Speeches by Hobhouse.

“The Minister mentioned the hospitality sector earlier, and I briefly want to come back to that. Bath council and I are seeking the power for local authorities to introduce a modest visitor levy, alongside our proposed 5% cut in VAT for hospitality. Does she agree that a visitor levy on overnight stays would generate a …”

“I speak today on behalf of one constituent, although there are many similar examples. My constituent, who does not want to be named in order to protect herself, is losing out quite substantially because the Child Maintenance Service is failing to enforce the regular payments that she is owed. The non-resident parent ma…”

“T3. Yesterday, I met Volkswagen. It stressed that to meet our electric vehicle targets the Government must provide long-term support and certainty through to 2030 and beyond, with sensible incentives, a supportive tax framework and more robust infrastructure. What steps is the Department taking to ensure that consumers…”

“3. What steps her Department has taken to help support the decarbonisation of the maritime sector.”

“UK ports are clear that large-scale electrification is essential for maritime decarbonisation, but the required grid capacity is severely lacking. The Transport Committee has urged the Government to provide planning authorities with clear guidance to facilitate grid and substation upgrades. Will the Department prioriti…”

“I hear from so many constituents that, out of those suffering from any condition, people suffering from ME have the lowest quality of life. Is it not also the case that people simply do not understand what ME is?”

“I was a councillor many years ago and I remember we developed supplementary planning documents. Should all councils develop supplementary planning documents around this to strengthen the support for community energy?”

“From everything we are hearing, it is to give it a statutory footing, isn’t it?”

“This is developing the theme. Local people can obviously be very much involved, and we know the benefits of local people being involved in local area energy plans. Can you spell out for me the real benefits of having local people involved in that energy planning?”

“Very quickly, why can community energy groups not be directly involved in the local area planning?”

“Can I just understand the sequence? If you already have local people involved in local energy planning, I understand there is a concern that it is too much led from the top or from the region with DNOs. You would fix that to involve local people more in the local area energy plans and then back that up with a supplemen…”

“I was a councillor many years ago and I remember we developed supplementary planning documents. Should all councils develop supplementary planning documents around this to strengthen the support for community energy?”

“From everything we are hearing, it is to give it a statutory footing, isn’t it?”

“This is developing the theme. Local people can obviously be very much involved, and we know the benefits of local people being involved in local area energy plans. Can you spell out for me the real benefits of having local people involved in that energy planning?”

“6. What discussions she has had with the Secretary of State for the Home Department on the effectiveness of the Online Safety Act 2023 in tackling drug dealing on social media.”

“Will the hon. Gentleman give way?”

“Is it not the truth that the reason energy bills are still so high is because we still produce a lot of electricity by burning gas? Burning gas, which is sold on the global market, keeps energy prices high. That is the main problem. We need to decouple electricity from gas prices, and particularly to get away from gas.”

“Drug dealing is absolutely rampant on social media. The Minister might be aware of the campaign I lead, together with the University of Bath, against spice-spiked vapes in school and the terrible harm they are causing. We are increasingly frustrated that Ofcom does not use its power under the Online Safety Act to hold …”

“Is it not the truth that once the projects have been built, the energy is free? There is no commodity concentration, because the wind and sunlight cost nothing; there is very little cost apart from the installation.”

“I am interested in hearing what he has to say about cutting bills. Does he not recognise that the cost of letting climate change go on unmitigated is a vast one for every household in this country?”