Speeches by Rushworth.

“Thank you. I appreciate that.”

“Just to be clear, we are not the Government.”

“What effect, if any, is the increase in aid worker casualties having on the willingness of staff, local or international, to be deployed in insecure environments? That is to either of you, but we will start with Mr Novakovic.”

“If we turn that question around to the level of NGOs and agencies, we are seeing an increase in attacks on aid workers. I think there is a sense that sometimes there is something quite cynical behind that, which is that if you hurt a few aid workers you will get people to pull out of an area. We have also seen examples…”

“They are not doing the de-confliction?”

“Do you think we are reaching a point, though, in those situations where some NGOs and agencies are just saying, “Do you know what, we just can’t function in this setting any more because we are a target”?”

“So it is not just the aftercare? There was very little training beforehand, and little awareness among staff of the situations that you might encounter.”

“Before I was an MP, I used to work in your world, so I am very interested in the issues that you are raising. I am interested to understand, when you were initially working in that situation, what sort of steps your organisation took to prepare you—or firstly to assess and analyse the risks but also to prepare you for …”

“So it is not just the aftercare? There was very little training beforehand, and little awareness among staff of the situations that you might encounter.”

“Are you still working in that world?”

“Steve made a very interesting point that sparks a question. In your experience, do you feel that there is a difference between the way that local and international staff are treated by an international NGO for risk?”

“Thank you. I appreciate that.”

“Just to be clear, we are not the Government.”

“What effect, if any, is the increase in aid worker casualties having on the willingness of staff, local or international, to be deployed in insecure environments? That is to either of you, but we will start with Mr Novakovic.”

“If we turn that question around to the level of NGOs and agencies, we are seeing an increase in attacks on aid workers. I think there is a sense that sometimes there is something quite cynical behind that, which is that if you hurt a few aid workers you will get people to pull out of an area. We have also seen examples…”

“They are not doing the de-confliction?”

“Do you think we are reaching a point, though, in those situations where some NGOs and agencies are just saying, “Do you know what, we just can’t function in this setting any more because we are a target”?”

“My hon. Friend is doing a great job in explaining some of the new powers that the Bill will give our police. Police officers in my area to whom I have spoken find it absurd that it has taken until now to do so. Does my hon. Friend agree that these measures are such common sense that no reasonable party in the House sho…”

“I thank the right hon. Member for Gainsborough (Sir Edward Leigh) for securing this debate; I got to know him well recently on our visit to the region. I also thank everybody who has spoken in the debate. I am rapidly rewriting my speech, because many things that I would have said have already been covered. I start by …”

“I thank the British public for bringing this petition forward so that we can debate it today, and thank those who have led on this issue. The petition comes from a place of real strong feeling among parents. This is not some blind moral panic; it is the lived experience of anybody who has raised a teenager in the last …”