Perran Moon

Meur ras, Mr Twigg. It is an honour to serve again under your chairship. I invite Members to use their imagination and picture me as an 11-year-old tearaway on Sunday 20 December 1981, walking down Causewayhead in Penzance. We had had a storm the night before, but everything seemed very still the day after it, and I remember seeing a grown man crying for the first time ever. I knew something terrible had happened. It was not until we went to school the week after that I learned of the Penlee lifeboat disaster, in which the eight crew of the Solomon Browne had perished, along with the eight people on board the Union Star. That disaster had a profound effect on me, but it also had a big impact on lots of my friends. Over the next few weeks, we learned who those eight men on the Solomon Browne were and where they lived in our communities. We also learned about the work of the RNLI. Even to this day, at the end of December in the village of Mousehole, the lights are dimmed to remember the crew of the Solomon Browne. We not only learned who they were and what they did, but that the RNLI does not differentiate according to the colour of a person’s skin, or their creed; it goes out to help anyone in peril on the sea. People who live in coastal communities see the RNLI saving lives on a weekly basis. Across these British Isles its volunteers save thousands of lives every year. I have nothing but the highest, deepest admiration for these volunteers. They will always have my unequivocal support. Those volunteers are truly the best of British. Those who abuse and bully those volunteers are, without a shadow of a doubt, the worst of British. They are not patriots. I ask the Minister: what powers can be used to punish those who abuse our heroes—the heroes who week in, week out think not of their own safety, but go out to sea to save people in trouble? The RNLI volunteers act selflessly when we need them to protect us; at this time, we need to do all we can to protect them.