http://www.chrishuhnemep.org.uk/speecharchive.php Recent Speeches from Chris Huhne MP en-GB Chris Huhne MP http://www.chrishuhnemep.org.uk/ Prater Raines Ltd http://www.praterraines.co.uk/ (c) 2010 Chris Huhne MP 2010-03-10T18:57+00:00 United Kingdom http://www.chrishuhnemep.org.uk/speeches/000085/queens_speech_debate__home_affairs.html I welcome this opportunity to discuss the proposals put forward in this year's Gracious Address. My hon. Friends have already pointed out that the Address is little more than an opportunity for electioneering, and the Government have admitted as much themselves. Much of the legislation stands little, if any, chance of making it on to the statute book, and is heading inexorably towards the wash-up and a soapy consensus. That is not necessarily a bad thing at this stage of a Parliament, but we have seen it all before, too often. 2009-11-25T17:00+00:00 http://www.chrishuhnemep.org.uk/speeches/000093/antisocial_behaviour_speech.html We need to deal with the problem of anti-social behaviour by using a set of agencies across the Government and locally. I recently visited the Liverpool community justice experiment and was very impressed by it. I know that there has been a similar effort in Salford, too, but it depresses me that the Ministry of Justice has decided not to roll out the scheme, because it seems that there has not been a holistic appreciation of the cost savings to other Departments. The MOJ has looked at the costs that its own budget would incur, but it has not taken into account the savings elsewhere. Our inability to join up government in a way that makes the most effective contribution is an enormous problem. 2009-11-02T14:00+00:00 http://www.chrishuhnemep.org.uk/speeches/000086/usuk_extradition_treaty_speech.html This is a timely and important debate. Every few months, an extradition case hits the headlines, including most recently the case of Gary McKinnon, which is still sub judice while judicial review proceeds. Before that, as the Home Secretary and my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for North-East Fife (Sir Menzies Campbell) have pointed out, there were the NatWest three. These repeated causes célèbres underline the problems with our extradition arrangements. They underline the injustice of the unequal treaty that we have signed with the United States, and they will go on and on until that treaty is amended to put American and British citizens on an equal footing. 2009-07-15T17:00+01:00 http://www.chrishuhnemep.org.uk/speeches/000096/28_days_precharge_detention.html We on the Liberal Democrat Benches are unhappy with the further extension of what was clearly introduced as a temporary provision. That is why we will divide the House on this issue later today. There is an old adage that there is nothing so permanent as the temporary, and there are many examples of that in our legislation, but we should not seek to extend that principle to these particular provisions. 2009-07-09T16:00+01:00 http://www.chrishuhnemep.org.uk/speeches/000094/id_cards_debate.html I have one key point to make: the ID card scheme is not just about the cards, but about the national identity register. That is why we tabled an amendment, which is on the Order Paper but was not, unfortunately, selected, calling explicitly for the abandonment not just of ID cards but of the centralised biometric register. 2009-07-06T17:00+01:00 http://www.chrishuhnemep.org.uk/speeches/000091/strategic_development_area_eastleigh.html Chris Huhne: It is a pleasure to speak under your chairmanship, Mr. Jones. I am grateful to Mr. Speaker for selecting this matter for debate. It is of intense importance to my constituents in Boorley Green and Botley, whose homes will be blighted if their pleasant rural setting is developed as a new town. The planning process has let them down badly. 2009-06-30T12:30+01:00 http://www.chrishuhnemep.org.uk/speeches/000087/knife_crime_speech.html Knife crime is one of the most serious problems facing Britain today. The number of children admitted to hospital having been assaulted with knives has gone up by 83 per cent. in five years. That is frankly shocking, but sadly there are no simple solutions, as we have heard; there is, perhaps, consensus across the House on that. We need a response from the education and health services, the police and the criminal justice system, so I was heartened to see the emphasis on cross-community co-operation to address the root causes of knife crime in the motion, and to hear it in the speech of the hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell (Chris Grayling). That appears to us to be a new emphasis, which we welcome. 2009-06-09T17:00+01:00 http://www.chrishuhnemep.org.uk/speeches/000084/lessons_from_the_policing_of_protest.html Thank you for inviting me to speak today. I am very happy to be able to add my contribution particularly on the good liberal subject of protests. 2009-06-08T13:00+01:00 http://www.chrishuhnemep.org.uk/speeches/000092/whitsun_adjournment_debate.html I apologise to you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, and other hon. Members, particularly those on the Government Benches, because I know that the Deputy Leader of the House is near boiling point in his exasperation at wanting to get away for the Whitsun recess. I can sympathise with that, because we had an important statement today on the Gurkhas and I had to rush out to celebrate with the Gurkhas who are outside. I am delighted that my hon. Friend the Member for Colchester (Bob Russell), along with myself and a number of others, was given one of these rather marvellous scarves as a token of the appreciation that the Gurkhas feel for the vote that the House took and which the Government have now respected. 2009-05-21T14:50+01:00 http://www.chrishuhnemep.org.uk/speeches/000088/policing_and_crime_bill_speech.html On the government's proposals: 2009-05-19T17:00+01:00 http://www.chrishuhnemep.org.uk/speeches/000083/terrorism_and_the_conflict_with_liberty.html Speech by Chris Huhne MP at Magdalen College, Oxford on 12th March 2009 2009-05-05T17:01+01:00 http://www.chrishuhnemep.org.uk/speeches/000082/the_bill_of_rights_and_responsibilities_and_the_role_of_a_freedom_bill.html Thank you very much for your introduction, and for inviting me here to speak today. Lectures such as this, and the wider work of the British Institute of Human Rights, are vitally important in the current climate. Global terrorism is a challenge. The global economic downturn is unlikely to improve the climate of tolerance. Our commitment to human rights will come under fire on a near daily basis. 2009-05-05T13:00+01:00 http://www.chrishuhnemep.org.uk/speeches/000089/gurkha_speech.html I beg to move, 2009-04-29T17:00+01:00 http://www.chrishuhnemep.org.uk/speeches/000095/control_orders_debate.html Control orders are not an appropriate instrument for a free society under the rule of law. They are unfair; they breach key rights to a fair hearing; and they get perilously close to reversing a fundamental principle of our criminal justice system, which is that we are innocent until we are proven guilty. Moreover, they are ineffective. We have heard that seven of the 38 people who have been made subject to control orders have absconded. The guilty are more likely to abscond, so the innocent are more likely to be detained. Criminal trials and custodial sentences would be a far more effective way of proceeding and protecting the public. 2009-03-03T17:00+00:00 http://www.chrishuhnemep.org.uk/speeches/000090/policing_and_crime_bill_speech.html The Bill is a hotch-potch, as is commonly recognised, but it hides a clear hole. It is a hotch-potch because it contains legal ingredients on matters that are barely related, which have been thrown together with no thought as to freshness, let alone a recipe. We have measures on police reform, force collaboration, prostitution, aviation security, alcohol-fuelled disorder, asset seizures and extradition. This is the 66th criminal justice Bill since 1997, and it should be becoming abundantly clear that quantity does not make up for a lack of quality. I want first in my remarks to deal with the central void in the Bill, namely police reform. I shall then deal with some of the bitty aspects and I shall finally turn to the reforms of the prostitution laws, which would not only be controversial, but in my view-I agree with the right hon. Member for Leicester, East-a serious mistake. 2009-01-19T17:00+00:00