the National Infrastructure Commission was tasked to consider how best to maximise the potential of what is indisputably one of the most exciting, knowledge-intensive economic clusters anywhere in the world. The facts speak for themselves. Within the arc, there are at least 10 major higher education institutions, including Cranfield University, with its world-leading strengths in aerospace and automotive engineering; the Open University; and of course the globally renowned universities of Oxford and Cambridge. Those are institutions that any country would be proud to host, yet this Government’s economic policies are stifling their progress, and the progress of the corridor project. That is the crux of the problem: the Chancellor wrote, in her foreword to the Government’s policy paper on the Oxford-Cambridge growth corridor, that “Economic growth is the number one mission of this government and remains at the heart of all we do.” If this is what it looks like when growth is at the heart of what the Government do, I dread to imagine what they would do if they decided it was not a priority. That statement is not the experience of the institutions, businesses and local communities that work tirelessly to ensure that the corridor remains a leading hub of innovation, productivity and opportunity. We know that the Chancellor believes that the corridor could add up to £78 billion to the UK economy and we agree, but that number becomes a reality only if the Government provide the environment, the confidence and the long-term stability that private investors need. Instead, they have hiked taxes, raised business rates and plunged the markets into uncertainty. The Government’s own announcements, dropped somewhat sporadically and often without clarity, speak to their confusion. In October, Ministers published a press release promising jobs, homes and better transport links across the corridor. We heard about water infrastructure investment, a proposed new town at Tempsford, £400 million of initial funding to kick-start development in Cambridge and £15 million for the University of Cambridge innovation hub. All of those things sound encouraging, but this Government have become experts in making announcements while failing to deliver the underlying conditions that make delivery possible. They talk of homes but their housing targets will not be achieved. They talk of infrastructure but cannot secure long-term investment. They talk of growth but have presided over an economy with its growth revised downwards again and again, meaning that long-term problems will be incurred in the progress of this much-needed project. Before the 2024 election, the Chancellor told British people that she would raise taxes by £7 billion. Instead, at last year’s autumn Budget she raised them by £40 billion and at this year’s autumn Budget by another £26.6 billion. Economic forecasters have not been fooled. Since the Chancellor took office, the Office for Budget Responsibility, the Bank of England, the International Monetary Fund and the CBI have all downgraded the UK’s growth prospects. The OBR’s growth forecast for 2026 fell from 1.9% to 1.4%; inflation, which stood at just 2.2% on election day, has risen to 3.8%; the unemployment rate has hit 5%; and the deficit is set to double by ’28-29. The UK now has the fastest rising tax burden in the G7. That does not encourage growth, business investment or the stability that businesses and organisations need to get this project off the ground. In her 2025 Budget, the Chancellor invoked the Oxford-Cambridge growth corridor as an example of a long-term national priority, but what message does it send to the businesses, universities and investors of the corridor when the Government cannot even be transparent about their own growth projections? In this debate, speaker after speaker has rightly emphasised the immense economic, scientific and social value of this region, but potential alone is not enough. Potential needs partnership, consistent leadership and a Government who understand the scale of the opportunity, but everything emanating from the Government has made the aspirations for the corridor more difficult. That is why this debate matters. This corridor is not just about the south-east or the east of England; it is important to the whole country. It is a showcase for the very best of British innovation, where research excellence meets commercial opportunity, where new technologies are born and where global investment sees a home. The Oxford-Cambridge growth corridor is a once-in-a-generation opportunity. With the right leadership it could drive economic growth, technological advancement and prosperity for decades to come. Can the Minister tell us how the Government intend to give the corridor the long-term stability, investment confidence and strategic backing it urgently needs to realise its economic potential? Will he commit to setting out a clear, accountable plan for how the Government will support the institutions, businesses and communities of the growth corridor, so that they can contribute fully to the UK’s future growth, rather than being held back by uncertainty and delay?

• 2 Dec 2025 · Budget Resolutions · Hansard source

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  I am grateful to the Secretary of State for intervening, but this is my intervention, not his. Why was he part of a Cabinet that stood by and punished his colleagues for voting against the two-child benefit cap? Why do we now see this sudden conversion and revisionism? Why does he think that most people in this country who were polled are against the removal of the child benefit cap?

• 2 Dec 2025 · Budget Resolutions · Hansard source

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  Will the Secretary of State give way?

• 1 Dec 2025 · Free School Applications · Hansard source

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  Parents and pupils deserve a school system that builds on success, not one that holds it back. The coalition Government opened 24 free schools in 500 days, yet this Government have spent over 400 days reviewing 44 already-approved schools. Free schools outperform non-selective state schools at every key stage, so why are this Government blocking more children from accessing a good education?

• 1 Dec 2025 · Free School Applications · Hansard source

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  13. What her planned timetable is for decision on existing free school applications.

• 1 Dec 2025 · Budget Resolutions · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend is right. My constituency on the south coast has Oil Spill Response Ltd, which tackles oil spills. At a recent event, the vice-president of a very big oil company said that it was essentially closing up its operations in the UK and moving 50 miles up the road to Norway. Has she found the same in her constituency?

• 24 Nov 2025 · East Sussex County Council: Elections · Hansard source

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  The Secretary of State really needs to do better than that. With local government reform not being in the Labour party manifesto and with the Prime Minister last week refusing to rule out further cancellations of local elections, will the Secretary of State now rule out—not “intention” but rule out—cancelling the next local elections, yes or no?