Jerome Mayhew MP: speeches

Speeches

• 10 Jun 2026 · Railways Bill · Hansard source

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  I have addressed that point, so I want to move on. We have the key challenge that the division of track and train at times created some perverse incentives between the track operator and the service operator, and this too often led to some inefficiencies. This Government, however, inherited from the Conservatives a solution in the Shapps-Williams review: the creation of Great British Railways, where track and train services could be integrated to design out the problems of the earlier settlement while, importantly, retaining the efficiency and service benefits of private operators, as well as the increased access to capital.

• 10 Jun 2026 · Railways Bill · Hansard source

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  I stand to correct the hon. Gentleman: the most punctual is, I believe, Greater Anglia, which services my constituency, but the point he makes is a good one. The greater integration of track and train brings greater efficiencies and leads to greater punctuality. That is exactly why that was Conservative party policy going into the last general election. What we do not need is increased control by perhaps heavily unionised workforces being given extra political power through nationalisation, taking the focus off the customer and focusing on the organisation and its purposes instead. We have the track and train being integrated, and this Bill should be giving GBR the tools it needs to deliver dynamic management. That is crucial for a big organisational change. It should be putting passengers first by giving GBR the power to sort out the worst of the union-imposed inefficient working practices. How can we seriously have a seven-day timetable staffed by a five-day working week, requiring voluntary overtime to staff just normal service? It is clearly ridiculous. This legislation should give GBR the power and, importantly, through this new clause, the political support it will need to fix that problem. We need to enable drivers to operate train doors where that is not yet standard practice and to fix similar Spanish practices. I think that is very unfair on the Spanish, by the way, who surprisingly run a much more efficient railway in some respects. We need to increase flexible driver training and operation, and so much more. Under new clause 54, tabled in my name, a working practices and productivity modernisation framework would provide GBR with that direction and give it the political cover to act.

• 10 Jun 2026 · Railways Bill · Hansard source

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  The Father of the House is nailing me down to a cast-iron assurance at the Dispatch Box. I am not in a position to do that, but I fully expect to be in this role in a future Government and look forward to the opportunity to encourage open access to provide the through train that the right hon. Gentleman needs or for GBR to do so. If GBR needs the dynamic management that we say it does, the Government are imposing for political reasons—very popular ones among their Back Benchers, as we have heard—a management system that has never worked in the past, but somehow it will be different this time. They have made their choice and we need to make the best of it. At the very least, this founding legislation should identify core key performance indicators which will survive the test of time in legislation. New clause 53 and amendment 158 provide them. They are detailed, but in essence, they focus on reliability, safety, comfort and on-board experience, affordability and value for money, passenger and network growth, financial sustainability and freight growth. Until covid, privatisation undeniably brought a focus on ridership that had been missing previously under nationalisation. I accept that private businesses are not trying to be nice; they work to increase ridership because it brings in fare income, which creates profit. They are not directed to do so; the natural incentives work to solve the problem. The innovation of privatisation, fought tooth and nail at the time by Labour and the unions, was supported by passengers, who voted with their feet. British Rail oversaw the long-term decline in ridership from about 1 billion in 1950, reducing in a straight line to 750 million in 1992. Privatisation immediately reversed that 40-year trend of decline, growing back ridership not just to 1 billion but to 1.7 billion in 2019. Under the Bill, GBR does not even have a passenger growth target. New clause 14 in my name would rectify that by requiring the Secretary of State to set GBR a passenger growth target and to keep it under review. How can the Government be against that? They have agreed to put one in for rail freight growth, but for some reason passengers are not listed in the Bill. Instead of these sensible, pro-growth and pro-passenger measures, we have clause after clause of political control, micromanagement of a nationalised structure, and unfettered rights of guidance and direction by the Secretary of State—by which we mean Department for Transport officials—over GBR at any time and for any reason, under clauses 7 and 9. It is a recipe for corporate paralysis where decisions are second-guessed by civil servants. Amendments 150 and 151 limit at least the giving of guidance by Department for Transport officials to issues where GBR fails to meet a key performance indicator, and the giving of mandatory directions to serious issues where GBR has missed KPIs and the chief executive has been removed in consequence. I fear that over time, as the corporate memory of the train operating companies fades and with it their focus on the customer experience, this focus will be replaced by other incentives. Heavily unionised workers of a nationalised industry well understand that the Government will now be politically exposed to industrial action as never before. It will be entirely rational for them—I do not blame them for doing so—to use this new bargaining power to increase pay and improve conditions, which sounds good, does it not? Why would they not do so? It does, however, increase costs and reduce productivity. Who benefits? Not the passenger or the taxpayer. Labour will be too weak to stand up for the taxpayer and for fare-paying passengers. Services will become more expensive, worse, less frequent—or all three—and we will be back to the rationing of resources as we see in every nationalised sector.

• 10 Jun 2026 · Railways Bill · Hansard source

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  My right hon. Friend rightly says that the needs of disabled passengers such as his constituent, whom he so ably represents, are very important. That is one performance indicator that the Government should impose on GBR, but is it not ridiculous that we have to have Government action to impose KPIs on a railway? We should not be doing it this way. Instead of giving GBR a clear purpose and direction and then supporting it to deliver, the Government are imposing nationalisation, which will bring with it, as we see in the Bill, an inevitable explosion of bureaucracy, civil service plans, targets, long-term strategies and civil service rights to give guidance and direction, all in the name of the Secretary of State. What will be the impact of this on GBR over time? Will it lead to the dynamic management that this structural reorganisation must have if it is to have a hope of working? Let history be our guide. I cannot think of a single example of a nationalised industry in any country, either now or in the past, that is or was a byword for management dynamism. Members should try it themselves—we cannot think of one, can we? If GBR needs dynamic management, how can nationalisation possibly be the answer?

• 10 Jun 2026 · Railways Bill · Hansard source

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  I quite agree with my right hon. Friend. It seems that the Government have insisted on going back to the future: back to the 1970s, with state control and a revamped British Railways. They have even chosen the same logo, which I think tells us a lot about their intentions.

• 9 Jun 2026 · Draft Airports Slot Allocation (Alleviation of Usage Requirements) Regulations 2026 · Hansard source

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  Thank you for chairing the Committee, Ms Lewell. I am grateful for the Minister’s explanation of what is essentially a pickle of the Government’s own making. We will not divide on the regulations because we recognise that there is a real problem that has to be solved. But rather than fiddling around with emergency statutory instruments to plug a gap, the real problem is the Government’s running down of the domestic energy sector and our ability to refine jet-grade oil and supply our airline industry. We need to rejuvenate our energy sector, encouraging the investment and business conditions that will allow refineries to reopen. That is essential to manage the challenges posed by fuel shortages—I am thinking of Stanlow, Fawley, Pembroke and others. We have the ability to refine jet fuel in this country; we just need to expand it. The problem with the Government’s other policies on energy is that they are making it so expensive to operate energy-intensive businesses such as oil refining in this country that the industry has voted with its feet and left in a large percentage. We do not actually need less jet fuel than before the conflict in the middle east began. In fact, the spiralling cost of the carbon tax has meant that refineries are struggling to remain open. That will only increase our reliance on imports and make us vulnerable to geopolitical concerns around the strait of Hormuz. If we want to support our oil refining sector, we must start by removing the additional costs, such as the carbon tax, while backing our North sea oil and gas industry to support the energy ecosystem that we rely on. That includes licences for new exploration and drilling. However, we have seen little evidence of that—in fact, quite the opposite in the case of the North sea, with the Government’s baffling legislative proposal on new licences. Given the Government’s lack of commitment to tackling the fundamental issue, they have turned to these regulations, which have had the unfortunate consequence of dividing the opinions of airlines and airports. While airlines broadly support the proposals, we should acknowledge—as I hope the Minister will—the ongoing and significant concerns of airports. Those concerns have increased over the near two years of this Government’s rule, because of their mix of anti-business mandates and enormous increases to business rates, which have imposed significant costs on airports, even if they have managed to avoid the preposterous increases that were originally set out. The increases will create further challenges for regional airports, which face some of the steepest charges. We only have to look at Heathrow, which had an initial proposal of a 350% increase in its business rates. The combination of measures has made airports wary, so it is unsurprising that they have concerns about the concept of an increased number of flights being cancelled under a new regime, with the cost of those empty slots being borne by the airports. I understand that this goes to the winter of 2027, though I think the Minister said June 2026. I may have misheard him, so perhaps he could clarify—

• 9 Jun 2026 · Draft Airports Slot Allocation (Alleviation of Usage Requirements) Regulations 2026 · Hansard source

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  If we could have a bit more clarity on that, I would be grateful. The director of the Airports Council International Europe went so far as to say: “The UK Government is effectively handing airlines a carte blanche to cut services and not deliver their schedules, leaving passengers, communities and airports to bear the full brunt.” Although I appreciate that there is a balance to be struck, that is a strong argument and deserves a direct response from the Minister about how he will maintain the balance through these regulations. We all appreciate the importance of airport slot alleviation, particularly if there are significant fuel shortages, so I will not oppose the regulations today. Nevertheless, the proposals have been introduced in such a way that I think it is incumbent upon the Minister to address a few of the issues. That includes whether there are sufficient protections for travellers under the 14-day window, and whether he is confident that the system will work as intended and we will not see people’s holidays more disrupted than necessary over the summer period. In addition, I would be interested in hearing his rationale for extending the period into the winter when the peak period for flights is during the summer. Would it have been feasible to make changes at a later date, particularly if the Government get around to passing their Civil Aviation (Consumer Protection and Regulatory Reform) Bill in a more timely manner than they appear to be doing at the moment? Ultimately, the Government are right to ensure that there is flexibility when there is a crisis, but we have been repeatedly told that there is not a jet fuel shortage. That is always liable to change, but those comments raise fair questions from the sector about the appropriateness of the regulations that the Government propose. I hope that the Minister can answer some of the concerns of airports, and, frankly, my concerns about the risk posed to the travelling public, so that there can be clarity about the necessity of these measures beyond the existing alleviation rules.

• 8 Jun 2026 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  My constituents hate seeing organised shoplifting taking place with apparent impunity. Norfolk police recognises this and has identified suspects in more than a third of all cases, but what is the point when the Government’s assumption is that any sentence shorter than 12 months will automatically be suspended? What are the Government going to do about it?

• 3 Jun 2026 · Lord Mandelson: Response to Humble Address · Hansard source

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  It is a great pleasure to be the last Back-Bench contributor. I actually mean that, because unlike some debates which we have all been in, this one has been characterised by knowledge and a really serious approach to the subject in hand. I have learned a lot, and I am grateful for many of the contributions made. The right hon. Member for Islington North (Jeremy Corbyn) made quite a good point when he said that he was surprised there were not more people in the Chamber to take part in the debate. Perhaps one of the reasons why the Chamber is relatively sparsely populated is that this feels like old news. It is easy to lose the sense of wonder and shock at the seriousness of the allegations that led to the Humble Address. It is old news that Peter Mandelson was grossly unfit for public office—we have known that for decades. Tony Blair knew it, because he sacked him for dishonesty not once but twice. We have known for years that Peter Mandelson was a byword for double-dealing—after all, his nickname was the Prince of Darkness, and that did not come from nowhere. We have known for years, unfortunately, of his continued friendship with his best pal, Mr Epstein—that they were such close friends, and that Mandelson was so on Epstein’s side that he stayed in Epstein’s house even when Epstein was in prison for child sexual offences. We say that too often without stopping to realise what it actually means. It is an extraordinary statement. We knew that. The Prime Minister appointed Mandelson despite knowing those things and despite having advice on vetting from his then Cabinet Secretary. He ignored that advice. This, of course, is the Prime Minister who famously said that he was going to put “country before party”. On this occasion, he appeared to put party before national security. It is pretty serious. Some months ago, we had the unedifying spectacle of the Government attempting through obfuscation to cover up this scandal. They whipped their Back Benchers to vote down the release of relevant documents, which was such a grubby move that it fomented such revolt among Labour Members that the Government were forced into a climbdown. Then there were not one but two stolen phones. I accept that perhaps that happened, but there were also no messages from the Chancellor of the Exchequer, no messages from the Deputy Prime Minister—although we know that no one tells him anything, so perhaps we have not missed anything there—and no messages from the Chief Secretary to the Prime Minister, either. We also had the use of disappearing messages, with no record kept by the Prime Minister, in direct contradiction of Cabinet Office guidance for the retention of records. All that was found out drip by drip, one painful and damning piece of evidence after another, as a result of the Conservative-led Humble Address. Yet we are still not at the end. It is clear from the documents that have been released that there are obvious continuing gaps in disclosure. Messages have been leaked to the press, including The Guardian and T he S pectator , which are not included in the release to Parliament, even though they were ordered to be. The Intelligence and Security Committee—an organisation of eminent Members of the House from across the parties—has given its opinion that the Government are interpreting exclusion of material on the grounds of prejudice to national security or international relations “far too broadly”. I am sorry to say this, but it feels that the Government are still at it, because they are withholding documents. We have talked a lot about the vetting file. If that file is too difficult to disclose, at least its conclusions should be shared with the ISC, as my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Kenilworth and Southam (Sir Jeremy Wright) suggested. It is important that the Government have no legal authority to take decisions not to disclose. As the Intelligence and Security Committee said, “while Government may believe that there is good reason to withhold certain documents, it does not currently have the authority to so do.” It is not for officials to decide what is released to Parliament; Parliament decides. If the instruction—a direction from the high court of Parliament to officials—is thought by officials to be too widely framed, it is the responsibility of Ministers to come to this House and persuade Parliament to change its mind. They have not done so. One of the things that really worries me about this Administration is that officials appear to think that they can decide what is and is not supplied to Parliament. That undermines the administration of this country by democracy. Parliament is where decisions are taken; we are the people who decide what authority is granted to the Executive. For officials to then decide, perhaps for good reason, that they will not comply with the direction of the high court of Parliament undermines our entire democratic process. They do not have the legal authority to make that decision. It is for the Government to stand up for Parliament, and if they think that Parliament has made too wide a direction, they must come and persuade us of that, and they will no doubt get a vote to correct it.

• 3 Jun 2026 · Lord Mandelson: Response to Humble Address · Hansard source

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  I would never accuse the Government of being too clever by half, and I am unable to put myself in their heads. However, I hear the hon. Member’s concern. We have this drip, drip, drip: the failed cover-up, the partial disclosure, the embarrassing exposures and the continued unauthorised retention. When will the Government realise that this is not going to stop and that this painful, weeping sore will remain open until they finally deliver what the Humble Address requires of them?

• 21 May 2026 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  Our economy needs access to oil. Last October, the Government announced that they were going to sanction Russian oil and jet fuel. Yesterday, they decided not to do so, on the same day that they banned new drilling in the North sea. Why do the Government support Putin’s Russian oil, but not our UK oil?

• 21 May 2026 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  T2. If he will make a statement on his departmental responsibilities.

• 21 May 2026 · Pubs: Broadland and Fakenham · Hansard source

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  5. What steps he is taking to support pubs in Broadland and Fakenham constituency.

• 21 May 2026 · Pubs: Broadland and Fakenham · Hansard source

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  Pubs in my constituency will respond to that answer with disbelief. There were 74 pubs in my constituency at the last count—that may be an inaccurate figure now; it could have dropped—employing roughly 2,000 people, and on top of that there are cafés such as the Heydon Village Tea Room. They tell me that they are being crucified by the Government’s policy of the jobs tax, the removal of business rates relief and the business rates revaluation, and to top it off there is now talk of an overnight levy for pubs with rooms. Why do the Government not want pubs and hospitality to thrive in Broadland and Fakenham?

• 20 May 2026 · Banking Hubs · Hansard source

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  We are talking about the rules. We know that the banks have withdrawn from our communities. My market towns of Fakenham and Aylsham have had all the banks go apart from one Nationwide. They say their answer to that is Link, and yet the rules seem to say that market towns, with that huge hinterland they also serve, are not sufficient to allow for banking services to be provided via hubs. Does the hon. Member agree that if those are the rules, those rules need to change?

• 19 May 2026 · High Speed 2 Reset · Hansard source

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  I am grateful to the Secretary of State for advance sight of her statement. The Secretary of State’s comments today demonstrate not only the challenges faced in the past and the reasons that action was taken to reduce the scope of HS2, but the significant challenges ahead if it is finally to be delivered. It is true that the early years of the HS2 project were beset with delay and cost overruns, with HS2 Ltd failing to maintain tight control of the budget and, frankly, the Department for Transport allowing it to get away with it. It was for that reason that the previous Government appointed Mark Wild OBE as the new chief executive of HS2 Ltd with the clear instruction to get a grip of costs and robustly oversee the project. It is apparent from today’s statement that HS2’s leadership under Mark Wild is taking those steps to try to achieve that. Where there are actions that can reduce costs in the long run, the Opposition will clearly support them, but given concerns about trust in the project, I hope that the Government and HS2 Ltd will set out in detail how they believe these measures will save money and deliver even on this new extended timetable. In addition, we have to acknowledge the deep-seated infrastructure challenges we face in this country. When the Prime Minister was campaigning during the last general election, we heard a range of promises about housing and infrastructure goals, but they completely foundered when they came into contact with reality. That is why the Opposition propose substantial changes to environmental legislation to give us the freedoms needed to cut environmental red tape, both for business and large infrastructure projects. Even the Prime Minister does not support regulations that lead to a £100-million bat tunnel—does the Secretary of State? This issue must be addressed because the Secretary of State has made a number of strong statements. If she is angry, as she says she is, those statements must be backed up by consequential legislative changes that prevent cost overruns from occurring in future. Turning to the specifics, I wish to press the Secretary of State on matters on which those in the sector have indicated they want assurances. For example, what do the new project cost figures include? Do they include all the rolling stock under the new plans? To what extent is funding for Euston included in the new estimates, and do they include signalling? Do the Government intend to set out precisely what is being funded and when the various elements will be delivered under their new timetable? Can the Secretary of State also explain what steps the Government have taken to improve HS2 Ltd’s performance on settling claims with those impacted by construction, since she has highlighted separately that this is an area that requires improvement? Of course, HS2 does not operate in a vacuum. On the same day that this statement is being made to the House, it has been announced that Government pressure will result in one in seven rail services being cut on one of Avanti West Coast’s routes following a Government request to reduce expenditure. Given the comments made about the project, is it appropriate that services on the west coast will offer fewer services to passengers? Ultimately, the Government are right to take steps to reduce costs on this project. Errors were made and should be rectified, and I am glad that the Government continue to support Mark Wild and his team as they work towards opening HS2.

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

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  Further to the question from my hon. Friend the Member for Bridgwater (Sir Ashley Fox), I met two trainee midwives in a surgery just last week in my Norfolk constituency. They are training at the Norfolk and Norwich university hospital, where 250 student midwives are going after just 50 places. What has happened to the graduate guarantee?

• 13 May 2026 · Debate on the Address · Hansard source

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  I said I would give way to the hon. Member for Dewsbury and Batley (Iqbal Mohamed).

• 13 May 2026 · Debate on the Address · Hansard source

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  The hon. Gentleman will acknowledge that the previous Government absolutely did take action to reduce the welfare state, although the global crisis caused by covid knocked that back a bit. The shadow Chancellor, in his previous role as Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, was bringing in wide-scale reform, which would have been effective, but it was cut short by the general election. So this was a long-term project for the Conservative Government, but it has gone into reverse as a result of the Labour Administration. If there is one message that the election results last week should have transmitted loud and clear to all of us, it is that the country is frustrated. People feel that we are bogged down in bureaucracy, with Ministers announcing plans and then nothing happens, but it costs a fortune and takes forever, with costs spiralling. So where was the “reducing bureaucracy Bill” that would unlock the power of the state to actually get things moving? We heard the Leader of the Opposition, in her powerful response to the Gracious Address, setting out the plans of a Conservative Administration, yet without such a bureaucracy-busting Bill, this Government are doomed to failure, even on their own terms. For that matter, without cheaper energy, manufacturing in the United Kingdom is also doomed to failure. Commercial energy in the UK is now the highest in the world, which is a sobering fact, and domestic energy is the second highest in the developed world. So Labour Members cannot be surprised when we have a decline in manufacturing if its energy, which is its primary input, is the highest in the world. It is higher not because it costs us more to produce energy in this country than elsewhere, but because of deliberate taxation and levy decisions taken by the Government. The Government have taxes and levies on electricity to subsidise expensive renewables. Where is the cheap energy Bill? They have done the opposite. The Labour Government have doubled down on their renewable levies, tying this country into the world’s most expensive energy for decades to come. Let us look at the wider economy. The high street has been hammered by Labour, whether from the business rates revaluation, the removal of the hospitality and leisure exemption, or employer national insurance contributions. Pubs and shops right across the country—not just in my constituency, but in every one of the Labour Members’ constituencies—have been closing in record numbers. So where is our “bring back the high street Bill”? It is not there. In fact, there is no coherent plan for a stronger economy and a stronger country. Instead, the King’s Speech is just a hotchpotch—bureaucratic fiddling while the Prime Minister burns. The Government have had two years—two years already—yet the Opposition are doing more serious thinking about solving the problems of this country than the Government, with all their resources, which is shaming. [ Laughter. ] Labour Members should not be laughing; they should be ashamed of themselves and of their Government, given that the Opposition have a more complete King’s Speech, with more complete answers to the problems of this country, than their Government seem able to bring forward. It is extraordinary that we have this weak legislative programme from a weak Government. The country deserves so much better.

• 13 May 2026 · Debate on the Address · Hansard source

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  I will just deliver this point and then give way. We have the extraordinarily named “regulating for growth Bill”, which I think is oxymoronic—or perhaps just moronic—because it seems to me that the Government’s answer to anaemic growth is more regulation. We will also have “more Europe”, according to the Prime Minister.

• 13 May 2026 · Debate on the Address · Hansard source

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  Madam Deputy Speaker, you do not need me to tell you that this is a deeply unhappy Government. It is a deeply unhappy party sitting on the Government Benches, and Labour Members do not appear to understand that their core problem is a lack of economic growth. If the Labour Government were presiding over fast economic growth, the taxes would come rolling in, their ability to spend on their pet welfare projects would be unlimited, and they would be riding high in the polls. They used to know that. When they came into office, they said that their No. 1 mission was to deliver economic growth, yet what we have seen in the two years since is the most appalling example of a fundamental misunderstanding of how an economy works. Instead of bringing in policies to increase economic growth, we have entered into the depressing doom loop of increased taxes to fund increased welfare, leading directly to reduced economic activity, which leads to increased welfare needs and therefore an increased need for tax rises. We need a leader and a Government who have a plan, not just words, to support economic growth—something that reverses the welfare taxation doom loop. And what do we have in the King’s Speech? Where is the welfare reform bill? It is an appalling statistic that we now spend more on welfare than we recover in income tax. Four million adults receive PIP—the figure has gone up by half a million since the last general election. The Centre for Social Justice came out with a really terrifying argument the other day: according to its analysis, 25% of all full-time workers would be better off receiving benefits than they are in employment—a quarter of the working population. Yet, in this King’s Speech, there is nothing to fix the relationship between welfare and the productive economy.

• 27 Apr 2026 · Lord Mandelson Humble Address: Government Response Update · Hansard source

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  One of the glaring omissions in the first release of documentation was the Prime Minister’s response to his box notes about the proposed appointment of Peter Mandelson. The Government have now had three months to think about it. Will the Minister set out whether there is any reason why those documents will not be part of the next release?

• 23 Apr 2026 · Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency · Hansard source

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  I join everyone in congratulating the hon. Member for Mid Dorset and North Poole (Vikki Slade) on securing the debate and on making a very important contribution, which has been supplemented by speech after speech right across the Chamber identifying a common theme around medical cases, as well as other issues. I will come on to those shortly. The DVLA’s role in upholding the licensing system is essential for maintaining driver safety—that is a truism—and ensuring that the correct people are behind the wheel. We should not underestimate the scale of the task; it is a huge one. Last year, the agency collected £8.4 billion of vehicle excise duty for the Exchequer. It maintained 53 million driver records, as well as 47 million vehicle records, and it processed getting on for 100 million customer transactions. That is no mean feat. If we want to keep our country moving, it is vital that the DVLA processes its work efficiently, reaching the correct answers and doing so quickly. The huge disruption caused by the covid pandemic saw the operation creak and exposed its weaknesses, with systems unable to cope with, among other things, staff distancing. Thanks to important work under the last Government, backlogs were brought down and longer-term efficiency improvements began to be implemented. Changes were made to streamline existing processes. For example, the law was altered to enable healthcare professionals other than doctors to respond to DVLA medical questionnaires. My right hon. Friend the Member for Basildon and Billericay (Mr Holden), when he was a Minister in the Department—he is now the shadow Secretary of State for Transport—launched an independent examination of the DVLA in 2023 to establish what the Government could do to provide genuinely customer-focused services. We had hoped that that reform process would continue with the new Administration after the election in 2024, and some of it has, but as we have heard in the debate today, the data suggests that in many instances that reforming zeal has not continued. The DVLA’s business plan tells us that the average waiting time for licensing decisions on medical cases will be within 50 days—a long time in its own right. However, the Government now admit that in October 2025 the waiting time was over 78 days. By November, the delay had increased further to over 80 days. That has real consequences. We have heard that from Member after Member, and I shall pick out one. The hon. Member for Guildford (Zöe Franklin), in a powerful speech, referred to a constituent who has stage 4 cancer and has been waiting nine months and counting for a decision. That is totally unacceptable. Across 2025-26 the overall average was over 56 days, missing the Government’s already slack target of 50 days. That is not acceptable, because it leaves drivers hanging, uncertain of what their fate will be. I would greatly appreciate it if the Minister could explain whether the position has improved since November last year—the last date for which figures are publicly available. Have the Government met, or are they closer to meeting, the target? The DVLA has said that it is completing the migration of its digital driver licensing services from its old digital platform on to a new strategic cloud platform. While that is welcome progress, it does not appear to align with the scale of the reform programme set out by the Treasury in its 2025 departmental efficiency plans. The Department for Transport plan listed: “AI initiatives to increase automation and self-service at its contact centre”, “expanding the use of Robotic Process Automation software”, “automating Vehicle Excise Duty (VED) refunds”, and “wider organisational and workforce restructure.” It claimed that, taken together, those changes would secure net efficiencies of £39 million by 2028-29. However, the actual business plan from the Department for 2025-26, published in March, makes no mention of AI initiatives to bring forward automation and self-service, or to automate refunds for customers. What happened to the plans? Has the Minister changed his mind? Has he told the Treasury? Will he tell us? Without that focus in the business plan, how can we ever expect to see improvements in efficiency and service for the customer? Those are not the only reforms that the DVLA is struggling with. There are challenges around fee deficits. The Government have promised efficiency savings, but it is not clear how they plan to deliver them. The shadow Transport Secretary asked about the £2.50 fee charged for the release of vehicle keeper details. Unfortunately and ironically, the Department’s written answers were later acknowledged to be partially incorrect, as they included inaccurate information about the requirement for legislation. Will the Minister take this opportunity—I am sure he will—to explain whether he plans to change those fees and, crucially, whether he is confident that he can make those changes effectively, given that he was unable to provide accurate information on the process in the first place? When there are questions about efficiency savings, it appears that there is a gap between the rhetoric and the actual delivery. Cloned number plates are another problem of increasing concern that must be tackled, as was highlighted effectively by the hon. Member for West Bromwich (Sarah Coombes). The DVLA has to be supported in its work with the police to crack down on the issue. In her important speech, she referenced the example of a manufacturer who had been caught and received a £5,000 fine and a non-permanent ban—a five-year ban, from memory—from the registration list at the DVLA. That is madness and she is absolutely right to highlight the issue. We have to tackle the supply and use of cloned plates. Current legislation does not properly reflect the seriousness of the crime. The Conservative party is proposing new legislation so that manufacturers and online retailers of cloned plates would face a fine of up to £1,000 and/or up to five years’ imprisonment. On top of that, any driver caught using a plate that does not match their vehicle’s registered data would incur a driving ban of up to two years, up to a year in prison and a £5,000 fine. These are not accidental infringements of driving laws; it is express criminal activity, often to facilitate other crimes, and it should be treated as such. Ultimately, we need to have laws in place that clamp down on criminality. It is an oddity that it is much harder to scrap a car than it is to buy one. To scrap a car, people need ID, a vehicle licence and a UK bank account, whereas to buy one they can just turn up and pay in cash. That is a gateway for thousands of uninsured vehicles to be used for criminal purposes. The different approaches make no sense. Why do we not tighten up the rules, so that if a person wants to buy a car, at the very least they have to record their driving licence? Will the Government consider working with the DVLA to support our proposal to tighten up that method of removing uninsured vehicles from the road? The DVLA is ripe for further reform. Its services our ideal for use of AI to improve productivity, reduce costs and improve responsiveness. Instead of being paralysed by the Mandelson affair, the Government need to focus on driving through reforms to serve the driving public and clamp down on vehicle-related crime. I am concerned that the current data appears to be going in the wrong direction, but there is still time for the Government to turn this around. We have a plan for improvements and I look forward to hearing that the Government have one too.

• 23 Apr 2026 · Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency · Hansard source

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  This is not a party political point, because I am sure that blame could be focused on my party as well. Given that we have 34,000 registered suppliers, does the Minister recognise that it is an impossible task for the DVLA to keep any kind of meaningful record as to whether they are in fact compliant?

• 22 Apr 2026 · Mountain Rescue · Hansard source

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  Thank you for agreeing to chair this important debate, Ms Lewell. Like others, I congratulate the hon. Member for Hazel Grove (Lisa Smart) on securing it. We have heard a huge amount of unanimity across the political divide about our support for mountain rescue and the analysis of some of the challenges that it faces. Frankly, mountain rescue is easy to ignore because it operates by definition in remote areas, but there is something else: it is operated by people who are typically self-sufficient, independent and tough volunteers, and as a result it is a self-sufficient, independent and tough organisation. Those are not typically the kind of people who put their hands up and say they want the Government to do something for them, but—and this is an important “but”—when someone needs mountain rescue, it is the most important organisation in the world. There seems to be a qualification for being on the Front Bench at the moment. The hon. Member for Didcot and Wantage (Olly Glover) was stuck out on a mountain in Italy for 48 hours, and look where that has got him. I was an idiot myself when I was in my teens: I got stuck up above the snowline on a mountain overnight, with no equipment at all, wearing trainers. Unfortunately, that was before the days of mobile phones, and I just had to survive; I managed to climb down the following day. By the sounds of it, there is a link between risk taking and political careers, but I hope that both of us have learned our lessons; I look forward to further anecdotes from the Minister. We need mountain rescue, and we know that demand is increasing. We have heard about the 26 teams in Scottish Mountain Rescue, which in 2025 had 1,270 call-outs and assisted more than 900 people. It is worth remembering that that took more than 39,000 hours of volunteer time. We heard from the hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Tim Farron) about the many English mountain rescue teams—five, I think, in his constituency—and we heard from the right hon. Member for Dwyfor Meirionnydd (Liz Saville Roberts) about Welsh mountain rescue. Like her, I want to raise the profile of Llanberis Mountain Rescue Team. In my former career, I was the managing director of Go Ape, working in outdoor recreation—often out in the mountains—and the Llanberis team was responsible for training for the mountain leader qualifications. It is at the heart of this country’s very good training and outdoor education, and was responsible for responding to 10% of all call-outs last year. There is plenty to support and give plaudits for. We have heard a number of arguments that more should be done regarding funding, and some of those arguments no doubt have merit, but we should be careful what we wish for with volunteer organisations. When I think, off the top of my head, about the most loved, must trusted and most supported organisations in our country, I think of the RNLI, the Air Ambulance Service, the hospice movement and mountain rescue. They have something important in common: they are not adjuncts of the state. They grow up from their local community, and they are therefore supported by, loved by and close to their community. It would be a terrible disservice to mountain rescue if, through some misplaced wish to support it, we brought it into the confines of the state.