Results 1-20 of 6,860 for in the 'Commons debates' OR in the 'Westminster Hall debates' OR in the 'Lords debates' OR in the 'Northern Ireland Assembly debates' speaker:Gordon Brown

Dalgety Bay Radiation (6 March 2013)

Gordon Brown: Is the Minister saying that the only reason he is taking no action on Dalgety Bay is that he has no such commercial contract in that instance?

Dalgety Bay Radiation (6 March 2013)

Gordon Brown: Will, therefore, the investigation report, which is the basis on which SEPA will be able to make the decisions, be before the Dalgety Bay Forum when it meets next Monday? Otherwise, we will face considerable delays before this report can be examined. Will the Minister also accept that, despite all the information he is trying to give us, SEPA has already said its investigation has not...

Dalgety Bay Radiation (6 March 2013)

Gordon Brown: I am grateful to you, Mr Speaker, for the opportunity to speak on behalf of the patient but hard-pressed and increasingly angry residents of Dalgety Bay in Fife in my constituency. They are residents who discovered 18 months ago that the houses that were built 50 years ago were built near or above radiation-contaminated particles. They are residents who in the last 18 months have suffered the...

Dalgety Bay Radiation (6 March 2013)

Gordon Brown: I will come to that. It is incontestable—indeed, nobody disputes this fact—that about 50 years ago, radiation-contaminated materials were dumped in the Dalgety Bay area. Nobody disputes the fact, either, that in the past few years, 3,400 particles of radiation-contaminated materials have been collected in the Dalgety Bay area by scientists and others, who have seen coastal erosion...

Dalgety Bay Radiation (6 March 2013)

Gordon Brown: My hon. Friend is absolutely right. This is a real problem. I have a letter from the Minister of State, Ministry of Defence, the right hon. Member for Rayleigh and Wickford (Mr Francois)—not the Minister who is replying to the debate—in response to my raising the question of radiation. In his letter, the Minister says: “Correspondence should be addressed to SEPA as the...

Remploy Marine Fife (15 January 2013)

Gordon Brown: rose—

Remploy Marine Fife (15 January 2013)

Gordon Brown: This debate is about Remploy Marine Fife and questions need to be answered about it. I have made a practical proposal that the Government, the Scottish Administration and Fife council should meet and look at flexible arrangements, so that the shortfall is eliminated as quickly as possible for a viable product. Will the Minister agree to those meetings?

Remploy Marine Fife (15 January 2013)

Gordon Brown: I rise on behalf of myself, my hon. Friends the Members for Dunfermline and West Fife (Thomas Docherty) and for Glenrothes (Lindsay Roy), and, I believe, the whole communities of the county of Fife to urge the Government to save the jobs, the work programme and the marine business of the Remploy factories in Leven and Cowdenbeath in Fife. The two factories, set up in 1948, have been part of...

Remploy Marine Fife (15 January 2013)

Gordon Brown: Of course. The cutting equipment that is necessary for the raw materials that produce the manufactured goods in Fife is in Dundee. If a rescue is going to work, there must be some relationship between what happens in Leven and Cowdenbeath and in Dundee. We will follow up my hon. Friend’s suggestion about a meeting between Fife and Dundee. I urge the Government to agree to hold a...

Remploy Marine Fife (15 January 2013)

Gordon Brown: I hope there is financial support from Scottish Enterprise. I have not yet seen it. An 18-month subsidy will not be adequate to bridge the gap between the losses incurred at the moment and financial viability. The price of failure is that large numbers of people will lose their jobs, but success could be achieved by all the parties working together—the UK Government, the Scottish...

Dalgety Bay (Radiation) (30 November 2011)

Gordon Brown: The issue comes down to this: even after the letters from the Ministry of Defence and the meeting yesterday, the Scottish Environment Protection Agency still says that, unless the Ministry of Defence can give assurances, it will designate the land as radioactive and contaminated, which is not something people want. It seems strange that the Ministry of Defence was prepared to accept...

Dalgety Bay (Radiation) (30 November 2011)

Gordon Brown: The Ministry of Defence has been told by the Scottish Environment Protection Agency that a remedial action plan is needed. It has the power to designate the land and require the Ministry of Defence to do this. It will not change its mind about whether a remedial action plan is needed, and nor should it because of what we have found in the past few weeks. All we need is an assurance from the...

Dalgety Bay (Radiation) (30 November 2011)

Gordon Brown: The work is not seen as satisfactory by the Scottish Environment Protection Agency. I talked with head of the agency this afternoon, who assured me that he has had no assurances from the Ministry of Defence that it will do what the Scottish Environment Protection Agency needs. To return to the central point, the Ministry of Defence was prepared to accept responsibility for the site when there...

Dalgety Bay (Radiation) (30 November 2011)

Gordon Brown: I have called this debate for one purpose and one purpose only—to persuade the Ministry of Defence of the need for urgent action in an area in my constituency where radioactive materials have been discovered. The affected land on the shores of the Firth of Forth occupied by and near Dalgety Bay sailing club is a few yards from people’s homes, near where children play, and is an...

Dalgety Bay (Radiation) (30 November 2011)

Gordon Brown: That was in 2010. I shall come to that. I have had to call this debate because, despite a succession of approaches to the Ministry of Defence—letters, phone calls, a chance conversation with the Secretary of State for Defence, whom I acquainted with the issue—the Ministry of Defence has yet to instruct the necessary actions and agree that a plan for remedial work is prepared,...

Dalgety Bay (Radiation) (30 November 2011)

Gordon Brown: Yes. We now have clear evidence that there is a radioactivity level higher than anything that has been seen before. We have a desire—indeed, a demand—locally for remedial action. The community council chairman, Colin McPhail, has said very eloquently that fears in the area need to be allayed. We have correspondence, which I have seen, between the two Government agencies, but it...

Opposition Day — [19th Allotted Day — Half Day]: Rupert Murdoch and News Corporation Bid for BSkyB (13 July 2011)

Gordon Brown: It is a bit like the old days for me, with the Government on the run, the Opposition in pursuit and a headline in The Sun saying, “Brown wrong”, another example of my very close relationship with News International. It is like the old days, but with one exception: if I had not come to the House when I was Prime Minister, in a debate in which the Prime Minister has been implicated,...

Opposition Day — [19th Allotted Day — Half Day]: Rupert Murdoch and News Corporation Bid for BSkyB (13 July 2011)

Gordon Brown: I want to set out the facts for the House and will be happy take any interventions after. In nearly 30 years as a Member of this House, in opposition and in government, I have never sought to propose or impose any restrictions on the freedom of the press. At all times I have defended their right to expose any wrongdoing wherever it is found and to speak truth to power however uncomfortable it...

Opposition Day — [19th Allotted Day — Half Day]: Rupert Murdoch and News Corporation Bid for BSkyB (13 July 2011)

Gordon Brown: I will set out my case and then I will answer questions. This is the only way—[ Interruption. ]

Opposition Day — [19th Allotted Day — Half Day]: Rupert Murdoch and News Corporation Bid for BSkyB (13 July 2011)

Gordon Brown: This is the only way to describe the behaviour of those at News International who took the freedom of the press as a licence for abuse, who cynically manipulated our support of that vital freedom as their justification, and who then callously used the defence of a free press as the banner under which they marched in step, as I say, with members of the criminal underworld. This...