Speeches by Smith.

“It is important that we take account of the hard-working families who will be affected by Labour’s economic mismanagement, and that their voices are not drowned out by the political drama surrounding the Budget. To ensure that I heard directly from those I represent in South West Devon, I launched a survey ahead of the…”

“The Bill also places a duty on the ORR to have regard to guidance given to it by the Secretary of State. Will that duty inhibit your independence?”

“Specifically on that point about the ORR, and I know you sat through their evidence, but do you think they will have sufficient powers to enforce the licence once it is in place? That links to your KPI point. Who will ensure that GBR deliver on an improved railway, which is what we are led to believe this will create?”

“No, they have not, and I think these are all linked. I have a question for Steve. Given what we have talked about regarding the licence and ensuring that access is fair, particularly for the open-access people, how important is a strong independent regulator for securing those access requirements going forward?”

“What role would industry expect to play in the production of GBR’s licence? Will the ORR have sufficient powers to enforce that licence once it has been set up?”

“I had another question building on that, which we asked the ORR earlier. It is something I also asked the Secretary of State when we were talking about the investment that has been made in Newton Aycliffe. Do you think there should be measures on the face of the Bill to ensure that investors still have confidence in in…”

“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Stringer, and I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Member for Salisbury (John Glen) on securing this important debate. Given his experience as a Treasury Minister for many years, it has been a pleasure to hear his thoughts on this issue. My right hon. Friend coul…”

“I am not going to do that. Many businesspeople across my constituency have contacted me to stress how damaging the Bill will be. It seems to be more of an ideological issue on which Opposition Members differ. The red tape, particularly around things like zero-hours contracts, will have a massive impact, but I guess the…”

“Will the hon. Gentleman give way?”

“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs Harris. I welcome today’s debate. Plymouth and the surrounding area boast some of the finest examples of British advanced manufacturing. Babcock refits the Royal Navy’s frigates, maintains our nuclear deterrent and assembles the Supacat Jackal armoured vehicles at …”

“I mentioned skills as a significant challenge in the defence sector and the additional manufacturing. We have five defence technical excellence colleges opening by the end of next year. How well connected is the Minister’s Department with the Department for Education? Does he have any knowledge of when those colleges w…”

“Does my hon. Friend agree that the current pathway for innovative technology to be licensed is both costly and time consuming, meaning inventions that would help his constituents, such as BeechBand, which uses vibrotactile stimulation to decrease symptoms, face delays in testing and potential introduction, and that we …”

“Just briefly, you mentioned the maritime strategy in your first answer. I have a question here about the maritime strategy. I am just checking we are talking about the same one. Is a new maritime strategy on the way, or are you sticking with Maritime 2050?”

“We might help as individual MPs in terms of connecting people, because there is a huge amount going on—particularly down in the south-west, if I may say so—on decarbonising maritime. If we can help in any way to give you some pointers, or at least introduce you to some people doing some stuff, we would be happy to do t…”

“Obviously you have public ownership on one side, which is a big part of the Railways Bill going forward, but we have also seen some really significant private investment in rail in recent months—for example, the £500 million that came from FirstGroup, which I believe you and the Prime Minister both celebrated at Hitach…”

“Thinking about the recent landslip in Cumbria, we know that back in July the ORR said that risks to future asset reliability, including from constrained funding, need to be carefully managed. We have seen that, although the area was being maintained in line with industry standards, something is obviously not quite goin…”

“I am sorry I was late. I was at a FirstPort meeting, which I am sure we all appreciate is just as important. To build on what Alex has said, particularly around ambition and reality, if you are not one of those pilots, not in a franchising position and not a local authority that is yet able to take the benefit of the n…”

“Given the postponement of the maritime net zero framework at the International Maritime Organisation, what are the Government’s next steps in leading international maritime decarbonisation?”

“What work has been done on securing green shipping corridors?”

“It would be really interesting to see that broken down into what that actually looks like, because one of the challenges we face, particularly with transport things, is that we get these enormous figures of money quoted. To actually know what that looks like on the ground, so to speak, is quite difficult. I will leave …”