Speeches by Foord.

“I commend the Chair and the Defence Committee for turning their scrutinising eye to the global combat air programme. The Chair talked about the benefits and risks of new partners, and explained that we need to weigh the benefits against the risks. In previous multilateral fighter jet programmes, there has been an overe…”

“I do not question the Minister’s difficult inheritance, but the Labour party adviser Dan Neidle suggests that the plan to slap inheritance tax on farms worth more than £1 million should be replaced with a much higher threshold with a clawback mechanism, perhaps for land over £20 million that is sold. That would tackle …”

“For 75 years, NATO has stood as a bulwark against territorial acquisition, and NATO is stronger when all its members stand against that. What discussions does the Foreign Secretary plan to have with the President-elect of the United States about the status of Denmark, Greenland and Canada? Will the Foreign Secretary re…”

“2. What discussions he has had with NATO allies on strengthening that alliance.”

“Will the Minister give way?”

“You estimate that 25% of the overseas students arriving in the UK have been influenced by the British Council. How do you measure that, and what evidence do you have for it?”

“Over the same period the number of senior managers recruited by the British Council increased by 22%.What were the senior managers being recruited to do, and how has that changed the nature of the British Council’s business?”

“How did that change the output and what the British Council was producing?”

“Until 2019, you published an annual gender pay gap, but I do not think it has been published since then. Why did you stop publishing the gender pay gap at that point?”

“Hospices in Devon were already struggling before the Government’s Budget last autumn, which introduced a hike in employers’ national insurance. To talk first about the national picture, we have heard that a third of funding for hospices tends to come from the state, through the NHS. However, in Devon, it is less than a…”

“Throughout the decades—at least since 1945—the development of defence technology has been bound by international law. I understand that the Defence Committee has taken the view that it will not be informed by law or ethics, but I wonder whether work will be done in future to bring together the House of Lords report fro…”

“Twenty years ago, the Save Darfur coalition was one of the biggest international social movements of its time, but today the campaigning voices of charities and NGOs on the conflict in Sudan are not being amplified in quite the same way, certainly not by Governments. Why does the Minister suppose this is, and what more…”

“In 2022, following the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, we saw a huge Government subsidy for household energy bills and an extra £15 billion per year in additional support for households. I appreciate that gas is traded globally and that the gas price moves globally, but if storage had been greater in 2022, could any of…”

“But it seems to have been going in the wrong direction. I wondered how you would account for the gender pay gap having doubled over that five-year period?”

“Finally, do you have information on the pay gap in relation to diversity?”

“The statistics that I am looking say at that it was 10.9% in ’17-18 and 20.7% in ’23-24.”

“I appreciate that those are examples, but what makes you suppose that there is demand in those places for those sorts of things? One thing that made me question it is that there is actually very good disinformation training and education in Nordic and Baltic states; they are very far advanced in that area. In fact, do …”

“I want to talk a little about the numbers and proportions of staff over the five-year period around covid, between 2018 and 2023. I understand that the British Council employed 30% fewer teachers at the end of that period than at the beginning. What are the reasons for that, please?”

“Cullompton and Wellington railway stations were two of the most advanced of all the programmes in the restoring your railway fund. The existing local transport authorities have already invested in getting us to the stage of a full business case, with a high benefit-cost ratio of 3.67. Can the Secretary of State confirm…”

“What steps is her Department taking to help older people who do not feel comfortable utilising technology to access public services?”