May 2026

All roads lead to the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon), Mr Speaker; certainly, all urgent questions do. I was not here for the debate yesterday because I was in Strasbourg, but I feel as if I am hearing some of what was rehearsed then, and I do not want to repeat the arguments. I am grateful for the hon. Gentleman’s comments about my sincerity on this. The only point I would make to him is that I am desperate to make sure that the Ukrainian people are able to assert their freedom and def

Shropshire is the only county in England without a direct train service connecting it to London. I stand here today alongside my neighbours from Wrexham, Ruabon, Wolverhampton, South Shropshire, The Wrekin and Nuneaton, who share my request to reinstate the line that connects six underserved towns back to the capital. In total, over 10,000 people have signed the petitions, with 1,436 having done so on paper and 8,741 having signed a similar one online, demonstrating the strong public demand for

Q2. This year marks the 20th anniversary of the Royal Regiment of Scotland—20 years of duty, courage and, for 23 of its soldiers, the ultimate sacrifice in service to our country. Across Scotland, more than 20 councils have recognised the regiment’s service by granting it the freedom of their area, reflecting Scotland’s long and proud tradition of respecting our armed forces. Earlier this month, however, SNP and Green councillors in Glasgow rejected Labour’s motion to grant the Royal Regiment of

I welcome any debate that has the collective security of the British people at its heart, because I believe one of the greatest threats to our security is the economic system governing this country, which has consistently failed working-class people and communities, and which will undoubtedly be made worse still by the illegal and ill-planned war in Iran. Now more than ever, we need a radical restructuring of priorities and policies: more council housing, a total end to right to buy, and the nat

Today’s debate theme is defence readiness, and I am pleased that we heard in His Majesty’s Speech the Government’s clear commitment to a sustained increase in defence spending. I also welcome the announcement of several Bills aimed at boosting national security, notably the tackling state threats Bill, intended to create a tougher operating environment for foreign intelligence services and their proxies. I also welcome the national security Bill to target those inciting terrorism—whether Islamis

For years, Ministers on the Treasury Bench have told us that oil is traded as a global commodity, so it makes no difference where in the world it is taken out of the ground and that, as a consequence, we can wind down production on the UK continental shelf—availability of supply would continue. Given what the Minister has had to announce today, is he satisfied that that argument still holds water?

Parliamentary appearance by Adrian Ramsay

I do not need to add a great deal to that, because my right hon. Friend served in Operation Banner and speaks with great authority. He has always been passionate on this issue, and he hits the nail on the head. As so many veterans have said to me, it is the process of the lawfare itself that is so punishing. It is so damaging, it is not in the national interest and it will damage the British armed forces.

I beg to move amendment (o), at the end of the Question to add: “but respectfully regret the absence of a Defence Readiness Bill from the Gracious Speech, and the 10 month delay to the publication of the Defence Investment Plan; call on the Government to bring forward both as a matter of urgency; further call on the Government to raise defence spending to 3% of GDP by the end of this Parliament; further regret that the Gracious Speech commits to re-starting inquests into Northern Ireland veteran

I am always grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his very good interventions. He has hit the nail on the head. This is not just about veterans, as important as they are; it is about the wider impact on recruitment. Indeed, hon. Members do not have to take my word for it, or his. In November last year, nine former four-star generals wrote: “This lawfare is a direct threat to national security…The Troubles Bill achieves nothing—and ongoing lawfare risks everything.” I say this to Labour MPs: when co

I respect the hon. Lady, and I respect the strength of her view on this matter, but we have to deal with what is certain. In my view, it is extremely unlikely that any new cases would lead to prosecutions. It is, however, certain that were this process to recommence, it would damage the morale of our armed forces at a time of war on two fronts, and that would not be in the national interest.

My right hon. Friend makes an excellent point, and he is absolutely correct. Our legacy Act was based on what happened in South Africa. We may not like it, but if we want peace and reconciliation, any changes in the law that favour those who may have been guilty have to apply to both sides. It is simply a statement of fact. As I think I just showed with Loughgall, our Act of Parliament—the legacy Act—did indeed stop an inquest that would have been damaging to the armed forces but which I do not

My hon. Friend has remarkable foresight, because I will be coming to the Chagos issue. This is the key point: had the Prime Minister held his nerve and reformed the benefits system, toughening the rules for working-age benefits and keeping the two-child limit, as was his previous position, he could have found the billions to fund defence rather than entrenching welfare dependency even further. Given this total failure of nerve from the Prime Minister, he had some brass neck to use his response t

I think the hon. Lady would be better focusing on the Type 45 destroyers. The former Labour Government were meant to order 12 Type 45s, but they slashed that order in half to just six. Worse than that, in an act of genius they inserted an engine that did not even work and we had to spend years trying to replace it through the power improvement project. On the issue of welfare and defence funding, we have been the first party to explicitly set out how we would reduce benefit expenditure to increa

I give way to my right hon. Friend, who is an expert on the industrial base.

I am aware that timelines are an issue on a couple of dimensions in the Chamber at the moment, so I will come to my conclusion shortly. My right hon. Friend asks a fundamental question about the Royal Navy when we know we have shortages of surface ships. I hope the Minister will set out exactly how many Type 26s we will order irrespective of the Norway deal. I support the Norway export deal. How many will we be ordering in addition to that? The written answer he gave me was very ambiguous. We ne

The hon. Gentleman is always very generous in giving way. He says that the Liberal Democrats would issue war bonds for the extra defence spending, which is just other borrowing. He has also said that he would maintain aid spending at 0.7%, which is a huge increase in spending. How would that be funded?

Bankrupting the country has consequences.

One of the most critical issues in defence at the moment is the munitions position. Obviously, we did not publish it; we were not allowed to as it is a highly sensitive document. I cannot state what the figures were. We had a general election and we became the Opposition. However—[Interruption.] Madam Deputy Speaker, I am being intervened on as I intervene. To be clear on the 14 years point—I hope that those on the Government Benches agree with this—we gave a vast amount of munitions to Ukraine.

I welcome the Minister to her place. My constituency was one of the lucky ones that was awarded a banking hub two years ago, and I worked with Cash Access UK to secure a temporary place in the council library. Two years on, it has failed to secure an accessible permanent site and is refusing to engage with me. Will the review also look into the delivery of commitments by Cash Access UK?