Speeches by Bryant.

“It is true that this piece of the jigsaw in relation to sanctions policy lies across two Departments. The Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office is in charge of sanctions policy, and we in the Department for Business and Trade have responsibility for trade and export licences. That is why there has been a bit of …”

“There are two things here. A set of sanctions comes into force today, including on oil and oil products processed in a third country. It is the first time that the UK has gone down that route. As I say, the previous Government chose not to go down that route, even though people were arguing for it. I think this will be…”

“I completely agree with my hon. Friend, and that is the tenor of the conversation that has been happening. He will know that the Prime Minister has been chairing regular meetings to consider the impact of the situation in the middle east. This is undoubtedly one area where we had to take action to minimise the instabil…”

“The hon. Gentleman makes an extremely good point. That is one of the reasons we thought it was important to phase the process. Because of the time lag, we needed to make it possible for businesses not to be caught in legal limbo, as it were, as a result of the sanctions coming into force today. It is probably best if I…”

“Well, I apologise for the rhetoric and bluster, but it is my general way of doing things, so it seems a particularly cruel attack from my colleague! The serious point to make is that I am proud of what we are doing today. I am not hiding away from what we are doing, but we could definitely have communicated it better, …”

“The one bit of the right hon. Gentleman’s remarks that I completely agree with is that we have handled this clumsily. That is entirely my fault, and I apologise to all hon. Members, because I think we have ended up giving the wrong impression of what we are trying to do. We are trying to strengthen the regime, not weak…”

“We are putting an end to the import of these products from Russia. We want to debilitate and degrade the Russian war machine. The point I would make to the hon. Member is that even if we were to grant licences today for further exploration, that would not solve the problem that we have today, arising from the instabili…”

“Mr Speaker, you will be aware of the phrase that sometimes it is conspiracy and sometimes it is something else. I just want to say that, in relation to communications, there is no conspiracy. Nobody is trying to undermine our support for Ukraine. The statutory instrument on the tougher measures was always going to come…”

“I think the hon. Gentleman wrote the first half of that question before he heard what I had to say on the subject. I want to make it absolutely clear, once again, that up until now it has been possible for people to perfectly legally import into the UK refined products that have been processed in third countries but th…”

“As it happens I am not on the Russian sanctions list, although when I raised this with the Russian—”

“I am sorry, but up until today it was perfectly legal for people to use Russian crude oil that had been processed in a third country and brought into the UK. The hon. Member is inventing a saga that does not exist.”

“My hon. Friend is right that we need to ensure that these sanctions are not only implemented but effective. We need—I think the previous Government felt this as well—a constant ratchet or a whack-a-mole approach to tackling any new diversion there might be that Putin might take advantage of. He talked about jet fuel, a…”

“All roads lead to the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon), Mr Speaker; certainly, all urgent questions do. I was not here for the debate yesterday because I was in Strasbourg, but I feel as if I am hearing some of what was rehearsed then, and I do not want to repeat the arguments. I am grateful for the hon. Gentle…”

“Putin must never be allowed victory in Ukraine and we will do everything we can as a Government and a country to debilitate and degrade the Russian war machine. That is precisely what our sanctions regime is designed to do. We have sanctioned more than 3,300 individuals and organisations and hundreds of shadow fleet ta…”

“I will try again. The point I am making is not the point the right hon. Gentleman thinks I am making. The point I am making is that, up until now, we have been doing precisely what he said. We have been allowing Russian oil processed in other countries to come into the UK without any impediment whatsoever. That is prec…”

“The hon. Lady knows that I am very fond of her—”

“I completely agree with my hon. Friend’s comments. Notwithstanding his point that every time the price of oil around the world goes up, that is a benefit to Putin—that is one of the problems and ironies of the situation in the middle east at the moment—I would also point out that Russia’s economy is stagnating because …”

“I thought that the Liberal Democrats were in favour of moving towards renewables. Sorry, I may have misunderstood the question; if so, the hon. Member may wish to grab me afterwards. As I said, the problem about the headlines this morning was that some journalists saw half of the story, and not the whole story. That is…”

“I welcome the hon. Member to his new responsibilities, though I must say that I really liked his predecessor—I got into terrible trouble when I tweeted that, so maybe I should not say it in the House either. It is good to see the hon. Member in his place. He makes an interesting argument and one that I would expect him…”

“I am terribly sorry; I am so fond of the right hon. Lady that I think of her in a commonplace way, or should I say a common-sense way? She was, of course, the Minister for common sense—although, despite that, she never took any measures to stop the import of Russian oil into the UK when she was a Minister. Oh dear.”