Speeches by Carmichael.

“He is a wonderful Minister, but he is not a fisherman.”

“The Crown Estate will tell you that their priority is to maximise economic benefit to the Treasury, so it is not necessarily about fishing any more, is it?”

“Indeed, we all know that. Look, I am sure the trawlermen of Cambridge will be well represented by Minister Zeichner, but what message should you take from the experience of the SNP-Green coalition in Holyrood and its efforts to introduce HPMAs?”

“You will be aware of how it worked for them.”

“At the end of the day, nobody will get everything that they want, but we have to make sure that everybody feels they have had a fair crack of the whip.”

“Good luck with that.”

“What the right hon. Lady is saying is very important and the overall thrust of her case is absolutely on point. Is it not the case, though, that NDAs are the symptom, and that the underlying disease is the inability of ordinary people to get access to justice through the courts? That is why people enter into non-disclo…”

“The hon. Member hits on an important point. It is surely up to us all to judge the value of what we are told by any particular lobbyist. We listen to constituents who lobby us all the time, and that is not necessarily a bad thing. What is bad is the lack of transparency about lobbying, not just of parliamentarians but …”

“My hon. Friend has spoken about political intervention. Fishery quota negotiations are difficult and nuanced at the best of times and understanding the granular detail of advice from the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea, for example, is never straightforward. It always goes badly wrong when we bring…”

“If that first space launch happens, and I believe it will, it will happen at SaxaVord in Unst, and the Secretary of State will be very welcome to join us when it does. For the UK space sector as a whole to recognise the full opportunities we have, we need to get serious about the delivery of the Government’s space stra…”

“The Secretary of State, in her speech to the Oxford farming conference, spoke about the plan for change, which was going to include a commitment to public sector procurement, but that was in January, and we are now in March. With the closure of the basic payment scheme and the ending of the sustainable farming incentiv…”

“The language that we use in this conflict matters. We know what has happened and the Foreign Secretary has reminded us today: for weeks, supplies of basic goods and electricity have been blocked. To say that Israel “risks” breaching international law for having done that is to say that this country does not see those a…”

“For the industry to be sustainable, it must have access to labour. The inshore fleet in the hon. Gentleman’s constituency, like the one in mine, will doubtless be crying out for labour to come in from foreign countries. It is not able to because of the way the visa rules are structured.”

“I beg to move, That leave be given to bring in a Bill to make provision about the Groceries Code Adjudicator; to require co-ordination between the Groceries Code Adjudicator and the Agricultural Supply Chain Adjudicator; to make provision about public procurement in respect of British food products; to make provision a…”

“The right hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. It has to be properly understood that farming underpins everything in rural communities. To take the example of agricultural merchants and machinery dealers, these are successful businesspeople. They will be people who are part of the local Rotary club. They will have child…”

“Since I opened this debate, Douglas Paterson, a seventh-generation farmer in my constituency, has sent me a copy of a letter addressed to his great-grandfather from 10 Downing Street, dated 5 March 1917. It states: “Dear Sir, We have now reached a crisis in the war when to ensure victory, the heroism of our armies at t…”

“I am doing my best.”

“May we have an early debate in Government time on the ending of the radio teleswitch, upon which many people who rely on electric heating and storage heating depend? It was last debated in an Adjournment debate on 4 December. That spawned a ministerial roundtable on 5 February, which promised further updates, but none …”

“What the right hon. Gentleman refers to is the consequence of an agricultural policy that, despite aiming to do many worthy and worthwhile things, no longer has the concept of food production at its heart. Across this House and the different parties, we need to rebuild a consensus around getting food production back in…”

“I absolutely do, and my hon. Friend puts it perfectly when she talks about working with farmers. It seems that—this is as true for Governments north of the border as it is for those south of it—so much of what passes for agricultural policy is something that is done to farmers, rather than in partnership with them. To …”