Luke Evans MP: speeches

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Speeches

9 Sept 2025 · Diego Garcia Military Base and British Indian Ocean Territory Bill · Hansard source
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The Minister has made it absolutely apparent that this is about the long-term security of the base, so could he explain why, under article 13, if after 99 years the Mauritians decide not to negotiate, the base will just stop. We will get first refusal, but we can easily see that the Chinese would outbid us because we in this country decide that that is not affordable. We are a hostage to fortune, and that base will crumble. He has not secured the base, he has just deferred the issue by four generations, and this House will then have to decide what to do.
9 Sept 2025 · Diego Garcia Military Base and British Indian Ocean Territory Bill · Hansard source
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Will the hon. Member give way?
9 Sept 2025 · Diego Garcia Military Base and British Indian Ocean Territory Bill · Hansard source
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Will the hon. Member give way?
9 Sept 2025 · Diego Garcia Military Base and British Indian Ocean Territory Bill · Hansard source
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Is this not the point that we have heard time and again from Government Members? This deal runs out in 99 years, and at that point Mauritius can simply close the base or hand it on to the biggest offer. We get first rights on it, but if the Chinese decide to invest hundreds of billions, we may not be able to match that. We are over a barrel. In 100 years’ time, people will be in this place having this exact debate saying, “How do we solve this problem?” Is the hon. Member as concerned about that as I am?
9 Sept 2025 · Diego Garcia Military Base and British Indian Ocean Territory Bill · Hansard source
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rose —
9 Sept 2025 · Diego Garcia Military Base and British Indian Ocean Territory Bill · Hansard source
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The Minister challenged the Opposition and the shadow Chancellor about our position on net present value, but the reason is that the use of NPV is unprecedented. It is used for commercial deals that the Government make and is standardised for that alone, not for international agreements on sovereignty. Does my right hon. Friend agree that we will not change on net present value, which has its place in commercial deals but not in giving away sovereignty?
9 Sept 2025 · Diego Garcia Military Base and British Indian Ocean Territory Bill · Hansard source
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The hon. Member is making a powerful point. We heard an impassioned defence not to bring the Falkland Islands or other British overseas territories into this, but Gibraltar and the Falkland Islands have self-determination, voted for by their people. Is it his thesis that that will apply for the Chagossians, and therefore they would make the determination whether to be British or, indeed, go to the Mauritians on that basis?
9 Sept 2025 · Diego Garcia Military Base and British Indian Ocean Territory Bill · Hansard source
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Will the Minister give way on that point?
9 Sept 2025 · Diego Garcia Military Base and British Indian Ocean Territory Bill · Hansard source
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On the conservation point, is it not that the case has already been tested in UNCLOS between 2010 and 2015, when it was said that we could not go ahead with a marine protection area for this British territory because we had not consulted properly with Mauritius? At that point, it was also determined that UNCLOS could not rule on sovereignty as that was not its basis. So we found out not only about the sovereignty side, but that we cannot protect the islands on the environmental part. What guarantees does my right hon. Friend see in the treaty that we will have ecological protections in the area, given those findings?
9 Sept 2025 · Diego Garcia Military Base and British Indian Ocean Territory Bill · Hansard source
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Absolutely, the Minister says it is within the Green Book. Absolutely not, because it has a perfect place in domestic use for commercial practicalities, not for international sovereignty issues. No other country has looked, or would look, at this because it does not make sense. The House of Commons Library said when asked that “this methodology is regularly used in government accounting, but its main use is for cost-benefit analyses. It is unusual to see it used in this situation like this, where only the cost is being assessed and it is not being compared to any benefit”. On that basis, and listening to the House of Commons Library, what cost-benefit analysis has actually been done in this case, and would it be put in front of the House so we might be able to see it? At the end of the day, NPV is highly political because it assumes a discount rate, and what is the discount rate that one should choose? In the details, it talks about 3.5%, but the US will use 3.5% or 7%, which would vastly differentiate the figures. It goes on further, for the social time preference rate is 3.5%, but for 30 years. This deal is for 99 years, so how can the Government respond in a written parliamentary question that this “represents good value for UK taxpayers”? On what basis are they comparing that if there is no international comparison? We are talking only about domestic uses and for an accounting point. As I come to my conclusions, possibly the scariest thing to me—I have tried to highlight it throughout the debate—which does seem to be falling on deaf ears, is article 13. I believe this treaty is legally bomb-proof. It looks sensible, and I am no legal expert as I have attested to, but it seems to stand the test of time. That means when article 13 says explicitly that in 99 years Mauritius can say no and just take control, that is a big worry. We have heard from many Government MPs how it secures the long-term aspirations of this country for a period of 99 years. When I mentioned that, several Government MPs scoffed. But is it not the duty of this House to provide not only for the next generation, but the rest of time for our country, in the best interests of our country? After listening to all the arguments that have been made about how essential the base is, the very fact that Mauritius could pull the base is a very scary prospect. There is, of course, a caveat: the right of first refusal. But if China decides to do a deal with Mauritius at exorbitant cost, we are over a barrel and the British taxpayer must fork out yet again to guarantee our security. Mauritius has been given a golden ticket, and it knows it. Beyond the sovereignty and cost, my biggest concern is that we are outsourcing decision -making for our children and our children’s children. That is the modus operandi of this Government—we need only look at the borrowing in the Budget to see how they borrow on the backs of future children. Pushing this decision out for 99 years is not security for now; it will help, but it creates a far bigger problem in 100 years’ time. If the Government want to give away our islands, they should be open and transparent about how and why. The biggest thing is that we have not even had our day in court. That is what most troubles the British public. I think that the British public would be reasonable if a court found against us—they would happily say, “We follow the rule of law”—but the Government will not even try that. They say that there is a risk. As has been said, this has been going on for years, and still we are looking at a treaty to sign it off. That inevitably poses final questions about what happens with Gibraltar, the Falklands and Cyprus. The Minister is correct to point out that there are differences, but the biggest fundamental problem that the Government have in arguing to the British people and the people of the Falklands is about understanding. If this House cannot understand the legal concepts of the places where we are likely to fight these causes, how can we expect the public to do so? When it comes to delivering comms to the UK public, that is what they need to understand.
9 Sept 2025 · Diego Garcia Military Base and British Indian Ocean Territory Bill · Hansard source
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Will the Minister give way?
9 Sept 2025 · Diego Garcia Military Base and British Indian Ocean Territory Bill · Hansard source
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May I say how much of an honour it is to follow the right hon. Member for Islington North (Jeremy Corbyn)? Although we do not necessarily agree on a lot of policy, I am always struck by the fact that he puts people at the heart of his speeches. That has never been the case more than during his long campaign on this issue, on which he spoke eloquently. He is putting Chagossians right at the heart of any decision making. He deserves a lot of acclaim for that. He is right to call out some of the rhetoric in this debate, because, at the end of the day, those people really matter. I thank him for putting his points on the record. There are three broad areas that I would like to cover: sovereignty, costs and some of the scariest parts of the Bill. I listened to my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Kenilworth and Southam (Sir Jeremy Wright), and I must admit that I am not nearly as learned or experienced as him; I bow to his legal analysis. I am a mere doctor, so I look for an evidence base when trying to understand the process. To that end, I thought it would be useful to write to the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, which I duly did. I received a letter on 28 July 2025 from the Minister of State, Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, the hon. Member for Cardiff South and Penarth (Stephen Doughty), who I see will kindly respond, and is sat in his place. Much to my surprise and pleasure, a lot of what is in the letter was in the Minister’s speech. This debate allows me to walk through some of the letter and pose the questions that hit me as I looked into this case. I must admit that when I stepped into this House in 2019, this was not a topic that I knew a huge deal about—I think many Members on both sides would say the same—but it very quickly became a topic that I realised we should look into understanding, especially as it deals with security. The letter states: “We had to act now because the base was under threat.” That implies urgency, but the letter is loose on who was under threat, where and how. There is legal uncertainty but, as we have heard, we do not know which court is involved or why. It goes on to say: “The courts have already made decisions which undermine our position.” Courts, plural. We know that the ICJ is involved, but as has been stated, its opinion was non-binding, and there is a carve-out relating to the Commonwealth. The Minister of State, Ministry of Defence, the hon. Member for Plymouth Sutton and Devonport (Luke Pollard), said, after being pushed to speak on the matter multiple times, that the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea was the area of concern, but he will know that back in 2015, under annex VII, the tribunal agreed with the UK that sovereignty could not be determined by UNCLOS. This was a marine protection issue. Britons were trying to protect the area, and Mauritius wanted to open it up to farm it, and we were found against, under that treaty, in that court. This raises an important side issue: what protections are there in the Bill for the environment? They seem scant, or just not there. The letter goes further, stating that “in 2021…a Special Chamber of the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea…ruled that Mauritius’ sovereignty was inferred from ICJ”. So the Government themselves point that out. The letter goes on to say: “The UK was not party to this case”. Well, obviously, it would not be, but that means that we have not had our day in court to explain why we do not think that the judgment should apply. Mauritius’ sovereignty was inferred from that non-binding, political judgment. The letter goes on: “If Mauritius were to take us to court again, the UK’s longstanding legal view is that we would not have a realistic prospect of successfully defending its legal position on sovereignty in such litigation.” Well, which court? If this advice is so long-standing, why do we not know about it? How have we got this far, going for year upon year with no agreement, without any urgency? It seems sensible and appropriate to release the advice on this. At the start of that quote, the letter said “If Mauritius”. It states later that it is “highly likely that further wide-ranging litigation would be brought quickly by Mauritius against the UK.” What evidence do the Government have to back that up? What is it that they say Mauritius will act so quickly on? We certainly have not seen it, if it was from 2021. The dates 2023 and 2024 have been mentioned, and we are now in 2025. I would be interested to see the Government release the evidence base for their claim about how quickly litigation would come forward, because as they rightly point out, there have been 11 rounds of negotiations, so there has clearly been time to sort things out. Before someone jumps in and says, “Well, you opened the negotiations”, I would point out that we did that for the Falkland Islands as well. I find it amazing that we have trade unionists who built their whole careers on negotiating suddenly chastising the Conservatives for listening to the other side of a disagreement. That seems bizarre to me, because we want to respect each other and exchange ideas, but not have an agreement. It is rightly pointed out by Conservative Members that the agreement was not there; we did not take it. On the cost of the deal, there is no cost, because we did not have a deal to sign off. The very next sentence in the letter says: “This might, for example, include further arbitral proceedings against the UK under Annex VII of the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea. A judgment from such a tribunal would be legally binding on the UK.”
9 Sept 2025 · Diego Garcia Military Base and British Indian Ocean Territory Bill · Hansard source
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I am grateful to my right hon. and learned Friend for giving way and using his legal background. It is more secure legally for those 99 years but, more definitively, at that 99-year point, if the Mauritians decide not to have a base there, categorically that is their decision. Therefore, by proxy, it is actually more unsafe, just in 100 years’ time.
9 Sept 2025 · Diego Garcia Military Base and British Indian Ocean Territory Bill · Hansard source
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Will the Minister give way?
9 Sept 2025 · Diego Garcia Military Base and British Indian Ocean Territory Bill · Hansard source
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It is. It is true about the legally binding aspect within the area that the tribunal covers, but that does not cover sovereignty, as we learned in 2015 when the tribunal sided with the British Government. Here we have the farcical situation of a House of policy and law shining light on one side and another, but never on the truth. This is where my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Kenilworth and Southam is exactly right. If the Government were to come forward and say exactly which court, where and why, they might get more sympathy from Opposition, but we have been through an entire five-hour debate and we still do not have answers to those questions. Another court that is often cited is the International Telecommunication Union covering spectre, radio and radar. Article 48.1 states “Member States retain their entire freedom with regard to military radio installations,” and the Government know that. Even the written answer from the Minister—it has been hinted at before—states: “Individual countries have the sovereign right to manage and use the radio spectrum, within their borders, the way they wish, subject to not causing interference with other countries. This right is recognised in the Radio Regulations. The Radio Regulations are the international framework for the use of spectrum by radiocommunication services, defined and managed by the International Telecommunications Union (ITU). Individual countries, not the ITU, make their own sovereign spectrum assignments in accordance with the Radio Regulations. The ITU has no legal authority over these assignments regardless of the country’s civilian or military classification of spectrum. The ITU cannot challenge the UK’s use of civilian or military spectrum.” It is clear here—the Government know it in their own answers—that the ITU has no role in sovereignty. It all boils down to where one believes British overseas territories stand. Now we must talk about the cost, which has been much debated. There have been three figures in the debate: £3.4 billion, £10 billion and £34 billion. The £3.4 billion is the net present value using social time preference rate. The £10 billion is inflation adjusted, and the £34 billion is the nominal value by the Government Actuary’s Department. The question is, why use net present value? I put it earlier in the debate that there is no other precedent in the world for NPV being used in sovereignty matters. The Minister at the time asked whether the Conservatives want to do away with using NPV—of course not.
3 Sept 2025 · Hospitality Sector · Hansard source
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Will the Minister give way on that point, very quickly?
3 Sept 2025 · Hospitality Sector · Hansard source
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Wales has introduced a tourism tax, or is planning to do so. In light of what we are talking about today, can the Minister rule out the UK introducing a tourism tax in the upcoming Budget?
3 Sept 2025 · Hospitality Sector · Hansard source
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One thing that is not picked up in the figures is the fact that cafés and businesses up and down Hinckley and Bosworth are having to reduce the man-hours that people are working to reduce their staffing costs because of the taxes that are being put in place. This is a real problem. Does my hon. Friend agree that we are not getting the growth that we want in this country because people are having to deal with this toxic concoction of legislation and tax?
3 Sept 2025 · Property Taxes · Hansard source
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Will the Minister give way?
3 Sept 2025 · Property Taxes · Hansard source
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Is not the difference now that we are seeing stagflation—high inflation and the economy not growing as it should be? We are therefore seeing job losses and unemployment going up every month under this Labour Government. Unless they do something drastically different, it will only get worse, and that will impact on our growth prospects and therefore on the prosperity not just of our nation but of the individuals who work and try to thrive here.
3 Sept 2025 · Property Taxes · Hansard source
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Was it not the current Prime Minister who said “not a penny more on your council tax”? Is the shadow Chancellor aware of how that worked out?
3 Sept 2025 · Property Taxes · Hansard source
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Is that not exactly the point—that the top 1% of earners pay almost 30% of income tax? If we lose them, we damage the people who need the support and the investment from the very taxpayers we have just scared off. Should not the reverse be happening? We should attract more people into this country to spend more money, so that we have more money for such services through tax collection.
2 Sept 2025 · Eating Disorders: Prevention of Deaths · Hansard source
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I thank the Minister for giving way. I am pleased that his Government have continued the roll-out, because we share the aim of trying to deal with this early. On that point, there was mention of the updated guidance, and clearly these hubs are going to need that guidance if it is updated. Will he set out when that guidance will be brought forward?
2 Sept 2025 · Eating Disorders: Prevention of Deaths · Hansard source
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Forgive me if I misheard, but the Minister said that that was for adults. Can he comment on children and schools?
2 Sept 2025 · Eating Disorders: Prevention of Deaths · Hansard source
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The hon. Member for Isle of Wight West (Mr Quigley) said that he wants to push for change, and he is a tremendous advocate for doing exactly that. We are six months on from a very similar debate on eating disorders. The fact that so many Members across the parties are here to support the debate shows the strength of feeling. In the short time that I have, I will not repeat everything that I said last time. Following the debate in April, I wrote to the Government to find out more and ask some questions. I received a letter from Baroness Merron on 12 June. The first question I had asked was whether the Government had a plan for eating disorders. The reply stated: “The Department has no current plans to create an eating disorder strategy”. It went on to say: “NHS England is currently refreshing guidance on children and young people's eating disorders. The refreshed guidance will highlight the importance of awareness and early recognition of eating disorders within schools, colleges, primary care, and broader children and young people’s mental health services.” I hope that the Minister can provide us with an update on when that updated guidance will be brought forward. Back in April, I also posed the question whether the Government would be open to having a cross-party meeting or roundtable with experts in APPGs. I have not yet had a response to that question, either in a debate or in the letter that I received, but I think it would go a long way towards helping to explore this issue in a way that would make a difference. In the previous debate, the hon. Member for Bath (Wera Hobhouse) raised an issue around the recording of death. She said: “Accurate recording will raise awareness and ultimately save lives.” —[ Official Report, 1 April 2025; Vol. 765, c. 30WH.] The Minister responded: “I share the concern of the hon. Member for Bath about accurate recording of deaths to understand the extent to which eating disorders and other factors have caused or contributed to deaths. This matter is being explored with the national medical examiner for England and Wales, the Office for National Statistics and the Coroners’ Society of England and Wales.” Can he provide an update on where that has got to and what the outcome is? Back in April, the Minister also gave us great expectations about the 10-year health plan: “Through the 10-year health plan, this Government will overhaul the NHS and ensure that those with mental health needs, including those living with eating disorders, are given the support that they need.” —[ Official Report, 1 April 2025; Vol. 765, c. 49WH.] He also said: “Raising awareness of eating disorders and improving treatment services is a key priority for the Government, and a vital part of our work to improve mental health services.” —[ Official Report, 1 April 2025; Vol. 765, c. 47WH.] I will be grateful if the Minister can respond to the Beat CEO, who has said: “We’re very disappointed to see that mental health hasn’t been consistently highlighted as a priority throughout the Government’s 10 Year Health Plan, and that there are no specific commitments on eating disorders.” That is a concern—not as a party political point, but because people who are suffering can now see it written that there is no strategy, and it is not mentioned in the 10-year health plan. I will be grateful if the Minister can alleviate the concerns about whether this issue is truly a priority. Finally, one of the big plays that the Government have made is changing integrated care boards. In the last debate, the Minister said: “The Government’s view is that ICBs are best placed to make decisions as close as possible to the communities that they serve and to target and, if necessary, reallocate funding accordingly.” —[ Official Report, 1 April 2025; Vol. 765, c. 47WH.] The changes brought forward by this Government have seen a reduction in staffing of 50% in many ICBs. Are the Government concerned? Has any analysis been done of whether there will be an impact on commissioning in respect of eating disorders, given the severity that has been highlighted across the Chamber? It is often said that treatment is about progress, not perfection. I guess that much the same could be said about formulating policy as we deal with the rising number of people with eating disorders. To that end, I hope that the Government will take these questions as part of the process, helping to highlight this area in which we all want to see progress as the Minister brings his policies to bear on this country.

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