Speeches by Cocking.

“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Dr Murrison. May I congratulate you on the 25th anniversary of your election to this House, which happened a few days ago? I also congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Harborough, Oadby and Wigston (Neil O’Brien) on securing this important debate. For the past few…”

“I, too, sit on the Housing, Communities and Local Government Committee. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that the reason the Government are struggling to answer that question is that local government reorganisation will not save a single penny?”

“Will the Minister give way?”

“Broxbourne is an important commuter area when travelling into London. Millions of journeys start and end at stations in my constituency every year, and more than double the national average number of people use the railway to get to work. The line that I and my constituents rely on—Greater Anglia—was one of the first t…”

“I thank the hon. Member for supporting the point I was making. The Elizabeth line was a new line with new trains going along it, but currently, planning applications are submitted and the response is: “This development is next to a railway station. We will grant the planning permission.” There are no new services. Ther…”

“15. What steps he is taking to improve accountability in the health service.”

“We need more local accountability in the NHS. In Broxbourne we have seen thousands of new houses built, but when I and local Conservative councillors have pushed for new healthcare facilities to cope with the new demand, we have been refused. Can the Minister explain who will be accountable for that under the Governmen…”

“This is an appalling and sickening tragedy. Words cannot express my heartbreak for Henry’s family and my fury at the system that has led to this. We have all seen the body-worn video footage. In a previous role, part of my job was to review that footage and give an independent judgment. In this case, it is clear to eve…”

“”

“This is an appalling and sickening tragedy. Words cannot express my heartbreak for Henry’s family and my fury at the system that has led to this. We have all seen the body-worn video footage. In a previous role, part of my job was to review that footage and give an independent judgment. In this case, it is clear to eve…”

“Will the Minister set out the evidence for her statement that unitary councils perform better?”

“Will the Minister give way?”

“I have a quick follow-up. If there is deep fake material going out against a specific candidate who represents a party in one constituency, obviously voters from across the country could see that and that could affect how they vote in their patch. It does not necessarily have to be related to one of the candidates that…”

“First, I am not sure any of your solutions are radical enough to try to deal with the scale of the problem. That is just a point. I think you need to go away and think about what more needs to be done. I get that they can take off 1% and all the rest of it, but I have yet to hear anything radical where I think that is …”

“What is the radical solution? By the way, I did not say whether I agree or disagree with any of the solutions or radical solutions. I completely understand that it is a finely balanced act to try to deal with some of this stuff, as you quite rightly pointed out, about free speech. What is a radical solution then, in yo…”

“Sam, you were obviously quoting the 2024 general election, but we have had a significant number of local elections since then. I get frustrated in this space because technology moves on so quickly. Examples of two years ago are out of date, but just happened to miss local elections and just happened last year. We are i…”

“Lewis Cocking, MP for Broxbourne.”

“If the Minister reckons that Ministers should not dictate what local government structures should be, will she let areas that have two-tier government, and that want to keep their district councils, keep them? My area does; it wants to keep Conservative-run Broxbourne district council. Why is she mandating that we go t…”

“I have some questions for you, Tom, about automatic voter registration. We heard today that about 7 million to 8 million people are not currently registered to vote, and some of that may be through choice. I have asked Ministers a number of times around whether they are all going happen at the same time for the same ge…”

“I do not understand how that can be true if half the voters are automatically registered and the other half are not.”