Speeches by Smith.

“No. How can you be? They are not in place. They are not going ahead. There is this whole issue about the money that exists that is sitting in Euroclear in Belgium, which is now being decided by the EU and I hope they make their minds up on this one, but we have similar money sitting in London. Whatever happens with Rus…”

“I think there is something peculiar about our whole system. I mean, I was in Government for a while; if you are not careful, Governments try to make no fast decisions. But the truth is that there are times when you need to make speedy decisions. We are under threat in this country from this alliance of totalitarian sta…”

“We are basically creating an explanatory note with respect to the statement here on the front page. I would probably want to stretch the wording a wee bit more than that, but it does not have to be much more; it needs to have a focus. Everybody will know what this debate is all about. But we need to vote on this if we …”

“Well, I hope the comments I have made already tell you the urgency of this. The problem we have is that things may move—things may happen soon—and we may lose the chance to go after individuals to sanction them if we do not do it early. If we wait until after Easter to point out the failings of Government agencies in t…”

“This debate has the support of 18 Members; we probably would have had more, but we came forward with it as a result of other actions that have taken place in the Chamber that were unsatisfactory. Those actions have been unsatisfactory for a while, as you will know, on many occasions. The idea is that this House is conc…”

“I agree with the right hon. Lady in her comments about the terrible attacks in Bondi, and I congratulate her on raising that now, but I rise to express the view again that this case is not only about Hong Kong, but about this Chamber. I have been named nine times in the prosecution case against Jimmy Lai. Others have b…”

“I congratulate the hon. Member for Aberdeenshire North and Moray East (Seamus Logan) on securing this urgent question. Although there have been two recent sanctions—[Interruption.] All right, four, if we add in the other two. In reality there are 21 other Sudanese, many of them RSF, operating here in the United Kingdom…”

“The right hon. Gentleman is making a very good case. I am utterly opposed to digital ID, as are many of my constituents. One of them has made the point that in fact our great liberty, our great freedom, which is that the state has to prove that a person is guilty of a charge—innocence before guilt—is reversed by this, …”

“I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Harwich and North Essex (Sir Bernard Jenkin) on his opening remarks, which were specific and precise; I will try not to repeat many of them, but to get into some of the other issues. My personal connection with Ukraine goes right back to a matter of months after the original…”

“They have not really taken it.”

“It is, of course, a fact that we stand by the rule of law and teach others to do so, but the reality is that this whole problem could be resolved if there was greater resolve—by the way, this is a criticism not just of the present Government but the previous one—in the Foreign Office and the Treasury to leave no stone …”

“On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. You sit in the Chair and are not allowed to speak, so many in the House may not realise your role in all this. You have visited Ukraine with me and others, and you have been a stalwart champion of all that we have been debating today, so I wanted to make sure that the House re…”

“I want to raise a point that I have just been told about. There is a debate right now in the Bundestag about the sanctions regime, and the German Chancellor Herr Merz has given up other visits in the last 24 hours to go to Belgium to persuade the Belgians to agree to proposals on sanctions. There is pressure around thi…”

“Might the hon. Lady take an intervention?”

“It is interesting that although we have all mounted pressure on the UK Government, and the Foreign Office in particular, to seize these assets and use their capital value—most of the assets are in cash now anyway—the answer has been a refusal. I understand the nervousness about resulting market instability, but the Gov…”

“The will is non-existent. I will conclude by simply saying that Ukraine should not be written off. The issue is not whether Ukraine has to make a deal now because it cannot win. Winning, for the Ukrainians, is getting back their land, their rights and their country. It is written into the constitution of Ukraine that t…”

“I apologise—I have only just seen this report. I was not aware that it was coming out in this statement, so forgive me if the hon. Lady has already covered this. Two questions have emerged. The first is that one of the biggest criticisms as the Bill went through the House of Commons and that still remains—I say this as…”

“In the light of that, some two years ago it was recommended very clearly that a gambling ombudsman should be set up. So far, across two Governments, nothing has happened on that. That is needed to check that all these elements are being dealt with at the same time. Does the hon. Gentleman not agree with me that that sh…”

“I have been here a few years and have seen the run to different Budgets. In line with the Chair of the Treasury Committee, the hon. Member for Hackney South and Shoreditch (Dame Meg Hillier), I have to say that this Budget has been utterly chaotic and appallingly dangerous. The reality is that the Minister said there w…”

“I do not wish to delay the Minister, but there is a concurrent theme throughout, which is the sheer incompetence of the DVSA over a long period. Does the Minister think that it would be better to have an inquiry into what is wrong with the DVSA and its failure to deal with these issues? It should not be left just to po…”