Shockat Adam MP: speeches 2026

Speeches

• 15 Sept 2026 · Coronial System: Delays · Hansard source

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  A constituent of mine died in state custody in July last year. His family was told to expect the prisons and probation ombudsman report within weeks, but it was quietly paused, pending the coroner’s post-mortem report, and the family were not told about that for several months. They have now passed the first anniversary of the death, with no answers at all, and with no post-mortem report. Will the Minister meet me to discuss this case and the plight of families who are caught between investigations that wait on one another?

• 9 Sept 2026 · Pharmacies: Government Funding · Hansard source

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  Does the hon. Member agree that another opportunity for Pharmacy First—indeed, a generational opportunity—is independent prescribing? That would really unlock the potential of pharmacies and help patients, but it requires both a vision and adequate funding.

• 9 Sept 2026 · Pharmacies: Government Funding · Hansard source

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  I thank the hon. Member for making that point about how much stress is put on pharmacists and small business owners. In the last year, there was a 2.3% increase in items reimbursed by the NHS, a 17% increase in service volumes, a 3% increase in inflation, and increases in operating costs such as national insurance and business rates. That all adds to the pressure when pharmacists should be concentrating on providing a vital service to the community.

• 9 Sept 2026 · Pharmacies: Government Funding · Hansard source

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  I agree that we need expanded services for our pharmacies, but does the right hon. Member agree that should come with adequate remuneration? At the moment, pharmacists are saying they are doing a lot more for a lot less.

• 9 Sept 2026 · Education and Skills Reform · Hansard source

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  I welcome much of the Secretary of State’s statement, especially how it acknowledges that one size does not fit all and highlights that 1 million of our young people are not in education, employment or training. One way out of that is through apprenticeship schemes, but apprenticeship providers are really struggling. That is especially true of my constituent Amanda, who runs an independent hairdressing business and is now playing £204,000 a year in employment taxes and VAT before she even pays her wages. We need entrepreneurs like Amanda, but current policies mean that she cannot afford to take on apprentices. What steps is the Minister taking to address that issue?

• 9 Sept 2026 · Summer Health and Resilience · Hansard source

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  Analysis from Ordnance Survey has highlighted that my great city of Leicester is now projected to show the biggest rise in Britain’s heat vulnerability ranking, climbing from 10th to fourth. This is deeply concerning, considering the record-setting heatwave we have just had. In the absence of a full and speedy green transition, what reassurance can the Secretary of State give my Leicester South constituents that their health facilities will be able to cope with the inevitable increase in heat?

• 8 Sept 2026 · Israel and Palestine · Hansard source

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  The Egyptian-American author Omar El Akkad said: “One day, when it is safe, when there is no personal downside to calling a thing what it is, when it is too late to hold anyone accountable, everyone will have always been against this.” I thank the Foreign Secretary for his statement, and many of my constituents will thank him. It is late—70,000 Gazans dead, late—but it is not too late to hold those perpetrating war crimes to account. What will he do to hold the war criminals to account?

• 7 Sept 2026 · Health Bill · Hansard source

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  I refer the House to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests. I am a practicing optometrist and an officer for the APPG for eye health and visual impairment. Sight is precious and none of us would like to lose it—but, sadly, 2 million people in this country are living with some form of sight loss today. On the Department’s own projection, that figure will rise to 2.7 million by 2030. Every day, 250 people in the UK start to lose their sight—one person every six minutes. Left unaddressed, that number is set to more than double to over 4 million by 2050. We are witnessing a growing problem, which, sadly, the Bill does not treat with the urgency it deserves. Tonight, I urge the Government to strengthen this legislation in some specific ways. On governance, clause 21 rightly ensures that ICBs reflect local political accountability, but it says absolutely nothing about clinical accountability. Optometrists have no guaranteed voice in the rooms where commissioning decisions affecting their patients are made. It would be unthinkable to build localised healthcare without GPs at the table. It would be equally unthinkable to do so without pharmacists. I say to the Government plainly: optometrists have the expertise, the infrastructure and the systems already in place to relieve pressure on our hospitals, yet this Bill says nothing about it. I want to see eyecare—glaucoma monitoring in particular, along with the management of minor eye conditions—commissioned consistently by every ICB in England and not left to a postcode lottery. Optometry already has what I call the TAC effect: it is trusted, accessible and capable. Commissioning it properly would reduce unnecessary demand on emergency departments, freeing them to focus on genuinely specialist cases while improving patients’ access to specialist eyecare where they need it. A recent report by the Association of Optometrists has found that right now, 780,000 people—the equivalent of the entire population of Greater Nottingham—attend A&E with eye problems annually, at an average cost of £145 to the NHS per A&E presentation. That is £113 million a year. At least seven out of 10 of those people with eye problems could be successfully managed in a community optometry setting with the right service commissioning. Those stats reflect a lived reality for many across our country. If the new Government want to make smarter decisions with public money, they must consider that. Finally, I turn to the single patient record. Proposed new subsection (7) to clause 51 should be amended so that it explicitly includes optometry in the single patient record framework, ensuring that optometrists have appropriate access to relevant patient information. This Bill takes real and welcome steps in many areas, but more than 2 million people have already lost their sight—a number that none of us wants to see double to more than 4 million by 2050. Fundamentally, seeing should be a right, not a privilege, so I ask the Government to look again.

• 7 Sept 2026 · Economic Growth · Hansard source

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  I, too, am a bit concerned that the Minister is missing a page of her statement, because there has been no mention of the east midlands. The Prime Minister was right when he blamed Margaret Thatcher for picking winners and abandoning whole regions, and that appears to be happening to the east midlands this time. In my constituency, Leicestershire and Rutland receives a grand total of zero pounds in infrastructure investment. On skills funding, Leicester gets £11.30 per head, compared with £52.10 in Greater Manchester and £66.19 in the west midlands, which is six times more. Can she reassure me, the people of the east midlands and my constituents in Leicester South that we will not be left behind?

• 3 Sept 2026 · Frontier Artificial Intelligence · Hansard source

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  4. What recent assessment she has made of the potential impact of frontier AI on society.

• 3 Sept 2026 · Frontier Artificial Intelligence · Hansard source

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  I welcome the response from the Secretary of State. The company OpenAI has just created a program called Astra, which, in its own words, is the most dangerous program it has ever created because it can hack other programs autonomously. That follows other AI programs unleashing themselves from their own security system and hacking other programs simply because they can—because they speak a language that only they seem to understand. AI is inevitably our future, but with the Government handing over NHS contracts and our public service records to big American AI companies, what is the Secretary of State doing to ensure that we are kept safe in this dangerous world?

• 16 Jul 2026 · Business of the House · Hansard source

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  I refer Members to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests: I am a practising optometrist. Children across England are living in a postcode lottery when it comes to vision screening. Only 50% of local authorities provide vision screening in our schools, which means that conditions such as amblyopia—lazy eye—get missed before the age of five. If we miss these conditions, children’s educational abilities and employment opportunities can be reduced. May we have a debate in the Chamber about this cost-efficient, proficient method of screening in all our schools?

• 16 Jul 2026 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  At a recent packed talk with my Highfields residents, they told me the same thing that all my residents tell me about: the scourge of potholes. We know that councils are facing a backlog of £17 billion in road repairs, but new technology exists that can detect early cracks and seal them before they become potholes. Will the Secretary of State commit to funding the roll-out of that preventive AI-based road technology, instead of constantly chasing the problem?

• 14 Jul 2026 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  Young people with cancer often face severe isolation during treatment, separated from their friends and everything that is normal to them at that critical age. In Leicester South, at Leicester Royal Infirmary it has been left to charities like the Teenage Cancer Trust to provide vital care and support, funded through donations and philanthropic grants. What steps is the Secretary of State taking to ensure that those charities are sustainably funded so we can support them as much as they are supporting our young people with cancer?

• 30 Jun 2026 · Culture, Media And Sport · Hansard source

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  I recently read Viktor Frankl’s “Man’s Search for Meaning”, which is a powerful account of life in a concentration camp. There is a poignant part of that book where victims and concentration camp prisoners, talking to each other at the end of the day when they could barely keep their eyes open, go and witness a sunset because its beauty brings out something in them that would keep them going for the next day. The reason I talk about that is that it demonstrates the importance of art, in any shape or form. It can help our young people and those who are looking to improve their ill health. Creative art for young people is routinely treated as discretionary spending: nice if there is money left over, but expendable the moment that there is not. I pay homage to the hon. Member for Stroud (Dr Opher), who has done a lot of work on this subject. He recently held a roundtable where he showed that ill health currently costs the UK economy £212 billion a year, with 2.8 million people out of work due to long-term sickness. However, arts and health interventions are estimated to return up to £8.56 in social value for every £1 spent. We also know that poor mental health costs the economy an estimated £300 billion annually. Conversely, cultural engagement among 18 to 30-year-olds shows an average wellbeing benefit of £854 per person. Evidence on social prescribing tells the same story in cash terms; reductions in GP and A&E attendance and hospital admissions could represent around a £4 saving on every £1 spent on a link worker’s salary. The 2023 “Creative Health Review” found that the problem is not a lack of evidence, but fragmented funding. I will quickly pay homage to some organisations in my city that are utilising arts to improve the mental health of young people and the recovery of those who are unwell. Since October last year, the Shine programme, launched by the Curve theatre in partnership with the Randal Foundation, has brought drama-based sessions into five Leicester city-centre schools, reaching 250 teenagers in some of our most disadvantaged communities. The early findings from Dr Lyndsey Bakewell at De Montfort University are striking: every student involved has reported doing something they have never done before, and teachers have reported an increase in student resilience across the board. One participating pupil described feeling comfortable speaking in front of others—something that they had always found difficult. That is what early intervention looks like. There is also Talent 25, which is De Montfort University’s extraordinary 25-year longitudinal study, led by Professor Bertha and funded by the Arts Council. It is following 440 children from across Leicester, from birth into adulthood, tracking the effects of regular access to arts and creativity on a child’s development. The early findings are positive among the children now starting school, with researchers reporting no unauthorised absences and parents describing real, lasting changes in their own lives, reduced isolation—

• 29 Jun 2026 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  Sadly, Leicester South is not immune to the unemployment figures for young people—1,000 young people and counting. My concern is that AI is about to make it even worse, especially as CEOs are citing lower human capital value as justification for replacing workers with AI. What is the Secretary of State’s Department doing to ensure that technological advancements create opportunity, rather than unemployment?

• 24 Jun 2026 · Engagements · Hansard source

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  Q9. My children, like millions of others, are kicking every ball of England’s world cup campaign, but as a parent I am really concerned about their security in this country, along with other Muslim parents. Let me explain why. When a Sikh lady was raped in Walsall, the perpetrator repeatedly called her an effing Muslim bitch. There was no condemnation by a Minister at the Dispatch Box and no outcry from Members in this Chamber who openly call out these matters when the perpetrators are of a different colour. When we had the Unite the Kingdom march calling openly for the expulsion of Muslims in this country, there was no ministerial statement condemning such statements. This weekend, five members of the Muslim community were stabbed on the streets of Edinburgh. There was no ministerial statement of condemnation, no Cobra meeting and no solidarity. What does this silence say to my children as they wait with bated breath for Harry Kane to bring it home?

• 22 Jun 2026 · UK Politics: Pro-Israel Influence · Hansard source

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  It is an honour to serve under your chairship, Mrs Harris. I agree wholeheartedly that conflating a people’s religion with a Government’s actions is totally unacceptable. Criticising the state of Israel and its actions, especially with its present Government, is not antisemitic, otherwise the bombing of Iraq or Afghanistan would be Islamophobic. I want to concentrate my speech particularly on Elbit, which supplies around 85% of Israeli military drones and land-based military equipment. As the International Court of Justice considers allegations of genocide, and while the ICC has issued arrest warrants against the Israeli Prime Minister and former Minister of Defence, Elbit continues to profit from the genocide in Gaza. United Nations investigators have documented the repeated use of armed quadcopter drones against Palestinian civilians. One of those systems, the Lanius drone, is manufactured by Elbit. Elbit has a significant presence in my city of Leicester through its manufacturing and technology operations. The company generates billions of dollars in annual revenue while supplying the military equipment used in a conflict that is subject to allegations of genocide before the International Court of Justice. That is why parliamentary scrutiny of its access to Ministers is essential. It is deeply alarming that freedom of information disclosures reveal repeated meetings between Elbit executives and the Home Office. Briefing papers show that Ministers were preparing to reassure the company in response to Palestine Action protests. They also reveal that Home Office officials had been in contact with the police regarding those protests, while another meeting was scheduled to include a representative from the Attorney General’s Office. It is disturbing that, while Ministers meet privately with executives from a company whose weapons are alleged to have been used in acts now under scrutiny before the international courts, those who want to challenge those activities through protest increasingly face being associated with terrorism. While the suppliers of war and genocide are granted meetings with Ministers, those opposing the machinery of war risk being treated as a threat. Most troubling of all, the section of the ministerial briefing entitled “Past lobbying” was redacted. If there is nothing to conceal, why are the details of previous lobbying being withheld from Parliament and the public? My question for the Minister is straightforward: why was an arms manufacturer being reassured by Government Departments while international legal proceedings over genocide in Gaza continued? What safeguards exist to ensure that commercial relationships with any foreign defence contractors do not influence policing, prosecutorial independence or British foreign policy? Transparency is not optional; if Ministers are confident that those relationships are appropriate, they should have no objection to placing them fully in the public domain.

• 15 Jun 2026 · Brain Cancer · Hansard source

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  I will begin by paying homage to a young girl by the name of Eiliyah: when her tumour took over her right hand, she began to learn to draw with her left, because she loved arts and crafts more than anything else. When she could not dart around any more, she started to bum-shuffle everywhere. She was unfortunately diagnosed with DIPG, one of the most aggressive childhood brain tumours known to medicine. The family had a bit of hope but, before proper treatment could start, the tumour returned again. Her family could only watch as she lost her movement, her speech, her sight and finally her ability to eat. She died on 2 May this year, surrounded by those who loved her. She was just a child. Eiliyah’s aunt asked me quietly to speak for her today, but I would like to speak quietly also for my own sister, only a handful of years older than me, who went from full of life to grade 4 glioblastoma and then death in under six months. During that time, she was barely offered any treatment at all, and what she was offered was decades old. That is the heart of the problem: as we have heard today, brain cancer is the biggest cancer killer of children and adults under 40, yet our survival rates lag behind most of Europe. Nowhere is that cost clearer, as we have heard, than on tissue freezing, so will the Minister commit to a national standard for tissue freezing? I ask the Minister for three things: first, to increase brain cancer research funding urgently and substantially, with ringfenced investment for diseases such as DIPG; secondly, to ensure that every patient can access whole-genome sequencing; and, finally, to enshrine the right to try—the right to reach clinical trials, innovative treatments and immunotherapies even when standard treatment has failed. Treatments have not meaningfully changed in decades. Eiliyah deserved better; my sister Shahida deserved better; Owain deserved better; the families who will hear the words “brain cancer” for the first time this week deserve better. I urge the Minister to act, and to act now.

• 11 Jun 2026 · Passenger Rail Services · Hansard source

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  Safety concerns are blighting passenger rail services. Constituents working at Leicester train station have raised serious concerns about security gaps, particularly the near impossibility of reaching transport police during emergencies. With nearly 80,000 offences recorded on our railways in 2023 and 2024 and the RMT reporting staff being punched, threatened, spat at and abused simply for doing their jobs, what assessment have Ministers made of whether private security contractors at railway stations have the enforcement powers they need to keep both passengers and workers safe?

• 10 Jun 2026 · Belfast: Violent Disorder · Hansard source

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  We all condemn the actions on Monday night, and we look with concern at the subsequent rioting, but my concern is about those who make it possible for such actions to happen—those who politicise and weaponise. When I was younger, in the 1970s, if somebody was going to attack me for racial reasons, which did happen, I could spot them from a mile away. Now, those who instigate racial hatred wear smart suits, speak the King’s English, and occupy every radio wave and television channel to instigate hate. We seem to be repeating the same situation—Southport, the Liverpool fans who were run over, and the Huntingdon train stabbing. People are looking at crime through a lens of racialisation, but many in this Chamber have spoken in unity today. This week, we commemorate 10 years since the death of Jo Cox, who spoke about what unites us rather than divides us. May I ask the Minister to consider setting up a cross-party taskforce to tackle this issue, which is going to affect every single member of our communities?

• 9 Jun 2026 · North Belfast: Violent Attack · Hansard source

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  I thank the Secretary of State for that answer. Following on from that question, I also give my deepest sympathies to the victim and his family, and pay tribute to the bystanders who intervened in this horrific case. Does the Secretary of State agree that, as he has already expressed, crime and heroes come in all different hues and colours? We saw that on the train in Cambridgeshire and with the stabber of the Saudi student in the picturesque streets of Cambridge last year. It does not matter which background people come from. It is the responsibility of Members of this House to temper the inflammatory remarks so that we do not see actions like those last week in Southampton, where innocent police officers have had to go into hiding.

• 9 Jun 2026 · Middle East · Hansard source

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  The Secretary of State in her statement—in her own words—talked of Netanyahu’s condemnation of settler violence as being “hollow”. Will she allow the Great Israeli Real Estate Event to proceed on UK soil this weekend? If she does, could she not be accused of the same thing?

• 8 Jun 2026 · Unite the Kingdom Rally: Policing · Hansard source

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  Many in the Muslim community are feeling bewildered, besieged and beleaguered. When they exercise their democratic right to vote and the results do not go a certain way, they are accused of sectarianism. When they take to the streets to protest peacefully against genocide, they are accused of going on hate marches, all the while witnessing not one but two Unite the Kingdom marches, where there were open calls for their expulsion from this country, which are met with apparent indifference. What steps is the Home Secretary taking to protect the Muslim community from further alienation and what message does she send to those who incite hatred against them?

• 8 Jun 2026 · Digital Safety: Children · Hansard source

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  I refer Members to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests as a practising optometrist. Myopia—shortsightedness—is nearing epidemic levels for UK children. It is a crisis that was sharply increased by covid, when screentime surged and outdoor activity collapsed. Research shows that nearly one in three of our UK children will now be short sighted, and the rate is still rising. Shortsightedness after a certain dioptre level can lead to retinal conditions and sight loss. When developing any digital policies, can consideration be given to the devastating impact of screentime on our children’s eye health?