Speeches

My Lords, I extend my gratitude to the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, for initiating this vital debate, and declare my interests as a parent of home-educated and state-educated children and as a board member of an organisation committed to providing private education. We are at a critical juncture, where the mental health challenges facing our youth have intensified—notably since the pandemic, as others have pointed out. Just this month, the Royal College of Psychiatrists said that there had been a 53% increase in the number of children in mental health crisis over the last four years. This situation is exacerbated ...

The report rightly highlights areas where the UK must improve to achieve its ambition of becoming a science and technology superpower, whether you define that in terms of the amount of innovation generated, the number of patents, ideas or even Nobel prizes, the value of ideas commercialised or simply our influence. The report highlights the areas that are key to success: increasing R&D funding; forging closer ties between academia and industry and between different parts of government, industry and academia; changing the way visas are charged for; and supporting start-ups to scale up. But without action, “science and technology superpower” ...

My Lords, what else is there to say after so many heartfelt, excellent and eloquent tributes both in this Chamber and beyond? Our late Queen upon her passing, as ever in life, brings out the best in us, inspiring us to be our better selves and to fulfil our duty, despite the turbulence around us. Her departing has stopped time as we mark the end of an era, and united the world as leaders around it pay their respects whether friend or foe. We will never see anyone like her again, and we will miss her desperately.  Many have remarked ...

My Lords, in moving Amendment 64B I shall also speak to other amendments in my name. I declare an interest, as I have before, that I am from a home-educating family, which I am proud of. I wish there were more noble Lords in this Chamber who had the privilege of being part of home education. As was discussed earlier, the Bill really should not exist in its current form. It has been thoroughly gutted already, and there were good reasons for that. The reasons for gutting the earlier parts of the Bill are no different from the reasons for ...

My Lords, I shall speak to my Amendment 171X on the proposal for an ombudsman to provide protection for home educators. I support many other amendments in the group. I pay tribute to my noble friend Lord Lucas for putting this focus on the need to provide protection from overzealous local authorities. I also need to apologise for not speaking at Second Reading due to a variety of home and personal health matters. I also need to declare an interest, in that I am part of a family that home educates. I cannot disclose all the details, which are private, ...

My Lords, I thank my noble friend the Senior Deputy Speaker for tabling this debate and declare my interest as a partner of the Shaftesbury Partnership, which is exploring some of the tools for governance that I will mention in my speech. As is right with this House, given its rich and long history as an essential part of our unwritten constitution, it is normal to expect it to flex as times and needs change, while rightly maintaining our traditions. This is no different when it comes to how it is itself governed. I fear, however, that there is a tendency to ...

"My Lords, I too congratulate my noble friend Lord Wharton of Yarm on an excellent maiden and declare my interests in the register. In view of the time, I will focus on what we now need to do given that the PM has kept his promise to leave and has agreed a deal. Brexit and many other cataclysmic events in recent times, including Covid, have highlighted several things. First, the biggest challenge we face in the world today, even with Covid causing untold havoc, is how to share power peacefully, whether you are a President, the head of an institution ...

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, for tabling this timely debate. I declare an interest as an adviser and director of various real estate related companies, as outlined in my register of interests. For too long in this country, we have allowed ourselves to be trapped in a siloed way of thinking about creating new communities. The truth is that we need to come together across divides to innovate in every area. We need to recreate the bottom rungs of the ladder to owning not just property, but your own business, vehicle, and, one day, even robots, ...

              Source: Hansard My Lords, I, too, thank the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, for tabling this debate and for his very able chairmanship of the committee, and in particular for steering us through the creation of this report. I declare my interests as set out in the register. Broadly speaking, I am relatively happy with the findings of the report and its recommendations, but with some significant caveats. It is a solid document and I pay tribute to my fellow committee members, our adviser and our officials, as well as to those who contributed ...

              Source Hansard My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, for tabling this debate. I, too, am a member of the sub-committee that produced this report. I pay tribute to our chairman and my colleagues for the work that has gone into it. I refer Members to my register of interests. I welcome this report and the logical way it analyses the largest services sectors to get a more granular understanding of the issues involved. There is always a danger that you miss out details using this approach, both in the emerging ...