Peter Prinsley MP: speeches

Speeches

• 22 Apr 2026 · Junior Doctors’ Foundation Programme · Hansard source

  More

  Some time ago, when I came here, I had working with me an intern, Dr Harry Dunn, who was a medical student at Cambridge University. He graduated last year. He came top, not only of the University of Cambridge medical student cohort, but of the whole of the University of Cambridge, so he was the top student of his year. He was offered a foundation post in Northern Ireland. He chose not to take it, and has now gone into consulting, having given up medicine. That is an extremely sad example of an unintended consequence of this crazy lottery.

• 22 Apr 2026 · Junior Doctors’ Foundation Programme · Hansard source

  More

  I absolutely agree that doctors are only part of a much bigger healthcare system. We certainly need to look after all the people involved in health and social care. Of course, that is more of a problem in geographically remote districts such as the hon. Gentleman’s constituency, where I believe it is difficult to recruit professions of all sorts. I do not want only to sound nostalgic this morning, although of course I am. I am not arguing that absolutely everything was better in my time, because it certainly was not, but in one important respect it was better: it was designed around human beings. It understood that newly qualified doctors are individuals, not one of a herd to be simply moved across a map by a computer. It also recognised that pastoral support and clinical teams matter, and that the transition from medical student to doctor is a particularly vulnerable moment in a medical career. Let us come back to that point soon. Today, we have a thing called the foundation programme. In 2024, the foundation programme office replaced the application process with something called preference informed allocation. What happens is that medical students list the foundation schools in order of preference, and are each assigned a computer-generated rank. The rank is not informed by academic achievement, personal circumstance, where the student trained or what they did; it simply works through the ranks and places the student accordingly. The UK foundation programme’s 2026 figures show that of the 10,810 graduates allocated this year, 82% received their first preference. Superficially, that sounds quite reassuring, but I do not really think it is. Every year, a minority of graduates—this year it is roughly 1,900 young doctors—end up somewhere other than their first choice. The minority who do not get their first preference find themselves, aged 22 or 23, packing up their lives for a city where they know nobody. As I put it in the Chamber last month, it is a “crazy foundation lottery that sends a doctor from Norwich to Belfast and a doctor from Belfast to Norwich.” —[ Official Report , 26 March 2026; Vol. 783, c. 452.] That is what we mean when we talk about a lottery. It is not a figure of speech, but a literal description of how the system works. There is another reason why this headline figure flatters to deceive: the system incentivises what we call strategic preferencing. The students know the ranking system is random and that a high rank does not protect them tomorrow, so they game it. They preference the foundation schools they think they can realistically get, rather than the ones they actually want. A high first preference rate is, in part, a measure of the student lowering their ambition to protect themselves against a coin toss. That is not a system working; that is a system being worked around. Let me say a bit about couples. Medical students often form a couple with other medical students or other people who work in hospitals, because that is the nature of a hospital. The foundation programme offers something called linked applications, but the unfairness is particularly acute. Two medical students in a relationship can choose to link their applications so that they are allocated together, but the pair is placed using the lower of the two ranks, so that if one of them is lucky in the ballot and the other is not, both are placed in the worst ranked situation. Should the algorithm be unable to accommodate both in a single school, the link is broken. A student cannot unlink once they have applied, and there is no appeal. The system quite simply cannot see that these are two people trying to begin their careers side by side. It just sees two records on a database. That has knock-on consequences throughout the rest of the service. When foundation doctors are disorientated, unsupported and demoralised, their work does not disappear; it flows upwards to the more senior doctors, who take more and more of it on themselves. Young doctors should not be deployed by ballot into strange cities, with only limited account taken of their circumstances—their partners, their dependants, their health or their need to be near home. The claim that the current system is somehow fairer than the one it replaced is, I am afraid, one we cannot accept. Let me talk about how we got here and the recent reform. The old system was not perfect. For many years, medical students competed on a combination of academic decile and a national examination known as the situation judgment test. The SJT was quite unpopular: it was stressful, it had unpredictable validity and there was a documented score gap that consistently disadvantaged candidates from ethnic minority backgrounds. That was a real and serious unfairness, and those who reformed the system were right to try to address it. When the students lobbied against the SJT, they had a good reason to do so, but they did not ask for a random number generator—yet that is essentially what they got. In 2024 the SJT was abolished and academic achievement stripped out. In their place came PIA, underpinned by a computer ranking. It is hard to think of a clearer case of throwing the baby out with the bathwater. Students asked for fairness, and they were given randomness. Those are not the same thing. Fairness takes account of circumstance; randomness ignores it. Fairness rewards merit and responds to need; randomness does neither. What we have is not a reformed system, but an experiment that has gone wrong. That is not just my view. The medical training review led by Professor Stephen Powis and Professor Chris Whitty, published last October, drew on more than 8,000 responses, 6,000 of them from resident doctors. Its very first recommendation was that “a reform of postgraduate medical education and training is undertaken as a matter of urgency.” It also recommended that recruitment to medical training be reviewed so that it is “fair and equitable to all candidates”. It is not sufficient, on any reading of the report, for allocation merely to be random. Random is not fair. The BMA has taken a big interest in this question, which is not surprising, and I will read out some of its recommendations: “The BMA is calling for: meaningful improvements to working lives with greater access to support services, supervision, rest and mess facilities; increased flexibility in rotations, including the option to swap placements; a guarantee that all UK graduates will be offered a foundation post, with full details provided at least 12 weeks before the start date; and any review of the allocation system to include proposals for a new recruitment process developed with meaningful consultation with students.” There is another group of doctors that we should consider: those who will progress to become academic doctors. There is a crisis in this country of clinical academics, the doctors who teach the next generation of doctors. It has become very difficult to recruit into clinical academia. The career pathway for clinical academics has become very uncertain, and we have an emerging crisis—a real and present crisis—that must be addressed. One way to do that is to think about how we recruit foundation doctors into academic programmes. Here is a straightforward proposal, which I hope colleagues will improve rather than simply accept. Let us return to a firm-based model for the first year of training. The F1 placement should be arranged by the medical schools, not by a centralised national algorithm, with each new doctor placed alongside peers they already know with consultants who have taught them. That is the system we had so many years ago. Medical schools know their students; they know who has the caring responsibilities, who has a linked partner, who has health needs, who has a strong reason to stay close to home. They are in the best possible position to start designing a year that makes sense for each individual. That does not preclude movement later. F2 can broaden horizons, and specialty training will often mean relocation, but in the critical first year, when doctors are doing their first on-calls up at night by themselves, writing their first prescriptions and being present at their first deaths, they should not be alone in a city where they do not know anybody. They should be doing that with the support of their friends, teachers and colleagues they already trust. I do not think that would be particularly expensive; it might even cost less than the centralised allocation machinery we run today. Whatever we do, I offer one principle: medicine is the most distinctly human of professions and it is futile, and somewhat ironic, to try to reform it with an algorithm. The reform must be human. Let me close where I began. Resident doctors have just come off picket lines. I do not think that in this debate we can rehearse the pay dispute, which is a matter for another day, but the strikes are not just about pay. At root, they are about a sense that the profession has been treated as though it does not matter. The individual doctor has become invisible behind the workforce spreadsheet. The Government have taken one very important step, with the Medical Training (Prioritisation) Act 2026 giving UK graduates the rightful priority for specialist training places—and that matters. Today’s debate is an opportunity to take the next step to fix the starting point itself. We have in medicine one of the most extraordinary workforces in the world. Young doctors are among the best trained, most dedicated and most compassionate professionals. We owe them and, more importantly, the patients who depend on them, better than a lottery. We owe them the fair, well-supported, human start they deserve. I believe that would go a long way to resetting the Government’s relationship with the profession, and towards ending these damaging rolling strikes.

• 22 Apr 2026 · Junior Doctors’ Foundation Programme · Hansard source

  More

  I will wind up, then. I thank everyone very much, and I look forward to seeing success in the future. Question put and agreed to. Resolved, That this House has considered the Foundation Programme and its role in supporting and retaining resident doctors.

• 22 Apr 2026 · Junior Doctors’ Foundation Programme · Hansard source

  More

  I beg to move, That this House has considered the Foundation Programme and its role in supporting and retaining resident doctors. Thank you, Mrs Barker, for chairing today’s debate. First, I must thank everyone for coming and say something about my interests. As many know, I am an ear, nose and throat surgeon and I have a son who is a registrar in accident and emergency medicine. I am a fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons, I have an MD from the University of East Anglia, and my medical school was at Sheffield. This debate is to consider the foundation programme and its role in retaining resident doctors. It is a privilege to introduce the debate, and I am grateful to all the colleagues who have come along this morning. As we all know, our resident doctors just spent six days on the picket lines; the wards were covered by others, operations were postponed and patients’ appointments were rescheduled. When the strikes ended, as they did just over a week ago, the problems did not go away. That is why I asked for the debate. If we are serious about resetting the relationship between this Government and the medical profession, as I believe we all are, we must begin somewhere, and in my view we should begin where every doctor begins: at the foundations.

• 22 Apr 2026 · Junior Doctors’ Foundation Programme · Hansard source

  More

  I know—it is hard to believe. I was a medical student in Sheffield, and my first jobs were at the Royal Hallamshire hospital and the Northern General hospital. I have fond memories of the time that we started there. There was, for instance, a doctors’ mess with hot food. There was somewhere for us to live; we had residences. It is ironic that the name “junior doctors” was changed—just last year, I think—to “resident doctors”, because that is the very last thing they are. The residences have all disappeared—they have been sold off—and the doctors work shift systems, sometimes with absolutely nowhere to rest. We had six-month rather than four-month rotations, which meant that we got to know the teams we worked with. We worked with named consultants. We had a distinct pyramidal team, with senior registrars, registrars and senior house officers, and we knew the people we were working with. They were people we had known as medical students; they were often the people who had taught us. That meant that there was a sort of support network for young doctors as they started in their careers. On the whole, the newly qualified doctors of today do not experience anything quite like that.

• 22 Apr 2026 · Junior Doctors’ Foundation Programme · Hansard source

  More

  Certainly we must address the workload but, as I will reveal later in my speech, there are many things that we can do to help the situation. Let me say a bit about my own experience, which admittedly was a long time ago—

• 22 Apr 2026 · Junior Doctors’ Foundation Programme · Hansard source

  More

  I heard the same thing; indeed, I met Dr Fletcher from the BMA yesterday myself and heard exactly this story, so the situation is intensely frustrating, but I believe that we can get ourselves back to a position in which an agreement can be reached. My argument this morning is simple. The foundation programme, the first two years of a doctor’s working life, is, in its present form, not supporting and retaining doctors as it should. The problem is that the doctors are treated like numbers on a spreadsheet rather than the people they are, and some of our brightest young doctors, at precisely the moment when they need the most support, are considering leaving the NHS altogether. Let me set out what the system does, why it is failing, what we have learned from recent attempts to reform it and what I believe we ought to do instead; but let me first refer to a Royal College of Physicians survey of resident doctors that was done in 2025, which has some interesting findings. Only 44% of the resident doctors stated that they were satisfied with their clinical training. Just 26% of the respondents felt ready to move on to the next step. About 20% of the doctors thought that the recruitment process was fair, which meant that 80% of them thought that it was unfair. About half of them want to work less than full time and, most alarmingly, only 65% of them said that they thought they would be working in the NHS in five years’ time.

• 16 Apr 2026 · Places of Worship Renewal Fund · Hansard source

  More

  6. What discussions the Church has had with the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport on the planned timetable for the introduction of the places of worship renewal fund.

• 16 Apr 2026 · Places of Worship Renewal Fund · Hansard source

  More

  I thank my hon. Friend for her answer. Church leaders in Bury St Edmunds and Stowmarket are rightly concerned about the cancellation of the listed places of worship grant scheme. Will the Church Commissioner outline what conversations she has had with the Government regarding the support and guidance given to those people who are concerned with the upkeep of churches in my constituency and across the country? It is surely for our generation to preserve the legacy bequeathed to us by our forefathers.

• 15 Apr 2026 · Cost of Heating Oil · Hansard source

  More

  I thank the hon. Member for North Norfolk (Steff Aquarone) for securing this debate. I want to speak about the impact that the rising cost of heating oil is having on rural communities such as mine in Suffolk. Following events in the middle east, many residents who rely on heating oil contacted me—as I am sure happened to others—with understandable concerns about the sharp increase in prices. That matters because it is an immediate pressure on family budgets, one that many people feel powerless to avoid. This issue is important because my constituency has one of the highest number of households relying on heating oil. About 40% of all properties in the villages are completely off the grid. That means that many residents are exposed to this sudden price shock. Those most affected are those least able to absorb the extra cost, especially residents in council homes and in lower-income rural communities that are disproportionately hit. For many of those households there is no short-term alternative and no flexibility. As the hon. Member for North Norfolk said, the Government have taken some important steps in response. The £53 million emergency support fund is welcome, as is the warm homes plan providing targeted support for low-income households in rural areas. It is right that the money is distributed through local councils, which are often best placed to identify where the support is most urgently needed. I raised the matter locally with Goff, one of the principal suppliers of heating oil. I was pleased to be assured that it will honour the original prices quoted to customers who ordered on 28 February, 1 March and 2 March, at the start of hostilities. That provides immediate reassurance for those residents who acted promptly and should not be penalised. That must be our approach: immediate support for those facing rising costs now; proper oversight of the market; and long-term action to reduce dependence on heating oil. For rural communities in my patch, that is a necessity, which we should all push for.

• 15 Apr 2026 · Engagements · Hansard source

  More

  Q13. I would like first to thank the nurses, the doctors, the radiographers and the receptionists who were not on strike when I tripped and broke my wrist last week.After years of neglect, Labour is rebuilding our NHS, including the West Suffolk hospital at Bury St Edmunds and the new dental school at the University of East Anglia. Does the Prime Minister share my genuine alarm, as a surgeon who has worked at the frontline for more than 40 years, that the vague social insurance proposals of some of our opponents would be the end of our NHS and seriously threaten the health and wellbeing of millions of our fellow citizens?

• 15 Apr 2026 · Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill · Hansard source

  More

  I understand exactly what the hon. Member says. My position is this: I support the Government, and I support the Bill, but I think the House should take very seriously what the Lords have asked us to consider. If the Government are not minded to accept the amendment as it stands, I believe there is a strong case for them to bring forward their own proposal to achieve the same outcome clearly and in a timely fashion. Ultimately, this is about setting the right boundaries for children in a digital world that is evolving quickly. There is a clear expectation, inside and outside this House, that we must act.

• 15 Apr 2026 · Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill · Hansard source

  More

  I agree that we must hold the tech companies to account; they are the ones in control of the situation. The amendment proposes a higher standard—not simply “reasonable steps”, but highly effective age assurance, and that is meaningfully different. We have heard about movement internationally. France and Spain are taking similar steps, and others are following. We ought to be part of the broader shift in how Governments are approaching online safety for children. Also, this cannot just be about restrictions; of course, there is a role for education. Children need to understand the online environment that they are engaging with, particularly when it comes to the algorithms, data and content driven by artificial intelligence. We have heard about the consultation, and I support it in principle, but the scale of the issue is already well evidenced. There is a question about what additional insights small trials would realistically add, given the body of research that already exists.

• 15 Apr 2026 · Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill · Hansard source

  More

  Let me start by saying that I support the Government’s direction of travel on this Bill. The focus on children’s wellbeing, both in schools and out, is obviously right, but let me address Lords amendment 38, tabled by Lord Nash, about social media access; it was accepted back into the Bill, with a large majority. It has cross-party support and reflects growing concern not just in Parliament, but among parents, teachers and professionals working with young people. The amendment is quite simple: it is about delaying access to certain harmful social media services until children are 16. It is not a blanket ban or a restriction on everything, but targeted measures aimed at services that are not designed with children in mind. That distinction matters, because some criticism has suggested that the amendment would create cliff edges, but we already have age limits in place today. The issue is not whether limits should exist; it is whether they are properly enforced, and whether they reflect the reality of how platforms operate. There has been a lot of debate about whether age verification actually works. The evidence from countries like Australia suggests that where it is not working, it is often because platforms are not properly enforcing the rules, or young people find ways around the ban through VPNs. That leads to a broader point: the onus must be squarely with the tech companies to implement the safeguards. Where the law sets a clear standard, platforms must meet it consistently and effectively.

• 14 Apr 2026 · NHS Dental Services · Hansard source

  More

  May I congratulate the ministerial team, the University of East Anglia and the Office for Students on finally getting the new dental school at the university over the line? It will admit 25 students from September next year and will go some way to dealing with the dental deserts that we inherited in Norfolk and Suffolk. In the meantime, what progress has been made with the General Dental Council to increase exam capacity for dentists coming from overseas to help with the present crisis?

• 26 Mar 2026 · Resident Doctors: Industrial Action · Hansard source

  More

  I share the frustrations of Ministers and of the Government. I know that they have worked really hard on this. Dr Fletcher of the BMA has also worked hard, and I am sure that there is a deal to be done somewhere. The Medical Training (Prioritisation) Act 2026, to prioritise UK graduates, was very welcome, but I wonder whether we can also do something to fix the foundations of medical careers, by devising a much better system than the crazy foundation lottery that sends a doctor from Norwich to Belfast and a doctor from Belfast to Norwich. That would be a great expression of good will. Meanwhile, I am sure that my colleagues in the NHS will work around this strike—our patients will be safe—and I am sure that our NHS will continue to improve under this brilliant Labour Government.

• 26 Mar 2026 · Rail Renationalisation: East of England · Hansard source

  More

  I am grateful for that answer. Greater Anglia has consistently been at the top of the performance scale for our railway operators, but could the Secretary of State tell me whether the nationalisation of the railway will lead to the increased likelihood of a much better commuter service between Bury St Edmunds and Cambridge, which is presently only an hourly service, and what the prospect is of a direct train line from Bury St Edmunds to London?

• 26 Mar 2026 · Rail Renationalisation: East of England · Hansard source

  More

  1. What assessment she has made of the potential impact of the renationalisation of the railways on rail users in the east of England.

• 26 Mar 2026 · Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome and Craniocervical Instability · Hansard source

  More

  It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Ms Furniss. I was not going to talk in this debate until last week, when a lady came to my surgery at Bury St Edmunds. I used to hold surgeries all the time for patients with ear, nose and throat disorders; now I hold surgeries for constituents who come with political difficulties. This young lady was in a wheelchair, and told me she had Ehlers-Danlos syndrome and that she had been to Germany to get a diagnosis, after many years of failing to get one in this country. Ehlers-Danlos syndrome is a disorder of the protein that is involved in the making of the connective tissue—which is the tissue that joins us all together—particularly the elastic bits. When I was a medical student there were four types of Ehlers-Danlos syndrome, and it was quite a favourite topic for examine questions. But now I see from the Ehlers-Danlos Society that there are 13 recognised types of the syndrome. We always thought of it as the double-jointed disease, and one would loosely test it by seeing whether someone could take their thumb and put it against the side of their arm—I increasingly cannot even get mine to a right-angle now. It is a rare disorder. To give hon. Members a flavour of the different sorts of Ehlers-Danlos syndrome, there is a hypermobile Ehlers-Danlos, which is the double-jointed person. That is about one in 5,000 people. The classical Ehlers-Danlos, which is where people get this very stretchy skin that kind of falls away, is about one in 20,000 people. The really frightening Ehlers-Danlos syndrome is the one that affects the lining of the blood vessels. The blood vessels have an elastic lining, and if the elastic lining fails, they begin to expand, causing aneurysms. The most frightening aneurysms are those of the main aorta, which in some patients can rupture, leading to sudden death. They can occur all over the body, however, and therefore cause all sorts of curious neurological or gastrointestinal symptoms depending on where the aneurysms are happening. That is about one in 100,000 people. There is even a dental Ehlers-Danlos syndrome, which causes the teeth to loosen and fall out. That is about one in a million people. Given that there are many different types of Ehlers-Danlos syndrome, it is not surprising that it can be difficult to diagnose. To diagnose something, one has first to think of it. In my long career as an ENT surgeon, I saw very few cases, but I am certain that I missed many cases. I did some brief research into ear, nose and throat surgery and Ehlers-Danlos, and there is a particularly frightening situation that occurs in patients who need to have their tonsils out. Ehlers-Danlos syndrome is associated with this instability of the neck vertebrae—the cervical vertebrae; the axis and the atlas bones. When one does a tonsillectomy, one anaesthetises a patient and tips their head right back to open the mouth as wide as one possibly can. I saw a report from 2013 by Agarwal of a child who developed quadriplegia after a tonsillectomy. The tonsils were taken out, and when the child woke up, the arms and legs would not move, because the spinal cord had been compressed by the subluxation of the vertebrae. Diagnosis is difficult, and we must first think of it. We should do what we can to educate people, particularly clinicians in medical schools and nursing schools, and even the general population. A debate such as this is certainly helpful in that respect. Research is essential. Specific genetic mutations are associated with many of the varieties of Ehlers-Danlos syndrome—sadly not the most common sort, but certainly many of the other sorts. The Minister may know that there is a proposal for universal genome sequencing of newborns and young people in this country. I do not think that future generations will have this problem of odd clinical symptoms accumulating over decades before somebody works out what has happened, because in future, people will be able to access their genomes. We will be able to predict what will happen. However, just because we can predict it and identify the genes that are causing it, that does not mean that we will come up with magic treatments. We will certainly need to provide services for all the people with this condition into the future. Diagnostic pathways and well-organised arrangements for the clinical care of people with this presently completely incurable condition are essential.

• 23 Mar 2026 · Middle East · Hansard source

  More

  The long-range missile attacks have raised the spectre in my mind, and surely in those of others, of attacks on the United Kingdom. I have listened to the Secretary of State’s reassurances about the defence of this country, but we have all seen the value of the Iron Dome. What is being done to create such a system for the defence of this country?

• 23 Mar 2026 · Hatzola Ambulance Attack · Hansard source

  More

  In our synagogues each week, we pray for the King and for the Almighty to grant wisdom to all his counsellors. Never has such wisdom been more essential, for antisemitism and Iranian-backed terrorism are evil bedfellows. Will the Minister join me in supporting all the work of the CST and our emergency services at this terrible time?

• 19 Mar 2026 · Business of the House · Hansard source

  More

  I know that some in this Chamber are sceptical about the role of the other place. However, after dinner last night, at about 11 o’clock, I took some visitors into the House of Lords Gallery, and was completely astonished to find a very lively debate taking place in a full Chamber. Will the Leader of the House join me in recognising the great diligence of our colleagues in scrutinising legislation? However, does he agree that the House of Lords must not obstruct the will of the elected Chamber?

• 19 Mar 2026 · Courts and Tribunals Bill · Hansard source

  More

  I welcome the Government’s reforms to the criminal justice system, but I would like to ask what measures will be taken to increase cultural, class and age-group diversity in magistrate recruitment, so as to increase confidence in our reforms?

• 18 Mar 2026 · Student Loans · Hansard source

  More

  Student finance is complicated. With thanks to my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow South (Gordon McKee), who has been in and out of his seat all afternoon, I was able to produce a biscuit explainer today, which is available on all good social media channels. Reforming the student finance system is not straightforward. It is a complex challenge—it is made much more difficult by the need to stabilise the economy, which is something that I obviously strongly support—but we must be clear that the task is harder because of the economic mess left behind by our predecessors: years of short-termism and under-investment that have constrained what can now be done. Yet even within those constraints, the direction proposed by the Opposition is a bit flawed. The suggestion to scrap degrees, particularly in the arts and cultural sectors, is culturally dismissive, plainly disrespectful and insulting. It reflects a narrow view of value and ignores the real contribution of the creative industries to our economy and our national life. Turning to the system itself, student finance is not neutral. It perpetuates an inequality. Those from less well-off backgrounds must take on larger maintenance loans simply to afford the cost of living, graduating with significantly higher debts than their peers. That undermines social mobility. Instead of higher education acting as a ladder of opportunity, the system has reinforced disadvantage. Those who start with less, leave with more to repay. In reality, we all know that what we have is a form of a graduate tax—long-term, income-contingent and unavoidable for many—but without the clarity or fairness such a system should have. So we do need reform, but not through the Opposition’s plan; we must make a better plan. The Labour party is and will remain the party of working people, grounded in the principles of fairness, which means confronting systems that entrench inequality and replacing them with ones that expand opportunity. If we are serious about fairness, we must act—and act we will, for we will use the levers of the state to ensure fairness.

• 18 Mar 2026 · Royal Mail: Performance · Hansard source

  More

  It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Twigg. I thank the hon. Member for Exmouth and Exeter East (David Reed) for introducing the debate. I also thank the hon. Member for Sutton and Cheam (Luke Taylor), who has turned private investigator. I was very impressed by his efforts. There is no doubt that there is a real crisis in the postal service. I have just read “Precipice” by Robert Harris; it tells the story of a love affair between Prime Minister Asquith and a young socialite. It is recorded in the many, many letters delivered between them each day. The book is about the letters between them, half of which survive. The letters to the Prime Minister, I believe, were destroyed, but the letters to the socialite survive and form the basis of the book. Mr Harris invented the other letters—love letters to the Prime Minister: imagine that. Now we have email and texts, and no doubt future writers will look at political emails. Times have changed, and we must acknowledge that. In Denmark, the letter post has, unbelievably, completely stopped. Here, the universal service remains an obligation, not an option. Our people expect that. I urge the Government to get a grip on this. If the solution is indeed public ownership, let us simply do that.