Speeches by Crichton.

“Would you support what Katie, or Katie’s organisation, has said about putting the ombudsman on a statutory basis?”

“Thank you all for coming in. I will pick up on what Katie mentioned about the ombudsman and the structure of the ombudsman. I will do that with you first, Alex. First of all, thank you for the work citizens advice bureaux do throughout the land. They have great services and they deal with the nightmare of overbilling, …”

“Dr Roy, I have no wish for you to be sitting in the stocks but you are the only company on the panel now. We have been told in evidence that the ombudsman’s own metrics show that the resolution involves small payments to customers, payable by the suppliers. Somebody described it to us as a sausage machine designed to g…”

“What surprised me when we started reading into this is that the ombudsman is funded by the very companies it rules on. There is quite a high level of low-cost resolution, which saves the companies money and saves the ombudsman hassle, I guess, when it has only 380 staff to deal with a large number of complaints. Are co…”

“If you had to score the ombudsman on a one to 10 scale, where one means it is no good and 10 means it is the consumer champion of the world—”

“Dr Roy, I have no wish for you to be sitting in the stocks but you are the only company on the panel now. We have been told in evidence that the ombudsman’s own metrics show that the resolution involves small payments to customers, payable by the suppliers. Somebody described it to us as a sausage machine designed to g…”

“Thank you all for coming in. To get back to something you said to Melanie Onn, Ed, about the escalating series of penalties, you have to help me out. Suppliers are legally bound to implement your remedies within 28 days but some of them do not. What percentage do not, and can you tell me again what the escalating scale…”

“You mentioned that it costs them to go to the ombudsman and also it costs their reputation. Why do you not just name and shame the ones who do not comply?”

“Beth, Jonathan, how can you help them?”

“Do you have any powers that you can use to make sure that suppliers do what the ombudsman wants them to do?”

“Ed, Jonathan, naming names or without naming names, do you have repeat offenders? Is there any evidence that some suppliers just do not listen to you and do not remedy?”

“It is a massive industry to regulate. Does Ofgem need a bigger stick?”

“Is there any way to make suppliers behave properly to resolve customer disputes and make sure that the customer comes first?”

“I will.”

“I ought to begin with an explanation of what is a very long word. Put simply, haemochromatosis is too much iron in the blood—haemo, blood; chroma, iron; and tosis, too much of it. To save time and the good offices of Hansard, I will refer to it occasionally as HCT in this debate. It is an inherited genetic condition, a…”

“The hon. Gentleman’s interventions are always a blessing, never a curse. I have some information of particular interest to his part of the world later in my speech. I have declared my interest, as I have haemochromatosis, but it is not just my experience, but that of my constituents and the make-up of my constituency i…”

“I do indeed agree. Haemochromatosis, although widespread, was not widely known about until very recently, but genetic testing, as well as simple ferritin level tests, will inform many more people. Early intervention is vital to preventing people from developing crippling illnesses which might otherwise be wrongly ascri…”

“I do not disagree with that. Screening would be revolutionary. It would save money for the NHS in the short term and the long term, and, more important, it would save lives and put us two decades ahead of the rest of the world in preventive medicine. It would be transformative for my constituency. It would be radical, …”

“My hon. Friend anticipates much of the remainder of my argument. As I said, the research and DNA testing in the islands could and should be paid for by community funds from large-scale renewable projects, just as similar screening projects proposed for Orkney and Shetland could be paid for by funding from wind farms th…”

“I understand the priority to evacuate UK citizens from Israel, but advice to our constituents in Qatar to shelter in place until further notice is hardly comforting. May I press the Foreign Secretary to outline what more detail will be provided for UK citizens in the wider region and whether there is a specific threat …”