Speeches by Downie.

“Very briefly, Elisabeth, if I can bring you back to what you were talking about on Taiwan, I have had some conversations about subsea cables in Taiwan and a concern that some of the lessons in Taiwan could not be shared with the UK directly for political reasons, certainly mil to mil. Are there international forums whe…”

“To pick up on something you mentioned earlier about Granite Resolve, there was a debate yesterday in Westminster Hall on the idea of preparedness. What are the lessons out of Granite Resolve on what preparedness looks like for you? Safety procedures, because of the industry, have been practised over decades, but how do…”

“How long has the reporting mechanism to DESNZ that you talked about been in place and how effective is it? Is that who you call in the event of a problem? Is it well understood by your members that they are the people to call?”

“No, I am more getting at what your expectation would be.”

“Okay, no problem. Graham, can I pick that up with you? What is your understanding of what action can be taken if there is a drone near an offshore installation? I have tried to get an answer to this from DESNZ and the Ministry of Defence. No one will give me an answer as to whether or not we have a legal right to attac…”

“Chloe, if I can go back to where we started at the very beginning about the legal basis for action, I was in Romania recently and it is building Neptun Deep in the Black sea gas installation. I was speaking to their Minister for Foreign Affairs and Defence, who was talking about how they have created a new legal framew…”

“Very briefly, Elisabeth, if I can bring you back to what you were talking about on Taiwan, I have had some conversations about subsea cables in Taiwan and a concern that some of the lessons in Taiwan could not be shared with the UK directly for political reasons, certainly mil to mil. Are there international forums whe…”

“To pick up on something you mentioned earlier about Granite Resolve, there was a debate yesterday in Westminster Hall on the idea of preparedness. What are the lessons out of Granite Resolve on what preparedness looks like for you? Safety procedures, because of the industry, have been practised over decades, but how do…”

“How long has the reporting mechanism to DESNZ that you talked about been in place and how effective is it? Is that who you call in the event of a problem? Is it well understood by your members that they are the people to call?”

“No, I am more getting at what your expectation would be.”

“Okay, no problem. Graham, can I pick that up with you? What is your understanding of what action can be taken if there is a drone near an offshore installation? I have tried to get an answer to this from DESNZ and the Ministry of Defence. No one will give me an answer as to whether or not we have a legal right to attac…”

“Chloe, if I can go back to where we started at the very beginning about the legal basis for action, I was in Romania recently and it is building Neptun Deep in the Black sea gas installation. I was speaking to their Minister for Foreign Affairs and Defence, who was talking about how they have created a new legal framew…”

“I beg to move, That this House has considered preparedness for national emergencies. It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs Barker, and I am grateful to colleagues for coming to this important debate. As the Joint Committee on the National Security Strategy has set out, the assumptions underpinning UK s…”

“Sitting adjourned.”

“I could not agree more. A lot of planning had gone into severe weather events in Fife over the years, but it had never been tested. A lot of it was out of date, and staff had moved on. For example, in High Valleyfield, a former coal-mining village, there was an almost 10-year-old resilience plan that said that the loca…”

“My hon. Friend is absolutely correct: we need to ensure that we are preparing for all these eventualities, regardless of what causes them—I believe that individual case was caused by one driver shortage. The need to plan and have contingencies in place is vital.”

“I am about to go on to that point; I will mention the need for resilience to be across Departments and involve the public. The impact of these events is often not immediately dramatic but gradual, cumulative and enduring. One crisis flows into another, as I am sure Ministers feel every day. We must think of preparednes…”

“I absolutely agree; that is a point I will come to later. We must engage with the public if we want their permission to plan for resilience. Article 3 tells us that preparedness must be constant and not confined to defence Departments. It must be collective, but it requires active participation across the system. I wou…”

“As ever, I agree with the hon. Gentleman—I always agree with his interventions, particularly when they are made so well. There is a need to make sure that we break outside of the M25, frankly, when we talk about resilience. We also need to look seriously at the resilience of our critical national infrastructure. What i…”

“I absolutely agree. We need to make sure that we are preparing clear information about the risks that we face, what a climate emergency means in reality, and how communities can help respond to that fully and effectively. We also need to make sure that we are providing practical guidance for individuals and communities…”