Speeches by Cocking.

“Does the Minister not agree that it is the hypocrisy from the Labour party, which did not include this policy in its manifesto at the general election?”

“Will the Minister give way?”

“Last July, the hon. Lady stood on an election manifesto that did not include the removal of winter fuel payments to pensioners. Is she proud of the fact that she was elected on a manifesto that said something completely different from what she is supporting the Government in doing now?”

“The hon. Member makes a point that he is passionate about, but I do not agree with him. We need to produce more of our energy here at home, rather than relying on imports. That is why the Government should change their policy and issue new oil and gas licences. I urge hon. Members on the Government Benches —lots of the…”

“My hon. Friend makes an important point. What the Government could do to lower energy bills is to secure North sea oil and gas investment in this country, so that we produce here more of the gas that we need to power all the industry in this country, instead of importing it.”

“No, I will not give way. The Government got elected on a manifesto. Within eight months, they have introduced significant policies that were not in that manifesto, including the family farm tax, the national insurance increase, and of course withdrawal of the winter fuel allowance. That is what my constituents in Broxb…”

“When I was out on the doorsteps during the general election campaign—as I am sure every Member of this House was—I spoke to my electorate in Broxbourne. They said, “Look, Lewis, we know what’s coming. We know we’re going to get a Labour Government. We know they’re going to get into power and then they’re going to tell …”

“Andy, you have answered some of my questions about the fire service and you said earlier that the recommendations you have implemented throughout the inquiries and reports are not just a tick-box exercise for you. Can you explore that in a bit more detail for us and give us some comfort that, just because you have done…”

“I am the MP for Broxbourne and a Hertfordshire county councillor.”

“My constituents are confused about the Justice Secretary’s position. She says she believes that these sentencing guidelines are wrong in principle, and that they amount to differential treatment before the law, but she is in government; she has the power and the tools at her disposal to stop this and change it. Why has…”

“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Twigg. I congratulate the hon. Member for Norwich North (Alice Macdonald) on securing this important debate this afternoon. Some antisocial behaviour problems can be extremely localised down a single street, in a block of flats or between neighbours, ruining the liv…”

“T7. The Government say that foreign national offenders make up 12% of the prison population. Can the Secretary of State tell me when that number will be zero?”

“The Minister mentions a multi-agency approach. I think the public get frustrated with us when we have meeting after meeting about the same issue. What assurances can she give us that this multi-agency approach will lead to action taken on the ground to solve some of this antisocial behaviour in our communities?”

“Yes. When you are giving the Committee examples, it is useful for us if they are like-for-like examples, not examples that we know are different anyway because of the number of people paying council tax or what have you. On council tax specifically, do you agree with the referendum cap? If there was no cap, I get that …”

“You have mentioned lots of things that would get more money from central Government to cities, but do you think rural councils should be compensated? In some instances, in a rural authority, it costs more to collect the bins than it would in your authority, for example.”

“Lewis Cocking, MP for Broxbourne. I am still a Hertfordshire county councillor.”

“I remind the hon. Member that the last Conservative Government recruited 20,000 police officers across the country and the only force not to meet that target was the Metropolitan police under Labour mayor Sadiq Khan.”

“Does the hon. Member agree that when police set up patrols to catch people who speed, the news quickly gets on to apps to tell people coming down the road that there is a policeman standing there with a speed gun? Does he think the Government should explore whether to ban apps that do that, so that we can catch people …”

“Peter, you are essentially saying you do not mind it being ringfenced as long as it suits you. If it does not suit you, you do not want it to be ringfenced.”

“I want to come back to your point, Bill, and ask a different question. You are saying that you applied to go above the council tax threshold by 2.5%, which was accepted. We have done a lot of work on this Committee around unitarization. Your council went unitary. We are always told if you go unitary you save loads of m…”