Amesbury Incident

Lord Arbuthnot of Edrom Excerpts

Thursday 5th July 2018 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

My noble friend is absolutely right to point out that Novichok is a military-grade nerve agent. Therefore, the usual methods of detection are impossible. It is a lengthier process and far more difficult to pinpoint—hence, possibly, why we have had the events of the past few days.

[Lord Arbuthnot of Edrom (Con)]

My noble friend is quite right to refuse to speculate about the causes of this, but will she ask the media not to speculate about possible causes as to why this couple were found in a distressed situation? Some disgraceful things have been said in the media which should not have been aired there; that was most unhelpful.

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

I thank my noble friend for making that point. Perhaps the media should have guarded against naming the couple in the first place before their families had been informed, which is the reason that the Government have not named the couple. I have read all sorts of things in the media over the past 24 hours. Thank goodness I do not get my briefings from the media, else we might have heard all sorts of nonsense across the Dispatch Box this afternoon. I totally support a free press, but my noble friend is right: this reporting has been irresponsible.

Afghanistan

Lord Arbuthnot of Edrom Excerpts

Thursday 17th October 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Order. This is an important statement, but I remind the House that there are two debates to follow under the auspices of the Backbench Business Committee, the first of which is especially heavily subscribed, so I must appeal to colleagues to ask single, short supplementary questions, without preamble, and to the Secretary of State for her customarily pithy replies.

[Mr James Arbuthnot (North East Hampshire) (Con)]

What does my right hon. Friend regard as the greatest strategic threat to the longer-term success of our mission in Afghanistan?

[Mr Speaker]

A master class from the Chairman of the Defence Committee.

Oral Answers to Questions

Lord Arbuthnot of Edrom Excerpts

Wednesday 7th July 2010 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

We believe that what matters is having low tax rates, and what we did in the Budget—which the House voted on last night—was to cut the small company rate of corporation tax back down to 20p from 22p and set out a path for getting corporation tax down to 24% by the end of this Parliament. That would give us one of the lowest tax rates in the G8, the G20 or anywhere in Europe. That is what we will benefit from, but I note that the Labour party voted against those tax reductions.

[Mr James Arbuthnot (North East Hampshire) (Con)]

Q3. How can my right hon. Friend reassure my constituents about the planning system? Under the last Government, my local councils turned down some massive developments such as the Pyestock mega depot, only to have those decisions overturned by Ministers who had never even visited the site. How can we re-engage local people in these local decisions?

[The Prime Minister]

I want to reassure my right hon. Friend, because it is right that local authorities should be taking decisions that affect people and that those decisions should be taken as locally as possible. We are scrapping the targets and the bureaucracy that we inherited from the Labour party. I can tell him that, since the election, we have managed to scrap the new unitary councils; the comprehensive area assessments have gone; regional spatial strategies—gone; regional assemblies—gone; home information packs—gone; and Labour’s ports tax and bins tax have both gone.