Speeches by Leigh.

“I am sorry to declare an interest, but why is my right hon. Friend so ageist? Some people are wonderful at the age of 80, and others are useless at the age 50.”

“Q8. As a good lawyer, the Prime Minister will want to listen to the evidence, so if evidence mounts from experts and organisations such as the National Farmers Union that smaller family farms of average size—250 acres—will be severely impacted by the tax changes, will he, in a spirit of compromise, listen to that evide…”

“Q8. As a good lawyer, the Prime Minister will want to listen to the evidence, so if evidence mounts from experts and organisations such as the National Farmers Union that smaller family farms of average size—250 acres—will be severely impacted by the tax changes, will he, in a spirit of compromise, listen to that evide…”

“21. How many foreign national offenders were removed from the UK through a prison transfer agreement in each year since 2010.”

“The previous Government negotiated a scheme by which we can deport Albanian prisoners back to Albania. It is an excellent scheme; Albania is a completely safe country, of course. Given that those crossing the channel are committing an illegal offence, is there anything legally to stop us arresting them and putting them…”

“Will my right hon. Friend give way?”

“I warmly congratulate the new shadow Chancellor on his appointment. It is richly deserved, given his tremendous work as Secretary of State for Work and Pensions in getting people back to work. In opening this debate, the Secretary of State said that she is only attacking wealthy people. My right hon. Friend the Member …”

“The right hon. Gentleman and I could have an argument about history, but I would still defend my mentor and, even more so, the Prime Minister at that time, Margaret Thatcher, until the day I die, and we would just have to disagree on that. That is our philosophical foundation. I could devote my speech to an attack on t…”

“Well, let us see. Of course we can pump more and more money into this broken system and solve some of the short-term problems, but soon we will be not just a country with an NHS, but an NHS with a country attached to it. Is it 44% of total spending that goes on the NHS? It is growing all the time, which means that, as …”

“Well, if the hon. Lady thinks that, I wish her luck, but I fear that we are just going to gradually paper over the cracks—and I will criticise my own side in this regard. For 14 years, Ministers went along with the liberal consensus, talking about “our NHS”, papering over the cracks with more and more money, employing …”

“No; I have to keep going. I accept that some issues, such as hospital capacity, can only be dealt with by spending, but we do not need to reinvent the wheel; we need to learn from other countries. The Health Secretary, who I admire for his apparent radical zeal—although we have not seen much evidence of it—studied Aust…”

“The hon. Lady has made her point, although I was talking about incapacity benefit, so I am not sure how her point has addressed mine. The culture of people living off the state for years, when they are capable of doing some work, needs to be stamped out. We have to work together in the House to get people off benefits …”

“The hon. Lady has tried to intervene again and again, so I will give way.”

“I must not give way too much, because I will prevent other people from getting in. A study of 18 developed countries shows that the UK is in the bottom three when it comes to survival rates for common cancers, strokes and heart attacks. Lord Darzi’s review found that 14,000 avoidable deaths per year were due to long wa…”

“It is a pleasure to follow the right hon. Member for Birmingham Hodge Hill and Solihull North (Liam Byrne). He said that Alistair Darling was his hero. My hero was Nigel Lawson, because I am personally convinced that the way to create growth and prosperity is to flatten and lower taxes. I think I have sat through 45 Bu…”

“With so much good agricultural land now covered by solar panels, how will the Government incentivise builders to build on brownfield rather than good agricultural land, thus ensuring regeneration rather than imperilling food security?”

“Order. Will the hon. Member now draw his remarks to a close?”

“Order. To get everybody in, we will start with an informal time limit, so please do not speak for more than five minutes. Keep an eye on the clock, please.”

“I have served for several years on the programme boards for restoration and renewal. The existential threat to this building is fire. I have raised on several occasions, as I know others have, the importance of installing a water mist system, installing more fire doors and making sure that they all shut. This is such a…”

“It has been a pleasure to chair this debate. I am only sorry that no one mentioned the best racecourse in the country—Market Rasen. Question put and agreed to. Resolved, That this House has considered Government support for the horseracing industry.”