"May I firmly tell the Minister that the road to hell is paved with good intentions? I do not trust bureaucracies, and I certainly do not trust this one. Judging by the way in which it behaved last time, with its instinct to lock us all down—we have seen huge …..." Richard Drax - View Speech
"I commend my right hon. Friend for his stalwart stubbornness in securing this important increase in defence spending. He and I both know that much more money is needed, but this is a step in the right direction. He is off shortly to meet NATO members, and I fear that …..." Richard Drax - View Speech
"I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Hastings and Rye (Sally-Ann Hart) and my hon. Friend the Member for Darlington (Peter Gibson)—who is sat beside me—on securing this debate, and it is a pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for West Dorset (Chris Loder). I start by …..." Richard Drax - View Speech
"I pay tribute to my right hon. and gallant Friend the Minister for Armed Forces—I am very sad to hear that he is going. He talks of warfighting. As he knows, I am on the Defence Committee. I would challenge the idea that we are ready to fight a sustained …..." Richard Drax - View Speech
"Bearing in mind all that my right hon. Friend has said, he may be concerned to hear what we have heard in the Defence Committee. English Ministry of Defence companies are having a nightmare in employing those with specialist AI skills from university, because they are all Chinese. Is he …..." Richard Drax - View Speech
"I refer the House to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests.
It is a pleasure to contribute to the Budget debate. Before I talk about a few specific issues, I promised a constituent—a victim of the infected blood scandal—that I would raise the question of compensation if …..." Richard Drax - View Speech
"Would it not be a better idea to scrap these agencies all together and hand responsibility back to Ministers, where it originally was, because the agencies that are now employed to do this are often doing things completely against Government policy and, in particular, against farmers?..." Richard Drax - View Speech
"It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Tim Farron). I do not often agree with him, but on farming I am pretty much on board with him. I pay tribute to Minette Batters, who has done a wonderful job as president of the NFU, …..." Richard Drax - View Speech
"It takes an extraordinary person to go back to a country where he knows he will be imprisoned, tortured and then murdered. All our thoughts are with Alexei Navalny’s wife, and our best wishes go to her.
The best way to commemorate Alexei Navalny’s tragic death is to ensure that …..." Richard Drax - View Speech
"I have a once-proud former postmaster in my constituency, who ran the post office in Swanage. He fell foul of this scandal and was sacked, not prosecuted. His life was utterly ruined and he repaid the money that was owed. That was many years ago, but his wife is now …..." Richard Drax - View Speech