Dr Luke Evans

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I will speak to the amendments, starting with amendments 1 and 7, and take a canter through my position, as my constituents will have an interest in that. My right hon. Friend the Member for Beverley and Holderness (Graham Stuart) asked the important question why. Amendments 1 and 7 try to address the most important issue: context. As my right hon. Friend the Member for New Forest East (Sir Julian Lewis) pointed out, our signing this deal does not make sense. The Government have been weak in presenting the evidence for why they think we should sign the deal. I wrote to the Government to ask them to explain, and I was able to pull their response apart on Second Reading, one step at a time, explaining why their reasons do not fit. Context is really important. I thought that the deal did not make sense, but factoring in the collapsed spy trial, the billion pounds provided to the steel factories, the pending decision on the embassy—yes, maybe no—and the change in the language used around the subject of China, we need to get to the heart of what is going on. The amendments are an attempt to do that in the name of transparency, which is hugely important.

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