Results 161–180 of 1551 for speaker:Geoffrey Robinson

Public Bill Committee: Taxation of Pensions Bill: Examination of Witnesses (11 Nov 2014)

Geoffrey Robinson: So perhaps we may say that all is set for another unpleasant set of disillusions among your customers.

Public Bill Committee: Taxation of Pensions Bill: Examination of Witnesses (11 Nov 2014)

Geoffrey Robinson: I will be very brief. Two of the witnesses sound a bit like Pontius Pilate—that is how it comes over. You have tried to use all your encouragement  and all your persuasive powers to get people to take legal advice. Only 3% take it, and you say, “Up to you.” It sounds slightly as though we are entering an area where you are saying, “Okay, it’s up to you. We are not responsible. We...

Public Bill Committee: Taxation of Pensions Bill: Examination of Witnesses (11 Nov 2014)

Geoffrey Robinson: Perish the thought!

Public Bill Committee: Taxation of Pensions Bill: Examination of Witnesses (11 Nov 2014)

Geoffrey Robinson: That provides a measure of reassurance.

Public Bill Committee: Taxation of Pensions Bill: Examination of Witnesses (11 Nov 2014)

Geoffrey Robinson: I was interested to hear Mr Boulding and others on the panel say that one of the problems is the response. It comes back to engagement and the ability to communicate with your customers clearly and in such a way that people feel inclined to respond. I can sense the difficulty you have. You really seem to have given up on it a bit, as though there is nothing more you can do than send round...

Public Bill Committee: Taxation of Pensions Bill: Examination of Witnesses (11 Nov 2014)

Geoffrey Robinson: I am very relieved to hear that. The effect of this Bill in general is going to be a much greater devolution of responsibility, decision making and flexibility on the customer, is it not? Unless you take corresponding steps to ensure that engagement actually takes place, we are going to have another big mess on our hands, so I urge you to do exactly what you are saying and perhaps even to...

Public Bill Committee: Taxation of Pensions Bill: Examination of Witnesses (11 Nov 2014)

Geoffrey Robinson: Absolutely, but I hope your helpline works better than most helplines do. Frankly, you get shunted from pillar to post on these helplines, particularly Government ones—it is impossible. If you are going to do it, make sure it works—that people get through and you have enough advisers. It is an investment now that will pay back later. Otherwise, as I say, we are heading for great...

Oral Answers to Questions — Communities and Local Government: EU Budget (Surcharge) (10 Nov 2014)

Geoffrey Robinson: Can the Chancellor explain why the EU Commissioner said on 27 October that the UK would benefit in any event from the rebate that was due? Also—this is at the heart of the problem—what evidence does the right hon. Gentleman have to suggest to the House, other than in a gross act of deception worthy more of Goebbels than of the British Chancellor of the Exchequer—

Oral Answers to Questions — Communities and Local Government: EU Budget (Surcharge) (10 Nov 2014)

Geoffrey Robinson: I am happy to withdraw it, Mr Speaker; it was meant in a light-hearted manner.

Oral Answers to Questions — Communities and Local Government: Localism (10 Nov 2014)

Geoffrey Robinson: Is the Secretary of State aware that localism is not much help when the most important project in Coventry, the Gateway project, is called in and then the decision is delayed? An answer was expected in December, but it has been delayed to January and then to the end of January. Will he tell us when he will make a decision?

General Practices (Coventry) (30 Oct 2014)

Geoffrey Robinson: We are greatly reassured by the Minister and agree with what he said. Will he confirm the figure—I was quite surprised to discover it—that at least 90% of all initial contacts with the NHS are through primary services? As he rightly says, it is mainly GPs, but chemists and others, too. Is the 90% figure correct?

General Practices (Coventry) (30 Oct 2014)

Geoffrey Robinson: My hon. Friend and I are very reassured by what the Minister has said. As for the numbers—which, of course, we always have to plan for—does the increase of 5,000 by 2020 mean an increase in the total number of doctors, or an increase in the number of GPs? Will that be enough, given that 10,000 doctors will retire from general practice alone in the next five years? Does the 5,000 figure...

General Practices (Coventry) (30 Oct 2014)

Geoffrey Robinson: This debate might not be as lively as the debate on post offices in May, when we also had the pleasure and privilege to have you presiding over us, Madam Deputy Speaker. Nevertheless, we have an important topic to debate and I am pleased that the Under-Secretary of State for Health, the hon. Member for Central Suffolk and North Ipswich (Dr Poulter) is ready to respond, because we have one or...

General Practices (Coventry) (30 Oct 2014)

Geoffrey Robinson: I am very grateful to my hon. Friend for his intervention. Some 10,000 GPs—I am sure these figures are well researched by Deloitte—have expressed an intention to retire in the next five years. That is 2,000 a year, and Labour is promising to increase the number of GPs by 8,000. We will therefore need considerably more than that just to remain where we are now. What are the projections for...

Backbench Business: Oral Hormone Pregnancy Tests (23 Oct 2014)

Geoffrey Robinson: I apologise for not being in my place for the Minister’s opening remarks. The news that the Minister has just announced is very encouraging and will help to bring closure and reassurance. I am sure that no Member, including my hon. Friend the Member for Bolton South East (Yasmin Qureshi), will want to press the motion to a Division now. I thank the Minister for his reply and the positive...

Backbench Business: Oral Hormone Pregnancy Tests (23 Oct 2014)

Geoffrey Robinson: I have been briefed fully by campaigners outside this House. Marie Lyon, whose daughter was born with a very foreshortened arm, came to see me with her husband yesterday. She has been indefatigable in her briefing of MPs and we should pay tribute to her for that.

Backbench Business: Oral Hormone Pregnancy Tests (23 Oct 2014)

Geoffrey Robinson: It is a pleasure to succeed the hon. Member for Aberconwy (Guto Bebb). I think that the whole House would like to congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Bolton South East (Yasmin Qureshi) on securing this debate and to commend the work that she and the hon. Member for Enfield North (Nick de Bois) have done. I thank the Backbench Business Committee for granting the debate. It is a...

Backbench Business: Sale of Puppies and Kittens ( 4 Sep 2014)

Geoffrey Robinson: I am pleased to be taking part in this debate. Like other Members, I would like first to congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent South (Robert Flello). He and the colleagues who have supported him so well have taken us into a most important debate. Clearly this matter strikes a chord across the country. If I heard my hon. Friend the Member for Hayes and Harlington (John...

Backbench Business: Sale of Puppies and Kittens ( 4 Sep 2014)

Geoffrey Robinson: I thank the right hon. Gentleman for that intervention. It is very welcome, coming as it does from such a distinguished intellectual quarter of the Conservative party. It was up to his usual high intellectual standard. Joy Yeates then urged me to attend this debate. I am pleased to be here and to give the point of view of those who want practical steps to be taken. Although he is not present,...

Oral Answers to Questions — Treasury: Child Sex Abuse (Rotherham) ( 2 Sep 2014)

Geoffrey Robinson: Although we urge on the Home Secretary the need to get the overarching review under way—the names and all that—we already have Professor Jay’s report. We can learn from the dreadful experience of Daniel Pelka in Coventry, of which the Home Secretary is aware, and we had a report on that. We are not short of reports or action plans for local safeguarding boards, but what we need is a...


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