Extract from Commons
statement on Women’s Suffrage Centenary
(Walthamstow)
(Lab/Co-op): May I join the Minister in calling out
controlling and misogynistic language—trying to shout women down
in public life? We must learn the lesson that the suffragettes
taught all of us: it is deeds, not words, that we are here to
give. Will she join those of us calling out the Sierra Leonean
politicians using female genital mutilation as an election pledge
and standing with the women whose voices can no longer be heard,
such as Michelle Samaraweera, whose rapist and murderer still
sits free in India despite the Government asking for his
extradition eight years ago? Madeleine Albright told us that
there was a special place in hell for women who do not help other
women. Let us use our platform to speak for women who cannot yet
speak out and show the difference it makes.
The Minister for Women and Equalities (Amber
Rudd): I thank the hon. Lady for raising that point, and
I completely share her view. This Government, with cross-party
support, have done much to ensure that we address female genital
mutilation in this country and that, where we think girls are
being taken abroad, the Border Force is trained to make sure that
it looks after this issue. But there is no room to stop on that
sort of action and I share her view. The idea of using female
genital mutilation as an election pledge is just disgusting and
disgraceful.
Extract from
Westminster Hall debate on International Disaster
Relief
The Minister for the Middle East (Alistair
Burt):...Since the Asian tsunami in 2004, DFID has
mounted more than 30 humanitarian responses to both natural
disasters and conflicts, including earthquakes in Nepal, Haiti,
Pakistan and Indonesia, floods in India and the Balkans, hurricanes in
Bangladesh, Burma, the Philippines and the Caribbean, conflicts
in Yemen, South Sudan and Syria, and the Ebola outbreak in west
Africa. DFID responds widely across an unstable world...
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