Paul Waugh MP: speeches

Speeches

• 10 Jun 2025 · Nuclear Power: Investment · Hansard source

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  Andy Burnham’s Atom Valley mayoral development zone for advanced manufacturing will be based in Rochdale, Oldham and Bury, and it is so named in honour of Ernest Rutherford’s groundbreaking research at the University of Manchester on splitting the atom. Does my right hon. Friend welcome the fact that today’s huge public investment in both nuclear and nuclear fusion will rely on precisely the kind of cutting-edge research that will be done at the Sustainable Materials and Manufacturing Centre in Rochdale?

• 7 May 2025 · India-Pakistan: Escalation · Hansard source

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  The murder of 26 civilians in Pahalgam was truly horrific, but India’s airstrikes have resulted in the deaths of 26 civilians in Pakistan and Azad Kashmir. This cannot be a bizarre, macabre game of tit-for-tat where the only people who suffer are civilians on both sides. Can the Minister reassure my Rochdale constituents, many of whom are concerned about family members, that the Government are doing everything they can through their consular access and also at diplomatic level to de-escalate the situation and to make it crystal clear to India that water cannot be used as a weapon of war against the wider people of Pakistan and Kashmir?

• 20 Mar 2025 · Fly-tipping · Hansard source

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  Rochdale council has removed 6,500 fly- tips this past year alone, the equivalent of 50 tonnes of illegally dumped waste every month, at a cost of £400,000 to local taxpayers. But my council tells me that there is a real failure in the courts issuing consistent and tough enough fines. Does the Minister agree with me that it is time to crack down harder on fly-tippers, put much tighter regulations on waste carriers and treat the fly-tippers like the criminals they are, by crushing their cars and putting points on their licences?

• 10 Feb 2025 · Biomass Generation · Hansard source

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  Drax has been a greenwashing con that has ripped off the British public for far too long, so I welcome the statement. The Minister and the Energy Secretary have done more than eight previous Tory Energy Ministers, and indeed one Lib Dem Secretary of State. I welcome the move to slash the subsidy for Drax and to enforce 100% sustainability targets on its supply chains. But when the Minister talks about a windfall mechanism, may I gently urge him to call a spade a spade? This is a windfall tax on Drax and we should be proud of saying so.

• 3 Dec 2024 · National Insurance Contributions (Secondary Class 1 Contributions) Bill · Hansard source

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  Forgive me, Madam Deputy Speaker. Labour is the party taking tough decisions today and refusing to duck the issues that the Conservatives were so timid to grasp, from planning reform to energy security, from welfare reform to removing tax breaks for the richest. In the past four weeks, the Conservatives have made £6.7 billion of commitments to cut taxes, but they have not said which public services they would cut to fund them. But the most damning indictment of their low-pay, low-growth, low-investment, low-productivity economics was the model that totally failed. In 1964, the outgoing Tory Chancellor Reggie Maudling bumped into James Callaghan and said, “Good luck, old cock. Sorry to leave it in such a mess.” It is a shame that the current Tory party cannot earn up to their own failures with a similar sense of regret or humility.

• 29 Oct 2024 · Terrorism (Protection of Premises) Bill (First sitting) · Hansard source

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  Q Thank you, Andy, and thanks also to Figen and Brendan. You all make a really powerful case for why strengthening security actually helps business—it is not just helping the public, but helping businesses to thrive because then they can attract people in a secure, safe environment. However, at the same time, some smaller, independent, live concert promoters, very small-scale people, are worried about the impact on them. The reason Martyn went to this gig was the reason a lot of people go to gigs—they love music. You love music. Greater Manchester, and Manchester itself, is fantastic for music. Could you explain what is happening in Manchester locally to reassure some of those small-scale live music people, who are saying that this could put them out of business—“We’re not the big boys, we’re not the arena, how can we cope with this and make everyone feel safe without changing our way of life?” As Brendan said, not changing our way of life is ultimately the purpose of this legislation. Andy Burnham: It is a good question, Paul, and it goes back to the guidance for local authorities. The way we work—when I say “we”, I am thinking of the leader of Manchester city council, Bev Craig, and deputy Mayor of Greater Manchester, Paul Dennett; people you will know—is that we get close to the venues because we all love music and we are a music city region. You will know that there has been a threat to one of our venues night and day in recent times; at different points, we have had similar issues with other venues. We cherish the infrastructure, and we work hard to keep it. We work hard to understand the issues that venues have, and how we can work in a practical way to help them. That is what I mean by getting close to the night-time economy—that is critical, and it is one of the things we do really well in this country. It is a big reason why people come and visit Britain: not just for the big arenas, but for the grassroots music scene as well. We had WOMEX, the Worldwide Music Expo, in the city last week; Councillor Besford has been very much at the heart of that, and he runs the English folk festival. We, like Edinburgh, often have events that involve the smallest and the biggest. My point is: do not just impose things on venues. You have to sit down and talk with them and ask what we can do to help. This is my point about Greater Manchester Fire Rescue Service—if you have a capable fire service, they can go in and help. The blue-light services can help provide the training and help people comply with the measures in the Bill. This is not just about leaving venues on their own, saying, “Here is Martyn’s law, so get on with it even if it puts you out of business.” That is not how it is done. We are doing it a different way: get down there and listen to them all. They will all have different issues, so support what they do because they are important in bringing visitors to the city. I am just giving you the Manchester perspective. That is the way we go about things. The music infrastructure in the city, and the broader entertainment infrastructure, is highly valued. There was an era when a certain nightclub was just left to close and there are flats there now. We do not think like that these days; we protect the infrastructure and that means supporting the venues. It is tough for them, so get close to them and support them. I appreciate that times are hard, but there are blue-light services everywhere that can help them raise their game from a security point of view. I just think that we cannot talk ourselves into a sort of thing where it is all too big a burden. I can tell you from experience: a terrorist attack is a massive burden on a city and what it does challenges everybody at every level—and that is ongoing. Like Figen said, Manchester will never be the same again after what happened. It has changed us but it has strengthened us and made us more united, and as I say, I do not want any other city to go through that. The Bill is designed to prevent people going through that and part of what I would say is that the way we and Edinburgh do it is a good model for others to look at.

• 8 Oct 2024 · Climate Change: International Work · Hansard source

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  21. What steps he is taking with his international counterparts to tackle climate change.

• 8 Oct 2024 · Climate Change: International Work · Hansard source

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  I welcome the Secretary of State’s commitment to our international obligations, whether that is clean power lines or our own strong domestic climate policies that will help areas such as Rochdale, with billpayers in recent years facing the grim possibility of high bills. This will make a huge difference, and the obvious comparison with the previous Government is there for everyone to see. Will he outline to the House what further steps he is taking on the global stage at both COP29 and COP30 to increase our global reach on climate?