Speeches by Kruger.

“I agree with every single word the hon. Lady said, except the implication—actually, I will just leave it in agreement. I respect what has happened in Scotland, and I welcome the reductions they have seen there, but my concern about the public health model is that it might mean we have an excuse not to think about the e…”

“I am sorry, but I do not think we should spend the whole time disputing the statistics. I can cite statistics suggesting there has been a 60% increase in knife crime in the last year. Let us not trade stats, but by all means let us take this offline, if the hon. Lady would like to trade citations. The fact is that sign…”

“This ceasefire is tremendous news, and I sincerely congratulate everybody who was involved in bringing it about, whoever they were, including the British Government. I was in Israel last week, and on the day that the ceasefire was announced, I visited the Nova festival site and spoke to civilians and soldiers on the Ga…”

“I will be quick, in that case. I express my appreciation to the hon. Member for Isle of Wight West (Mr Quigley) for a very important speech; I am grateful to him. I particularly welcome the points made by him and the hon. Member for Carlisle (Ms Minns) about the need for better understanding and collaboration in the sy…”

“But with no possibility of any of those entitlements coming down or any of the spending being reduced? We have 1.25 million foreign nationals claiming universal credit, most of whom are not in employment. I hope that the Minister does not plan to co-produce his plans with foreign nationals—although, knowing Labour lawy…”

“It is good to see the Minister back after the break, but I am sorry to hear that there are still no plans to reduce spending on personal independence payments. He has said that he is collaborating with people who would not be working with him on his review if there were to be any reductions in the levels of benefit or …”

“It is an honour to stand here in this empty Chamber to speak about the original purpose of this space, when it was a chapel in the Church of England. The old Chamber of the House of Commons, on which this space was modelled after the great fire of 1834, was St Stephen’s Chapel—formerly a royal church. It was given by t…”

“My hon. Friend will not be surprised to hear that I do agree with him. He makes the point very well, and I absolutely acknowledge it. The paradox of our constitution is that under a monarchy, we have a system with the most developed political freedom in the world, and that under an established Church, we have a traditi…”

“Job coaches tell me that one real problem they have is employers who are concerned about the national insurance rise. Has the Department done an analysis of the impact, not only on the supply of jobs but on wages, as a consequence of the national insurance rise itself?”

“There is still a £50-a-week incentive to present as incapable of work through the reduced but still substantial LCWRA entitlement. Surely the logic of what you are saying is that that should be scrapped altogether and that PIP should be the benefit that people receive to help them cope with the cost of disability.”

“But in practice, what might happen is that the budget that is currently available for households in an emergency will decrease, and there will instead be investment in local social infrastructure.”

“I will just go on to my question, if you do not mind. I am interested to hear your views on that. There are two ways to reduce overall welfare expenditure. One is to reduce the supply of it by introducing cuts, which was the intention of the Treasury, at least until the U-turn. The other is to reduce the demand for it …”

“I get the argument, and I am sorry to interrupt—”

“It sounds like quite a substantial change in the purpose of the existing funds. What I hear you saying is that you are going to shift the funding from grants to households to grants to social infrastructure of various sorts. I appreciate that you are leaving the discretion to local authorities, but that might, in pract…”

“Can I ask the permanent secretary what work the Department has done to assess the impact of the national insurance rise on the jobs market?”

“I will come on to PIP, if I may. Secretary of State, thank you. I do not want to exploit all the political problems you have had, and I appreciate the hard work that you and the Minister have done on this. My commiserations for the battles you have fought and lost. I was struck by what you said about getting to the rig…”

“It is funny: I often find myself in agreement with the hon. Gentleman, which is great, and not what I expected when he was elected to this place. I was about to come to my final point: the importance of family life. I do not know to what extent that really is on the Government’s agenda when it comes to the child povert…”

“It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent North (David Williams); it has been a while since I have heard the words “Stoke-on-Trent North, Kidsgrove and Talke”, which used to be bellowed out by our former hon. Friend and his predecessor Jonathan Gullis, who was a great schools Minister—briefly—in a p…”

“The story of the last 14 years is quite easily told. In 2010 there was a budget deficit of 9%, and we had almost fiscal bankruptcy. We spent 10 years very painfully restoring the public finances at great cost, and I totally understand that. Then we were back down to a balanced budget. Then covid hit, and we spent the l…”

“The difference is that child benefit is paid to everybody. Child benefit is a universal entitlement. We need to ensure that we are not adding to the incentives in the system to live a life on benefits. I fully recognise the point that the hon. Gentleman makes. When I say that some people receive more from the system th…”