Lincoln Jopp MP: speeches

Speeches

• 23 Feb 2026 · Local Government Reorganisation · Hansard source

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  I thank the Secretary of State for his statement. He mentioned Surrey, and he will know that my constituency is going to be in a unitary authority called West Surrey. I have received a huge number of representations from constituents who would like the Secretary of State to consider calling that unitary authority West Surrey and South Middlesex, to take account of the fact that Spelthorne has been in Middlesex for 1,000 years and has never really thought of itself as being in Surrey. Will the Secretary of State meet me, so that I can make further representations on my constituents’ behalf?

• 23 Feb 2026 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  Last year, 88,000 new homes were meant to be started in London, but instead, 5,891 were started. That shortfall has a direct impact on rents in my Spelthorne constituency. Will the Secretary of State say why he is allowing Sadiq Khan to run circles around him?

• 12 Feb 2026 · Lord Mandelson: Government Response to Humble Address Motion · Hansard source

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  In September last year, we had an emergency debate at the request of my right hon. Friend the Member for Goole and Pocklington (David Davis) on the sacking of Peter Mandelson. I said at the time that the Government should be turning Lord Mandelson inside out, because someone had politically fatal compromising material on him during his whole time as ambassador. The Government simply said, “Well he’s been sacked.” Do the Government regret not carrying out that due diligence in September last year and instead waiting for more compromising information to drop?

• 12 Feb 2026 · Pharmacy First: Withholding Payments · Hansard source

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  The Trio Pharmacy in Shepperton told me that there are two problems with Pharmacy First. The first is that pharmacies are simply not getting the referrals that they should from GPs. The second is that remuneration for their services does not take into account the amount of time needed for examination, diagnosis and prescription. The Nebel Pharmacy in Sunbury, near where I live, says that the work needs to be looked at as a vocation, because it simply makes no money. That is not sustainable, is it?

• 11 Feb 2026 · Local Government Finance · Hansard source

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  rose—

• 11 Feb 2026 · Local Government Finance · Hansard source

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  Has the Secretary of State made an analysis of the division of Pride in Place funding between Labour and Reform seats versus Liberal Democrat and Conservative seats?

• 11 Feb 2026 · Local Government Finance · Hansard source

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  I am incredibly grateful to the Secretary of State for giving way. He calls it a milestone; I call it a millstone. He talks about fairness. Stanwell in my Spelthorne constituency hits the markers for the double deprivation criteria that would qualify for the Pride in Place funding, but that is diluted by the more affluent areas in my constituency. How is it fair to the people of Stanwell that they do not qualify for Pride in Place funding just because they are surrounded by more affluent areas? Rather than helping, is the Secretary of State not just going to engineer the continuation of pockets of deprivation?

• 11 Feb 2026 · Local Government Finance · Hansard source

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  Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

• 11 Feb 2026 · Local Government Finance · Hansard source

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  Does the hon. Member believe that people who promise not to raise council tax should not raise council tax?

• 10 Feb 2026 · Businesses: Cost of Energy · Hansard source

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  2. What steps his Department is taking to help reduce industrial electricity prices.

• 10 Feb 2026 · Businesses: Cost of Energy · Hansard source

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  Ametek and SSS Gears are two quite rare breeds—they are manufacturing companies in my Spelthorne constituency, inside the M25. One employs 200 people, while the other employs 43, and they seek to export around the world. How does the Minister expect those companies to be competitive in a global market when energy prices in Ashford, Middlesex are four times higher than those in Ashford, Alabama?

• 10 Feb 2026 · Cyber Security and Resilience (Network and Information Systems) Bill (Fifth sitting) · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend the Member for Bromsgrove raised the case of M&S, which would clearly be out of the scope of the Bill. However, it has a managed service provider, so it is a bit like the JLR case. I am still looking for some certainty as to whether JLR and M&S would come within the scope of the Bill by dint of the fact that they have managed service providers, which are within the scope. I am still not 100% clear on the answer to that question. I would be grateful for greater clarity from the Minister.

• 10 Feb 2026 · Cyber Security and Resilience (Network and Information Systems) Bill (Fifth sitting) · Hansard source

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  I might have to remind myself. I asked the Minister whether the purpose of this clause is for a regulator to be able to ask a managed service provider what their entire client list is, in order to make various assessments.

• 10 Feb 2026 · Cyber Security and Resilience (Network and Information Systems) Bill (Fifth sitting) · Hansard source

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  In terms of scope, could the Minister give us some sense, when it comes to managed service providers, whether the purpose behind this clause is to enable regulators to find out their entire client list? I would be grateful for some clarity on that point.

• 10 Feb 2026 · Cyber Security and Resilience (Network and Information Systems) Bill (Fifth sitting) · Hansard source

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  On a point of order, Dr Murrison. Yesterday, I spoke in a petition debate in Westminster Hall. The petition was signed by 114,000 members of the public calling for a public inquiry into Russian influence in British democracy. In researching my response on behalf of His Majesty’s Opposition, I came upon the Government’s statement about this Bill, which said that it would “require organisations in critical sectors to further protect their IT systems”. The split infinitive notwithstanding, I do not believe that the Bill requires any organisations in critical sectors to further protect their IT systems. If the Minister thinks that the Government are correct in saying that, would he like to direct us to that requirement in the Bill?

• 10 Feb 2026 · Cyber Security and Resilience (Network and Information Systems) Bill (Fifth sitting) · Hansard source

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  I am grateful to the Minister for giving way a second time. I understand his answer, but, to be clear, if an incident that meets the severity threshold is reported to a client who is out of scope, would that bring any obligation to report in the normal way?

• 10 Feb 2026 · Cyber Security and Resilience (Network and Information Systems) Bill (Fifth sitting) · Hansard source

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  On the subject of charging and money, has the Minister had the opportunity to revisit his own impact assessment on the basis that there might be a glitch in the matrix? It says on multiple occasions that the hourly salary for a contract lawyer is £34 an hour. When we discussed it last week, I contended that this was totally unrealistic, probably to a factor of 10.

• 10 Feb 2026 · Cyber Security and Resilience (Network and Information Systems) Bill (Fifth sitting) · Hansard source

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  This is really where the regulatory rubber hits the road. Earlier, we described cases involving a client who is not in the Bill’s scope but who employs a managed service provider that is, and that is therefore vulnerable to these charges. What happens when there is an interface between a client employee operating an IT system and what the managed service provider does? For example, someone could bring in a data stick, shove it in the side of a computer and break the rules, eliciting some form of ransomware. How will it work when the regulator goes to the managed service provider and says, “Here’s your £10 million fine,” and the client says, “That is down to you”? It is going to be a lawyer-fest, isn’t it? Even lawyers who get paid more than £34 an hour are going to make quite a lot of money.

• 10 Feb 2026 · Cyber Security and Resilience (Network and Information Systems) Bill (Fifth sitting) · Hansard source

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  On a point of order, Dr Murrison. In Thursday’s session, I asked the Minister why pupil data was not within the remit of this Bill. He said: “On the question of schools, and more broadly the question of public sector authorities, I entirely accept that the handling of pupil data in schools is a critical aspect of our public service operations. The reason why public service authorities have largely been left out of the Bill’s scope is because we do not need to wait for the legislative process to act. We have been working, not least closely with the Government’s cyber-security strategy and the cyber action plan, to ensure that pupil data is kept securely and robustly.” –– [ Official Report, Cyber Security and Resilience (Network and Information Systems) Public Bill Committee, 5 February 2026; c. 137.] Since then, I have been researching any action taken in respect of the Government’s cyber-security strategy and the cyber action plan, and can find no record of them dealing with the issue of pupil data. I wonder whether, this morning, the Minister could specify what he meant last Thursday or commit to coming back to the Committee with that detail.

• 10 Feb 2026 · Cyber Security and Resilience (Network and Information Systems) Bill (Sixth sitting) · Hansard source

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  To take this a little bit beyond the theoretical, is the Minister suggesting that, where it is discovered that, for example, a major offshore wind power generation facility was fitted with remotely triggerable kill switches, triggerable by a foreign state or sub-state actor, the Secretary of State could require that energy company to remove whatever piece of hardware or software was producing that threat?

• 10 Feb 2026 · Cyber Security and Resilience (Network and Information Systems) Bill (Sixth sitting) · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Stringer. When we left off, we were considering the powers of the Secretary of State to bring new organisations within scope. I am a Conservative, and my view is that the best form of regulation is usually competition, so I am not actually volunteering these sectors for the guards. However, I want to understand the underlying logic as to why certain things have been included and certain things have not. We have a fairly good guide as to what is essential. The reason we do is that we went through a global pandemic, and the following groups and organisations were designated as absolutely essential for the running of the state: health and social care, which is included; education and childcare, which is not; anything to do with the justice system; religious staff; public service broadcasters; local and national Government, which again is not in the Bill; food and other goods, which, as we discussed, are also not in the Bill, although they are in the new clauses; public safety and national security; transport; utilities; communications; financial services; and postal services. That is the analogue I am putting to the Minister: we found out which things we really needed, we designated them as essential and we allowed them to continue during the covid pandemic. None of us particularly relishes being reminded of that time, but we owe it to the people who will be subject to the Bill to ask the Minister exactly what has been argued in and what has been argued out of scope, to understand how vulnerable the blank cheque we are issuing to the Secretary of State is to their including more and more in it, come the day of the races.

• 10 Feb 2026 · Cyber Security and Resilience (Network and Information Systems) Bill (Sixth sitting) · Hansard source

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  What happens when the Secretary of State, via his various proxies—the regulator or whomsoever—gives a direction to a company to do something in the interests of national security, and the entity disagrees and says, “That simply won’t work, and it won’t solve the problem that you are seeking to address”?

• 10 Feb 2026 · Court Reporting Data · Hansard source

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  The Minister complains that it is currently the wild west out there, and hopes that we can somehow regulate it. Well, we do actually have a regulator for incidents such as these. Pursuant to the answer that she gave to my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Solihull West and Shirley (Dr Shastri-Hurst), she acknowledged that data breaches have to be reported to the ICO within 72 hours. We hear that she was advised that this breach did not hit the threshold, which I find absolutely staggering. Advisers advise, and Ministers decide. Why was the Minister’s judgment not to go away and immediately question the advice that she received from her Department?

• 9 Feb 2026 · Russian Influence on UK Politics and Democracy · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Ms Butler. I thank the hon. Member for South Norfolk (Ben Goldsborough), who, on behalf of the Petitions Committee, has brought us to Westminster Hall today. I particularly thank the 114,000 petitioners, who would like a public inquiry into Russian involvement in British democracy. I think that the Nathan Gill case and the petition do us a great good because they have flushed out, and given us a chance to shine a light on, something way bigger than Nathan Gill: the extent to which the Russians are attempting to infiltrate. I also thank a number of hon. Members who have spoken today.

• 9 Feb 2026 · Russian Influence on UK Politics and Democracy · Hansard source

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  The clever ones are the ones that the hon. Member cannot see. But yes, I agree that we urgently need to look at defence investment in hard power. It is a source of huge frustration in our defence industry domestically and overseas that the Government have failed to agree the defence investment plan. When I was in the Ministry of Defence, we had an old adage: “Plans without resources are hallucinations.” At the moment, our defence industry is dining on fresh air, because the defence investment plan has not yet been agreed. We have time, so I will ask your indulgence, Ms Butler, to mention that Nelsonian eye. Hon. Members will remember that in September last year the British ambassador to the United States of America was sacked. My right hon. Friend the Member for Goole and Pocklington (David Davis) secured an emergency debate, in which I made this point: “Since December last year, our ambassador in Washington has been potentially subject to leverage and blackmail, because someone—we do not know who—had politically fatal kompromat on Lord Mandelson throughout his whole time in office. I am amazed that the Foreign Office has not gone into full lockdown and damage limitation mode, having found out that potentially Lord Mandelson could have been blackmailed this entire time. If it had turned out that he had been an agent of a foreign state, the Foreign Office would have done that. All it knows now is that someone—we do not know who—had politically fatal kompromat on him that whole time.” —[ Official Report , 16 September 2025; Vol. 772, c. 1380.] The Foreign Office Minister in that debate did not respond to the suggestion that they turn Peter Mandelson inside out once they had realised that fact. I suspect that after the events of the past week, one or two Government Ministers wish that they had heeded that advice at the time; they might have saved themselves some problems. Last week, Members who were in the Chamber also heard the point of order made by my right hon. Friend the Member for Goole and Pocklington, who said: “On a point of order, Mr Speaker. Today’s Opposition day debate will focus on Mandelson and his relationship with the paedophile Jeffrey Epstein. However, it will not cover his relationship with another alleged paedophile, murderer, gangster, specialist in bribery and corruption, and Putin favourite: Oleg Deripaska. That relationship may be just as bad as the one he had with Epstein. As European trade commissioner, Mandelson made decisions favouring Deripaska’s company by $200 million a year. Mandelson avoided proper investigation by lying about the timing of his relationship with Deripaska. How can we find out what investigations were carried out before Gordon Brown and his Government appointed Mandelson as a Minister? Do you agree that this House needs to see that information”? —[ Official Report , 4 February 2026; Vol. 780, c. 269.] We all know how Wednesday played out after that. Lastly, I will speak about the other actions that the Government are taking. In preparation for this debate, I looked at the statement that the Cyber Security and Resilience (Network and Information Systems) Bill, introduced at the back end of last year, would “require organisations in critical sectors to further protect their IT systems”. I must tell the Minister that I am on the Committee for that Bill, and it does no such thing. All it does is to say that various providers from various sectors have to report after the event; it says nothing about making them more secure. I will leave the Minister with a couple of questions. Is enough being done cross-Government to raise threat perception in the nation? What is the Government’s policy on political donations being made in cryptocurrency? How have the Government changed electoral law to keep pace with a quickly evolving threat? I thank the Minister in advance for his remarks, and the House for its indulgence.