Speeches by Martin.

“Well, in that case, I would like to ask.”

“On my hon. Friend’s point about National Highways, the A21 runs through my constituency. It is the road between London and Hastings, and it is single track for most of the way, between halfway through my constituency and Hastings. That is a problem and a bad investment. It is a well-trafficked road. I wonder if it refl…”

“I have a brief question. I have put the Ministry of Defence as the responding Department, but is it possible in these applications to ask for the Prime Minister to respond?”

“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Sir Edward. On Saturday, I met with 200 members of the Paddock Wood Hong Kong community. You are probably wondering, Sir Edward, why 200 people would give up their early Saturday evening to see me. They did so because they were worried, for themselves and for their famili…”

“Like my hon. Friend, I have spent a fair amount of time on the ocean —not rowing but sailing. When sailing across oceans in a small boat, one cannot help but see the seas of plastic, whether left by fishermen or simply thrown overboard, that are carried on currents. Does my hon. Friend think the treaty goes far enough …”

“Will the hon. Member give way?”

“I will not take any interventions, as so many hon. Members are seeking to get in. The combination of highly skilled individuals and three-generational families means that, quite rightly, not everyone in a family goes to work, so what about the carers, part-time workers, the elderly and students? If a person is studying…”

“I thank the Minister for announcing this Bill to Parliament, and I broadly welcome the provisions within it, particularly the proposal on conversion from leasehold to commonhold—I think that is excellent. By my count, there are about 4.8 million leaseholders in England. Do the Government envisage driving this process s…”

“Secretary of State, what does success look like for defence reform? We are probably a year, 18 months into it now.”

“What does the end of the defence reform process look like when it has achieved its goals?”

“Can you give some specific examples?”

“That is the good. What is the bad? What frustrates you about the process? How would you tweak it or what tweaks have you made as you have been rolling this out?”

“How many people are needed?”

“Secretary of State, I can see that you want to keep this big picture. Following in that theme, I noticed across the Quads you have four budget holders and all their spend is categorised as either invest, readiness or operate, and that seems like a very sensible innovation. Could you tell me the balance or percentages o…”

“What would the percentages be across those three?”

“Is that going to be different in one, two or five years’ time? Do we see that shifting?”

“So that shift is going to move from less investment, more operational—”

“Far be it from me to speak in the Minister’s place, but surely the hon. and learned Gentleman has answered his own question. In forcing local authorities that are controlled by Sinn Féin to give due regard to veterans would we not be giving away the identity of those veterans to Sinn Féin controlled councils that may p…”

“My constituent Andrew co-founded Adzuna, a job search website built on artificial intelligence. Its research shows that existing AI tools could improve the DWP’s service and create 250,000 more jobs per year. However, it is reported that the new rebuild of the service is not going to include those AI tools. Can the Sec…”

“A former Deputy Prime Minister of the UK described to me the MoD’s approach to information security as “Stalinist”. Do you agree with that characterisation—as we have been discussing—and why do you think that is?”