Business of the House

John Howell Excerpts

Thursday 5th July 2018 Commons Chamber

[Andrea Leadsom]

The hon. Lady raises a really important issue, and I am pleased to tell the House that I was at a Youth Democracy Week event only this week where a young man raised exactly the same point. He asked why, when young men are being offered free condoms, young women cannot be offered free sanitary protection. I told him I completely agreed with him, and said that this would be exactly the sort of campaign that young people such as himself could use to raise the profile of this issue. The hon. Lady is also absolutely right to raise this, and I would be delighted to see her seek an Adjournment debate or indeed a Backbench Business debate so that this subject can be discussed more fully.

[John Howell (Henley) (Con)]

May we please have a debate on what is being done to support our high streets? They represent an important part of our towns, and it would be useful to have a debate on this matter.

[Andrea Leadsom]

My hon. Friend might have seen the Grimsey report, which promotes the idea of local leadership on the high street. He is right to say that high streets are vital to thriving communities, and as people change the way in which they shop, it is important that we do more at local level to ensure that we keep the heart of our communities going.