Speeches by Smith.

“The Regulating for Growth Bill has been announced in the King’s Speech, obviously looking at tackling the issues around marine autonomy, which is particularly important in my constituency down in Devon. I welcome the news about the sandbox phase for testing. Once enabled by the Bill, how long will that phase last and c…”

“Members of 42 Commando Royal Marines, led by Commanding Officer Tom Quinn, were a key part of the seizure of the Russian shadow fleet vessel yesterday morning. It is clear that our Royal Marines will always deliver for this country. They are world class, and I have had the privilege of seeing them in action at their ho…”

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“Thank you very much. I am sure that most of you know the significance of the battle of the Somme. As the chair of the all-party parliamentary group for the Commonwealth War Graves Commission and commemoration, I am here on behalf of everyone involved in that, and the 60 or so Members who have signed this debate applica…”

“I have been thinking about that. I actually think that a debate marking the end of the battle would be quite sensible, because it would land around Remembrance Day, in the middle of November. That would hopefully help with your scheduling but would also give the Members who have signed this application the best opportu…”

“I know that, like me, those on the Government Front Bench welcome the regulating for growth Bill, which will enable the modernisation of regulations for maritime autonomy testing and the creation of regulatory sandbox powers. That is vital for the unmanned vessels that we need to protect our coastal waters, but defence…”

“I have a simple question for the Minister. He keeps stating that 1,000 or so contracts have been signed, nearly all with companies based in the UK, but what percentage of those companies are small or medium-sized enterprises compared with the primes?”

“rose—”

“Listening to what you have been saying, a couple of things have been highlighted that lead into my question. Effectively, you are describing a postcode lottery at the moment. Are you near off-road parking that has charging? Has your local authority invested in large-scale charging areas? Are they doing the gullies? If …”

“How many of those charge points make charging as quick as filling a tank of petrol or diesel?”

“Government timelines for the EV transition have changed multiple times. Can you guarantee consistency in EV policy in the future to provide confidence to both consumers and the market? I realise we have asked some of those questions indirectly already, but are you completely convinced that that is deliverable?”

“We also have the pay-per-mile scheme coming in. How do you incentivise people when you are also changing the playing field for them? A lot of people have purchased electric vehicles in good faith. Maybe that was naive; of course that was going to change at some point. Particularly to lower income families, how does tha…”

“Minister, you are right to say that things are going well, but you have also talked about “trying to convince the public” that this is something they should do, while maintaining that you can get there by 2030. “Trying to convince the public” does not sound like a mechanism that will get to where you want to be. You ha…”

“So there are more non-home-based charging points now than petrol pumps.”

“Not in terms of policy.”

“Even regions? Do you have it for the south-west, the south-east or the north?”

“The question I asked was, does your modelling account for those regional differences? I appreciate it is great that local authorities are doing things, and we know that, because we have had them come in and we all have experiences of that, but my key question was about your data and your mapping. Does your data take in…”

“That could be an interesting statistic to come back on.”

“I completely agree with the Chair. I think we all get that, if you have one, it is great. The problem is that the vast majority of people still cannot have one for an economic reason, for example. It is great that we have heard that some are now under £20,000, but £30,000 for the average family is a lot of money to be …”

“To move on to my actual question, we have talked about cross-pavement charging a lot today, and we have talked about it a lot before. I am a former planning committee chair for a local authority, which was resolutely not interested in pursuing the issue despite claiming to be an incredibly green council. I am glad that…”