Speeches by Jopp.

“As well as the self-licking lollipop of legislation and compensation, does my hon. Friend acknowledge that this is a proxy war? It is all about relitigating the question, “Who won?” Does he agree that we are allowing our brave servicemen and women, who served the nation incredibly bravely in Northern Ireland, to be use…”

“I fear that the Liberal Democrat spokesman may have misspoken earlier in his remarks. I will quote from the Joint Committee on Human Rights report on the first draft: “A declaration of incompatibility has no legal effect and does not affect the ongoing validity of the incompatible legislation. It is merely a tool by wh…”

“The shadow Secretary of State makes a very powerful point, but I think it is worth putting it on the record that it is pretty unlikely his words will carry the day on the basis that there are eight Labour Back Benchers here to hear this debate about applying a guillotine to gut a piece of existing legislation without p…”

“I hope I am not misquoting the Secretary of State, but he said the Government are using this guillotine motion to withdraw parts of an existing law before they have another one in place because of the urgency, and that that urgency was created by a desire to “build trust” in both the civilian victims of terrorism and t…”

“I am new in this place, but my sense of the hon. Member is that he a great parliamentarian, so I would like to understand how he has reconciled himself with this being the correct course for the Government to take—bringing in a remedial order that pulls a law out before we put a new one in?”

“Has my right hon. Friend noticed, like me, that all the military veterans in the Government and on the Labour Benches—with one notable exception—seem to have abandoned their post today? I have counted about nine veterans on our Benches. If more veterans had been on the Labour Benches, perhaps they could have told the F…”

“But I do not think that that answers my question, which is on what basis the judges were extending the remit, if they were only getting their information from the MoD. The MoD is the source of the knowledge of the threat to life.”

“Lastly, in your subsequent conversations, in your open-source research or in conversations with journalists, have you come across anyone asserting that a super-injunction has been served on the Speaker of the House of Commons before, or was this unique?”

“You have characterised the judges’ decision making as increasingly activist. You have also said that they were also getting secret information from elsewhere.”

“We can examine that with the Secretary of State next week.”

“I am intrigued by the ever-increasing demand signal being set by the judges. We have heard from others this morning that, politically, this is now starting to give you a problem because of the pressure and the juxtaposition with people who have come here illegally being in accommodation and the way that drives up rent …”

“Yes.”

“Can I just look at the mechanics of how the compartment of a super-injunction gets extended? For example, was it your decision? Do you apply to the court saying, “We think the Speaker should be read into this”? Or does the judge just come to his own position?”

“The benefits of a polo match.”

“I do not know whether the Secretary of State gives instructions to his lead counsel on issues as important as this. Are you aware of the motivation for suggesting that the Speaker be read in? Was it so that, in some way at least, Parliament would “know”, in inverted commas? Or was it to thwart his granting an urgent qu…”

“So it was more to ensure that there would be no further parliamentary scrutiny, not to ensure parliamentary scrutiny.”

“Did you say that the judge and your lead counsel came up with this plan themselves, not under your direction?”

“No. Ideally we would win, so they could stay.”

“I have a quotation from something you have written, and I just want you to contextualise it, because it does not make a lot of sense to me: “The suggestion I was driving a new entitlement for those not eligible for ARAP or ACRS but affected by the breach is untrue”. Did you say that?”

“And also, it sets the conditions, were we ever to do expeditionary operations in someone else’s country in the future. It is not just a short-term thing.”