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Tag: Ed Davey

  • Ed Davey – 2022 Comments on Illegal Immigration

    Ed Davey – 2022 Comments on Illegal Immigration

    The comments made by Ed Davey, the Leader of the Liberal Democrats, in the House of Commons on 13 December 2022.

    Ed Davey (Kingston and Surbiton) (LD)

    Our thoughts and prayers are with the families and community in Solihull who have lost their young sons.

    Some 97,000 people have been waiting for a decision on their asylum claim for six months or more. That is 97,000 people trapped for months in Home Office limbo, banned from working, while the NHS, social care, agriculture and hospitality are all desperately short of staff. Last month it was revealed that even the Home Office’s own analysis shows that the right to work does not act as a pull factor for asylum seekers, so will the Prime Minister end this absurd ban on work, to save taxpayers money and help to grow our economy?

    The Prime Minister

    The simple answer is no. We will not do that, nor will we grant blanket amnesties, as happened in the past, to get the backlog down. We will go through it methodically and properly. The best way to reduce the pressure on the backlog is to stop people coming here in the first place, and if the right hon. Gentleman is interested in doing that, he should support our new legislation.

  • Ed Davey – 2022 Statement on Carers Rights Day

    Ed Davey – 2022 Statement on Carers Rights Day

    The statement made by Ed Davey, the Leader of the Liberal Democrats, on 23 November 2022.

    People looking after their loved ones are doing a remarkable job, often in very difficult circumstances. This is something I know all too well, as a carer for most of my life – first for my mum, then for my gran, and now for my disabled son, John.

    This year, we mark the theme of Caring Costs. It’s clear that Caring Costs in so many ways, whether it’s emotional or financial. Especially in light of the cost of living crisis.

    Up and down the country, family carers are facing huge pressures. Soaring energy costs and fuel prices can make it difficult to undertake their caring responsibilities. At the same time, many carers are struggling to juggle paid work with their caring responsibilities. And Carer’s Allowance remains the lowest benefit of its kind, at just £69.70 a week.

    But yet again, the Conservatives are completely ignoring family carers. They were left out of the £650 Cost of Living Payment  – and have even seen their support slashed by £207 this year, once soaring inflation is factored in.

    Our carers deserve so much better than this. That’s why Liberal Democrats are calling on the Conservatives to extend their £650 Cost of Living Payment to all those on Carer’s Allowance. And we will keep campaigning to increase Carer’s Allowance by £1000 each year.

    Carers and their loved ones desperately need extra support this winter. And Liberal Democrats will keep fighting for them.

  • Ed Davey – 2022 Comments on FIFA

    Ed Davey – 2022 Comments on FIFA

    The comments made by Ed Davey, the Leader of the Liberal Democrats, on 21 November 2022.

    Cheering on Wales and England as they begin their World Cup campaigns today.

    But Qatar’s treatment of migrant workers, abuse of LGBT+ people and continued discrimination against women make it wholly unfit to host this tournament, and show that FIFA isn’t fit to govern football either.

  • Ed Davey – 2022 Comments on the Conservative Leadership Contest

    Ed Davey – 2022 Comments on the Conservative Leadership Contest

    The comments made by Ed Davey, the Leader of the Liberal Democrats, on Twitter on 21 October 2022.

    Just months ago Conservative MPs said Boris Johnson wasn’t fit to run the country. Now many are flocking to put this liar and lawbreaker back in Number 10.

    It is an insult to the British people who are being denied a say in this stitch up.

  • Ed Davey – 2022 Comments on the State of the Government

    Ed Davey – 2022 Comments on the State of the Government

    The comments made by Ed Davey, the Leader of the Liberal Democrats, on Twitter on 19 October 2022.

    This is the most chaotic and incompetent government I’ve seen in my lifetime.

    How much longer will they cling on to power while the country suffers?

    General Election now.

  • Ed Davey – 2022 Comments on Government’s Emergency Statement

    Ed Davey – 2022 Comments on Government’s Emergency Statement

    The comments made by Ed Davey, the Leader of the Liberal Democrats, on Twitter on 17 October 2022.

    So much damage has already been done by these reckless Tories.

    Now they will slash spending on our NHS and schools, while propping up bankers’ bonuses to keep their donors happy.

    General Election NOW.

  • Ed Davey – 2022 Comments Calling for a General Election

    Ed Davey – 2022 Comments Calling for a General Election

    The comments made by Ed Davey, the Leader of the Liberal Democrats, on 14 October 2022.

    Boris Johnson failed our country and now Liz Truss has broken our economy.

    It’s time the British people were given their say on this shower of a Conservative party.

    We need a General Election now.

  • Ed Davey – 2022 Tribute to HM Queen Elizabeth II

    Ed Davey – 2022 Tribute to HM Queen Elizabeth II

    The tribute made by Ed Davey, the Leader of the Liberal Democrats, on 9 September 2022.

    It is a real pleasure to follow the right hon. Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May), and I congratulate her on her lovely, heartwarming speech.

    The Liberal Democrats join Members on both sides of the House in expressing our deepest condolences on the passing of Her Majesty the Queen. We are mourning a profound loss. The Queen was a formidable monarch who faithfully served our country all her life, and she was loved the world over. She represented not only duty and courage but warmth and compassion, and she was a living reminder of our collective past, of the greatest generation and their sacrifices for our freedom.

    For many people, myself included, Her Majesty was an ever-fixed mark in our lives. As the world changed around us and politicians came and went, she was our nation’s constant. In challenging times, she was always a source of calm and comfort. She tied our nations together, embodying an unwavering pride in our country. She showed us that patriotism is not defined by political allegiance and reminded us of the many things that bind us all together, even when it does not always feel that way.

    We saw this so vividly during the platinum jubilee celebrations in June. I am proud to represent the oldest royal borough in England, Kingston upon Thames, and our jubilee street parties certainly lived up to that status. It was truly wonderful to see such an outpouring of affection by people across Kingston from all walks of life. Schoolchildren baked jubilee cakes, neighbours shared bunting and choirs sang hymns of praise. It was incredibly fitting that, after so long kept apart by covid, it was a celebration of Her Majesty’s reign that brought our communities back together so joyfully, just as the whole country is united today, so sadly, in grief.

    The deep mourning across the country now, just like the celebration of her jubilee a few months ago, comes not from a sense of duty but from genuine and heartfelt affection, love and admiration for Her Majesty. It is not because we were her subjects but because she was truly our Queen. What she meant to us is perhaps best summed up by a phrase on so many people’s lips over the past 24 hours: “I cannot imagine our country without her.”

    For almost everyone in our country, she had been there our whole life, at times of national grief and national jubilation. She had never not been there for us, so it is hard to accept that she is gone and hard to see how we go on without her, but we will. Our great United Kingdom has a great future because the Queen’s spirit of strength, grace and resolve lives on in her people.

    One of the greatest privileges of being a Member of this House was having the chance to meet Her Majesty, such as when she visited Kingston on the occasion of her golden jubilee or when I was deeply privileged to sit next to her at lunch at Windsor Castle. I was initially confused by a silver cylinder beside her place setting. I wondered to myself what treasures it might hold. I had my suspicions when, as dessert was served, her beloved corgis were let in and nestled themselves around her feet. The Queen lifted up the lid of the cylinder, plucked out some digestive biscuits, and began sneaking them to her grateful dogs. Whenever I met her, I was struck by her warmth, her wisdom and her humour, and I am looking forward to hearing similar stories from hon. and right hon. Members from across the House as they give glimpses of the wonderful person beneath the crown.

    Her Majesty will be remembered with honour as a monarch who guided our country out of the shadow of a terrible war, who helmed us calmly through troubled waters and brought us safely into a new millennium. She will be remembered so fondly as the monarch who leapt from a helicopter with James Bond and who showed Paddington where she kept her marmalade sandwiches. For the royal family, she will be remembered simply as a beloved mother, grandmother and great-grandmother. Our thoughts, prayers and condolences are with them all as they bear this terrible loss.

    After a lifetime of dedicated and tireless service to our country and our Commonwealth, Her Majesty has gone to her eternal rest. May God rest her soul and may God save the King.

  • Ed Davey – 2022 Speech on Energy Price Capping

    Ed Davey – 2022 Speech on Energy Price Capping

    The speech made by Ed Davey, the Liberal Democrat MP for Kingston and Surbiton, in the House of Commons on 8 September 2022.

    Following the earlier statement from Mr Speaker, I think our hearts, thoughts and prayers will be elsewhere, but I wanted to contribute to the debate and to agree with the right hon. Member for Forest of Dean (Mr Harper) and his questions on heating oil. That is a critical issue for people in rural communities, and we need answers immediately.

    What the Prime Minister has announced is not a freeze on people’s energy bills. In the middle of a cost of living emergency, the Conservatives are choosing to put energy bills up by another £500 for struggling families. That hike in people’s energy bills comes on top of the £700 rise we saw last April. Struggling families will be paying twice as much for energy as they were last year, and people will still be desperately worried about how they will keep warm this winter. Last May’s £400 discount will simply not make up for the enormous rise in energy bills. So where is the new support for families and pensioners who are struggling? Under the Prime Minister’s plan, fuel poverty will get worse, not better.

    I turn to how we think the Prime Minister is proposing to pay for the package. Why does it seem that the Government will be handing an eye-watering bill to taxpayers in the form of higher borrowing? We all know that that ultimately means higher taxes for taxpayers, and particularly for our children. That does not seem conservative, and it does not seem right. Why has she rejected the alternative of a windfall tax on today’s oil and gas giants, who are raking in enormous, unexpectedly high profits thanks to President Putin’s invasion of Ukraine? How is it fair to take money from future taxpayers—from our children—and hand it to today’s oil and gas barons? How is it responsible to borrow so much to pay for consumption when our economy is already in such a mess, with the pound falling so dangerously?

    The fair and responsible energy policy would be to increase investment massively in the cheapest and most popular forms of energy available to us: wind and solar. I was absolutely shocked that the Prime Minister did not announce a massive, fast expansion of renewables to bring people’s energy bills down.

    The Prime Minister has made some alarming choices today by rejecting cheap wind and solar power, raising energy bills even higher than they are now, refusing to give extra support to struggling families and pensioners, and paying for a policy with higher taxes on our children instead of a windfall tax on fossil fuels. Those are the wrong choices.

     

  • Ed Davey – 2022 Speech in the No Confidence in the Government Motion

    Ed Davey – 2022 Speech in the No Confidence in the Government Motion

    The speech made by Ed Davey, the Liberal Democrat MP for Kingston and Surbiton, in the House of Commons on 18 July 2022.

    Like so many of the British people, we on the Liberal Democrat Benches have absolutely no confidence in this whole Conservative Government. This Government have plunged our great country into three serious crises: the cost of living crisis, the healthcare crisis and a political crisis. Before the Prime Minister was forced to resign, there was absolutely no plan to tackle any of these crises, and now the candidates to succeed the Prime Minister are proving comprehensively that they have no idea of the scale of these crises, let alone how to tackle them.

    I mention the scale of these crises because it is shockingly evident that the Conservative party is totally out of touch with the financial and healthcare catastrophes facing millions of British families and pensioners later this year. Let us start with the cost of living. Already families and pensioners are struggling to pay their soaring energy, petrol and food bills, and inflation is accelerating away. Energy bills alone were up £700 in April, with an even bigger rise coming in October. So many of our constituents are already asking how they are supposed to pay next month’s bills, and their fear about winter’s heating bills is understandably growing every day. Millions of people are facing a financial catastrophe over the next few months, yet the Conservative party seems blissfully ignorant.

    In the so-called debates between the leadership candidates, there is this massive elephant in the room, the energy bill catastrophe, yet they have no serious answer to that. The Liberal Democrats have showed what could be done. For months, we have been calling for an emergency cut in VAT, which would save families £600 a year. Instead, this Government have chosen to raise taxes, to raise national insurance, to freeze income tax thresholds and to hit hard-working families, making the crisis worse, not better.

    Then there is the healthcare crisis. Health crises used to occur for a few weeks every winter, but not with this Conservative Government. This Prime Minister has brought healthcare crises for winter, autumn, summer and spring. Just look at the stats: a record 6.5 million people on hospital waiting lists, cancer treatment targets missed by miles, and record long delays in ambulance response times. This Government have ignored the ambulance crisis, hoping it goes away: they have failed to employ the GPs, the NHS dentists and the care staff that the British people need and deserve. Now, leadership candidates argue about how much to slash the NHS budget, which brings me to the political crisis.

    It would be easy to blame all the political crisis on the Prime Minister, and he must certainly take a large part of blame—he has debased the high office of the British Prime Minister and he has shattered the public’s trust in our politics—but he did not act alone. For three years, Conservative Members have backed him to the hilt. When he was at the Dispatch Box telling us that there were no parties at No. 10, or claiming that crime had gone down when it had gone up, they were all there behind him, nodding along with every word of it. Conservative MPs defended the indefensible and excused the inexcusable. It is not just the Prime Minister we have no confidence in; it is all of them.

    The people of Chesham and Amersham showed that they have no confidence in the Government when they elected my hon. Friend the Member for Chesham and Amersham (Sarah Green) last year. The people of North Shropshire showed that they have no confidence in this Government in December, when they voted for another of my hon. Friends, the Member for North Shropshire (Helen Morgan). The people of Devon showed they have no confidence in these Conservatives just last month, when they so wisely elected my hon. Friend the new Member for Tiverton and Honiton (Richard Foord).

    We think it is time we gave everyone across the country the chance to have their say and to end this shameful, shambolic Conservative Government through a general election. When Conservative Members decide how to vote today, I urge them to ask themselves these questions. Do they really have confidence in a Government who have raised taxes by more than £1,000 per family in the middle of a cost of living crisis? Do they really have confidence in a Prime Minister who was fined by the police for breaking his own law, who forgot about serious allegations against his Deputy Chief Whip, and who is now under investigation for contempt by a Committee of this House? Do they really have confidence in a Government who are running our NHS into the ground and taking local communities for granted? I believe that the British people have lost confidence in all of them, and if the Conservatives have any decency left, they will back this motion tonight.