argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Engagements — House of Commons, 2018-07-11
Topic: Health
Questions: As a proud Welshman and a proud Brit, I say, “Come on England!”Crime is on the increase in the Ribble Valley, including antisocial behaviour orders, but the response from the Labour police and crime commissioner is to close front desk services at police stations, including Clitheroe police station. Does my right hon. Friend agree that we do not better protect the public by degrading the service that they pay for?; My right hon. Friend will be aware that in London we have experienced a 377% increase in moped crime in the past two years. As the Mayor of London has so failed to tackle crime, will my right hon. Friend ensure that the Government intervene to make London the safest city in the world?; There are growing concerns in my constituency about the proposed changes to planning powers for fracking applications being put forward for consultation by the Government and specifically the idea of treating non-fracking shale exploration as permitted development. Will my right hon. Friend update me on when the consultation will be open, and does he agree that these kinds of planning application must come forward on the basis of local authority consent?; The artificial pancreas, which is championed by the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, has the potential to transform the lives of those with type 1 diabetes. Will the right hon. Gentleman agree to look at ways to increase access to diabetes technology, including the artificial pancreas and continuous glucose monitoring, so that everyone with type 1 diabetes will have access to the best available technology?
David Roy Lidington (Conservative, Centre-right): First, I recognise the work that the right hon. Gentleman personally has put into campaigning on this issue. I am also aware of his personal experience of the devastating impact that this condition can have on families. I reassure him that the Government are committed to promoting the best possible care and treatment for people with diabetes as a priority. The National Institute for Health Research biomedical research centre in Cambridge is pioneering the development and use of the artificial pancreas, and the prototype system is now being tested by people in their own homes. I understand that the NIHR infrastructure supported more than 100 new studies and recruited almost 38,000 patients to help with those studies. That work is ongoing to test the efficacy of the artificial pancreas, and I shall certainly draw the right hon. Gentleman’s comments and campaign on this issue to the attention of the new Secretary of State for Health and Social Care.
Afghanistan — House of Commons, 2018-07-11
Topic: Defense
Julian Murray Lewis (Conservative, Centre-right): I understand that this deployment sends a very strong signal, as my right hon. Friend put it, to the Taliban that they will not be allowed to win, but does it send a sufficiently strong signal to the Treasury—an even more formidable opponent—that an uplift in the defence budget towards 2.5%, and eventually 3%, of GDP is necessary to fund our global role adequately?
Afghanistan — House of Commons, 2018-07-11
Topic: Defense
Gavin Alexander Williamson (Conservative, Centre-right): We are very much focusing on the Taliban with this announcement, which goes to show how Britain can make a difference in the world. We talk about global Britain, and this is a brilliant personification of how we can make a difference in different nations. It is to our armed forces that our nation so often turns. Whether in dealing with the recent difficulties in Salisbury or in Afghanistan, it is our armed forces that have the capabilities, the knowledge and the ability to deliver consistently for this nation.
Afghanistan — House of Commons, 2018-07-11
Topic: Defense
Michael Fallon (Conservative, Centre-right): Although the increase in non-combat support is welcome, and the sacrifice of our own troops there should never be forgotten, should we not also acknowledge the massively greater contribution of the United States to the support of that very fragile democracy, and put on record this week our thanks to President Trump for the increase in United States troop numbers and missions, which help the operations in Afghanistan that help to keep us safe from the threat of transnational terrorism?
Afghanistan — House of Commons, 2018-07-11
Topic: Defense
Gavin Alexander Williamson (Conservative, Centre-right): My right hon. Friend makes a very important point about the role that the United States has played in doing so much to bring about and promote stability in Afghanistan, and to deal with terrorist threats that can manifest themselves at home. I put on record our appreciation not just for President Trump, but for US Defence Secretary Jim Mattis and for General Nicholson, who has taken such an important and pivotal leadership role in dealing with the insurgency in Afghanistan over the past few years.
Afghanistan — House of Commons, 2018-07-11
Topic: Defense
Cheryl Elise Kendall Gillan (Conservative, Centre-right): I thank the Secretary of State for delaying his arrival at NATO to make this important announcement himself from the Dispatch Box. I believe this is the largest deployment he has authorised since becoming Defence Secretary I share with everybody in the Chamber a great respect for the Welsh Guards, in particular—they will be playing a significant role. Does my right hon. Friend recognise the role that UK aid has played over the past few years, particularly in the education and training of young women and teachers? Do not the role of UK aid and that of our services personnel complement each other in helping to make Afghanistan a more stable country?
Afghanistan — House of Commons, 2018-07-11
Topic: Defense
Gavin Alexander Williamson (Conservative, Centre-right): As a Department, we have consistently worked closely with the Home Office to ensure that any issues brought to our attention have been resolved. We made a change in our policy just a few weeks ago that we hope will be of further assistance to more of those people who helped and supported the British armed forces. We will continue to review that and provide what help we can.
Afghanistan — House of Commons, 2018-07-11
Topic: Defense
Gavin Alexander Williamson (Conservative, Centre-right): We recognise the enormous contribution that so many people made—not just those working with British forces, but the Afghan security forces, who are taking the fight to the insurgents every single day. I am talking about not just the Taliban, but Daesh and other states that seek to extend their influence into Afghanistan.
Afghanistan — House of Commons, 2018-07-11
Topic: Defense
Leo Docherty (Conservative, Centre-right): Will the Secretary of State join me in thanking members of the 1st Battalion the Grenadier Guards from the Aldershot garrison for their continued contribution to the security and stability of Kabul? Will he tell the House his assessment of the link between the Taliban in Afghanistan and elements of Daesh?
Afghanistan — House of Commons, 2018-07-11
Topic: Defense
Gavin Alexander Williamson (Conservative, Centre-right): I certainly wish to thank all those tens of thousands of service personnel who have contributed to efforts to make sure that Afghanistan is not a safe place for terrorism. As for the link between the Taliban and Daesh, we are seeing more and more Daesh fighters heading from Iraq and Syria into Afghanistan. That is why we need to be making these moves to ensure that they do not create a space in which they are able to operate.
Afghanistan — House of Commons, 2018-07-11
Topic: Defense
Robert John Blackman (Conservative, Centre-right): British forces are renowned for not only their military capability, but their ability to capture hearts and minds. Will my right hon. Friend therefore further explain our objectives and also tell us the expertise we will apply that is unique to Britain?
Afghanistan — House of Commons, 2018-07-11
Topic: Defense
Gavin Alexander Williamson (Conservative, Centre-right): We have been pivotal to creating the ethos and template for the Afghan military academy, giving the country’s armed forces the skills, training and knowledge they need to be able to command forces in often hostile and difficult environments. Those skills, along with what we will bring in terms of command to the Kabul security force, will be vital, because people turn to us as a nation that has an understanding of Afghanistan and the ability to lead other nations.
Afghanistan — House of Commons, 2018-07-11
Topic: Defense
Robert Alexander Courts (Conservative, Centre-right): I briefly worked in New Zealand, so I am very conscious of the ties between our two countries. Although NATO is the cornerstone of our defence, will the Secretary of State comment on the importance of the wider military alliance?
Afghanistan — House of Commons, 2018-07-11
Topic: Defense
Gavin Alexander Williamson (Conservative, Centre-right): We have a deep and enduring relationship with not only New Zealand, but all "Five Eyes" nations. We are seeing a deepening of that relationship in terms of not just operations, but the sharing of capabilities. Of course, we had the great news of the purchase of Type 26 frigates by the Royal Australian Navy. I was speaking to my counterpart in New Zealand just at the weekend, and we are looking at how we can operate more together to deal with the threats that are emerging in the world.
Afghanistan — House of Commons, 2018-07-11
Topic: Defense
James Stephen Heappey (Conservative, Centre-right): Just over 13 years ago, I deployed to Kabul on my first Afghanistan tour, and I found it very rewarding indeed. I wish the Welsh Guards well. The frustration during that first tour was the imbalance in commitment and risk appetite between the NATO countries that made up the Kabul Multinational Brigade. Does the Secretary of State agree that it is not just numbers and budgets that underpin NATO, but member states’ willingness actually to deploy their troops with rules of engagement and a risk appetite that allows them to contribute fully to alliance operations?
The Secretary of State’s Handling of Universal Credit — House of Commons, 2018-07-11
Topic: Health
Simon James Hoare (Conservative, Centre-right): It is a pleasure to follow the right hon. Member for East Ham (Stephen Timms), who speaks with great experience on these matters. One of the burning questions this afternoon is whether the Labour party’s official position is to continue to support the principle of universal credit. Every time that Labour has the opportunity to endorse universal credit, it dodges doing that and seeks to tear it down from within The hon. Member for Wirral West (Margaret Greenwood), who speaks from the Opposition Front Bench, may be interested to hear the observation of one of the senior managers in my local jobcentre in Blandford Forum, which I visited a few weeks ago. He told me that he had been advocating and urging something like universal credit since he joined the service way back in 1986. This simplified approach, making it easier for people, is absolutely the right way. Likewise, the approach of roll-out, pause, reflect and revise that the Government and the Department have adopted is absolutely the right one. That is in sharp contradistinction to the dramatic roll-out, to trumpets and drums, of the tax credit system, and look at the absolute disaster that that was. The Department’s approach is the right one The shadow Minister, of course, has form on these matters. In a debate on the national health service in January this year, she told us: "Let us have no more talk about taking the politics out of the NHS. The NHS is a political entity."—[Official Report, 10 January 2018; Vol. 634, c. 373.] I chastised her on that. She likes to come forward with crocodile tears, synthetic concern and outrage. Labour Front Benchers merely use this to prey on the concerns of very vulnerable people for what they believe to be cheap political advantage The hon. Lady may be interested to hear an email from a constituent of mine—[Interruption.] If the hon. Member for Easington (Grahame Morris) wants to intervene, he is very welcome to.
Defence Industry and Shipbuilding — House of Commons, 2018-07-11
Topic: Defense
John Alan Redwood (Conservative, Centre-right): I welcome the Opposition’s approach. We want a strong Navy and more ships built in Britain. Anything we can do together to achieve that will be greatly welcome, and I trust that the Government will agree.
Defence Industry and Shipbuilding — House of Commons, 2018-07-11
Topic: Defense
Julian Murray Lewis (Conservative, Centre-right): I am very sympathetic to the case that the hon. Lady is making, but the consequence of going down the route that she recommends, and which I am inclined to support, is that the black hole in the defence equipment budget will become even greater. If we accept that there needs to be an uplift in the defence budget to be able to make this sort of investment and get the long-term gains that she describes, will she confirm that her party’s policy is to support an increase in the defence budget?
Defence Industry and Shipbuilding — House of Commons, 2018-07-11
Topic: Defense
Philip Martin Dunne (Conservative, Centre-right): I cannot allow that to stand. I was in post when the P-8 Poseidon contract was placed, and an integral part of the relationship with Boeing was an understanding, now being fulfilled through contracts, that it would make a significant investment in RAF Lossiemouth. As a result, £400 million is now going into that base, in part to support and maintain those aircraft and other aircraft operated by our allies. Those aircraft will be coming here to the UK to be maintained and serviced. That means UK jobs and UK investment.
Defence Industry and Shipbuilding — House of Commons, 2018-07-11
Topic: Defense
Douglas Gordon Ross (Conservative, Centre-right): As the Member of Parliament for Moray, which is home to RAF Lossiemouth, I have to take exception to the points made from the Labour Benches. This is a major investment—£400 million and hundreds of new jobs—in Moray and Scotland and is welcomed locally by every man, woman and child. They will look very poorly at the Labour party today trying to say it is not good enough for the area.
Defence Industry and Shipbuilding — House of Commons, 2018-07-11
Topic: Defense
Tobias Martin Ellwood (Conservative, Centre-right): There is nothing in that that I would disagree with; the hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. I will come on to what we are doing to promote Royal Navy ships; we will come on to the core fact of what is a Royal Navy ship and what is a fleet auxiliary ship, which again goes to the heart of the difference in how these different types of ship are procured.
Defence Industry and Shipbuilding — House of Commons, 2018-07-11
Topic: Defense
Tobias Martin Ellwood (Conservative, Centre-right): I will move on to our maritime capability and our procurement process, but first please allow me to finish the bigger case of why it is important that we invest here I am making the point that although we must persuade Members of Parliament, we also need to persuade the nation. This is the same nation that enjoyed the fly-past yesterday and that expects us to step forward as a global influencer, but I am afraid is perhaps worryingly naive about the need to invest, because that is not a doorstep issue; it does not come up very much on the election circuit compared with health, education or transport. I think all Members would accept that point Our defence posture matters; it is part of our national identity. It allows us to sit with authority at the international top table and help shape global events. Other nations and allies look to us; they look to Britain to step forward, and to lead in the air, on land, on the sea and now on the cyber-plane as well. That ambition could be lost in a generation if we do not continue to invest; that capability, and desire to step forward, could be lost When we look at the current challenges facing Europe, the middle east and parts of Africa, we see that we are the best in Europe in terms of security, military capability, and intelligence and policing. We have an opportunity to leverage that position of strength as we craft a new post-Brexit relationship with our European allies and take a leading role in NATO, but we can only realistically do that with a sensible increase in our defence spending, which includes investment in ships.
Defence Industry and Shipbuilding — House of Commons, 2018-07-11
Topic: Defense
Tobias Martin Ellwood (Conservative, Centre-right): During my time as a Member of Parliament I have seen a change in the posture of the Royal Navy that we can all be proud of. What is the Type 45? It is the best in its class. What is the Type 26? It will be the best in its class. What is the Type 31? It is a change in approach to modular design, which will be exactly what we need for export. This is what Britain is doing. We invented the aircraft carrier; we were the ones who first put that concept together. That innovation that is inherent in our DNA is what is allowing us to do exactly what the hon. Gentleman says.
Defence Industry and Shipbuilding — House of Commons, 2018-07-11
Topic: Defense
Tobias Martin Ellwood (Conservative, Centre-right): I have hinted that I will come to that in a second, but there is a distinction between fleet support ships that employ civilians and Royal Navy ships that employ Royal Navy personnel. There is a distinction between the two from a security perspective Going back to the point about value for money for the taxpayer, the Defence Secretary, the Procurement Minister and I all want to ensure that we are able to utilise the advanced skill sets in our defence industry across the UK, but the bottom line has to be value for money. Let us take as an example the ships that were recently purchased in Korea. The price was half the British value. Is the hon. Member for Llanelli saying that she would pay double the price for the same auxiliary support ships?
Defence Industry and Shipbuilding — House of Commons, 2018-07-11
Topic: Defense
Tobias Martin Ellwood (Conservative, Centre-right): I am suddenly very popular, but may I just finish answering that point? Then perhaps we can go round houses This is a serious point. The hon. Lady did not answer the question on whether she would endorse purchasing a British-built ship that cost twice the amount as one built elsewhere. I hear what she says about the knock-on impacts for small and medium-sized businesses and so on, but a third of the money being spent comes back to Britain anyway. That is part of the contract that has been secured by the Procurement Minister. So in fact, we are already doing as she says, but taxpayers are paying half the price that they would have been paying had we purchased something from Britain. That is the situation that we face, and without wishing to sound too political, that is the difference between us on the Government Benches, who want to be fiscally responsible with taxpayers’ money, and those who simply want to pay for anything. I absolutely want it to be British, but we have to have value for money. Also, it is wrong to suggest that there is no shipbuilding capacity coming through. I have just mentioned the aircraft carrier, the Type 26 and the Type 45, in which there is continuing interest, and we also have the Type 31 and the offshore patrol vessels that are coming through. So there is plenty out there to keep our capability alive and busy.
Defence Industry and Shipbuilding — House of Commons, 2018-07-11
Topic: Defense
Tobias Martin Ellwood (Conservative, Centre-right): I am grateful to my hon. Friend, but I want to move on to the second question that I posed, which is how we can best meet the ambition of optimising our industry’s capabilities while spending taxpayers’ money wisely. The UK is a world leader in the defence sector. In 2016, the UK defence sector had a turnover of £23 billion, £5.9 billion of which was export orders. The MOD is the sector’s most important customer, spending £18.7 billion with the UK industry and directly supporting 123,000 jobs in every part of the UK. Indeed, my hon. Friend the Member for Ludlow (Mr Dunne), in his report that was published on Monday, shines further light on the important contribution that defence makes UK prosperity, and I pay credit to him for his work. The report shows that there is more that we can do, which should be welcomed by both sides of the House.
Defence Industry and Shipbuilding — House of Commons, 2018-07-11
Topic: Defense
Tobias Martin Ellwood (Conservative, Centre-right): We have wandered away from ships a little, but my hon. Friend is right. I pay tribute to the RAF for its event yesterday, and for what it has done and continues to do. The Royal International Air Tattoo starts at RAF Fairford on Friday, and we have the Farnborough airshow next week, where we will be launching our air strategy, based on the same principles as for shipping, which will be exciting Returning to ships and the role of the maritime sector, we should remind ourselves of the significant changes to the Royal Navy fleet. We have two incredible aircraft carriers coming into service, a new generation of Dreadnought-class submarines, the Type 45 destroyers—the most advanced in the world—and the new Type 26 global combat ships. We also have the Type 31e frigates—e for export—which have deliberately been designed with a modular concept. Depending on the export need, which could be interdiction, surface support or humanitarian purposes, its parts can be interchanged simply to adapt to the local requirement. This is an exciting time, and all the ships will be built in the United Kingdom.[Official Report, 24 July 2018, Vol. 645, c. 7MC.] To achieve our ambitions, we need a strong shipbuilding industry as part of the wider maritime sector. As the Opposition spokeswoman said, more than 100,000 people work in this country’s maritime and marine sectors, including in the shipyards that supply parts and support equipment to keep the great industry alive.
Defence Industry and Shipbuilding — House of Commons, 2018-07-11
Topic: Defense
Tobias Martin Ellwood (Conservative, Centre-right): I do not disagree. I try to be less partisan than others who jump up at the Dispatch Box, and I absolutely agree with the hon. Lady about the importance of that drumbeat of orders, but it should not come at any price. We need to make sure it blends with what is built for the Royal Navy and for the Royal Fleet Auxiliary. We have accepted every single recommendation made by John Parker, and we thank him for his very wise report.
Defence Industry and Shipbuilding — House of Commons, 2018-07-11
Topic: Defense
Roger James Gale (Conservative, Centre-right): Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker I may have misunderstood the Minister, and I know it is not the custom to ask a question to which one does not know the answer, but I think he said that royal naval ships were confined to aircraft carriers, frigates and destroyers. Would that not also apply to any replacement amphibious craft that we might need?[Official Report, 24 July 2018, Vol. 645, c. 8MC.]
Defence Industry and Shipbuilding — House of Commons, 2018-07-11
Topic: Defense
Tobias Martin Ellwood (Conservative, Centre-right): My hon. Friend is absolutely right—that would be considered royal naval class, so not manned by the Royal Fleet Auxiliary It is important that, as we move forward, we look closely at value for taxpayers’ money.