Speeches by Gardiner.

“Minister, a comprehensive restriction does not mean an immediate ban. As the Chair has pointed out, the EU model explicitly allows a time-limited derogation. On what you said about what industry wants, industry are quite happy at the moment, are they not, because they are getting away with not having to pay for the cle…”

“On page 9 of your plan it says, “We expect to see progress through a combination of improved public understanding, industry-led and industry-owned initiatives (such as the Chemical Industry Association’s PFAS Information Exchange Forum), and transparent self-regulation.” So on the one hand you are putting the responsib…”

“Does the hon. Gentleman recall that between 2022 and 2024, even though the number of spaces in the care sector was deemed to be between 6,000 and 40,000, his Government made available 616,000 visas for that?”

“One of the four pillars that the Minister has set out in the consultation document in relation to integration is volunteering. A number of hon. Members have already mentioned that there is an arbitrariness—a subjective nature—to that. Who will certify the volunteer work that is done? One can imagine a plethora of organ…”

“Will the Minister confirm whether the changes that are firm were also consulted on in the consultation document? If so, why were they consulted on?”

“I congratulate my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Tony Vaughan) on securing the debate. Legislation should be clear, and the people to whom it applies should know where they stand. Retrospectivity and arbitrary or subjective criteria make for bad law, precisely because they destroy clarity …”

“Does the Minister share with me a sense of irony that the former Home Secretary and the former Immigration Minister who were responsible for giving out those 616,000 have now joined Reform?”

“Nothing shapes a landscape more than a river. Nothing brings a landscape to life more than a river. If we ask ChatGPT, “What is a river?”, it will tell us: “it is a natural stream of flowing water that moves downhill across land”— and that tells us precisely why Members of Parliament should never use ChatGPT. A river i…”

“I am grateful to my hon. Friend— I did not know his constituency was the manufacturer of Benylin. It has certainly worked on my cough on this occasion, so I thank him very much. Nature-based solutions are the cost-efficient, multi-benefit, long-term solution. They recognise that enabling nature to thrive is the best wa…”

“I would be very grateful to my hon. Friend if he intervened.”

“I am sure my right hon. Friend appreciates the enormous disappointment on this side of the House. Only two years before the general election, our now Prime Minister spoke in favour of a just settlement for WASPI women. I acknowledge that my right hon. Friend says that this was not in the manifesto on which we all stood…”

“When will the Government publish the full national security assessment of global biodiversity loss and ecosystem collapse? No. 10 is said to have pulled the full report last autumn because it was too alarming. Given that the truncated version, published last week, says that “every critical ecosystem is on a pathway to …”

“My colleague is going to come on to that.”

“That is really helpful. Thank you very much.”

“I am so glad that you have raised that because it would suggest then that any Government action on improving air quality and tackling pollution would be very progressive and delaying it is regressive because of the double impacts that you are talking about, the way in which it does affect the poorest in our society.”

“I do not want to halt your flow, which is great, but are there specific things that this Committee could point out need addressing in what you have just said?”

“There was a slowing down last year in achieving even their own pathetic standards. Is that as a result of the loss of the air quality grant scheme? What other factors do you believe were brought to bear in that?”

“That is one of the things that I wanted to explore with you. My view on this is that, as you say, it is a very tall order to achieve and certainly to achieve it instantaneously. However, we have a very good example of how to approach things that are tall orders and it is called the Climate Change Committee. In the Clim…”

“If that were knife crime, this place would not stop talking about it.”

“My apologies for arriving late. I wanted to look at air quality or, rather, air pollution. You are the watchdog looking at the homework the Government have set themselves and then marking that homework, but when the homework that they set themselves is not anywhere near what we believe the global standard should be, in…”