Speeches by Spencer.

“When an extremist minority spreads division and intimidation and now has even attacked our military, prioritising foreign regions and their interests above our own, it is an attack on our country. It is treason. The primary job of our Government is to protect the UK, so I welcome the announcement today that the Governm…”

“I thank the Foreign Secretary and his Department for the work they are doing to protect British citizens here and abroad. What does he think needs to happen for Iran to abandon its ambitions to build and deploy a nuclear weapon?”

“It is often said that Parliament is the conscience of the nation, but I believe that it is also its safeguard. There are people who will benefit from physician-assisted suicide, as implemented in this Bill, but there are also people who will be harmed: those with mental illness, those in care homes, those who feel a bu…”

“rose—”

“I thank the Home Secretary for her statement, and for changing her mind on the need for a national inquiry. She has had the Casey report for the past 10 days. Could she lay out what evidence in that report was most persuasive in changing her mind, or, if she reached that conclusion independent of the report, which fact…”

“Will the hon. Lady give way?”

“I think I am pushing it. I tried to intervene on the hon. Member for Spen Valley (Kim Leadbeater) to ask what she thinks about that. She is welcome to intervene on me now if she has further points to add. Otherwise, I ask the Minister to address those points.”

“I thank the hon. Member for his intervention. Of course, these are difficult things to disentangle. People will say, “You would say this, wouldn’t you, Ben?”, but we should get the person in front of a psychiatrist or a clinical nurse specialist working in psychiatry. This is what psychiatry does; this is what it is ab…”

“I thank the hon. Member for her intervention. Of course there are situations in which a decision to end one’s life is perfectly understandable—indeed, rational. I spent my career looking after people, many of whom presented to me and to medical services with thoughts about wanting to end their life. Many of them had me…”

“Before I come to the substantive part of my speech, I would like to pick up on the comments of the hon. Member for North Warwickshire and Bedworth (Rachel Taylor). I have signed the amendments tabled by my right hon. Friend the Member for Salisbury (John Glen). I support them because I think the panel needs strengtheni…”

“Will the hon. Lady give way on that point?”

“Will the hon. Lady give way?”

“What is most interesting about the spending review is what is not mentioned: there is no mention of the River Thames scheme, no mention of our rivers, no mention of the Animal and Plant Health Agency in New Haw, and no mention of improvements to rail, despite the nationalisation of South Western Railway. In fact, there…”

“It feels like we are going from “Groundhog Day” to “Lost in Translation” because the Government clearly are not getting the message. Today I will try something different and tell the House a story—the story of this debate: A story was read in the deep dark wood, AI saw the book, and the book looked good. “Where are you…”

“I thank the Chair of the Select Committee, who is also trying to break us out of the groundhog day that we seem to have found ourselves in. The Lords amendment does not fetter the Government’s policy options, nor does it prescribe how proportionate transparency should be achieved. It simply puts a line in the sand for …”

“Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. As I said, this is clearly a tricky area to legislate—I have said that at the Dispatch Box and in Committee many times—but what is not helping is the uncertainty that has been created throughout the debate, whether it is the position of copyright law, preferred third options or the stat…”

“What the last Government did not do is release a consultation that had a ministerial foreword to say that the position of copyright was uncertain. What they did not do was say their preferred option was opt-out, which spooked the creative industry and caused all these problems in the first place. It is this Government’…”

“I thank the Secretary of State for his comments on continuity of service, which will provide some reassurance to my constituents. Thames Water has failed my constituents time and again; clearly, it needs investment. What is he doing to ensure that there is the confidence to invest in our water sector?”

“Back again, and it feels a bit like groundhog day. I must confess that I am a Bill Murray fan, and I think “Groundhog Day” is a great movie. However, I realise that some Members on both sides of the House may not have been born when it was released, which makes me feel a little old, so I will explain a little of the pl…”

“As hon. Members know, the substance of this Bill began with the previous Government, in recognition of the need to streamline and harness the use of data to grow the economy and drive improvement in the delivery of public services. As I have said before, when the Bill started its life, most of us had no idea that it wo…”