Dear Constituent

Many of you will be sharing my horror at events in Ukraine. The daily scenes of death and destruction, of mass movements of people fleeing the violence are harrowing. They are a constant reminder of why war is wrong. They are what happens when politics and negotiation fail.

Some of you write wanting the U.K. to enforce a no fly zone over Ukraine to stop aerial bombing. This  would mean declaring war on Russia, as a no fly zone would require contesting Ukrainian air  space with the Russians. Escalating the war in this way would be full of hazards. Nuclear powers  taking each other on requires restraint by both sides over first use of nuclear weapons. NATO could of course defeat Russia at likely great cost to life and property but the U.K. alone would be stretched. Our allies led by the USA  do not want to take  NATO to war with Russia over Ukraine. A successful No fly zone after a bruising set of air battles would not end the ground artillery and missiles raining down on Ukraine unless a victorious NATO airforce went on to bomb Russian forces in difficult urban locations with likely deaths of the very people we wish to help.

Some of you wish to see more rich Russians in the U.K. sanctioned, with confiscation of assets. Ministers  are keen to do this to all cronies of Putin who might still have some influence  over him, and to those who came by their wealth through crime.  They do need to proceed according to the rule of law. Many rich Russians living peacefully in the U.K. are neither Putin supporters nor criminals. The government should sanction those where they have a good legal case against them. This can take time to research and establish.

Some of you want a generous offer to those fleeing the violence. The government is expediting entry to the U.K. to those with family here who wish to come to stay. The needs and wishes of the hundreds of thousands crossing into Poland and Romania is to be housed and fed  near to Ukraine with a view to returning to their homes as soon as possible. Many are women and children temporarily separated from their menfolk who have stayed at home to fight. The U.K. is offering substantial financial and practical aid to assist with the temporary camps. The U.K. will keep its support under review as the situation develops as needs and wishes may change.

The U.K. did lead a stronger response from NATO with deliveries of weapons to help defend Ukraine before others and by working with US Intelligence to reveal the true nature of Putin’s plans to encourage preparation against the onslaught. The U.K. is striving to do all it can as a good ally short of declaring war to pressurise Russia to end the violence and helping brave Ukrainian defenders hold off the attacks.

Yours sincerely

John Redwood

Constituents have asked how they can donate to the humanitarian effort in Ukraine. I’ve been informed that the Disasters Emergency Committee (DEC) has launched its Ukraine Humanitarian Appeal. The UK Government will match pound-for-pound the public’s first £20 million and look to increase over time.

https://www.dec.org.uk/appeal/ukraine-humanitarian-appeal

It is wrong that the U.K. is importing Russian Gas by LNG carrier. It means more CO 2 is generated than burning home  produced gas. It means Russia gets huge tax revenues that the U.K. would reap on home gas. It means we miss out on more better paid jobs. It means we finance Russia’s thug wars.

It is wrong that the U.K. continues to import wood from North America to burn in the Drax biomass power station. We should growing more of our own timber to stoke the fires at Drax.

It is wrong  that we are importing electricity from a European continent short  of energy and dependent on Russian gas and coal for some of its generation.  We should generate our own using U.K. fuels or renewables.

So why are we undermining our national resilience? Why are we making U.K. consumers pay even higher prices to cover the  extreme  costs of imports at current spot prices? Why are we creating more global CO2 with this import based system?

Part of the answer seems to be the civil service and some Ministers’ passion to get the U.K. count of CO 2 produced down. The  way they count it if we import fossil fuel or products made with fossil fuel is the  CO 2 generated counts against the  exporting  country and does not add to our total. Yet the world ends up with more CO 2. Time to account for all the CO 2 to weight decisions back in favour of domestic energy and production.

Rt Hon Sir John Redwood (Wokingham) (Con): To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what proportion of covid-19 test kits are imported.

Maggie Throup, Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for the Department of Health and Social Care: Currently 90% of lateral flow device tests are imported although we expect this to decrease to approximately 70 to 80%.

Rt Hon Sir John Redwood MP (Wokingham) (Con): To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what progress he is making on improving air extraction, air filtration and UV cleaning in NHS properties.

Edward Argar, Minister of State at Department of Health and Social Care: The ‘Health Technical memorandum – Specialised ventilation for healthcare buildings (HTM 03-01)’ was issued on 22 June 2021, which includes updates guidance on ventilation to manage infection risks and the technology available. The guidance is available at the following link:

https://www.england.nhs.uk/publication/specialised-ventilation-for-healthcare-buildings/

All trusts must have an Authorising Engineer (Ventilation) designated by the trust management to provide independent auditing and advice on ventilation systems, to review documentation on verification and validation and witness the process as necessary.

In April 2021, updated guidance on the cleaning of National Health Service facilities was provided in ‘National standards of healthcare cleanliness 2021’, which is available at the following link:

https://www.england.nhs.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/B0271-national-standards-of-healthcare-cleanliness-2021.pdf

While ultraviolet (UV) cleaning has been considered, it does not replace the need to physically clean the environment and therefore it has not been recommended instead of physical cleaning. In addition, it cannot be used in occupied rooms, therefore its applicability in an operational healthcare environment is challenging. However, we understand that some NHS trusts deploy UV cleaning based on local cleaning needs. As new research and technology becomes available, the NHS will update existing or provide additional guidance.