Roger Gale MP: speeches

Speeches

• 30 Oct 2024 · Roadworks: Journey Times · Hansard source

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  That was terrible.

• 22 Oct 2024 · Ukraine · Hansard source

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  Given that answer, does the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office consider that the reported presence of the United Nations Secretary-General at Putin’s summit in Russia will be helpful or unhelpful to Ukraine? If the latter, what is the Minister doing about it?

• 22 Oct 2024 · Ukraine · Hansard source

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  In sharp contrast to the presence of the United Nations Secretary-General at Putin’s summit in Russia, which sent out all the wrong signals, this statement is hugely welcome, so I thank the Secretary of State. Further to the question that the Chairman of the Defence Committee asked, is it not now time that not only Storm Shadow but all the matériel supplied to Ukraine by the western alliance should be used by Ukraine in the manner that it sees fit?

• 16 Oct 2024 · Driving Test Availability · Hansard source

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  Order. Before we proceed, let me first point out that I am going to call those who have submitted letters. Not every Member present and not every Member rising has written in. I have to give priority to those who have submitted an application to participate in the debate first. The second point I have to make, sadly, is that this debate is very time limited indeed. I am going to have to impose a time limit of three minutes and I may have to reduce that.

• 16 Oct 2024 · Driving Test Availability · Hansard source

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  Jas Athwal, you are on the list but you are not rising. Do you not wish to speak?

• 16 Oct 2024 · City and Town Centres: Regeneration · Hansard source

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  Given injury time for the Division, the debate will end at 4.18 pm, but the mover of the motion will need a couple of minutes to wind up.

• 16 Oct 2024 · City and Town Centres: Regeneration · Hansard source

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  Order. The Minister has a very limited amount of time to wind up. I appreciate that there will be hon. Members who have not said everything that they want to, but I ask them to resist the temptation of doing so if the Minister is to respond to the debate.

• 15 Oct 2024 · House of Lords (Hereditary Peers) Bill · Hansard source

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  Will my hon. Friend agree that if this legislation is to go through, there should be a provision to ensure that all the hereditary peers are offered a life peerage as part of the package?

• 15 Oct 2024 · House of Lords (Hereditary Peers) Bill · Hansard source

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  Some minutes ago, the right hon. Gentleman said that the young people of Torfaen believed in and wanted equal opportunity, a point reiterated by the hon. Member for Reading West and Mid Berkshire (Olivia Bailey). I am not quite sure how that equal opportunity squares with a Labour party that wants to stuff the House of Lords with its cronies. I cannot see any equal opportunity in that. That aside, this legislation, on which we will be required to vote, is ill thought through. Will the right hon. Gentleman accept that the hereditary peers who are Members of the House of Lords have made, and continue to make, a considerable contribution to the work of the upper House, and if so, has he given any consideration to, at the very least, ensuring that those hereditary peers who are abolished are given life peerages in a future Parliament?

• 15 Oct 2024 · House of Lords (Hereditary Peers) Bill · Hansard source

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  I have long advocated—with, I think, the support of my right hon. Friend the Member for Goole and Pocklington (Sir David Davis)—the abolition of the House of Commons, the abolition of the House of Lords, and instead four national Parliaments, each with a First Minister, and an upper House dealing solely with defence, foreign policy and macro-taxation, which was the original purpose of Parliament. Why is the hon. Lady prepared to go half hog rather than the whole hog?

• 15 Oct 2024 · House of Lords (Hereditary Peers) Bill · Hansard source

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  Will the Minister give way?

• 15 Oct 2024 · House of Lords (Hereditary Peers) Bill · Hansard source

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  Setting aside the hon. Gentleman’s ageist remarks, which I find deeply offensive, let me consider the point that the hon. Member for Richmond Park (Sarah Olney) made. Why is it okay for the Labour party to maintain the Prime Minister’s patronage to appoint party cronies to the House of Lords while abolishing the hereditary peers, who do a good job?

• 15 Oct 2024 · House of Lords (Hereditary Peers) Bill · Hansard source

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  I do not wish to detain the House, but when I raised this point during the Minister’s remarks he indicated that it would be perfectly proper and possible for a leader of a party to put forward hereditary peers for life peerages, but that is not the point. The point is that there should be a separate list in this legislation to accommodate all of them.

• 15 Oct 2024 · House of Lords (Hereditary Peers) Bill · Hansard source

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  Shame!

• 15 Oct 2024 · House of Lords (Hereditary Peers) Bill · Hansard source

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  In an earlier intervention, my right hon. Friend said that this Bill is an opportunity missed, and that such legislative opportunities do not come by very often. For the moment, the Cabinet Office has this Bill. Might I suggest that replacing 92 hereditary peers with what my right hon. Friend the Member for South Holland and The Deepings (Sir John Hayes) called “placemen” is not reform? Would it not be a good idea if Ministers gave a clear undertaking this afternoon that they will accept amendments of the kind that my right hon. Friend the Member for Stone, Great Wyrley and Penkridge (Sir Gavin Williamson) proposes?

• 10 Sept 2024 · Winter Fuel Payment · Hansard source

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  I am grateful for my hon. Friend’s question, because it does not lie with the hon. Member for Ealing North (James Murray). It lies with the Chancellor of the Exchequer and with the Prime Minister, both of whom should be on the Government Front Bench this afternoon, but neither of whom have been present during the debates—although the Chancellor did come in to vote, and then nipped out again. That in itself is shameful. I abhor the fact that there are politicians sitting on the Labour Benches who are quite prepared to fight to the last drop of somebody else’s political blood, because that is what is happening this afternoon.

• 10 Sept 2024 · Winter Fuel Payment · Hansard source

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  The hon. Lady has misrepresented me. She knows perfectly well that while I said I supported the principle, I abhor the way she is going about it.

• 10 Sept 2024 · Winter Fuel Payment · Hansard source

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  Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker—I stand chastised. The Leader of the Opposition was in the Chamber earlier this afternoon, but I saw no sign whatsoever of the Prime Minister. However, the answer to the hon. Lady remains the same: the responsibility for this policy lies directly with the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the Prime Minister, and they are going to live to regret it.

• 10 Sept 2024 · Winter Fuel Payment · Hansard source

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  My wife, Suzy, is over retirement age. She is also in full-time employment. I am over retirement age. I am also in full-time employment and a higher rate taxpayer. I have always believed that the winter fuel allowance should be means-tested, because while we give it to charity, there are other, perhaps younger people—such as the young and disabled, who cannot run around and keep warm—who could use the money. I have believed that for probably as long as the now Chancellor of the Exchequer has believed it. Let us be clear: this has nothing to do with black holes in the economy, which Laura Kuenssberg identified while interviewing the Prime Minister on Sunday as being largely contributed to by inflationary pay increases for the unions—for railway workers and junior doctors. This is a policy dreamed up in 2014 by the present Chancellor of the Exchequer—that is on the record. It is a policy made in No. 11 Downing Street and endorsed by the nation’s undertaker in No. 10. It is cruel, it is heartless, and it is going to lead to deaths this winter, so while I believe that there should be a means test, the manner in which the Government are going about it is profoundly wrong and deeply flawed and will cause untold-of hardship. It has got to change.

• 10 Sept 2024 · Winter Fuel Payment · Hansard source

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  I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his intervention. I have made the point, and will make it again, that I have no quarrel with the principle. I have a huge quarrel with the manner in which this policy is being implemented, because it is cruel and heartless. It is going to leave thousands, if not millions, of pensioners literally out—or more probably in—in the cold this winter, and some of them will die as a result. It is not necessary, it does not have to be done, and it will not save money, so there has to be a rethink. Just to conclude, I detect a degree of arrogance on the Government Benches this afternoon. The fact that there are only about 30 Members on those Benches speaks volumes to those outside who thought that Members were going to come and hear this matter being seriously debated. There seems to be a belief that the next election is five years away. The next general election may be five years away, but the next election is next May, and those voting in the county council elections in May—those pensioners and their families—will not forget this.

• 2 Sept 2024 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  The national planning policy framework clearly militates against building on agricultural land. Notwithstanding the Minister’s desire not to interfere in local democracy, will he write to the leader of Thanet district council to remind him that agricultural land is the stuff that we grow food on, and cannot be for housing if we are to remain sustainable?

• 30 Jul 2024 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  This summer marks the 50th anniversary of Turkey’s illegal invasion and occupation of the northern part of the island of Cyprus. Will the Foreign Secretary tell the House what steps and initiatives his Government are going to take to seek to resolve that frozen conflict, for which the British Government have a historical responsibility as a guarantor power?

• 30 Jul 2024 · Building Homes · Hansard source

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  It is good to see you in that Chair, Madam Deputy Speaker. I am not sure whether the Secretary of State has discussed her proposals with the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs or the National Farmers Union, but the answer she gave on food production was risible. What she has announced today is effectively a recipe for disposing of the land that will be needed to feed our children and grandchildren. Just before she goes ahead with that, will she tell the House how many planning consents that have been granted are sitting there unbuilt-out? Should we not use those first?

• 25 Jul 2024 · Business of the House · Hansard source

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  When in opposition, the present Administration made some efforts to criticise the then Conservative Government’s record on animal welfare. The King’s Speech, of which the right hon. Lady indicates she is so proud, contains not one word relating to animal welfare. Was that a deliberate omission, or a careless and uninterested oversight, and when might we have a Bill to outlaw the proceeds of trophy hunting?

• 24 Jul 2024 · Engagements · Hansard source

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  Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker—Mr Speaker. [ Interruption. ] Another Freudian slip! The old dog is off the leash. May I first thank the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition for their supportive policies in relation to Ukraine? Their expressions today will have been of great comfort to the thousands of Ukrainian residents in the United Kingdom who simply wish to return to their lawful home. Further to the answer to my hon. Friend the Member for Broxbourne (Lewis Cocking), can the Prime Minister tell the House how his planning reforms, which will smother with houses fields in east Kent that currently yield wheat for bread, are compatible with the desire of his own Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs to achieve sustainability?