John Slinger MP: speeches

Speeches

• 31 Mar 2025 · Defending Democracy Taskforce · Hansard source

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  I declare an interest as a member of the Speaker’s Conference. Does my hon. Friend the Minister agree that aside from the security measures that are sadly increasingly necessary to protect candidates and elected representatives, it is vital that everyone who believes in the importance of defending our democracy plays their part in doing so, and that this must include Parliament, social media companies, the traditional media, the education system, businesses, charities and civil society organisations? That way, we can collectively create a healthier and safer environment within which our democracy can flourish.

• 31 Mar 2025 · Defending Democracy Taskforce · Hansard source

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  5. What recent progress the defending democracy taskforce has made.

• 27 Mar 2025 · PIP Changes: Impact on Carer’s Allowance · Hansard source

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  I have spoken to Jobcentre Plus in Rugby about its excellent work to support people into work, including young people with special educational needs whom I have met. Will my right hon. Friend confirm that the package of employment support announced last week—something that charities in my constituency have long been calling for—is one of the biggest ever amounts of money to give disabled people and those with long-term conditions the help they need to find work?

• 27 Mar 2025 · Business of the House · Hansard source

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  I will be quick, Madam Deputy Speaker. One of my constituents in Brownsover has been flooded several times over the past 10 years from leaks in Severn Trent pipes. The company makes good the damage, but does the Leader of the House agree that that is the bare minimum? The company should compensate for emotional harm—which I saw for myself on Saturday—and also consider buying homes at market rate when people cannot sell, and divert more resources away from shareholder dividends and towards fixing the infrastructure for the long term, so that my constituents feel the benefit of first-world amenities such as proper water infrastructure. Will she consider time for a debate on this?

• 26 Mar 2025 · Spring Statement · Hansard source

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  Does my right hon. Friend agree that the main contrast between this Government and the last one is strength versus weakness? They were too weak to crack down on wasteful spending, to address the tax breaks and loopholes for the wealthy, and to take on the blockers in the planning system. Does she further agree that while the Conservatives—the party of vested interests—seek to conserve what has failed, this Labour Government have the strength to take the tough, long-term decisions to build a better and much fairer Britain?

• 26 Mar 2025 · Tobacco and Vapes Bill · Hansard source

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  rose—

• 26 Mar 2025 · Tobacco and Vapes Bill · Hansard source

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  It is not very pleasant of the right hon. Gentleman to say that, but I thank him for letting me intervene. Regarding the age of consent and the amendment calling for it to be raised to 21, does he not accept that the tobacco industry would merely target its immense marketing power on those who were over 21, and that that that could have a very bad effect on public health?

• 26 Mar 2025 · Tobacco and Vapes Bill · Hansard source

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  Does the hon. Gentleman agree that a responsible Government should seek to improve public health, particularly the public health of the younger generation?

• 26 Mar 2025 · Tobacco and Vapes Bill · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend is making an excellent speech. She refers to the risk that young people will increasingly use vapes. Does she agree that the ban on advertising vapes cannot come quickly enough? In my constituency of Rugby, I see shops that look like sweet shops and whose names sound like sweet shops that are clearly designed to encourage and frankly entice young people to take up this unpleasant habit.

• 26 Mar 2025 · Engagements · Hansard source

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  Q1. If he will list his official engagements for Wednesday 26 March.

• 26 Mar 2025 · Engagements · Hansard source

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  Under this Labour Government, NHS waiting lists are down for five months in a row. [Hon. Members: “Hear, hear!”] The Hospital of St Cross in my constituency of Rugby is playing its part, but many of my constituents remain concerned about long waits in A&E, which we inherited from the Conservatives—especially those constituents who have to travel to the general hospital in Coventry. Will the Prime Minister set out how our plan for change to bring the NHS back into the heart of Government will help us to support the frontline and deliver better emergency care closer to the community, which our constituents have long called for?

• 25 Mar 2025 · Asylum Hotels and Illegal Channel Crossings · Hansard source

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  I commend the work that the Government have undertaken with European countries and others to smash the criminal smuggler gangs, such as the French deployment of specialist units on the beaches, German raids on small boat warehouses and, indeed, the efforts of my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary in Iraq and in respect of the Kurdistan Regional Government in Iraq. Can the Minister confirm that although we will not smash the gangs overnight, the Government remain committed to working with our international partners to secure our borders?

• 19 Mar 2025 · Winter Fuel Payment · Hansard source

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  Will the hon. Member give way?

• 19 Mar 2025 · Defence Industries: West Midlands · Hansard source

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  I thank my hon. Friend for securing this important debate. I attended a roundtable in my constituency held by the Manufacturing Technology Centre and chaired by the Minister for Defence Procurement and Industry, my right hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool Garston (Maria Eagle), and the Minister for Nature, my hon. Friend the Member for Coventry East (Mary Creagh), who is one of my neighbouring MPs, to discuss with local businesses their involvement in the defence supply chain. I am very interested in what my hon. Friend is saying about large companies investing in skills development. GE Vernova is a 130-year-old company based in Rugby that specialises in electric propulsion systems for naval vessels. It has supplied propulsion systems for the Royal Navy’s Type 23 frigates, and it developed and delivered the world’s first fully electric warships. Indeed, 92% of the Royal Navy’s fleet is powered by its electric propulsion systems. This is vital, because it is creating new jobs in Rugby and across the country. Does my hon. Friend welcome the Government’s commitment to spreading the economic benefits of the defence sector across the entire country?

• 18 Mar 2025 · Welfare Reform · Hansard source

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  Does my right hon. Friend agree that the clue is in the name of our party? Because we believe in dignity in work and enhanced workers’ rights; dignity and far more support for disabled people and people with health conditions seeking work, particularly with the right to try; and dignity and compassion for those unable to work, especially in ending reassessments. Does she also agree that this Labour Government will get Britain working and get welfare working better, with compassion and support at its heart?

• 17 Mar 2025 · G7 · Hansard source

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  Earlier today in Parliament, I chaired an event to remember the victims of the appalling chemical weapons attack at Halabja on 16 March 1988 carried out by the vicious Saddam Hussein regime. They thank the UK for our help and friendship over the years. Does my right hon. Friend agree that that and current crises show the need for a strong UK? What I mean by that is: strong armed forces; strong diplomacy through our superb diplomats; soft power with the World Service and the British Council; and our alliances in Africa, in the Gulf and in Europe. Those are vital to preserve and protect the international rules-based system that we all rely on.

• 14 Mar 2025 · Rare Cancers Bill · Hansard source

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  I commend my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh South West (Dr Arthur) on bringing forward his important Bill. I also commend hon. Members across this House for their powerful and moving speeches, particularly those of my hon. Friends the Members for Calder Valley (Josh Fenton-Glynn), for Mitcham and Morden (Dame Siobhain McDonagh) and for Cumbernauld and Kirkintilloch (Katrina Murray), who showed that the love for a sibling or child persists forever and can be harnessed to bring about change. I am speaking today because my constituent Mr Peter Realf contacted me about his son Stephen, who was training to be an RAF pilot when he was diagnosed with astrocytoma. He was just 19. Tragically, despite his cancer being described as “low-grade” and despite receiving treatment that prolonged his life, he died six years later, aged just 26. I cannot imagine the pain and sense of loss felt by Stephen’s family and friends, and my heart goes out to them and all those who have faced the consequences of this cruel disease. Mr Realf and his family have campaigned tirelessly since Stephen’s death to address the baffling paradox that despite brain tumours killing more children and adults under 40 than any other cancer, and despite them robbing patients of more years of their life than any other cancer, only a fraction of the Government’s research funding into cancer is used for brain tumours at just 1.37% of national spend, according to the charity Brain Tumour Research. Stephen Realf’s case is stark: a talented, hard-working and clearly impressive young man who died young, losing perhaps 50 years of life and 50 years of potential. A huge public petition and an article written by Stephen’s sister Maria led in 2015 to the then-new Petitions Committee of this House conducting its first inquiry. I challenge any right hon. and hon. Member to read the report’s conclusions from 2016—nine years ago—and not to conclude that, in general, little has improved since then. We should be deeply concerned—though perhaps, as my hon. Friend the Member for Mitcham and Morden has indicated, the appropriate emotion is a stronger one. We hear of the additional £40 million pledged by the last Government and how, according to reports, £28 million of it is yet to be released to scientists. After one of the relevant authorities, the National Institute for Health and Care Research, came to see us at the all-party parliamentary group on brain tumours recently, my colleagues and the campaigners, patients and families present still could not fathom just why the money had not been spent in all those years. I am relatively new to this place, but I have been observing politics for a long time, and something about this issue does not fit. It does not feel right. Something is profoundly wrong. Where there should be outrage, there appears to be relative indifference—not to death and suffering, of course, but to the need for radical changes to get money flowing. Where there should be urgency among the authorities—for, after all, people are dying, often young—there appears to be a degree of inertia, and where there should be action, we often get lost in the chilling snowstorm of bureaucracy. I am not impugning the decency, compassion or professionalism of officials, researchers or clinicians; they are of course committed to helping to cure, treat and prevent cancer. However, as with other examples of institutional failure, it does not take overt malice, just the absence of grip and tenacity in the face of injustice, or of challenging the status quo, for good things not to happen, or even for bad and preventable outcomes to occur. I do not know why progress does not seem to be happening. What reasons could there possibly be for the continuing paradox of the underfunding of rare cancer research? We must find out the reasons and overcome those forces, or perhaps even vested interests, because the stakes could not be higher. Little has changed in terms of treatment and survivability since the 1960s. Patients with brain tumours do not have time on their side, as many hon. Members have said; sadly, most of those diagnosed die within five years. The following statistics from Brain Tumour Research are stark, but, before I read them, I should say that I am glad of the progress on more common cancers, which have affected my family as they have every family. Brain Tumour Research states: “Brain tumours kill more children than leukaemia. Brain tumours kill more men under 70 than prostate cancer and more women under 35 than breast cancer. Incidences of and deaths from brain tumours are increasing… At the current rate of spending, it could take 100 years for brain cancer to catch up with developments in other diseases and find a cure.” That is why the Bill introduced by my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh South West is so needed. It offers practical steps to get more funding into research to take on and defeat those cancers. Finally, I know my ministerial colleagues want only the best for patients, so I gently encourage them, if they have not already done so, to ask this question of officials: “Why is it that research into these cancers, which cause so much death and suffering among the young and rob so many people of so many years of life, are receiving so little funding?” Ministers should keep asking until they get a satisfactory answer. MPs should keep asking until we get a satisfactory answer. We should work together, cross-party if possible, to overcome obstacles and we should certainly pass this Bill. The pain, loss, concern and even anger must be channelled into urgent, substantive action. We owe it to the past, current and future victims of rare cancers and to their families.

• 13 Mar 2025 · NHS England Update · Hansard source

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  This welcome reform cannot come quickly enough in Warwickshire where councillors, local health campaigners, I and others have been making the case for a doctor-led urgent treatment centre at our local hospital, the Hospital of St Cross, to complement the excellent nurse-led and GP out of hours service, but many of my constituents are concerned about having to travel to the larger hospital in Coventry and the long waiting times they find there. The integrated care board has a review of urgent care under way in Warwickshire, but I still do not know when it will be completed and my constituents want to know when urgent care at our local hospital will be upgraded. Does my right hon. Friend agree that his reforms to NHS England should equip ICBs more effectively to respond to local needs?

• 12 Mar 2025 · Engagements · Hansard source

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  Q4. With one in eight young people across the country not in education, employment or training, people in Rugby are worried about a wasted generation. Too many people with disabilities and health conditions are not getting the help they need to get into work, so will the Prime Minister set out how this Government will give everyone who is able to work the support they need, provide compassion to those who cannot work, and fix the broken welfare system left behind by—you guessed it—the Conservatives?

• 4 Mar 2025 · Iranian State Threats · Hansard source

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  I welcome the Minister’s statement. I am confident that he will agree that this House, the Government and the country bear no animosity towards the Iranian people, and that it is the actions of the Iranian state that we are deeply concerned about and taking action on. In that regard, will he give me more detail on the training available for police officers, who must often counter the actions of the Iranian state on our streets in constituencies around the country?

• 4 Mar 2025 · Plan for Neighbourhoods · Hansard source

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  I know that the list of areas is the one the Minister inherited. He gave a truly brilliant statement, which spoke of a stronger community, of pride in place and of the need for thriving communities. I pay tribute to the Minister for visiting Rugby, where he did a walk-around and held a roundtable with me, and saw that our Labour borough councillors—my colleagues—are working hard to achieve all those things, as well as a vibrant community and business sector. I hope the Minister will work with them so that they can learn some of the lessons from this absolutely superb plan for neighbourhoods going forward.

• 4 Mar 2025 · Market Towns: Cultural Heritage · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Sir Jeremy. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Southend East and Rochford (Mr Alaba) on securing this important debate. I represent the town of Rugby, which has perhaps the ultimate origin story in a sport that carries our name across the globe, but our great town is about much more than the sport. I will take a little canter around it, as I did when I joined Ken on the volunteer-run walking tour of Rugby. Rugby has so much to offer. To take the music scene, for example, we have the Rococo players, the Bilton brass band, Boldfest in Newbold, Rugbylele—our own ukulele band—as well as great bands such as Courthouse, singer-songwriter Jessie May and much more. In the arts sector, we have Art at the Alex, a former pub, which is now a community-run arts organisation. We also have a wonderful art gallery and museum that currently has a fantastic exhibition from the Ingram Collection, and also runs a superb exhibition on a history of Rugby in 50 objects—I thoroughly recommend it to anyone who wants to come and have a look. Rugby has a wonderful literary heritage, including being the birthplace of Rupert Brooke. It has a fantastic, vibrant sports sector, and Rugby borough women’s football team narrowly lost, unfortunately, to Liverpool in the FA cup recently. It has a wonderful industrial heritage, with British Thomson-Houston and Willans Works factories covering aviation, maritime and automotive. The inventor of helium was born in Rugby, holography was invented there, and Sir Frank Whittle first tested the jet engine in Rugby. We had the incredible radio masts at Hillmorton. Today, GE Vernova provides high-tech jobs. This debate is about the future. There is such huge potential in small market towns that needs to be unleashed, so I wonder whether the Minister might consider a campaign to encourage people to visit small market towns such as Rugby. If we go to the VisitBritain website, we see a lot about cities, but we do not see much about towns. All too often, smaller towns are forgotten by officialdom—they are not forgotten by politicians, as everyone can see from this debate, but they are often forgotten by officialdom. We must invest in our small towns, our people and the potential. Cultural heritage is about the past, the present and, most importantly, the future.

• 3 Mar 2025 · Social Housing · Hansard source

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  I thank my hon. Friend for his answer. What measures will his Department consider to support councils that find themselves in viability negotiations with developers, who sometimes push down the quota of social homes and, indeed, affordable homes?

• 3 Mar 2025 · Social Housing · Hansard source

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  9. What steps she is taking to build more social housing.

• 3 Mar 2025 · Ukraine · Hansard source

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  At the weekend, a Ukrainian constituent said to me: “As the bombs fell on my city last night, one thing remains unchanged: no one here wants a peace built on surrender or at the cost of dignity. So to those who stand with us—not just in words, but in truth—thank you.” Does the Prime Minister agree that strong diplomacy, such as his, that encourages friends to defend our values, Ukraine and the international rules-based system is in the permanent interests of the UK, Europe, the United States and the wider world, and that it honours our Ukrainian friends, who have sacrificed so much?