Speeches by Jopp.

“T7. In a speech in December, the Minister said that he wanted to put bureaucracy on more of a “start-up” footing with a Silicon Valley vibe, and that in order to achieve that he was going to send teams—indeed, not just teams, but crack teams—to Manchester, Liverpool, Sheffield and Essex in order to test, learn, and fix…”

“BP’s global headquarters are in my constituency. As the Minister meets industry “all the time”, to use her words, she will be fully aware that it announced a major reset last month, whereby it is increasing its investment in upstream oil and gas to the tune of $10 billion a year from next year. That is investors’ money…”

“I am going to ask a contact battle question, if I may. America has said that it is no longer going to be supporting Ukraine with military support. In terms of UK sovereign capabilities, where are we not able to fulfil any of the roles currently being fulfilled by the Americans? The obvious ones are Patriot, ATACMS and …”

“Have a go at them as much as you want.”

“Mr Kinniburgh, you used the phrase, “We are not yet on a war footing”, and we have approached some of the things that might change, were we to be on a war footing. I am just keen to explore the extent to which you have told Ministers that you want to be put on a war footing and whether they understand the implications …”

“That is probably where this Committee can play a role.”

“We did have the NATO standard. At the end of the cold war, the only two things that were common across all NATO members were diesel and 105 mm ammunition. That was at the end of the cold war, so “good luck” is what I would say to that. You all put in your submissions to the defence industrial strategy by last Friday’s …”

“That is enlightening and somewhat worrying.”

“Will my hon. Friend give way?”

“I have been to war three times, each time working for an American general—General Schwarzkopf in the first Gulf war, the outstanding David Petraeus in the second Gulf war, and General Richard Mills of the US Marine Corps in Afghanistan. One of the lessons that keeps coming up after those wars is that we have to prepare…”

“Clearly, the highest standards of independence and probity will be required of the chair in order to execute their duties, particularly given that we have not brought back to Parliament the ability to raise debt on the assets of the Crown Estate. I feel duty bound therefore to ask the Minister whether he is aware of me…”

“My right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Kenilworth and Southam (Sir Jeremy Wright) spoke incredibly slowly and incredibly clearly—so much so that even I understood his question. However, the Minister did not actually give him an answer. When we joined the ICJ, we did so on the basis of a carve-out that meant th…”

“To join two dots, Mark, I think you said there was 16% knowledge of or recognition of the Covenant, and General, I think you said that the state seems to understand it, albeit delivery is patchy, but you were more concerned about industry and the third sector. That seemed to jump over one part. Although they might be o…”

“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir John. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Dumfries and Galloway (John Cooper) on securing the debate at this pivotal time. It is typically prescient of him to have done so. When considering my remarks, my first thought was to try to embarrass the Governmen…”

“I always thought it was ironic that Armed Forces Day, which is a way of the nation giving back to their Armed Forces, normally meant soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines having to work another day, which did not seem to fit the bill in any way at all. With that thought, I will hand back to the Chair.”

“We have concentrated a lot on the serving issue, and it has been very helpful to talk about it, because we obviously do not get to invite those serving to come and give evidence to us. We have also looked at some of the veterans’ issues. Generally speaking, that seems to be the world that we look at: bifurcated between…”

“6. If she will make an assessment of the potential impact of the Pensions Regulator on economic growth.”

“The then pensions Minister, Guy Opperman, said that green-lighting defined benefit pension superfunds was his greatest achievement of lockdown. The unelected Governor of the Bank of England then unhelpfully intervened and said that superfunds would be a risk to financial stability, and as a result the Pensions Regulato…”

“4. What recent discussions she has had with the Welsh Government on NHS reform in Wales.”

“The Labour party has been running the NHS for 25 years in Wales, where waiting lists are through the roof, compared with those in England. Does the Secretary of State agree with Mr Mark Drakeford that what Wales really needs is fewer hospitals?”