"I refer hon. Members to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests. The commitment to solar is vital, but does the Secretary of State recognise that food security is as important as energy security? Every building, every warehouse and every commercial enterprise should be covered in solar before …..." John Hayes - View Speech
"There is another point, too. Recent events in particular have shown us that we need more security, including food security, but these solar farms are often sited on grade 1 or grade 2 agricultural land, which should be used for food production. Does my hon. Friend agree that the production …..." John Hayes - View Speech
"I am sorry to intervene on my hon. Friend again—I know that time is pressing. None the less, he may know that the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities—and more or less everything else—has made it absolutely clear that beauty should be at the heart of the …..." John Hayes - View Speech
"I am grateful for your indulgence, Sir Charles, and I will speak briefly as a former energy Minister. Before I do so, I draw the attention of the House to my entry in the Register of Members’ Interests.
The point that my hon. Friend the Member for Tiverton and Honiton …..." John Hayes - View Speech
"The hon. Gentleman and I have been debating these issues for longer than either of us care to remember. I am sure he will acknowledge that against that backdrop—the objective he set out—it is important to measure the environmental cost of renewables. The manufacture, siting and anchoring, for example, of …..." John Hayes - View Speech
"Does not the coronavirus provide us with another lesson, which is that Government historically have not been terribly good at assessing risk and modelling the response to it? I say that as a former Minister, like my right hon. Friend. I was always surprised, in all the Departments I served …..." John Hayes - View Speech
"This Bill is welcome, necessary, important and, it has to be said, overdue. In making a few remarks about it, I draw the Minister’s attention to the fact that the Chairman of the ISC, the right hon. Member for New Forest East (Dr Lewis), is not able to be with …..." John Hayes - View Speech
"I do, but the challenge in a democratic polity is ensuring sufficient accountability while maintaining that degree of flexibility. It is all much easier in less democratic countries—I use that term as gingerly and modestly as I can—which are not obliged to legitimise or justify what their Governments do. We …..." John Hayes - View Speech
"That is true. Vulnerability, of course, is also dynamic. That is why I emphasised, in intervening on my right hon. Friend the Member for Tunbridge Wells (Greg Clark), that the Government need to get better at assessing risk and modelling the response to it. This is what the Bill begins …..." John Hayes - View Speech
"The right hon. Gentleman made that point in his contribution earlier and it seems to me to be a profound one. In establishing the new processes and the new governance associated with this legislation, it is vital that the interaction with the intelligence services, and all the skills available to …..." John Hayes - View Speech