Speeches by Francois.

“Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker, and good luck in your new role. It is possible to have successful development, but from experience it has to be something done with people and not to people. This policy is the latter. These pernicious top-down targets have the practical effect at ground level of setting one town agains…”

“I welcome the affirmation of the funding for Ukraine, which I presume was already fully allocated from the Treasury reserve, in the usual way. On the mainstream defence budget, the Chancellor has announced that all departmental spending will now be reviewed every two years. Given the speed at which Whitehall works, thi…”

“My hon. Friend was a very good Defence Procurement Minister, and we on the Committee liked him because, crikey, he actually answered the questions. He will know from that experience that even the Americans, who have a new thing called the next generation air dominance fighter, are struggling to afford it; there have be…”

“The hon. Gentleman is quite right to highlight what happened to TSR-2, which was a generation ahead of its time and a world beater. It was scrapped because the Treasury wanted to buy the F-111 instead, which was an American aircraft, and then it did not end up buying it. There is a lesson from history there too, is the…”

“I thank the Minister for giving way. She is a Foreign Office Minister heading this up, I believe, not a Defence Minister, which is interesting, but it is an international agreement. Can she tell the House whether, because of the threat to the programme from the defence review, she has had any representations from the J…”

“Madam Deputy Speaker, may I begin by congratulating you on your election and welcoming you to the Chair? I am sure that you will chair our proceedings excellently. We wish you all good luck. May I also thank the hon. Member for Leyton and Wanstead (Mr Bailey) for a fine, fluent and—if I may say so—at times poignant mai…”

“I am not a Minister, but I was for three years. Will the Minister give way?”

“Will the Minister give way?”

“And the Navy, in which my father served, for completeness. The Royal Air Force needs this aircraft. We need it. The Japanese, the Italians and the west need it. By all means, let us control the costs, but let us keep it. We are not going to scrap the Spitfire of the future.”

“Before my hon. Friend does so, would he give way very briefly?”

“Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker, for kindly calling me to contribute to this important debate on the King's Speech, after 11 very good maiden speeches and 11 very promising—even fabulous—starts to parliamentary careers. Those who have been in this House a little longer will know that our great friend the late Sir David Am…”

“On the matter of mandatory housing targets, having been a constituency MP for 23 years and seen them tried in a number of different ways, may I humbly offer the Chancellor this, with all sincerity? There is such a thing as good development, but it only works if it is something that we do with people and not to people. …”