• This Conservative Government has risen to challenges with no precedent in recent history – leading the response to Putin’s attack on Ukraine and protecting lives and livelihoods in the battle against Covid – but these events have caused huge disruptions to the global economy.
• The Queen’s Speech set out 38 new bills to deliver on the United Kingdom’s top priorities, including easing the cost of living and growing our economy, cutting crime and supporting communities, clearing the Covid backlogs, and providing the leadership needed in the years ahead.
• The Conservative Government is building on the work it has done so far, delivering on its manifesto promises, focusing on the British peoples’ priorities, making the most of our Brexit freedoms and getting the country back on track.

Rebecca Harris has welcomed the Queen’s Speech 2022 – setting out the Conservative Government’s legislative agenda to grow and strengthen the economy and help ease the cost of living for families across Castle Point.

The Queen’s Speech sets out how the Conservative Government will seize Brexit freedoms to best grow the economy and support British business – creating the economic strength and prosperity needed to ease cost of living pressures and help people into high-skilled and well-paid jobs.

Measures set out today to help grow the economy and boost living standards include the landmark Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill, shifting power to local leaders to regenerate their towns and cities; the Energy Security Bill, delivering a more secure, homegrown and cheaper energy network; the Social Housing Regulation Bill, ensuring better quality homes meaning renters are not saddled with the cost and worry of unsafe homes; and the Schools Bill, raising standards for students, reforming funding and encouraging attendance.

The Conservative Government also set out how they will be using Brexit freedoms to grow and strengthen the economy, using the Brexit Freedoms Bill to give greater control over UK laws that best deliver for the British people.

Further Brexit freedoms includes the Financial Services and Markets Bill, enhancing the global leadership of the UK’s financial services sector, and the Trade (Australia and New Zealand) Bill, implementing new Free Trade Agreements as Global Britain.

Further delivering on the Conservative Government’s pledge to put 20,000 more police officers on our streets to keep our communities safer – the Queen’s Speech outlines how the Conservative Government is going further to cut crime. The promised Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency Bill will bear down on criminals and kleptocrats who abuse our economy whilst the Public Order Bill will give the police new powers to keep our street safer.

This legislative agenda builds on the Conservative Government’s commitment to fund our NHS and clear the Covid backlogs – investing a record £36 billion and recruiting an additional 27,000 nurses to provide the NHS with the funding and resources it needs.

Commenting, Rebecca Harris MP said:

“It is the central mission of this Conservative Government to deliver on the priorities of the British people – providing the framework for the economy to prosper, supporting families with the cost of living.

“That is why I was pleased to see this new agenda, showing how we will strengthen our economy, regenerate towns and cities, support people into high-skill and well-paid work, seize Brexit freedoms to deliver for British businesses and cut red tape within our public services to deliver value for money for taxpayers.

“This Queen’s Speech addresses costs of living pressures and goes further to support long-term growth in our economy, increases safety across communities and spreads opportunity across the UK.”

Queen’s Speech 2022:

We are growing the economy to address the cost of living and improve living standards by:

• Providing £22 billion of support to help families to tackle the global cost of living increase, easing costs for households.
• Supporting people into high-skilled and well-paid jobs through our multi-billion pound Plan For Jobs, giving thousands of people the security of a job.
• Levelling up and regenerating our towns and cities through our landmark Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill, shifting power to local leaders.
• Reforming our higher education system through our Higher Education Bill, raising education standards and increasing fairness within the system.
• Introducing our Energy Security Bill, delivering a more secure and homegrown energy system that is more affordable and cleaner, cutting costs for families.
• Modernising our business rates system through our Non-Domestic Rating Bill, increasing fairness for business owners.
• Improving tenants’ rights through our Social Housing Regulation Bill, ensuring better quality and safer homes.
• Introducing our Social Security Bill, allowing more people nearing the end of their life to get fast-tracked access to key disability benefits.
• Enabling the sale of Channel 4 through our Media Bill, strengthening the UK’s system of public service broadcasting.
• Putting Great British Railways on a statutory footing through our Transport Bill, making our transport system more reliable and efficient for passengers.
• Introducing our UK Infrastructure Bank Bill, giving the Infrastructure Bank powers to target regional and local growth through vital funding.
• To further support our recovery from the pandemic and offer long-term solutions to cost of living pressures, we are going further by introducing:
  • A Product Security and Telecommunications Infrastructure Bill, which will improve cyber resilience of smart devices and digital connectivity across the UK.
  • An Electronic Trade Documents Bill, which will give electronic trade documents the same legal standing as paper equivalents.
  • A Harbours (Seafarers’ Renumeration) Bill, which will close loopholes that allow ferry operators not to pay their workers the national minimum wage.
  • A draft Audit Reform Bill, which will reform and strengthen the UK’s audits and corporate reporting system.
  • A draft Digital Markets, Competition and Consumer Bill, which will promote fair competition in digital markets and modernise the UK’s competition and consumer protection regimes.

We are using our Brexit freedoms to grow our economy, ease cost of living pressures and support British business by:

• Seizing our Brexit freedoms through our Brexit Freedoms Bill, putting us in control of our own laws which best deliver for the UK.
• Introducing our Financial Services and Markets Bill, delivering our post-Brexit financial services and enhancing our global leadership.
• Improving our procurement regime through our Procurement Bill, providing new opportunities for smaller businesses.
• Strengthening our school system through our Schools Bill, raising standards for students, reforming funding and encouraging attendance.
• Introducing our Trade (Australia and New Zealand) Bill, implementing our Free Trade Agreements as we strike out as Global Britain.
• We are taking advantage of our Brexit freedoms by introducing legislation which best delivers for the country’s needs, including:
  • A Data Reform Bill, which updates and reforms the UK’s data protection framework, reducing the burden on business and fostering innovation.
  • A Genetic Technology (Precision Breeding) Bill, which will reform the regulation of genetically modified organisms to unlock the potential of gene-edited products in farming.

We are making streets safer and cutting crime by:

• Recruiting 20,000 new police officers, helping to keep our streets safe.
• Enshrining the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts (PCSC) Act into law, keeping dangerous offenders behind bars for longer.
• Supporting our police officers further through our Public Order Bill, giving the police new powers to keep our streets safer.
• Introducing our Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency Bill, bearing down on criminals and kleptocrats who abuse our economy.
• Bringing forward a Draft Victims Bill, strengthening rights for victims by placing the new Victims’ Code on a statutory footing.
• Strengthening our approach to modern slavery through our Modern Slavery Bill, protecting human trafficking victims.
• Introducing our National Security Bill to further protect our national security and the safety of the British public, supporting our security services.
• Carrying our Online Safety Bill over from the previous session to improve safety online, making the UK the safest place in the world to be online.
• Bringing forward a Draft Protect Duty Bill, enhancing national security and reducing the risk terrorism poses to the public.

We are funding our NHS to clear the Covid backlogs by:

• Following the unprecedented challenges placed on the NHS by Covid-19, we are investing £36 billion as we clear the backlogs.
• Delivering the biggest and fastest NHS vaccination programme in the NHS’ history, saving countless lives and enabling us to learn to live with COVID-19.
• Recruiting an additional 27,000 nurses and investing £1.5 billion to create an additional 50 million GP appointments, tackling the backlogs.
• Bringing forward our draft Mental Health Act Reform Bill, putting patients and the centre of mental health services.

We are providing the leadership needed in challenging times by:

• Championing security around the world, working closely with our international allies to maintain a united NATO.
• Introducing our Boycotts, Divestment and Sanctions Bill, ensuring our foreign policy is cohesive across the country.
• Introducing our Bill of Rights, ensuring our human rights framework meets the needs of the British people.
• Introducing our Identity and Language (Northern Ireland) Bill, balancing the measures negotiated under the New Decade, New Approach deal.
• Fulfilling our manifesto pledge and introducing our Northern Ireland Troubles (Legacy & Reconciliation) Bill, committing to providing better outcomes for victims and veterans.
• Banning conversion therapy through our Conversion Therapy Bill, stamping out practices which intend to change an individual’s sexual orientation.

You can view the Queen’s Speech 2022 in full here and you can also view briefing notes on the announcements made in the Queen’s Speech here.