Andrew Murrison MP: speeches

Speeches

• 3 Jun 2026 · Lebanon: Israel Defence Forces Operations · Hansard source

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  I am sure the Minister understands that there can be no sustainable ceasefire for as long as there exists in Lebanon an Iranian terrorist proxy that has as its war aim the complete, final and irrevocable destruction of the state of Israel and the Jews who live there. So we are faced, are we not, with trying to mitigate some of the actions of this terrorist organisation. Would he agree with me that the only viable way of doing that, given this situation, is to do everything in our power to strengthen the Lebanese army, which he will know is a credible organisation, and to support the UN Secretary-General in his stated intention of renewing UNIFIL and making sure it is fit for purpose, rather than simply an observer, as is currently the case?

• 3 Jun 2026 · Defence Growth Deal: Economic Impact · Hansard source

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  Has the Minister seen the report published this week by techUK, which has members across Northern Ireland in the defence sector, focusing particularly on tech? The report expressed concern that the absence of the defence industrial strategy has been the single biggest cause of retardation of its members’ business, and is particularly affecting employment. What does that say for growth in Northern Ireland?

• 2 Jun 2026 · Armed Forces Bill · Hansard source

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  I am sure the Minister will like to pay tribute to Alabaré, which does great work for service veterans in and around my constituency. However, will he ensure that we do not give the false impression that all veterans are homeless and have mental health problems? Nothing could be further from the truth. Happily, the great majority of people leaving our armed forces are well sorted in their life, and in robust mental health. That is important, since we need to attract people to join our armed forces and our reserve forces, not deter them or put them off.

• 2 Jun 2026 · Armed Forces Bill · Hansard source

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  I am privileged to be called in this debate. I start by declaring my interests as a reservist and as the author of a book called “Tommy This an’ Tommy That: The military covenant”—which is sadly no longer in print, but is available, I am told, from good charity shops. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Rayleigh and Wickford (Mr Francois). said, the covenant is not about advantaging the men and women of our armed forces, but about not disadvantaging them. It is important to make that clear. Servicemen and servicewomen do not expect to be given anything particularly; they are usually the greatest pragmatists going and do not expect that at all. However, they do expect not to be messed around, if that can be avoided. Much of what is in the Bill, as is always the case now with armed forces Bills, is trying to mitigate some of the disadvantages that they necessarily have to put up with by virtue of the unique circumstances that they find themselves in.

• 2 Jun 2026 · Armed Forces Bill · Hansard source

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  Has my right hon. Friend had a chance to look at the report published by techUK, which represents a lot of small and medium-sized companies in the defence tech sector, and seen what it has to say, objectively, about the number of jobs that are being lost in the sector, the lack of investment in the sector, the pressure that its members are coming under and the sector’s lack of viability given this continued, unbearable delay? It needs certainty. When are we going to have it?

• 2 Jun 2026 · Armed Forces Bill · Hansard source

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  I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for giving way; he is being very indulgent. I agree with him and—with respect—not with the Minister, because my recollection from being the Minister at the time was that there was a shortage of officers to populate court martial boards. When in office, we ensured that the process was service agnostic, which gave a bigger pool from which to draw. Would it be a compromise to allow retired officers of a certain seniority or length of time out of service, since that would maintain the currency that clearly is troubling the Minister? Does my right hon. Friend agree that the Minister is right to require OR-7s, as well as warrant officers, to serve on court martial boards since that would expand the pool of people available?

• 2 Jun 2026 · Armed Forces Bill · Hansard source

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  I am concerned by the hon. Gentleman’s remarks. We have the continuous attitude survey, which does its work every year and delivers to Ministers a clear account of what is keeping people in and what is driving them away. Is he seriously proposing another set of reviews, which would add very little to what we already know?

• 2 Jun 2026 · Armed Forces Bill · Hansard source

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  The question is surely whether victims are given a choice. At the moment, they are. The prosecutors’ protocol usually means that these cases are tried through the civilian criminal justice system. That is fine, but does the hon. Gentleman acknowledge that justice delayed is justice denied? Through the service justice system, these cases are brought to a conclusion far more rapidly than they currently are in our civilian criminal justice system.

• 2 Jun 2026 · Armed Forces Bill · Hansard source

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  One area that will blight the lives of many of my right hon. Friend’s constituents as it does mine is, of course, primary care dentistry. People can move from one end of the country to another into a dental desert—Wiltshire is one of those. Does he think that there is a case for putting a duty on integrated care boards to translate people’s position with an NHS dentist—where they are lucky enough to find one—to their new area? I am thinking particularly of Wiltshire and the shortage of places, especially for service children and the partners of service personnel.

• 21 May 2026 · Steel Industry (Nationalisation) Bill · Hansard source

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  On that point, will the Secretary of State give way?

• 21 May 2026 · Steel Industry (Nationalisation) Bill · Hansard source

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  In keeping open the options that the Secretary of State hints at, has he had any discussions with his colleagues in the Ministry of Defence? At least for the foreseeable future, there will always be a need for virgin steel for certain defence applications.

• 21 May 2026 · Middle East · Hansard source

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  The behaviour of Smotrich and Ben-Gvir brings shame on all of us who consider ourselves to be friends of Israel. Given that the joint comprehensive plan of action was not working and Iran continued to advance its plans for a nuclear weapon, how would the Minister have de-fanged the regime? While he is right to claim some credit for the FTA with the gulf states, will he give credit, too, to his predecessors, who did a lot of the heavy lifting, and will he at least concede that the whole thing would not have been possible if we were still in the European Union?

• 21 May 2026 · Middle East: Economic Response · Hansard source

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  The announcement on red diesel will be welcomed by my farming constituents, who will await the details on the tariffs the Chancellor has cited with a great deal of interest and a certain amount of trepidation. Does she acknowledge that a third of the world’s fertilisers pass through the strait of Hormuz, and that the increase in the price of fertiliser is bound to have an impact on British agriculture and therefore on prices in the shops? What will she do to relieve some of that—in some cases existential—pressure on farms in the United Kingdom?

• 21 May 2026 · Business of the House · Hansard source

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  In his business statement, the Leader of the House rightly referred to fly-tipping waste criminals. Will he allow for a debate in Government time to consider a different sort of waste perpetrated on our constituents, which is that arising from so-called energy-from-waste plants, otherwise known waste incinerators, which are more polluting than burning coal and for which the UK is already overprovisioned. We have too many of these things, they are not wanted and it is time for a moratorium. Can we have a debate on that?

• 20 May 2026 · Defence Readiness · Hansard source

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  Will the hon. Gentleman remind the House which party it was that insisted we delay the replacement of the continuous at sea deterrent by two full years as a condition of the coalition?

• 20 May 2026 · Defence Readiness · Hansard source

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  May I genuinely congratulate the right hon. Member for Ilford North (Wes Streeting) on a remarkable speech and wish him well in his future ambitions? His speech and its content were, I am afraid, not as germane as the contribution of the hon. Member for Slough (Mr Dhesi), who chairs the Defence Committee. I agree with everything that he had to say; I only regret that I could not put it as elegantly as him. The resignation letter of the right hon. Member for Ilford North is worth reading, and I am sure that Members on the Treasury Bench will have read it closely. He wrote on Thursday that “where we need vision, we have a vacuum. Where we need direction, we have drift”, and that should worry the Government. I agree with him, and I am thinking in particular of the defence investment plan, which we have not seen. I am conscious that the defence readiness Bill, which we were expecting in this King’s Speech, has yet to materialise, and that is of deep and profound concern. In the 1930s, we arguably faced a similar situation to what we are up against now, and the Government of the day decided about five years in advance of the outbreak of the second world war that they must gear up our defence industrial base for the future. They created things such as shadow factories, initially with opposition from industry. Those were centred largely, at least initially, on the automotive industry and the production of aircraft, but went on to extend much further than that. It was a truly co-operative venture that led eventually to this country being able to turn out more aircraft in those early years than Germany could. I would have thought that this Government would have learned those lessons and now be bringing forward, as a matter of urgency, its own defence readiness Bill. The Government have missed an opportunity, and I am sorry about that, because there is no shadow of a doubt that industry is being held back, as has already been mentioned this afternoon, in its ambition to partner with the Ministry of Defence and with Ministers to get things going, whether that is reprovisioning what we have rightly sent to Ukraine or fitting our armed forces for the future. Some have already mentioned hollowing out. It is worth saying that in 1989, every country in the western world was taking a peace dividend. It would have been extraordinary had they not, and they would have been punished by the voters, but that was then. The big lesson I have learned from what has happened in the years since 1989 is that Governments can afford to titrate what they provide in order to defend this country against the threats facing it—although that is never popular electorally—but they must do nothing to reduce the armed forces below an irreducible minimum, so that armed forces can regrow rapidly, as happened in the years immediately preceding 1914 and 1939. Governments must also do nothing that will damage long-term projects, because procurement is not something that can be turned on and off like a tap—procurement takes decades. I think we have learned from that mistake. One of the mistakes that the previous Government made was delaying the Dreadnought class. That was because, as I referred to in the intervention that the hon. Member for Lewes (James MacCleary) generously allowed me to make, of pressure from our then partner in the coalition Government. Right now we are facing the prospect of our principal ally, the United States, backing off in terms of its support for us and our European allies. We can no longer entirely rely on that on which we previously relied heavily. If, as seems likely, the United States proceeds with this particular course of action, we will be the only provider of a nuclear deterrent declared to NATO, and it is therefore important that in the defence readiness Bill—when we see it—we have a reaffirmed commitment to reprovisioning the continuous at-sea deterrent apace. Much work has been done in respect of infrastructure and at the Atomic Weapons Establishment, but we are still facing a rundown Vanguard class that is obliged to go on patrol for upwards of 200 days, with a consequent impact on the men and, now, women who man the submarine service. Of all the pinch point trades in our armed forces, it is those in the submarine service that should keep us awake at night. It is imperative that we accelerate that programme. I also ask Ministers to look at the F-35A provision, and to agree with me that providing 12 airframes is hardly sufficient given the threat that we now face. I need to know, I should like to know, and I am sure the whole House would like to know when the F-35As will be operational, as opposed to the provision of training airframes. Is it the intention of the Government to expedite that programme? Is it the intention of the Government to exploit the option that they have kept open to have more than 12 of those airframes, and will Ministers confirm that they will be nuclear-enabled? I strongly urge Ministers to consider the sovereign defence fund Bill in the alternative King’s Speech, which would repurpose the National Wealth Fund to overhaul our vital defence industrial base. Governing is about difficult decisions, and it seems to me that defence is a more urgent priority right now than using the fund—in the words of the Government—to help tackle climate change, and, indeed, a more urgent priority than ramping up welfare, as Lord Robertson has made very clear. The defence industrial base will be pretty useless if it is not populated by men and women with the skills that are necessary to deliver what is needed in order to keep this country safe. The youth opportunity Bill, which also features in the alternative King’s Speech, has the kind of imaginative content that I would have expected from an incoming Government who had 14 years to think about these matters. Unfortunately not: all that we had from the Prime Minister on young people on Wednesday was a load of waffle. Time and again, it is as if he is a passive observer rather than an active participant. The youth opportunity Bill explains how genuine investment in our young people will power and grow the economy, delivering a virtuous circle from which everyone benefits. It will cap state funding for pointless, work-irrelevant, badly taught degrees from third-rate institutions that are perpetrating a fraud on a generation, and will grow well-focused apprenticeships such as those offered by Wiltshire College in my constituency. Let me now say a few words about special forces. We must approach these issues with a great deal of care. I am extremely concerned by the messaging that has gone out from this Government in relation to the Northern Ireland Troubles Bill—not so much the case that has been put before the House by the Northern Ireland Office and the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland as the way in which it has been received. The Minister for the Armed Forces, the hon. Member for Birmingham Selly Oak (Al Carns), who is sitting next to the Secretary of State for Defence, will know very well—because his contacts are probably better than mine—that this messaging has caused a degree of disquiet, particularly among units that are crucial to this country’s defence and security. They will perceive that, in years to come, a future Government may decide that what is happening now, and what is acceptable now, is no longer acceptable.

• 20 May 2026 · Defence Readiness · Hansard source

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  I follow the Minister’s words, as always, with much interest. Has he had a conversation with the former Health Secretary, the right hon. Member for Ilford North (Wes Streeting), who last Thursday spoke of dither and delay, and does he relate that to the extraordinary delay in the defence investment plan?

• 20 May 2026 · Defence Readiness · Hansard source

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  My right hon. Friend will not be surprised to hear that I absolutely agree with him. This is about more than Northern Ireland, because Northern Ireland has a read-across to a number of theatres where our men and women are actively engaged or could be in the future. The exodus from some of these units will cause irretrievable and irrecoverable damage to our ability to protect the men and women of this country. I have no doubt that Ministers are acting with the best of intentions, but I urge them to look at the messaging that is being given to the men and women of our armed forces, many of whom I have the honour and privilege to represent, and to decide what they can do to address this legislation. I would say “Scrap it and start again”, but if they cannot do that, I ask them to consider what they can do to prevent the idea from gaining penetrance among those units that the Government are simply not on their side, and in any event even if they were, that Governments in the future might, by the standards of the day, decide that what is being done at the moment in the name of the state and in the King’s name was no longer acceptable. Lawfare is a real and present danger to the men and women of our armed forces, and, knowing him as I do, I feel certain that the Secretary of State is cognisant of the threat that it poses. Conscious of the frog in your throat, Madam Deputy Speaker, I shall end my remarks there.

• 20 May 2026 · Defence Readiness · Hansard source

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  I am following the hon. Member’s remarks with a great deal of interest. He mentioned the reserves, and I am a reservist. Would you give the Government credit where it is due for carrying over the Armed Forces Bill, which will advance the age of retirement for reserves to 65, and agree with me that we can probably go further in looking at people, especially the reserves, who are skilled in particular areas and may be able to help us address the challenges of the future, rather than those of the past?

• 28 Apr 2026 · Fire and Rescue Services: Funding · Hansard source

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  I will call Matt Vickers to move the motion and then call the Minister to respond. I remind other Members that they may make a speech only with prior permission from the Member in charge of the debate and from the Minister. As is the convention for 30-minute debates, there will not be an opportunity for the Member in charge to wind up.

• 28 Apr 2026 · National Accident Prevention Strategy · Hansard source

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  With a huge sense of trepidation, as he was not here for the openings—or at least not until the very end of them.

• 27 Apr 2026 · Dunmurry Police Station Attack · Hansard source

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  Jon Boutcher has been fairly critical of a number of political parties, including, it must be said, the party of government. He is clear about the fact that his force, the PSNI, is not funded like other forces across the United Kingdom, and he believes that that is partly due to legacy issues—a position that will be made far more acute by the Northern Ireland Troubles Bill. Does the Secretary of State agree with the Chief Constable or not?

• 27 Apr 2026 · Northern Ireland Troubles Bill (Carry-over) · Hansard source

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  Does the hon. Gentleman agree that the person who is likely to draft those amendments is the Advocate General for Northern Ireland, who is one and the same Lord Hermer? What confidence does the hon. Gentleman think the armed forces community can have that this Bill will be any better?

• 27 Apr 2026 · Northern Ireland Troubles Bill (Carry-over) · Hansard source

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  I represent a very large number of veterans. What are they to make of the remarks made by the Attorney General, who has suggested to his human rights lawyer friends that they have done more for the sum total of human happiness than the brave, highly decorated men and women of our armed forces, many of whom I have the honour and privilege to represent?

• 20 Apr 2026 · Security Vetting · Hansard source

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  The Prime Minister has now been on his feet for nearly two hours. May I put it to him that the most charitable explanation that could be put forward to explain this sorry saga, is that it has been a bad, probably terminal case of the three wise monkeys: see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil?