Steve Race MP: speeches 2025

Speeches

• 18 Dec 2025 · Local Government Reorganisation · Hansard source

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  I thank the Minister not just for her statement, but for moving at pace with the local government reorganisation programme. Contrary to what we heard from the shadow Minister, for whom I have great respect, we want local government reorganisation in Exeter and across Devon. I have lost count over the past 18 months of the list of places and topics for which two-tier government is simply not working for a diverse and dynamic city such as Exeter. I will not list them today, Madam Deputy Speaker, but does the Minister agree that streamlining councils and allowing cities such as Exeter to take control of their own economy, destiny and services will deliver real benefits—not just for the economy and for services, but for local people?

• 17 Dec 2025 · Local Government Finance · Hansard source

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  I welcome the multi-year settlement, and I thank the Minister and the Secretary of State for their engagement with me and Members from across the House as we make the case for our local areas. It looks like Devon county council will get a significant uplift over a period of years. If that is true, I am particularly keen to see the Lib Dem and Green-led Devon county council U-turn on its decision to cut 66% of its homelessness budget, get on top of the weeds that it has allowed to grow throughout our entire city, which are engulfing some communities, and go back on its current consultation to cut library hours. Will the Minister set out how she thinks the increase in funding to local authorities will have a positive impact on services and local people?

• 17 Dec 2025 · UK-EU Common Understanding Negotiations · Hansard source

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  As a Member of the UK-EU PPA, I absolutely welcome the statement, particularly that we will be rejoining the Erasmus+ scheme to the benefit of young people in Exeter. We should never have left, and this is the next step in rebuilding relations with our closest neighbours after such a catastrophic period under the previous Government. Does the Minister agree that it is only through co-operation with our closest European neighbours and partners, not isolation, that we will get the cultural, social and economic growth this country really needs?

• 9 Dec 2025 · Railways Bill · Hansard source

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  I thank the Secretary of State for her work on this vital legislation, which will bring the railways back together into one cohesive system, which should allow better planning and use of capacity, and should increase passenger satisfaction. I am pleased to see this Labour Government making good on their manifesto commitment to take back our railways into public ownership and to establish Great British Railways, something that people in the great railway city of Exeter have long called for, after years of decay under the Tory Government. Putting passengers at the heart of every part of the rail industry was a promise on which I and many colleagues here stood for election last year, and I am proud to see that coming to fruition. Since I was elected, I have been proud to see Exeter continue to grow in size and economic importance. It is one of the fastest growing cities in the country. Last year, our city was ranked sixth in the PwC’s “Good Growth for Cities” index. We in Exeter can see what good, equitable growth looks like—in climate tech, in scientific research and in education—and public transport is a key driver of it. Indeed, Exeter and Devon folk are avid railway users. Our passenger numbers exceeded the pre-covid peak long before many other cities. However, rail performance has often been poor under the current system; all three major operators across the two main lines and the several branch lines have been affected by long-term delays and cancellations, and critical infrastructure has needed investment. At a time when residents in Exeter want more frequent and reliable services, the opposite is being delivered under the current system. We want to continue to grow our economy and attract inward investment, and a fast, reliable and regular train network is needed more than ever. I very much hope that Great British Railways will take a better approach to operating our railways, in the interests of passengers. I welcome the fact that Great British Railways will have a whole-system view of investment, and will be able to judge where delivery will have significant impact, so that Exeter and Devon can deliver the sustainable economic growth that they need. That should mean backing the Devon metro proposal, increasing services into and out of Exeter to one service every 15 minutes by implementing passing loops on the South Western line, and improving the signalling on the Barnstaple line to increase capacity and reliability. That will enable further modal shift in Exeter and our growing hinterland, incentivise people out of their cars, and reduce some of our chronic traffic problems. We need to improve the resilience of the line past Exeter to our great city neighbour of Plymouth and on into Cornwall. While our famous main line is scenic, it occasionally falls into the sea or is buried by a landslide, as happened at Dawlish in 2014. Reopening a completed line between Exeter and Plymouth north of Dartmoor would add resilience to the network, and it would prevent the peninsula being cut off, should Dawlish happen again. I welcome the provisions that continue to allow open access operators on the network. The experience of the Lumo Edinburgh-to-London service and the Hull Trains service between Hull and London suggests that competition on the lines increases capacity and passenger numbers, rather than cannibalising numbers from elsewhere. Further, devolution and local decision making are imperative to ensuring that regions like the south-west can have a proper say on their transport infrastructure, and I hope that Exeter and Devon will achieve the local government reorganisation and devolution that I believe will work for us. I welcome the commitment to embedding the relationship between GBR and strategic mayors into the functionality of the organisation, and I look forward to exploring how that will work effectively. GBR should be a real powerhouse and driver of innovation, seeking out new innovation through its procurement, but also allowing the continued free use of data, so that start-ups can build businesses and thrive in the wider ecosystem. In this debate and beyond, I look forward to hearing Ministers’ vision for how GBR will look and feel. A nimble and strategic organisation with a defined mandate, working in partnership with the Department for Transport, will be more likely to deliver for passengers than a larger bureaucracy. Finally, I welcome the provisions on accountability. As the Secretary of State and Ministers will know, I look forward to continuing to lobby them and GBR, as I have done on many occasions, on providing lifts at my St Thomas and Polsloe Bridge stations. I am proud to support the Bill, and I dedicate my words to the hard-working railwaymen of Exeter, who set up our local party in the 1950s, and who have played such significant roles, as elected politicians, in the development of my city and the county. They would be delighted by this return to a national railway system.

• 8 Dec 2025 · Child Poverty · Hansard source

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  I recently held roundtables with Exeter residents to discuss child poverty, which in some of our neighbourhoods runs as high as 30%. All the evidence suggests that ingrained poverty cuts across a wide range of policy areas, so I was delighted by the publication of the child poverty strategy and the introduction of the new measure of deep material poverty. Could the Minister set out what this will mean for integrated policy development across Government, so that we can end child poverty for good?

• 8 Dec 2025 · Child Poverty · Hansard source

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  5. What steps he is taking to reduce the number of children in poverty.

• 2 Dec 2025 · Homelessness: Funding · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Vickers. I thank the hon. Member for Harrow East (Bob Blackman) for initiating this debate. I ask Members to note my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests; I am a patron of my local homelessness charity, St Petrock’s. As the largest urban centre for a very wide geography, Exeter has always had a pull factor for people whose housing situation deteriorates. We know that under 14 years of Tory government, homelessness increased substantially again after a period under the last Labour Government when it fell to historic lows due to political attention and drive. The factors driving homelessness are often complex, ranging from benefit changes and poverty to family breakdown, family violence or substance abuse. Researchers at the University of Exeter also look at the little-understood link between acquired brain injury and homelessness. Most people sleeping rough have experienced trauma, either as a child or—as with the veterans who find themselves homeless—in their working life, serving our nation. According to CoLab Exeter, the city’s homelessness cases have the highest prevalence of complex support needs in the region. I am sad to say that Exeter has one of the highest rates of homeless deaths in the country. That is due in part to the pernicious impact of the highly addictive and dangerous drug Spice on our homeless population. I would like to see that scourge gripped by national authorities. In this context, there are some bright spots, but there are also areas of significant concern. First, I am pleased that the Government have recently added a further £500,000 to Exeter city council’s budget for homelessness from the rough sleeping prevention and recovery grant, taking our budget this year to £1.8 million. That new money will partly support substance abuse services and children in temporary accommodation. I thank the Minister for that. However, our city, despite being the economic driver for the region and a fast-growing city, sits in a two-tier local government system, with Devon county council as the upper-tier authority with a far larger core budget. Supporting homeless people has historically been divided between the remits of Devon county council and Exeter city council, with housing a city council responsibility and the provision of care and support to an individual a county responsibility. That is where we have far more serious problems. After proposing at a budget meeting in 2023 to cut its entire £1.4 million homelessness budget for this financial year, the majority of which is spent in Exeter, Devon significantly reduced that budget from £1.4 million to £1 million and then to just £500,000 next year, or to zero; it is not entirely clear to stakeholders. For this year, I am told that the grants have not been paid in full. One stakeholder was informed that they would get Q1 and Q2 payments and a smaller payment—about half of one quarter payment—for the remaining two quarters of the year. There has been little to no communication to service delivery partners, including our local YMCA, which delivers transitional housing for previously homeless people, about the funding decision since it was proposed about 18 months ago. Providers are therefore working on the assumption that they will lose a majority of their funding from April next year. That means that vital emergency off-the-streets bed spaces and longer-term supported accommodation will be lost. The local support pathway out of homelessness will be significantly damaged, with no funding from other sources available to replace that lost funding. One organisation, Bournemouth Churches Housing Association, has confirmed that its funding for this financial year has been reduced by 28%, after 10 years without inflationary increases. Its contract with Devon county council ends at the end of March 2026. There is a realistic possibility that Gabriel House, the main hostel provision for people transitioning out of rough sleeping, may close. Gabriel House accommodates 42 former rough sleepers and provides the main stepping stone from the street to more stable housing. Exeter is already feeling the impact of the decision. At November’s annual rough sleeper count, our team saw a significant increase in the number of people they identified sleeping on the city streets. Another provider, Julian House, has had to close services, as funding to Exeter city council from the rough sleeper initiative and rough sleeper accommodation programme has been cut over previous years. Labour introduced the Supporting People programme in 2003 as a ringfenced fund, which successfully reduced homelessness and rough sleeping, along with providing a net saving to the Exchequer due to the impacts on other budgets such as health, criminal justice and so on. However, ever since the ringfence was removed in 2009 and the budget absorbed into local authority core grants under the coalition Government, as the hon. Member for Harrow East mentioned, local authorities have been diverting funding to other uses, with the results that we see daily on the streets. I therefore ask the Minister to give serious consideration to reintroducing the ringfence on homelessness prevention funding from central Government to local authorities. I have received helpful information from the Department, through the Parliamentary Private Secretaries, about the replacement of the rough sleeping initiative and the rough sleeping prevention and recovery grant. However, given that the funding for next year is wrapped up in the local government financial settlement, stakeholders and delivery partners are, at this point, assessing their ability to make it to the end of March without knowing what funding will be made available. That will have a destabilising impact on homelessness prevention services. RSI contracts end in March, so providers will potentially be winding down the projects and beginning redundancy processes in advance of those contracts ending. I encourage the Minister to view homelessness prevention and elimination through a Total Place-style model in the upcoming homelessness strategy, which is essential if we are to tackle multiple disadvantage rather than continually managing crisis. Although Total Place was mentioned in the Budget, it was limited in its development to five mayoral authorities, which risks leaving places such as Exeter behind at a time when instability is accelerating. Exeter could be an ideal pilot for a Total Place model in a smaller city undergoing transition and, hopefully, devolution, allowing us to demonstrate how integrated preventive investment can work effectively outside larger metropolitan areas. I pay tribute to the excellent organisations in Exeter that, despite pressures on capacity and funding, have provided vital support for our homeless population and have a wider beneficial impact in our city, including St Petrock’s, the YMCA, CoLab, Gabriel House and Julian House. These organisations do not just need an adequate sum of funding; they also need clarity on where that funding will come from. Funding uncertainty is part of a long-standing challenge embedded by two-tier delivery of local services—one that I am hopeful will be addressed by local government reorganisation. That is why Exeter city council has applied for unitary status on expanded boundaries. I look forward to working on that with MHCLG.

• 1 Dec 2025 · Office for Budget Responsibility Forecasts · Hansard source

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  First, I express my concern about the findings of the leak report, which are completely unacceptable, especially as they are apparently so systemic. The OBR productivity downgrade reduced revenues by £16 billion. Why does my right hon. Friend think productivity growth has, since 2010, so consistently underperformed against forecasts—and in other countries too?

• 27 Nov 2025 · Identity, Sexuality, Relationships and Marriage · Hansard source

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  I thank the Leader of the House for that answer. I wonder whether the Second Church Estates Commissioner might make it clear to the House of Bishops and the new Archbishop of Canterbury, whom I welcome, that the Church of England is accountable to Parliament, and that going backwards on very modest moves to end discrimination against same-sex lay and clergy couples is unacceptable and not a sustainable position if the Church wishes to continue to enjoy the privileges of its established status.

• 27 Nov 2025 · Identity, Sexuality, Relationships and Marriage · Hansard source

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  4. What discussions the Commissioners have had with the House of Bishops on the decision to move to a two-thirds majority requirement in Synod to progress the recommendations of “Living in Love and Faith”.

• 27 Nov 2025 · Budget Resolutions · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for North Cotswolds (Sir Geoffrey Clifton-Brown), and a great pleasure to speak in this Budget debate. I direct Members to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests. This is the second of what will be many Labour Budgets that will help this country to rebuild our public services, rebuild our public finances and bring down the monumental national debt. That is all at the heart of delivering long-term economic sustainability, growth and fairness, which is our great task after 14 years of Tory and Lib Dem mismanagement. I want to speak about the two issues closest to my heart as the MP for Exeter—the start-up and scale-up economy, and child poverty in Exeter. Today, over 1,000 start-ups are active across the south-west region, and our start-ups are growing not just in volume, but in value. The average venture-backed start-up in the south-west is now worth £11 million. Moreover, five of the UK’s top 50 start-up constituencies by funds raised are in the south-west: Bristol Central, Filton and Bradley Stoke, Bristol East, Bath and, indeed, Exeter. That amounts to 10% of the national total in a region that is too often overlooked. What is most exciting is what comes next. Half of our start-ups are at the seed stage, brimming with ideas and ambition. These are the major employers and major innovators of the future. These are the businesses that will supercharge Exeter’s economy and help deliver economic sustainability and prosperity. That is why I was really pleased to see changes in the Budget that will support new businesses in my constituency to start up and then to scale up, helping them to raise capital, attract talent and stay competitive here in the UK. First, the significant expansion of the investment limits for both the enterprise investment scheme and the venture capital trusts means that from April 2026 companies will be able to raise much larger sums, with annual limits doubling to £10 million and lifetime limits rising to £24 million, and even higher thresholds for knowledge-intensive companies. That means that more ambitious ideas can be funded right here in Britain, particularly in sectors such as green engineering, AI, biotechnology and fintech—the sectors that will power the next decade of economic leadership in this country. Secondly, the Budget strengthens one of the most powerful tools for fast-growing firms: the ability to attract and retain the skilled people who make innovation happen. By expanding the enterprise management incentive scheme—increasing the employee headcount eligibility to 500, and raising the asset and share option limits—we will ensure that starters can continue to offer meaningful equity to their teams as they grow. This gives scaling companies the firepower to compete with big employers to keep talent in the UK, and to ensure that workers share in the success they help create. Together, the reforms send a strong signal that Britain backs bold entrepreneurs. We want the next global success stories to start, scale and stay right here in the UK and in Exeter. Indeed, just today one of my contacts in the start-up world said that entrepreneurship was at the heart of the Budget in a way that has never been seen before. I want everyone in Exeter, no matter their upbringing, to know that they can achieve their potential by working in start-ups, scale-ups, or elsewhere in the economy and public services. That is why I was pleased that the Budget rightly put fairness at the heart of our national mission. Nowhere is that mission more urgent than in the fight against child poverty. Child poverty is not a statistic on a page. It is children in Exeter whose parents are going without meals so that they can eat. It is a family making impossible choices—heating or food, rent or clothes. As one of five children who grew up in a council house, I know what it is like when every penny counts. Nationally, more than 2.7 million children were living in poverty last year, which is 22% of all 0 to 15-year-olds. That is more than one in five children across the UK. We all recognise that that is not only unsustainable, but morally indefensible and a catastrophic consequence of 14 years of Tory and coalition government. In Exeter today, around 3,000 children aged 0 to 15 live in relative poverty. That is 19.9% of all our children—one in five. Earlier this year, I convened a local roundtable in Exeter with charities, schools, housing providers and health leaders, and we asked the hard questions. Where are families slipping through the gaps? How do we redesign support so that children are not left paying the price of economic insecurity? The message was clear: child poverty is family poverty. It is not isolated to any one Department. It cuts across the housing system, the labour market, childcare and education. It affects health, mental wellbeing and lifetime opportunity. I am proud that this Government are not looking away. We are tackling the barriers that families face head-on, right across the Government, through the expansion of free school meals, funded childcare and beyond. That is why I welcome the Chancellor’s decision to lift the two-child benefit cap—a long-overdue change that will raise 450,000 children out of poverty. But I know that we will go further, which is why I have been engaging with Ministers on the creation of the child poverty strategy, so that we take a whole-Government approach that tackles the causes and not just the symptoms, because simply raising benefits is not enough. I want every child in Exeter to break away from intergenerational poverty, and to succeed and fulfil their potential in life through their own work and achievements. We have already started the process of rebuilding hope and opportunity for young people. I have spoken before in this Chamber about the gutting of Sure Start, which was one of the most transformational programmes of the previous Labour Government. I am delighted that we are restoring Sure Start-style services in communities across the country: evidence-led family-centred support that helps children keep thriving from the very beginning. For my city, these services are not an optional extra; they are foundational. If we want children to arrive at school ready to learn, healthy, safe and confident, this is how to do it. The Budget recognises that fairness is not something that trickles down; it is something we build. Exeter children need us to build it now. They waited too long under the last Government, who simply failed a whole generation. We must ensure that the circumstances a child is born into never limit the life they are able to lead. I am therefore proud to support the Budget, and proud that the Government are choosing to put our children first.

• 27 Nov 2025 · Right to Trial by Jury · Hansard source

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  I recently met the local Crown Prosecution Service in Exeter, which informed me that, as has been discussed, defendants who have the choice often choose a jury trial to delay their case and game the system. Because of that, 10% of adult rape cases are stopped after a defendant has been charged, as the victim no longer supports prosecution due to the long delays in their case. With the backlog at 78,000 and rising, victims are waiting years. Does the Minister agree that we need this bold action to get the court system back on its feet?

• 25 Nov 2025 · Immigration Reforms: Humanitarian Visa Routes · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Edward. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Rushcliffe (James Naish) on securing this debate and on making such a powerful case. First, I welcome many of the Home Secretary’s announcements from last week about reforms to the asylum and immigration system, particularly the proposal to develop safe and legal routes, and a move to a community sponsorship model that is very much based on the Ukrainian and Hong Kong schemes. I hope that it will break the pull factors that force migrants into the hands of people smugglers and into using the treacherous cross-channel route. Moving on to the substance of the debate, Hongkongers in Devon is a community interest group based in my constituency. It was founded by Dennis Mak, and it estimates that there are about 1,000 Hongkongers in Devon, most of whom are based in Exeter. Many are teachers, university lecturers, nurses, IT professionals and so on, and they are enriching our community and contributing to the local economy. Our Hongkonger community is exceptionally active, holding Chinese new year breakthrough events, a mid-autumn festival lunch, and dragon boat racing on the River Exe. Both culturally and economically, Hongkongers in Exeter are a valued and vital part of our community. Having worked with Hongkongers to make the case to Government on a range of issues—including the conditions of their visas, their ability to access funds still held in the Chinese system, and of course Chinese state monitoring of Hongkongers in the UK—I greatly welcome the Government’s Command Paper, published last week, which confirms that British national overseas visa holders would be fully exempted from the proposed earned settlement criteria and maintain a five-year route to indefinite leave to remain, in recognition of their unique circumstances and, indeed, the UK’s historic responsibilities to the people of Hong Kong. I know that the community welcomes that. Will the Minister comment on how else we might support the Hong Kong community in the UK, in particular the request for a special British identity for their newborns who are born in the UK, in order to guarantee their rights and recognition as integral members of the community in the future? Hongkongers are also asking for a simplified route for BNO passport holders seeking British citizenship. I know that the Government have worked hard to clarify many areas of the visa settlement regime for Hongkongers, and I welcome that. However, my question for the Minister is: how can we ensure that we provide total clarity for those communities?

• 17 Nov 2025 · Asylum Policy · Hansard source

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  Exeter is a proud city of sanctuary and has welcomed communities of Hongkongers, Ukrainians and Afghans over recent years. Many of my residents will be pleased with and welcome this re-establishment of safe and legal routes for refugees, which were long forgotten by the Conservatives. Does the Home Secretary agree that safe and legal routes are an element of a system that has control and order, and can she set out how the system will be flexible when geopolitical factors change?

• 17 Nov 2025 · Small Modular Nuclear Reactor Power Station: Wylfa · Hansard source

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  I welcome the announcement of the new SMRs at Wylfa. This is British innovation we can be proud of, leading to decarbonisation of our electricity grid, and helping to combat climate change. It is exactly the sort of policy that my Exeter constituents want from this Government. Does the Minister agree that supply chains at Wylfa and Sizewell C will benefit businesses and workers across the entire United Kingdom, alongside the local areas where they are based?

• 17 Nov 2025 · Illegal Waste: Organised Crime · Hansard source

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  Residents in Exeter have raised with me the appalling fly-tipping in the glorious countryside around our city, particularly in Stoke Woods. As we have heard, it is rarely individuals; this is about dodgy cowboy operators who are ruining our countryside. I am pleased that the Government are cracking down on them, but we have to break the business model. How is the Department working cross-Government to tackle the financial incentives of waste crime, which would also support the many legitimate, responsible waste companies that do exist?

• 5 Nov 2025 · Conflict in Sudan · Hansard source

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  I thank the Government for the leadership they are showing on Sudan, including last week’s statement at the United Nations. The Minister is right to stress both the urgency and the horror of the current situation in El Fasher and beyond, but can he set out what is required next at the UN, in terms of both process and outcomes, to try to stop the violence and to tackle the ongoing humanitarian crisis?

• 5 Nov 2025 · Bronze-age Heritage: Cambridgeshire · Hansard source

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  I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing the debate. Devon also has one of the highest concentrations of bronze-age settlements in the country. The Royal Albert Memorial Museum in Exeter plays host to the Pinhoe and the Dawlish hoards, two fantastic bronze-age treasures for residents and visitors to see. Does my hon. Friend agree that such local museums are a good resource for local people?

• 4 Nov 2025 · Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria · Hansard source

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  I am delighted that the Prime Minister has chosen to co-host the eighth replenishment of the Global Fund, alongside the Republic of South Africa. I put on record my thanks to my hon. Friend the Member for Gedling (Michael Payne) for working hard over the last year to corral myself and other colleagues to work with the Government to make the case for the Global Fund. Does the hon. Member agree with me that by co-hosting the summit, which is a good thing in itself, we are showing that the UK remains at the forefront of global development, and that doing so in partnership with South Africa exemplifies our commitment to working with other nations to achieve our shared ambitions?

• 27 Oct 2025 · Employment: People with Health Conditions · Hansard source

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  4. What steps he is taking to support people with health conditions into work.

• 27 Oct 2025 · Employment: People with Health Conditions · Hansard source

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  I recently visited Pluss in Exeter, which supports people living with physical disabilities and mental health conditions back into employment. I met some of the fantastically committed mentors, who provide tailored training and support, helping hundreds of people who have been long-term unemployed into meaningful jobs, boosting their confidence and helping them rebuild their lives. Does the Minister agree that under the last Tory Government, disability employment was shockingly neglected? In contrast, this Government’s recent announcement about Connect to Work funding for Devon will help many more people back into the workplace.

• 20 Oct 2025 · Post-16 Education and Skills Strategy · Hansard source

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  Exeter has a fantastic tertiary college—Exeter college—which, thanks to this Government, will be a technical excellence college for construction. We also have an exceptional specialist maths school that provides excellent maths, physics and computing education, which are skills we really need in the south-west. How will these reforms raise standards for every child in Exeter, to help make sure they reach their full potential?

• 16 Oct 2025 · Biodiversity Beyond National Jurisdiction Bill · Hansard source

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  I welcome the Government and the Minister’s leadership on this issue in bringing the Bill to the House to enact the UN high seas treaty. I, too, am a member of the APPG for the ocean. I know that people in Exeter care very deeply about our natural environment, particularly the seas and oceans, and rightly so. The world’s oceans are vital to the health of our planet and to our people. They produce over half of the world’s oxygen and absorb a quarter of all carbon dioxide emissions, helping to regulate our climate. They support an immense diversity of life, providing food for billions of people and supporting enormous ecosystems, which contain knowledge that we have only just begun to tap. After decades of industrial damage, this landmark legislation and the treaty will go some way to protecting two thirds of the world’s oceans, and it represents a massive step forward by nations across the world to protect marine life and ecosystems beyond our national borders. By providing the legal framework necessary to implement the BBNJ agreement domestically, the Bill includes provisions for marine protected areas, environmental impact assessments and the sharing of benefits from the collection and use of marine genetic resources, and will help us to meet the target to effectively conserve and manage at least 30% of the ocean by 2030. I also welcome the Bill as a core part of re-establishing the UK’s role in providing global leadership on climate and nature, both at home and around the world. Just as the UK is a leader in marine and climate science, so is Exeter. I was delighted this week to host in Parliament the Met Office, which is based in Exeter, to showcase the range and depth of its expertise. The Met Office is not just a specialist in our weather. It is also a specialist in space weather, our oceans, and the connection between climate change and forecasting. Its work on ocean biogeochemistry—studying how carbon and other gases are absorbed, transported and exchanged by the oceans, the mechanisms involved and the impact changes have—is pioneering. It researches the risks of rapid loss of sea ice, and is studying the rise of sea levels and the impacts on communities, the environment and the economy. The Met Office also provides a vital service in generating risk assessments of rapid changes to the meridional overturning circulation, which I am told—I am literature graduate, Madam Deputy Speaker, not a science graduate—plays an important role in regional climates. It is also part of the National Partnership for Ocean Prediction, bringing together world-class expertise and research, as well as developing beneficial marine products and services. In addition, the University of Exeter has a wide-ranging research community working on projects related to our oceans. These come together under the Exeter Marine research network, and their ocean research runs from pollution and conservation to governance and human health. In June this year, Exeter University’s Professor Callum Roberts was the lead author of a report in Nature supporting the UN high seas treaty. His paper highlighted that the high seas are the Earth’s largest and most secure carbon sink. Protecting them is critical to preserving the biological and nutrient cycles that draw down and keep atmospheric CO2 in check. They welcome the UN high seas treaty, saying it offers a pathway to greater protection, but they are concerned about the length of time for implementation. The report’s authors also argue that a full and permanent ban on extractive use of the oceans is both feasible and necessary, modelled on the successful precedent set for Antarctica in the 1950s. Will the Minister comment on what more can be done, beyond the treaty as we bring it in, to protect our oceans above and beyond this legislation? Finally, I want to pay tribute to my constituents Mary Attewell, Debbie Thomas, Sue Down and Lizzie Waler of Exeter’s Greenpeace group, who have been doggedly campaigning for the UK’s ratification of the treaty. I thank them for all their work and for keeping this issue at the top of the political agenda. I hope they will be celebrating this evening, if the Bill passes its Second Reading. They have asked to question how the treaty will be enforced. I would welcome comments from the Minister on that, too. I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Chesterfield (Mr Perkins) that we want there to be cross-party and cross-House agreement on this issue. While it is disappointing that the Conservatives are not here, it is also disappointing that Green party MPs, other than one small intervention at the beginning, are not here to participate substantially in the debate. I commend the Bill. I am extraordinarily thrilled and pleased to support it. I know that the ratification of the agreement as soon as possible supports the UK’s broader climate and nature agenda, and will mean that we can take our seat at the top table at the first COP. That will ensure we remain at the forefront of global efforts to tackle biodiversity loss and climate change through multilateral co-operation. This will strengthen the role of international law—so important in these times—and multilateral institutions as the foundation for ocean governance.

• 11 Sept 2025 · Business of the House · Hansard source

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  The women’s rugby world cup is providing a fantastic sporting showcase, including the seven matches hosted by Sandy Park in Exeter to sell-out crowds. Will the Leader of the House join me in congratulating the organisers, including the staff at Exeter city council and the teams for an excellent tournament so far, and send the best of luck from this place to all the home nation teams as they enter the knock- out stages this weekend?

• 11 Sept 2025 · Life Sciences Investment · Hansard source

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  I welcome the Minister to his place. Exeter has a very strong life sciences and R&D sector and just recently the University of Exeter was awarded £10.5 million from UK Research and Innovation to set up the metamaterials hub—that is real cutting-edge science—which also leveraged extra private sector investment of another £10 million. Does the Minister agree that that sort of investment and commitment to research and development will enable cities such as Exeter to thrive and grow in future?