Sarah Champion MP: speeches

Speeches

• 9 Jun 2025 · Planning and Infrastructure Bill · Hansard source

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  I rise to speak to amendment 91, on allotments and community gardens, and to new clause 60, on landfill sites, both of which stand in my name. The UK currently has a shortage of allotments, with nearly 160,000 people on English local authority waiting lists. We need more space to grow. For the 8 million people in the UK who have no garden at home, shared spaces such as community gardens are a vital lifeline to nature. I am proud that my amendment 91 is supported by the Royal Horticultural Society, the Horticultural Trades Association, members of the National Network for Community Gardening and the National Allotment Society, as well as by Members across the House. Without being overly prescriptive, my amendment aims to tackle the erratic provision of allotments and community gardens across the country, making them an essential part of all spatial development strategies. In her correspondence with me, the Under-Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, my hon. Friend the Member for Bethnal Green and Stepney (Rushanara Ali), said that because there was “nothing preventing” local authorities from including those green spaces in their strategies, amendments such as mine were not needed. I would like to refute that—that is precisely the problem. A person’s space to grow should not be dependent on their postcode or the whims of their council. That is especially the case given that the loss of allotment land over the past 75 years—60%—has been eight times greater in deprived communities such as mine. In his 2024 annual report, Sir Chris Whitty said: “Making…access to green space easier and more equitable, would go a long way toward removing barriers to improving physical activity levels and could significantly improve the health of England’s increasingly urban population.” These small but mighty green spaces are about more than just vegetables; they are essential to supporting health, nature recovery and food security. They also supercharge biodiversity, because the quality of soil on allotments creates a unique environment in which life can thrive. In the midst of a nature crisis, gardeners and amateur horticulturists are our secret weapon. What is more, allotments create space for education and social projects. With so many on waiting lists or blocked from turning an unloved patch of land into a community garden, and with a desperate need for nature recovery, my campaign represents a win-win for the Government. I now turn to my new clause 60, which comes in direct response to a gross injustice for my own constituents. Droppingwell tip in Rotherham was closed in the 1990s following a determined campaign by local residents. It was subsequently capped and returned to a natural state. Two decades later, in 2016, a permit variation was granted by the Environment Agency, allowing landfill operations to resume without any notice to residents. While the Environment Agency had the power to conduct a public consultation, it chose not to do so. Its argument was that as planning permission had been granted in the 1950s, no further scrutiny was required. Vital issues such as traffic, noise, pollution, and the impact on neighbouring properties were given no consideration whatsoever. It cannot be right that landfill operators can so easily evade public scrutiny simply by reopening long-dormant sites, nor can it be right that my constituents’ views have been totally ignored. While my new clause comes too late for Rotherham, it would prevent the rights of other communities from being trampled by ensuring that planning permission for landfill sites would automatically lapse after 10 years of dormancy. Any proposals to resume landfill operations would be required to be subjected to full scrutiny through the planning system. My amendments can make a real difference, and I hope Government Front Benchers will support them.

• 5 Mar 2025 · Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office · Hansard source

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  I thank the Backbench Business Committee for selecting this subject for this very timely debate, which is in my name and the name of my right hon. Friend the Member for Islington South and Finsbury (Emily Thornberry). I also thank the members of the International Development Committee and the Foreign Affairs Committee for their support in securing it. Let me start this debate by welcoming the Government’s commitment to increasing our defence spending; that is long overdue and much needed. However, there was no need to announce a decision on where the funding was coming from before the spending review or, indeed, before the defence review concluded. It will not surprise the House to learn that I will use this debate to argue that the decision to take all the defence uplift from official development assistance was wrong. When the former US Defence Secretary General James Mattis was asked in Congress whether it was wise to properly fund international development work, he replied: “If you don’t fund the State Department fully, then I need to buy more ammunition”. It pains me to say so, but the Prime Minister is setting exactly this dangerous course for the UK. By planning to take 40% out of ODA, he is taking the axe to our most effective tool for reducing global conflicts and for increasing our national security. Do not take my word for it. Instead, consider this warning given last week by General Richard Dannatt, the former Chief of the General Staff: “Every pound we cut from development aid today risks costing us far more in future military operations…slashing aid further to fund defence spending is not just shortsighted—it is dangerously counterproductive.” He added: “we are setting ourselves up for greater instability, which will require even more military spending in the long term…If we cut aid, we will be forced to deploy military resources in areas where we could have mitigated instability through targeted development.” I urge the Prime Minister to recognise that if we abandon our commitments to the world in this way, we will see greater numbers of people displaced from their homes as a result of climate disasters, poverty and war. More people will lose hope, and will instead look to extreme ideologies for the answer, and civil societies will no longer have the skills to hold rogue Governments to account. It concerns me greatly, as it should the whole House, that the Government have yet to carry out an assessment of the impact of their decision, which has been rushed through without proper scrutiny. I urge Ministers to study carefully an analysis by the ONE Campaign, which demonstrates the real-world impact of cutting ODA assistance from 0.5% to 0.3% of national income. It has calculated that if the 40% reduction in UK aid is distributed evenly across global health and food programmes, there will be nearly 40 million fewer children immunised; 600,000 fewer lives will be saved because of reduced support to the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB and Malaria; and almost 300,000 fewer school children will receive nutritious meals and essential food assistance through the World Food Programme. I appreciate that the Prime Minister has pledged to protect what he considers to be the most vital areas of spending—Gaza, Sudan and Ukraine, vaccinations and climate—but as the powerful resignation letter written by my right hon. Friend the Member for Oxford East (Anneliese Dodds), the former development Minister, lays bare, that is, sadly, a delusion. As my right hon. Friend, who knows the reality better than anybody else, has written: “It will be impossible to maintain these priorities given the depth of the cut; the effect will be far greater than presented…It will likely to lead to withdrawal from regional banks and a reduced commitment to the World Bank; the UK being shut out of numerous multilateral bodies; and a reduced voice for the UK in the G7, G20 and in climate negotiations.”

• 28 Nov 2024 · UK Leadership on Sudan · Hansard source

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  Yesterday, in the Committee’s session on Sudan, Dr Eva Khair, director of the Sudan Transnational Consortium, made it clear that we should regard this not as a civil war but as a war on civilians, and she is right. Since April 2023, when the war started, 61,000 people have been killed, with 11 million people internally displaced—nearly a quarter of the population. Fourteen regions are at risk of famine, and the UN’s fund is only 57% funded. I welcome the personal involvement of both the Foreign Secretary and the Minister for Development, but I seek assurances that that commitment will continue, because we are the penholder and a former colonial administrator, which means that we have special duties when it comes to Sudan. Will the Minister give assurances about how she is convening the international community to stop the war and, importantly, to involve civil society in the debates?

• 26 Nov 2024 · Middle East: Humanitarian Situation · Hansard source

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  In October, the Israeli Knesset passed two laws relating to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency: the law for cessation of UNRWA activities in the state of Israel; and the law for cessation of UNRWA activities. They will take effect on 28 January, and the consequence will be preventing aid distribution in Gaza and the prevention of primary care, education and refuse collection in the west bank. Last week, my Committee was in Palestine and Jordan. There is huge concern that if that legislation takes effect, it will breach numerous international laws and have a catastrophic effect on the humanitarian and security situation in the region. What conversations have Ministers had with their Israeli counterparts to prevent that implementation, and what are they doing with the international community to protect a UN organisation?

• 5 Sept 2024 · Great British Energy Bill · Hansard source

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  Thank you Madam Deputy Speaker, and may I congratulate you on being in the Chair? It is pleasing to me and a benefit to the House to have three strong women in that position. I also congratulate the hon. Member for Eastleigh (Liz Jarvis), who used her personal experience to speak of her pleasure and pride in her constituency. Her personal, lived experiences will make her a much stronger MP in this House; I welcome her to her place. Rotherham is a hub of innovative green energy research and production, which is integral to the UK’s energy transition. Our Advanced Manufacturing Research Centre—AMRC—boasts expertise in nuclear, fusion, hydrogen and the construction of offshore wind turbine blades. That creates good, skilled jobs for Rotherham and contributes more than £55 million to the South Yorkshire economy every year. The AMRC is also home to the UK’s first sustainable aviation fuel facility, and therefore I welcome the SAF Bill which is coming soon. Rotherham’s renewable production does not stop there. Our fusion technology facility works with industry and science, to pioneer fusion energy as a major source of low-carbon electricity. Templeborough power station, a biomass plant, sustainably converts waste wood into energy. It uses recycled sawdust, wood chippings and scrap that would go into landfill, and is used in my constituency by Esken Renewables to fuel the power station. In doing so it saves 150,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide every year. The research and innovation taking place every day in Rotherham gives it a unique role to play in this Government’s ambitious energy plans, and there is an open invitation to the Secretary of State and Ministers to visit the opportunities in my constituency. I ask the Minister to include community energy as one of the specific objectives in clause 3 of the Bill. An inquiry by the Environmental Audit Committee outlined the enormous contribution that community energy schemes can bring, while reducing dependency on international energy imports. I express my gratitude to Ministers for not pursuing the legal challenge on the closure of the Rosebank oilfield. When the Conservatives were in power they granted new oil and gas licences to sites such as Rosebank, but over a third of licences granted overlapped with marine protected areas and failed to consider the impact on biodiversity and marine health. MPAs are intended to protect rare, threatened and important species from damage caused by human activities. Instead, innumerable careless decisions by the last Government led to 215 spills over the previous 12 years, resulting in 308 tonnes of oil being spilled and a devastating biodiversity decline in the very areas we should be protecting the most. Like many in the Chamber I believe that solar energy has a key role to play in our transition to a low-carbon economy. However, I am concerned that without incorporating human rights mechanisms in the Bill, the transition will not be clean or just. It is well documented that solar photovoltaic supply chains have a sinister dependency on forced labour programmes in the Xinjiang autonomous region of China, where the Chinese Government are systematically persecuting millions of Uyghur, Turkic and Muslim- majority people on the basis of their religion and ethnicity. The People’s Republic of China’s global market share across the solar PV supply chain exceeds 80%. The Uyghur region has become the dominant global sourcing location for critical inputs for the solar industry. An estimated 35% of global polysilicon—used in almost all solar panels worldwide—is produced in Xinjiang. China’s rapid success in the industry has been achieved with low-cost, subsidised, dirty coal, completely undermining the green credentials it boasts. As early as 2021, the US enacted the Uyghur Forced Labour Prevention Act, which placed a ban on the importation of products from the Uyghur region, including shipments of solar panels with connections to Xinjiang. The legislation has been highly effective, with the market responding with new, ethical supply chains. Canada, the EU and Mexico have followed suit with similar regulations, but we have fallen behind. I urge the Minister to address that failing, now that evidence has emerged of global supply chains bifurcating, with tainted solar goods being redirected to countries with weaker regulation, such as the UK. Our nation has become a dumping ground for dodgy solar. With this Bill, it is vital that we make a U-turn on the mistakes of our predecessors. I welcomed the Secretary of State for Business and Trade saying this morning that he expects and demands “no modern slavery in any part” of our solar supply chain. He expressed a willingness to extend legislation to help tackle the problem. We must raise standards with this Bill by committing to the production and supply of clean energy that is free from slavery and state-imposed forced labour at any stage of the supply chain, and I will be tabling amendments to that effect. In tandem, we must seriously consider implementing an import ban. Like the US prevention Act, it would need to ban renewable energy products made in whole or in part with state-imposed Uyghur forced labour. I hope the Minister will meet me to discuss that further.