Speeches by Smith.

“One of my constituents is experiencing severe delays in getting Access to Work scheme payments, dating back to February. In correspondence with the Department, a letter openly says there is no long-term solution to that, so when will the Secretary of State come forward with a long-term solution to speed up these paymen…”

“It is always a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir John. I begin by drawing the House’s attention to my entries in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Reigate (Rebecca Paul) on not only securing this debate but delivering a superb opening speech. She spo…”

“I will give way to my constituency neighbour.”

“What I regret is the ZEV mandate, which is why I voted against it at the time. It puts shackles around our automotive industry, and it needs to be revisited so that our automotive sector has the freedom to get on, innovate and provide future solutions that consumers might actually want to buy. Even with the electric ob…”

“The film industry is enormously important to the Buckinghamshire economy. Pinewood Studios is in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Beaconsfield (Joy Morrissey), but many of my constituents are supported in jobs not just at the studios themselves, but in the many supply-chain businesses that feed into th…”

“I welcome the Defence Secretary’s statement, and I add my thanks to, and appreciation for, the Royal Air Force and all those involved in this successful operation. In his statement he said that “even Russia has attempted to support the Houthi operations.” However, does it not go a little bit deeper than that? The Wall …”

“Unitary council elections, county council elections and mayoral races are taking up a lot of the headlines at the moment, but in local government, there is an often regrettably forgotten subset of incredibly hard-working people who offer to serve on parish and town councils—people like Nic Brown, who, after 25 years, i…”

“I think I am grateful for that intervention. I am not sure whether I have any contacts in the Conservative group on the hon. Gentleman’s council, but I will gladly see if I can get that message passed to them. In the limited time we have available, I would like the Minister, when she sums up, to consider a few practica…”

“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship this afternoon, Mrs Hobhouse. I congratulate the hon. Member for Didcot and Wantage—and possibly for the Netherlands—(Olly Glover) on securing this important debate. In just an hour of Westminster Hall, we have had many contributions, far more than normal, including fro…”

“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship in this important debate, Mr Betts. I congratulate the right hon. Member for Sheffield Heeley (Louise Haigh) on securing this debate. I remember sitting as the shadow Minister on Report of the Employment Rights Bill, listening to her speak about her amendment to the Bil…”

“Earlier, the Prime Minister seemed reluctant to answer a direct question about his jobs tax. Next time he visits my constituency to enjoy the beautiful Buckinghamshire surroundings of Chequers, will he go five minutes up the road to Wendover, and explain to Kate Rumsey of Rumsey’s Handmade Chocolates why his choices an…”

“I can say in response to the Minister’s quip from a sedentary position that I have never spoken with a handout from the Whips. Sometimes, we sit there in the main Chamber listening to the usual yah-boo of party politics, but every so often there is a speech—it can come from any part of the House—that makes our ears pri…”

“I will just finish the point; I am pre-empting the hon. Lady. There is still time, as the Bill passes through the other place, to look again at this legislation. Instead of risking those unintended consequences in hospitality settings, for example, the Government could put provisions in the Bill to tackle the serious, …”

“I do not particularly want to relitigate our debate in the main Chamber a few weeks ago. It is the job of the Opposition to kick the tyres on legislation that the Government put forward, and that is what did in that debate. I hope the hon. Lady turns out to be right, but the Employment Rights Bill is still a Bill, and …”

“I draw the House’s attention to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests, particularly as it relates to the use of synthetic fuel donated for my summer surgery tour last August. My concerns about this statutory instrument, unlike my concerns about other recent pieces of parliamentary business, are narro…”

“I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for that point, which I have been making for many years. I certainly did so during my time on the Transport Committee in the previous Parliament, and outside this place, as I have engaged with the classic car sector and all parts of the industry. He is right that there is a big inn…”

“The hon. Gentleman is right that this is fundamentally about weight, but on the point about synthetic fuel, which my right hon. Friend the Member for North West Hampshire (Kit Malthouse) drew me on to a moment ago—I rarely need asking twice, given the number of years I have spent talking about this—it is true that ther…”

“My hon. Friend makes an accurate point. In some ways, the statutory instrument seeks to address that point. However, he is right that when real people out there in the country make choices on their vehicles, they will make practical decisions such as the one outlined by my right hon. Friend the Member for North West Ha…”

“On Friday in my surgery, a constituent came to talk to me about her eight-year-old adopted son who was born withdrawing from the drugs that his birth mother took during pregnancy as well as from alcohol abuse. The birth mother also suffered significant physical and emotional abuse. That has left this poor boy with many…”

“I add my birthday wishes to the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon). Significantly muddled messages are being sent to the aviation sector. On the one hand, the Climate Change Committee, upon whose altar the Government appear to worship, wants flights to fall by 2030, which is a massive blow to our aviation sector,…”