Results 1-20 of 179 for (in the 'Commons debates' OR in the 'Westminster Hall debates' OR in the 'Lords debates' OR in the 'Northern Ireland Assembly debates') speaker:Lord Jones of Birmingham

World War I: Veterans — Question (12 May 2009)

Lord Jones of Birmingham: My Lords—

World War I: Veterans — Question (12 May 2009)

Lord Jones of Birmingham: My Lords, I declare an interest as a former serving officer in the Royal Navy and a passionate advocate of defence manufacturing equipment from Britain in both the CBI and UKTI. The Minister recognised the sad loss last Thursday—I notice that one of them was a Gurkha. I would love to hear from the Government that we will honour not only these two amazing veterans of a faraway conflict,...

Finance: Offshore Centres — Question (7 May 2009)

Lord Jones of Birmingham: My Lords—

EU: Budget — Question (6 May 2009)

Lord Jones of Birmingham: My Lords—

Business Support — Statement (14 Jan 2009)

Lord Jones of Birmingham: My Lords, I, too congratulate the Secretary of State on a package that is at last talking about some real numbers and real help. On the eight weeks, to which he refers, to get it filtering into the economy, anything that can be done to get it in in February will be really helpful to business. There is a crying need for urgent help. I urge the noble Lord to go to his colleagues at No. 11 and...

Energy: Renewables — Question (13 Jan 2009)

Lord Jones of Birmingham: My Lords, perhaps I may help the Minister in building a bridge between the question and the necessary answer—because it is bridge building and other civil engineering projects in which Britain excels around the world and for which the ECGD is so desperately needed. Is not the lack of take-up of this fund due to the United Kingdom business community having no confidence in the ECGD? Do...

Unemployment — Question (17 Dec 2008)

Lord Jones of Birmingham: My Lords, the Minister says that he is doing everything that he can to ensure that the employment figures are maintained but, in the light of such worrying unemployment figures, will he explain why it was deemed necessary to spend £12 billion of taxpayers' money on knocking 25p off a Christmas present through VAT and not on ensuring that we preserve people in jobs in this country? If you...

Banking and Financial Services — Question (11 Dec 2008)

Lord Jones of Birmingham: My Lords, I declare a vague interest as a solicitor admitted to the roll of solicitors of the Supreme Court. As noble Lords know, it is a profession that never uses one word when 10 will do. I should like an acknowledgement from the Minister that if the knee-jerk reaction to the banking crisis is to be more and more regulation, the result will be more and more complicated documents from the...

Queen's Speech — Debate (3rd Day) (8 Dec 2008)

Lord Jones of Birmingham: My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Hunt of Chesterton, for his kind words. I also join him in saying to the new Secretary of State: it was a good start. However, perhaps I may lay two issues at his door. First, the accent in the Pre-Budget Report was on stimulation of the consumer. However, regardless of a VAT reduction, people will not go shopping for big-ticket items when they are out...

Euro — Question (8 Dec 2008)

Lord Jones of Birmingham: My Lords, are we not, with respect, dancing on a pinhead here? The point is not whether the conditions are right but, as the Minister just said, that adopting the euro is an irrevocable act and the success or failure of the nation's economy for years ahead will be defined by the rate at which we join. I have in mind particularly the rate at which Germany came in and the rate at which France...

Education: Adult Learning (3 Nov 2008)

Lord Jones of Birmingham: My Lords, given the success of the learning and skills councils when it comes to a major attack on a community such as the closure of Vauxhall at Luton or the closure of MG Rover at Longbridge in Birmingham, will the Minister explain why they are being replaced by local authorities, which will be politically motivated, rather than business-driven, which has been the key to previous success?

Energy Bill (28 Oct 2008)

Lord Jones of Birmingham: My Lords, I take the opportunity to speak for the first time from the Cross Benches to say that I support fully what the noble Viscount, Lord Montgomery, has said. For many years at the CBI, businesspeople got increasingly frustrated with so many billions of pounds being put into the infrastructure of the nation, both in airports and the Channel Tunnel, to enable the productivity of the...

Energy Bill (28 Oct 2008)

Lord Jones of Birmingham: My Lords, once every five years my birthday falls on the very day when the clocks go back. For all of 53 years I have enjoyed a 25-hour birthday every five years. Therefore, in speaking against myself in the interests of a prolonged celebration every five years, I sincerely hope that we can see the adoption of Central European Time as quickly as possible.

Energy Bill (21 May 2008)

Lord Jones of Birmingham: My Lords, we have had an interesting and wide-ranging debate. I hope that noble Lords will forgive me if I deal with it in considerable detail. Because I am not troubled by what is going on in Moscow tonight—those of us who support Aston Villa are never troubled—I make no apology for perhaps going past the time for kick-off. Noble Lords might catch the second half if they are...

Energy Bill (21 May 2008)

Lord Jones of Birmingham: My Lords, as it is presumably a question of just power generation companies and not companies in general, I will save time and move on. Many noble Lords mentioned feed-in tariffs. It is true that Germany has been successful in deploying renewables by using a feed-in tariff, but at a very high cost. It cost €68 billion between 2000 and 2012. There are 500 different types of tariff, with...

Energy Bill (21 May 2008)

Lord Jones of Birmingham: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord for raising the issue of taxation. That is a matter for the Treasury; it is a matter of fiscal policy, not a matter for tonight. My noble friend Lord Puttnam spoke about the public interest test. I welcome his contribution. He gave his apologies as he had to leave to attend an awards ceremony. I would welcome a meeting with him and my officials to see...

Energy Bill (21 May 2008)

Lord Jones of Birmingham: My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a second time. Of the many challenges we face, few can be more significant or more urgent than tackling climate change and maintaining the security of our energy supplies. International Energy Agency projections indicate that global energy demand is set to increase by 53 per cent between 2006 and 2030, in turn driving a 55 per cent increase...

Energy: Clean Coal Technology (21 May 2008)

Lord Jones of Birmingham: My Lords, since the energy White Paper in May 2007 we have made steady progress on the development of clean coal technologies. The competition for our carbon capture and storage demonstration project is under way and the carbon abatement technologies demonstration programme is supporting an oxyfuel project and a new call for project proposals which will be announced this year. There is also...

Energy: Clean Coal Technology (21 May 2008)

Lord Jones of Birmingham: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Ezra, for mentioning that coal has an enormous role to play as part of the mixed bag of fuel that will be used this century for energy generation across the world. As he will know, Kingsnorth power station, a coal burner, is going to proceed here in Britain. He also mentioned the Middle East. As chairman of UK Trade & Investment, I was in...

Energy: Clean Coal Technology (21 May 2008)

Lord Jones of Birmingham: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Jenkin, raises a valid point about hypothecation. It is very easy for Abu Dhabi to hypothecate when they provide something like 20 per cent of the world's fossil fuel revenues and have little call on that money. Here, the money goes into the Treasury and is used to promote so many different initiatives. But the noble Lord is not exactly accurate when he says...