UKPOL.CO.UK

Tag: Steve Double

  • Steve Double – 2020 Speech on Policing in Devon and Cornwall

    Steve Double – 2020 Speech on Policing in Devon and Cornwall

    Below is the text of the speech made by Steve Double, the Conservative MP for St. Austell and Newquay, in the House of Commons on 6 July 2020.

    I am delighted to bring this debate to the House, to present and highlight the incredible work that Devon and Cornwall police do, and to raise a number of the very particular, in some cases unique, challenges that they face. I am delighted to be joined this evening by colleagues from Devon. It is one of the few occasions on which out-and-out co-operation and unity can be seen between Devon and Cornwall Members of Parliament.

    I place on record very firmly my thanks to Devon and Cornwall police. Day in and day out, week in and week out, throughout the year they do an incredible job keeping the people of our two counties safe. As I am sure we are all aware, the covid-19 pandemic has brought a great number of new challenges to our police across the country. The pandemic has brought unprecedented challenges for our police, as they have had to adapt to new operational and resource pressures, and to a rapidly changing police environment.

    Neil Parish (Tiverton and Honiton) (Con)

    I endorse the fact that it is great to be with Cornwall tonight—not always, but tonight. Seriously, the police are dealing with covid-19 and with lots of tourists coming into our area now. They have a greater challenge than ever, and I very much respect that they police by consent in this country, especially in Devon and Cornwall. Can we ensure that, as our tourists come, they please behave, because that will make the police’s job so much easier?

    Steve Double

    I am very grateful to my hon. Friend. I suspect that not for the first time this evening another Member will make a point that I will go on to make, but I join him in acknowledging the very proactive but sensible way Devon and Cornwall police have approached the pandemic. They have indeed policed with consent, and even though they, I believe, have issued the fourth-highest number of fixed penalty notices in the country—I believe we are currently up to just under 1,000—it has been done in a very sensible way.

    The police have continued, I believe, to enjoy the overwhelming support and respect of the people of Devon and Cornwall in the way they have gone about policing this pandemic. I want to say a big thank you to them, and I pay tribute to them. I also want to place on record my great thanks to both our police and crime commissioner, Alison Hernandez, and our chief constable, Shaun Sawyer, for the clear leadership they have provided during these past few months, as it has really helped the police on the ground to carry out their work so effectively. In my own constituency, I want to thank the inspectors in Newquay, Guy Blackford, and in St Austell, Ed Gard and the Cornwall commander, our very own IDS—Ian Drummond-Smith—for the way that they have provided the pragmatic and sensible approach that we have needed. I just want to say thank you to them all.

    The image of Devon and Cornwall for most people is that of a picturesque, rural and coastal part of the world where people love to visit for their holidays. Policing in Devon and Cornwall is just as challenging as it is anywhere else in the country—in some ways, it is ​more so because of its very unique situation. Let me give colleagues an idea: the Devon and Cornwall police force area is the largest in England, covering more than 4,000 square miles. Our emergency services deal with more than a million calls per year, and their work is cut out because we have more than 13,600 miles of road, the highest in the country, 85% of which are rural. As we all know, rural roads are, in fact, the most dangerous and often the most challenging to police. The force area also has the longest coastline in the country. Cornwall itself has 675 miles of beautiful cliffs, beaches and coves. Devon is not quite so great or quite so beautiful, but, equally, that in itself presents a number of incredible challenges to our police force.

    Simon Jupp (East Devon) (Con)

    I cannot possibly let that stand. Does my hon. Friend agree that the state-of-the-art new police headquarters, based in my constituency of East Devon, is a prime example of the investment that our police need in Devon and Cornwall?

    Steve Double

    Absolutely. Those improvements are very welcome. They represent, I believe, some of the investment that is going into the area, but, as I will go on to say, it cannot end there. We do need continued investment.

    Another factor that is often overlooked when we consider all our public services, but particularly with regard to policing, is the fact that we are a peninsula and therefore not able to share resources with nearby forces or other county areas. That often means that our police are isolated from other assets. I believe that one statistic is that only 10% are within seven miles of another police asset, which in itself presents a number of very great challenges to the way the police operate.

    Selaine Saxby (North Devon) (Con)

    I would like to highlight, as my hon. Friend has done, the excellent work done by Devon and Cornwall police. The force really has managed huge influxes of visitors, so, despite what he says about Cornwall versus Devon, we have seen a huge influx of visitors to Devon in recent weeks, and we simply cannot borrow from our neighbouring forces given our geography and our extensive rural road network. We just need more local police. Unless visitors are going to start to bring their own, we need a more sustainable solution.

    Steve Double

    My hon. Friend makes the point very well. I will come on to talk about that in a bit more detail.

    Before I go any further, it would be wrong of me not to mention the Isles of Scilly, largely because my wife hails from there. She was born and bred there and her family still live there. It is also another unique part of our force area. The five inhabited islands that are 25 miles off the mainland need to be policed by Devon and Cornwall police, and that adds further complexities to their work.

    The Devon and Cornwall police area has a number of very particular challenges. When taken together, it is clear that no other police force in the country has to face this combined complexity. None the less, the Devon and Cornwall police do an incredible job. Devon and Cornwall is the second safest region in England and Wales and has the lowest rate of victim-based crime ​nationally. But what is incredible is that, despite all those challenges, the force provides an excellent service in keeping us safe with lower than average national funding. The Devon and Cornwall force receives 52p per day per person in police funding, compared with the England and Wales average of 61p per person per day, while having to cope with the challenges that our rural peninsula presents.

    In addition to all this, as colleagues have mentioned, we must include the impact of tourism and the summer surge that we see every year. The funding gap is even more significant when we consider that Devon and Cornwall experience the highest level of visitors in terms of overnight stays, second only to London. In fact, I learned during the lockdown that the constituency I have the pleasure of representing has the highest number of overnight stays, at 4.7 million a year, of any individual constituency in the whole of the UK. During the extended tourism season, we experienced a 14% increase in the number of incidents, including an 11.7% increase in recorded crime. This represents the highest seasonal increase in recorded crime across the whole country. The intensity of calls for service seen in the extended summer period places considerable pressure on our services for the rest of the year, as staff seek to catch up on training and annual leave and to address the toll that the summer season pressure takes on their workloads. So the pressure of tourism is not just felt during the peak tourist season; it has an impact on policing across the whole year.

    Anthony Mangnall (Totnes) (Con)

    I thank my hon. Friend for his comments and for securing this Adjournment debate. If he would like to have a vote on whether Devon or Cornwall is better, I would take our odds as a good chance. He is talking about the geographical issues as well as the population influx that we have in the south-west. Would he support what has been done by our police and crime commissioner in the councillor advocate scheme, which gives new mechanisms for people across the area to support their police officers and help to eradicate crime?

    Steve Double

    I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that intervention, because he highlights a point I was going to make. The pressures and the below-average funding that our police face mean that the Devon and Cornwall force is often at the forefront of innovation and finding new ways in which to work and use its resources in the very best, most efficient way. The example he highlights shows a way of working within the community to ensure that effective policing takes place despite having lower than average funding. We should praise our police force for the work that it does but at the same time make the case that it deserves better funding.

    I also want to take this opportunity to mention the excellent piece of analysis that the office of the police and crime commissioner for Devon and Cornwall has put together. It is entitled “Understanding the exceptional policing challenges in Devon and Cornwall from tourism, rurality and isolation”. I am sure that the Minister is familiar with this piece of work. It shows in much greater detail the unique challenges that our police force faces.​

    I want to talk a bit more about funding. The current funding gap between rural and urban police forces needs to be addressed. This is something that I have raised continually since I was first elected five years ago, and I know I was not the first to do so. It is a long-standing issue that needs to be addressed. I would again draw the Minister’s attention to the fact that funding for Devon and Cornwall police is 9p per day less than the England and Wales average, and that when we factor in the adjustment to the population for tourist numbers, it is 13p per day. That situation needs to be addressed, so I seek confirmation from the Minister that any future review of police funding will factor in these different elements and ensure that police funding better reflects the position on the ground and the challenges that the police force actually faces. We need a better funding formula that really reflects the complexities that policing in rural areas, particularly in Devon and Cornwall, faces. The current formula fails to reflect the very high volume of calls for services faced by the police, which cover a very broad nature of incidents. Last year, as much as 84% of Devon and Cornwall police force’s total demand fell under the non-crime categories, many of which occur in rural and remote locations that are very time-consuming to get to, and so are an intensive use of resource. The role that our police officers play in rural areas, more than in urban parts of the country, is much broader than what is captured in the recorded crime figures.

    I would like to make reference to the allocation of police numbers. I believe that all colleagues here will have welcomed the 141 new police officers that Devon and Cornwall was allocated out of the initial 6,000 tranche of the 20,000 new officers that we are going to put on to the frontline. However, we await the Government’s decision regarding how the remaining 14,000 of this 20,000 uplift will be allocated. If we are truly to deliver on the Government’s levelling-up agenda across the board, we need rural areas such as Devon and Cornwall to get a better share of new police officers in future. An allocation model based on population, for instance, would provide a truer reflection of the universal service demands placed on policing, given that the vast majority of all emergency calls do not in fact result in a recorded crime, particularly if such calculations include the increase we face through tourism. We do not want an approach that is largely based on recorded crime or levels of specific crimes such as serious violence, because that is urban-centric and favours inner cities over rural areas. When it comes to allocating the new police officers we are recruiting, I ask the Minister to consider these matters carefully to ensure that new officers are deployed in the best way to meet the challenges our police are facing.

    I again pay tribute to our police officers across Devon and Cornwall for their hard work and dedication as they continue to work to keep us safe. I am grateful to the Minister for taking the time to listen to this case this evening. I hope he understands the unique challenges and circumstances that we face in our two counties. I look forward to working with him positively, going forward, to ensure that we get the results that we need in Devon and Cornwall.

  • Steve Double – 2020 Speech on Plastic Waste

    Steve Double – 2020 Speech on Plastic Waste

    Below is the text of the speech made by Steve Double, the Conservative MP for St Austell and Newquay, in the House of Commons on 15 June 2020.

    It is a pleasure to speak in support of the measures before the House. I speak as the chairman of the all-party group on ocean conservation. The regulations mark another important step forward in our fight against plastic waste.

    I take on board some of the comments made by the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Brighton, Kemptown (Lloyd Russell-Moyle); we all recognise that there is more to do. No one is pretending for a moment that this marks the end of our fight against plastic waste, but it is an important step. It has been talked about for some time and generally has the support of the public. It is absolutely right that we introduce the regulations at this moment to try to address one source of a great deal of the plastic waste in our society.​

    There is an urgent and pressing need to get to grips with the issue of plastic waste. It is right to acknowledge the progress that the Government have already made: the charge on plastic bags has resulted in billions fewer plastic bags in the system, and the microbead ban is very welcome. I echo the comments made by colleagues about the deposit return scheme, which will be another important step forward in this fight. The Government have taken the issue seriously and have come forward, when appropriate, with measures to address it, and I am sure that will continue and that today will not be the end of that.

    I put on record my acknowledgement of and thanks to a number of organisations in Cornwall in particular that have campaigned for measures to ban plastic straws and other items. I have the great pleasure of working closely with Surfers Against Sewage, which for 30 years has led the campaign in our fight against pollution in our oceans. The Final Straw Cornwall has also campaigned heavily on this issue.

    In Cornwall, we see the impact of plastic waste right on our doorsteps, as do the tens of thousands of people around the country who take part in beach cleans every year. Too much of the plastic waste in our society ends up in our oceans and along our coast. The regulations will certainly help to reduce that and make the job of those of us who regularly participate in beach cleans an awful lot easier.

    The statistic that I continue to cite is the prediction that if we do not take drastic action by the year 2050, there will be more plastic than fish in our oceans. We cannot allow that to happen, and it is steps such as these regulations that will help to make sure that that does not happen. I very much welcome the sensible measures in the regulations, and I also welcome the sensible exceptions to allow plastic items to be used in medical and other appropriate settings when it is deemed appropriate.

    While I have the Minister’s attention, I wish to mention something else. Although I absolutely welcome the measures that we are considering, now is surely the time to take a look at a couple of other things that we need to ban: sky lanterns and balloon releases, about which there is a great deal of concern. These matters were last considered in 2013, and I wish to put on record that now that we have banned plastic straws, cotton buds and stirrers, surely this is the time to ban sky lanterns and balloon releases. They do untold damage to our environment, they can damage property and they do a great deal of damage to wildlife and farm animals. Surely now is the moment, once the issue we are considering is put to bed, to come forward with further measures to take those items out of the system as well and stop them polluting our environment.

    I thank the Minister for her work on the regulations. I very much welcome these measures and am happy to support them wholeheartedly.

  • Steve Double – 2020 Speech on the Census

    Steve Double – 2020 Speech on the Census

    Below is the text of the speech made by Steve Double, the Conservative MP for St. Austell and Newquay, in the House of Commons on 6 May 2020.

    The Minister will not be surprised to hear that I wish to discuss the matter of a tick box for Cornish national identity.

    There is no doubt about the historic identity of the Cornish. We have been around for more than 12,000 years and, along with our Welsh cousins, we are the most ancient people on this island. We have our own language, which is about 5,000 years old but is enjoying a revival. We have our own flag, patron saint and even our own party. The idea of Cornish as a national identity in its own right is not some ageing romantic notion; it is a belief that is alive, real and passionately held today—and growing.

    The Cornish received a huge boost when, in 2014, the Council of Europe framework convention for the protection of national minorities officially recognised our identity. That was duly welcomed and embraced by the UK Government, who stated at that time that they would give the Cornish the same recognition as the other Celtic people of these islands—the Welsh, the Scottish and the Irish. It was a moment of celebration: at last, for the first time in centuries, the Cornish had been recognised by the UK Government. A sense of optimism was unleashed, the struggle was over: we had been recognised and told that we would be given equality of recognition.

    However, that optimism proved to be misplaced. Far from the struggle being over, it has never felt more important, because having been granted that recognition, what is now important is that it is acted upon—that it actually comes to mean something, not just in words but with something tangible.

    An advisory committee from the Council of Europe visited the UK in March 2016 to assess how the UK Government and other public bodies were complying with the articles of the framework convention. In early 2017, it published an opinion that was very critical of the UK Government and their failure to act on the articles of the convention. In the committee’s report, one key proposal to address that shortcoming is to include in the 2021 census a Cornish tick box for national identity. It is hugely disappointing, and indeed frustrating, that we are here today and a tick box for the Cornish has not yet been included in the upcoming census. ​It would be simple and straightforward to grant, and enable the Government to say that they had actually delivered something to recognise the Cornish.

    However, the frustration has not been having to convince Ministers; we have been consistently told that we need to convince the ONS. From the numerous meetings and discussions that I and others have had with the ONS, it is clear that it sees this as a localised and minority issue. It has failed to recognise that there are hundreds of thousands of Cornish men and women living across the UK who wish to be able to register their nationality as Cornish.

    I cannot say often enough that this is not about the geographical place of Cornwall; it is about the national identity of Cornish people, who are found living in all corners of the UK. I am sad to say that it appears that the ONS simply does not get this. It certainly feels as though the ONS was determined not to grant the tick box for Cornish national identity, whatever case was made, because every objection that it has raised to a tick box has been answered. We have demonstrated time and again the unique case for the Cornish, and it is a unique case—no other indigenous national people in these islands are able to make such a claim. We are the only indigenous national identity that is not recognised in that way.

    Sadly, because of the circumstances that Parliament is currently operating in, we find ourselves unable to push this matter to a vote in order to amend the order. If we had been able to vote, I feel sure that one would have been called.

    In winding up, I have two points to put to the Minister. First, we have been told that, in place of a tick box, a write-in option will be available for people to identify as Cornish, and that a campaign will be run to draw awareness to this, focused in Cornwall. But the Cornish diaspora are spread far and wide across this nation. In fact, more Cornish people live outside Cornwall than in it. Will the Minister therefore ensure that any such campaign is national and not limited to Cornwall?

    Finally, the Government continue to have an obligation to give the Cornish equal recognition as the other Celtic people, so if not a tick box, what will the Government do to ensure that the Cornish are recognised as we rightly should be?

  • Steve Double – 2020 Speech on Marine Licensing

    Below is the text of the speech made by Steve Double, the Conservative MP for St Austell and Newquay, in the House of Commons on 12 February 2020.

    I am delighted to bring to the House this debate to consider the process for the consultation on marine licensing applications carried out by the Marine Management Organisation on behalf of the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. The process has come to my attention in recent years because the way in which it works has led to widespread dismay among my local fishing communities. They have been left out of the consultation process when it comes to considering important decisions that impact on their livelihoods.

    The Cornish fishing industry has recently been highlighted on a national scale, not only in the British Academy of Film and Television Arts award-winning short film “Bait”, much of which was filmed in St Austell bay and which stars local Cornishman Ed Rowe, but in the excellent BBC series “Cornwall: This Fishing Life”. The series has highlighted, and brought to national prominence as never before, the highs and lows of the Cornish fishing communities and the tremendous risks involved in one of the most dangerous professions. Of the six episodes that were shown, I would have to say—although I may well be biased—that the first was the best, because it highlighted the thriving harbour of Mevagissey in my mid-Cornwall constituency and the fishermen who fish out of that port, often in under- 10 metre boats, in all weathers and at all times of the year.

    Let me provide some important background information on this jewel in the crown of fishing in Cornwall. Mevagissey is the second busiest and fastest-growing fishing port in Cornwall. Mevagissey harbour is home to a fleet of 62 registered fishing vessels and employs 94 full-time fishermen and dozens more who support the fishing industry. Some 75% of the fleet work very close to or within 500 metres of the shore at some point during the year, and many work exclusively close to the shore. An average year sees around £2.5 million-worth of fish landed into Mevagissey. I believe I can say with some accuracy that somewhere in the region of £1 million- worth of that fish is caught within 500 metres of the shore.

    The primary fishing industry aside, Mevagissey harbour relies heavily on associated fishing dues and revenues, but it also attracts 800,000 tourists every year, largely because it is a living, thriving fishing port. As Members can imagine, any issue that would impact on the lifeblood of Mevagissey without consultation with the fishermen would be cause for much consternation in the community.

    That brings me to the marine licensing consultation process, as carried out by the MMO, and specifically to decisions that were recently taken about mussel farms. Mussel farms, for colleagues who may not know, are made by intertwining heavy rope with large floats in areas of coastal water. Mussels are attracted to the ropes and grow off them, and can then be harvested.

    I have nothing at all against mussel farms; in fact, I am a huge fan of that growing sector. Sea farming is a sustainable way to grow and cultivate shellfish, and the mussels that are farmed from St Austell bay are, of ​course, the finest mussels in the country. However, naturally, the deployment of mussel farms, which can cover vast areas of the sea, can hinder more traditional fishing activities from taking place in that area. So, when a large mussel farm situated in St Austell bay, in an important area for the Mevagissey inshore fishing fleet, appeared—from their point of view—out of the blue, members of the local fishing community were understandably vexed. The Mevagissey Fishermen’s Association contacted the MMO and asked what had gone on.

    It turned out that no individual or organisation in Mevagissey had been consulted by the MMO when considering the application for a new mussel farm—not the Mevagissey parish council, the harbour trustees or Mevagissey fishermen, either through their association or individually. Yet fishermen are constantly receiving information from the MMO, so their contact details would have been readily available, and consulting them would not have required a massive time or resource commitment.

    It turns out that the MMO did consult some groups—specifically, the Royal Fowey Yacht Club. The club replied that the original location for the mussel farm would have had an adverse effect on recreational boating and sailing, and that led to the farm’s being moved to a place where it became a hindrance to fishermen. I place it on the record that I have nothing against the Royal Fowey Yacht Club. It is a fine establishment, which can be traced as far back as 1880, and whose patron is no other than the Duke of Cornwall. I absolutely respect the club’s right to be consulted on the application, and to raise its concerns regarding the positioning of the new mussel farm.

    Scott Mann (North Cornwall) (Con)

    The MMO does not have a great track record on consultation. Its recent proposals for the catch app have not gone down particularly well with fishermen from Padstow. I ask my hon. Friend to consider, when he makes his approach to the Minister, whether we could look at the catch app and see whether any alternatives to that could better serve many of our fishermen in Cornwall.

    Steve Double

    I am grateful to my hon. Friend and neighbour for raising that point. He makes a very good point about the wider concern in the fishing industry about the lack of consultation that often goes on with the MMO. The specific point that he raises regarding the catch app has been raised by many in the fishing industry in Cornwall, and I hope that the Minister will look at it again.

    The MMO was right to consult the yacht club. However, the Mevagissey fishermen, who have a legitimate expectation to be able to fish in the area where the new mussel farm was constructed, where they have fished for generations, should also have been consulted, and it was wrong for the MMO not to consult the local fishermen. The MMO did not follow their duty to act fairly when considering the application, by not informing the most affected stakeholders, who make their living in the waters in question.

    The fishermen brought this matter to my attention, and on appraising the consultation process for marine licensing, I have found it to be out-of-date and not fit for purpose. I have subsequently been in prolonged correspondence with the MMO, with DEFRA and with ​previous ministerial colleagues, in order to seek to reform the process and ensure that local fishermen are an integral part of the decision making process.

    I believe that there is room to improve the MMO’s consultation process to make it more robust and much more like that for planning applications. Maritime licences can, after all, have an impact on their surroundings just as much as buildings on land can have following a planning application, but at the moment there does not seem to be the same level of structure or clear consultation with statutory consultees for MMO licences as there is for planning applications.

    The MMO originally replied that it would consider including local parish councils among the statutory consultees for fishing communities. Again, that would be similar to the process followed for planning applications. Parish councils such as Mevagissey’s are integral parts of their community, are well connected with the local fishing community and harbour, and would, in my mind, be natural consultees. However, that was not followed up, as it was apparently considered to involve too much additional work for the MMO. I would challenge that. Particularly in areas such as Cornwall, which has a unitary council and no district councils, parish councils play an increasingly important role in representing their communities. It surely cannot be beyond the MMO’s ability to consult directly with them.

    If, however, the MMO is not prepared to consult parish councils, a fair compromise would be to transfer responsibility in the consultation process for checking with local bodies such as fishermen’s associations from the MMO to the local authority, which is already a statutory consultee. This would accomplish the dual outcomes of taking pressure off the MMO and allowing the local authority, which would presumably have a greater knowledge base, to speak to the right people. If that does not happen, the MMO, in conjunction with the local inshore fisheries conservation authorities, should draw up an up-to-date list of all fishermen’s associations and make them integrated statutory consultees for every licensing application.

    There is also scope—I ask the Minister to look at this—for modernising the public notice element of the process, which stipulates only that a small and sparsely worded notice be published in a local newspaper. As we are all aware, the readership of local newspapers is falling as more and more people obtain their news online. This method of giving notice of applications seems outdated. The process could be brought up to date; applications could be circulated online, alongside the existing notice, as part of the MMO’s regular communication with fishing communities. Fishermen also tell me that the MMO’s website is difficult to navigate; even when they know that there is a live licensing application, it is difficult to find it on the website.

    In conclusion, I hope I have shown that the MMO licensing consultation needs to be reviewed and significantly changed. The MMO needs to change the process to ensure that groups such as fishermen and parish councils are aware of licensing applications and are consulted on them. It needs to modernise the way it notifies the public about applications, and to improve its website, so that live applications can be easily found.

    I hope the Minister will take on board the points I have raised on behalf of my local fishermen. I look forward to going back to Mevagissey and giving the fishermen the good news that we in this place have ​listened to their concerns, and that the system will be reviewed and changed, so that in future, their views are sought on decisions that directly affect their livelihoods.

  • Steve Double – 2019 Speech During No Confidence Motion

    Below is the text of the speech made by Steve Double, the Conservative MP for St. Austell and Newquay, in the House of Commons on 16 January 2019.

    It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Ilford North (Wes Streeting).

    It is well documented that I have had my differences with the Prime Minister in recent weeks and months, and it was with regret that I found I could not support her deal in the Lobby last night and had to vote against it, but I can assure the House that I will be voting against this motion of no confidence this evening, because I want this Conservative Government to remain in office.

    The Prime Minister has many qualities, and those qualities have come to the fore in recent times. People across the country admire her resilience, fortitude and determination, and I join them in saying that those are indeed great qualities which she has demonstrated. Let me also say, with respect, that if she now directs those qualities towards the European Commission, her stock in this nation will rise dramatically. The people of this country want to see our Prime Minister stand up to those in the EU and tell them what it needs from the negotiations, and I encourage her to do that.

    There is no doubt that the Prime Minister has been given an incredibly challenging job, but that job has been made all the harder by the behaviour of some Members who have sought to undermine her negotiating position time and again. Those who have called for a second referendum have completely undermined her position by making the EU believe that we could have a ​second vote to overturn the decision, thus making the deal unattractive in the hope that we would reject it, while those who have discounted no deal have undermined her position by taking it off the table. Anyone involved in negotiations will say that no deal must remain a position in any successful negotiation.

    I find it very interesting that Labour Front Benchers have said that they would rule out no deal, on the basis that it would be damaging to the country. I do not think no deal would be that damaging to the country—it would be a challenge—and businesses in my community tell me time and again that what they really fear is not a no-deal Brexit but a Labour Government. They are far more afraid of that. Let me say this to those Labour Front Benchers: if you have discounted no deal on the basis that it would be damaging to businesses, will you now please discount a Labour Government on the same criterion? Businesses up and down the country want us to stay in government to prevent Labour from taking office.

    It is fair to say that we are not where we want to be in these negotiations. However, I absolutely back the Prime Minister in her position, which is to say that we will continue to seek a consensus across the House in order to establish a basis on which we can renegotiate with the EU and come up with a deal that we can deliver for this country. So I will back the Government tonight. We need to deliver Brexit, we need to deliver the Brexit that we promised the country in our manifesto, and then we need to move on to a domestic agenda so that we can start to deliver the changes that the country needs and is crying out for.