Debate on the Address

Roger Gale Excerpts

Tuesday 11th May 2021 Commons Chamber

[Sir Roger Gale (North Thanet) (Con)]

I applaud the manner in which my hon. Friends the Members for North West Cambridgeshire (Shailesh Vara) and for South Ribble (Katherine Fletcher) moved the Loyal Address. I say to my young friend from South Ribble, as one of the balding geriatrics to whom she referred, that if she wants my advice it is always available to her, and provided that she studiously ignores it, she probably has a great career ahead of her. I also welcome my hon. Friend the Member for Hartlepool (Jill Mortimer), who took her seat earlier this afternoon and who is understandably absent now, and I again express my commiserations to the family of a very dear friend of yours, Mr Deputy Speaker, and mine—Cheryl Gillan. She is sadly missed.

When Her Majesty acceded to the throne, Winston Churchill was Prime Minister and William Morrison was sitting in the Speaker’s Chair. During her reign, Her Majesty has seen 14 Prime Ministers and 10 Speakers. We are debating her 67th Queen’s Speech, and that is an extraordinary achievement by a very great lady. Like most Queen’s Speeches, there is much of value in this one, and the measures to do with education, healthcare and the recovery of the economy are hugely welcome. However, like all Queen’s Speeches, which are of course written by the Government of the day, this one is like the curate’s egg: it is good in part. In the time available—I want to be very brief—I will concentrate not on the pluses, but on some concerns.

I share the view of my right hon. Friend the Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May) about the dangers in the proposed planning Bill. As she said, roughly a million planning consents have been granted for houses that are as yet unbuilt. That 1 million would make a huge difference. A vast swath of brownfield land is available to be built upon, and the Members of Parliament for Kent will not stand idly by and vote for measures that will turn the garden of England into a building site. I have said it to my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister before, and I will say it again now: we should not be using arable land—grade 1 arable land in particular—for development before all the other available sites, particularly in cities, have been utilised and all the planning consents have been used up. The Members of Parliament for Kent want a moratorium on the use of agricultural land for development until all the other options have been exhausted. We shall fight that and vote against the planning Bill if necessary.

It will not surprise you, Mr Deputy Speaker, to know that I applaud the measures relating to animal welfare that are contained in the Gracious Speech: the fact that the Ivory Act 2018 is going to be implemented and that measures to control puppy farming are going to be strengthened. There is a raft of other indications. This is all good news for animal welfare.

The animals abroad Bill, as I understand it is now to be called, incorporates the proposed ban on the import of hunting trophies. We have to make it plain that there cannot be a get-out clause that allows rich people to murder animals in the phoney interests of phoney conservation. If there is to be a ban on trophies, it must be unequivocal—a total ban. I hope and believe that that is what we shall see.

I wanted to refer to omissions, but in fact there is a reference to a social care Bill in the Gracious Speech. It says that the Government will bring forward “proposals”. I am afraid that we have heard that before, but if I understood the Prime Minister correctly as he spoke from the Front Bench this afternoon, he committed to legislation on social care in this Parliament. If that is correct, it is very good news indeed, but in my view it was not signalled loudly enough in the Gracious Speech. I hope that the Prime Minister—perhaps tomorrow afternoon at Question Time—will confirm that the social care Bill will be enacted in this Parliament and will address the very real issues that we all know face the care particularly of elderly, but not only elderly, people.

I hope that the measures relating to electoral reform will encompass lifetime votes for expat United Kingdom citizens. The doughty campaigner Harry Shindler, who is the oldest living member of the Labour party—and, by the way, a dear friend of mine—celebrates his 100th birthday this summer. The way Harry behaves, it is highly likely that he will, in fact, be alive to vote at the next general election, but I am not sure that we can take that for granted. It would be magnificent if Harry Shindler were to know that, on the statute book, there was the Bill that gives him and many other expats—loyal United Kingdom citizens around the world—the right to vote in our general elections.

The Prime Minister referred to his concern about pensions and for pensioners. I am delighted to hear that. I hope that that concern will extend to unfreezing the frozen pensions of, again, so many expat United Kingdom citizens around the world, some of whom, because their pensions were frozen when they left the United Kingdom, are now living in semi-poverty.

I am pleased that the Government are going to restore the balance of power between the Executive, the legislature and the courts. When I am at liberty to do so, I shall have a great deal more to say about that.

The Queen’s Speech has to be seen in the context of the duties of Members of Parliament. The third of those duties, outlined in the code of conduct for Members, says that we must represent the liberties and rights of those who elected us, and earlier this afternoon Mr Speaker said, “without fear or favour”. I believe that that is absolutely right, and that is a code of conduct that we have, effectively, sought to abide by since Speaker Lenthall sat in the Speaker’s Chair. No matter how high, no matter how mighty, we have to do what we believe to be right, and this Member of Parliament will continue to do it.

Finally—you will be relieved to hear that, Mr Deputy Speaker—the Queen’s Speech states:

“other measures will be laid before you.”

I hope that the Prime Minister will commission and, if necessary, enact the legislation to see a British royal yacht, the Duke of Edinburgh, built.