Speeches by Turner.

“I have a question similar to one asked of the previous panel. Do you think we can make better use of overlapping skills within the transport manufacturing sector and, indeed, other sectors? If so, are there barriers within industry and Government that prevent this from being achieved?”

“I draw attention to my chairship of the GMB parliamentary group. As someone who worked on this issue the last time around, I was astonished to hear the Opposition’s flight of fantasy when they accused others of delay. On their watch, the airports commission was artificially delayed until after a general election, with …”

“I am grateful to my hon. Friend for securing this important debate. I draw attention to my chairship of the GMB parliamentary group. I am glad that he mentioned GMB’s frustrations with Amazon. Another sector in which that union and other unions have been frustrated is social care, which has been fragmented for three de…”

“The people charged with the protection of public safety carry a heavy burden, and not all the information that they consider has yet been laid out in the public domain. However, I have deep concerns about the principle of block-banning entire groups of opposition fans—some of whom, let us not forget, may be UK resident…”

“I am truly grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Morecambe and Lunesdale (Lizzi Collinge) for securing this debate and for her powerful speech. One of this debate’s origins was a question raised by a pupil at St Thomas Aquinas school in Kings Norton. They wanted to know what more could be done to improve the share …”

“We have talked almost exclusively about the workforce in terms of drivers. Does anybody want to comment about non-drivers who are involved in the trade, such as dispatch operators and local authority officers, and any wellbeing or pain conditions issues that you wish to draw to our attention?”

“Very quickly, because this question has been answered in part, how has the growth of ride-hailing apps changed the nature of private hire activity in your area? What challenges, beyond anything that you have already put on record, has that created for you as licensing authorities?”

“I draw the Committee’s attention to the fact that I am a former employee of the GMB union and chair of the GMB parliamentary group. The second question is also quite general. In your view, what are the biggest challenges facing taxi and private hire drivers in terms of their working conditions and wellbeing?”

“We are in the rapid-fire part of the panel. We have already heard from Mr Lawrie and other witnesses that enforcement is an issue with the triple lock. Please do not respond if you feel that you have covered this question already, but are there other areas where you would like to see the operation of the triple lock im…”

“There was a question earlier about the Supreme Court judgment in respect of Uber, which has been covered. What is the situation for other operators in terms of employee-worker status? It would be interesting to hear particularly about small operators.”

“I wonder if I might bring in Mr O’Hearn to respond as a GMB representative.”

“I have some follow-up questions for Mr Pattison. The first is about financing. You said that you are not allowed to make a profit but any surplus, as I understand it, goes into a reserve account, which in 2023 stood at £2 million. Presumably, that counts towards the authority’s overall balance sheet. Is there some adva…”

“I understand that point, but for absolute clarity, when the authority’s annual statement of accounts is published, is that reserve funding counted towards the net balance sum?”

“You said that you were proud of Wolverhampton’s standards. Would you accept, though, that where there are discretionary standards to be set, because Wolverhampton is now such a dominant licensing authority, other local authorities feel that they cannot go above Wolverhampton’s standards? I will give a practical example…”

“If I may press you on this, as I am sure you will understand, MPs—those of us who are local to the region, and others across the country—come across Wolverhampton licensing issues frequently. Looking at some published statistics, 100% of taxis licenced by Wolverhampton are wheelchair accessible. For private hire vehicl…”

“I am glad you used the term “equal footing”, because this is a question for you all. Do you think local authorities should have equivalent powers to cap the number of private hire vehicles as exist for hackney carriages?”

“I warmly welcome the £20 million pride in place funding for the Hawkesley estate in my constituency. It stands in stark contrast to the hopes and expectations that were allowed to be built under the last Government for £11 million for Northfield’s high street in the second-round bid for the levelling-up fund, which wer…”

“I thank the Foreign Secretary for her statement and for her recent decision, when she was Home Secretary, about the Ukraine permission extension scheme. Does she agree that when Putin probes weakness we must respond by demonstrating strength? Does she further agree that the post-war development of Ukraine’s significant…”

“Good afternoon. We had a lengthy discussion with the last panel about critical national priority status, and a number of respondents have made the argument that ports should have the same critical national priority status for planning applications as that afforded to low-carbon energy infrastructure. Are you sympatheti…”

“Yes, and what it does or doesn’t do, particularly where investment may or may not go ahead, depending on the wording. That is potentially quite important. We also heard that there is a discontinuity between freight and non-freight forecasts. Has any work been done on whether non-freight can be taken into account?”