Speeches by Arthur.

“I thank the Minister for his statement. I do pray that one day he will come to the Dispatch Box with good news for us, to be frank. In my surgery at Oxgangs library on Saturday, a UK-Palestinian woman came to see me. She brought date cookies, which had been freshly made by her mother. I had hoped to save one for you, M…”

“I thank the shadow Minister for the way in which he is approaching the debate. Local authorities all over England are letting contracts every single day, and all manner of contracts could go wrong. What is peculiar about this power that means there is a risk of bankruptcy?”

“I agree with those Members who have raised concerns about the impact that this cyber-attack might have on jobs. It also has an impact on our reputation as a country when two iconic brands basically have to go offline. I do not expect that this will be the last attack on either a retailer or an automotive company, but t…”

“It is a delight to serve under you today, Mr Pritchard. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for South Norfolk (Ben Goldsborough) for introducing the petition, and I thank all my constituents who signed it. I make my comments in the context of my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests. I acknowledge the nee…”

“Ali, you were talking about the targets in France for tripling carpooling. That is a great target, but I want reassurance. They could meet that target by dragging people out of buses, or off the footpaths, and putting them in cars. Is it part of a wider policy to reduce car use, car miles, and also hopefully increase p…”

“James, earlier you were speaking about how you get a club set up in a local authority and so on, and you talked about some of the detail around the exemptions from paying parking permits. What is the ideal scenario for you to set up in a town? Are you looking for an exclusive deal? Is that how it works? You talked abou…”

“Do you think the argument has already been made and people are benefiting?”

“Just on the charge, though.”

“It is actually a real challenge, because one version of the future is that far fewer of us will own cars but we will have more ready access to car clubs day to day. However, as a country, we seem not to be moving towards that. I think that a lot of people like the idea of owning a car, and I get that, but for a lot of …”

“Is this purely a business issue, rather than an issue that your customers might be concerned about? They will not be put off by using your service when they—”

“Your growth has already halted in EVs, yes.”

“James, sticking with London, the number of EVs in your fleet is dropping. In December I think there will no longer be an exemption for EVs with respect to the congestion charge, so what does that mean for you as a business? What does it mean for your customers once you drop out of that exemption?”

“What would you like to see happen? Is there anything else that can be done other than just continuing the exemption, anything else that would help you through this transition?”

“I wanted reassurance on that point. I guessed that was the case. Richard, you spoke about the lack of support in DfT, about nobody being responsible. How does it look in individual local authorities? Some local authorities must be leading on this and allocating resource to it, while, as you explained, the DfT is perhap…”

“Sam, thanks for introducing me to the interesting concept of grey mileage. If I understand rightly, in your example you are saying that the NHS has a car that people share. I understand the point that a worker’s car may be older, and all those other issues, but the reality is that the worker may well be bringing their …”

“I was going to ask this question earlier but I managed to stop myself. You talked about a street with a car on it. Someone I know co-owns a car with somebody else on his street, and it seems to work for them. This is a bit niche, but I wonder whether there are any barriers to people co-owning a car.”

“It is an interesting point about the TROs, the fact that it takes time and can be a lot of friction, if I can use that word, on your rate of expansion. Where I lived in Edinburgh a few years ago, there were no car club spaces because the local community council, a Scottish thing, opposed the loss of a car parking space…”

“Will the hon. Gentleman give way?”

“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship with a 90-second speech limit, Mrs Hobhouse. I thank the hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell (Helen Maguire) for securing this debate. In 2023, I met Elaine and her guide dog Tessy and she was able to show me first hand the impact that pavement parking was having on her life. …”

“I do not speak for RNIB Scotland or Guide Dogs Scotland but people with visual impairments leading isolated lives are a real concern for them. They want those people to be out working, meeting their friends, shopping and so on. Cars parked on the pavement are a barrier to that happening, so this issue is absolutely cor…”