House of Commons

Monday 23rd June 2014 Commons Chamber

Monday 23 June 2014

The House met at half-past Two o’clock

Prayers

Monday 23rd June 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker in the Chair]

Oral Answers to Questions

Monday 23rd June 2014 Commons Chamber

The Secretary of State was asked—

[Rosie Cooper (West Lancashire) (Lab)]

1. What steps he is taking to improve the administration of the work capability assessment.

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Mike Penning)]

I am committed to continually improving the administration of the work capability assessment. I am pleased to say that since the announcement in the House during our last Question Time, the backlog has fallen from 766,000 to 712,000.

[Rosie Cooper]

On 10 June, the Minister admitted to the Select Committee that 712,000 work capability assessments were outstanding. That number includes 234 recipients of incapacity benefit who are to be assessed for employment and support allowance, and 84,000 incapacity benefit recipients who have not yet been migrated. My constituents would like to know who is at fault, Atos or the Minister.

[Mike Penning]

When the coalition Government came to office, the WCA backlog did not suddenly happen; the problem already existed. However, we take responsibility for what we are doing. [Interruption.] There is no point in Labour Members’ shouting us down. They have short memories, but their backlog existed. If they do not wish to admit that, perhaps we can see the documents, which will enable us to know the facts. We have carried out 1 million incapacity benefit assessments, and 700,000 people are currently being helped into work or are looking for work.

[Mr Julian Brazier (Canterbury) (Con)]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that it would have been cynical if we had simply turned our back on all the existing claimants and not considered them too? That, of course, has been the cause of much of the backlog.

[Mike Penning]

I entirely agree. If we had not assessed those 1 million incapacity benefit recipients, those people would have been left, as the Labour party left them for 13 years. At least they now have an opportunity to look for work, and those who are not capable of going to work, or seeking work, are receiving the assistance that they require.

[Pat Glass (North West Durham) (Lab)]

22. Leaked memos reported by the BBC on Friday show that ESA is one of the largest fiscal risks that the Government currently face. What is the Minister going to do about that?

[Mike Penning]

No Government of any description talk about leaked documents, but I can say that the information in that document was not new. I had released most of it earlier, and I believe that the BBC worked up the story for its own benefit.

[Charlie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)]

The Minister said that the WCA problems were long-standing. Is there a process whereby the last Government’s figures could be made available to the House? Who entered into the Atos contract?

[Mike Penning]

There is no doubt that the Atos contract was taken out by the last Labour Administration. I would love to know exactly what the backlog was, but, as an incoming Minister, I am not allowed to see the figures. Perhaps Her Majesty’s Opposition would be happy to release them. If those documents were published, we would all know exactly what the backlog was before the present Administration came to power.

[Dame Anne Begg (Aberdeen South) (Lab)]

The backlog does not involve only ESA. There are also huge backlogs of decisions relating to personal independence payments and universal credit. Only 7,000 universal credit claimants have been dealt with, although at this stage the number should be about 1 million. In comparison with figures such as those, the passport fiasco pales into insignificance. Does the Minister not think that his Department has bitten off far more than it can chew?

[Mike Penning]

No, I do not. As the Chair of the Select Committee knows, there is no universal credit backlog, so her statement about that is not particularly helpful. I think that we need to concentrate on ensuring that benefits go to the people who deserve them. That is what is most important.

[Andrew Bridgen (North West Leicestershire) (Con)]

Can the Minister confirm that Atos Healthcare will not receive one penny of compensation from the taxpayer for the early termination of its contract?

[Mike Penning]

There is no doubt that the contract was taken out by the last Labour Administration. Her Majesty’s Opposition called for me to sack Atos. If we had done so, we would have had to pay it a huge amount of compensation, but, instead, it will pay substantial damages to the Government when the contract is terminated.

[Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab)]

20. Judge Robert Martin has said that Her Majesty’s Courts and Tribunals Service has seen a huge reduction in the number of work capability assessment appeals, not because of the quality of decisions, but because of the huge backlog and the quality of the service that is being provided.

[Mike Penning]

I am afraid that that is factually incorrect. I read Judge Martin’s comments, and I do not think that that is quite what he said. There has been a reduction of more than 80% in the number of people who are appealing. That is because better decisions are being made, which is right and proper for everyone.

[Stephen Timms (East Ham) (Lab)]

It is high time that Ministers took responsibility for their failings. It was their decision, after the election, to migrate all recipients of incapacity benefit to employment and support allowance. That was the decision that triggered the delays and backlogs about which we have heard. Now, the memos that were leaked last week have revealed that ESA

“is not delivering more positive outcomes for claimants”

than incapacity benefit did, and the Work programme has proved hopeless, with a 94% failure rate. How long will Ministers allow this shambles to continue?

[Mike Penning]

Clearly Her Majesty’s Opposition have a short memory as to what happened when they were in government. This problem started under Labour, Atos was in place under Labour—[Interruption.] Opposition Front Benchers are saying “No, not us”; then they should release the documentation that proves what the backlog was before the last election.

[Ann McKechin (Glasgow North) (Lab)]

2. What steps he is taking to improve the claims and decision-making process for personal independence payments.

[Fiona O'Donnell (East Lothian) (Lab)]

12. What steps he is taking to improve the claims and decision- making process for personal independence payments.

[Nick Smith (Blaenau Gwent) (Lab)]

16. What steps he is taking to improve the claims and decision-making process for personal independence payments.

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Mike Penning)]

Yet again I am committed to improving our performance and that of our contract providers. I want to make sure the right decisions are made as soon as possible. With that in mind, I have looked, particularly working with Macmillan, at how we can reduce waiting times for terminally ill people waiting for PIP. That stood at 28 days when I first met the Work and Pensions Committee, and I said that was unacceptable. It is inside 10 days now, and I want it to become lower.

[Ann McKechin]

As the Minister of State is aware, by his own Department’s statistics it will take 42 years to clear the current backlog. In the meantime people are running out money, and they are becoming more stressed and more ill as a result of his Department’s failure to get a grip on a payment which his Government introduced. When will the backlogs be reduced to a decent level, as people have a right to entitlements in this country?

[Mike Penning]

It is really important that we get the decisions right and that the right people get those payments. I said before the Select Committee that I promise to do that within my own Department’s administration, and we are addressing that. There was a real performance issue as to how many people were coming through the schemes. I am addressing that now with the providers, and it will improve, and not in the length of time the hon. Lady mentions, which is scaremongering.

[Fiona O'Donnell]

An awareness campaign last week by the MND Association and MND Scotland informed us that about half of people diagnosed with motor neurone disease die before 14 months. They do not fit into the Minister’s definition of “terminally ill”, so how long does he think those people should wait for their claim to be assessed?

[Mike Penning]

Now I have addressed the issue of the terminally ill, we are particularly addressing progressive illnesses. We want to look at that very quickly. As soon as we can get that situation addressed, I will come before this House and say so, but the priority must be that the people who need it get it, and the people who do not need it, do not get it.

[Nick Smith]

Some Blaenau Gwent constituents have waited months and months for assessment. Why did the Minister’s Department not properly pilot what has become this fiasco?

[Mike Penning]

It is interesting that yet again a Labour Member uses the word “fiasco”, and I know the Public Accounts Committee Chairman, the right hon. Member for Barking (Margaret Hodge), made a similar comment. It was not actually in the PAC report, however, so this was a made-up comment that was not in the report. [Interruption.] Well, it was not in the report, and how on earth can we be talking about something that was not in the report? At the end of the day, we need to make sure we address this situation. I have admitted that the waiting time is too long, and we will get it down. We will do something about it; the previous Administration did not do so.

[Duncan Hames (Chippenham) (LD)]

I was recently able to inform a constituent that they were about to receive a cheque for over £5,000—welcome news until we realise it is an arrears payment for a personal independence payment claim submitted some 300 days earlier. The Minister tells us he is addressing the matter; what is he doing to stop disabled people being out of pocket by so much for so long?

[Mike Penning]

What we are doing is making sure we speed up the process on our side and the contractors doing the assessments speed up their side. As I have said before, if necessary there will be a cash incentive for them to make sure that they deliver, which will be paid only when they deliver faster.

[Miss Anne McIntosh (Thirsk and Malton) (Con)]

I congratulate my right hon. Friend on reducing the time taken to handle these claims, but what is he doing to reduce the time taken for the appeals mechanism procedure, so that that part can be speeded up as well?

[Mike Penning]

The appeals process is a matter for my colleagues at the Ministry of Justice, and I intend to write to them today, but fewer people are going to appeal, particularly on PIP—it is much lower than predicted—and there has been more than an 80% reduction on work capability assessment. There is more to be done, but if the judges have less work to do on appeals, I will be very happy about that.

[Nigel Mills (Amber Valley) (Con)]

I also welcome the improvement in the process. What lessons have the Government learned for rolling out other new assessment schemes, perhaps including a replacement for Atos in respect of WCA?

[Mike Penning]

One of the things we will look at very carefully is making sure that the contract bids are judged not just on the lowest price, but on whether the contractor can produce the capacity that is required. That is exactly what we are doing; when we release a new contract, we look at whether the contractor has the capacity and the skills to produce quality decisions.

[Mr Frank Field (Birkenhead) (Lab)]

What is the Government’s target for how long people will have to wait for these benefits by the time of the next general election? As the Minister tries to restore order from this chaos, will he be in a position soon to tell those in the queue how much longer they will have to wait?

[Mike Penning]

One of the things we are trying to do is communicate much better with people who are waiting, which is the most important thing we can do. What we do not want to do is build up promises, so that people think they will be assessed quicker than they will be. On PIP in particular, we will make sure that the providers are doing the job we are asking them to do, and that we are acting as fast as we can and taking the correct decisions. On the first point, I cannot give a time scale at this time, and it would be wrong for any Minister to stand before the House and do so.

[Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)]

The Government did not bother to pilot PIP properly, Atos made misleading statements in its bid, Ministers have presided over a 42-year backlog in cases, and each decision costs £1,500—more than the benefit of some £1,120 that many receive. Reassessments have had to be postponed while sick and disabled people wait for a decision, including cancer patients, who according to Macmillan are experiencing anxiety, financial worries and worsening health. Is it not time that the Minister acknowledged that it is another catalogue of DWP chaos and that the £1 billion savings promised by 2015 will not be achieved, while sick and disabled people are living with the worry and hardship that he has caused?

[Mike Penning]

I do not accept many of the points that the hon. Lady makes, but what I do accept is that it is unacceptable for people who are in desperate need to wait, which is why I acted with Macmillan really fast to bring the time down from 28 days to inside 10 days for people with terminal illness. We are now looking at the other cases and working with as many of the charity and other groups as we can to make sure that we get the figure down. If they work with us, we can work on this together. The Opposition keep moaning about the policy, but the previous Administration left people on the disability living allowance for years, with only 7% of them ever having a face-to-face assessment. That was an appalling situation.

[Mel Stride (Central Devon) (Con)]

3. What assessment he has made of recent trends in employment figures.

[Mr David Amess (Southend West) (Con)]

4. What assessment he has made of recent trends in employment figures.

[Oliver Colvile (Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport) (Con)]

15. What assessment he has made of recent trends in employment figures.

[The Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Mr Iain Duncan Smith)]

The recent trends are remarkable: there are more people in work than ever before, youth unemployment is down 91,000 since the election, the claimant count for 18 to 24 year-olds has fallen for 30 consecutive months, and we have seen the largest annual fall in long-term unemployment since late 1998. I also note that in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Central Devon (Mel Stride), the claimant count is down 33% and the youth claimant count is down 41%.

[Mel Stride]

As my right hon. Friend has pointed out, youth unemployment in my constituency is substantially down since the last election, not least due to his efforts to ensure that work always pays. However, does he agree with me that approaches to incentivising work are always best if they are universal, unlike the Opposition’s proposal for means-tested youth allowances, which would punish hard-working families and those people who do the right thing?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

Yes, the reality of what we have been trying to do is to make sure that people can get into the jobs that are available. What they do not need—and what is quite ridiculous about the Opposition’s proposal—is to try to take everybody who is below level 2 up to a level 3 qualification. Some people who do not even have a GCSE in maths, for example, are expected now to do training courses to take them to level 3 before they go into work. The reality is that we are getting them work-ready and giving them the training they need. That is why there are record employment levels of some 30.5 million, which beats what we were left by the last Government.

[Mr Amess]

Will my right hon. Friend join me in welcoming the 29% decrease in the number of 18 to 24-year-olds claiming jobseeker’s allowance in the constituency I represent, and does he agree that it is further evidence of the success of our long-term economic plan?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

It is worth noting that under the last Government, youth unemployment increased by nearly a half—up almost 300,000—and long-term youth unemployment increased by 74,000. Since then, excluding full-time students, youth unemployment has come down to 7.9%, which is the lowest figure since 2008. Youth unemployment is down 98,000 on the year, and down 91,000 since the election, and long-term youth unemployment is down 25,000 on the year. That is getting the job right.

[Oliver Colvile]

Plymouth, as my right hon. Friend knows, is a low-wage, low-skills economy. Does he support the Government’s proposal to give Plymouth the city deal for a marine energy park, which will create more than 10,000 new jobs and help provide jobs for the young unemployed?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I absolutely agree with that; it is the right thing to do and it shows how this Government are investing in providing in an area the right kind of jobs for the right kind of people. Even in a difficult area such as my hon. Friend’s, the claimant count is down by 27% and the youth claimant count is down by 30% on the year. This kind of investment helps us to get people into real jobs, not jobs subsidised by the Opposition’s proposals.

[Mr Dennis Skinner (Bolsover) (Lab)]

Is the Secretary of State aware that a disabled unpaid voluntary worker has been told by the Department for Work and Pensions that as from now she will be in the same category as part-time workers who have a job? Is this a way of padding out the number of people in employment?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I do not know what this case is, but if the hon. Gentleman would like to write to me about it, I will deal with it specifically—

[Mr Skinner]

I have done.

[Mr Duncan Smith]

Well, I have not seen the letter, but I will once I have ferreted it out. We are not padding anything out—we do not need to, because there are about 600,000 vacancies now in jobcentres up and down the country and we are doing our level best to help people of all descriptions, including those who have disabilities, most of whom would genuinely like to seek and find work. We are working with them to help them get the kind of job that can change their lives, rather than parking them for many years in a row, as Labour did.

[Lucy Powell (Manchester Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

With so many young people still in unemployment, especially long-term unemployment, does the Secretary of State not think it anomalous that young people can get support in higher education but not in further education?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

That is not true really, because young people can get help in further education. Under jobseeker’s allowance, traineeships allow up to 30 hours’ training per week—we have made that more generous, because under the previous Government the figure was only 16 hours. For others, two to eight weeks’ full-time training is allowed, depending on the duration of the jobseeker’s allowance. It is one thing to come up with a policy, but another to come up with a policy answering a question that nobody has ever asked.

[Hywel Williams (Arfon) (PC)]

Employment rates in Wales are about the same as elsewhere in the UK, which is very welcome, even if historically rather anomalous. However, we have a large number of people who are involuntarily employed part-time, because they cannot get the hours required. Is it fair or even reasonable for the Government to insist that people take on hours when those hours are just not available?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

The jobcentres do not force anybody to take on something that is not there; the jobcentres are working will all those individuals. I welcome the hon. Gentleman’s welcome for the figures from Wales, because it has been particularly successful, having had some very difficult times, particularly in the valleys. I welcome that improvement in employment. Jobseekers go to the advisers, who help them to find those jobs and take the hours that are available. No one will be punished or penalised for trying to take a job or for working with the advisers and only taking the jobs that are there.

[Stephen Mosley (City of Chester) (Con)]

6. What assessment he has made of the performance of Universal Jobmatch.

[The Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Mr Iain Duncan Smith)]

Universal Jobmatch revolutionises the way jobseekers look for work. Since it was launched in November 2012, we have seen 6.9 million jobseekers register on the site; 4.3 million average daily job searches; over 560,000 jobs available; and more than 550,000 companies set up an account. It has been a successful transformation.

[Stephen Mosley]

My right hon. Friend will be delighted to hear that more than 5,500 jobs within 5 miles of Chester are being advertised at the moment, which is a massive testament to the number of new jobs that have been created under this Government. However, Universal Jobmatch depends on accurate data, so what steps is he taking to ensure that all the jobs on the site are described accurately, are real and are available for jobseekers?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

We regularly talk to all the employers. New employers are seen by advisers in the jobcentres in the local area. Fraudulent jobs are rare on the site; it is estimated that fewer than 0.1% of these vacancies have been fraudulent since go-live, and those have been removed. We constantly monitor the Universal Jobmatch system and we crack down on abuse. In addition, employment advisers are meeting all those employers they are not aware of or who have just come up on the system for the first time.

[Sheila Gilmore (Edinburgh East) (Lab)]

The problem is that that is just not happening, and perhaps the Secretary of State should accept that. For example, I saw a job advertised in my constituency today for a care assistant in a care home that has just closed down. Jobs are being wrongly categorised. Among sales assistants, we find jobs for account executives, for which qualifications are needed. What exactly is happening with Universal Jobmatch?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

The problem is not what the hon. Lady describes. It is with Labour Members, who cannot bear the idea that, when they were in government, they had an archaic system that worked only from 8am to 6pm. Our system works for 24 hours. It works while people’s computers are shut down. It nominates jobs, and advisers can offer advice online. This is a major success story. The problem is that Labour does not get it. We are getting more people into work, higher levels of employment and falling levels of unemployment. In fact, we have some of the lowest levels in the European Union.

[Mark Lazarowicz (Edinburgh North and Leith) (Lab/Co-op)]

7. What recent progress he has made on the universal credit programme; and if he will make a statement.

[The Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Mr Iain Duncan Smith)]

Universal credit is on track to roll out against the timetable set out last year. The claimant commitment is in place across all jobcentres. Universal credit is live in 14 sites, and from today further expansion is under way across the north-west, with couples and families joining at a later stage. Based on the case load projections, there are, at the moment, around 11,000 people making those claims on universal credit.

[Mark Lazarowicz]

I am interested in the Secretary of State’s answer. In 2011 he announced that a million people would be claiming universal credit by April 2014, when the true figure was just 6,000. What went so badly wrong with his projections, and what are his current milestones for the delivery of universal credit?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I think I made that clear before, but I will repeat it again. Back in 2012, I was not happy with the plan for the roll-out, because it mirrored too much the roll-outs that used to happen under the previous Government—[Interruption.] We hit the bump. [Laughter.] It is interesting that Opposition Members sit there laughing, because I remember the tax credit fiasco. They launched tax credits and people suffered. People did not get their payments and were out of pocket. That has not happened with universal credit. In answer to the hon. Gentleman, I simply say that we deliberately set a pathfinder and we are expanding it now, with 90 new sites. Universal credit is rolling out carefully, and we are ensuring that all those who are eligible get the money that is due to them when it is due. It is not the disaster that we had under the previous Government.

[Sir Nick Harvey (North Devon) (LD)]

What progress is the Secretary of State making in his discussions with other Government Departments about the various forms of state support they give in the era of universal credit? I am thinking of free school meals, which could be considerably improved. Is the matter all sorted? If it is not, how is he getting on?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I believe it is getting sorted. Very soon, the Department for Education will be able to make announcements about its preferred options for universal credit, and we will be able to accommodate them regardless of what it asks for.

[Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)]

That is very interesting. In 2011, the then employment Minister, the right hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell (Chris Grayling), said that the Department would consult on new eligibility criteria for passported benefits such as free school meals

“in good time to take decisions to meet our overall timetable to introduce universal credit by October 2013.”—[Official Report, 7 November 2011; Vol. 535, c. 66W.]

The Schools Minister has only just admitted that it would cost an extra £750 million to give free school meals to the children of all those whom he eventually expects to be on universal credit. Can we clear this up this afternoon? Do the Government intend to give free school meals to everyone on universal credit, or do they intend to introduce a new means test for free school meals? If the Secretary of State cannot give a proper answer this afternoon, as I suspect from the way he is performing, will he at least tell us when he will make up his mind?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

It is interesting that the hon. Gentleman does this publicly—he was told the answer to this the other day when he came to my office to talk to me directly. Just in case he does not know how free school meals work, let me tell him that they are means-tested today: there is no change to that.

[Chris Bryant]

No, they are not.

[Mr Duncan Smith]

Yes, they are, because they are set against means-tested benefits. I wish the hon. Gentleman would get his facts right and learn something about the benefits system. We have a system that will enable us to deliver the free school meals to those who are eligible for them, and not to those who are not eligible for them. The reality is that the mess that the Opposition left us is being cleared up and they cannot bear it. They do not even know whether they support universal credit. They flip-flop more on every policy than any other Opposition ever have.

[Julie Elliott (Sunderland Central) (Lab)]

8. What estimate he has made of the number of people below the threshold for auto-enrolment in a workplace pension.

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Steve Webb)]

We estimate that around 2.7 million individuals, aged 22 to pension age, who have earnings below the earnings threshold for auto-enrolment are not saving in a qualifying workplace pension in the private sector. About 1.6 million of those individuals are earning between £5,772 and £10,000 and have the right to opt in. Employers must tell workers about this right.

[Julie Elliott]

I thank the Minister for that answer, but does he agree that it would be right to extend pension auto-enrolment to all low-paid workers who are missing out at the moment?

[Steve Webb]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady, but let me explain why I disagree with her. She would enrol people at, for example, £6,000 a year—that is the policy of the Labour Front-Bench team. At current contribution levels, someone earning £6,000 a year would be putting 8.8p a week into a pension. If they did that for 35 years, they would end up with a pension of £1.93 a week. That does not seem a sensible policy to me.

[Graham Jones (Hyndburn) (Lab)]

21. Does the Minister agree that the Government have stealthily been depriving more low-paid women of pension contributions every year? Is it not time that that was put right?

[Steve Webb]

No, on the contrary, the people we are excluding from auto-enrolment are those for whom we think the default should be not to save in a pension, because they will get a state pension typically of £7,500. If they are earning £6,000 now, should the Government take money out of their pay packet, when they are earning £6,000, to top up a pension of £7,500? That does not make any sense.

[David Mowat (Warrington South) (Con)]

The Pensions Minister has made some welcome changes to the way in which smaller pots will be managed, with aggregation, pensions following workers and so forth. If that works well, will there be scope in the future to review this limit?

[Steve Webb]

We are keen to avoid discrediting automatic enrolment with trivially small amounts of money. My hon. Friend can imagine the newspaper headlines if we had required a firm to set up a pension scheme so that the employee and employer combined put 8p a week into a pension. We would have been laughed out of court. We have reformed auto-enrolment, and it is going extremely well. It has a good, strong reputation, and I want to protect it.

[Gregg McClymont (Cumbernauld, Kilsyth and Kirkintilloch East) (Lab)]

What the Minister does not tell the House, of course, is that Library figures show that someone earning just below the raised threshold for auto-enrolment could save up to £20,000 over a working lifetime—quite a decent nest egg, I am sure that we would all agree. So why have the Government deliberately removed 1.5 million people—the majority of whom are low-paid women—from auto-enrolment? Although that sum is not enough to buy a Lamborghini, does the Minister agree that millions of people are losing out?

[Steve Webb]

On the contrary, the Pensions Commission—the hon. Gentleman often refers to the Pensions Commission, one of whose members is now a Labour peer—recommended that low earners needed an 80% replacement rate. Someone on the wage that he just gave gets an 80% replacement rate based on the state pension alone, so we are delivering—[Interruption.] That is after tax and national insurance. [Interruption.] They are paying national insurance at £10,000 a year, so they get about an 80% replacement rate without needing to be automatically enrolled. Setting up auto-enrolment for tiny amounts of saving is simply inappropriate.

[Mr Stephen Hepburn (Jarrow) (Lab)]

10. What assessment he has made of the effect of sanctions on claimants of jobseeker’s allowance.

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Esther McVey)]

Sanctions have always been part of the benefits system and are imposed only where claimants fail to meet reasonable requirements. Sanctions play an important role in encouraging compliance: 70% of claimants say that sanctions are useful for them to follow the rules.

[Mr Hepburn]

Can the Minister explain why more than 50% of benefit claimants in my constituency whose benefits have been sanctioned have had the decision overturned? In the meantime, they had to live for weeks on nothing—unlike that lot over there, who stuff their nests. Is it not true that this scheme is nothing more than a con? The Government say that they are cutting benefits. They are cutting benefits, but they are taking them off the most vulnerable people in the country and leaving them out for ever.

[Esther McVey]

There are a couple of points I need to answer, because what was said was inaccurate. The figure for the overturns is 10%, not the high number the hon. Gentleman alluded to. At the same time, people on sanctions are still on benefits and have an underlying qualification to them. The hon. Gentleman is incorrect. Perhaps he does not like the fact that the number of people in work has gone up significantly under this Government and the number needing to claim benefits has gone down significantly.

[Philip Davies (Shipley) (Con)]

Sanctions as a principle are a very fine part of the benefits system. May I urge the Minister to maintain a system of sanctions and not to listen to the Labour party? It is clear that it is the Conservative party that has become the party of labourers and that Labour is the party of layabouts.

[Esther McVey]

My hon. Friend makes a very good point. As I have said, sanctions have always been a part of the benefits system, because it is about compliance. I would welcome an announcement today from Opposition Front Benchers on whether they would remove sanctions. That would be very interesting.

[Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)]

11. If he will take steps to reduce (a) the number of benefit claimants who appeal against decisions and (b) the length of time it takes to have such appeals heard.

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Mike Penning)]

Appeals on all benefit decisions have dropped by 79% in the first quarter of this year compared with the same period last year. The introduction of mandatory reconsideration and the decision assurance call is having a positive impact.

[Mr Hollobone]

My right hon. Friend will be as concerned as I am that some of the waits for first-tier tribunal appeal hearings for Kettering constituents have been up to 40 weeks, which is more than twice the national average. What success is he having with the Ministry of Justice to get the appeal waiting times down?

[Mike Penning]

One of the first things we can do to get appeal waiting times down is to have fewer people needing to appeal. I accept that it is taking too long in Kettering and perhaps in other parts of the country. That is for another Department, but I will contact it today.

[Ian Lucas (Wrexham) (Lab)]

A constituent of mine has had an application for the personal independence payment refused—a decision that I regard as perverse. I wrote to the Minister personally to draw to his attention how bad the decision was, but received a reply from a civil servant. I wrote to the Minister because I thought he was interested in creating an efficient system. Will he please do me the courtesy of replying to my letter and addressing his mind to the case of my vulnerable constituent, who has been so badly affected?

[Mike Penning]

I have a personal policy that I write to all Members of Parliament—from both Houses—if they write to me. If a civil servant wrote back, that is wrong. I will reply and perhaps the hon. Gentleman would like to come to see me at his leisure to discuss his constituent’s case.

[David Rutley (Macclesfield) (Con)]

13. What assessment he has made of recent trends in employment in the private sector.

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Esther McVey)]

There are more people in private sector jobs than ever before, up more than 2 million since the 2010 election.

[David Rutley]

Given the strong growth in self-employment in recent years and innovative schemes such as the Pop-Up Business School, which has helped people in Macclesfield start their own business, what steps are the Government taking to encourage the unemployed actively to explore opportunities in self-employment?

[Esther McVey]

My hon. Friend, who is a Harvard graduate and has been a senior executive in many high-flying companies, has a huge interest in people setting up their own business. This Government introduced the new enterprise allowance, which has led to 2,000 people a month setting up new businesses. We have done videos with people such as Levi Roots to reach out into different communities, and the link-up, start-up programme enables employers to speak to people who hope to be able to set up their own business.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

What is the right hon. Lady doing about the trends that show that more and more people are working in small and medium-sized companies in the service sector, which demands high skills? What are we doing to equip young people in particular with the right skills for a good life in the future?

[Esther McVey]

I will be glad to answer that question for the hon. Gentleman. We are taking significant steps to allow more than 1 million young people to earn and learn through apprenticeships. Equally, through sector-based work academies, we are helping people to get a job and then to progress in that job. We have put in place work experience to help young people to find out what a business entails and then to get a job in it, so there is considerable support to get young people into work, which is why youth unemployment has fallen for nine consecutive months, with 100,000 fewer people in that group than at the election.

[Wayne David (Caerphilly) (Lab)]

How many people are now employed on zero-hours contracts?

[Esther McVey]

Roughly the same number who were employed on zero-hours contracts under the Labour Government in 2000. I know that Opposition Members like to say that the number has significantly increased, but I believe that they were taken to task for getting that information wrong. Local councils such as Doncaster, where the Leader of the Opposition resides, have the highest number of zero-hours contracts.

[Dr Julian Huppert (Cambridge) (LD)]

14. What assessment he has made of the effect on homelessness among under-35-year-olds of the extension of the shared accommodation rate.

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Steve Webb)]

The Department has commissioned an independent review of the changes to local housing allowance, including the extension of the shared accommodation rate. The final report of that review is due to be published this summer.

[Dr Huppert]

I thank my hon. Friend for that answer. The situation worries many of my constituents, and a recent study by Crisis showed that in many parts of the country such as Cambridge only a tiny fraction of shared houses are available for people to rent. When he considers the review, will he change the broad rental market areas and ensure that people can find somewhere to live if they wish to be in Cambridge, Blackpool or any other location?

[Steve Webb]

My hon. Friend has made repeated representations about the broad rental market area for his constituency. We have used targeted funding to provide additional local housing allowance rates in areas of pressure, so although the general increase in the LHA rate is 1%, four of the five LHA rates for Cambridge, including that for shared accommodation, increased this April by 4%.

[David Wright (Telford) (Lab)]

What specific meetings has the Minister had with his colleagues in government with responsibility for housing to discuss schemes such as foyer projects, which link training initiatives with housing and support for young people?

[Steve Webb]

The hon. Gentleman raises the valuable work of foyer projects. My noble Friend Lord Freud, the Minister for welfare reform, leads on housing benefit for the Department, and I will ensure that he is aware of those projects, if he has not already held specific meetings about them. If the hon. Gentleman would like to give us further details, we will be happy to look at them.

[Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)]

The under-35 shared accommodation rate is a particular problem for fathers who do not live with the mother of their children, but want their children to stay with them at weekends, when it is simply not suitable for children to be in the sort of accommodation with other young men that people get under the rate. Has the Minister examined that situation?

[Steve Webb]

The hon. Lady will be aware that, in exceptional cases, housing benefit can be topped up, but she will also know that the same issue could arise under the shared accommodation rate for under-25s. However, if two single people choose accommodation together, the combined total of their shared accommodation rates is larger than one family’s standard rate for a two-bedroom flat, so two people coming together can rent a larger property than a family requiring two bedrooms.

[Mr David Ruffley (Bury St Edmunds) (Con)]

18. What steps he is taking to introduce stricter criteria on eligibility benefit for applications from foreign workers.

[The Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Mr Iain Duncan Smith)]

Our reforms have ended a situation in which migrant workers had indefinite access to jobseeking benefits, which we inherited from the previous Labour Government. Since April, we have banned access to housing benefit. From July, migrant workers will have their claims to jobseeker’s allowance stopped if they have claimed for six months and cannot show that they have found employment. I intend to tighten this up further still.

[Mr Ruffley]

I am grateful for that reply. I congratulate the Secretary of State on the tougher habitual residence test and the new minimum earnings guarantee. Has he received support from European partners for his tougher approach to curb benefit tourism, and are they taking further steps to move the approach forward?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I am in discussions with colleagues from various countries in the European Union. Many of them, including the Dutch and the Germans, have made it clear that they essentially support our direction of travel and that some kind of change must be made to the regulations. The German Chancellor made Germany’s position clear, saying that the EU is “not a social union” and there cannot be de facto immigration into other EU social systems.

[Kelvin Hopkins (Luton North) (Lab)]

19. What estimate he has made of the number of people who will receive face-to-face guidance at the point of retirement in 2015-16.

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Steve Webb)]

From April 2015, we expect over 300,000 individuals who retire each year to be able to take advantage of the new pension flexibilities and access the offer of free guidance. The Government have recently consulted on the delivery framework for the guidance, to ensure that it is designed to give consumers the support they need to make informed choices in the way they choose to access it.

[Kelvin Hopkins]

How will the Government ensure absolutely that retirees who cash in their annuities are not exploited by private sector financial vultures in the guise of advisers?

[Steve Webb]

The hon. Gentleman raises an important point. We already hear anecdotal examples of people getting cold-calls that say, “This is your Government guidance offer.” We want to make it clear that that is not based on Government guidance, because that has not started yet. We are trying to make sure that instead of people making retirement choices with no information or advice, which often happens, they will have a right to go to a reputable provider and get information and guidance from someone who does not have a commercial interest in selling them something.

[Rehman Chishti (Gillingham and Rainham) (Con)]

T1. If he will make a statement on his departmental responsibilities.

[The Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Mr Iain Duncan Smith)]

Today I welcome the National Audit Office’s positive response to the report on the child maintenance scheme, which simplifies the system and helps parents work together in the best interests of their children. There will be further to come on this soon. Already we know that twice as many parents intend to pay direct, even before the second stage of our reforms and ahead of expectation.

[Rehman Chishti]

What support are the Government giving to older workers and their employers in Medway to assist them into work and to build a fairer society?

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Esther McVey)]

I, along with the Pensions Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Thornbury and Yate (Steve Webb), recently published the “Fuller Working Lives—A Framework for Action” document, which sets out the support that we are going to give to older workers. That includes a new health in work service, Jobcentre Plus tailored support, guidance and a toolkit for employees, and from next week the right to request flexible working hours.

[Rachel Reeves (Leeds West) (Lab)]

At the start of this year 3,780 people were claiming universal credit. The most recent numbers show that 5,610 people are receiving the benefit. At this rate of progress, how long will it be until the 7.7 million households that are supposed to receive this Government’s flagship benefit, as the Secretary of State originally set out, are receiving it?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

We have already made that clear. To date around 11,000 people are on the pathfinders. We have started a roll-out to another 90 sites beyond the 10 sites where the pathfinder took place. There will be further changes and enhancements, and we expect and believe, according to the plan that we laid out, that everybody eligible will be on the benefit by 2017.

[Rachel Reeves]

I think that is the first time I have not heard the Secretary of State say that his project is on time and on budget, but we still hear total and utter complacency. At the present rate of progress, it will take a staggering 1,052 years before universal credit is fully rolled out. So what do we have? Universal credit delayed, personal independence payments delayed and employment and support allowance delayed. Does not the Secretary of State realise that his incompetence is not only wasting tens and hundreds of millions of pounds of taxpayers’ money, but causing untold pain and hardship for some of the most vulnerable people in our country?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

As I said, we are rolling out universal credit to 90 sites and we will deliver it safely and carefully, unlike what the Labour Government did with tax credits. To answer the hon. Lady’s general question about what we are doing, this Department and this Government have undertaken the biggest welfare reform programme ever and we are getting more people into work—there are record numbers in work and record falls in unemployment; and we are getting more young people into work and more young people who have been long-term unemployed back into work. The benefit cap means that 42,000 people have been capped, as a result of which 6,000 have moved into work.

On universal credit, 600,000 claimant commitments have been signed. There are 6.9 million people registered for Universal Jobmatch. The Work programme—[Interruption.] She does not want to hear this because these are all records of the success of welfare reform. Through the Work programme, 550,000 people whom the previous Government wrote off and who never got a job are now back in work, and through auto-enrolment under the Minister of State, my hon. Friend the Member for Thornbury and Yate (Steve Webb), 3.6 million people have moved into a workplace pension. This is a Government who are reforming welfare. The Opposition have no policies, no purpose and no prospects.

[Mr Robert Buckland (South Swindon) (Con)]

T5. This morning I was with the staff and students of Farleigh college of further education in my constituency, which offers excellent education and training opportunities to young people with autism and other complex conditions. What more can my right hon. Friend do to ensure that we reach the goal of full employment by ensuring that increased opportunities exist for young people with learning disabilities and autism?

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Mike Penning)]

I think the whole House would agree that we need to give everyone the opportunity to live their dreams and have their aspirations, and that is exactly what this Government want to do. I would love to come and see the scheme that my hon. Friend is talking about, so that I can see for myself what it is delivering.

[Nic Dakin (Scunthorpe) (Lab)]

T2. In last week’s Westminster Hall debate, the Minister said of the closure of the independent living fund that “there really should not be concern.”—[Official Report, 18 June 2014; Vol. 582, c. 91WH.] How will he ensure that the concern being expressed by current ILF recipients that they will lose their independence is unfounded?

[Mike Penning]

I also said during that Westminster Hall debate that, for nearly three years, new recipients of ILF have been dealt with by local authorities. There have not been any major problems. We are confident that this will roll out correctly and we intend to roll it out as soon as possible.

[Mr Brooks Newmark (Braintree) (Con)]

T7. Unemployment in Braintree between May 2010 and May 2014 has dropped from 3.4% to 2%, and youth unemployment in that same period has dropped from 6.3% to 3.8%. There remains a challenge, however, in that the unemployment rate is not falling as fast for young women as it is for young men. What are the Government’s policies doing to help young women to get back into work?

[Esther McVey]

I am pleased to say that unemployment is falling right across the country and across all age groups. Employment is up as a consequence. We are doing significant things. We now have record numbers of women going into work, and at record rates. Our policies, more than anything, are supporting young girls.

[Mr Andrew Love (Edmonton) (Lab/Co-op)]

T3. It is all very well for the Minister to say that, but more than 200,000 young people have been out of work for over a year, which has consequences for the possibility of their finding work in the future. Youth unemployment is falling more slowly than overall unemployment, so what is she doing to help the youth of this country get back into employment?

[Esther McVey]

It is quite incredible that the hon. Gentleman should ask that question, considering that youth unemployment shot up by 45% under the Labour Government, and that we have managed to get more young people into work. As I have said, youth unemployment has fallen for nine consecutive months; it is 100,000 fewer than at the general election. He would be better off reading about what we have done, if he wants to know how to get young people into work.

[Tracey Crouch (Chatham and Aylesford) (Con)]

Will the Minister provide the House with an update on the implementation and delivery of the mesothelioma compensation payment scheme?

[Mike Penning]

I am really proud that the coalition Government have introduced this new scheme. It is now fully funded and it is rolling out on time. Payments will be made on time to the people who need those funds so much, through no fault of their own, and we are all very proud of that.

[Mrs Emma Lewell-Buck (South Shields) (Lab)]

T4. My local citizens advice bureau has been contacted by a young single woman who has been hit by the bedroom tax. After paying her rent and utility bills, she has just 84p a day left to spend on food and toiletries. With eight households for each available one-bedroom property in my area, moving is simply not an option. How can the Secretary of State continue to try to justify a policy that results in such extreme poverty?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

We have given local authorities between £300 million and £400 million for discretionary payments. It is their job to ensure that individuals with particularly difficult circumstances can be helped with that money. The overall policy is very simple. It is about people who are living in accommodation that they do not fully utilise, and about others, including the quarter of a million left by the last Government in overcrowded circumstances and the 1 million people on waiting lists. I do not think that the hon. Lady has ever got up and asked a question about those people. The reality is that this policy will help them to get the accommodation they need to improve their lives, and not waste it on people who do not need it.

[Dr Julian Huppert (Cambridge) (LD)]

I hear repeated concerns that there may be targets for benefit sanctions at jobcentres. Will the Secretary of State confirm that that is not the case, and send a clear message to advisers that they should not be seeking to sanction people inappropriately to hit some sort of target? Their aim is to help people.

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I can assure my hon. Friend that there is no target on benefit sanctions, that the advisers give benefit sanctions as a last resort, and that the system has a full set of checks and balances. There is a mandatory reconsideration almost immediately of that decision, and then there is the opportunity to appeal. The purpose of a sanction is to help to remind the individual that this taxpayers’ money comes with an obligation to co-operate; to find work by seeking work.

[Lyn Brown (West Ham) (Lab)]

T6. Why will the Government not pay universal credit payments to the main carer of children in a family rather than the main earner?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

Let us pause and get this absolutely right. The reality is that what the Opposition are now saying is utterly illogical. [Interruption.] Let me give the hon. Lady the figures. What is fascinating is that 93% of cohabiting couples and 98% of married couples share their finances, so most of those people will reach a conclusion. The second point is that we have put safeguards in place within universal credit so that the payments can be nominated as an exception if the carer is to receive the money. Right now, this is about a household getting more money than under the existing systems. This is a benefit that benefits more people, and, honestly, the idea of micro-managing everybody’s lives from Westminster is the kind of absurdity that the Labour party tried when it was in government.

[Stephen Mosley (City of Chester) (Con)]

It is welcome that youth unemployment has fallen by some 59,000 in the past three months, but I understand that there has been an underspend of some £50 million on the Youth Contract budget. Can my right hon. Friend reassure the House that that money will be spent on supporting young people into work?

[Esther McVey]

Absolutely, I can. All the money that we said that we would be spending on youth schemes—we are doing just that.

[Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)]

T8. It is a great shame that Tory Members of Parliament criticised the Trussell Trust and Oxfam—in fact, some might say threatened them—for daring to suggest a link between food poverty and the social security system: the cuts, the delays, the misapplied sanctions and the abolition of the social fund. Will the Secretary of State now accept his responsibility for what has been a 54% increase in the need for food aid in just one year, and commit to working positively with those organisations to see how his Department can help to address the root causes of food poverty?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

Inequality is at its lowest since 1986. There are 500,000 fewer people in relative poverty than at the election; 300,000 fewer children in relative poverty than at the election; 200,000 fewer pensioners in relative poverty than at the election; and 450,000 fewer workless households than at the end of 2010. We have done more to help people who are hard up than the hon. Lady’s Government ever did.

[Charlie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)]

What impact has the Government’s long-term plan had on long-term unemployment, and what representations have the Government received on long-term unemployment from the Opposition?

[Esther McVey]

I thank my hon. Friend for asking that question because we have seen the biggest annual fall in long-term unemployment since 1998—108,000 fewer people on long-term benefits. That is a significant change. When we came into office we said that we would help those whom the Labour Government left behind and forgot about. We have set up the Work programme and other schemes, and the consequences are more of them in work.

[Heidi Alexander (Lewisham East) (Lab)]

T9. Last week I met a constituent who received her husband’s personal independence payment only after he had passed away. Will the Minister guarantee that no one else will suffer that deeply distressing situation in the future?

[Mike Penning]

Of course I cannot guarantee that, but we need to do everything we possibly can on this. Perhaps the hon. Lady will pass on our thoughts to her constituent for her loss. It is very important that we get the scheme to run faster, but the quality needs to be right. I am very sad when that sort of thing happens, but I cannot possibly guarantee to the House that it will not happen again. We just have to make sure that it does not happen very often.

[Mr David Winnick (Walsall North) (Lab)]

I have been here since the beginning of Question Time and may I tell the Secretary of State that I have been sickened—there is no other way to describe my feelings—by his complacent indifference to the agonising hardship suffered by the most vulnerable in our society? He should be ashamed of the policies he is pursuing.

[Mr Duncan Smith]

The only sickening thing is the last Government plunging the economy into such a crisis that more people fell into unemployment and hardship as a direct result of the incompetence of the people whom the hon. Gentleman has progressively supported.

[Daniel Kawczynski (Shrewsbury and Atcham) (Con)]

Under this Government, how many more women are now in employment?

[Esther McVey]

The rate is the highest it has ever been, at nearly 68%. The number and rate of women in employment is the highest we have ever seen.

[Mr Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith) (Lab)]

After nine months, fewer than 200 people in Hammersmith and Fulham are on universal credit. This morning the shadow ministerial team visited Hammersmith’s citizens advice bureau to hear directly from my constituents about the catastrophic failure of the Secretary of State’s Department in every area of operation. Is his failure to roll out universal credit just a cover-up of another DWP crisis in the making?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

Isn’t that interesting? What a revealing statement. We have endlessly offered the Opposition Front Bench team the opportunity to visit jobcentres where universal credit is rolling out, but only one spokesman went—[Interruption.] No, the shadow Secretary of State never went and is refusing to go. Now she would rather visit citizens advice bureaux than the people who are actually delivering universal credit. Surely that is the most pathetic excuse I have ever heard.

[Dr Eilidh Whiteford (Banff and Buchan) (SNP)]

I have a number of very sick constituents who have been pushed into severe financial hardship as a result of unacceptable delays in the PIP process. Some of them are now dependent on food banks. I listened carefully to the Minister earlier, but will he set out a timetable for clearing the backlog for all applicants, not just the terminally ill? What interim support will he offer to those having to wait more than 28 days?

[Mike Penning]

I repeat that it is taking too long. I accept that and am determined to get the time down. We are working with the providers to ensure that we get it down. I will look into individual cases if the hon. Lady wants to bring them to me, but we are doing everything we possibly can. I would rather see people being assessed than left without any assessment, as the previous Administration did, or with paper-based assessments.

[Andrew Gwynne (Denton and Reddish) (Lab)]

Underlying the overly positive spin that Ministers have put on the employment figures is the fact that for the first time ever the majority of families living below the poverty line are in work. What are the Government going to do to make sure that work is always a route out of poverty?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

Nothing is more revealing than when the Opposition start claiming that we somehow have to spin the fact that there are more people in work now than when we came into office. We will soon break through the barrier and have the highest proportion of people in work. Unemployment is falling, youth unemployment is falling, and adult unemployment is falling. We do not need to spin facts, because facts in this case tell us that our welfare reforms are working.

[Several hon. Members]

rose—

[Mr Speaker]

Order. I am sorry, but as usual demand exceeds supply and we must move on.

Points of Order

Monday 23rd June 2014 Commons Chamber

15:33

[Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions, the right hon. Member for Wirral West (Esther McVey), contradicted my hon. Friend the Member for Jarrow (Mr Hepburn) earlier when he asked about the sanctions rate. She said that the number of successful appeals was around only 10%. According to the Trussell Trust’s “Below the Breadline” report, the average success rate was 58% over the period from 22 October 2012 to 30 September 2013, and in the three months to 30 September 2013 it was 86%. How can we put on the record whether those figures cited by the Trussell Trust are correct and where the Minister managed to get the figure of 10% from?

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Esther McVey)]

rose—

[Mr Speaker]

The Minister is welcome to respond if she so wishes.

[Esther McVey]

Further to that point of order, Mr Speaker. I gave the official statistics, and I was correct.

[Mr Speaker]

Well, we will leave it there for today, but knowing the hon. Lady—

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

rose—

[Mr Speaker]

Order. Patience, Mr Sheerman. A man of your seniority should have acquired gravitas and stoicism. We are coming to you, man. Be calm, be happy—it is Wimbledon. Relax.

[Mr Sheerman]

rose—

[Mr Speaker]

I cannot wait any longer. We have got to hear you, Mr Sheerman; the nation must hear you.

[Mr Sheerman]

On a day like today when such serious issues are being debated in Question Time, when so few Conservative Back Benchers are here, and when time for the business runs out and there are a number of pent-up questions from Labour Members about serious issues such as the fact that the students’ disability allowance is being taken away, what can we do to add to the length of the session so that Members in all parts of the House get a fair crack of the whip?

[Mr Speaker]

My appetite for hearing hon. and right hon. Members ask questions is insatiable. I would happily run the session on for longer, but I am afraid that it is not within my power. Not only is the hon. Gentleman here every day during working hours, but I sometimes fondly imagine that he probably sleeps here as well; I do not know. He knows that his request is unfortunately beyond my powers, but he has made his point with his usual alacrity, and it is on the record.

[Sheila Gilmore (Edinburgh East) (Lab)]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. During Question Time, the disability Minister, the Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions, the right hon. Member for Hemel Hempstead (Mike Penning), stated that he had inherited the current backlog in ESA claims from the previous Government. How can we put on record the fact that his predecessor told the Work and Pensions Committee that a small backlog in 2011 was going to be eliminated by the summer of 2011? The two statements clearly cannot be consistent.

[Mr Speaker]

The evidence is that the hon. Lady has found her own salvation. She asked how it could be done and at the same time she did it. It is on the record, and we will leave it there.

Deregulation Bill

Monday 23rd June 2014 Commons Chamber

[Relevant documents: Fourteenth Report from the Joint Committee on Human Rights, Session 2013-14, on Legislative Scrutiny: (1) Criminal Justice and Courts and (2) Deregulation Bill, HC 1293; and Second Report of 2014 from the Speaker’s Committee on the Electoral Commission, Work of the Committee in 2013, HC 1173 of Session 2013-14.]

[2nd Allocated Day]

Further consideration of Bill, as amended in the Public Bill Committee

New Clause 4

Removal of restriction on investigation of tramway accidents in Scotland by RAIB

‘(1) The Railways and Transport Safety Act 2003 is amended as follows.

(2) In section 14 (extent of Part 1: investigation of railway accidents by Rail Accident Investigation Branch), omit subsection (2) (which prevents the Part from applying to tramways in Scotland).

(3) In consequence of subsection (2), omit section 1(3).” —(Tom Brake.)

Part 1 of the Railways and Transport Safety 2003 does not currently apply to tramways in Scotland and so the Rail Accident Investigation Branch cannot investigate tramway accidents there. This amendment removes that restriction.

Brought up, and read the First time.

15:37

[The Parliamentary Secretary, Office of the Leader of the House of Commons (Tom Brake)]

I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.

[Mr Speaker]

With this it will be convenient to discuss Government new clause 25—Civil penalties for parking contraventions: enforcement.

Amendment 61, page 7, line 22, leave out clause 10, clause 11 and clause 12.

Government amendment 13.

Amendment 1, page 26, line 4, clause 35, leave out paragraphs (a) and (b) and insert “in paragraph (a) leave out from “if new and important evidence” to “discovered” and insert

“where secondary investigations have enabled more new, significant, or important evidence to become available, having particular regard to—

(i) enhancing and preserving the rights of those affected by a maritime accident to learn from the proceedings of such reinvestigations and conclusions drawn from them; and

(ii) future safety issues and measures.”.”

Government amendments 36 to 49, 51, 24 and 26.

[Tom Brake]

This group of amendments covers accident investigation, parking contravention, driving, and private hire vehicle licensing.

New clause 4 and amendment 24 deal with rail accidents and, specifically, tram investigations in Scotland. They will remove a prohibition in the Railways and Transport Safety Act 2003 that prevents the Rail Accident Investigation Branch from investigating tram accidents in Scotland. The prohibition was originally included at the explicit request of the Scottish Executive because operation and safety matters on tramways are a devolved matter. Until now, this has not been an issue as there were no tramways in Scotland, and in practice the power would never have been exercised. However, now that the Edinburgh tramway has entered public service, the prohibition is no longer appropriate. This is a devolved matter, so the consent of the Scottish Parliament is needed. Scottish Ministers will support the legislative consent motion required to remove the prohibition.

The RAIB is already a UK-wide organisation. Its inspectors investigate accidents and incidents on all mainline services, including in Scotland, and currently undertake investigations of tramway accidents in England and Wales. RAIB inspectors already have the required investigative expertise and the necessary powers to conduct a thorough investigation and make recommendations to ensure that lessons are learned. Should there be an accident or incident on the Edinburgh tramway, it is therefore appropriate that RAIB inspectors should be able to undertake an investigation.

If the prohibition on undertaking investigations of tramway accidents or incidents in Scotland were not removed, RAIB inspectors would have no statutory power to investigate, so the safety implications of any accident or incident might not be fully exposed, and there might be repeat incidents if the root causes are not addressed. Although the new clause is only small, the implications for the continued safety of our rail network of perpetuating the prohibition are significant.

The RAIB has already shown its considerable value in contributing to our having one of the safest rail networks in the world. I of course hope that it will never be necessary for RAIB inspectors to be deployed, but we must not be complacent. This is an opportunity to remove a small legislative anomaly, enabling RAIB inspectors to apply their considerable experience and expertise consistently across the whole of the United Kingdom.

[Mr John Redwood (Wokingham) (Con)]

What has the accident experience of tramways in England been over the past year, and will the power include the ability to investigate pedestrians and drivers of third vehicles or bicycles that get caught by trams?

[Tom Brake]

I am afraid that I do not have figures to hand on accidents relating to trams in England and Wales, but I will write to my right hon. Friend on that subject. I assume that any investigation of an accident would assess its causes—for instance, if it involved a vehicle driving on to the tramlines—and would make recommendations about how to deal with such issues.

Government new clause 25 relates to changes in the use of CCTV for issuing parking tickets by post. The Government are concerned that the use of CCTV for on-street parking is no longer proportionate, and that local councils over-employ it to deal with contraventions when it would be more appropriate and fair for such contraventions to be handled by a civil enforcement officer. We have therefore committed ourselves to ban the use of CCTV for on-street parking enforcement. That was announced in September and re-stated in December 2013 as part of a package of measures designed to support high streets.

Under existing measures, when a CCTV camera is used by a civil enforcement officer to identify a parking offence, a penalty charge notice can be issued to the offender by post. In practice, that means that drivers may receive a parking ticket through the post several weeks after an incident, which makes it difficult to challenge the alleged contravention.

The Government are concerned that a proliferation of CCTV cameras for offences such as parking may undermine public acceptance of their wider beneficial use. To introduce the change, we need to amend legislation to prevent local authorities from relying so heavily on CCTV for parking enforcement.

[James Duddridge (Rochford and Southend East) (Con)]

The right hon. Gentleman has made it clear that the new clause relates to parking, but will he confirm that CCTV cameras can still be used for issuing fines via the post for other offences, such as parking on zig-zag lines in front of schools?

[Tom Brake]

I will come on to that point in a few moments.

New clause 25 will amend part 6 of the Traffic Management Act 2004 to prevent the automatic issuing by post of fines for parking offences, and instead require that notification of penalty charges is given by a notice attached to the vehicle.

The new clause includes a wider power to cater for an outright ban on CCTV if that is considered necessary in future. However, the Government intend to protect the use of CCTV cameras where there is a strong safety argument for doing so. Their use will therefore be banned in all but the following limited circumstances: when stopped in restricted areas outside a school; when stopped where prohibited on a red route or clearway; when parked where prohibited in a bus lane; or when stopped on a restricted bus stop or stand.

[Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)]

What discussions has the right hon. Gentleman had with the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government about his statement at the weekend that local authorities are not able to make a profit from CCTV cameras, and what does he think about that?

[Tom Brake]

I have not had any discussions with the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government since his announcement at the weekend. It is very clear that local authorities cannot issue parking fines to raise funds for other purposes, but that they can use the money from parking fines to invest in transport and some environmental measures. The Government are concerned that the family of local authorities as a whole has a surplus of about £630 million in funds raised through parking tickets. We believe that we have taken a sensible and proportionate approach by ensuring the power has the ability to exempt key parts of the road network so that we reach the right balance of fair enforcement in the right places.

I now move on to amendment 61 on taxis and private hire vehicles.

15:45

[James Duddridge]

Before the Minister moves on, will he confirm when the power will come into effect, and what will happen to councils that perhaps have a longer-term contract with a provider that falls outside the period?

[Tom Brake]

I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention. It is a very good point, which I think it would be more appropriate to respond to in writing. Clearly, there may well be contractual issues. If local authorities have entered into contracts for, say, a five-year period, there may be implications, so rather than giving him an off-the-cuff response, I will write to him on that point.

Amendment 61 would remove from the Bill the three clauses that relate to taxis and private hire vehicles. That is not a course of action that the Government intend to adopt. On the contrary, we consider that the taxi and private hire vehicle clauses will have significant benefits, both in terms of cost savings for the trade and convenience for passengers, and we are determined to see those benefits realised.

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)]

Will the Minister explain why he has not listened to what the travelling public want? There is huge concern about these clauses. He has not consulted the Local Government Association, nor has he listened to the public or the evidence, and as a result, he is going to put public safety at risk.

[Tom Brake]

I cannot agree with that at all. We are not putting public safety at risk, and I think the people who have concerns about safety do at least have London to consider, where, of course, all the measures apply, and I am not aware of significant issues being raised in relation to safety in London.

Clause 10 concerns the circumstances in which a private hire vehicle driver’s licence is required. Its purpose is to allow people who do not hold a private hire vehicle driver’s licence outside London and Plymouth to drive a licensed private hire vehicle when the vehicle is off duty. At a stroke, that will lift the burden that many families currently face of having to run a second car so that other family members can drive for domestic purposes. I have heard arguments to the effect that this will be unsafe and that the Government are being reckless in taking forward the policy, but I do not agree with that.

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

There was a case in the local Slough magistrates court on these issues very recently, and those who were charged were found guilty and fined extensively. The comments from the magistracy are interesting. The court said that they regarded this as a very serious set of offences, putting the public at risk and depriving legitimate drivers of income. They were particularly concerned that the trigger incident involved a lone female being collected late at night from Wexham Park hospital. Is that not evidence that these sorts of changes are required?

[Tom Brake]

I do not think that what the hon. Lady has described is evidence that what the Government are proposing—a relatively small number of changes to the way in which private hire vehicles can operate—will have an impact on safety.

[Grahame M. Morris (Easington) (Lab)]

On that point, does the Minister acknowledge the concerns of police and crime commissioners and organisations such as the Suzy Lamplugh Trust about rogue or unlicensed taxis? This deregulation is likely to compound that problem.

[Tom Brake]

I certainly agree with those organisations that we need to be concerned about rogue, unlicensed taxis, but I do not think that anything the Government are putting forward today will increase the likelihood of there being rogue, unlicensed taxi operators. For instance, a private hire operator passing on a job to another will be passing the job on to an operator who is, of course, licensed.

[Several hon. Members]

rose—

[Tom Brake]

I will make some progress.

Safeguards will be in place, the main one being that the law will continue to prohibit people who do not hold a PHV driver’s licence from acting as a PHV driver. It was with safety in mind that we decided to alter the position in London by introducing the reverse burden of proof: where a driver without a PHV licence is caught driving a licensed PHV with a passenger on board, the Bill places the onus on the driver to show that the vehicle was not being used as a hire vehicle at the time. We believe that that approach will make the job of enforcement more straightforward for local authorities.

Clause 11 will standardise the duration of taxi and private hire vehicle drivers’ licences at three years, and private hire operator licences at five years. Shorter licence durations will be permitted, but only according to the circumstances of a given case and not on a blanket basis. That will apply in England and Wales, but not in London or Plymouth. I have heard arguments about the adverse safety implications of clause 11, and about licensing authorities losing their ability to monitor drivers sufficiently. The three-year licence duration applies to more than 50,000 taxi and PHV drivers in London, and outside London just under half of licensing authorities set that duration for their drivers, so that measure is already common. We recognise that local authorities take their taxi licensing responsibilities seriously, which is commendable.

[Julie Hilling (Bolton West) (Lab)]

The National Association of Licensing and Enforcement Officers, the National Taxi Association, and the National Private Hire Association are totally opposed to these clauses. Why is the Minister not listening to those who have to enforce the regulations or who are part of the delivery of our taxi services?

[Tom Brake]

The Government have listened to and taken on board concerns expressed by a range of organisations, and have also heard support for the measures we are proposing. We think it important not to place a burden on private hire vehicle drivers that requires them to have a second vehicle in their family to enable them to get around. Safety is vital when licensing taxi and PHV drivers; that is why local authorities are allowed to take into account the criminal records of driver’s licence applicants. Best practice guidance advises licensing authorities to undertake formal criminal record checks every three years, and that facility will still be available. Moreover, the new Disclosure and Barring Service allows taxi and PHV drivers to sign up to an updating service that will allow licensing authorities to make inquiries about the drivers they licence, should they feel the need to do so.

Clause 12 allows private hire vehicle operators to subcontract bookings to operators licensed in a different district. It will apply in England and Wales, outside London and Plymouth. Once again, the clause has been opposed on safety grounds, with arguments that enforcement will be difficult. I stress that that measure already applies in London—I am not aware of any enforcement issues—and the principle of subcontracting, albeit to an operator in the same district, is already enshrined in provincial legislation. I cannot see how allowing PHV operators to subcontract journeys across borders will generate safety issues. Operators will be allowed to subcontract bookings only to other operators who are properly licensed, and those operators will have to fulfil their bookings using properly licensed drivers and vehicles.

[Grahame M. Morris]

The Minister says that he is not aware of any enforcement issues, but may I remind him that the real public safety concern is the number of bogus, unlicensed taxis that operate—particularly in London—and pose a threat to the welfare of women travelling home late in the evening? Last year there were 250 assaults and 56 rapes. Measures that will make that situation worse by making the system more difficult to enforce—that is what the Government propose—should surely concern the right hon. Gentleman and the whole House.

[Tom Brake]

Again, I agree that the Government, local authorities, the police and campaigning organisations should do everything they can to ensure that women and other users of private hire vehicles use only licensed vehicles, and that there is a strong clampdown on those who are operating illegally. Again, I do not think that anything the Government are proposing in these clauses will have the effect that the hon. Gentleman seems to be saying they will.

[Graham Jones (Hyndburn) (Lab)]

Will the right hon. Gentleman confirm that a local authority cannot take enforcement action against taxis that are licensed in another area, and that relaxing this policy will only add to that problem?

[Tom Brake]

As I have said, if, for instance, an operator cannot do a job in an outside area and passes on the responsibility to another licensed operator, that operator will be licensed, and there will be enforcement associated with that licence. Enforcement authorities will be able to check the operator’s records for any given booking to ensure that it has been undertaken lawfully.

To sum up, these are tried and tested measures. We believe there are adequate safeguards in place. We acknowledge, of course, that the Law Commission review is a significant landmark to those who have a keen or vested interest in the evolution of taxi licensing and regulation, but the key point is that that review will not deliver tangible change in the next year, whereas these measures will. They in no way undermine or nullify the Law Commission’s review; they are simply the first steps on a long deregulatory journey, which will continue when the Government find an opportunity to take forward the Bill that will arise from that review. The Government are firmly of the view that clauses 10 to 12 should remain part of the Bill, and that amendment 61 should be resisted.

[Graham Jones]

The Minister says these measures will be helpful, but Hyndburn borough council currently cannot take enforcement action against taxis from another authority, such as Rossendale, and his proposals will only aggravate the situation. Will he confirm that that is the case?

[Tom Brake]

At the risk of repeating myself, I do not think that any action the Government are taking will put people at risk.

Let me respond to a couple of earlier interventions. It was suggested, for instance, that we have not consulted. We have indeed consulted: we conducted a targeted consultation earlier this year and also tapped into the extensive consultation conducted by the Law Commission during its comprehensive review. Nor is it true that no one wants the measures we are proposing. For instance, the Private Hire Reform Campaign is highly supportive of all these measures, and after extensive consultation, the Law Commission recommended all three of them in its most recent comprehensive review of taxi legislation.

[Grahame M. Morris]

rose—

[Tom Brake]

I am afraid that I will move on now to Government amendments 13 and 51, which deal with the duration of driving licences granted to drivers with relevant or prospective disabilities. The Road Traffic Offenders Act 1988 provides that drivers with relevant or prospective medical conditions may be issued only with time-limited driving licences with a maximum duration of three years. That means that drivers with relevant medical conditions need to reapply for their licence at least once every three years. In many cases, where a medical condition is well controlled or progressing only slowly, a three-yearly review is unnecessary. Our amendments will enable the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency to issue licences with a duration of up to 10 years.

Every licence application will still be considered on a case-by-case basis, and licences will still be issued for shorter periods where that is appropriate. Only drivers with conditions that are considered low-risk and unlikely to progress quickly will get a licence of longer duration, so road safety will not be compromised. A driver will still have a legal duty to tell the DVLA of any condition that he or she has developed or that has deteriorated, and it is an offence to fail to do so. Doctors and other third parties, such as the police, can also notify the DVLA when patients or drivers who have a notifiable medical condition, or do not tell the DVLA about it, come to their attention.

When the DVLA consulted on this proposal, 81% of respondents said they supported it. Those expressing support included the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents, the Association of Chief Police Officers, the RAC Foundation, the Epilepsy Society, Diabetes UK, the Royal College of Physicians and the Freight Transport Association. Our amendments will ease the burden on motorists who currently need to make unnecessary applications every three years. They will also ease the burden on GPs, who have to complete the administrative work, and the DVLA, where applications are processed.

Let me turn to marine investigations and the Opposition’s amendment 1. Hon. Members have referred to the campaign—which was supported by the National Union of Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers—by the relatives of those lost in the sinking of the MV Derbyshire. I recognise that the amendment is intended to ensure that a future campaign of a similar type that uncovered new evidence would lead to the reopening of the formal investigation into the relevant accident. However, hard cases make bad law.

16:00

No one questions the valuable outcome of the reopening of the formal investigation into the Derbyshire, or the commitment of the campaigners to improving maritime safety, but the amendment would enable anyone who disagreed with the findings of an investigation to search for new evidence and, regardless of how trivial that evidence might be, compel the Secretary of State to reopen the investigation. In the Government’s view, that would do nothing to advance the cause of maritime safety.

Let me repeat the advice given in Committee about how the Secretary of State would approach the decision on whether to reopen an investigation. Each case for reopening would be considered on its merits. The points for consideration would include, but not be limited to: the likelihood of lessons being learned that would improve the safety of marine operations and ship design; the likelihood of being able to identify the true cause or causes of marine accidents, where those causes were particularly uncertain prior to the evidence being found; and the likelihood of uncovering information that would provide a deeper understanding of the causes of other marine accidents. Let me reassure hon. Members that I agree that the reopened formal investigation into the MV Derbyshire was valuable and led to real improvements in maritime safety. If similar circumstances applied again, I am convinced that the Secretary of State would reopen the investigation.

[Dr Eilidh Whiteford (Banff and Buchan) (SNP)]

A more general point about marine accidents is relevant here. All of us who represent marine communities know just how hard it is for bereaved families to come to terms with their loss in the event of marine accidents, and that is made all the harder when they do not know what happened, and when unanswered questions remain. Anything that makes it harder, more costly and more bureaucratic for the families to get the answers they need must be a retrograde step. I ask the Minister to look more carefully at not just this single instance, but at the framework, and to think again about how he takes forward the regulations on this issue. It is a huge comfort to bereaved families to find out what actually happened to their loved ones.

[Tom Brake]

Of course it is. I have just stated the parameters that will be used to establish whether it is appropriate to reopen an investigation. We would, of course, want to ensure that the families had the answers that they wanted and deserved, so that they could get closure. We are arguing only about whether there should be a mandatory requirement on the Secretary of State to reopen formal inquiries, irrespective of the value of any new evidence that comes forward, and however small it is.

[John McDonnell (Hayes and Harlington) (Lab)]

I hope to catch the Speaker’s eye later and contribute to the debate. The Minister may be convinced, but it is the seafarers and their families who need convincing, and they are not convinced. Will he clarify the process from here onwards? Will there be detailed regulation and consultation? If the legislation is agreed to today, how do we go forward towards implementation?

[Tom Brake]

I shall respond to that shortly, but let me restate that I do not believe that anything we are proposing would have got in the way of the MV Derbyshire inquiry. All the evidence surrounding that shows that under these proposals the Secretary of State would still have reopened the investigation. All we are talking about is whether there should be an automatic trigger, irrespective of the nature of the evidence that comes forward. That is the only point that is in dispute, and I am absolutely certain that if the current Secretary of State or any future Secretary of State felt that the evidence brought forward could, in any shape or form, lead to further safety improvements being identified, they would want to proceed with a formal inquiry. I think most Members would agree that if, 100 years from now, a formal investigation was automatically triggered under this legislation by something that happened today, that would not be likely to make a significant contribution to improving safety.

Amendments 36 to 49 make minor technical improvements to the drafting of schedule 2. Amendments 36, 37 and 39 make drafting changes to render the language more consistent. Amendments 40 and 43 relate to new section 128ZZA, which allows the registrar to cancel a requirement to undergo an emergency control assessment when it is appropriate to do so. The policy intention was to cover all ECAs, but cross-references were missed, so the Bill does not cover the ECAs that are required in relation to licences for trainee instructors. Amendments 40 and 43 simply extend the new section to cover ECAs in connection with licences.

Amendment 41 amends new section 133B(2A), which concerns the ability to retake failed ECAs. It inserts references to assessments required in relation to licences for trainee instructors, which will ensure that the ability to retake a failed assessment applies to all assessments, regardless of the stage at which they were originally ordered. New section 133B(5A) states that a person applying to undergo a further ECA cannot do so until after a further six months, or any other such period prescribed by regulations. Amendments 38 and 42 simply allow a person to retake an ECA before the end of the six-month period in cases in which that is appropriate. Amendments 44 to 49 make consequential amendments to the Road Traffic Offenders Act 1988 to reflect amendments made to the Act by schedule 2 to the Bill.

Let me now conclude my remarks—

[John McDonnell]

Will the Minister answer the question that I asked earlier, about the process involving marine investigations?

[Tom Brake]

If the hon. Gentleman will bear with me, I shall do so later. Let me now end by urging Members not to press amendments 1 and 61 to a Division.

[Mr Gordon Marsden (Blackpool South) (Lab)]

I rise to speak briefly on Government new clause 25 and more specifically to our amendments 61 and 1, which relate to taxis and maritime issues respectively.

First, I shall comment on what the Minister said about the CCTV measure. The short notice of the introduction of the amendment—it appeared only at the end of last week—suggests that it was a political hot potato, passed between the Department for Transport and the Department for Communities and Local Government. There have long been rumours that the DCLG intended to scrap the use of CCTV even in sensitive areas, in contrast to the wishes of DFT Ministers. Over the weekend, press coverage of the issue was almost entirely dominated by the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government. Perhaps the Minister will enlighten us on whether DFT Ministers decided to support what my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Northfield (Richard Burden) has called a “pickled policy”, or whether this is simply an example of what the Government’s frequent use of the Alice in Wonderland principle of sentence first and trial afterwards.

It concerns us greatly that the measure was introduced so late in the day. It is at odds with the consultative approach adopted by the Department for Transport. A range of organisations, including Living Streets, the Local Government Association, the British Parking Association, the Freight Transport Association, Disabled Motorists UK, the Parliamentary Advisory Council for Transport Safety and Guide Dogs for the Blind, have made their concerns known, yet the Government published the new measure before seeing those responses.

There are of course legitimate concerns that councils have been using cameras as a routine means of parking enforcement; that is wrong. There have also been problems where stickers, such as resident permits and blue badges, have not been visible and drivers have wrongly been issued with tickets; that is an occurrence that we should make as infrequent as possible. It is understandable that drivers become frustrated when the first they hear of an infringement is a letter through the post, without the opportunity to discuss the circumstances with an enforcement officer. So we agree with the Select Committee on Transport that there should be greater oversight of the way in which local authorities use cameras to institute penalty charges, but that could be done through statutory and operational guidance, which is exactly what the groups I just mentioned would have liked.

CCTV remains vital for parking and for traffic and safety enforcement in certain areas where the use of parking officers is not practical: schools, bus stops, bus lanes, junctions and pedestrian crossings all come into that category. We hear from the Government response to their consultation that those areas are to be exempted and that CCTV could still be used in these circumstances, but that is not on the face of the Bill and we would welcome confirmation that this is the case and that plans will be put into practice.

[Mr Redwood]

Does the hon. Gentleman understand that there are times when a camera-based system can get the wrong end of the stick? A constituent of mine was prosecuted for moving into a bus lane; they did so to get out of the way of an emergency vehicle, but the council still went ahead with the prosecution.

[Mr Marsden]

The right hon. Gentleman raises an instance of which he has the full details but I do not. I will not comment on the particular point but will comment on the general point, which is as I have just said: these matters are best dealt with by discussions with the enforcement officer before the ticket is issued. To that extent, I think we are at one.

[Kelvin Hopkins (Luton North) (Lab)]

The reality is that if we relax legislation of this kind, especially when the exemptions are not on the face of the Bill, certain people will take advantage of the situation—drive in bus lanes because they think they might not get caught, for example. There were cases some years ago in which CCTV of cars in bus lanes picked up many vehicles that were driven by criminals on the run for other causes. Once a criminal, always a criminal, and such people will take advantage.

[Mr Marsden]

My hon. Friend raises an interesting point that underlines why the Government should have given much more careful consideration to the thoughtful proposals and sometimes quite detailed comments submitted by the various groups before bringing forward these measures as part of this rag-bag Bill.

We do not object to the Government’s amendments reining in the use of CCTV in place of everyday traffic enforcement but, as is obvious from the comments we have already heard today, the whole House would welcome answers from the Minister, so we can ensure that vital spots such as bus routes and school runs continue to be protected by CCTV and we know the details of how that will be assured in legislation.

Amendment 61 would remove clauses 10 to 12. The Deputy Leader of the House will not want to hear this, but we strongly oppose the Government proposals on changing taxi and minicab law simply and crucially because it will put passengers at risk. I listened carefully to his opening comments: he said the Government are determined to see the reforms implemented, which reminded me of the old speaker’s note, “Argument weak here, shout like mad”—although, to be fair, being a Liberal Democrat, he did not shout. He really ought to take note of what Members have said today, particularly the interventions from my hon. Friends the Member for Slough (Fiona Mactaggart) and for Hyndburn (Graham Jones) about the particular concerns that women have —my hon. Friend the Member for Slough referred to an awful case—and about the vital issue of enforcement. On the basis of the reassurances he has given today, the Minister cannot guarantee that the Government will be able to enforce the current safeguards. The issue is one of enforcement.

The Minister talked about the “targeted consultation”—a wonderful phrase. We were told by Harold Wilson some while ago that a week is a long time in politics. Perhaps the Minister, being a Liberal Democrat, thinks that 10 days is an eternity, but 10 days is in fact the amount of time that was allowed for this “targeted” consultation. I doubt whether many people listening today will be particularly impressed with that process.

16:15

[James Duddridge]

I always tell my constituents not to believe everything that is in the papers, but Guido Fawkes carried a number of stories in an online blog about the unions lobbying on these issues and financial interconnections between members of Her Majesty’s loyal Opposition and the unions on this matter. Was there any evidence behind those rumours and is there anything to be declared?

[Mr Marsden]

Not on my part, I do not think; I think the only thing to be declared is the hon. Gentleman’s attempt to pursue something on a blog that, as various people know, may or may not have some foundation. In this case, it obviously does not have much foundation.

[Kelvin Hopkins]

A primary union concerned with this issue is the National Union of Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers, which is not affiliated to the Labour party, sadly.

[Mr Marsden]

My hon. Friend makes the point for me.

The truth of the matter is that once again an ideological imperative to be seen to be cutting red tape is resulting in vital principles of good governance being relegated. Although we have rightly had a long drawn-out process from the Law Commission’s proposals to consider all the interests involved—I shall come on to some of those in due course and perhaps put the hon. Gentleman’s somewhat paranoid mind at rest—it has been marred by the Government’s rushed and risky proposals. These plans have been poorly drafted and badly consulted on and they could put the travelling public in danger.

Taxis and private hire vehicles play a vital part in connecting people’s lives. They provide a wide range of services—everything from trips to the airport to early morning trips back from nightclubs. They are an essential means of transport for a wide range of people without access to a car, particularly in cut off or rural locations. For young people—sometimes for recreation, but also for work, training or family commitments—and for older people, they are a lifeline, providing mobility and social cohesion.

Previous work, including that of the Transport Committee in 2011, showed that the regulation governing the trade is often complex and contentious. We, therefore, like so many organisations outside this House, hoped that the DFT would approach reform in an inclusive, comprehensive and balanced way, especially looking to use the expertise of users, taxi operators and local councils in piloting a new course. Sadly, that has not been the case. Opposition to these measures is widespread: the police, industry bodies and members of the trade themselves are warning that they have severe safety implications. Yet Ministers have introduced the specifics of the plans late in the passage of the Bill, leaving little opportunity for real engagement with industry stakeholders.

Despite the excellent speech made on 29 April in Westminster Hall by my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Northfield—he has been steadfast and vocal on the threat that this part of the Bill poses to vulnerable taxi drivers, and even today has been meeting delegations from a range of organisations concerned about the proposals—it is still not clear why these measures were not included in the Bill on Second Reading, so they could have been debated more fully. Is this a reflection of their on-the-hoof nature, or a conscious attempt to avoid the criticism that would inevitably follow?

The context of today’s discussion is important. We should consider the questions that the rise of new services such as Uber pose about the impact of new technologies on the trade. The Government must be clear about what priorities they set for private transport companies, and surely those should be safety and security. That is quite the opposite of the piecemeal reforms being introduced in the Bill. What is needed is a far more comprehensive look at the regulation and enforcement of the taxi and private hire trade. That is exactly what the Law Commission announcement about the need for a new national framework underlined, so why on earth are this Government cutting the ground from beneath the Law Commission’s feet with these ill-thought-through proposals?

In the detail of the clauses we are opposing, the Government plan to allow people without a licence for a minicab to drive one when it is off duty. That could or will greatly increase the potential for rogue minicab drivers, who appear no different from legal drivers on the streets and could threaten vulnerable passengers, including women, who enter their vehicles. It will be nearly impossible to enforce these rules; it will be difficult to monitor whether a minicab is in service or off duty, and whether the driver is a minicab licence holder or not. The Minister may respond, as he has before, by talking about London—several times in his speech I thought he was grasping at London like a drowning man grasping at straws—but other areas of the country do not have the same resources for enforcement, and the sad truth is that rapes and sexual assaults committed by people purporting to be private hire drivers are not uncommon. The changes to the law are rightly an issue of public concern.

[Mr Redwood]

If the licence is the guarantee of safety and the person driving the minicab would need the permission of a licence holder, is that not the continued guarantee? [Interruption.]

[Mr Marsden]

As my hon. Friends ask from a sedentary position, “How do you know?” I could also talk about the transfer of these licences but, as I am sure the right hon. Gentleman will appreciate, this is about resources and enforcement. The truth is that we would not know.

The proposed measures might damage the entire legitimate taxi industry, too. Greater Manchester’s police and crime commissioner has said that there is a clear danger that they will lead to an increase in unlicensed private hire drivers taking business illegitimately and that the measures are a backward step for law enforcement. I say again that this move is unnecessary. Why have the Government not listened to the Law Commission, which led an extensive consultation on a complex issue, receiving 3,000 written responses from across the trade? The process involved a series of 84 meetings over four months, an industry survey and meetings—one of which I attended at Blackpool cricket club—where scores of taxi drivers all put useful points. Why have the Government ploughed ahead with these reforms? Was the review simply a waste of money?

My next point deals with the one made by the right hon. Gentleman. Ministers would also let minicab operators subcontract a job to firms in another area, which means the customer booking the taxi could not be sure of the individual or the firm picking them up. Customers would lose their right to select a firm based on a strong reputation for safety. Many vulnerable people may start to lose confidence in their travelling habits if they do not believe they have a safe cab company whose services they can rely on. These proposals also have implications further down the line, for the supply chain in taxis and cabs. We are talking about things being made in the UK, with jobs and livelihoods provided in the UK, and a valuable force for social cohesion. That force will be under threat if the general public lose confidence in the methods of regulation and licensing.

[James Duddridge]

In Southend, I have a regular contract with AC Taxis, as it is convenient; the firm is a good supplier and well trusted in the area. If it had to outsource some of its work, I would expect it, as a reputable firm, to outsource to another reputable firm. It may well outsource to Rochford Taxis, also an excellent supplier, but I would not expect it to go to a random firm to contract out the work. The company would be protecting its reputation, and it would be in its interest to behave in a decent and good way.

[Mr Marsden]

The hon. Gentleman is right about that, and he is right to defend the reputation of the company he has had dealings with and knows to be reputable. However, the basis on which we have to proceed in legislation is not what the best would do, but what the worst might do. That is the point I am trying to make. The Law Commission has made it clear that any such arrangements would need to be subject to enforcement officers having the ability to impound vehicles and issue penalties in other areas, so that jobs could be passed between firms more accountably.

The taxi and minicab hire industry in this country is locally and closely regulated by councils, which is where regulation should stay. At the moment, minicabs and taxis can, quite rightly, be driven only by someone who has undergone criminal, medical and background checks by the local authority. By trying to micro-manage the changes from Whitehall, the Government risk jeopardising people’s safety. Members here are quite right to emphasise issues such as women using taxis late at night. The Suzy Lamplugh Trust commented on the proposals, saying that it knows, from the sexual assaults on women each year, that posing as a legitimate minicab driver is what some particularly dangerous sexual predators do. The trust stated that

“moves to allow any individual to drive licensed minicab when it is ‘off duty’ will provide greater opportunity for those intent on preying on women in this way. We are also concerned about the proposal to require licensing authorities to renew licenses on a three-year basis rather than annually, should they wish to: we think that checks on drivers should be as rigorous and frequent as necessary”.

That is what we think as well. It is also what the Local Government Association and the police and crime commissioner for Northumberland, Vera Baird, have said. Sixteen police and crime commissioners from all political parties and none have gone on record to voice their opposition to the process and the proposals that have resulted. Incidentally, they include three former Members of this House: Tony Lloyd, Vera Baird and Jane Kennedy.

There is real anger from people who feel that their voices have been ignored in the process. Government guidance on consultation stresses the importance of adequate time and engagement and transparency with key stakeholders, yet Ministers settled for a short period of consultation to give them a cloak for enacting these controversial and piecemeal reforms. As I have said, the Government would dilute the safety checks by ending mandatory minicab licence renewal. As we have seen all too often, the Government pay lip service to localism, but when they want to beef up their so-called red-tape challenge, any mention of localism goes out of the window. What we then get, as we have with this proposal, is clodhopping centralism, dreamed up in short order to fit their soundbites, ignoring the concerns of all those who have looked at the matter in depth, and posing real safety concerns for people, not least women, who use taxis and private hire vehicles especially at night. I urge all Members who take seriously the safety of our roads and the vulnerable passengers in our community to back this amendment and to delete these clauses.

Finally, I come to amendment 1, which would amend clause 35. Today, the House has an opportunity to change these ill-conceived and potentially dangerous plans to row back the rights of seafarers and their families as they seek to find answers to the causes of marine accidents, and to learn lessons that could save lives. I listened carefully to what the Minister had to say, and felt that he was, from time to time, straining to convince himself rather than the rest of us. He said that hard cases make bad law, which is perfectly correct. Although I shall refer to the MV Derbyshire, it is not the simple thrust of why we have made this proposal. He said that he would be convinced—he used the words “would be”—that the Government’s proposals are adequate. The truth is that it is not good enough for any individual to be convinced that the Government’s proposals are good enough; it is important to have a framework that ensures they are good enough. The Minister said that hard cases make bad law, but I say, having heard him draw on examples from 100 years ago and beyond to the time of the Titanic, that ludicrous examples make bad argument. No one has, at any stage, proposed such a distance in time.

Clause 35 seeks to abolish the duty that obliges the Secretary of State automatically to order that a marine accident investigation case be reheard. This duty was enshrined in the Merchant Shipping Act 1995, which followed years of campaigning by unions and the families of those affected by accidents at sea. A number of serious maritime incidents demonstrate how important this duty is. The causes of major incidents involving great loss of life have sometimes been found on the second investigation and after some time. That, of course, includes shipwrecks, which are often discovered following painstaking research and the physical trawling of the seabed.

16:30

[Grahame M. Morris]

My hon. Friend is making an excellent argument. Does he agree that the 22 recommendations from the MV Derbyshire report support his argument that we should not downgrade the Secretary of State’s powers?

[Mr Marsden]

I do agree, but as importantly, so do most of the people involved in the MV Derbyshire campaign and, indeed, the Minister, John Prescott, who opened the inquiry.

[Kelvin Hopkins]

I strongly support what my hon. Friend says. In more recent times, we have had new technology, which might not have been available when an accident happened. We now might be able to investigate and find the causes of ships sinking or whatever, because of new technology.

[Mr Marsden]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right; it is an iterative process, which simply exposes the weakness of the Minister’s argument.

[Dr Whiteford]

The hon. Gentleman is making a strong case. I commend him for bringing amendment 1 to the Floor of the House, because in a context where it is increasingly difficult for families to get the legal aid that they need to take such things forward, it should not be left to them to launch their own investigations. It is an extremely costly, difficult and distressing process.

[Mr Marsden]

The hon. Lady makes an absolutely valid point. Context is all, particularly in this case, which was crucial to the duty being put into law. MV Derbyshire sank in 1980 and was found only in 1994. That example prompted reinvestigation many years after the original incident.

The duty that the Government want to scrap was used in 1998 to reopen the formal investigation into the loss of the Derbyshire in September 1980. The Derbyshire disappeared south of Japan during Typhoon Orchid. All on board—42 crew and two passengers, who were wives of crew members—lost their lives. She remains the largest UK ship ever to have been lost at sea.

A major union-funded search for the vessel in the 1990s, supported by the International Transport Workers Federation—a global organisation, with affiliates in Britain, including the RMT, Unite, the National Union of Seamen, Nautilus International and the Transport Salaried Staffs Association and broader support from the Public and the Commercial Services Union, the Communication Workers Union, the GMB and others—was required to make that breakthrough in discovering the wreck of the Derbyshire. That effort identified the wreck in 1994 and led to the introduction of the duty in the 1995 Act to establish the necessary evidence and place the legal obligation on the Government to reopen the investigation.

After nearly 20 years of campaigning, the investigation into the cause of the loss was reopened in 1998, and great credit for that decision goes not just to the organisations I mentioned but to my hon. Friend the Member for Garston and Halewood (Maria Eagle), who galvanised the local campaign and ran an all-party group on the subject, and of course to John, now Lord Prescott, who, as Secretary of State for Transport, invoked the powers for the reinvestigation because he drew on his awareness of the struggle that unions and families had undertaken to find the missing ship. He has recently described the Government’s attempt to remove the duty as a massive insult to those who campaigned for the truth about the Derbyshire.

The steadfast way in which the friends and family group that set up the campaign, based in and around Liverpool, and the poignant memories brought back by the 20th anniversary this year of the finding of the ship testify to the huge importance of the power to reinvestigate, not just to find out new facts but, as the hon. Member for Banff and Buchan (Dr Whiteford) said, to support and recognise the loss of those who were affected. All this has been reflected in the wording of amendment 1.

The reinvestigation absolved the crew of any blame for the loss of the vessel and led to significant improvements in the safe operation of bulk carrier class ships and the understanding of typhoon conditions. For those reasons, the claim made in Committee by the Solicitor-General, who is not in his place, that if a wreck is discovered many years after an accident, safety insights would be irrelevant or out of date, really does not hold water. That argument was disproved by the case of the Derbyshire. Maritime accidents may be relatively rare, but they are tragic events and it is crucial to understand them as fully as we can.

Although it relates to a different mode of transport, the recent search for the Malaysian flight MH370 demonstrates that even in today’s technologically advanced world there are circumstances in which even our greatest efforts struggle to match the vastness of the oceans our ships and planes traverse. Who knows when future evidence on that incident will emerge as to the plane’s final fate? It might take months, years or even decades.

[Kelvin Hopkins]

It may indeed be technology that has not yet been developed that will solve those problems.

[Mr Marsden]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. In the context of this debate, the MH370 incident shows that in other circumstances, where such incidents might affect British ships and citizens, Ministers must have flexibility and the power to reopen inquiries. [Interruption.] The Minister says that that is absolutely right, but I will go on to demonstrate that the inadequacies of his clause as drafted would not allow that to happen. If any such tragedy were to occur in British maritime in the future, we must have the law in place to guarantee that men and women working on our ships, and the families who rely on them, get the answers, however long the recovery of evidence takes.

The Government’s preferred approach in this Deregulatory Bill is to retain a discretionary power—a weaker section of the 1995 Act—to rehear such a case if the Secretary of State suspects that a miscarriage of justice may have occurred. That is simply an unacceptable weakening of the Secretary of State’s ability to protect seafarers and their families. It downgrades rights from a duty to a mere choice.

Sadly, that was reflected by some of the Solicitor-General’s comments when defending the change in Committee. In response to a challenge from my hon. Friend the Member for Derby North (Chris Williamson), the Solicitor-General said:

“We are talking about something similar to a judicial inquiry, with all the formality and costs associated with it. It is not just about money, but about taking up the time of a huge number of people. If it is a worthwhile exercise, because it will help safety or clear someone’s name, it is obviously worth doing, but it is pointless and expensive if it happens many years later.”––[Official Report, Deregulation Public Bill Committee, 11 March 2014; c. 311.]

Perhaps the hon. and learned Gentleman did not intend it, but he seemed to suggest that there should almost be a statute of limitations on the timescale that influences a Government’s response. I am sorry to say that grief, support and the ability to find the truth are not always amenable to an automatic, time-limited cut-off point.

There is also a circular problem inherent in the Government’s proposal. It is not clear how the Secretary of State can be expected adequately to assess the existing evidence in order to suspect a miscarriage of justice without the sort of rigorous, independent work carried out by the marine accident investigation branch. The work will now be undertaken by the branch only if the Secretary of State requests it because he already suspects a miscarriage of justice.

It has been claimed that the removal of the duty can be described simply as tidying up in order to synchronise the 1995 Act with other recent guidance. However, recent MAIB guidance has made it very clear that its remit lies only in dealing with the reporting of the circumstances of an accident and not an investigation of its root cause. The MAIB is not—I repeat, not—responsible for enforcement or prosecution of any responsible bodies. Those functions are still underpinned by the 1995 Act.

There is one other factor to take into account: reinvestigation inevitably might mean that difficult truths are unearthed about the adequacy and focus of previous assessments by officials and the Department when making an initial judgment. Any Minister should be able to pursue the process subsequently without fear or favour. Under the element of discretion that the Government propose, that ability might be, or could appear to be, hampered, but retaining the existing duty protects those in government—of whatever party—from any suggestion of partiality with regard to taking forward the reinvestigation process.

The Government’s impact assessment cites a human rights argument in defence of the clause, claiming that the possibility of the future automatic investigation of an accident could have an impact on the career prospects of survivors. However, the Derbyshire reinvestigation showed the value of being able to step back from an initial rush to judgment on the culpability of crew for the accident, because new evidence eventually established unrelated causes.

I have been hugely impressed by the work of campaigners such as Paul Lambert, who represents the families who lost loved ones in the MV Derbyshire accident. They still feel that this is a key issue, as does Mark Dickinson, the general secretary of Nautilus International, who takes a keen interest in the case, not least because, as a member of the International Transport Workers Federation, he helped to co-ordinate the search for the Derbyshire in 1994. I am pleased that amendment 1 has been signed by many hon. Members, several of whom hope to speak in the debate. Some have been contacted by constituents who have been affected by tragedies, while others represent coastal communities. Some are simply loth to see an important safeguard sacrificed so unthinkingly.

On Second Reading, my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent North (Joan Walley) emphasised the importance of maintaining the thrust of the existing duty. My hon. Friend the Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell) is to be applauded for frequently, tirelessly and with determination raising this and related maritime matters inside and outside the House. As hon. Members might suspect, there is a real worry that several aspects of the Bill show that the Government, in their bid to be seen as shedding regulation, risk blinding themselves to the value of apparently minor existing legislative provisions and specifications. However, the example of maritime investigations shows that the need for such detail has been vindicated by the blood, sweat and tears of those caught up in such tragedies, and the bitter years of struggle to uncover their causes.

Regrettably, our attempt in Committee to delete clause 35 in its entirety was defeated. However, in an attempt to build consensus, we have tried to recognise the Government’s argument that the Secretary of State should have the flexibility to avoid the costs of reinvestigation when it is absolutely clear that new evidence will be of little or no value to determine the causes of the accident, and if no interested parties are calling for a reinvestigation. However, amendment 1 would ensure that if there was a reasonable possibility that new evidence would provide significant new information about the causes of an accident, answers for the surviving families or safety lessons for today, the duty to reopen the investigation would be retained.

It is imperative that we retain a stronger power than that in the Bill so that the Secretary of State’s default setting is to reopen investigations. We owe it to those who have died or been injured not to remain silent on that point. We must send a clear message to Ministers and civil service administrations of now and the future, and to the men and women who do such valuable and vital work in our maritime economy today, that justice and safety will always come first, which is why I urge hon. Members on both sides of the House to reject clause 35 as it stands by voting for amendment 1.

16:45

[Mr Redwood]

We have just heard 37 minutes of the Opposition spokesman, the hon. Member for Blackpool South (Mr Marsden), largely misunderstanding the Government’s modest proposals or exaggerating their consequences. Let me reassure him that I, too, would wish to see an inquiry into a maritime disaster reopened as soon as there was significant new evidence and a hope of getting closure for the troubled families, or safety recommendations to save people who venture on the seas in the future. I am quite sure that is what the Minister said and, as I understand it, that is exactly what the Bill achieves.

Similarly, in the case of taxis, none of us here wishes to endanger people using taxis, as some Opposition Members seem to think the Government wish to do, but the proposals are nothing to do with that. They are to do with the possible use of a hire car vehicle by the family of the licensed user for their own family purposes, but not plying for hire. It seems a perfectly reasonable and modest proposal so that families who do not have a large income do not have to run two cars, which they might find difficult to do.

[Kelvin Hopkins]

Legislation must take account of possible unintended consequences, not just what seems to be a nice idea on the surface.

[Mr Redwood]

I agree, and that is what we are debating today. I am on the side of the Minister on this occasion. He might find that remarkable, but it seemed to me that he made a reasonable and moderate case. The language in the Bill and in the Government amendments does the job, so I am trying to reassure the Opposition, who seem to be giving a long-winded and misguided interpretation of what the Government intend. I would say the proposals are too modest overall. I would like to see more deregulation coming forward in these important areas, but in no way do I wish to jeopardise safety or give people a bad ride in their taxi.

[Julie Hilling]

I do not know whether the right hon. Gentleman realises that taxi drivers, private hire vehicle drivers and the rest of the people in the trade are not asking for other drivers to be able to drive their cars; in fact, they are saying that family members should not be allowed to do so.

[Mr Redwood]

Some are with the hon. Lady and some are with the Government. She cannot generalise quite as wildly as she does. I understand that some associations take that line, but if one talks to taxi drivers and private vehicle drivers, one finds people on both sides of the argument. I do not want to go into those sensitive issues; I just offered a little support to the Minister because the language captures exactly what everybody in the House wishes to achieve—better safety and security.

I want to concentrate on the issue of car parking. I am grateful that the Government have brought forward, again, an extremely modest proposal to deal with the fact that many motorists feel they are picked on by councils that have turned parking controls into a way of making easy money out of them. The proposal goes only a little way in the direction I would like the Government to take. I understand the Minister’s difficulties, because we need quite a lot of local decision making, but the idea behind his proposal is that simple camera enforcement is not always the right way to go. I gave an example in an intervention to show how camera enforcement of a bus lane proposal could be very misleading and unfair to the individual concerned, who was trying to keep out of the way of an emergency vehicle. That is not always captured by the fixed position of the camera, which concentrates on the bus lane. There could be similar problems with parking enforcement.

The problem, which is a large one for many electors, comes from too many parking restraints and restrictions that have not been well thought through. Once again, Members have rightly defended good parking controls. I am very much in favour of good parking controls. I agree that we need to stop people parking on blind bends, near pedestrian crossings or in places where their vehicle could obstruct the line of sight and endanger safety. I also agree that we need parking restrictions on roads where the parking would get in the way of the flow of traffic, because that not only impedes the traffic and stops people getting to work or taking their children to school, but can create danger by causing frustration among motorists.

It makes sense to have sensible parking restrictions that ensure that the flow on roads is reasonable, junctions have good sight lines and are safe, bends have the best sight lines possible, and so forth. That should be common ground in the House, and I do not think the Minister is trying to stop councils doing that or enforcing those sensible restrictions strongly and fairly, as we want. But the type of parking restriction that we may well be talking about here, where some relaxation is needed, is where a piece of road which the council designates as safe and fair for people to park on at certain times of day or certain days of the week and not others is subject to such complicated regulation that sometimes a law-abiding motorist cannot work out from the local signs and practices whether the parking regulation applies or not. For example, do the parking restrictions apply on bank holidays? Often, the sign is silent on that point. Is the sign clear about whether different rules apply on Sundays? Is the sign close enough to the parking area in question? Are there different restrictions on different sides of the same street, as sometimes happens in London? Do we know where one set of restrictions ends and another begins?

There can also be variable bus lane times, and it can be difficult to keep up with the changing regulations. This shows that there are circumstances in which a council thinks it perfectly reasonable to allow parking in a particular area or use of a bus lane at certain times but not at others. The motorist could be in genuine doubt about the restrictions, or perhaps feel that they were unfair or frivolous because they did not fall into the category of restrictions that are essential to ensuring that traffic can flow and that safety sightlines are maintained.

We can use this little debate to probe the underlying problem that we are trying to address. We can also use it to allow the House of Commons to tell councils that some of them are overdoing parking restrictions or are chopping and changing the regulations too often during the day or on different days of the week. Perhaps those regulations have not been properly thought through. Perhaps the enforcement is unfair, or too sharp. If someone has been delayed by three minutes while paying for something in a shop, they could find that they have committed an offence because they could not get back to their car within the given time on their ticket. People often have to be quite prescient in those circumstances. They need to know exactly how long it will take them to get to the shop, find their goods, queue to pay for them at the till and get out again. They do not want to overpay for what can be quite expensive parking, but if they get it slightly wrong, they can end up with a big fine. That is why people think that this is a nasty lottery in which the councils are the only winners, and camera enforced parking restrictions can be even worse for the individuals concerned.

So, one cheer for the Government for realising that this is a big issue and coming up with their modest proposal on camera enforcement, but may we please have some more, because this does not solve the overall problem? Solving the overall problem will help parades of shops and town centres in places where trade is not good. This irritating, over-bureaucratic, over-regulated parking is one reason that people do not bother even to try to park in those areas, because they think they are going to end up with a fine for behaving perfectly reasonably.

[Julie Hilling]

I am pleased to be able to take part in the debate. I must declare that I am a proud member of Unite the union, which has an interest in the taxi trade, although, sadly, it has not briefed me on this issue.

A few weeks ago, my two Bolton colleagues and I attended a meeting in my constituency which had been called by the National Association of Licensing and Enforcement Officers. In attendance were people from the Law Commission, the Local Government Association, the National Taxi Association, the National Private Hire Association, Unite, the GMB, the police and crime commissioner for Greater Manchester and councillors from a number of Greater Manchester authorities, including Bolton, Oldham, Rochdale, Trafford, Stockport and Salford. It was interesting that those attendees from a vast range of different backgrounds all spoke with one voice. They did not understand why the clauses affecting taxis were being rushed through in the Deregulation Bill. They wanted them to be withdrawn, and replaced by holistic legislation that focused on the Law Commission review. At a meeting of such a diverse group of people, it is unusual for everyone to speak with one voice.

We know that there are already problems in the system. In the north-west, for instance, Rossendale has licensed more than 1,000 hackney carriages, most of which are being used not in Rossendale but elsewhere. Where are the checks being carried out, and by whom? We do not have national standards, so a taxi that is licensed in Rossendale but does not reach the standards required by the authorities in Bolton could be driving around Bolton. In that situation, a passenger in Bolton who wanted to complain about that taxi could not do so to officers in Bolton, as they would have no right to inspect the vehicle or check the driver.

In Sheffield, North East Derbyshire district council has licensed a Sheffield-based operator that uses hackney carriages licensed by Gedling borough council, so in effect no council has regulatory control. Sheffield council is particularly powerless when there are complaints from Sheffield residents about taxis overcharging or poor driver behaviour. The interesting question for me is why Rossendale, for example, is licensing so many taxi drivers. Why are firms going to Rossendale or Gedling for licences? Is it because the regimes in those places are much easier to get through, or because it is cheaper to get the vehicles licensed there? What is it about the system in those places? When the system as a whole is fractured, there are all sorts of ways for disreputable drivers and companies, or people who are simply trying to make the quickest buck they can, to get through it.

There is also the question of whether operators should be able to make journeys across local area borders. We need to look holistically at what we do about those cross-border journeys to ensure that there can be enforcement of regulations. No matter where a taxi is licensed, if it is operating in Bolton, why can Bolton enforcement officers not be allowed to enforce regulations on that vehicle? I am not sure that the answer is necessarily to say that it is not possible. We need a framework in which it can happen, whereby local authorities can get remuneration to enable them to carry out checks when licensing has been carried out by a different authority. The situation is complex and is made much worse by this Bill.

The issue came to my attention when the parents of a 13-year-old girl came to one of my constituency surgeries because they were concerned about a specific incident that had happened to her. She had taken a taxi. To start with she was going to Bolton, but part way through the journey she received a call from her friend to say they needed to meet elsewhere. It appears that at some point on the journey the taxi driver turned off all his monitoring equipment, including his GPS. The 13-year-old was taken to quite a remote estate in the constituency. The taxi driver parked up and said that he was just waiting for a friend to bring him his mobile phone charger. Fortunately, the girl started to get agitated. She had told the driver that she was 16, because her mum had said that she should tell people that she was a little bit older, thinking that it would offer her protection. In fact, in these circumstances it appears to have done the opposite. The girl became concerned about the questions the taxi driver was starting to ask her about her social life and so on. Fortunately, she had the nous to get out of the taxi. She played a ruse and said she wanted to pop over to a nearby shop and buy some cigarettes, of all things. The taxi driver agreed, saying they could share them, and she got out of the taxi and ran like hell. Fortunately, she met a bystander who listened to her, took her to the local McDonald’s, called the police and waited with her until they turned up.

It turned out that the taxi driver had a record of past misdemeanours. He was taken through the tribunal system and lost his licence, so is now unable to operate in Bolton. But, like me, the girl’s parents were horrified to learn that although the driver is banned in Bolton, he could become a taxi driver anywhere else, depending on whether another local authority did a police check. Because he was not prosecuted, a police check might not throw up the fact that he was a danger to the travelling public and, it would appear, to young women in particular.

I asked the Department for Transport a written question about the proportion of local authorities in England and Wales that require a disclosure and barring service check on applicants before issuing a taxi or private hire vehicle licence, and I received this response:

“The Department for Transport does not hold this information. Local authorities are under a statutory duty to ensure that any person to whom they grant a taxi or private hire vehicle driver’s licence is a ‘fit and proper person’. As part of this process they can undertake”—

note the word “can”—

“criminal record checks on applicants but we do not keep details of the assessment policies and procedures adopted by local authorities.”—[Official Report, 28 April 2014; Vol. 579, c. 522W.]

That “can” seems totally inadequate.

I have asked questions about whether all local authorities carry out police checks, but as no one holds the information, we do not know the answer. That is another reason why we need holistic legislation that ensures that licensing authorities carry out proper checks on drivers. We need a system in which a person who is banned by one local authority is banned, full stop. The changes proposed in the Bill will make the situation worse, not better.

[Graham Jones]

My hon. Friend makes a powerful point. Does she accept that that principle applies not only to the licensee but to the condition of the vehicle? We have varying licensing conditions for vehicles themselves. Some authorities might argue that other authorities license vehicles that they would deem to be substandard because they have a higher threshold. Does she accept that the age and condition of the vehicle is also of paramount importance to local people?

17:00

[Julie Hilling]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. When a vehicle can be licensed in one authority and the driver in another, and both can operate somewhere else, we have a ridiculous situation in which nobody can enforce standards because the vehicle will never be driven in the authority where either licence was granted. He is absolutely right that we have no equality of standards across the piece. It is a ludicrous situation, and it is ludicrous that the Government intend to deregulate further. It makes no sense whatsoever.

I wrote to the Secretary of State about my 13-year-old constituent. In response, I was told that legislation obliges a local authority to satisfy itself that any person to whom it grants a taxi or public service vehicle licence is a fit and proper person to hold such a licence, but “fit and proper” is not defined in legislation and it therefore falls to the local authority to decide. Why do the Government think that further deregulation will keep my constituents safe?

When I first read the clause that allows family members to drive an off-duty taxi or private hire vehicle, I could see no problems with it and thought it seemed a sensible idea. I asked the operators and others involved about that when we met. I was not wholly convinced by the answer and so asked whether the taxi markings could be removed. I was told that that would be extremely difficult for taxis operating in my local authority—I guess this would be the case for all taxis operating outside London—because they are clearly marked as taxis. Another issue that was raised was what would happen in areas where taxis are allowed to use bus lanes. What would happen if an off-duty taxi used a bus lane? How would we enforce proper usage? I was then convinced by their arguments.

As we talked through those matters, I realised that in all our areas we already have a massive problem with unlicensed taxis touting for business, particularly late at night. I am no longer often in city centres late at night, but I have been in the past. It has to be said that one can become quite desperate when looking for a taxi. In particular, young people who have perhaps been drinking more than they should will not be rigorous about checking the identity of the driver or the car; they are simply delighted to be getting a lift home. We should not introduce any measures that weaken regulation and make it more likely that people will get into a vehicle that is not being driven by the licensed driver.

[Graham Jones]

My hon. Friend is making a powerful argument, and one that I think the general public will have a lot of sympathy with. Does she agree that there are also implications for police enforcement? In my area, taxi drivers are sometimes drug couriers, and the police find them. If we are going to deregulate who can drive the vehicle, the question of who is the mule—is it the driver or the person taking the car?—is a serious problem for police enforcement. Who is driving that vehicle? Who is the person who last had it?

[Julie Hilling]

My hon. Friend makes a powerful point yet again. I absolutely agree that we need clarity on who is the driver of the vehicle, particularly one that is marked as a taxi, and what the vehicle is involved in, whether it be legitimate or illegitimate trade.

All the people who came to the initial meeting—drivers, trade union representatives, operators and enforcers—said that nobody in the industry was calling for the right for family members to be able to drive the cars. They are all happy with the current situation, because they understand how it protects them, their family and their trade when their vehicle is used for business, not pleasure. I find it difficult to understand where the proposal came from, because the trade is not calling for it. It might be very generous of the Minister to say, “A driver won’t have to have a second car because his wife can drive his”, but they do not want that.

There are real problems with the current system. I wholeheartedly ask the Minister seriously to consider removing these nonsensical provisions from the Bill, to make sure that we have holistic legislation based on the Law Commission report, and to support our amendment. We need a national register of drivers. We need national standards for drivers and vehicle operators before we ever allow them to sub-contract. We need robust licensing policies in all licensing authorities. We need a clear duty and method for local authorities to share data with the police and other local authorities. We need the local authority where taxis are operating to be able to undertake checks and enforcement wherever the driver or the vehicle is registered, and for the enforcement body to be recompensed for that enforcement.

The Government should, as soon as possible, initiate a proper national system for taxis and private hire vehicles. That would be welcomed by the profession and by everybody involved in it, including licensing bodies, local authorities, and, most importantly—

[Mr Redwood]

Is the hon. Lady telling the House that the current licensing system is poor and allows through people it should not? Is she really sure that councils would welcome a national system?

[Julie Hilling]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his intervention because it allows me to reiterate what I said. Yes, the National Association of Licensing and Enforcement Operators has called for a more rigorous policy. It welcomed the Law Commission report and the notion of holistic legislation that could introduce some of the things the Government want but also created a robust system to ensure that we do not have rogue operators, rogue drivers, or people who are a risk to the travelling public.

I call on the Government to introduce holistic legislation and to remove these three piecemeal and ridiculous clauses from the Bill to ensure that the travelling public are safe and not put more at risk.

[Grahame M. Morris]

I urge the House to support amendments 61 and 1, and to reject clause 35. I will not rehearse the strong arguments comprehensively and ably made by my hon. Friend the Member for Blackpool South (Mr Marsden) about the safety of seafarers.

I want to say a few words about the Government’s proposals on taxi deregulation. In April, I held a Westminster Hall debate on their proposed reforms to the legislation on taxis, private hire vehicles and hackney carriages. Incredibly, there was near-unanimous support across the Chamber, even from Government Members who seemed to agree that the reforms were poorly drafted, rushed, and involved risk and unintended consequences. Taxis and private hire vehicles form an essential part of our national transport system. Indeed, for many of our elderly and disabled constituents, they are often the only form of public transport; that applies particularly to those of us who represent rural or semi-rural areas. I fear that in the rush to deregulate, changes are being proposed that may well endanger public safety.

Those concerns are being expressed not only by me and by other Labour MPs but by, among others, Unite, my union; the RMT; the GMB, which represents thousands of drivers of private hire and hackney vehicles all over the country; the National Association of Licensing and Enforcement Officers; the Local Government Association; and the Suzy Lamplugh Trust. I have met all those bodies, or they have been in contact with my office to express their worries about the nature and implications of these proposals for the deregulation of private hire vehicles.

Opposition Members have expressed a particular concern about clause 10, which will enable people who do not hold a private hire vehicle licence to drive that vehicle when off duty. The reform will surely lead to an increase in the number of unlicensed drivers posing as legitimate drivers, if there is very little that policing or licensing authorities can do, in practice, to identify bogus drivers.

Following the Westminster Hall debate, I conducted a consultation exercise with taxi and private hire vehicle drivers in my constituency. One of my findings was that passengers very rarely, if ever, ask drivers to show their licence badge. Drivers made it clear that they felt that the operation of unlicensed taxis in their area risked damaging the reputation of, and confidence in, the firms they worked for.

I want to draw the Minister’s attention to the concerns voiced by some 19 police and crime commissioners around the country, including mine, Ron Hogg, the police and crime commissioner for County Durham and Darlington. His view is that an inevitable consequence of this deregulation will be an increase in the number of people attacked after a night out.

For the sake of the record, I want to make the Minister aware of police figures showing that, in London alone, 214 women were sexually assaulted last year after getting into an illegal minicab or an unlicensed taxi, and 54 were raped. The Suzy Lamplugh Trust, a leading independent women’s safety charity, shares my concerns. It has said that clause 10

“will provide greater opportunity for those intent on preying on women in this way.”

None of us wants our constituents to be put at risk—I do not believe that the Minister does, either—but passenger safety and public confidence in the taxi and private hire vehicle industry should not be undermined by the Government’s mad dash to deregulate.

There are concerns about clause 11, which will set standard durations of three years for taxi and private hire vehicle driver licences, and of five years for private hire vehicle operator licences. The industry and trade unions expressed concerns on that point during the limited time available for the consultation. The National Private Hire Association and the Institute of Licensing have said that the clause will remove flexibility from councils, and there are already concerns about how effectively drivers are scrutinised.

Although local authorities impose licence conditions on private hire vehicle drivers and operators that require them to report criminal convictions and changes to their medical status within a specified period, in practice such conditions are often ignored. Even in the case of driver licences, although the police are supposed to inform the local authority of any recordable convictions—indeed, the police have the discretion to inform the local authority of minor matters—information is often given haphazardly.

Some local authorities get information directly from their local police force, but—for the Minister, it is a big but—in very few instances do local authorities receive information from police forces outside their area. My hon. Friend the Member for Hyndburn (Graham Jones), who is sitting alongside me, made that very point. It is important, because one of the Bill’s provisions will allow subcontracting, so a taxi or private hire firm might come from another area and be covered by a different police force.

I remind the House that effective implementation will require local authorities to sign up to the disclosure and barring service in order to receive information about convictions during the term of a licence. The Minister has said that he does not see any problem, but the service is relatively new, and how it will work in practice is not yet known. We know that local authorities have inadequate control over, or powers for, effective policing or enforcement, so how will the extension of cross-border work that the provision will bring in be properly licensed and controlled? The lack of confidence in clause 11 is further evidence, I believe, of the rushed and piecemeal nature of the reforms.

17:15

One of my principal concerns relates to the Government proposal to allow private hire vehicles to subcontract and book an operator in a different licensing area. When I re-read in Hansard the Minister’s response in the Westminster Hall debate, and indeed on Second Reading and in Committee, I saw that he said that the change would give customers more choice—that was part of his justification—and that it might be advantageous, in that passengers could ring up their local provider if they did not know who to call. However, passengers may well not want to use the subcontractor that has been sent to their door. At the moment, they have some degree of control over that.

Quality is an issue, and in some cases, the name of a company is important—a Government Member raised that point during the Minister’s opening statement. People may book on that basis, and may choose not to book others on the same basis. A customer might choose a local operator because of their local knowledge, because they like those particular drivers and feel comfortable with them, or because they have experienced problems with another operator. A member of the public might call a specific operator because they feel that they are reliable and safe to travel with. I am thinking specifically about women travelling home. They might not be travelling back from a night out; they might be nurses or home care workers travelling back from employment. They might have a preferred operator because they know they will be transported safely. A disabled passenger might know their preferred provider to be competent in assisting disabled passengers, and they may have confidence and comfort in the knowledge that a particular provider will take them home safely.

My consultation found that drivers appreciated those concerns, and as a consequence, were overwhelmingly opposed to the reforms. Particularly in relation to subcontracting, there is a risk in passing jobs from one company to another. It is not the wonderful panacea that some advocates of deregulation, such as the right hon. Member for Wokingham (Mr Redwood), who is no longer in his place, would have us believe. The House really should think about some of the consequences, including the unintended consequences, of the proposals.

[Graham Jones]

My hon. Friend makes a powerful point. People might be expecting a vehicle that is perhaps five years old at most, and that has been crash-tested for safety, from an operator they are familiar with and a local authority that has a very robust licensing system; but the vehicle that turns up may be from another authority, or could even have been licensed in the far ends of the United Kingdom. It could have no age restrictions on it, and be poorly MOT-tested, or its tests may not have been as frequent as they would have been under the local authority. The vehicle may not be as robust or as sound—it is only as good as it was on the date on which it got its MOT—as a vehicle that their local authority would permit. People could end up with a vehicle that is unsatisfactory, compared with what they would expect in their local authority area, because of the cross-border taxi proposal.

[Grahame M. Morris]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that intervention. He makes a very sensible point. Apart from choice and preference, and whether a cab or a private hire vehicle is adapted for the disabled, there are also issues about levels of maintenance, and different standards in different local authority areas.

On the Opposition side of the House, and on my part, there is agreement about the need for reform of the industry. However, there is consensus across the trade that this piecemeal approach is not what is needed. What is different since the Westminster Hall debate a couple of months ago is that the Law Commission has now reported. In his opening statement, the Minister said that the Law Commission agrees with clauses 10 to 12; well, that is not quite the whole truth, is it? What the Law Commission has advocated—and for the life of me, I cannot understand why the Government are not following through on this—is a comprehensive review to get rid of the inconsistency in standards across the country that my hon. Friend the Member for Hyndburn and others identified, and to deal with the concerns about inadequate enforcement. The idea that we can cherry-pick three proposals for deregulation and that there will be no consequences flies in the face of what the Law Commission is about, and seems rather contrary.

As my hon. Friends have indicated, the Law Commission’s July 2013 interim statement said that if reforms were to be implemented, they must be underpinned by tougher powers for licensing officers. I do not see why the proposed reforms are so urgent that the Government should bypass meaningful consultation; in doing so, they are undermining the work of the Law Commission that they initiated.

We must have a holistic approach; changes to regulation should be considered in the context of the legislation as a whole, rather than in a piecemeal fashion. Failure to do so not only disregards the trade and other stakeholders, but may put passenger safety at risk. The reforms look set to endanger the travelling public and ignore stakeholders. I do not believe that they are fit for purpose, and they should be removed from the Bill.

[Caroline Lucas]

I rise to reinforce some of the arguments that hon. Members have made about amendment 61, to which I have added my name. Many people in my constituency have raised this issue with me, and there is real concern about public safety. Nothing that I have heard from the Government this afternoon has put my mind—or, I am sure, my constituents’ minds—at rest.

Taxi companies in my constituency have also raised concerns. I come back to a theme to which other hon. Members have returned time and again: nobody really knows what is driving these measures. People are not asking for them; on the contrary, organisations that are watching the proposals are sounding the alarm. They include the Suzy Lamplugh Trust, which we should surely listen to closely. Given that no counter-argument is coming from other organisations to balance the discussion, it strikes me as incredibly perverse for the Government to push ahead with these measures and fly in the face of so much advice suggesting that there are dangers involved.

I was particularly moved to hear the hon. Member for Bolton West (Julie Hilling) again tell the House the story of her 13-year-old constituent—she raised that topic in the Westminster Hall debate secured by the hon. Member for Easington (Grahame M. Morris) a few weeks ago. It was horrifying to hear that story then, just as it was today. The bottom line is that people with disabilities, young women, those worried about how they will get home at night, and those without access to a car will be watching for the implications of clauses 10 to 12, and they are worried about them.

Brighton and Hove has 1,800 drivers who serve our city well. Many of them have said that they are worried about the Government’s attempts to rush through changes to the regulations, and that the measures will be bad for the travelling public and the city, and potentially dangerous. The Government proposals seem rushed and are another example of unthinking, anti-regulation, small-state ideology that has no basis in evidence or common sense and, as has been said, risks putting public safety at risk.

We have had nothing close to meaningful consultation, and the Government even failed to discuss these changes with councils before tabling the clauses. The Local Government Association put it politely, but states clearly:

“We are disappointed that the LGA was not made aware of these proposed clauses until they were brought before the Deregulation Bill Committee.”

Where is the speed coming from? Why do we have to pre-empt other processes to get these measures into statute so fast?

There is concern that the proposals could lead to women being put at risk of assault or attack by unlicensed and unregulated drivers when they travel late at night. The deregulation of the taxi industry could also lead to rogue taxi drivers, criminals posing as drivers, passengers being ripped off, and people being unsure whether the taxi they have flagged down is legitimate.

Ministers should surely follow the 2011 proposals of experts on the cross-party Select Committee on Transport, who advised the Government to listen to users—particularly those in vulnerable groups—those in the trade, and local authorities, and to keep the situation simple and local. Instead, clauses 10 to 12 show a systematic attempt to water down standards and rules that were designed to serve and protect the public.

I come back to the sense that this is being driven by—I do not know: is it being driven by ideology or something else? During the debate of the hon. Member for Easington in Westminster Hall, I just observed that the boss of the minicab giant Addison Lee had made an individual donation of £500,000 to the Conservatives last year—it was reported as the third largest donation in the three months to the end of September. Government Members immediately started jumping up to point out that Addison Lee does not currently operate outside London and so has no particular interest. However, Addison Lee is on record as saying that it would very much like to operate outside London. I will leave it there; I simply say that when we are searching for a reason to understand why the Government are pursuing this policy, one cannot help but notice that there has been a very large donation from Addison Lee.

[John McDonnell]

I convene the RMT group in Parliament. I raised these issues at the RMT conference this morning and we had a discussion about their implications.

On the taxi and minicab issue, the RMT represents only the black cabs in London, which has been prayed in aid as operating the system that will now be rolled out elsewhere. I want to dissuade the Minister from the view that the RMT is happy with the regime in London at the moment. In fact, in the RMT’s view, there should be further regulation, with annual testing. The figures have already been given for assaults and rapes, which are occurring even in the capital city’s regulated regime.

What worries me is exactly what others have said. From the point of view of the union and a number of other organisations that have been cited, everyone thought that we were on a journey over the last couple of years: the Law Commission would conduct its investigation and review; there would be adequate consultation; a comprehensive Bill would be produced; and then we would establish a regime that, although perhaps not everyone would be happy with it, would at least be nationally comprehensive, effective, properly enforced and readily understandable. There is therefore a lack of comprehension of why the measures have been introduced in such haste. In fact, I am led to believe that one of the informal consultations on some of the legislation lasted only 10 days and was conducted by e-mail.

There may well be some association between donations, speed and amendments, but to be frank, what concerns me most is getting the legislation right, and I just do not think that the measure will prove effective. I think it will cause more problems than it is worth. I also think it will prove deeply unpopular as it is rolled out. If there is a lack of safety, particularly for women, the Government will reap the whirlwind. They will face a backlash, because what they are doing flies in the face of all the expert evidence that has been presented. Everyone who practises on the ground, right across the country, is saying that this is not the way to go about it, so I caution the Government: they are making a mistake today and may well want to think again before the day is out.

On marine investigations, again, people are slightly bewildered about why the measure is included in this Bill. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Blackpool South (Mr Marsden), who sits on the Front Bench, for taking us through the history and in particular the Derbyshire incident. I, too, want to go back to that incident, because I find it extraordinary. I remember the campaign about the Derbyshire and I remember that key period when a number of the unions and others were raising the problems with that type of ship. From 1975 to 1997, nearly 400 of them went down and we lost something like 1,300 seafarers. The Derbyshire was one of those ships. There was an issue with design and safety.

At the time, there were all sorts of insinuations about it being the crew’s fault. The RMT undertook its own investigation, along with Nautilus and the International Transport Workers Federation, as my hon. Friend said. They found the ship and discovered the real causes. However, the investigation would not have been reopened but for a piece of legislation introduced in 1995 by—who? By a Conservative Government. Until then, the system was not satisfactory. The Derbyshire relatives, the unions and others had to campaign because reopening an inquiry was left to the whim of a Minister. That was unsatisfactory. A Conservative Government thus changed the legislation to provide for an automatic reopening of an inquiry when new evidence was found.

17:30

We have heard the argument that inquiries should not be reopened on the basis of slight or insubstantial evidence. None has reopened in that way. No inquiries have resulted from people coming forward with evidence relating to a ship sunk a century ago and demanding an inquiry. What people want is the confidence they never had before the Conservative Government introduced the legislation: that when new information becomes available, an inquiry will automatically be reopened.

The people most affected—the relatives—have an important role to play. The point was made about closure. The Derbyshire relatives wanted to know what happened to the 42 seafarers and the two wives who went down. Until they knew, there would always be allegations, there would always be uncertainty. They just wanted to know what happened to their relatives. At least the legislation gave them some potential for closure.

I can understand why, if we are scrutinising legislation, we might want to remove elements of regulations that are no longer needed and no longer effective, but everyone in the sector and everyone who represents seafarers is saying that these regulations are desperately needed, because they provide confidence and security to the families in the whole sector and to seafarers themselves that when an incident has occurred and new information has come to light, there will automatically be an investigation. It will not be left to the discretion of an individual Minister and decided on a whim.

I asked the Minister in an intervention what would happen if the Government went ahead with this and what would be contained in the detail of the regulations, but I have yet to hear a response. I hope the Minister will respond in detail later. I would like to see something along the lines of amendment 1, tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Blackpool South. That would at least provide some protection for the involvement of interested parties, particularly the relatives. It would also give some commitment that, if information emerges from which we might learn lessons regarding the future safety of seafarers, that should be a relevant factor in the considerations.

I hope that this legislation does not go through tonight, but if it does, I urge that a proper and detailed consultation be held with all those in the seafaring industry and all those who work in the maritime sector, so that the regulations can be considered in detail. We need to learn the lessons not just from the Derbyshire but from other cases and from those who have been involved in the campaigns.

Let me repeat that the current regulations came from Conservative legislation, which I supported at the time and helped to campaign for outside this place. I simply cannot understand why the Conservative party is stepping back tonight from what has proved to be an effective piece of legislation that was implemented on a cross-party and consensual basis. My hon. Friend the Member for Blackpool South mentioned the role of Lord Prescott in ensuring that the inquiry was reopened; he used the legislation that the Conservative Government had introduced. I ask Members to think again before approving this measure, which has a significance beyond a deregulation Bill; it drives to the heart of our maritime industry and to the protection of seafarers as they risk their lives on behalf of our economy.

[Kelvin Hopkins]

We have heard a series of excellent speeches from my hon. Friends, which I think have comprehensively demolished the Government position on just about every front. I do not wish to repeat the fine arguments made by my hon. Friends and other Members on the Opposition Benches; rather, I shall say a few words about perhaps the lightest of the relevant issues—parking and parking enforcement.

I do not believe anyone has spoken up today for those most affected by parking. Those who watched the news reports last night no doubt saw some drivers, typically male drivers, saying, “We don’t want too much parking regulation. We’d like a bit less regulation and a bit more freedom.” It was all a bit “Jack the Lad”. On the other hand, we heard a middle-aged woman saying, “I want to see the parking laws enforced properly, because we do not want to be affected by it, and if people break the law they should face the penalties of the law.” I strongly agree with her.

I am sure we have all had postbags bulging with complaints about parking problems, and it is nearly always from people who have been abused by people who have parked irregularly. The right hon. Member for Wokingham (Mr Redwood) kept confusing the rules on parking and where people can park with the enforcement of those rules. We are talking about enforcement. If rules are not enforced, it means that people are getting away with breaking the law.

[Mr Redwood]

I did not confuse them at all. I drew the distinction. I said that the reason people are fed up with the enforcement is that, in many cases, they do not think the rules are fair.

[Kelvin Hopkins]

If the right hon. Gentleman wants to challenge those rules, that is fine, but we are talking about the enforcement of the rules that exist. To most people, I think, the rules are probably reasonable, but the enforcement sometimes falls down, and I think that using CCTV to enforce those rules is absolutely right. I do not want the rules to be weakened, and I do not want the enforcement to be weakened. I want to help people who are affected badly by parking. For example, people park across my neighbour’s driveway when football matches are on. It is completely unacceptable that he should be blocked into or out of the driveway by other people parking across it; that is simply not on.

These problems may not be as important as the investigation of accidents at sea, or the potential dangers involved in the licensing of private hire vehicles, but they do affect people and people are concerned about them. I want strong enforcement of the parking rules to continue. As the right hon. Member for Wokingham said, we may sometimes challenge the way in which the rules operate, but they should be enforced none the less.

I entirely agree with what was said by my hon. Friend the Member for Bolton West (Julie Hilling) about the need for a national register. There is no reason why we should not have one. We have automatic number plate recognition on a national basis. It ought to be very easy for the police to find out quickly who someone is and what his or her car is by means of an electronic register.

I also agree with what the hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Caroline Lucas) said about the Bill. I was a member of the Joint Committee that subjected it to pre-legislative scrutiny. I thought then that it was driven by dogma, and I still think that. The Government want to say “We are the great deregulating Government,” so they must introduce deregulation Bills, but I am a regulator: I want more regulation in certain circumstances; I want life to be made more civilised; I want ordinary people to be protected by regulation. I do not want freedom for people who will make life miserable for other people, and that may mean more regulation. I am a re-regulator, not a deregulator. I shall certainly vote against the Bill tonight, not just because it is dogmatic, but because of what is in it.

[Grahame M. Morris]

Does my hon. Friend agree that the banks collapsed not because there was too much regulation, but because there was too little? The Government are advocating deregulation and a light touch.

[Kelvin Hopkins]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. I will not get on to the subject of the banks, Madam Deputy Speaker, because you would stop me if I did, but I think that they are too unregulated now. We have banks in public ownership which are still not behaving themselves because they are not sufficiently regulated.

[Mr Redwood]

Does the hon. Gentleman recollect that the whole of banking regulation was completely changed by the incoming Labour Government, who introduced new agencies? I presume that he is criticising them.

[Kelvin Hopkins]

The right hon. Gentleman may remember that I was not always in favour of everything that new Labour did. In fact, I wanted to go a great deal further. I called myself a democratic socialist, rather than new Labour.

[Julie Hilling]

Does my hon. Friend recall that the then Tory Opposition continuously argued against regulation of banks and other financial institutions?

[Kelvin Hopkins]

My hon. Friend is right. I think that we are now recognising the mistakes of the past and, perhaps, seeing the supertanker beginning to turn. I want it to turn much faster, and move towards the more civilised society that we had before the deregulatory society that we have seen for the last 20 or 30 years.

I think that I have made my point. I think that the Bill is dogmatic, and that bits of deregulation have been put in to give it some kind of meaning. I think that the Government are profoundly mistaken. The speeches made by Opposition Members have demolished the Government’s arguments, and I look forward to seeing the Government defeated in the Lobbies.

[Graham Jones]

I want to speak about the Government measures on the deregulation of taxi licensing. My hon. Friend the Member for Easington (Grahame M. Morris) made a valuable point when he said the light-touch approach is not necessarily the best one. In this case, certainly, while we have the localisation of taxi licensing, we can see a plethora of problems in taxi licensing that will not be resolved and, indeed, will be made considerably worse by the measures. They could do a lot of damage to taxi licensing and the respect taxi drivers have in the taxi licensing industry if quality and standards for the fare-paying passenger start to erode. I will therefore vote against these amendments tonight if a Division is called, and I want to explain why I cannot support them.

On the issue of non-drivers being able to drive cars, I mentioned earlier one concern that I have in Lancashire. We work with Lancashire police and we get taxi drivers who are involved in criminal activity—fortunately not many, but a significant number none the less. The police work with the local authority to deal with criminality through taxi licensing. Occasionally taxis are used for couriering drugs around. The police have a difficult job trying to determine who was responsible for the drugs in a particular vehicle, and that will be made more difficult when there are other drivers of a vehicle in which the police find drugs or other illegal items. Having various individuals driving a particular vehicle may throw considerable doubt on such matters. My constituents would expect me to raise the point as to the need to be clear about who is driving a vehicle, who is in a taxi, and who is licensed to drive that taxi, and where.

All these things are crucial, because, certainly in my area, if we are to have a taxi industry that the public respect, we need a taxi policy the public have confidence in, and I do not think the public will have confidence in a taxi policy that opens the door to criminality. For my constituents, there is no worse form of criminality than the transportation of drugs in taxis. I must emphasise that this does not happen frequently, but when it does happen—and it does happen—it is worrying. Not knowing who is driving a vehicle is therefore of some concern.

As I have said, having non-drivers, so to speak, driving taxis is certainly of concern to my local constabulary, and I am sure there are many other reasons why people will feel uneasy about that, too, not least the issues mentioned to do with the abuse of taxis—having the plates on the sides of taxis and non-drivers driving in bus lanes and so forth—or having rogue drivers in those taxis thinking they can take a chance and pick up a fare even though they are not a licensed taxi driver. There is a host of issues around individuals who are not licensed to drive taxis but who may drive the vehicle as a taxi where the plate is on the side and they think they can get away with it.

I have grave concerns about the three and five-year licences, primarily because it will remove local authority control. Situations may also arise where people on three and five-year licences may have been involved in issues that would have led to a suspension in one area where the licence applies but it has not done so and they carry on operating with the licence in other areas, and they do not have to appear before the committee for a fresh licence. It is worrying that it may be accepted and a given that they carry on with that licence. We are trying to raise the standards of taxi operators, taxi licences and taxi vehicles, and this erodes that. The fact that taxi drivers will not be compelled to come back before the local authority licensing committee regularly will open the system up to those who would take advantage of the longevity of their licence to carry on plying their trade, albeit legally in the authority that they licence from, but perhaps not up to the standard of the local authority in which they are operating.

17:45

The third and final issue I wish to discuss is subcontracting. As my hon. Friend the Member for Easington said, people might phone through to their favourite operator whom they know and trust, and that operator could subcontract to another licensed firm in another local authority area, and a vehicle that they are unfamiliar with or unsure of could arrive at their door. That raises all sorts of issues. Is it possible, as was asked, to turn that taxi away, or does it have to be accepted? Most people would probably assume that it was a taxi from the company they had phoned, and would get in it.

Hyndburn wants a local authority taxi licensing policy that reassures the public that the taxis are of a good standard, that that standard is properly, professionally and regularly maintained by the local authority, and that the taxi drivers are reputable and meet a standard determined by local people through localism and the local authority. Other authorities might adopt standards that are a little bit lower—or in some cases, a lot lower—and perhaps the people of Hyndburn do not wish to have such taxis on their roads. However, this provision will simply allow those taxis to turn up, because the job is subcontracted to another local authority, and the paying passenger might be none the wiser or might simply feel obliged to take the taxi.

There is some variation in taxi licensing across the United Kingdom. One local authority not far from me was licensing taxis in Aberdeen. Anybody who knows my constituency knows that it is in the centre of the United Kingdom, in the north of England, so it is rather ridiculous that that local authority is licensing taxis in Scotland. I do not think that a taxi driver from Scotland would ply his trade in that area. Essentially, there is a race to the bottom.

What is aggravating the situation is that local authorities’ revenues have been taken away by the Government’s austerity cuts, and they are chasing revenue. Local authorities therefore see taxi operators as a means to an income, which means that they want to increase the age threshold of the vehicles and relax the inspection regime. We are talking about consumers of local authority services in what is a marketplace, so a race to the bottom in taxi licensing is taking place. Local authorities near me have raised the age threshold for vehicles considerably and reduced inspections, allowing them to take place in the private sector, which gives rise to questions about whether the inspection process is robust enough. There is deep concern about the age of such vehicles. My local authority frequently carries out MOT tests on vehicles, and that testing must be done through the local authority MOT testing station. We have a very high standard, and the age limit for such vehicles is seven years. I doubt whether my constituents want 20-year-old charabancs with 400,000 miles on the clock turning up, driven by someone with a five-year licence who may have a conviction for violent assault or carrying drugs, and who can ply his trade in Hyndburn simply because he is licensed from another authority.

This provision will make the situation far worse because the customer will not be in control. They will phone up their local, trusted company, but the job will be subcontracted to a local authority in which the standards may not be as high, or far lower, and where the licensing conditions may be far more relaxed. The driver who turns up may well be a sex offender, or have some sort of criminal record. The vehicle may well be 20 years old, with many thousands of miles on the clock, and it might have been tested at an MOT station where the methods are not quite as robust or reliable. Of course, a vehicle’s MOT test is only as valid as the day of the test and not the day after, so if we do not have regular MOTs or other inspections, a vehicle’s condition cannot be as guaranteed as that of others where there is a more robust testing regime. This comes back to the issue of choice; the customer is not in control. The customer will phone their favourite taxi firm and the taxi will roll up from a taxi firm operating in a local authority area with poorer standards, so what will we get? We will get poorer conditions. The fare-paying public will not appreciate the proposal being put forward in their name because it devalues the service they receive.

I am concerned that this provision is being introduced without any support, apart from among those on the Government Benches—although I sometimes doubt whether it has any support there, because it does not make sense to anyone who is aware of the taxi industry. A wider discussion needs to take place. The Law Commission is looking into taxi licensing issues that go beyond those in the three provisions today, yet the Government have sought to bring forward these proposals ahead of the Law Commission’s findings. That seems bizarre, if not perverse or daft. We should have waited for the Law Commission to report because a restructuring of taxi licensing needs to take place. The Law Commission’s input would have been valid and we would have sought to iron out not only the problems the Government are exacerbating today, but some of the others that exist in taxi licensing. So, with deep concern, I will be unable to support the proposals on taxi licensing. The Government have got real problems with them, and they will have to examine them again and repeal them, because they are in danger of presenting the paying public with drivers and vehicles they are not happy with. This is not the public’s choice and they are being put in a very vulnerable position. People will be upset to realise that the Government are not on their side, seem to be on the side of the taxi operators and are, in essence, bringing a danger or a threat to the customer’s door.

Let me make one further point. We talk about taxis, but we should not forget to mention things such as minibuses and the importance of crash safety test standards. We can talk about minibuses on motorways taking school kids, but let us up the ante a bit. It really does matter that the right operator—the trusted one—turns up at the door. Let us suppose that 12 school kids are in a minibus where the seats have not been welded in to a crash safety test standard. Let us suppose that they are whizzing down the motorway and are suddenly involved in an accident. Let us suppose that the favourite operator, which would normally have taken those children, has proper welded-in seats in a proper crash safety tested minibus. In such circumstances, lives could have been saved, and the Government will look at this legislation and think that they have made a terrible mistake by sublicensing to other areas. Such a tragedy would cost lives in order for us to arrive at a sensible point, which is why the Government ought to row back from the position they are in.

[Tom Brake]

First, I wish to respond to the points made by the hon. Member for Blackpool South (Mr Marsden), who is not in his place. He started by discussing CCTV exemptions, which he wanted included in the Bill. I made it clear in my opening remarks precisely what the exemptions were, but to avoid doubt I will simply repeat them. CCTV cameras can still be used in relation to restricted areas outside a school; red routes or clearways; bus lanes, where parking is prohibited; and cases where a vehicle is stopped at a restricted bus stop or stand. That is very clear.

[Richard Burden (Birmingham, Northfield) (Lab)]

The Minister has indicated where he intends exemptions to be made, but he has not answered the questions my hon. Friend put to him. Where will those exemptions be listed? Where will they be codified? Under what regulations will they be introduced? When will those regulations be laid?

[Tom Brake]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention and I am sure we will shortly provide the clarity he seeks.

My hon. Friend the Member for Rochford and Southend East (James Duddridge) raised the issue of CCTV and parking, and asked when we would introduce regulations and commence the provision. Clearly we will do that as soon as is practicable after Royal Assent. He also suggested that we could restrict CCTV use through statutory guidance. There is a need to legislate; the difficulty at the moment is that local authorities are not supposed to use CCTV other than in exceptional circumstances, but its use is proliferating. We need to respond to that because CCTV is now being used routinely.

The hon. Member for Blackpool South, like other Opposition Members, made a number of comments about how we are putting passengers at risk and how that risk could be greatly increased, but they did not illustrate that with any examples. He attacked me for using London as an example—I believe he said I was praying it in aid—but London does have rather a big private hire vehicle market and so everything that he says is going transpire as a result of the measures we are introducing would have already happened in London. The evidence shows that it has not.

[Grahame M. Morris]

May I remind the Minister that there were 54 rapes and more than 200 assaults in London last year? Does he not think that should concern him and the whole House?

[Tom Brake]

Clearly it concerns me, the Government and the whole House. The issue is that the hon. Gentleman seems to be linking those very serious cases and what the Government are proposing without actually producing any evidence to suggest that there is a link between the two.

[Graham Jones]

Will the Minister give way?

[Tom Brake]

I am going to make a bit more progress. The hon. Member for Blackpool South called on the Government to have a more comprehensive look at this issue, but the Bill provides an opportunity to introduce the three measures which, as he will have heard me say, the Law Commission supports. We are introducing those three measures. He will know, as will other Opposition Members, that Bills, unlike buses, do not come along in threes; Bills come forward relatively infrequently and if there is an opportunity to take small steps in relation to taxis, we should take them.

[Mr Marsden]

I am listening with care to what the Minister is saying, but so much of the thrust of the criticism that has been made has been about how the Government have put the cart before the House. When were these measures put into this Bill?

[Tom Brake]

I will address that shortly. The hon. Gentleman attempted a joke at the Government’s expense about whether the Department for Communities and Local Government and the Department for Transport had spoken about these matters. The consultation was issued jointly in December by both Departments, and the announcements that Members will have seen in the press at the weekend were supported by both Secretaries of State and both Departments. Clearly, Departments are working hand in hand on this issue, as they should be.

The hon. Gentleman has stated that we did not listen to the Law Commission, but it supports the three measures. He, like a number of Members, asked about enforcement, which will be dealt with in the usual way. For example, where journey bookings are subcontracted across licensing boundaries the operator that takes the initial booking will retain liability and licensing authorities can investigate any issues in the usual way, so local authorities retain their licensing duties.

[Graham Jones]

The Minister rightly says that the licence will be administered by the local authority, but the vehicle that turns up at the door may well not be licensed by the local authority, and neither may the driver. The operator might be, but the driver and the vehicle may well not be licensed by the local authority where the original booking is made.

[Tom Brake]

I will come to that matter shortly in response to another intervention, and I hope that the hon. Gentleman will be satisfied with my answer.

Moving on to the issue of marine safety, the hon. Member for Blackpool South suggested that I had used a bad example when I referred to something that had happened 100 years ago, although I think that he, or someone from his party, went on to do the same. The issue is that, under his suggested amendment, if a wreck were discovered 100 years from now, regardless of whether it represented substantial new information or had any impact on an investigation, there would be an automatic reopening of an inquiry. That is something for which we want to provide flexibility.

18:00

The hon. Gentleman said that Ministers must have flexibility to reopen inquiries, and that is exactly what we are trying to achieve. We are giving the Secretary of State the flexibility to reopen an inquiry. However, there is no flexibility in relation to miscarriages of justices, for which an inquiry will have to be formally reopened.

[Mr Marsden]

I hesitate to say that the Minister is misrepresenting the words of our amendment. I invite Members to look at its words. As I said, there will not be an automatic reopening of an inquiry, whether it is in 10, 20 or 100 years’ time.

[Tom Brake]

I am afraid that my advice says that the hon. Gentleman’s amendment widens the remit rather than closing it down. Perhaps he should go back and look at precisely what he is proposing. It is clear that the Secretary of State will still be required to reopen a formal investigation where there are grounds for suspecting a miscarriage of justice. It is also worth pointing out that what we are talking about has no impact on the work of the marine accident investigation branch; that is completely separate to this issue.

The hon. Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell) asked whether there would be regulations for marine investigations. The answer is no, there would not be regulations. That is something that would be implemented. We have set out the circumstances in which we would expect the Secretary of State formally to reopen an inquiry. We would of course consider any specific requests that were received from relatives or trade unions that were affected by that decision-making process. The measure would come into force two months after Royal Assent.

[John McDonnell]

The Minister should recognise that he is now taking the law back to what it was when it was completely ineffective. The Conservative Government had to amend the legislation, and the Derbyshire relatives had to campaign for 20 years to ensure that they got justice.

[Tom Brake]

I simply do not agree with that. I said that, under our proposals, the MV Derbyshire case is one that would have been reopened. I must disagree with the hon. Gentleman on his analysis of the impact of this measure.

[John McDonnell]

The reason why the Conservative Government introduced the legislation was that the decision was at the discretion of the Minister. This measure returns it to the discretion of a Minister—it does not matter which party is in power—in whom the public no longer have confidence.

[Tom Brake]

As the hon. Gentleman will have heard me say in relation to miscarriages of justice, there is no flexibility. There will be an automatic reopening of the inquiry. I hope that he agrees that there must be some assessment of whether or not new evidence should trigger a formal reopening of an inquiry. Surely the evidence must pertain to the incident. It has to be of a nature that is likely to lead to safety improvements.

[John McDonnell]

rose—

[Tom Brake]

I will give way one final time.

[John McDonnell]

That is precisely why I support the amendment. However, if the amendment is not suitably drafted, the usual process is that Government consult on the detail of regulation. People will be involved in that, and we can hopefully arrive at a consensus. Today the Minister is saying that there will be no regulation that will guide Minister and therefore no consultation. We are back where we were before 1995.

[Tom Brake]

I am repeating myself rather a lot, but I say again that we are not back where we were. I have made it clear that, under our proposals, the MV Derbyshire inquiry would have happened.

I thank my right hon. Friend the Member for Wokingham (Mr Redwood) for his support. I was not quite as surprised as he thought I might be in receiving support from him. He expressed the view that the Government had not gone far enough in relation to deregulation. The Opposition saying that we have gone too far and my right hon. Friend saying that we have not gone far enough probably means that the Government have got it about right.

My right hon. Friend went on to highlight other problems with parking, with which we, as Members of Parliament, are all too familiar. I apologise if I have not been brave enough to venture into the other areas that he would like to discuss in relation to parking, but, first, I would be ruled out of order, and, secondly, we all know that when it comes to parking issues, it is a lose-lose situation whatever decision is taken.

[John Hemming (Birmingham, Yardley) (LD)]

Does the Minister agree that one concern of citizens is the use of fines to raise funds? I checked Magna Carta 1297, which for these deregulatory purposes can be found in the volume of statutes from 1235 to 1770, and it is clause 14 that is, in part, being reinstated by this Bill.

[Tom Brake]

I did not know that Magna Carta touched on the matter of parking, but I am better informed as a result of my hon. Friend’s intervention.

Still on parking, my right hon. Friend the Member for Wokingham touched on complicated parking signs and rules. Local authorities should ensure that signs are appropriate for parking restrictions. If they are not, drivers may complain to their council. If they receive a ticket, they have a free appeal to the local council and then a free appeal to the adjudicator if the council decides against them. I am sure that he is aware of that and will have referred many a constituent to the adjudicator in relation to disputes over parking tickets. The Government announced over the weekend that local residents and local firms will be able to demand a review of parking in their areas, including charges and the use of yellow lines.

We then had a contribution from the hon. Member for Bolton West (Julie Hilling) who described a distressing incident involving a young constituent of hers. I am sure that we all wish to convey our sympathy to her constituent for what was clearly a very traumatic incident. I do not know whether she has pursued with her local authority its participation in the disclosure and barring service, which may have been able to identify a problem with that particular driver. The hon. Lady went on to say that what we propose in this Bill will make matters worse. Again, I dispute that. We have had many comments from the Opposition saying that the Government will make matters worse, but they have offered little to substantiate those allegations.

The hon. Lady referred to the risk of the public using an unlicensed taxi. The measures to allow off-duty use of private hire vehicles relates not to taxis but to PHVs or mini cabs. In London no issues have been reported to the Department by Transport for London. As I have stated on a number of occasions, the Law Commission recommended this measure. In fact, it may go further as it calls for off-duty use of taxis, too.

[Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)]

Is it correct that a person who runs a licensed taxi company, for example, is responsible for everyone who drives for that company? If so, that person has the responsibility to ensure that his or her drivers act properly and are properly checked.

[Tom Brake]

Certainly, that is my understanding. The operator is licensed as such and needs to check all the drivers who are used by that firm.

[Graham Jones]

The Minister says that there has been no safety issue in London. What assessment has he made outside London of police stop checks of taxi vehicles in local authorities that have less regulation than others? We are all aware that in some local authorities a high proportion of taxis stopped by the police are in breach of roadworthiness rules, and those vehicles must be repaired. What assessment has he made of vehicles’ roadworthiness?

[Tom Brake]

I personally have not made such an assessment, but I am sure that the hon. Gentleman, as a Member of Parliament, has regularly requested that sufficient enforcement action is taken and that suitable checks are made. I am sure that his local authority will want to pursue that actively and that the police and crime commissioner in his area will want to emphasise it as well. We expect those checks to be carried out now, irrespective of anything proposed in the Bill.

The hon. Member for Easington (Grahame M. Morris) dwelt on subcontracting, as did other Members, and talked about what would happen if people used the local reliable firm that they knew and liked, but the job was passed on to another operator. At the moment, if someone wants to use their local reliable firm and it cannot fulfil that job, they are simply told to find another operator, so the risks that he tried to highlight in the job being passed on to another operator are already there when the reliable firm says, “Sorry, we can’t do that job for you. Go and look in the phone book to find another operator.” What we propose would allow that local reliable firm, which one would expect to want to set up a business relationship with another reliable, not local firm, to work with it in partnership to fulfil those jobs appropriately. Irrespective of these arrangements, all firms must be licensed. That is the basis on which their reliability is confirmed.

[Graham Jones]

The Minister says that an individual who is unable to order a private hire vehicle from their favourite firm is in the same position if the company locates a private hire vehicle from another local authority. On many levels, that is wrong. When that individual flicks through the “Yellow Pages”, as the Minister describes it, they can choose to look for a company in their area. This proposal will allow the company to take charge, and that taxi could come from another area with different standards. The choice is therefore removed from the fare-paying customer. Does the Minister accept that the customer is in control when they look through the “Yellow Pages”, but not when the job is passed from one operator to another who locates a taxi from outside the area?

[Tom Brake]

Yes, when people use “Yellow Pages”, they may well be in control of their choice of private hire firm, but I thought the point that the hon. Gentleman and other hon. Members were making was that there was a risk in a job being passed on by a local reliable firm to another operator. I would suggest that the risk of simply going to the phone book is much greater than using a local reliable firm whose reputation relies on delivering a good service, whether it does so directly or by subcontracting to another firm in an area where it cannot operate. With our system, security is enhanced, rather than damaged in the way he suggests.

18:15

The hon. Member for Easington referred to the need for a comprehensive, nationwide review and reform of private hire. He is probably well versed in private hire and taxi matters. He will understand how difficult it is to get a comprehensive, nationwide review of services. I suspect that there have been attempts under our Government and under Labour Governments to get that comprehensive review under way. It is not straightforward, and it is not something that happens overnight. We have an opportunity in the Bill to introduce some small measures, supported by the Law Commission. We have chosen, rightly, to proceed with them now, and that is the right action for the Government to take.

The hon. Gentleman also referred to the disclosure and barring service. There is an automatic update system. It is an optional service for local authorities, which can judge whether to use it. Crucially, three-yearly licence renewal is seen as best practice. That applies in London and half of all authorities outside London.

[Grahame M. Morris]

The Minister is being generous in giving way. Although he uses London as the example where these changes are already in place, does he acknowledge that the enforcement regime is rather different because of the unique arrangement between the Metropolitan police and Transport for London? That arrangement is not replicated elsewhere in the country.

[Tom Brake]

If, as the hon. Gentleman suggests, that is an issue—clearly, several Members have raised it during the debate—it is a prime case for the police and crime commissioner to get involved in, to try to ensure consistency across their patch.

The hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Caroline Lucas) said that the Government have made no counter-argument in support of the proposals. Again, I simply refer her to the fact that the Law Commission supports our three proposals on taxis.

The hon. Member for Hayes and Harlington called for a comprehensive Bill. Of course we want the Law Commission to deliver a comprehensive Bill, and nothing that we have done in relation to these measures stops it doing so. He referred to marine investigation and MV Derbyshire. I have taken quite a lot of interventions from him on that issue. I simply say again that the Government are clear that if such an incident happened again, under our proposals the case would definitely be reopened.

The hon. Member for Luton North (Kelvin Hopkins) wants parking laws enforced properly; well, so do I, and so do the Government. Local authorities will be able to enforce them properly by using traffic wardens, and nothing that we are doing will stop them doing so. I hope he will agree that, as I stated in my opening remarks, the issue is that local authorities have generated a surplus of £635 million by issuing parking tickets.

[Kelvin Hopkins]

Does the Minister accept that, by reducing CCTV surveillance of parking, he will reduce the number of convictions and make it easier to get away with parking illegally?

[Tom Brake]

That depends on how local authorities respond. If they use traffic wardens, there is no reason why what the hon. Gentleman has suggested will happen. He suggested that a national register is needed. I do not know whether he has investigated that and can demonstrate that it would increase safety and what the associated price tag might be. Of course, the Bill is about deregulation, not, as he would like, more regulation.

The hon. Member for Hyndburn (Graham Jones) talked about our taxi policy opening the door to criminality, and I dispute that anything we are introducing would do so. He made that comment without backing it up with any evidence. He referred at some length to subcontracting, which we have dealt with. He wants taxis of a good standard; so do we, and that is what the licensing regime is for.

I think that I have dealt with all the points made, and I simply conclude my remarks by urging the Opposition not to press their amendments.

Question put and agreed to.

New clause 4 accordingly read a Second time, and added to the Bill.

New Clause 25

Civil penalties for parking contraventions: enforcement

‘(1) Part 6 of the Traffic Management Act 2004 (civil enforcement of traffic contraventions) is amended as follows.

(2) After section 78 (notification of penalty charge) insert—

“78A Notification of penalty charge: parking contraventions in England

(1) Regulations under section 78 must include provision requiring notification of a penalty charge to be given by a notice affixed to the vehicle where the charge is in respect of a parking contravention on a road in a civil enforcement area in England.

(2) The regulations may, however, provide that the requirement does not apply in circumstances specified in the regulations (which may be framed by reference to the type of contravention, the circumstances in which a contravention occurs or in any other way) and, where the regulations so provide, they may make any such alternative provision for notification as is authorised by section 78.”

(3) After section 87 insert—

“87A Power to prohibit use of devices etc: parking contraventions in England

(1) The Secretary of State may by regulations make provision to prohibit the use by civil enforcement officers of a device of a description specified in the regulations, or of records produced by such a device, in connection with the enforcement of parking contraventions on a road in a civil enforcement area in England.

(2) The prohibition may be—

(a) general, or

(b) limited to particular uses specified in the regulations.

(3) The regulations may provide that a general or limited prohibition does not apply in circumstances specified in the regulations (which may be framed by reference to the type of contravention, the circumstances in which a contravention occurs or in any other way).

(4) Regulations under this section may amend this Part or any provision made under it.”’—(Tom Brake.)

This new clause deals with the enforcement of parking contraventions in England under Part 6 of the Traffic Management Act 2004. It provides that, subject to certain exceptions, regulations under section 78 must provide for notification of a penalty charge to be given by a notice affixed to the vehicle (which means that a civil enforcement officer must be present to affix the notice). It also confers a power which would enable regulations to be made to restrict the use of CCTV or other devices in parking enforcement.

Brought up, read the First and Second time, and added to the Bill.

New Clause 15

Footpaths: provisions to stop up or divert due to privacy, safety or security

‘(1) The Highways Act 1980 is amended as follows.

(2) In section 118 (Stopping up of footpaths, birdleways and restricted byways), in subsection (1) after “on the ground that it is not needed for public use”, insert “or the public need could reasonably be provided by an alternative public right of way or highway nearby”.

(3) After subsection (1) insert—

“(1A) When making a determination under subsection (1A) the council and Secretary of State shall have regard to the presumption that footpaths should not pass through farmyards, gardens, commercial premises or other land where privacy, safety or security are an issue.”.

(4) In section 119 (Diversion of footpaths, bridleways and restricted byways), subsection (6A) after “a public right of way,”, insert “, and the presumption that paths should not pass through farmyards, commercial areas, gardens or other land where privacy, safety or security is an issue.”’—(Bill Wiggin.)

Brought up, and read the First time.

[Bill Wiggin (North Herefordshire) (Con)]

I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Dawn Primarolo)]

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:

New clause 17—Presumed diversion of intrusive public rights of way in limited circumstances—

‘In section 119 of the Highways Act 1980, after subsection (6A), insert—

“(6B) Where a path or way passes through the curtilage of a residential dwelling including the gardens and driveways of the premises, a working farmyard or forestry yard or other operational business or working industrial premises—

(a) subsections (6) and (6A) above shall not apply; and

(b) the Secretary of State or council shall confirm a public path diversion order unless he, or as the case may be, they are satisfied that the privacy, safety or security of the premises are not adversely affected by the existence or use of the path.

(6C) Where the premises have been unlawfully extended to encompass the path or way subsection (6B) above do not apply.

(6D) In exercising the powers under this section, the Secretary of State and the council shall have particular regard to the presumption that public rights of way or highways should not pass through the curtilage of residential premises including the gardens and driveways of the premises, a working farmyard or forestry yard or other operational business or working industrial premises.”’

This new Clause will facilitate statutory guidance to allow for the diversion of rights of way that pass through domestic or business premises on the grounds of privacy, safety or security.

New clause 18—Presumed extinguishment of intrusive public rights of way in limited circumstances—

‘In section 118 of the Highways Act 1980, after subsection (6), insert—

“(6A) Where a path or way passes through the curtilage of a residential dwelling including the gardens and driveways of the premises, a working farmyard or forestry yard or other operational business or working industrial premises a council shall make and the Secretary of State or the council shall confirm an order stopping up a path or way unless he, or as the case may be, they are satisfied that—

(a) the privacy, safety or security of the premises are not adversely affected by the existence or use of the path; or

(b) it is possible to divert the path or way such that the privacy, safety or security of the premises are not adversely affected by the existence or use of the path; or

(c) the path or way provides access to a vital local service or amenity not otherwise reasonably accessible.

(6B) In exercising the powers under this section, the Secretary of State and the council shall have particular regard to the presumption that public rights of way or highways should not pass through the curtilage of residential premises including the gardens and driveways of the premises, a working farmyard or forestry yard or other operational business or working industrial premises.”’

This new Clause will facilitate statutory guidance to allow for the extinguishment of rights of way that pass through domestic or business premises on the grounds of privacy, safety or security if a diversion is not possible and the right of way does not provide access to a vital local service or amenity not otherwise accessible.

New clause 19—Presumed extinguishment of intrusive byways open to all traffic in limited circumstances—

‘In section 116 of the Highways Act 1980, after subsection (1), insert—

“(1A) Where a byway open to all traffic passes through the curtilage of a residential dwelling including the gardens and driveways of the premises, a working farmyard or forestry yard or other operational business or working industrial premises it is presumed that diversion of the highway so that it does not so pass will make the path more commodious and that the highway is unnecessary unless the court is satisfied that—

(a) the privacy, safety or security of the premises are not adversely affected by the existence or use of the path; or

(b) the path or way provides access to a vital local service or amenity not otherwise reasonably accessible.

(1B) In exercising the powers under this section, the authority and the court shall have particular regard to the presumption that a byway open to all traffic should not pass through the curtilage of residential premises including the gardens and driveways of the premises, a working farmyard or forestry yard or other operational business or working industrial premises.

(1C) A “byway open to all traffic” means a highway over which the public have a right of way for vehicular and all other kinds of traffic, but which is used mainly for the purposes for which footpaths and bridleways are so used.”.’

This new Clause would create a presumption that byways open to all traffic should be diverted so as to not pass through residential or business premises unless the byway does not impact on the privacy, safety or security of the premises, or provides access to a vital local service or amenity not otherwise accessible.

[Bill Wiggin]

I draw the House’s attention to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests.

New clause 15 is all about safety. I want to see a fall in the number of deaths that take place every year as a result of rural accidents, as I am sure does every Member. I am passionate about the safety of those who use the countryside. My recent ten-minute rule Bill proposed greater detail in the recording of agricultural accidents. After discussions with the Health and Safety Executive, I am delighted that my proposals have been accepted. I must thank the Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions, my right hon. Friend the Member for Hemel Hempstead (Mike Penning) for his support in discussions with the HSE.

I believe, however, that further measures are necessary. As a farmer, I am alarmed at the risks created by footpaths passing through fields or farmyards. A 21st-century farm is dangerous. Equipment is often operated at higher speeds, is incredibly heavy and has risky blind spots. Livestock can be unpredictable, territorial and easily provoked, for instance by a dog. The death of Roger Freeman, caused—or not—by a Brown Swiss bull in 2010, and the subsequent negligence trial, has brought the issue back into the public eye. To quote a letter from the Ramblers to me,

“The case has really highlighted the necessity to re-examine legislation around bulls being kept in fields with footpaths.”

Recently, I have been contacted by two constituents who have been unable to fulfil their role as parish footpath officers, for fear of their safety on local footpaths. My constituents report being chased from routes by dairy cows. They were particularly harassed when accompanied by a dog and describe the cattle as “extremely persistent and worrying.” Nobody—neither walkers nor farmers—should be placed in a position where their safety is at risk.

Equally, farmers cannot be placed in a position of responsibility for the safety of walkers among livestock. No farmer can say with complete confidence that their cattle would always be 100% safe, including if, for example, they had been stung by a wasp. Farmers are therefore incredibly vulnerable to claims of negligence in accidents where the only evidence is from the victim or hearsay. This pressure can foster resentment against those who use footpaths, creating an atmosphere of walkers versus farmers. Such a division can only be unhelpful. The priority for all must be safety.

Traditional rights of way cannot be held to be a greater priority than the safety of those using them. The risks are very real: 24 people have been killed by cattle in the past four years. We cannot continue to turn a blind eye to the issue. The right to walk in the countryside does not mean the right to die walking. We must therefore be flexible and allow alterations of rights of way to favour safer routes. Common sense on this issue must prevail.

I must also raise deep concerns about privacy and security in the countryside. One of the great pleasures of the British countryside is that it is free to be enjoyed by all. In this day and age, however, the access provided by footpaths is at odds with society’s fear of strangers. The privacy and security of a family home is something we treasure, yet both of those values must be sacrificed by those who have a footpath running through their home or garden. A footpath allows strangers to come on to their property and close to their family at any hour of the day or night. The feeling of security in one’s home is a luxury that most people take for granted. An Englishman’s home may be his castle, but for those with a footpath through their property, there is no security behind their walls.

The desire to protect one’s privacy and security is entirely legitimate and rational. It is natural to be wary of strangers. In January, the Intrusive Footpaths campaign undertook a survey of home owners’ experiences of footpaths. The results present a shocking picture. The IFC found that footpaths through private property have been the cause of two suicides, 12 nervous breakdowns and numerous cases of financially crippling disputes. Families affected in this way should be supported by appropriate legislation, not abandoned to cope with the consequences.

[Mr Brooks Newmark (Braintree) (Con)]

I am listening to my hon. Friend, but Opposition Front Benchers are chuntering. Unfortunately, people who live in urban areas do not appreciate that people who live in rural areas have footpaths that go within 5 or 10 yards of their front doors. It puts enormous stress on people, particularly those who live by themselves, when strangers walk past their front door. Does my hon. Friend agree that it is important that the Minister takes note of the stresses put on families who feel that their privacy is being invaded? We are not talking about footpaths that are miles away from people’s front doors.

[Bill Wiggin]

My hon. Friend is right, and I am sure he will seek to catch your eye, Madam Deputy Speaker, and share his expertise with the House. The key thing for Opposition Members to remember is that we are talking about not rights of way, but people killing themselves, or being seriously hurt or injured. That is what we are trying to avoid. We are trying to make sure that every person who walks or works in the countryside is safe.

No one should feel besieged in their own home. Rights of way should not affect someone’s right to safety. I am therefore asking again for flexibility, as I fear that if privacy is not considered as reasonable grounds for safely altering a footpath, more people’s lives will be plagued by intrusion. Common sense must again prevail.

I read with interest the 2010 “Stepping Forward” report by Natural England’s stakeholder working group on unrecorded rights of way. Although the group did not address the safety and privacy of routes, I believe that my new clause is in the spirit of its recommendations. The report praised surveyors for taking use of land into account in footpath diversions. In its evidence to the Bill Committee in February, the group indicated that it has discussed diversions in greater depth since 2010. In her evidence, Sarah Slade of the Country Land and Business Association emphasised her support for making people’s lives easier through diversions. My new clause is a natural progression from the group’s recommendations. I strongly believe that all interested parties would regret missing this opportunity to ease the risks and conflicts created by footpaths.

The stakeholder group’s guidance, which I suspect the Government hope to make statutory, will not overrule the tests that determine changes to footpath routes, so it is not equal to the task in hand. Nor will it deal with the standard objection of—please forgive the wording—“not substantially less convenient”, which is the excuse given when a footpath may be a few metres longer than it was previously. New statutory guidance may therefore help, but it will not solve the problem.

[Bob Stewart]

Obviously, I am no expert, and I am listening very carefully to what my hon. Friend says, but is there no way in which a public right of way could be changed as things stand, or do we have to legislate for that?

[Bill Wiggin]

There is a way in which a change can be made at minimal cost, but if there is a single objection, the balance of favour, as it were, goes against the owner of the property. Additionally, the process can cost a vast amount. What makes me sad is that this should be not a fight between the landowner and the person objecting—the walker or whoever it might be—but about safety. If people think that a route can be better, we should make it as straightforward as possible to achieve that.

18:30

I am only calling for greater provision in existing highways legislation. The Bill’s aim is to reduce the burden of legislation on day-to-day life, and my new clause would dramatically improve the quality of life of many farmers, home owners and walkers. Ignoring safety and privacy can change rights of way from a delight to a risk. When considering my new clause, hon. Members must understand that its vital element is safety, and that we should consider privacy and security as necessary parts of safety.

Over the past six years, the working group has investigated many issues to do with rights of way, yet it has not addressed the subject of the deaths that occur on them. I am saddened that safety has not been the group’s focus while fatalities have continued. Such deaths are completely unnecessary, because diversions must offer an effective, simple and cheap option to protect walkers. Diverting footpaths does not mean closing off the countryside for walkers; nor does it mean forcing walkers on to roads. It can simply mean changing the route of a right of way to the edge of a field. Walkers’ enjoyment of the countryside would not be lessened by their following the perimeter of fields, but they would be less likely to disturb livestock, and it would be easier and more cost-effective if a farmer wished to fence off that footpath for safety, as only one extra length of fencing would be required.

To encourage that ideal scenario, farmers must be supported when they try to keep the public safe, yet under the existing system they are penalised. A landowner involved in a disputed diversion can face costs of tens of thousands of pounds. At the moment those costs are borne by the landowner. It is irresponsible that the power to allocate full cost recovery lies with county councils, which are not famed for their parsimony. In fact, that is probably the worst possible sort of arrangement. Delay and excessive costs without a cap simply add to everybody’s misery. Farmers who want permanently to alter footpaths on their land to protect the general public and maintain a right of way are delivering a key public service. If a farmer can show that their altered route improves safety, has proper signposting and is away from a road, they should be supported, rather than demonised, by councils.

The Government could provide funding for safe footpaths. The money could come from the rural development programme, funded from pillar two of the common agricultural policy. That option would reduce the burden of disputes involving farmers and councils, but without that assistance, farmers could be forced to copy the image that I am sure we all saw in The Times on 10 May: two long pieces of metal fencing lining a footpath across the centre of a field in Frome. Is that not a terrifying image of the future for rights of way if common sense does not prevail? It is our duty to preserve the Great British countryside for all who are lucky enough to visit it, and to live and work there. Part of that preservation is providing support for those who farm our countryside. Farmers already want the best protection for themselves and those who walk on their land, so I urge the House to support the safety, security and privacy on footpaths that new clause 15 would bring.

[Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)]

I am sure, Madam Deputy Speaker, that you will be pleased to learn that members of my constituency Labour party and I took part yesterday in what we call, in a comradely fashion, a red ramble. We walked from the site of the battle of Newburn Ford to Wylam, the birthplace of the great engineer George Stephenson. We walked most of the way across the land of the Duke of Northumberland. Unfortunately, we did not see any red squirrels, but we enjoyed the unequalled beautiful countryside, and views of the Tyne. As we walked, we discussed the role of the Labour movement over hundreds of years in fighting for the right of public access, sometimes illegally, including in the mass trespass of Kinder Scout. I mention that to set out to the hon. Member for North Herefordshire (Bill Wiggin) the depth of feeling among Labour Members that causes us to oppose new clause 15.

In government, Labour has demonstrated that depth of feeling by long supporting public access to the countryside and the wider natural environment. In 1949, the post-war Labour Government passed into law a requirement to record public rights of way on a legally conclusive document known as the definitive map and statement. Labour’s 1987 manifesto for government outlined commitments not only to offer all people more freedom to explore the open countryside, but to strengthen the protection of our national heritage. The Countryside and Rights of Ways Act 2000 was one of the most successful and supported pieces of legislation in this area, and it strengthened and consolidated the aims of our original National Parks and Access to the Countryside Act 1949.

[Mr Newmark]

I am listening carefully to the hon. Lady, but I do not think that any Government Member disputes the right to go about the open countryside; that argument was won a long time ago—congratulations on winning it. We are concerned about the right of individuals effectively to intrude on people’s private property and to get—

[Mr Andrew Turner (Isle of Wight) (Con)]

Rubbish.

[Mr Newmark]

Excuse me—[Interruption.] Does my hon. Friend wish to intervene?

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Dawn Primarolo)]

Order. There can be only one intervention, and it should be a short intervention.

[Mr Newmark]

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. We are talking about the right of an individual to walk on someone’s property, and how to find a way forward, with local councils, on moving a path slightly, so that people can get to their destination.

[Chi Onwurah]

This is all about individuals’ rights to walk on private property, just as I walked over the Duke of Northumberland’s land yesterday. I do not want to belittle or trivialise cases in which property owners experience significant stress, but there are already powers that permit landowners and land managers to apply to a local authority to make an order to divert or close a public path that crosses their land, so additional legislation is not required.

[Bill Wiggin]

rose—

[Chi Onwurah]

I know that other hon. Members wish to speak, but I give way to the hon. Gentleman.

[Bill Wiggin]

Will the hon. Lady tell us her party’s proposals to ensure that the family of Roger Freeman know that no other family will suffer the pain and misery that they have been through?

[Chi Onwurah]

The Bill’s measures on this subject derive from the Natural England stakeholder working group. I think that the hon. Gentleman would agree that finding a consensus between users, landowners and local authorities, and between Ramblers and the Country Land and Business Association, is such an achievement that it should not be jeopardised. If he wants further proposals to be brought forward, he should work with the stakeholder working group to deliver consensus on them. It is imperative that the measures agreed by the working group are implemented as soon as possible. We do not want them to be jeopardised by the new clauses in the group, especially because those new clauses raise several important questions. For example, who would decide that a public right of way was intrusive? Why are the measures necessary when there are already powers that permit landowners to apply to a local authority, as I set out? Who would define what “limited circumstances” were?

A presumption in favour of a diversion would take powers away from local authorities and reduce the ability of communities to have a say. Is this in accordance with the localism agenda, which I thought all Members on the Government Benches agreed with? Local communities, through their local councils, should have the ability to shape their local area. We should support the rights of all to access the countryside and to maintain existing rights of way, especially as the local countryside offers our citizens benefits in terms of health, exercise and mental well-being.

[Mr Newmark]

I shall speak to new clauses 17, 18 and 19.

Many people up and down the country, especially in rural areas, face the daily personal stress and blight of their properties caused by highly intrusive public rights of way across their land, including the gardens of family homes and working farmyards, as well as commercial premises. The new clauses that I propose set out how local authorities should respond to requests to divert or extinguish rights of way, to applications under the right to apply introduced by the Countryside and Rights of Way Act 2000, or negotiation under the new modification consent order process set out in paragraph 5 of schedule 7 to the Bill. Specifically, my new clauses 17, 18 and 19 address and amend sections 119, 118 and 116 respectively of the Highways Act 1980.

It might be helpful for the Minister to have a little context and background to my new clauses. The existence of public rights of way within private property raises several concerns, many of which have been highlighted to me by my constituents. Most important among them is the security of the family and property of the landowner, in particular the security of young children. Having in their backyard a public footpath that anyone can access is worrying for parents and impacts on the daily life of their families.

[Mr Andrew Turner]

Is my hon. Friend aware that people who own such footpaths can apply for them to be moved? I do not see why he is proposing an alternative method.

[Mr Newmark]

As my hon. Friend the Member for North Herefordshire (Bill Wiggin) pointed out, there are issues of safety and security. This is not a subject that I knew anything about until it was raised with me by several constituents, who are extremely frustrated with the existing process designed to protect their family and property. That is what my new clauses are about.

Following on from this are concerns with potential infringements on the privacy of residents and their expectation of being able to relax without strangers appearing in the same contained space. Pathways across land can also reduce the value of the property. That, by the way, is probably the least of my concerns, but it has been raised by my constituents. Finally, farmyard operations put the public potentially at risk because of the limited space through which these routes pass.

[Susan Elan Jones (Clwyd South) (Lab)]

I could accept what the hon. Gentleman says if he were referring to hustling, for example, but the fact that he does not seem to address is that many rights of way are very historic. When I was taken by my grandfather to the footpath that went from Esclusham Above to Esclusham Below, I did it in the knowledge that he went with his grandfather. Such rights are intrinsic in our rural areas. That is what we are frightened about.

18:45

[Mr Newmark]

Yes, yes. I am totally sympathetic with what the hon. Lady says. I am not trying to change historic rights of way. My intention is to create more flexibility in the system to allow paths that go right past people’s front doors and their gardens to be moved slightly. I am not looking to stop people’s access to those ancient rights of way.

In order to solve these problems, the owner of the land in question must seek an order to divert or extinguish the right of way through a modification consent order or an application for public path order. This guidance applies where a public right of way passes through a garden which forms part of the curtilage of a residential dwelling, a working farmyard or forestry yard, or other operational business or working industrial premises. The interests of the landowner must be weighed against the overall impact on the public as a whole—a point that Opposition Members emphasised—and the privacy, security and safety of the landowner are all considerations to which due weight should be given. Furthermore, if the public right of way is extinguished, it should be diverted elsewhere in order to reduce inconvenience to the public.

Now that I have laid out at least some of the rationale for my new clauses, let me touch briefly on each new clause in turn. New clause 17, entitled “Presumed diversion of intrusive public rights of way in limited circumstances”, amends section 119 of the Highways Act 1980 and facilitates statutory guidance to allow for the diversion of rights of way that pass through domestic or business premises on the grounds of privacy, safety or security. New clause 18, entitled “Presumed extinguishment of intrusive public rights of way in limited circumstances”, amends section 118 of the 1980 Act and facilitates statutory guidance to allow for the extinguishment of rights of way that pass through domestic or business premises on the grounds of privacy, safety or security if a diversion is not possible as the right of way provides access to a vital local service or amenity not otherwise accessible. Finally, new clause 19, entitled “Presumed extinguishment of intrusive byways open to all traffic in limited circumstances”, is an amendment to section 116 of the Highways Act 1980 and creates a presumption that byways open to all traffic should be diverted so as not to pass through residential or business premises unless the byway does not impact on the privacy, safety or security of the premises or provides access to a vital local service or amenity not otherwise accessible.

I am sure that the Minister will agree that although it is essential that we respect the ancient rights provided by footpaths and byways that the hon. Member for Clwyd South (Susan Elan Jones) spoke about in her intervention, it is important that we also respect the privacy, safety and security of individuals and their property. That is the narrow path that I am trying to navigate. I hope the Minister will acknowledge that new clauses 17, 18 and 19 are drafted both to be reasonable to landowners and to respect the rights of individuals to have access to byways, especially if those byways provide access to a vital local service or amenity not otherwise accessible. In this spirit I look forward to his response to new clauses 17, 18 and 19 as well as to new clause 15, which is proposed by my hon. Friend the Member for North Herefordshire. I end by thanking my constituent Roger Duffin for raising this important issue and for his guidance in enabling me to draft a constructive solution to a sensitive problem.

[Tom Brake]

I thank my hon. Friends the Members for North Herefordshire (Bill Wiggin) and for Braintree (Mr Newmark) for tabling their new clauses and allowing us to discuss the important topic of rights of way and the impact that these can have.

We recognise that all four amendments seek to address the issue of intrusive public rights of way. The Government have been giving very careful consideration to this, in discussion with the rights of way stakeholder working group. The work done by the group has been invaluable in pulling together the potentially divergent views of landowners and ramblers.

The Government acknowledge that for householders, farmers and others, an intrusive footpath can have a substantial impact on their quality of life or on their ability to run a business. We understand that while this is not a widespread problem, where it occurs it can cause severe difficulties, and in a significant number of cases people have been put through years of considerable inconvenience and stress, as my hon. Friend the Member for North Herefordshire mentioned.

It is not clear to me whether my hon. Friend feels that his amendment would help prevent incidents involving dangerous cattle on footpaths, unless it is envisaged that the presumption that paths should not pass through other land where safety is an issue could be used to close or divert rights of way that run through fields where cattle are present. That would clearly be a radical and sweeping measure that could lead to the closure or diversion of innumerable rights of way with questionable justification. The issue of cattle attacks on public rights of way is being addressed separately by the Government, and there is no suggestion from any of the parties involved that primary legislation is required to sort out the problem to which my hon. Friend rightly referred. It is clear, however, that there has to be a change in the way in which both legislation and policy operate if people are to get a satisfactory hearing, and that is what the Government are doing in the Bill.

We very much sympathise with people’s genuine concerns about the problems that can arise from footpaths running through private gardens and farmyards and recognise that we need to find an acceptable solution, but we do not believe that these new clauses are the best way to go about this. Measures are already being developed that will make a significant difference to the way in which requests for diversions and extinguishments of rights of way will be dealt with by local authorities. We are working towards making effective the “right to apply” provisions in the Bill. That will enable a landowner to make a formal application for the diversion or extinguishment of a public right of way; with that will come the right to appeal to the Secretary of State if the authority rejects the application or fails to act on it, so local authorities will not be able simply to rebuff or ignore representations from a landowner, as they can at present. I hope that my hon. Friends will see that as a positive development.

Moreover, the right to apply will be supplemented by guidance that will effectively act as a presumption to divert or extinguish public rights of way that pass through the gardens of family homes, working farmyards or commercial premises where privacy, safety or security are a problem. That guidance has been developed in agreement with the rights of way stakeholder working group.

[Mr Newmark]

The Minister was actively listening and I appreciate his response, but I would ask him to be sensitive to the cost of appeal. Many of these people are not wealthy and it is important that we keep costs to an absolute minimum.

[Tom Brake]

Costs can be a significant issue, and the Government and local authorities will clearly want to ensure that they are kept to a minimum.

My hon. Friend the Member for North Herefordshire asked whether the guidance would be statutory. This is a deregulation Bill, the purpose of which is to minimise the statutory burden rather than increase it. We believe that the combined effect of the right to apply and the guidance will have the desired effect, and we should see how the measures work out in practice before seeking to add to the legislative burden.

A draft of the guidance has been deposited in the House Library. We recognise that it needs further refinement and it remains open for comment. The rights of way reforms will also give local authorities more scope to deal with objections themselves, rather than having to submit every opposed order to the Secretary of State as at present. We believe that the provisions will make a significant difference, and until we see how well the “right to apply” provisions work alongside the new guidance, making further legislation would be premature. The new clauses would create new regulation where it may prove to be unnecessary and create more problems than they resolve.

The issue of intrusive public rights of way is emotive. I can appreciate why it arouses strong feelings and why those affected feel so strongly that something needs to be done. While putting the terms of a presumption on the face of the Act might seem like a way of making sure something happens, it carries a high risk that the presumption will not work as intended and, unlike the guidance, it would not be possible readily to make changes in response to unforeseen circumstances or to take account of new developments.

As the draft guidance on diversions and extinguishments has been developed by the stakeholder working group, there is a strong consensus around it, which means that it is far more likely to be complied with. We welcome the fact that a new working group is likely to be set up through the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, which will look at some of the other complex issues, such as green lanes—another very difficult issue to which to find a consensual solution. We firmly believe that solutions arrived at in that way, based on agreement and mutual interest, will result in less conflict and less need for enforcement in the long run.

The proposed new clauses also do not strike the correct balance between public and private interests, which is critical to the agreement reached on the guidance by the stakeholder working group. Legislative solutions imposed without a consensus tend to result in more disputes and legal challenges and there is no stakeholder consensus around the legislative changes proposed here. The new clauses would be quite a fundamental change to the current legislative status quo, which should not be made in the absence of either public consultation or stakeholder agreement, so I regret that I must urge my hon. Friends not to press their amendments.

[Bill Wiggin]

I thank my right hon. Friend the Minister for his helpful and constructive comments; it is useful to know that the Government are looking at the risks. I also welcome the formation of a new working group. It does not come as a terribly big surprise that the Government are unwilling to accept new clause 15. However, on behalf of my hon. Friend the Member for Braintree (Mr Newmark), I thank the Minister for looking at our concerns seriously and promising to keep a watching brief on how things progress.

I say to the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne Central (Chi Onwurah), who answered for the Labour party, that rights of way are of course emotive and vital, but keeping people alive is more important. Until Labour Members recognise that, they are not fit to be in government. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the clause.

Clause, by leave, withdrawn.

Clause 10

Private hire vehicles: circumstances in which driver’s licence required

Amendment proposed: 61, page 7, line 22, leave out clause 10, clause 11 and clause 12.—(Mr Marsden.)

18:58

Division 12

Ayes: 206

---

Labour: 201
Plaid Cymru: 3
Social Democratic & Labour Party: 2
Green Party: 1

Noes: 285

---

Conservative: 243
Liberal Democrat: 41

19:10

It being later than three hours before the moment of interruption, the proceedings were interrupted (Programme Order, 14 May).

The Deputy Speaker put forthwith the Questions necessary for the disposal of the business to be concluded at that time (Standing Order No. 83E).

Clause 33

Reduction of burdens relating to the use of roads and railways

Amendment made: 13, page 25, line 32, at end insert—

“(aa) the duration of driving licences to be granted to drivers with relevant or prospective disabilities;”—(Tom Brake.)

Clause 35

Removal of duty to order re-hearing of marine accident investigations

Amendment proposed: 1, page 26, line 4, leave out paragraphs (a) and (b) and insert

“in paragraph (a) leave out from “if new and important evidence” to “discovered” and insert “where secondary investigations have enabled more new, significant, or important evidence to become available, having particular regard to—

(i) enhancing and preserving the rights of those affected by a maritime accident to learn from the proceedings of such reinvestigations and conclusions drawn from them; and

(ii) future safety issues and measures.”.”—(Mr Marsden.)

Question put, That the amendment be made.

19:11

Division 13

Ayes: 211

---

Labour: 203
Plaid Cymru: 3
Scottish National Party: 3
Social Democratic & Labour Party: 2
Green Party: 1

Noes: 284

---

Conservative: 242
Liberal Democrat: 41

Schedule 2

Driving instructors

Amendments made: 36, page 62, line 13, leave out

“authorise the person to apply”

and insert “require the person”.

This amendment is a drafting improvement to make new section 124(3)(a) of the Road Traffic Act 1988 more consistent with the new system for registering driving instructors.

Amendment 37, page 62, line 36, leave out “applicant” and insert “person”.

This amendment is a drafting change to improve the cross-reference between new section 125(3D) and 125ZA(4)(ba) of the Road Traffic Act 1988.

Amendment 38, page 65, line 26, at end insert—

“unless the Registrar considers it appropriate for the application to be made at such earlier time as may be specified by the Registrar.”

This amendment will enable the Registrar to allow an application to undergo a further emergency control assessment under section 133B(4) to be made before the end of the six month period referred to in new section 133B(5A).

Amendment 39, page 66, line 39, leave out “applicant” and insert “person”.

This amendment is a drafting change to improve the cross-reference between new section 125(2D) and 125(5A) of the Road Traffic Act 1988.

Amendment 40, page 69, line 30, leave out paragraph 22.

This amendment is consequential on amendment 43.

Amendment 41, page 72, line 2, leave out from “assessment” to end of line 3 and insert

“—

(i) under section 125(2C) or 129(1B), or

(ii) as mentioned in section 125(5)(a)(ii) or 129(5ZA),”.

This amendment amends new subsection 133B(2A), inserting references to section 129(1B) and section 129(5ZA) to ensure that the ability to re-take failed emergency control assessments applies to assessments taken in connection with licences as well as to those taken in connection with registration.

Amendment 42, page 72, line 15, at end insert—

“unless the Registrar considers it appropriate for the application to be made at such earlier time as may be specified by the Registrar.”

This amendment makes the same change for Part 2 of Schedule 2 to the Bill that amendment 38 makes for Part 1 of Schedule 2.

Amendment 43, page 72, line 37, at end insert—

“Part 5 has effect as if after section 133D there were inserted—

“133E Direction to disregard emergency control assessment requirement

(1) This section applies where a person has been required—

(a) under section 125(2C) or 129(1B), or

(b) as mentioned in section 125(5)(a)(ii) or 129(5ZA),

to submit himself for an emergency control assessment.

(2) At any time before the assessment takes place the Registrar may withdraw the requirement (in which case this Part applies as if the requirement had never been imposed).

(3) At any time after the assessment takes place the Registrar may direct that the requirement is to be disregarded for the purposes of this Part (and accordingly any condition that the person holds an emergency certificate is to cease to apply).

(4) Notice of—

(a) the withdrawal of a requirement under subsection (2), or

(b) a direction under subsection (3),

must be given to the person on whom the requirement was imposed.””

This amendment extends what was new section 128ZZA so that the Registrar’s powers under the section cover emergency control assessments in connection with licences. The new section is inserted after section 133D to reflect its revised content. The amendment which inserted new section 128ZZA is removed by amendment 40.

Amendment 44, page 73, line 21, leave out “In”.

This amendment is consequential on amendment 47.

Amendment 45, page 73, line 23, after “2006,” insert “is amended as follows.

(2)”

This amendment is consequential on amendment 47.

Amendment 46, page 73, line 25, at end insert—

( ) in the second column, for “for registration as disabled driving instructor” substitute “to be registered in respect of driving instruction”;”.

Amendments 46, 47, 48 and 49 add further consequential amendments to Part 1 of Schedule 2 to the Road Traffic Offenders Act 1988, to reflect the amendments to the Road Traffic Act 1988 made by Schedule 2 to the Bill.

Amendment 47, page 73, line 26, at end insert—

“(3) In the entry for section 133C(4) of the Road Traffic Act 1988, in the second column, omit “disabled”.

(4) In the entry for section 133D of the Road Traffic Act 1988, in the second column, for “disabled persons” substitute “persons required to hold an emergency control certificates”.”

See amendment 46.

Amendment 48, page 73, line 32, at end insert—

(aa) in the second column, for “for registration as disabled driving instructor” substitute “to be registered in respect of driving instruction”;”.

See amendment 46.

Amendment 49, page 73, line 33, at end insert—

‘(3) In the entry for section 133C(4) of the Road Traffic Act 1988, in the second column, omit “disabled”.

(4) In the entry for section 133D of the Road Traffic Act 1988, in the second column for “disabled persons” substitute “persons required to hold emergency control certificates”.”—(Oliver Heald.)

See amendment 46.

Schedule 9

Regulation of the use of roads and railways

Amendment made: 51, page 122, line 26, at end insert—

“Part A1

Duration of driving licences to be granted to drivers with relevant or prospective disabilities

A1 Part 3 of the Road Traffic Act 1988 (licensing of drivers of vehicles) is amended as follows.

A2 In section 99 (duration of licences of drivers of motor vehicles of classes other than any prescribed class of goods vehicle or any prescribed class of passenger-carrying vehicle), in subsection (1)(b) (duration of licence to be granted to person suffering from relevant or prospective disability), for the words from “of not more than” to “may determine” substitute “as the Secretary of State may determine which shall be a period—

(i) of not more than ten years and not less than one year, ending on or before the seventieth anniversary of the applicant’s date of birth, or

(ii) where, at the time the licence is granted, there are less than three years until that seventieth anniversary or where the licence is granted on or after that anniversary, of not more than three years and not less than one year”.

A3 In consequence of paragraph A2, in section 100(1)(b) (appeals relating to licences: determination under section 99(1)(b))—

(a) for “three” substitute “ten”;

(b) after “or less” insert “or, where sub-paragraph (ii) of section 99(1)(b) applies, for three years or less”.”—(Oliver Heald.)

This amendment increases the period for which a driving licence for non-vocational drivers suffering from a relevant or prospective disability can be granted from a maximum of three years to a maximum of ten years, ending no later than the driver’s 70th birthday. Once a driver is over 67, the maximum is three years.

Clause 54

TV licensing: duty to review sanctions

[Helen Goodman (Bishop Auckland) (Lab)]

I beg to move amendment 62, page 40, line 13, at end insert—

‘(3) The Secretary of State must lay the terms of reference of a review under subsection (1) before each House of Parliament.”

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Dawn Primarolo)]

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:

Government amendments 14 and 15.

Amendment 63, in clause 55, page 41, line 26, at end insert—

‘(14) The power conferred by subsection (1) may not be exercised until after the BBC’s Royal Charter has next been reviewed.”

Government amendments 20 and 22.

[Helen Goodman]

I want to speak to the amendments in my name and that of my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle upon Tyne Central (Chi Onwurah), as well as to the Government amendments.

Clause 54 puts a duty on the Secretary of State to review the sanctions on those who own a television but fail to pay the licence fee. Our amendment would require the Secretary of State to lay the review’s terms of reference before both Houses. Clause 55 gives the Secretary of State a power to decriminalise sanctions on those who fail to pay the licence fee. Our amendment would prevent this power from being used before the completion of the next review of the BBC’s royal charter.

The BBC is a universal service, and the licence fee is a universal payment for anyone with a television. The licence fee is not a tax; it is a guarantee of the BBC’s independence. The BBC is the most trusted source of news in the United Kingdom, with 58% of people rating it as their most trusted news source.

[Kelvin Hopkins]

Does my hon. Friend agree that the BBC is trusted not just in Britain but across the world, and when other broadcasting services are compared to it, they take it as flattery or a compliment?

[Helen Goodman]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The BBC is now one of the great British brands and it exports across the world.

In the evolution of British broadcasting, the licence fee has gained broad support. Nearly everyone in the UK uses the BBC each week—it has 97% reach—which helps to explain why support for the licence fee is at 53%, up from only 31% in 2004, and is ahead of the 17% support for subscriptions and the 26% support for advertising. It is the top choice for funding the BBC across all ages and all socio-economic groups, whether people are in Freeview, Sky or Virgin households.

Not just the public but other broadcasters appreciate the licence fee, since they have built their business models using finance from advertising, sponsorship and subscription on the assumption that the BBC will not enter those markets and that, as a result, the size of those markets will be fairly stable. Labour believes that the licence fee is the best funding model.

[Kelvin Hopkins]

I apologise for intervening again so quickly, but I want to reinforce my hon. Friend’s point. The fact is that we have quality television across the piece in Britain because of the BBC. If it were not for the BBC, standards might drop severely.

[Helen Goodman]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. No one wants people to go to prison for non-payment of the licence fee. Last year, 165,000 people failed to pay, and 51 were jailed for non-payment of the associated fines, even though people can pay by instalment. Clearly, we need some sanctions to ensure payment. The question is whether the current sanctions are the right ones. That is why we have agreed to a review of the sanctions.

Our amendment 62 would require the Secretary of State to lay the review’s terms of reference before Parliament, because we want a proper, analytical and unbiased review. I wrote to the Solicitor-General’s colleague, the Under-Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, the hon. Member for Wantage (Mr Vaizey), who has responsibility for communications, about this matter on 7 April.

Such a review should cover the impact of a change on the level of licence fee evasion. It would be helpful to have historical data on evasion rates. According to the TV licensing database, the statistics on the socio-economic background of unlicensed properties show that 38% are ABs, 29% are C1s, 13% are C2s, 8% are Ds and 11.5% are Es. Those figures are broadly in line with the socio-economic background of UK properties as a whole. That does not translate to the socio-economic status of those prosecuted or imprisoned for non-payment of the licence fee, but it indicates that there is higher evasion among better-off households.

The review should cover the impact on the BBC’s finances. Without that information, we will not know the full impact of evasion. Estimates suggest that a 1% increase in non-payment might lead to a £35 million loss to the BBC. It has said:

“If Licence Fee evasion were to double to around 10%, the BBC would have an estimated…£200 million less per annum for content and services—equivalent to the combined budget of BBC4 and our two children’s channels, CBeebies and CBBC, for example. Due to low rates of evasion at present, an additional £6.7m was available to spend on BBC content in 2012/13.”

Obviously, if evasion went up, such investment would no longer be possible.

The review needs to look at the impact of new technology and the possibility of ending the BBC’s universal offer. Currently, the BBC cannot switch off the signal, so what would happen if it could?

19:30

The review also needs to look at alternative sanctions. Should those be a mixture of criminal and civil penalties? Licence fee evasion currently attracts a level 3 penalty, which is in line with other criminal offences, such as using a vehicle untaxed or without insurance. The maximum fine for non-payment is £1,000, although magistrates take account of a person’s income and employment status. The average fine levied last year was about £170, and it was significantly lower for the unemployed. In contrast, civil penalties tend to be fixed at a single level for all affected.

I am sure the Minister knows that under the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012, the Government intend to raise maximum fine limits across category 1 to category 5 offences. Increasing maximum fines is the Government’s decision. However, the magistrates court sentencing guidelines will consider that when they are finally being tweaked.

The Government amendments are relevant to this particular point. We are content with Government amendments 14, 20 and 22, but I would be grateful if the Solicitor-General gave the House an explanation of Government amendment 15. Why are the Government unwilling to set the penalties on this occasion? Are they thinking of establishing a new quango, or would it be an extra duty that he would give to Ofcom?

The review also needs to look at the cost of collection now and at any alternatives. Obviously, we do not want the costs of collection to rise. Similarly, it is important to look at the costs to the courts now, and again, we would not want those costs to rise if we changed the system.

My understanding is that although licence fee evasion cases make up around 10% of magistrates court criminal cases, the vast majority are heard uncontested and in bulk, with an average presentation time of three minutes. They account for less than 0.3% of court time, so I hope very much that this is not a major plank of the Government’s policy justification.

We also think it would be a good idea to look at other relevant experiences to see whether that would improve the quality of forecasting the effects of changing the system, such as the DVLA, subscription channels, utilities and the council tax. We understand that the DVLA has had to write off around one third of all unpaid fines for non-renewal of vehicle tax, as it is too hard to collect. Of the two-thirds they pursue, less than half are paid. That does not augur well for the BBC licence fee.

Currently, the BBC cannot stop people who do not pay the licence fee using its services, so it is more vulnerable to payment evasion than its competitors, such as Virgin and Sky, which can disconnect non-payers, or the utilities, which can install prepayment meters. Furthermore, around 10% of households have missed or made only partial payments on a utility bill. If licence fee evasion were to increase to that level, it would result in a reduction of around £200 million to the BBC’s revenue. We also think it would be helpful for the Government to look at any international experience. All those are factors that we would want to see in the terms of reference for a good review.

Amendment 63 is even more important. We need to look at the BBC’s finances in the round. The royal charter review is the opportunity for a complete assessment of the role and strategy of the BBC. Changing financing without reference to strategy and role risks producing an unsustainable position. We do not want to see a salami-slicing of the BBC’s position or the insidious undermining of this great national institution, which, if I may say, Mr Deputy Speaker, seems to be the intent of some of the Minister’s more right-wing colleagues, who are not even sitting in the Chamber today, even though they initiated the whole debate. The impact on other broadcasters matters as well. The royal charter review is an opportunity for them and the public to engage fully with the issues.

The mix we have of large and small broadcasters, public service and commercial, has produced the best television in the world. It is a credit to our country, a huge economic success, and a powerhouse of creativity. It is also a delicate balance and not a trinket to be played with. That is why any change to the licence fee must be properly considered at the time of the royal charter review.

[Mark Field (Cities of London and Westminster) (Con)]

I wish to speak briefly on this matter. I have a lot of sympathy with the Opposition’s views, and the hon. Member for Bishop Auckland (Helen Goodman) is right: we have a lot to be proud of. I am always wary of using the phrase, “It is the envy of the world”, but we have a superb television service and, largely, the British Broadcasting Corporation is responsible for that.

There are those on the Government Benches—I have some sympathy with some of my, as the hon. Lady would put it, “right-wing colleagues”—who worry about the political bias of the BBC. Even its former director-general, Mr Mark Thompson, has referred to that. None the less, I do not think any of us can deny that the BBC does a very good public service with its broadcasting, and it is one that is recognised throughout the world. My concern is this: we are living in a fast-changing world and the notion that the BBC’s licence fee can remain in aspic as the only model of funding is one that would be dangerous for the BBC, as well as for all of us, necessarily to hold close to our hearts.

Criminalisation is also something that I want to speak about briefly. When my late mother died, she was living alone. She had been widowed for some years, and she died in September 2010. I took on the responsibility for looking after her affairs in the home in which she had lived prior to it being sold, which took place some months later. I was appalled by the experience that I had, which I am sure is one shared by many hundreds of thousands of our fellow countrymen in a similar position. Literally on a fortnightly basis, we got threatening letters from the BBC’s licensing department, saying that we were committing a criminal offence by not having a licence. There is a sense, I am afraid, in which the BBC regards every single home as being fair game, whether anyone is living there or, indeed, using a television set. It certainly was not terribly good public relations, not just for me personally, but, I suspect, for many other people who go through that particular rigmarole. There is a sense that the BBC feels it has the right to claim, almost with menaces, moneys, when the particular circumstances of my mother having passed away made it even more upsetting to get one letter after another in this way.

[David Rutley (Macclesfield) (Con)]

My hon. Friend makes an important point by talking about his mother’s circumstances. My constituents, too, have had similar experiences with the TV licence and the point they are trying to make is that these approaches by the BBC are overly aggressive. That has helped the push towards the introduction of the amendments.

[Mark Field]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. For those of us who are broadly supportive of the BBC and its values, it is very upsetting to see that aggressive approach, particularly in circumstances such as the ones that I have pointed out, which affect, as I said, many tens of thousands of our fellow countrymen on a day-to-day basis. The notion is put across that somehow, if we lose the money, we will not be able to have CBeebies and BBC4, but again, there has to be a sense of prioritisation in the BBC, which has a very privileged position with its money—some £2.5 billion a year—that it is able to rely on in order to make the excellent programmes to which we have all referred.

I hope that we will have a sensible debate—in fairness to the hon. Member for Bishop Auckland, she has presented some sensible proposals—on how our British Broadcasting Corporation will be funded. The only warning sign is that we are increasingly living in a world of pay-per-view and a proliferation of channels. Like me, the hon. Lady grew up at a time when, until 1982, there were only three channels. A fourth channel then emerged, and suddenly we had a plethora of channels that we can rely on. As a result, if the BBC is to play as important a part in public life in the decades to come, it must be wise to the fact that there will have to be changes to its funding mechanism, without immediately accusing the House, and others who wish it to survive well into the 21st and future centuries, of being aggressively anti what it does.

I hope that the Solicitor-General will have some proposals regarding what I have said, and particularly that he will ensure that the good will towards the BBC in the hearts of many of our fellow countrymen remains intact. Some of the BBC’s antics are the sorts of things that have allowed people who would otherwise oppose the amendments to hold the views expressed in one or two of them, although, as we see, they will not necessarily be discussed to any great extent.

Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker, for allowing me to make a brief contribution. I look forward to an interesting debate, which I expect will take place not just on the Floor of the House but will make up an important part of discussions on the renewal of the charter in 2016 and beyond.

[Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)]

It is a delight to support the amendments tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Bishop Auckland (Helen Goodman), and an enormous shame that those who drafted the original clauses are not present to take part in the debate that they began.

[The Solicitor-General (Oliver Heald)]

rose—

[Chris Bryant]

I do not really think the Solicitor-General should be replying to a debate on broadcasting, but I am happy to give way.

[The Solicitor-General]

I am sure the hon. Gentleman will accept that we did have a debate in Committee, in which the hon. Gentleman who tabled the amendments was a very active member, and he was satisfied with the Government’s approach.

[Chris Bryant]

Of course—it stands to reason that the hon. and learned Gentleman was present; otherwise, he would not have been able to speak to the amendments. That is a rather redundant, kind of tautologous point—[Interruption.] No, the debate is not finished and I am sorry that the Solicitor-General is adopting that approach. The honest truth is that the Government have approached this whole issue in completely the wrong order. The amendments tabled this evening are the only way we can correct that order because we are putting the cart before the horse.

Surely we should decide what the point of the BBC is and how it should be financed, and then decide on sanctions should those things not be met—not the other way round. Under the Bill, however, before any review of the licence fee and the next charter, it has been decided in principle that there should be a change to the arrangement on sanctions for not paying the licence fee. That is completely the wrong way round. The Government have caved in to some frankly preposterous Back-Bench campaigning, and it is a shame that those campaigners are not present to see the end of this debate and listen to the next stage. The discussion is far from over.

If the Education Secretary were here and looking for a list of British values, I would tell him that I would put the BBC and British broadcasting at the top of that list. I have spoken to politicians from India who said that the style of broadcasting that we invented in this country and exported around the world inspired them to have free and independent broadcasting in their country. I have known politicians from Chile, Argentina and Spain who talked of sitting under the kitchen table and hiding while listening to British broadcasting on the radio—largely through the World Service as it was in the past—because they believed that was the only way they could get an independent source of news.

[David Rutley]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Chris Bryant]

In one moment.

The BBC is not just about independent news; it is about a long tradition of being able to tell a story about British society in a way that incorporates the whole of human experience. That tradition probably stretches way back to Chaucer, Shakespeare, Marlowe and all the rest, and I believe that the modern BBC sits solidly and squarely slap bang in the middle of that tradition, and is itself a British value. The fact that it is funded by the licence fee is part of that—everybody gets to pay for and share in it, and everybody gets something out of it. I know there are people who believe that the licence fee should pay only for high-minded broadcasting—perhaps for news, classical broadcasting and the like.

19:45

[The Solicitor-General]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Chris Bryant]

In a moment.

Many of my constituents are on low incomes and in a deprived community, but they are happy to pay the licence fee because it guarantees something for everybody. For them, the sport on television, which would probably be commercially available elsewhere, is public service broadcasting; “EastEnders” is public service broadcasting. The quality that is brought by ordinary broadcasting to everyday lives is part of what people in my constituency believe to be public service broadcasting.

[David Rutley]

rose—

[The Solicitor-General]

rose—

[Chris Bryant]

I will give way first to the hon. Member for Macclesfield (David Rutley) because I said I would.

[David Rutley]

The hon. Gentleman misses the point. No Government Member in this debate or in Committee was questioning the values of the BBC.

[Chris Bryant]

Yes they were.

[David Rutley]

No, not the values. Some might have questioned some of the services, but not the values or the news services and values that are espoused there—absolutely not. The key issue is whether the late-payment approach should be decriminalised, and that is what all Government Members were keen to do.

[Chris Bryant]

I completely disagree with the hon. Gentleman, who I know is fair minded. If he were to return to the previous debates, I think he would say that the fundamental argument made by those proposing these measures is that the licence fee should pay only for high-end broadcasting. Frankly, I think of that as getting the poor to pay for broadcasting for the rich. That is why I believe in a licence fee that is paid by every household and guarantees something for everybody.

[Kelvin Hopkins]

I agree very strongly with my hon. Friend. The licence fee promotes social cohesion, and the alternative would promote social division. He is making the point extremely well.

[Chris Bryant]

Absolutely. I am not opposed to the idea of ending present licensing offences per se, although I think there are dangers in that which I will come to in a moment. However, doing it in this order, and in a Deregulation Bill that has nothing to do with broadcasting or licensing, is particularly bizarre. On the whole I dislike Christmas tree legislation, which is what the Bill has become, and these proposals are wholly inappropriate. If we had a broadcasting Bill, I would be happy to see these matters debated in the round and in the context of broadcasting. I think we would have a fuller Chamber—better viewing figures perhaps, and not just BBC executives who are doubtless following every second of this debate.

As we consider current offences and whether they should be swept away, we must bear in mind the fact that broadcasting always tends towards monopoly as that is its fundamental nature. It is very expensive to make a programme, but it is more or less as expensive to show that programme to one person as it is to show it to 5,000, 2 million or 5 million people.

[Mark Field]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Chris Bryant]

If the hon. Gentleman will let me finish this argument, I will give way.

I think it appropriate, especially in markets of the size we have in the United Kingdom, to ensure that a pot of money is available for local, British programming—programmes made in this country that reflect its interests, not just in terms of news and current affairs, but drama, comedy, religion, and all the different genres. That is an essential part of ensuring that monopoly does not always triumph.

The hon. Member for Cities of London and Westminster (Mark Field) referred to the £2.7 billion that the BBC is guaranteed as though that were an enormous amount of money. It is nothing compared with Sky, which has £7 billion a year; and how much programming does it produce that is then exported round the world on behalf of Britain? To what extent does it sell Britain abroad? How much does it reflect the whole of British society? It is difficult enough to get a Sky journalist to travel outside the M25, let alone all the way down to Wales, for heaven’s sake. That is why I believe we must have an alternative in the public sector to the monopoly that will otherwise be set up.

[Mark Field]

I had hoped to agree with what the hon. Gentleman said about this measure being in a Christmas tree Bill. I agree with him fundamentally that it would be better to have it in a proper broadcasting Bill, but the difficulty is that we focus our minds on the BBC only when the renewal of the charter comes up, which is not necessarily the best time to look at these things in the broadest sense. However, I disagree with what he said about Sky. Ultimately, we are all consumers of Sky. It is the market that decides, and if there were no market for it, Sky would not have £7 billion in its coffers. We have £2.7 billion in the BBC, which I think does a terrific job, given that amount of money, but it is right that the market should prevail to a certain extent.

[Chris Bryant]

Perhaps what the hon. Gentleman says reflects his constituency, but for the majority of the time that I have been a Member of Parliament, the only way in which my constituents could get BBC 3, BBC 4 or, in most parts of it, BBC 2, let alone Channel 4, was to pay Sky. It had an absolute monopoly on digital television in the south Wales valleys. Because of the mixture of platforms, the geography, the various ways in which, for instance, mansion block flats in London work and all the rest of it, it is important that we have a public service broadcaster with a commitment and a statutory requirement to deliver to every household and provide something for everybody: the 83-year-old who likes listening to Chaucer and Mantovani—if there is a person who likes only that combination—and the 18-year-old who is interested only in the kind of things that are shown on BBC 3.

That is an important commitment and we need that combination, because as somebody once put it to me, if we are to have one 800 lb gorilla in the forest, in the shape of Sky, it is a good idea to have a second 800 lb gorilla in the forest, because that is safer for everybody. The competition we have in the UK between public service broadcasting and the commercial sector is positive. We were wrong in the past to campaign against having ITV and the commercial sector and all the rest. It is right to have that mixture. The two feed off each other, and Sky is now finally learning that it is a good idea to produce programmes of its own.

The licence fee is a phenomenal success for this country. The £2.7 billion that the hon. Gentleman talks of is basically an investment in production, which is why programmes are sold all around the world. We are the only country in Europe that manages to be a net exporter of programming. That might be because of our history, but I think it is also because we have a strong BBC. I also think that the alternatives to the licence fee that are experienced elsewhere in Europe, which many people tout—for instance, Germany has a mixture of a licence fee and advertising, others have a public service broadcasting model based just on advertising, and the Netherlands has a fixed amount of income tax—are more flawed than the licence fee. To paraphrase Churchill, yes, the licence fee may be terrible—for all the reasons that I am sure people can adduce: it is not progressive, it bears down unequally, it affects everybody, whether they are rich or poor, and all the rest of it—but it is better than all the alternatives.

[Andrew Bridgen (North West Leicestershire) (Con)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Chris Bryant]

I am not going to give way, because the hon. Gentleman was not here for the beginning of the debate. I would normally be very generous, but he was not here even for the beginning of my speech, let alone the moving of the amendment.

[David Rutley]

I have been following the hon. Gentleman’s argument as closely as I can. He makes the point about how important it is to ensure proper programming and how important the licence fee is, but what we are talking about in this debate is whether it should be a criminal offence to pay the fee late or to be unable to pay it. There are many other worthy providers of great public services that do not have that right. That is what we are discussing.

[Chris Bryant]

It is not, actually. What we are discussing is the order in which the Government should proceed—in other words, whether they should first decide what the future sanction should be and then review the licence fee, or whether they should first review the licence fee and the charter and then decide what the sanction should be. I believe the latter is the only logical and commonsensical way of proceeding. That is why I am strongly supportive of the amendments that my hon. Friend the Member for Bishop Auckland has tabled, because that is precisely what they do. It would be extraordinary if the Government were to oppose our amendments this evening. I know that the Solicitor-General is sometimes a very reasonable man—[Interruption]—although he has not got his reasonable face on now, I see.

[The Solicitor-General]

It is because you would not give way to me.

[Chris Bryant]

I give way to the hon. and learned Gentleman.

[The Solicitor-General]

The debate we have been having, in Committee and with my hon. Friend the Member for North West Leicestershire (Andrew Bridgen), is about enforcement of the licence fee, not about the principle.

[Chris Bryant]

I have read all the debates, which were actually about fundamental principles as well, and the fundamental principle for me is that we should do the whole policy in the round, rather than doing it piecemeal in a deregulation Bill.

That takes me to the key point about sanctions. Whatever regime one moves to—whether one decriminalises or not—one needs some form of sanction if one is not fundamentally to undermine the licence fee. As I understand it, the Government do not want to undermine the licence fee. They still support it—[Interruption.] From the look on the Solicitor-General’s face, I see that he is not so sure about that. However, broadly speaking, given that the majority of people in this country support the licence fee and believe that although it might not be perfect—they may support decriminalisation—it is none the less the best way to finance the BBC, it is only common sense for us to ensure that some of form of sanction is available.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Bishop Auckland pointed out, we would need only a very small increase in the rate of licence fee evasion to see a significant fall in BBC income. I can imagine Government Members then being the first to say, “You can’t cut spending on programming in my area”, or “You can’t cut the regional current affairs programme”, or “You can’t cut spending on orchestras”, or “You can’t cut spending on programmes that are produced and delivered in my part of the country.” However, I say to them that if the Government make it easier for people to evade the licence fee, because they have not put in place sanctions—

[Andrew Bridgen]

rose—

[Chris Bryant]

I am not going to give way to the hon. Gentleman. He was not here for the beginning of the debate. End of story, I am afraid.

If the Government do not put proper sanctions in place, they are in danger of cutting the overall income for the BBC. On the whole, I think the idea of a summary review of the licence fee, as well as the way in which Governments have sometimes tended to proceed with a new royal charter, is problematic in a modern democracy. It has meant going through the back door of Buckingham palace, rather than in through the front door of this palace in Westminster. On the whole, I would prefer a proper debate in the round. If there are going to be changes after the next charter review and the next licence fee review, that is the time for us to make proper decisions about how we ensure that the licence fee is not undermined but that some of the egregious examples we have all heard of—people being been sent to prison for what is a minor offence—are dealt with too.

As I have said before, in many ways I agree that the licence fee is terrible—it bears down heavily on the poor, just as it bears down on the rich—but it also means that the poor have an opportunity to get quality television. There are very few things in this country about which one can genuinely say with one’s hand on one’s heart, “We do it better than anyone else in the world”, but I honestly think we do broadcasting better than any other country in the world. By proceeding in the wrong order, because of how the Government have mishandled this debate, there is a danger that we will undermine the licence fee and break something that is fundamentally a British value—good public service broadcasting.

20:00

[The Solicitor-General]

We have had a short but lively debate, and I would like to put it on record that no Government Member said that the BBC was not a fantastic institution, or anything of that sort. Our debate was not about the licence fee, although the charter review is coming up, and that will have a process of its own; it was about enforcement.

My hon. Friend the Member for North West Leicestershire (Andrew Bridgen)—I pay tribute to the way he put his case—made the point that there are many poor and vulnerable people who struggle with the licence fee, and they can be criminalised and even sent to prison for failure to pay it. He clearly felt concerned about them, and made his case in that way. It was not developed as some kind of veiled attack on the BBC. I think it right to look at decriminalisation. Even the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) seemed to accept that at one point, and he even seemed to accept that it would be right to have a review of the sort proposed by the Government. Again, I do not see much cross-party disagreement there.

Clearly, the Government will not take up the invitation of the hon. Member for Bishop Auckland (Helen Goodman) and say what the outcome of the review and the penalties will be—something I thought she said. She asks why the Government are unwilling to set the penalties now; the answer is that we have not yet had the review. Whether one particular body will have the duty of setting the variable fees is another issue for the review; we want a proper review that will look into all aspects of the issue. As to what analysis has been done of the potential impacts—positive and negative—of switching to a civil rather than a criminal enforcement, or of having the option of both, we are having a review precisely to determine that. The whole point is that we do not want to prejudge the review.

[Helen Goodman]

My question was not why the Government will not decide the penalties at this juncture—I completely accept what the Solicitor-General said about that—but why the Government were offloading the task of setting the penalties on to another body.

[The Solicitor-General]

There will clearly need to be a mechanism to effect the change; someone will have to decide what the variable penalties should be, and I shall come on to that in a moment. I do not think it right, however, to prejudge who or which body should do the setting. The hon. Lady suggested one particular body, but we are happy to let the review look into these issues and come up with its thoughts on what sort of regime should or should not be approved.

The amendments are designed to achieve two objectives. Under amendment 62,

“The Secretary of State must lay the terms of reference of a review”

of the TV licensing enforcement regime

“before each House of Parliament.”

Those would be key papers for the review, and there would be others. What normally happens, and what we propose, is that those papers are deposited in the Libraries of both Houses. It would be unusual to lay them before the House. That would be the normal and best way forward, and it would achieve the same effect as the amendment—that is, it would ensure that the House of Commons was fully aware of the details.

Amendment 63 looks to ensure that the power to decriminalise the failure to have a TV licence via secondary legislation, either by replacing the criminal regime with a civil regime, or by enabling the imposition of civil penalties for such offences, would not be exercised until after the conclusion of the charter process. As previously mentioned, this power would need to be exercised in the light of the review’s findings, and considering the full impacts, costs and benefits to licence payers, to the court system—where, as the hon. Lady said, changes are being made—and to businesses of any changes to the enforcement regime. That would be considered in the context of the charter review.

At this stage, it would be premature to put restrictions on the timing of when the power may be exercised, given that the charter review has not yet started, and the Government have not set out the detail of the process and the timing. The Government therefore resist the amendments on the following grounds. First, the key papers will be deposited in the Library in the normal way and, secondly, we do not want to restrict what should or could happen, in terms of decriminalisation, by aligning the legislation with the timing of the charter review, although the legislation would be in the context of the review.

My hon. Friend the Member for Cities of London and Westminster (Mark Field) made the point that we are living in a changing world. That is true, both as regards the courts and how they go about enforcing, and about the media and broadcasting world. It is also true in respect of how we look at enforcement. Given that so many public services have civil enforcement and that it can be effective, it is certainly right, I think, at this point to have a review, and to try to move away from the aggressive approach that my hon. Friend mentioned. The point was made by my hon. Friend the Member for Macclesfield (David Rutley), and I have encountered the issue in my constituency postbag and at surgeries. Elderly people who feel that they have paid their licence fee—they often have—can be threatened with bills, letters about going to court and so forth, yet it is often the TV licensing authorities that have made the mistakes. A civil approach, where at least the threat of court is not frightening elderly, vulnerable and poor people, might be a better way forward. It is certainly something worth reviewing. On the issue of excellence and free markets, it is right that both can deliver.

[Chris Bryant]

I got a bit confused with all the different reviews we seem to be talking about. We are talking about a review of the charter, which is coming along; and a review of the system of sanctions, which may lead to recommendations on what needs to change and on the use of the secondary legislation included in the Bill. All I am saying is that the latter should not come before the former.

[The Solicitor-General]

I hope the hon. Gentleman would accept that we are where we are. That may not be novel, but it is true. [Interruption.] It does. The Bill had within its scope the enforcement arrangements for the licence fee. My hon. Friend the Member for North West Leicestershire—not me—was concerned about the issue, which garnered considerable support in the House. He was persuasive in saying that it was right to review this area and take the powers at this convenient opportunity, in case the review comes to the same conclusion as him. [Interruption.] The hon. Member for Rhondda is very experienced in these matters and has had a role in the leadership of House operations, so he understands these things. This is not such a novel and surprising thing. It is actually a good opportunity to tackle an issue that has arisen in Parliament.

[Chris Bryant]

What I think I understand by that—I hope the Solicitor-General will confirm whether I am right, or will correct me if I have it wrong—is that his Government would or could bring in and use the secondary legislation before the charter review happened. Is that his intention?

[The Solicitor-General]

It is certainly not the intention to do anything that does not take into account the full context—[Interruption.] The hon. Gentleman laughs, but there is a full context to the charter review. It is difficult when the process has not been set out and nobody is aware of the full details, so one needs to be wary of tying one’s hands too much. All I am saying is that some commitments have been made about the time scale for the review; that is in the legislation. We know when the charter review will take place, and we know that nothing will happen until the review has been completed, taking into account all the various points I have made. That should satisfy the hon. Gentleman.

The hon. Member for Bishop Auckland mentioned variable fees; they are provided for in the Government amendments, which also deal with the question of extent and the Crown dependencies. I commend Government amendments 14 and 15 and 20 and 22, and urge the hon. Lady to withdraw the amendment.

[Helen Goodman]

I did not find the Solicitor-General’s arguments very convincing. He seems to want to retain the freedom to fiddle around with the way in which the licence fee operates before we have seen the results of the royal charter review. None the less, I do not wish to press either amendment 62 or amendment 63 to a vote, although I suspect that amendment 62 may be re-examined in another place. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Clause 55

TV licensing: alternatives to criminal sanctions

Amendments made: 14, page 40, line 24, after “be” insert “—

(a) ”

This amendment is a drafting amendment related to amendment 15.

Amendment 15, page 40, line 25, at end insert

“, or

(b) such amount, not exceeding a maximum amount specified in the regulations, as may be determined by a body so specified.”—(The Solicitor-General)

In the event of the Secretary of State deciding to make regulations replacing the TV licensing offences with a civil penalty regime, this amendment would allow the regulations to provide for the amount of the penalty to be determined by a body specified in the regulations, subject to a maximum amount specified in the regulations.

New Clause 3

Limit on indemnity required under Outer Space Act 1986

‘(1) The Outer Space Act 1986 is amended as follows.

(2) In section 3 (prohibition of unlicensed activities), after subsection (3) insert—

“(3A) An order under subsection (3) may—

(a) provide that section 10(1) does not apply to a person to the extent that the person is carrying on activities that do not require a licence by virtue of the order;

(b) specify the maximum amount of a person’s liability under section 10(1) so far as the liability relates to the carrying on of activities that do not require a licence by virtue of the order.”

(3) In section 5 (terms of licence), after subsection (2) insert—

“(3) A licence must specify the maximum amount of the licensee’s liability to indemnify Her Majesty’s government in the United Kingdom under section 10 in respect of activities authorised by the licence.”

(4) In section 10 (obligation to indemnify government against claims), after subsection (1) insert—

“(1A) Subsection (1) is subject to—

(a) any limit on the amount of a person’s liability that is specified in a licence, and

(b) any order made under section 3(3).”

(5) The Secretary of State may vary any licence under section 4 of the 1986 Act that is held at the time when this section comes into force so as to specify the maximum amount of the licencee’s liability under section 10 of that Act.

(6) A variation under subsection (5) is to be made by giving notice in writing to the licensee.

(7) The power under section 15(6) of the 1986 Act may be exercised so as to extend to any of the Channel Islands, the Isle of Man or any British overseas territory any provision made by this section (subject to any specified exceptions or modifications).” —(Oliver Heald.)

Section 10 of the Outer Space Act 1986 requires people carrying out certain space activities to indemnify the UK government against claims arising out of the activities. The new clause makes provision for limiting the amount of the liability under the indemnity.

Brought up, and read the First time.

[The Solicitor-General]

I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)]

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:

Government new clause 6—Power of HMRC to disclose information for purposes of certain litigation.

Government new clause 7—Combining different forms of subordinate legislation.

Government new clause 20—Tenancy deposits.

Government new clause 21—Short-term use of London accommodation: power to relax restrictions.

Government new clause 22—Electoral Commission: changes to facilitate efficient administration.

Government new clause 23—LGBC for England: changes to facilitate efficient administration.

Government new clause 24—Poisons and explosives precursors.

New clause 8—Replacing homes lost through the Preserved Right to Buy—

‘(1) Within one year of this Act receiving Royal Assent, the Secretary of State shall lay before each House of Parliament a plan to—

(a) replace the homes lost through the Preserved Right to Buy;

(b) review the effectiveness of the current Right to Buy policy.

(2) Before making any further changes to Right to Buy, the Secretary of State must carry out and publish an assessment of the impact of Right to Buy policy on affordable housing supply since 2012.”

This new clause would require the Minister to produce a plan to replace affordable homes lost in England as a result of Right to Buy, review the effectiveness of current policy and carry out an assessment of changes since 2012 before making further policy changes.

New clause 10—Repeal of the Sunday Trading Act 1994—

‘(1) The Sunday Trading Act 1994 is amended as follows.

(2) Paragraph 2(1) of Schedule 1 to the Sunday Trading Act 1994 (which restricts Sunday trading at large shops) is repealed.

(3) Section 2, subsection (5) of that Act and Schedule 3 to the Act (which restricts loading and unloading at large shops on Sunday mornings) are repealed.”

New clause 11—Extending of Sunday trading hours—

‘(1) The Sunday Trading Act 1994 is amended as follows.

(2) In Schedule 1, paragraph 2(3), leave out “six” and insert “eight”.

(3) In Schedule 1, paragraph 2(3), leave out “6 p.m.” and insert “8 p.m.”.”

New clause 12—Suspension of restriction of Sunday trading hours—

‘(1) Paragraph 2(1) of Schedule 1 to the Sunday Trading Act 1994 (which restricts Sunday opening at large shops) does not apply during the suspension period.

(2) But Schedule 3 to that Act (which restricts loading and unloading at large shops on Sunday mornings) is to apply during the suspension period to any shop to which it would apply during that period were it not for the disapplication made by subsection (1).

(3) “The suspension period” means the part of the Glasgow 2014 Commonwealth Games period which—

(a) begins with Sunday 27 July 2014, and

(b) ends with Sunday 3 August 2014.

(4) Where a shop worker gives an opting-out notice in the pre-Games period that relates to work at an exempted large shop, section 41(3), of the Employment Rights Act 1996 has effect as if the notice period in relation to the shop worker were the period which— Section 42(2) of that Act accordingly has effect in relation to the shop worker as if the reference to three months were a reference to the notice period as it is modified by subsection (1).

(a) begins with the day on which the notice is given, and

(b) ends two months after that day, or with Sunday 3 August 2014 (if that is later).

(5) Where the opting-out notice includes an express statement to the effect that the shop worker objects to Sunday working only during the suspension period, the shop worker is to be treated for the purposes of that Act as having given an opting-in notice at the end of that period.

(6) The “pre-Games period” is the period which—

(a) begins with the day on which this Act is passed, and

(b) ends with Sunday 3 August 2014.

(7) An “exempted large shop” is a shop to which paragraph 2(1) of Schedule 1 to the Sunday Trading Act 1994 would apply during the suspension period were it not for the disapplication made by section 1(1).

(8) In this section—

(a) “opting-in notice”, “opting-out notice” and “shop worker” each have the same meaning as in the Employment Rights Act 1996, and

(b) “suspension period” has the meaning given in section 1(3).”

New clause 13—Suspension of restriction on Sunday trading hours—

‘(1) Paragraph 2(1) of Schedule 1 to the Sunday Trading Act 1994 (which restricts Sunday opening at large shops) does not apply during the suspension period.

(2) But Schedule 3 to that Act (which restricts loading and unloading at large shops on Sunday mornings) is to apply during the suspension period to any shop to which it would apply during that period were it not for the disapplication made by subsection (1).

(3) “The suspension period” means the part of the Rugby World Cup 2015 period, which—

(a) begins with Sunday 20 September 2015, and

(b) ends with Sunday 25 October 2015.

(4) Where a shop worker gives an opting-out notice in the pre-Rugby Cup period that relates to work at an exempted large shop, section 41(3) of the Employment Rights Act 1996 has effect as if the notice period in relation to the shop worker were the period which—

(a) begins with the day on which the notice is given, and

(b) ends with Saturday 31 October 2015.

(5) Section 42(2) of that Act accordingly has effect in relation to the shop worker as if the reference to three months were a reference to the notice period as it is modified by subsection (1).

(6) Where the opting-out notice includes an express statement to the effect that the shop worker objects to Sunday working only during the suspension period, the shop worker is to be treated for the purposes of that Act as having given an opting-in notice at the end of that period.

(7) The “pre-Rugby Cup period” is the period which—

(a) begins on Friday 17 July 2015, and

(b) ends with Friday 11 September 2015.

(8) An “exempted large shop” is a shop to which paragraph 2(1) of Schedule 1 to the Sunday Trading Act 1994 would apply during the suspension period were it not for the disapplication made by section 1(1).

(9) In this section—

(a) “opting-in notice”, “opting-out notice” and “shop worker” each have the same meaning as in the Employment Rights Act 1996, and

(b) “suspension period” has the meaning given in section 1(3).”

New clause 14—Further exemption to Sunday trading hours: garden centres—

‘(1) The Sunday Trading Act 1994 is amended as follows.

(2) In Schedule 1, paragraph 3(1), after paragraph (k) at end insert—

“(l) any garden centres.”

Government new schedule 2—Poisons and explosives precursors.

Amendment 84, page 11, line 18, leave out clause 17.

Government amendment 12.

Amendment 85, page 24, line 11, leave out clauses 30 and 31.

Amendment 79, in clause 30, page 24, line 14, leave out from “State” to end of line 17 and insert

“in relation to England may include a requirement that applies only where a planning authority makes compliance with the requirement a condition of a grant of planning permission.”

Government amendments 80 to 83.

Amendment 2, in clause 30, page 24, line 42, at end insert—

‘(2) This section and section 31 shall not come into force until the Secretary of State has laid a Zero-Carbon Housing Strategy before both Houses of Parliament.”

Government amendments 16 to 18.

Amendment 64, page 50, line 30, leave out clauses 73 to 76.

This amendment removes the requirement on persons exercising a regulatory function to have regard to the desirability of promoting economic growth.

Amendment 66, in clause 73, page 50, line 33, leave out “economic growth” and insert “sustainable development”.

Amendment 67,  page 50, line 35, leave out “economic growth” and insert “sustainable development”.

Amendment 69,  page 50, line 37, leave out “only”.

This amendment makes it clear that a person exercising a regulatory function under this section must take regulatory action when needed.

Amendment 68, in clause 75, page 51, line 29, leave out “economic growth” and insert “sustainable development”.

Amendment 70, in clause 76, page 52, line 4, after “75”, insert

“sustainable development” means development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of existing communities and future generations to meet their own needs; and that contributes to the principles that the nation and areas within it should live within their environmental limits, should achieve a sustainable economy and should seek to ensure a strong, healthy and just society.”

This defines sustainable development in terms recommended by the Communities and Local Government Select Committee 2011 inquiry into the National Planning Policy Framework, which drew on the 2005 UK Sustainable Development Strategy.

Government amendments 76, 19, 21 and 77.

Amendment 3, in clause 80, page 53, line 38, at end insert

“, subject to the condition in subsection (2) of that section;”

This amendment is consequential on amendment 2.

Government amendments 25, 50, 52 to 54 and 57.

[The Solicitor-General]

This is a substantial group that covers a range of issues, from zero-carbon homes to outer space and back again via the right to buy. Let me begin with new clause 3.

In their growth review, published in March 2011, the Government set out their intention to reform the Outer Space Act 1986 by introducing an upper limit on liability for United Kingdom operators. The aim was to help to level the playing field for United Kingdom companies competing for international business. UK space operators have long argued that the unlimited liability placed on them by section 10 of the Act is very difficult to manage in terms of financing. Given the global nature of the space industry, that could result in work being lost to countries from outside the United Kingdom. The licensing regime enables the UK Government—among other things—to offset some of the unlimited liability to which they are exposed under the terms of the United Nations liability convention.

Section 10 of the Act requires licensees to indemnify the Government against any proven third-party costs resulting from their activities. That is an unlimited liability on licensees. As it is not possible to insure against unlimited liability, licensees are required to obtain third-party liability insurance both during the launch and while the satellite is in operation, with the UK Government a named beneficiary. If a claim were to exceed that amount, the Government could seek to recover the balance under section 10 of the Act.

In the growth review, the Government set out their intention of reforming the Act by introducing an upper limit on liability for UK operators. A two-part approach has been undertaken. Part 1—the announcement by the Minister for Universities and Science of a reduction in the compulsory insurance requirement from £100 million to €60 million—was well received. Part 2 involves a legislative change that will cap the unlimited liability at €60 million for the majority of missions. The chosen route for the achievement of that change would give the Secretary of State the power to set or vary the liability limit through the licensing regime, which will provide flexibility, and, we hope, lead to a level playing field. It may also help with the development of smaller satellite technology. CubeSats, for instance, offer lower-cost and possibly lower-risk access to space, along with growth opportunities for the UK.

New clause 6—which deals with mesothelioma—and amendment 19 introduce a power to enable Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs to supply, without the need for a court order, the work history of deceased persons to their personal representatives and some dependants. That would be for the purpose of making a personal injury claim for the benefit of the deceased’s estate, or making a claim under fatal accidents legislation. The change will benefit the families and dependants of the deceased. It will enable them more quickly and easily to prove their claim for compensation against the person or organisation liable for the injury or death, including compensation for loss of dependency on the deceased. As I know that that proposal has all-party support, I do not intend to deal with it at greater length, but I will of course be happy to say more about it if that is required.

20:15

New clause 7 forms part of the Government’s good law initiative, and would allow different forms of subordinate legislation to be combined in a single statutory instrument when that is appropriate. Rules, regulations and orders could be combined in one statutory instrument. The rationale is that, currently, different forms of statutory instrument cannot generally be combined unless an Act gives an express power for the purpose. That remains the case even if they implement a single policy, or relate to the same subject matter.

The use of a variety of forms of statutory instruments to give effect to a single policy can result in a bewildering combination of different instruments, and can make things harder for users of legislation. Allowing different forms to be combined should create a much more coherent legislative story and policy narrative, while—we hope—reducing the number of administrative burdens and the amount of parliamentary time that is wasted.

New clause 20 concerns tenancy deposits. At this point, let me thank my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley (Philip Davies). I have let him down once or twice during the Bill’s passage by not accepting his proposals, but on this occasion I want to thank him for tabling new clause 16. I also thank him for subsequently withdrawing it in favour of the technically correct new clause 20, with which, I understand, he is satisfied.

It was never intended that the tenancy deposit protection legislation should apply to a deposit received prior to the date on which legislation came into force in circumstances in which the tenancy subsequently rolled over and continued as a statutory periodic tenancy.

[Philip Davies (Shipley) (Con)]

For the purpose of clarification, I refer Members to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests. Let me also make it clear to the Minister that not only am I satisfied with the Government’s new clause, but it is, quite predictably, far better than the one that I originally tabled, and for that I am extremely grateful.

[The Solicitor-General]

I thank my hon. Friend for displaying his customary modesty.

[Philip Davies]

I have much to be modest about.

[The Solicitor-General]

I do not agree. I think that my hon. Friend makes a huge contribution in the House, although I do not always agree with him.

It was made clear in the briefing the Government published in 2007 that there was no intention of affecting prior deposits. It was also never the intention that landlords who had protected deposits and who had given their tenants information about that protection should then have to reissue the same information about the deposit protection each and every time the tenancy was renewed, although the same deposit would continue to be protected in the same scheme from one tenancy to the next. That, however, was the result of the Court of Appeal’s decision in the case of Superstrike Ltd v. Marino Rodrigues. As a result of that decision, a large number of landlords were at risk of court action and open to a financial penalty, despite having done what the sector and successive Governments considered to be the right thing. Our proposals are broadly similar to those made by my hon. Friend, and will protect landlords who follow Government and tenancy deposit scheme advice from financial penalties and delayed possession proceedings by providing a grace period and making other provision.

New clause 21 deals with short-term lets. It is aimed at an outdated, 40-year old law that restricts householders in London from being able temporarily to let out their homes, or even a spare room, for less than three months without having first secured planning permission for change of use. Currently, failure to secure planning permission in Greater London for short-term letting can result in a fine of up to £20,000. That is not the case in the rest of England, where property owners can let out their homes on a short-term basis without needing permission to do so.

During the 2012 Olympics while we were all encouraging visitors to come to London and join in the celebrations, some people who welcomed visitors into their homes were subject to enforcement action from London boroughs. That was not universal, but I do applaud the boroughs that entered into the spirit and encouraged residents to let out their homes or a spare room. Wimbledon is on at the moment, of course, and Londoners have traditionally rented out spare rooms and homes to people visiting the capital for the championships. The new clause enables the Secretary of State to make regulations to give London residents more of the freedoms enjoyed in other parts of the country.

I have discussed this with my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Kensington (Sir Malcolm Rifkind). He made the point that sensitive handling is needed to ensure that regulations covering companies that sub-let regularly are not circumvented by these changes. The regulations have to be properly dealt with in a sensitive way.

[Toby Perkins (Chesterfield) (Lab)]

I entirely agree with what the Minister says about the sensitivity of this matter and the importance of getting it right. The London property market’s problem at the moment is certainly not that it is too long term. With that in mind, does the Minister think there has been sufficient consultation and enough opportunity to consider the full implications, given that the proposal has been brought forward long after all the pre-legislative scrutiny has been finished?

[The Solicitor-General]

Clearly the regulations need to be carefully considered and proper consultation is needed to ensure that the effect of the measure, which is to give more freedom to individual householders, is respected while giving proper recognition in the policy to the difficulties the hon. Gentleman mentions, which my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Kensington also brought to my attention.

[Mark Field]

I endorse the view stated earlier that a process of consultation began as recently as February on this issue and has not yet come to a close, so it feels a little strange that this measure has been rushed through in this Bill. That is the tenor of the concerns expressed by my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Kensington (Sir Malcolm Rifkind) as well. Why does the Minister think there is a different regime for London? Why was that put into place some 40 years ago and why is the time suddenly now right for it to be changed?

[The Solicitor-General]

As I think was said in another part of the country today, London is a super-city: it is an enormous city and it does have unique circumstances. The Government recognise the necessity of working with the London boroughs to design the provision to ensure we achieve the right balance between increasing the freedoms for Londoners and protecting London’s housing supply. We would not want that to be undermined. We are trying to ensure that speculators are not able to buy homes meant for Londoners and rent them permanently as short-term lets.

[Ms Karen Buck (Westminster North) (Lab)]

Is the Minister aware that central London authorities such as Westminster, as the hon. Member for Cities of London and Westminster (Mark Field) will know, Kensington and Chelsea, Camden and Islington, backed almost unanimously by the amenity and neighbourhood associations in those boroughs, have all expressed extremely strong reservations about these proposals, precisely because of the fear that they will lead to a loss of residential stock in what are already highly stressed neighbourhoods?

[The Solicitor-General]

Yes, the Government are aware of that, and we have tried to respond, first of all by making the point, as the Department has done, that the London boroughs must be fully involved in the process and also by allowing the regulations to be subject to the affirmative procedure, which means that the hon. Lady and other colleagues will have an opportunity to consider the detail of the changes and whether they are appropriate.

Turning to Government new clauses 22 and 23, the Electoral Commission and the Local Government Boundary Commission are independent bodies established by Parliament and overseen by the Speaker’s Committee on the Electoral Commission. Currently, both bodies have to provide a five-year corporate plan. The Committee has reviewed governance and suggested a five-year corporate plan should be produced in the first financial year of a Parliament, and the duty to update it and produce a new plan on an annual basis should be removed, although the Committee would retain the right to request updated plans outside this cycle. Value for money studies would take place at the beginning of the five-year period, not annually, and provision would be made to allow the Local Government Boundary Commission to appoint independent members to its audit committee and other committees. These changes are supported by the Electoral Commission and the Local Government Boundary Commission.

I shall now turn—briefly—to the subject of poisons and explosives precursors. New clause 24 introduces the new schedule inserted by new schedule 2, which abolishes the statutory requirement for a poisons board under the Poisons Act 1972 and introduces a common licensing system for poisons and explosive precursors to streamline the regimes and bring them into line with the latest EU regulations.

I am sure the hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Caroline Lucas) will wish to comment on new clause 8 and the preserved right to buy and the idea that within one year of Royal Assent a plan should be laid to replace homes that have been sold under right to buy and review the effectiveness of it. Since the revitalisation of right to buy, 19,500 households have achieved their home ownership aspirations, but this is not just about buying; it is also about building. More than £419 million from the right-to-buy sales has been ring-fenced to fund new homes, and I assure the hon. Lady that the Government are committed to keeping the reinvigorated right-to-buy scheme under review.

The impact assessment sets out a wider perspective on right to buy and how the policy will work. The Department for Communities and Local Government publishes quarterly statistics on right-to-buy sales in England and annual statistics on preserved right-to-buy, and live data tables are on the Department’s website. The hon. Lady will be pleased to know that, on future stock transfers, the Department for Communities and Local Government has recently published a stock transfer manual. So the Government have set out their position very clearly and the intention is that for transfers completing after 30 September 2014, net proceeds from preserved right-to-buy sales are, within three years, to be used to fund new affordable housing at no greater subsidy cost than under the main affordable homes programme.

[Caroline Lucas]

Not enough of that money is properly ring-fenced, and it has been estimated that only about one in every seven homes sold through right to buy has been replaced by more affordable housing. Is the Minister as shocked as I am to discover that in one London borough a third of the council homes sold in the 1980s are now owned by private landlords, some of whom own dozens of properties that they now rent back at very high rents?

[The Solicitor-General]

Of course we can always ask for more, but the point I would make to the hon. Lady is that that one in seven figure is misleading, because the money we are talking about is from extra sales, over and above the profile, and as far as that is concerned, this very considerable sum has been set aside. We are confident that over the next three years we will get the sorts of results I described.

On new clauses 10 to 14 on Sunday trading, I am afraid this time I am going to disappoint my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley, although I will not go on at great length as I am hoping he might have a chance to speak about this. The interests of smaller retailers, the working hours of employees, the effect of extra lorry traffic and the need to have some family day consideration lead the Government to the view that the current balance does not need changing, although it was for the Olympics, and very successfully so.

[Gavin Shuker (Luton South) (Lab/Co-op)]

Does the Solicitor-General agree that with 77% of the public supporting the current regime, it would be madness to change the plans in place now?

20:30

[The Solicitor-General]

I would never describe my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley’s plans as mad, but on this occasion I do not agree with them.

Turning to Government amendment 12 and the amendments to remove clause 17, we had a lively debate about insolvency practitioners in Committee. Of course, the profession deserves a great deal of credit for the good work it does in rescuing struggling businesses that still have a viable future, saving jobs and preserving value in the economy. As the hon. Member for Chesterfield (Toby Perkins) said in Committee, the World Bank rates our Insolvency Service the seventh best in the world, and it is a service that other countries admire. This has been achieved through innovative policy developments, and we believe that the one we are discussing now—the system of partial authorisation introduced by clause 17 —is a positive development for the sector, for the profession, for creditors and for insolvent companies and individuals.

The proposed system will reduce barriers to entry by enabling would-be insolvency practitioners to qualify in respect of only corporate or personal insolvency; if they want to, they can continue to do both, but those who wish to specialise will benefit from shorter training periods and lower training costs. That will increase competition and bring down fees, and the profession will benefit too. If a firm decides to fund someone through qualification, it will cost them less than it does now. The amount of money involved is substantial: BPP, the leading provider of professional training, charges £3,470 for each of the three courses needed for the professional examinations, and there are many fees on top of that, so we are talking about significant sums—not hundreds of pounds but thousands. The Government have heard arguments against partial authorisation, but have decided to continue with the policy.

Amendment 85, which would remove clause 30, is misguided. It is intended primarily to halt the Government’s proposed changes to the Planning and Energy Act 2008 and is based on a misunderstanding of what we are doing. It would bring to an end all the excellent work we have undertaken with industry and many interested bodies in the sustainability, access and environmental sectors to rationalise the plethora of local standards by regularising them through the building control system. It would also leave in place the considerable range of excessive and ill-considered costs imposed on the housing industry by some local authorities. These standards are holding back development and are a mess.

On journalistic materials, I did promise earlier that we would introduce extensions to the power of the criminal procedure rules to cover the procedure for making certain sorts of applications, ensuring that journalists do not lose any of the statutory protections they currently have.

I need not address the remaining minor and technical amendments at this stage. I am sorry to have taken up so much of the House’s time, but this is a big group of amendments.

[Toby Perkins]

I begin by drawing the House’s attention to my declaration of interests.

The fact that the Solicitor-General had to whistle through so many new clauses and amendments says a tremendous amount about the Bill and the way the Government have approached it. We have 49 minutes to debate 43 different new clauses, amendments and new schedules. It is an absolute disgrace and an affront to democracy that this House is being asked to whistle through the approval of very important measures that this Government have brought before us at a moment’s notice.

The Bill was originally an unambitious, predominantly inconsequential list of minor changes to the way we sell yarn and chocolate liqueurs that most people would not much mind or particularly appreciate, mixed in with a few substantially more dangerous provisions. However, it has morphed almost daily into a leviathan of a Bill with a multitude of ill-thought-out, scarcely consulted on clauses, the aims of which are unclear, the consequences of which are uncertain, the benefits of which are unproven, and the coherence of which is absolutely impossible to fathom. If this is the final piece of legislation this Government introduce, it will be a fitting climax for them: unloved, owned by no one, with few advocates, whose central purpose has long since been obscured, and who exist now only to be seen to be doing something, in the hope that, if they hang around for a bit, the polls might take a turn for the better.

The ultimate summary of the Government’s approach was heard when the Solicitor-General said in response to the very reasonable criticisms of his previous Bill that we are where we are. In fact, the Deregulation Bill could be the “we are where we are” Bill. Virtually no one is speaking up for it or offering much in the way of support for it.

We oppose clause 17 because we believe it will dumb down the profession. As the Solicitor-General rightly said, we have one of the best insolvency professions in the world. The Bill will de-professionalise what is a very successful profession. It will give an advantage to large insolvency firms, working against the smaller firms and new entrants to the market that Members on both sides of this House profess to support. In Committee, we warned that this change would represent a regulatory move, rather than a deregulatory one. Throughout their response, the Government were unable to come up with any serious support for the Bill.

The Solicitor-General said that the purpose of the Bill—its benefit—was to save money. When he was asked about that in Committee, he said that it costs £4,000 for each of these exams, and if someone only has to do two of them, they will save £4,000. He was also very critical of the insolvency profession, and then suggested that that saving will be passed on to the customers of insolvency practitioners. Many practitioners have been in the industry for some 20 years. The idea that, 20 years later, they are going to give some sort of discount because back then they saved themselves £4,000 bears no scrutiny.

In Committee, the Solicitor-General described responses to the consultation on this change as “mixed”. That was an extraordinarily generous euphemism. Excluding the Secretary of State, just one out of seven recognised professional bodies in the field supports partial licences, and 75% of small firms undertake both corporate and personal insolvency procedures for commercial reasons, so it is the large players that are likely to be able to adopt partial licences. If any of the benefits that the Solicitor-General has laid out actually come to pass—I strongly suspect they will not—they will exclude small players from the insolvency market and make it very much the preserve of large companies. He is setting out to dumb down the profession rated by the World Bank as the seventh best in the world, judged on the basis of the amount returned to creditors and the speed of the process—two key aspects we would expect an insolvency regime to have. When I asked a turnaround specialist from Germany who was working in Chesterfield why he was working in the UK rather than back in his homeland, he told me, “Because your insolvency regime is so much better than ours.” He gave a list of reasons why we should be proud of what we have. Amazingly, this Government are coming to this House to make changes that would de-professionalise something that is tremendously successful and which do not enjoy the support of the industry. The major trade body representing insolvency practitioners calls for clause 17 to be not amended but scrapped, yet the Solicitor-General says he is doing this on behalf of the industry. This is a bizarre set of circumstances.

The Solicitor-General will be creating a three-tier system where, rather than there being one set of exams, people will operate in three different ways. The implications for Scotland, whose insolvency regime is very different, have not been laid out. Our amendment would delete the clause. Even if one accepts the Government’s arguments on personal insolvency specialists not needing corporate insolvency, saying in reverse that people who do corporate insolvency, which will often involve aspects of personal insolvency, do not need to have studied personal insolvency is bizarre. We think the Government are very misguided, as does the industry, and we strongly call on them to do the right thing, support our amendment and drop this clause.

I know that my hon. Friend the Member for Stalybridge and Hyde (Jonathan Reynolds), the hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Caroline Lucas) and the hon. Member for Shipley (Philip Davies) want to discuss their proposals, and despite the lack of scrutiny that these clauses will get, I will ensure that they get an opportunity to do so. However, I shall quickly speak on those measures from the Front Bench.

On Sunday trading, I support entirely what the Minister said, and I will not be supporting new clauses 10 to 14 for the following reasons: the Government promised that their emergency legislation for the Olympics was not a Trojan horse leading to further liberalisation of Sunday trading hours; the importance of Sunday trading legislation for employees; the broad, cross-party coalition supporting our current legislation in this area; the impact these proposed changes would have on small businesses and the convenience sector, which is very much under pressure; and the fact that these measures are being proposed in the way that they are, without any consultation on an issue that divides opinion tremendously. All those things mean that this Bill is entirely the wrong place for such measures to be introduced.

On new clauses 20 and 21, the Labour party is, as we said previously, absolutely committed to greater security for tenants and a long-term approach to the private rented market. It is revealing that at a time when the Labour party is proposing policies that will give tenants more security and certainty in their tenure, the Government are introducing something that specifically encourages more shorter-term lets. Just because their priorities are wrong, it does not mean that, individually, there is no merit in these new clauses, but they need to be considered carefully. The hon. Member for Cities of London and Westminster (Mark Field) has made a strong case, and London Members from across the House are deeply concerned that the London letting market does not suffer from the problem of being too long term. I am very concerned that there should be proper consultation on these new clauses.

We think that the proposal made by the hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion is important. We are very conscious that the Green party leader of Brighton council recently slammed the entire principle of right to buy, describing it as the

“biggest privatisation programme this country has ever seen.”

Right to buy is important. We need to help people who otherwise would not be able to access the housing market, as with so many in Cameron’s Britain; in 1997, it took the average family three years to save for a deposit on a home but now it takes about 22 years. Given that catastrophic record of this Government, in particular, it is important that right to buy is available, but it is also important that these properties are replaced.

As I have said, this group contains a huge number of measures. We will seek to divide the House on amendments 84 and 2. It is entirely wrong that Members have had so little time to discuss this group, but in order to give people the opportunity to discuss their proposals, I will leave my comments there.

[Several hon. Members]

rose—

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)]

We have six speakers and 17 minutes left.

[Philip Davies]

I will be brief and do not intend to put any of my new clauses to the vote. My new clauses 10 to 14 deal with Sunday trading. They would completely liberalise the Sunday trading laws—that is what I would prefer—extend the current arrangements or put them on a more temporary basis. This country’s Sunday trading laws are out of date and absurd—they are completely unjustifiable. People talk about defending small shops, as the shadow Minister did, and say, “This measure helps small shops.” He has to realise that the world has moved on. The small convenience shops that are open on a Sunday are not Mr Miggins’s pie shop or Mrs Miggins’s greengrocers; the small convenience stores being protected by the current Sunday trading laws are Tesco Express, Sainsbury’s Local and Morrison’s Local.

Companies such as Tesco are probably quite pleased with the current arrangements, because they do not have to open their bigger stores, which sell goods at much lower prices. They can close the big stores and force everyone to go along to their small shops, where everyone has to pay a hugely inflated price for their shopping. Companies such as Asda cannot compete. The Labour party keeps saying, “We are concerned about the cost of living.” There is a cost of living crisis in this country, and what does it do? It opposes the measure that would have a massive effect on reducing the prices in the shops for people who shop on a Sunday. People are forced to go to higher priced shops such as Tesco Express rather than shop at a bigger store. It is absurd.

20:45

I would like the arrangements in Scotland to be put in place here. Scotland has full liberalisation. Has the sky fallen in? There are many religious people, including Catholics and Protestants, in Scotland. They seem quite happy with the current arrangements. Has anyone heard of any big issues?

[Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that the choice as to whether someone attends church or goes shopping is the same choice regardless of the number of hours that larger shops can remain open?

[Philip Davies]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right, and I know that he is a church warden. Most church services on a Sunday are at 10 or 11 o’clock in the morning when the shops are open.

[Gavin Shuker]

rose—

[Philip Davies]

I will press on because various people wish to speak. If we extended the Sunday trading hours there would be more opportunity for people to go to church at 10 or 11 o’clock on a Sunday morning.

[Gavin Shuker]

rose—

[Philip Davies]

I will not give way because others wish to speak. I am trying to ensure that other Members can get in.

Then we hear that this is all about protecting the workers. Again, that is an absurd argument. First, what about those people who want to work on a Sunday? I am talking about young people who are desperate to get a foot on the ladder and cannot get a job on a Sunday. The current regulations are depriving them of that. What a ridiculous situation. The Minister and shadow Minister say it is absolutely fine for people who work in a Tesco Express to work every hour that God sends on a Sunday. They can work from 6 am to 11 pm, yet if they worked in a big Tesco, they would have to be protected from working those long hours. It is a completely absurd argument. With the high street facing competition from the internet, we must give our shops the opportunity to compete. People can shop at all hours on the internet—[Interruption.] I will be two seconds, Mr Deputy Speaker. I am coming to a close. People can shop for any amount of time at Waitrose on the internet, or have their goods delivered at any hour on a Sunday, but they cannot go into a Waitrose to shop. Workers can take the orders online, but they cannot work in a shop. It is a completely absurd situation.

My final amendment is about garden centres, which cannot open on a Sunday. I want people to think about that, because most garden centres are very small businesses. They might be big in area, but they are often small one-man bands. I do not see why they should be lumped in with companies such as Asda, Tesco or Morrisons, when they are only small businesses. I will leave my remarks there.

[Caroline Lucas]

I have tabled a number of amendments in this group, but given that we are so pressed for time, I will speak to just one of them, new clause 8, which I hope to press to a vote.

I am deeply concerned about the lack of affordable housing, which is yet another indictment of this Government, who have turned their back on “generation rent”. Housing is undoubtedly at the heart of the concerns of my constituents in Brighton. That message comes across clearly from conversations on our city streets, in my surgeries and from the e-mails and letters I receive.

In addition to tackling things such as letting fees, housing standards and security of tenure in the private rented sector, it is absolutely crucial that we ensure an adequate supply of affordable housing. Yet this coalition’s slapdash, ill-thought-out approach to right to buy is undermining this. The Bill, as currently drafted, would reduce the eligibility period for the right to buy from five years to three years. Giving local authority tenants and some housing association tenants the opportunity to buy their home at a discounted price is not a bad thing in itself, but only on the strict condition that it does not jeopardise affordable housing supply, including the ability of housing associations to build new affordable housing.

The new clause would require the Government to produce a plan to replace affordable homes lost in England as a result of right to buy, review the effectiveness of current policy and ask for an assessment to be carried out of changes since 2012 before further policy changes are made. Around 1.8 million households are waiting for a social home, which is an increase of 81% since 1997. The reality of right to buy is about much more than families being able to own their home. Last year, it was revealed that rich landowners are cashing in, buying up multiple ex-council properties and renting them back to people on endless housing waiting lists. In one London borough, as I said earlier, a third of council homes sold in the 1980s are now owned by private landlords, some of whom own dozens of properties.

Far too often, the rich, not the poor, are the real beneficiaries of housing benefit. Currently, only one in every seven homes sold through right to buy has been replaced, and I find it astonishing that the Government are so complacent that they are not even monitoring the number of homes replaced following the preserved right to buy. Housing associations say that, in fact, the number is likely to be even less than one in seven. It is inexcusable that Ministers have not even consulted housing associations, which provide 2.5 million homes to more than 5 million people.

We are a rich country. If we are serious about tackling the housing crisis, we need a major programme of direct capital investment to build sustainable council housing, and the constraints on borrowing faced by local authorities should be lifted, so that councils can better meet demand for new homes. We must not inhibit the ability of housing associations to build more homes. This would ease pressure on the private market and, in turn, help rent levels and housing prices. Instead, we have the appalling situation where we are paying housing benefit to private landlords at extortionate market rates for good houses that once belonged to the taxpayer. It is a scandal.

Today, house prices speak for themselves. In my constituency, the average one-bedroom flat costs nearly six and three-quarter times the median household annual income, and three-bedroom houses cost more than 12 times. That is why I hope that people will support my new clause.

[Mark Field]

I think I speak on behalf of the hon. Member for Westminster North (Ms Buck) and my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Kensington (Sir Malcolm Rifkind) when I express some concerns about what appears to be the anomalous situation in London with the short-term letting of residential properties. These proposals have caused enormous concern among communities in the heart of our capital.

The Greater London Council (General Powers) Act 1973 was originally introduced to ensure that London’s permanent housing stock would be protected from strong market pressure to convert homes into visitor accommodation, and was deemed wholly necessary to deal with the acute housing shortage that London was then experiencing. At that time, London had a population of some 7.5 million and declining. Its population now stands at 8.2 million and, as all London MPs know, increases at a breath-taking annual rate. It needs to be recognised that allowing greater flexibility to change use from permanent residential occupation to short-term letting will have significant implications for London’s stock of permanent housing. It may make it impossible for our local authorities to meet their targets for new homes.

My constituents have very good reason to believe that a loosening of the rules governing short lets, as set out in this somewhat ill-thought-through new clause 21, will make it much harder to keep their buildings safe, secure and well maintained. It risks undermining a sense of community that can be all too difficult to build in an essentially transient urban population. In fact, London’s hyper-mobility and hyper-diversity get greater year by year. It will make it far more difficult for local authorities to deal with noise and antisocial behaviour. Above all, it threatens to make central London homes, already traded by many people as some sort of global currency, into little more than assets to be exploited for maximum profit.

[Jonathan Reynolds (Stalybridge and Hyde) (Lab/Co-op)]

I will be a little briefer than I would have ideally liked, but I am extremely obliged to you, Mr Deputy Speaker, for giving me the opportunity to speak to amendment 2, which stands in my name. It would prevent the Government stopping local authorities specifying a higher standard of energy efficiency in new build properties until after the zero-carbon homes policy came into effect. To be clear, the Bill is intended to prevent local authorities from having autonomy, and my amendment would ensure that local authorities must adhere to as high a standard as possible.

The UK’s housing stock is the least efficient in Europe. As a result, we have some of the worst fuel poverty statistics in Europe—only Estonia does worse than we do at the moment—because our housing stock is so old. A great deal of the discussions that take place here are about the challenge of retrofitting, whether through supplier obligations or things such as the green deal. Surely that puts a premium on us to ensure that the new build standards are as high as possible.

The Labour Government introduced the zero-carbon homes policy, with the intention of implementing it by 2016. It was an excellent policy, with a clear implementation framework that allowed the private sector to produce the plans to deliver it. This Government have successfully undermined that policy. The definition was changed substantially some time ago, and that was further diluted in the Queen’s Speech. I am afraid that I do not have a great deal of faith in this Government’s Department for Communities and Local Government to deliver zero-carbon homes, but even if the Government tried to do so, what would happen between now and 2016?

Many people will take a localist view, to which I am sympathetic. The constituency I represent covers a substantial part of the green belt between Greater Manchester and Derbyshire, and if that green belt comes under pressure from new build, I believe we should be able to argue that the standard should be as high as possible for those homes. However, I appreciate that that would widen the debate too much, and I hope that a focus on preventing clause 30 from coming into effect until zero-carbon homes are in operation will command as much support as possible.

Of course, if the Government are sincere in backing zero-carbon homes, they have nothing to fear from my amendment—it would make no difference to a Government committed to delivering an ambitious zero-carbon homes policy in 2016. However, the issues of sustainability, efficient use of energy, and fuel poverty, as well as public acceptance of new build housing, which affects all of us, are so important that I will, with your permission, Mr Deputy Speaker, seek to divide the House on my amendment, as well as appeal to the other place to give the matter the due attention it deserves.

[Ms Buck]

I want briefly to reinforce the points made by the hon. Member for Cities of London and Westminster (Mark Field) relating to concerns about the impact that the relaxation of the rules on short-term letting proposed by new clause 21 will have.

Most of the inner-London local authorities, across the parties, and the amenity and residential associations in Westminster have raised three main objections to the relaxation of the rules. The first relates to the loss of residential stock. As we have heard, the pressure on inner-London residential stock is already acute, and the amount of money involved in the hotel and tourism trade is such that the sector is already eroding extremely rapidly. A further relaxation of the rules is likely to lead to a further diminution of stock in areas such as Lancaster Gate, Bayswater, Maida Vale and St John’s Wood in my constituency and, of course, in south Westminster.

The second issue is the cost involved and the resources needed for enforcement. We already know from Westminster council that, as the rules stand, an average of about 500 enforcement actions have been taken against short-term lets. The Government’s proposed rule change is likely to make it even more difficult and even more expensive for local authorities to enforce the rules. They will have to demonstrate not that a property is being let short term, but that it is in habitual short-term use, which is a much more difficult and higher bar to overcome, and it is likely to lead to a burden on council tax and resources.

The third issue relates to residential properties such as mansion blocks, which are very attractive properties for the purpose of short-term letting. The rapid turnover of tenants resulting from short-term lets means that a sense of neighbourliness and community is being eroded. It also leads to a higher incidence of antisocial behaviour, such as problems with noise and rubbish collection. That is not necessarily because the tenants or holidaymakers are antisocial, but simply, in common with boarding houses, bed and breakfasts and hotels, because the situation generates more of that kind of behaviour. That will also lead to additional problems, and there are real concerns.

Of course, we do not want to have to take enforcement action. The classic example, raised on the back of the Olympics, is that people might want to do a home swap or let their property for a fortnight.

[Mr Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith) (Lab)]

I think that all inner-London MPs will agree with my hon. Friend and her fellow Westminster MP, the hon. Member for Cities of London and Westminster (Mark Field). The consequences may be unintended, but they will put more pressure on the private and rented market, where at the moment nobody is able to get a property with decent rent. This will simply make things more difficult and more complicated in that market.

[Ms Buck]

I absolutely agree with my hon. Friend—those are exactly what the consequences will be. No one wants enforcement action to be taken against someone who lets their home for a few days or a couple of weeks, or who does a home swap, but there will be unintended consequences in a high-value, high-turnover and high-pressured area such as central London. Kensington and Westminster councils have made it clear that it is not those sorts of letters against whom they would take enforcement action, but the persistent trade in short-term lets. I hope the Government will think very carefully when they draw up the regulations for the enforcement of this particular provision.

[Mr Nuttall]

Whether Sunday is special or not is a personal choice everyone must make for themselves. Let us not forget that for some people, choosing to go shopping on a Sunday evening may be what makes Sunday special for them. Personally, I hope that they will choose to go to church on a Sunday morning, but that is a matter for them. I hope that, regardless of the number of hours that a larger shop remains open, individuals will decide for themselves whether to go to church or to go shopping. It is a matter for them and—

21:00

It being one hour before the moment of interruption, the debate was interrupted (Programme Order, 14 May.)

The Deputy Speaker put forthwith the Question already proposed from the Chair (Standing Order No. 83E), That the clause be read a Second time.

Question agreed to.

New clause 3 accordingly read a Second time, and added to the Bill.

The Deputy Speaker then put forthwith the Questions necessary for the disposal of the business to be concluded at that time (Standing Order No. 83E).

New Clause 6

Power of HMRC to disclose information for purposes of certain litigation

‘(1) The Commissioners for Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs may disclose information held by them—

(a) to a person who is entitled to bring proceedings under the fatal accidents legislation or for whose benefit such proceedings may be brought, for use in connection with the proceedings or in reaching a settlement without the need to bring proceedings;

(b) to a person who is entitled to bring proceedings for damages for personal injury for the benefit of the estate of a deceased person, for use in connection with the proceedings or in reaching a settlement without the need to bring proceedings;

(c) to a person who has made or who wishes to make an application for a payment under the Diffuse Mesothelioma Payment Scheme on the basis that he or she is eligible for such a payment under section 3 of the Mesothelioma Act 2014 (eligibility of dependants for payments under the Scheme), for use in connection with the application.

(2) “The fatal accidents legislation” means—

(a) the Fatal Accidents Act 1976;

(b) the Fatal Accidents (Northern Ireland) Order 1977 (S.I. 1977/1251 (N.I. 18));

(c) section 4 of the Damages (Scotland) Act 2011.’—(The Solicitor-General.)

This amendment allows Revenue and Customs officials to disclose information HMRC holds to persons entitled to make claims under fatal accidents legislation, to persons entitled to bring proceedings for personal injury for the benefit of a deceased person’s estate or to persons claiming to be eligible under section 3 of the Mesothelioma Act 2014 for a payment under the Diffuse Mesothelioma Payment Scheme.

Brought up, and added to the Bill.

New Clause 7

Combining different forms of subordinate legislation

‘(1) Any provision that may be made by order, regulations or rules made by statutory instrument may be made by any other of those forms of legislation made by statutory instrument.

(2) Subsection (1) does not affect the procedure for making the instrument.

(3) A reference in any enactment or other instrument to an order, regulations or rules under an enactment (however expressed) includes a reference to provision made under it because of subsection (1).

(4) Subsection (1) does not apply in relation to any power of the Welsh Ministers to make provision by statutory instrument.’—(The Solicitor-General.)

This clause allows powers to make an order, regulations or rules to be used to make a combined instrument. At the moment it is sometimes necessary to make several instruments on a single topic because the enabling powers are expressed differently. In appropriate cases, using a single instrument would allow the legislation to be set out in a more coherent way and in one place.

Brought up, and added to the Bill.

New Clause 20

Tenancy deposits

‘In Chapter 4 of Part 6 of the Housing Act 2004 (Tenancy Deposit Schemes), after section 215 insert—

“215A Statutory periodic tenancies: deposit received before 6 April 2007

(1) This section applies where—

(a) before 6 April 2007, a tenancy deposit has been received by a landlord in connection with a fixed term shorthold tenancy, and

(b) on or after that date, a periodic shorthold tenancy is deemed to arise under section 5 of the Housing Act 1988 on the coming to an end of the fixed term tenancy.

(2) If, on the commencement date—

(a) the periodic tenancy is in existence, and

(b) all or part of the deposit paid in connection with the fixed term tenancy continues to be held in connection with the periodic tenancy,

section 213 applies in respect of the deposit that continues to be held in connection with the periodic tenancy, and any additional deposit held in connection with that tenancy, with the modifications set out in subsection (3).

(3) The modifications are that, instead of the things referred to in section 213(3) and (5) being required to be done within the time periods set out in section 213(3) and (6)(b), those things are required to be done—

(a) before the end of the period of 90 days beginning with the commencement date, or

(b) (if earlier) before the first day after the commencement date on which a court does any of the following in respect of the periodic tenancy—

(i) determines an application under section 214 or decides an appeal against a determination under that section;

(ii) makes a determination as to whether to make an order for possession in proceedings under section 21 of the Housing Act 1988 or decides an appeal against such a determination.

(4) If, on the commencement date—

(a) the periodic tenancy is no longer in existence, or

(b) no deposit continues to be held in connection with the periodic tenancy,

the requirements of section 213(3), (5) and (6) are treated as if they had been complied with by the landlord in respect of any deposit that was held in connection with the periodic tenancy.

(5) In this section and sections 215B to 215D “the commencement date” means the date on which section(Tenancy deposits)of the Deregulation Act 2014 is fully in force in England and Wales.

215B Statutory periodic tenancies: deposit received on or after 6 April 2007

(1) This section applies where—

(a) on or after 6 April 2007, a tenancy deposit has been received by a landlord in connection with a fixed term shorthold tenancy,

(b) the requirements of section 213(3), (5) and (6) have been complied with by the landlord in respect of the deposit held in connection with the fixed term tenancy,

(c) a periodic shorthold tenancy is deemed to arise under section 5 of the Housing Act 1988 on the coming to an end of the fixed term tenancy, and

(d) when the periodic tenancy arises, the deposit paid in connection with the fixed term tenancy continues to be held—

(i) in connection with the periodic tenancy, and

(ii) in accordance with the same authorised scheme as when the requirements of section 213(3), (5) and (6) were last complied with in respect of it.

(2) The requirements of section 213(3), (5) and (6) are treated as if they had been complied with by the landlord in respect of the deposit held in connection with the periodic tenancy.

215C Renewed fixed term or contractual periodic tenancies: deposit received on or after 6 April 2007

(1) This section applies where—

(a) on or after 6 April 2007, a tenancy deposit has been received by a landlord in connection with a shorthold tenancy (“the original tenancy”),

(b) the requirements of section 213(5) and (6) have been complied with by the landlord in respect of the deposit held in connection with the original tenancy,

(c) a new fixed term or periodic shorthold tenancy (“the new tenancy”) comes into being on the coming to an end of the original tenancy or a tenancy that replaces the original tenancy,

(d) the new tenancy is not one that is deemed to arise under section 5 of the Housing Act 1988,

(e) the new tenancy replaces the original tenancy, and

(f) when the new tenancy comes into being, the deposit paid in connection with the original tenancy continues to be held—

(i) in connection with the new tenancy, and

(ii) in accordance with the same authorised scheme as when the requirements of section 213(5) and (6) were last complied with in respect of it.

(2) The requirements of section 213(5) and (6) are treated as if they had been complied with by the landlord in respect of the deposit held in connection with the new tenancy.

(3) The condition in subsection (1)(a) may be met in respect of a tenancy even if—

(a) it replaces an earlier tenancy, and

(b) the tenancy deposit was first received in connection with the earlier tenancy (either before or after 6 April 2007).

(4) For the purposes of this section, a tenancy replaces another tenancy if—

(a) the landlord and tenant under the later tenancy are the same as under the earlier tenancy, and

(b) the premises let under the later tenancy are the same or substantially the same as those let under the earlier tenancy.

215D Sections 215A to 215C: transitional provisions

(1) Sections 215A to 215C are treated as having had effect since 6 April 2007, subject to the following provisions of this section.

(2) Sections 215A to 215C do not have effect in relation to—

(a) a claim under section 214 of this Act or section 21 of the Housing Act 1988 in respect of a tenancy which is settled before the commencement date (whether or not proceedings in relation to the claim have been instituted), or

(b) proceedings under either of those sections in respect of a tenancy which have been finally determined before the commencement date.

(3) Subsection (5) applies in respect of a tenancy if—

(a) proceedings under section 214 in respect of the tenancy have been instituted before the commencement date but have not been settled or finally determined before that date, and

(b) because of section 215A(4), 215B(2) or section 215C(2), the court decides—

(i) not to make an order under section 214(4) in respect of the tenancy, or

(ii) to allow an appeal by the landlord against such an order.

(4) Subsection (5) also applies in respect of a tenancy if—

(a) proceedings for possession under section 21 of the Housing Act 1988 in respect of the tenancy have been instituted before the commencement date but have not been settled or finally determined before that date, and

(b) because of section 215A(4), 215B(2) or 215C(2), the court decides—

(i) to make an order for possession under that section in respect of the tenancy, or

(ii) to allow an appeal by the landlord against a refusal to make such an order.

(5) Where this subsection applies, the court must not order the tenant or any relevant person (as defined by section 213(10)) to pay the landlord’s costs, to the extent that the court reasonably considers those costs are attributable to the proceedings under section 214 or (as the case may be) section 21 of the Housing Act 1988.

(6) Proceedings have been “finally determined” for the purposes of this section if —

(a) they have been determined by a court, and

(b) there is no further right to appeal against the determination.

(7) There is no further right to appeal against a court determination if there is no right to appeal against the determination, or there is such a right but—

(a) the time limit for making an appeal has expired without an appeal being brought, or

(b) an appeal brought within that time limit has been withdrawn.”’—(The Solicitor-General.)

Where the tenancy deposit protection requirements have been complied with by a landlord for a tenancy, this amendment means they do not need to be complied with again for a replacement tenancy. Where those requirements did not apply to the first tenancy, and a replacement statutory periodic tenancy is still in place, the amendment provides extra time for compliance.

Brought up, and added to the Bill.

New Clause 21

Short-term use of London accommodation: power to relax restrictions

‘(1) The Secretary of State may by regulations made by statutory instrument make provision for circumstances in which the use as temporary sleeping accommodation of any residential premises in Greater London does not involve a material change of use by virtue of section 25(1) of the Greater London Council (General Powers) Act 1973.

(2) Regulations under this section may also make provision for and in connection with enabling the Secretary of State or a local planning authority to direct that provision included in the regulations by virtue of subsection (1) does not apply to particular residential premises or to residential premises situated in a particular area.

(3) Regulations under this section may amend the Greater London Council (General Powers) Act 1973.

(4) Regulations under this section may—

(a) make different provision for different purposes;

(b) include incidental, supplementary, consequential, transitional, transitory or saving provision.

(5) A statutory instrument containing regulations under this section may not be made unless a draft of the instrument has been laid before, and approved by a resolution of, each House of Parliament.

(6) In this section, “local planning authority” has the same meaning as in the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 (see section 336(1) of that Act).’—(The Solicitor-General.)

Section 25 of the Greater London Council (General Powers) Act 1973 provides that the use as temporary sleeping accommodation of residential premises in Greater London involves a material change of use of the premises (with the result that planning permission is required). This amendment allows the Secretary of State to make secondary legislation specifying circumstances when this does not apply (so that planning permission is not required).

Brought up, and added to the Bill.

New Clause 22

Electoral Commission: changes to facilitate efficient administration

‘(1) Schedule 1 to the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000 (the Electoral Commission) is amended as follows.

(2) Paragraph 15 (five-year plan) is amended as set out in subsections (3) and (4).

(3) In sub-paragraph (1), after “paragraph 14” insert “in respect of the first financial year to begin after the day on which Parliament meets for the first time following a parliamentary general election,”.

(4) After that sub-paragraph insert—

“(1A) The Speaker’s Committee may require the Commission to submit a plan under sub-paragraph (1) when the Commission submit such an estimate as is mentioned in paragraph 14 in respect of a financial year other than one mentioned in that sub-paragraph.”

(5) In paragraph 16 (annual examination of Commission by Comptroller and Auditor General), in sub-paragraph (1)—

(a) after “paragraphs 14 and 15” insert “in respect of any year when both an estimate under paragraph 14 and a five-year plan under paragraph 15 are submitted to them,”;

(b) for “in each year” substitute “before the Committee consider the estimate and plan”.

(6) In the cross-heading preceding paragraph 16, for “Annual examination” substitute “Examination”.’—(The Solicitor-General.)

Currently, there is an annual requirement for the Electoral Commission to produce a five-year plan and for the Comptroller and Auditor General to provide an audit report on the Commission. The new clause alters this so that the requirements to produce a five-year plan and an audit report apply in respect of the first year of a new Parliament and subsequently as required by the Speaker’s Committee.

Brought up, and added to the Bill.

New Clause 23

LGBC for England: changes to facilitate efficient administration

‘(1) Schedule 1 to the Local Democracy, Economic Development and Construction Act 2009 (Local Government Boundary Commission for England) is amended as follows.

(2) In paragraph 5 (committees), for sub-paragraph (3) substitute—

“(3) A committee established under this paragraph to review the economy, efficiency or effectiveness with which the Commission has used its resources, or any sub-committee of such a committee, may include up to two people who are not also members of the Commission (“independent members”).

(4) The Commission may not appoint as an independent member anyone who would be ineligible for appointment as a member of the Commission because of paragraph 1(3).

(5) An independent member must be appointed on such terms and conditions, including terms and conditions as to remuneration, as the Commission may determine.

(6) Except as provided by sub-paragraph (3), only a member of the Commission may be a member of one of its committees or sub-committees.”

(3) Paragraph 12 (five-year plan) is amended as set out in subsections (4) and (5).

(4) In sub-paragraph (1), after “paragraph 11” insert “in respect of the first financial year to begin after the day on which Parliament meets for the first time following a parliamentary general election”.

(5) After that sub-paragraph insert—

“(1A) The Speaker’s Committee may require the Commission to submit a plan under sub-paragraph (1) when the Commission submits such an estimate as is mentioned in paragraph 11 in respect of a financial year other than one mentioned in that sub-paragraph.”

(6) In paragraph 13 (annual examination by Comptroller and Auditor General), in sub-paragraph (1)—

(a) for “For the purposes of paragraphs 11 and 12” substitute “For the purpose of assisting the Speaker’s Committee to discharge their functions under paragraphs 11 and 12 in respect of any year when both an estimate under paragraph 11 and a five-year plan under paragraph 12 are submitted to them,”;

(b) for “in each year” substitute “before the Committee consider the estimate and plan”.

(7) In the cross-heading preceding paragraph 13, for “Annual examination” substitute “Examination”.’—(The Solicitor-General.)

This new clause enables the Local Government Boundary Commission for England to appoint independent members to its audit committee. It also changes the current annual requirement for the production of a five-year plan and an audit report to a requirement in respect of the first year of a new Parliament and subsequently as required by the Speaker’s Committee.

Brought up, and added to the Bill.

New Clause 24

Poisons and explosives precursors

‘Schedule (Poisons and explosives precursors) introduces a common system for regulating the possession etc of non-medicinal poisons and explosives precursors.’—(The Solicitor-General.)

This amendment introduces the new Schedule inserted by new schedule NS2. This abolishes the statutory requirement for a Poisons Board under the Poisons Act 1972 and introduces a common licensing regime for poisons and explosives precursors in order to streamline the regimes established under the Poisons Act 1972 and under EU Regulation 98/2013 (on the marketing and use of explosives precursors).

Brought up, and added to the Bill.

New Clause 8

Replacing homes lost through the Preserved Right to Buy

‘(1) Within one year of this Act receiving Royal Assent, the Secretary of State shall lay before each House of Parliament a plan to—

(a) replace the homes lost through the Preserved Right to Buy;

(b) review the effectiveness of the current Right to Buy policy.

(2) Before making any further changes to Right to Buy, the Secretary of State must carry out and publish an assessment of the impact of Right to Buy policy on affordable housing supply since 2012.’—(Caroline Lucas.)

This new clause would require the Minister to produce a plan to replace affordable homes lost in England as a result of Right to Buy, review the effectiveness of current policy and carry out an assessment of changes since 2012 before making further policy changes.

Brought up.

Question put, That the clause be added to the Bill.

21:01

Division 14

Ayes: 208

---

Labour: 203
Plaid Cymru: 3
Social Democratic & Labour Party: 2
Green Party: 1

Noes: 274

---

Conservative: 232
Liberal Democrat: 42

New Schedule 2

“Poisons and explosives precursors

Abolition of Poisons Board

2 (1) The Poisons Board is abolished.

(2) As a result—

(a) in the Poisons Act 1972, omit section 1 and Schedule 1, and

(b) in Part 6 of Schedule 1 to the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (other public bodies and offices: general), omit the entry for the Poisons Board.

Establishment of common regulatory system

3 The Poisons Act 1972 is amended as follows.

4 For section 2 substitute—

“2 Regulated substances and reportable substances

(1) This section defines some key terms used in this Act.

(2) “Regulated substance” means a regulated explosives precursor or regulated poison.

(3) A “regulated explosives precursor”—

(a) is a substance listed in Part 1 of Schedule 1A in a concentration higher than the limit set out for that substance in that Part, and

(b) includes a mixture or another substance in which a substance listed in that Part is present in a concentration higher than the relevant limit,

but, in each case, only if the substance or mixture is not excluded.

(4) A “regulated poison”—

(a) is a substance listed in Part 2 of Schedule 1A in a concentration higher than the limit (if any) set out for that substance in that Part, and

(b) includes a mixture or another substance in which a substance listed in that Part is present in a concentration higher than the relevant limit,

but, in each case, only if the substance or mixture is not excluded.

(5) “Reportable substance” means a reportable explosives precursor or a reportable poison.

(6) A “reportable explosives precursor”—

(a) is a substance listed in Part 3 of Schedule 1A, and

(b) includes a mixture or another substance in which a substance listed in that Part is present,

but, in each case, only if the substance or mixture is not excluded.

(7) A “reportable poison” is—

(a) a substance listed in Part 4 of Schedule 1A in a concentration higher than the limit (if any) set out for that substance in that Part, and

(b) includes a mixture or another substance in which a substance listed in that Part is present in a concentration higher than the relevant limit,

but, in each case, only if the substance or mixture is not excluded.

(8) For the purposes of this section, a substance or mixture is “excluded” if—

(a) it is medicinal, or

(b) it is contained in a specific object.

(9) A substance or mixture is “medicinal” if it is—

(a) a medicinal product as defined by regulation 2 of the Human Medicines Regulations 2012 (S.I. 2012/1916),

(b) an investigational medicinal product as defined by regulation 2 of the Medicines for Human Use (Clinical Trials) Regulations 2004 (S.I. 2004/1031),

(c) a substance to which Part 12 of the Human Medicines Regulations 2012 or Part 6 of the Medicines for Human Use (Clinical Trials) Regulations 2004 applies by virtue of an order under section 104 or 105 of the Medicines Act 1968 (whether applying subject to exceptions and modifications or not and, in the case of an order under section 104, whether the substance is referred to in the order as a substance or an article), or

(d) a veterinary medicinal product as defined by regulation 2 of the Veterinary Medicines Regulations 2013 (S.I. 2013/2033).

(10) A “specific object” is—

(a) an object that, during production, is given a special shape, surface or design that determines its function to a greater degree than does its chemical composition, or

(b) an article that contains explosive substances or an explosive mixture of substances designed to produce heat, light, sound, gas or smoke or a combination of such effects through self-sustained exothermic chemical reactions, including—

(i) pyrotechnic equipment falling within the scope of Council Directive 96/98/EC on marine equipment, and

(ii) percussion caps intended specifically for toys falling within the scope of Council Directive 88/378/EEC concerning the safety of toys.

(11) See also section 9B (which contains power to disapply requirements of this Act in specified circumstances).

2A Power to amend Schedule 1A

‘(1) The Secretary of State may by regulations—

(a) amend Schedule 1A (whether to add, vary or remove a substance or concentration limit or make any other change), and

(b) amend section 2 in consequence of any amendment made under paragraph (a).

(2) The power in subsection (1) to add a concentration limit includes power to add a concentration limit in any Part of Schedule 1A (whether for an explosives precursor or a poison).

(3) In determining the distribution of substances as between the various Parts of Schedule 1A, regard must be had to the desirability of restricting Parts 3 and 4 to substances that meet each of the following criteria—

(a) they are in common use, or are likely to come into common use, for purposes other than the treatment of human ailments, and

(b) it is reasonably necessary to include them in one of those Parts if members of the general public are to have adequate facilities for obtaining them.”

5 For section 3 substitute—

“3 Activities prohibited without a licence

(1) A member of the general public commits an offence if he or she does anything listed in subsection (2) without having a licence, or a recognised non-GB licence, to do that thing with respect to that substance.

(2) The things are—

(a) importing a regulated substance,

(b) acquiring a regulated substance,

(c) possessing a regulated substance,

(d) using a regulated substance.

(3) For the purposes of this section—

(a) “acquiring” means taking into your possession, custody or control,

(b) “importing” means bringing into Great Britain from a country or territory outside the United Kingdom,

(c) “member of the general public” means an individual who is acting (alone or with others) for purposes not connected with his or her trade, business or profession or the performance by him or her of a public function,

(d) “possessing” means having in your possession, custody or control, and

(e) “using” includes processing, formulating, storing, treating or mixing, including in the production of an article.

(4) A member of the general public does not commit an offence under subsection (1) if the requirements of this section do not apply to his or her case by virtue of regulations made under section 9B.

(5) This section does not apply to the possession or use of a regulated substance at any time before 3 March 2016.

3A Supply of regulated substances

‘(1) A person commits an offence if the person supplies a regulated substance to a member of the general public without first verifying that the member of the general public has a licence, or a recognised non-GB licence, to acquire, possess and use that substance.

(2) In order to verify that someone has a licence or recognised non-GB licence, it is sufficient for these purposes to—

(a) inspect the person’s licence, and

(b) inspect the form of identification specified in that licence.

(3) A person commits an offence if the person supplies a regulated substance to a member of the general public without first entering details of the transaction (or causing details of the transaction to be entered) in the licence, or recognised non-GB licence, of the member of the general public.

(4) A person commits an offence if the person supplies a regulated substance to a member of the general public without first ensuring that a warning label is affixed to the packaging in which the substance is supplied.

(5) A “warning label” is a label clearly indicating that it is an offence for members of the general public to acquire, possess or use the substance in question without a licence (or recognised non-GB licence).

(6) A person does not commit an offence under subsection (1), (3) or (4) if the requirements of that subsection do not apply to the person’s case by virtue of regulations made under section 9B.

(7) Before 3 March 2016, subsections (1) and (5) have effect as if the references to possession and use of the substance were omitted.

3B Supply of regulated poisons other than by pharmacists

‘(1) A person commits an offence if the person supplies a regulated poison to a member of the general public other than in the circumstances described in subsection (2).

(2) Those circumstances are—

(a) the person is lawfully conducting a retail pharmacy business,

(b) the supply is made on premises that are a registered pharmacy, and

(c) the supply is made by or under the supervision of a pharmacist.

(3) A person commits an offence if the person supplies a regulated poison to a member of the general public without complying with the record-keeping requirements before delivering the poison.

(4) The record-keeping requirements are—

(a) the person must make an entry (or cause an entry to be made) in a record to be kept by the person for the purposes of this subsection stating—

(i) the date of the supply,

(ii) the name and address of the member of the general public,

(iii) the name and quantity of the regulated poison supplied, and

(iv) the purposes for which it is stated by the member of the general public to be required, and

(b) the person must ensure that the member of the general public signs the entry.

(5) A person does not commit an offence under subsection (1) or (3) if the requirements of that subsection do not apply to the person’s case by virtue of regulations made under section 9B.

3C Reporting of suspicious transactions, disappearance and thefts

‘(1) A supplier must report any relevant transaction that it makes or proposes to make if the supplier has reasonable grounds for believing the transaction to be suspicious.

(2) A “relevant transaction” is a transaction involving the supply of a regulated substance or a reportable substance to a customer, whether an end user or a customer higher up the supply chain and whether a business or a private customer.

(3) A relevant transaction is “suspicious” if there are reasonable grounds for suspecting that the substance in question—

(a) if it is a regulated explosives precursor or reportable explosives precursor, is intended for the illicit manufacture of explosives, or

(b) if it is a regulated poison or a reportable poison, is intended for any illicit use.

(4) In deciding whether there are reasonable grounds for suspecting such a thing, regard must be had to all the circumstances of the case, including in particular where the prospective customer—

(a) appears unclear about the intended use of the substance,

(b) appears unfamiliar with the intended use of the substance or cannot explain it plausibly,

(c) intends to buy substances in quantities, combinations or concentrations uncommon for private use,

(d) is unwilling to provide proof of identity or place of residence, or

(e) insists on using unusual methods of payment, including large amounts of cash.

(5) A person carrying on a trade, business or profession that involves regulated substances or reportable substances must report the disappearance or theft of any such substances if the disappearance or theft—

(a) is from stocks in the person’s possession, custody or control in Great Britain, and

(b) is significant.

(6) In deciding whether a disappearance or theft is significant, regard must be had to whether the amount involved is unusual in all the circumstances of the case.

(7) A duty under this section to “report” something is a duty to give notice of it to the Secretary of State in accordance with such requirements as may be specified by the Secretary of State by regulations made under this subsection.

(8) A person who fails to comply with subsection (1) or (5) commits an offence.

(9) A person does not commit an offence under subsection (8) if the requirements of subsection (1) or, as the case may be, (5) do not apply to the person’s case by virtue of regulations made under section 9B.”

6 Omit section 4.

7 After that section insert—

“4A Licences

(1) The Secretary of State may grant a licence to a person on application by that person in accordance with this section.

(2) The licence may permit the person to do one or more of the things listed in section 3(2) with respect to one or more of the regulated substances.

(3) The term for which a licence is granted must not exceed 3 years, but this does not affect—

(a) a person’s right to apply for a further licence to take effect on expiry of that term, nor

(b) any power of the Secretary of State under the terms and conditions of the licence to vary, suspend or revoke the licence before expiry of that term.

(4) The Secretary of State may charge applicants a fee for processing applications for the grant or amendment of a licence or for the replacement of any lost, damaged or stolen licence.

(5) The amount of any fees to be charged under subsection (4) must be specified in regulations made under subsection (10), and the amount specified must not exceed the reasonable cost of processing such applications.

(6) In deciding whether to grant or amend a licence with respect to a substance, the Secretary of State must have regard to all the circumstances of the case, including in particular—

(a) the use intended to be made of the substance,

(b) the availability of alternative substances that would achieve the same purpose,

(c) the proposed arrangements to ensure that the substance is kept securely,

(d) any danger to public safety or public order that may be caused by possession of the substance, and

(e) whether the applicant is a fit and proper person to possess the substance.

(7) But if there are reasonable grounds for doubting the legitimacy of the use intended to be made of the substance or the intentions of the user to use the substance for a legitimate purpose, the Secretary of State must in any event refuse the application so far as it relates to that substance.

(8) A licence may be granted or amended subject to such terms and conditions as may be specified in the licence.

(9) Examples of terms and conditions that may be specified include, for any substances with respect to which the licence is granted, terms and conditions about—

(a) storage,

(b) use,

(c) maximum quantities,

(d) maximum levels of concentration, and

(e) reporting of disappearances or thefts.

(10) The Secretary of State may by regulations make provision about the procedure for applying for and determining applications for the grant or amendment of licences under this section, including provision as to—

(a) who may make an application,

(b) the form and manner in which an application is to be made and any documents or evidence that must accompany it,

(c) the amount and payment of any fees,

(d) the supply of any further information or document required to determine an application,

(e) notice and publication of any decision about an application, and

(f) the procedure for an internal review of any such decision.

4B Recognised non-GB licences

‘(1) The Secretary of State must publish a list from time to time of recognised member States (if there are any).

(2) A member State is “recognised” for these purposes if licences granted by the competent authority of that State in accordance with the Precursors Regulation are recognised in the United Kingdom under Article 7(6) of that Regulation.

(3) References in this Act to a “recognised non-GB licence” are to—

(a) a licence granted in accordance with the Precursors Regulation by the competent authority of a member State that is included in the list (or latest list) published under subsection (1), or

(b) a licence granted under relevant Northern Ireland legislation.

(4) “Relevant Northern Ireland legislation” means—

(a) regulations made under the Explosives Act (Northern Ireland) 1970 (c.10 (N.I.)) by virtue of the Explosives (Northern Ireland) Order 1972 (S.I. 1972/730 (N.I. 3)),

(b) any legislative instrument that implements the Precursors Regulation in Northern Ireland, and

(c) any legislative instrument that replaces or supersedes (with or without modification) anything falling within paragraph (a) or (b) or this paragraph.

(5) In this section—

(a) references to the Precursors Regulation are to Regulation (EU) No 98/2013 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 15 January 2013 on the marketing and use of explosives precursors, and

(b) references to a legislative instrument are to—

(i) an Act or instrument made under an Act, or

(ii) any Northern Ireland legislation or instrument made under Northern Ireland legislation.”

8 Omit sections 5 and 6.

9 For section 7 substitute—

“7 Regulations about poisons and explosives precursors

(1) The Secretary of State may make provision by regulations about—

(a) the importation, supply, acquisition, possession or use of substances by or to any person or class of person,

(b) the storage, transportation and labelling of substances,

(c) the containers in which substances may be supplied,

(d) the addition to substances of specified ingredients for the purpose of rendering them readily distinguishable as such,

(e) the compounding of substances, and the supply of substances on and in accordance with a prescription duly given by a doctor, a dentist, a veterinary surgeon or a veterinary practitioner, or

(f) the period for which any records required to be kept for the purposes of this Act are to be preserved.

(2) A person who contravenes or fails to comply with any regulations made under this section commits an offence.

(3) A person does not commit an offence under subsection (2) if the requirements of the regulation in question do not apply to the person’s case by virtue of regulations made under section 9B.

(4) References in this section to “substances” are to regulated substances and reportable substances.”

10 After section 7 insert—

“7A Proof of lack of knowledge

(1) This section applies to the following offences—

(a) an offence under section 3(1),

(b) an offence under section 3A(1), (3) or (4),

(c) an offence under section 3B(1) or (3).

(2) In any proceedings for an offence to which this section applies, it is a defence for the accused to prove that the accused neither knew of nor suspected nor had reason to suspect the existence of some fact alleged by the prosecution that it is necessary for the prosecution to prove if the accused is to be convicted of the offence charged.

(3) This is subject to subsection (5).

(4) Subsection (5) applies where, in any proceedings for an offence to which this section applies—

(a) it is necessary, if the accused is to be convicted of the offence charged, for the prosecution to prove that some substance or mixture involved in the alleged offence was the regulated substance that the prosecution allege it to have been, and

(b) it is proved that the substance or mixture in question was that regulated substance.

(5) Where this subsection applies—

(a) the accused must not be acquitted of the offence charged by reason only of proving that the accused neither knew nor suspected nor had reason to suspect that the substance or mixture was the particular regulated substance alleged, but

(b) the accused must be acquitted of the offence charged if—

(i) the accused proves that the accused neither believed nor suspected nor had reason to suspect that the substance or mixture was a regulated substance, or

(ii) the accused proves that the accused believed the substance or mixture to be a regulated substance such that, if it had in fact been that regulated substance, the accused would not at the material time have been committing any offence to which this section applies.

(6) Nothing in this section affects any defence that it is open to a person accused of an offence to which this section applies to raise apart from this section.”

11 For section 8 substitute—

“8 Penalties

(1) A person guilty of an offence under section 3(1), 3A(1) or 3B(1) is liable—

(a) on conviction on indictment, to imprisonment for a term not exceeding 2 years or a fine (or both);

(b) on summary conviction—

(i) in England and Wales, to imprisonment for a term not exceeding 3 months or to a fine (or both),

(ii) in Scotland, to imprisonment for a term not exceeding 3 months or to a fine not exceeding level 5 on the standard scale (or both).

(2) A person guilty of an offence under section 3A(3) or (4) is liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding level 2 on the standard scale.

(3) A person guilty of an offence under section 3B(3) is liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding level 4 on the standard scale.

(4) A person guilty of an offence under section 3C(8) is liable on summary conviction—

(a) in England and Wales, to imprisonment for a term not exceeding 3 months or to a fine (or both).

(b) in Scotland, to imprisonment for a term not exceeding 3 months or to a fine not exceeding level 5 on the standard scale (or both).

(5) A person guilty of an offence under section 7(2) is liable on summary conviction—

(a) to a fine not exceeding level 4 on the standard scale, and

(b) in the case of a continuing offence, to a further fine not exceeding one-tenth of level 4 on the standard scale for every day subsequent to the day on which the person is convicted of the offence during which the contravention or default continues.

(6) In the case of proceedings against a person for an offence under section 3A, 3B or 3C, or an offence under section 7(2) in connection with the supply of a regulated substance or a reportable substance, where the act in question was done by an employee—

(a) it is not a defence that the employee acted without the authority of the employer, and

(b) any material fact known to the employee is deemed to have been known to the employer.

(7) Notwithstanding any provision in any Act, or Act of the Scottish Parliament, prescribing the period within which summary proceedings may be commenced, proceedings for an offence under this Act may be commenced at any time—

(a) within the period of 12 months next after the date of commission of the offence, or

(b) in the case of proceedings instituted by, or by the direction of, the Secretary of State, within the later to end of—

(i) that 12-month period, and

(ii) the period of 3 months next after the date on which evidence sufficient in the Secretary of State’s opinion to justify a prosecution for the offence comes to the Secretary of State’s knowledge.

(8) For the purposes of subsection (7)(b)(ii), a certificate purporting to be signed by the Secretary of State as to the date on which such evidence came to the Secretary of State’s knowledge is to be conclusive evidence of that fact.

(9) A document purporting to be a certificate signed by a person specified in subsection (10) stating the result of an analysis made by that person is admissible in any proceedings under this Act as evidence of the matters stated in the certificate, but either party may require the person to be called as a witness.

(10) The persons are—

(a) a public analyst appointed under section 27 of the Food Safety Act 1990, or

(b) a person appointed by the Secretary of State to make analyses for the purposes of this Act.

(11) In the application of this section to Scotland, subsections (7) and (8) have effect as if the references to the Secretary of State were references to the Lord Advocate.

8A Offences by bodies corporate etc

‘(1) If an offence under this Act is committed by a body corporate and is proved to have been committed with the consent or connivance of, or to be attributable to any neglect on the part of—

(a) a director, manager, secretary or other similar officer of the body corporate, or

(b) any person who was purporting to act in any such capacity,

that person, as well as the body corporate, is guilty of the offence and liable to be proceeded against and punished accordingly.

(2) The reference in subsection (1) to a director, in relation to a body corporate whose affairs are managed by its members, is a reference to a member of the body corporate.

(3) If an offence under this Act is committed by a Scottish partnership and is proved to have been committed with the consent or connivance of, or to be attributable to any neglect on the part of—

(a) a partner, or

(b) any person who was purporting to act in that capacity,

that person, as well as the partnership, is guilty of the offence and liable to be proceeded against and punished accordingly.”

12 (1) Section 9 (inspection and enforcement) is amended as follows.

(2) For subsection (4) substitute—

“(4) An inspector appointed by the General Pharmaceutical Council under article 8(1) of the Pharmacy Order 2010 may at all reasonable times—

(a) enter any registered pharmacy to ascertain whether an offence under section 3A, 3B, 3C or 7(2) has been committed by a pharmacist or a person carrying on a retail pharmacy business;

(b) enter any suspicious premises to ascertain whether either of the following offences has been committed—

(i) an offence under section 3B, or

(ii) an offence under section 7(2) in relation to contravention of any regulations that relate solely to regulated poisons.

(4A) “Suspicious premises” are premises in which the inspector has reasonable cause to suspect that an offence mentioned in subsection (4)(b) has been committed.

(4B) An inspector appointed by the General Pharmaceutical Council under article 8(1) of the Pharmacy Order 2010 may also make such examination and inquiry and do such other things (including the taking, on payment, of samples) as may be necessary for ascertaining any of the things mentioned in subsection (4)(a) and (b).”

(3) Omit subsections (5) to (7).

13 After section 9 insert—

“9A Application of PACE powers

14 After section 9A (inserted by paragraph 12) insert—

“9B Power to disapply requirements or exclusions in specified circumstances

(1) The Secretary of State may by regulations provide—

(a) that some or all of the requirements of this Act do not apply in circumstances specified in the regulations;

(b) that either or both of the exclusions do not apply in circumstances specified in the regulations.

(2) The power in subsection (1) may be exercised in relation to a substance or group of substances, in relation to persons or a class of persons or in any other way.

(3) When exercising the power in relation to a substance or group of substances, the regulations may for example provide that the requirements or exclusions in question do not apply to the substance, or substances in the group, where the substance—

(a) is intended for use for a specified purpose, or

(b) is contained in a specified substance, mixture or article, or

(c) is prepared in a specified manner or form, or

(d) is so intended, contained or prepared and is present in a concentration that is no higher than a specified limit.

(4) Nothing in subsection (2) or (3) is to be read as limiting the provision that may be made under subsection (1).

(5) In this section—

(a) “the exclusions” means the exclusions in section 2 for substances that are medicinal or contained in a specific object,

(b) “the requirements of this Act” means the requirements of section 3, 3A, 3B or 3C or of regulations under section 7,

(c) “specified” includes described,

(d) references to a substance also include a mixture, and

(e) references to a group of substances includes a group comprising all the substances listed in Schedule 1A.”

15 For section 10 substitute—

“10 Regulations

(1) Any power to make regulations under this Act includes power—

(a) to make different provision for different purposes,

(b) to make incidental or supplemental provision, and

(c) to make transitional, transitory or saving provision.

(2) Any power to make regulations under this Act is exercisable by statutory instrument.

(3) An instrument containing regulations under this Act is subject to annulment in pursuance of a resolution of either House of Parliament.”

16 (1) Section 11 (interpretation) is amended as follows.

(2) Omit subsection (1).

(3) In subsection (2), omit the definitions of—

“the board”

“local authority’s list”

“Poisons Rules”

“prescribed”

“sale by way of wholesale dealing”.

(4) In that subsection, insert the following definitions in the appropriate place alphabetically—

““Great Britain” includes the territorial sea of the United Kingdom other than the part adjacent to Northern Ireland;”,

““licence” (other than in the expression “recognised non-GB licence” and in section 4B) means a licence granted under section 4A;”,

““member of the general public” has the meaning given in section 3;”,

““mixture” means a mixture or solution composed of two or more substances;”,

““recognised non-GB licence” has the meaning given in section 4B;”,

““regulated substance”, “regulated explosives precursor” and “regulated poison” have the meanings given in section 2;”,

““reportable substance”, “reportable explosives precursor” and “reportable poison” have the meanings given in section 2;”, and

““substance” means a chemical element and its compounds in the natural state or obtained by any manufacturing process—

(a) including any additive necessary to preserve its stability and any impurity deriving from the process used, but

(b) excluding any solvent that may be separated without affecting the stability of the substance or changing its composition;”.

(5) In that subsection, in the definition of “retail pharmacy business”, for “section 132(1) of the Medicines Act 1968” substitute “regulation 8 of the Human Medicines Regulations 2012 (S.I. 2012/1916)”.

(6) After subsection (2) insert—

“(3) In relation to a regulated substance or a reportable substance, any reference to the substance is a reference to the substance or the mixture, as the case may be.

(4) References in this Act to supplying something—

(a) include any kind of supply or making available, whether in return for payment or free of charge, but

(b) do not include supply involving export to a person outside the United Kingdom.”

17 After Schedule 1 (which is omitted by paragraph 1 of this Schedule) insert—Hexamine (CAS RN 100-97-0)Sulphuric acid (CAS RN 7664-93-9)Acetone (CAS RN 67-64-1)Potassium nitrate (CAS RN 7757-79-1)Sodium nitrate (CAS RN 7631-99-4)Calcium nitrate (CAS RN 10124-37-5)Calcium ammonium nitrate (CAS RN 15245-12-2)Ammonium nitrate (CAS RN 6484-52-2) in concentration of 16% by weight of nitrogen in relation to ammonium nitrate or higher

“SCHEDULE 1A

Regulated substances and reportable substances

Part 1

Regulated explosives precursors

Name of substance and Chemical Abstracts Service Registry number (CAS RN)	Concentration limit (weight in weight)
Hydrogen peroxide (CAS RN 7722-84-1)	12% w/w
Nitromethane (CAS RN 75-52-5)	30% w/w
Nitric acid (CAS RN 7697-37-2)	3% w/w
Potassium chlorate (CAS RN 3811-04-9)	40% w/w
Potassium perchlorate (CAS RN 7778-74-7)	40% w/w
Sodium chlorate (CAS RN 7775-09-9)	40% w/w
Sodium perchlorate (CAS RN 7601-89-0)	40% w/w

Part 2

Regulated poisons

Name of substance and Chemical Abstracts Service Registry number (CAS RN)	Concentration limit (weight in weight)
Aluminium phosphide (CAS RN 20859-73-8)	—
Arsenic (CAS RN 7440-38-2); its compounds, other than those listed in Part 4 of this Schedule	—
Barium (CAS RN 7440-39-3), salts of, other than barium sulphate (CAS RN 7727-43-7) and the salts of barium listed in Part 4 of this Schedule)	—
Bromomethane (CAS RN 74-83-9)	—
Chloropicrin (CAS RN 76-06-2)	—
Fluoroacetic acid (CAS RN 144-49-0); its salts; fluoroacetamide	—
Hydrogen cyanide (CAS RN 74-90-8); metal cyanides, other than ferrocyanides and ferricyanides	—
Lead acetates (CAS RN 15347-57-6); compounds of lead with acids from fixed oils	—
Magnesium phosphide (CAS RN 12057-74-8)	—
Mercury (CAS RN 7439-97-6), compounds of, the following— nitrates of mercury; oxides of mercury; mercuric cyanide oxides; mercuric thio cyanate; ammonium mercuric chlorides; potassium mercuric iodides; organic compounds of mercury that contain a methyl (CH3) group directly linked to the mercury atom	—
Oxalic acid (CAS RN 144-62-7)	10% w/w
Phenols (phenol; phenolic isomers of the following—cresols, xylenols, monoethylphenols); compounds of phenols with a metal	60% w/w of phenols or, for compounds of phenols with a metal, the equivalent of 60% w/w of phenols
Phosphorus, yellow (CAS RN 7223-14-0)	—
Strychnine (CAS RN 57-24-9); its salts; its quaternary compounds	—
Thallium (CAS RN 7440-28-0), salts of	—

Part 3

Reportable explosives precursors

Hexamine (CAS RN 100-97-0)

Sulphuric acid (CAS RN 7664-93-9)

Acetone (CAS RN 67-64-1)

Potassium nitrate (CAS RN 7757-79-1)

Sodium nitrate (CAS RN 7631-99-4)

Calcium nitrate (CAS RN 10124-37-5)

Calcium ammonium nitrate (CAS RN 15245-12-2)

Ammonium nitrate (CAS RN 6484-52-2) in concentration of 16% by weight of nitrogen in relation to ammonium nitrate or higher

Part 4

Reportable poisons

Name of substance and Chemical Abstracts Service Registry number (CAS RN)	Concentration limit (weight in weight or, where specified, total caustic alkalinity)
Aldicarb (CAS RN 116-06-3)	—
Alpha-chloralose (CAS RN 15879-93-3)	—
Ammonia (CAS RN 7664-41-7 and CAS RN 1336-21-6)	10% w/w
Arsenic, compounds of, the following—calcium arsenites; copper acetoarsenite; copper arsenates; copper arsenites; lead arsenates	—
Barium, salts of, the following—barium carbonate; barium silicofluoride	—
Carbofuran (CAS RN 1563-66-2)	—
Cycloheximide (CAS RN 66-81-9)	—
Dinitrocresols (DNOC) (CAS RN 534-52-1); their compounds with a metal or a base	—
Dinoseb (CAS RN 88-85-7); its compounds with a metal or a base	—
Dinoterb (CAS RN 1420-07-1)	—
Drazoxolon; its salts	—
Endosulfan (CAS RN 115-29-7)	—
Endothal (CAS RN 145-73-3); its salts	—
Endrin (CAS RN 72-20-8)	—
Fentin (CAS RN 668-34-8), compounds of	—
Formaldehyde (CAS RN 50-00-0)	5% w/w
Formic acid (CAS RN 64-18-6)	25% w/w
Hydrochloric acid (CAS RN 7647-01-0)	10% w/w
Hydrofluoric acid (CAS RN 7664-39-3); alkali metal bifluorides; ammonium bifluoride (CAS RN 1341-49-7); alkali metal fluorides; ammonium fluoride (CAS RN 12125-01-8); sodium silicofluoride (CAS RN 16893-85-9)	—
Mercuric chloride (CAS RN 7487-94-7); mercuric iodide; organic compounds of mercury except compounds that contain a methyl (CH3) group directly linked to the mercury atom	—
Metallic oxalates	—
Methomyl (CAS RN 16752-77-5)	—
Nicotine (CAS RN 54-11-5); its salts; its quaternary compounds	—
Nitrobenzene (CAS RN 98-95-3)	0.1% w/w
Oxamyl (CAS RN 23135-22-0)	—
Paraquat (CAS RN 4685-14-7), salts of	—
Phenols (as defined in Part 2 of this Schedule) in substances containing no more than 60%, weight in weight, of phenols; compounds of phenols with a metal in substances containing no more than the equivalent of 60%, weight in weight, of phenols	—
Phosphoric acid (CAS RN 7664-38-2)	—
Phosphorus compounds, the following—azinphos-methyl, chlorfenvinphos, demephion, demeton-S-methyl, demeton-S-methyl sulphone, dialifos, dichlorvos, dioxathion, disulfoton, fonofos, mecarbam, mephosfolan, methidathion, mevinphos, omethoate, oxydemeton-methyl, parathion, phenkapton, phorate, phosphamidon, pirimiphos-ethyl, quinalphos, thiometon, thionazin, triazophos, vamidothion	—
Potassium hydroxide (CAS RN 1310-58-3)	17% of total caustic alkalinity
Sodium hydroxide (CAS RN 1310-73-2)	12% of total caustic alkalinity
Sodium nitrite	—
Thiofanox (CAS RN 39196-18-4)	—
Zinc phosphide (CAS RN 1314-84-7)	—

Note: for circumstances where requirements of this Act do not apply to a specified substance or mixture, see regulations made under section 9B.”—(The Solicitor-General.)

See the explanatory statement for new clause NC24.

Brought up, and added to the Bill.

Clause 17

Authorisation of insolvency practitioners

Amendment proposed: 84, page 11, line 18, leave out clause 17.—(Toby Perkins.)

Question put, That the amendment be made.

21:13

Division 15

Ayes: 213

---

Labour: 204
Plaid Cymru: 3
Scottish National Party: 3
Social Democratic & Labour Party: 2
Green Party: 1
Democratic Unionist Party: 1

Noes: 273

---

Conservative: 232
Liberal Democrat: 41

Amendment made: 12, page 14, line 33, after “(general))” insert “—

() in subsection (1) (fees for grant or maintenance of recognition of professional body), in paragraph (b) (power to refuse recognition, or revoke order of recognition, where fee not paid), after “391(1)” insert “or (2)”;”.—(The Solicitor-General.)

This amendment allows the Secretary of State to revoke or refuse recognition of a professional body recognised for the purpose of authorising partially authorised insolvency practitioners, where the body has not paid a fee in connection with the grant or maintenance of its recognition.

Clause 30

Optional building requirements

Amendments made: 79, page 24, line 14, leave out from “State” to end of line 17 and insert

“in relation to England may include a requirement that applies only where a planning authority makes compliance with the requirement a condition of a grant of planning permission.”

Clause 30 confers power on the Secretary of State in making building regulations to include requirements (referred to in the clause as “optional requirements”) that apply only where a local planning authority decides they should apply. The amendment means that such a requirement will apply only where a planning authority make compliance with it a condition of a grant of planning permission. See also amendment which inserts a definition of “planning authority”.

Amendment 80, page 24, line 25, leave out from ‘‘before’’ to end of line 26 and insert

“a planning authority may make compliance with an optional requirement a condition of the grant of planning permission.”

This amendment is consequential on amendment 79.

Amendment 81, page 24, line 27, leave out “local”.

This amendment is consequential on amendment 79.

Amendment 82, page 24, leave out lines 40 to 42 and insert—

“ “planning authority” means—

(a) a local planning authority within the meaning of that Act (see section 336(1));

(b) the Secretary of State (in the exercise of functions of granting planning permission);”.

This amendment defines “planning authority” so as to include both a local planning authority (as defined by section 336(1) of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990) and the Secretary of State. This ensures that, where the Secretary of State is exercising functions in relation to the grant of planning permission, he can provide for an optional requirement to apply.

Amendment 83, page 24, line 42, at end insert—

“ “planning permission” has the same meaning as in that Act (see section 336(1)).”—(The Solicitor-General.)

This amendment is consequential on amendment 79. It defines “planning permission” as having the same meaning as in the Town and Country Planning Act 1990.

Amendment proposed: 2, page 24, line 42, at end insert—

‘(2) This section and section 31 shall not come into force until the Secretary of State has laid a Zero-Carbon Housing Strategy before both Houses of Parliament.”—(Jonathan Reynolds.)

Question put, That the amendment be made.

21:25

Division 16

Ayes: 209

---

Labour: 204
Plaid Cymru: 3
Social Democratic & Labour Party: 2
Green Party: 1

Noes: 272

---

Conservative: 231
Liberal Democrat: 40
Democratic Unionist Party: 1

Clause 59

Criminal procedure: powers to make Criminal Procedure Rules

Amendments made: 16, page 43, line 24, leave out paragraph (a) and insert—

“() in paragraph 7, after “paragraph 4 above” insert “that relates to material that consists of or includes journalistic material”;

() in paragraph 8, for “such an order” substitute “an order under paragraph 4 above that relates to material that consists of or includes journalistic material”;

() in paragraph 9, for “Such a notice” substitute “Notice of an application for an order under paragraph 4 above that relates to material that consists of or includes journalistic material”;

() in paragraph 10, for “this Schedule” (in each place where it occurs) substitute “paragraph 8”.”

Clause 59(3) allows Criminal Procedure Rules to supply the procedure on an application for a production order under Schedule 1 to the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984. This amendment, with amendment 17, excepts any application which relates to material that consists of or includes journalistic material, as defined by section 13 of the 1984 Act, and ensures that the procedure for such applications continues to be dealt with in Schedule 1.

Amendment 17, page 43, line 2, at end insert

“, other than proceedings for an order under paragraph 4 above that relates to material that consists of or includes journalistic material.”—(The Solicitor-General.)

See the explanatory statement for amendment 16.

Clause 70

Power to spell out dates described in legislation

Amendment made: 18, page 49, line 13, at end insert

“or by the National Assembly for Wales constituted by the Government of Wales Act 1998.”—(The Solicitor-General.)

This amendment ensures that the power to spell out dates described in legislation cannot be used to amend subordinate legislation made by the National Assembly for Wales.

Clause 79

Extent

Amendments made: 76, page 53, line 26, after “(10)” insert

“,(Short-term use of London accommodation: power to relax restrictions)”.

This amendment provides for the new clause inserted by amendment to extend to England and Wales.

Amendment 19, page 53, line 27, after “Sections” insert

“(Power of HMRC to disclose information for purposes of certain litigation)”.

This amendment provides for the new clause inserted by amendment NC6 to extend to England and Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.

Amendment 20, page 53, line 27, after ‘Sections’ insert ‘”54,55,”.

This amendment extends clauses 54 and 55 (TV licensing) to the whole of the United Kingdom.

Amendment 21, page 53, line 27, after “70” insert

“, (Combining different forms of subordinate legislation)”.

This amendment ensures that the new clause mentioned in it extends to England and Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.

Amendment 22, page 53, line 28, at end insert—

‘( ) Her Majesty may by Order in Council provide for any of the provisions of section 55 to extend, with or without modifications, to any of the Channel Islands or the Isle of Man.”—(The Solicitor-General.)

This amendment allows the provisions of clause 55 to be extended to the Channel Islands or Isle of Man.

Clause 80

Commencement

Amendments made: 77, page 53, line 30, after “Sections” insert

“,(Short-term use of London accommodation: power to relax restrictions)”.

This amendment provides for the new clause inserted by amendment (which confers a power to make regulations) to come into force on the day on which the Bill is passed.

Amendment 24, page 53, line 39, after “35” insert

“and (Removal of restriction on investigation of tramway accidents in Scotland by RAIB)”.

This amendment has the effect that the new clause inserted by amendment NC4 will come into force 2 months after the Bill receives Royal Assent.

Amendment 25, page 54, line 4, after “70” insert

“, (Combining different forms of subordinate legislation)”.

This amendment ensures that the new clause mentioned in it comes into force 2 months after the Bill is passed.

Amendment 26, page 54, line 8, after “Parts” insert “A1,”—(The Solicitor-General.)

This amendment has the effect that the new Part added to Schedule 9 to the Bill by amendment 51 will come into force 2 months after the Bill receives Royal Assent.

Schedule 6

Insolvency and company law

Amendment made: 50, page 92, line 18, at end insert—

‘(1) The following repeals are made in consequence of paragraphs 18 and 19.

(2) In the Insolvency Act 1986—

(a) in section 1(2), omit “or authorised to act as nominee,”;

(b) in section 2(4), omit “, or authorised to act as nominee,”;

(c) in section 4(2), omit “or authorised to act as nominee,”;

(d) in section 7(5), omit “or authorised to act as supervisor,”;

(e) in Schedule A1—

(i) in paragraph 28(1), omit “, or authorised to act as nominee,”;

(ii) in paragraph 31(2), omit “, or authorised to act as nominee,”;

(iii) in paragraph 33(1), omit “, or authorised to act as nominee,”;

(iv) in paragraph 39(6), omit “, or authorised to act as supervisor,”.

(3) In the Insolvency Act 2000, omit section 4(3) and (4).

(4) In Schedule 6 to the Mental Capacity Act 2005, omit paragraph 31(2).”—(The Solicitor-General.)

This amendment makes amendments that are consequential on the repeal (by Part 6 of Schedule 6 to the Bill) of provisions allowing individuals to be authorised to act solely as nominees or supervisors in voluntary arrangements.

Schedule 12

Other measures relating to animals, food and the environment

Amendments made: 52, page 140, line 29, after “subsection (1)” insert

“(like the power in subsection (1) of section one of this Act)”.

The amendment equates the Bill’s existing amendment to the Destructive Imported Animals Act 1932 (making explicit that the power to make control orders for other destructive non-indigenous animals under section 10(1) includes power of revocation and amendment) to the power to make similar orders for musk rats under section 1(1).

Amendment 53, page 141, line 12, leave out “The Secretary of State” and insert

“Lantra (the company registered in England and Wales with the company registration number 2823181)” .

Following a DEFRA consultation (undertaken with the Scottish and Welsh Governments), this amendment makes Lantra (the UK’s Sector Skills Council for land-based and environmental industries), rather than the Secretary of State, the successor to the Council for Small Industries in Rural Areas as an appointer of a member of the Farriers Registration Council.

Amendment 54, page 141, line 14, leave out sub-paragraph (3).—(The Solicitor-General.)

This amendment is consequential on amendment 53. As the Secretary of State is no longer to have the power to appoint a member of the Farriers Registration Council, this amendment removes the requirement for the Secretary of State to consult the Scottish Ministers before making an appointment.

Schedule 15

Schools: reduction of burdens

Amendment made: 57, page 155, line 21, leave out paragraph 2 and insert—

2 (1) Omit sections 110 and 111 of the School Standards and Framework Act 1998 (which require the governing bodies of certain schools to adopt home-school agreements), and the italic cross-heading before those sections.

(2) In consequence of sub-paragraph (1)—

(a) in section 138(4)(a) of that Act, omit “, 110(10)”;

(b) in the Learning and Skills Act 2000, in Schedule 9, omit paragraph 85;

(c) in the Education Act 2002, in Schedule 7, omit paragraph 9;

(d) in the Education Act 2011, in Schedule 13, omit paragraph 10(9).”—(The Solicitor-General.)

Paragraph 2 of Schedule 15 currently provides for the requirement that governing bodies of certain schools (maintained schools, city technology colleges, city colleges for the technology of the arts and Academy schools) adopt home-school agreements to cease to apply in England. The amendment substitutes a new paragraph 2 which provides for the requirement to cease to apply in both England and Wales.

Third Reading

Queen’s and Prince of Wales’s consent signified.

21:36

[The Minister for Government Policy (Mr Oliver Letwin)]

I beg to move, That the Bill be now read the Third time.

I start by thanking all those responsible for bringing the Bill in good order through Committee, in particular my hon. and learned Friend the Solicitor-General, my right hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary, Office of the Leader of the House of Commons, and all those who participated. I specifically acknowledge the role played by my hon. Friend the Member for North West Leicestershire (Andrew Bridgen), who helped to draft the amendment on BBC licensing, and by my hon. Friends the Members for Stone (Sir William Cash) and for Harwich and North Essex (Mr Jenkin), who helped enormously with the section on the Defamation Act 2013.

Before saying a few words about the Bill, I will say something that I know the Solicitor-General would have liked to say at the end of Report, before he was timed out. I see the hon. Member for Stalybridge and Hyde (Jonathan Reynolds) is in his place, and he will know that the Queen’s Speech outlined the steps we will take to deal with zero-carbon homes and establish allowable solutions. We are aware that within that framework, the decision on the commencement date for amendments to the Planning and Energy Act 2008, which restrict the ability of local authorities to impose their own special requirements, must be made in such a way that the ending of those abilities to set special requirements knits properly with the start of the operation of standards for zero-carbon homes and allowable solutions. I hope that will make the hon. Gentleman—and, indeed, my hon. Friends who are concerned about the same question of timing—rest easy.

The Bill goes to the House of Lords in a condition which, despite the splendid rhetoric from those on the Opposition Front Bench, is similar to that in which it entered this House. There have been significant discussions in Committee and on Report—some things have been added, some things changed, and some dropped—but broadly the Bill goes as it came, and does what it set out to do, which, as I explained on Second Reading, is not in any way to substitute for the enormous amount of work that has been going on across Government for the past three or four years to lessen the burden of regulation by removing regulations from the statute book, improving regulations, changing guidance, and reducing the complexity of bureaucracy that surrounds guidance, orders, codes of practice and so on. Nevertheless, this Bill makes a contribution to that process and helps in a significant way to reduce costs. I remind the House of some few items in the Bill that are of great significance.

[Caroline Lucas]

I am grateful to the Minister for giving way, but does he not accept that a Bill that is so ideologically based—it is essentially evidence-free, simply saying that all regulation is bad and that the free market is always good—does not do justice to protecting people or the environment?

[Mr Letwin]

The hon. Lady makes an odd point, in the sense that if the purpose of the Bill were to suggest that all regulation were bad, it would have a much wider scope than it does. There will remain after this Bill many thousands of pages of regulation, much of which is well intentioned and well aimed. Our contention remains that there is, alas, a certain amount of regulation that is burdensome, bureaucratic and sometimes counter-productive and that often has adverse effects on growth and—this matters very much to the hon. Lady—the ability of our country to satisfy social and environmental concerns.

I draw the House’s attention briefly to measures such as clause 1, which gives self-employed people the ability not to be governed by health and safety at work laws under most circumstances; the sensible measures on taxi and private hire vehicles, which were widely welcomed by those around the country who are being unnecessarily constrained; the significant changes being made to alcohol and entertainment licensing; and the considerable advances on poisons that have just been made on Report.

I want to end with a word on poisons. A part of my personal journey in the red tape challenge began when I discovered that in this country we operated a system—this is germane to the hon. Lady’s point—whereby someone would pay a small fee and send a piece of paper to an office; there the paper was stamped, which cost the taxpayer a certain amount; it was then sent back and the person was allowed to sell all sorts of very poisonous substances. However, people had to send the same piece of paper and the same fee if they wanted to sell things such as household bleach. It was an entirely purposeless exercise, which had gone on for years and years. It neither served the purpose that we wish it to serve—that of regulating properly the sale of extremely dangerous substances—

[Kelvin Hopkins]

rose—

[Mr Letwin]

I am terribly sorry, but I need to bring my remarks to a close.

That system did not stop the sale of extremely dangerous substances properly, but it did impede the ability of corner shops to sell perfectly innocuous substances easily, so we are changing that. One of the measures introduced on Report will help to do that by getting rid of the poisons board. I therefore hope that the House will welcome a modest but highly useful contribution to the enormously important task of making this country an easier place to do business, so that we can fulfil our long-term economic plan.

21:43

[Chi Onwurah]

I echo the Minister’s thanks to all those involved in bringing the Bill to Third Reading, particularly colleagues involved in trying to give it the proper scrutiny it deserves.

This Bill has given a fascinating insight into the Government’s priorities and how they develop policy. On Second Reading I described it as a Christmas tree Bill, but one without the presents, and indeed, the Minister is an unlikely Santa Claus. By Committee stage, so much had been added to the Bill that a colleague said to me that it was more like the Blackpool illuminations than a Christmas tree, and since then there has been yet another festooning—I believe the Government are trying to go for Las Vegas.

My understanding is that when they were putting this Bill together, Cabinet Office Ministers were hawking themselves around Whitehall for regulations that were supposedly choking the economy. What they came back with, however, was a Bill that deregulated the sale of knitting yarn, but was more about removing burdens from Ministers than from the entrepreneurs and business people we seek to support, and of course it had the customary attacks on working people’s rights that we have come to expect from this Government.

[Kelvin Hopkins]

My hon. Friend has described the Bill kindly as a Christmas tree. I think “a dogma-driven ragbag” would be better. The Minister just suggested that household bleach is not a poisonous substance; I would like to see him convince us of that argument.

[Chi Onwurah]

The Minister shows a lack of understanding of what is considered poisonous by many in households across the country, and that goes with a lack of understanding of what the country actually needs to improve the situation of working people.

When the Bill was introduced to Parliament, Ministers estimated that it would save business £10 million over 10 years—20p for each and every business in the country. As my hon. Friend the Member for Hartlepool (Mr Wright) observed on Second Reading:

“It takes four fifths of a second for the British economy…to generate that potential saving”.—[Official Report, 3 February 2014; Vol. 575, c. 97.]

Over the weekend, the Prime Minister’s enterprise adviser, Lord Young said:

“Of course there’s a cost of living crisis”,

so it has taken him four years to come round from “They’ve never had it so good,” to “Of course there’s a cost of living crisis.” We Opposition Members have been saying it for years, and I hope the Prime Minister will now listen.

We need a Bill to help businesses that cannot get the finance they need and to help people who are struggling with energy bills and the cost of living. Families have lost £1,600 a year since the general election, yet this Bill, by its own estimate, will benefit each person in this country by 18p. I think Britain deserves better. It deserves better than a Bill contrived to meet the Prime Minister’s vainglorious goal to leave government, come what may, with fewer regulations than when he entered government—not fewer zero-hours contracts, not fewer youth unemployed, but simply fewer regulations.

On its way through the House, we have seen various measures tacked on to the Bill. Despite a comprehensive and ongoing process of scrutiny of the area, we had three new clauses rammed into the Bill over a 10-day consultation and far too much that we could not discuss today. We had 49 minutes to debate 43 amendments, as my hon. Friend the Member for Chesterfield (Toby Perkins) put it: there is certainly much that we will need to return to in the other place.

[James Duddridge]

Given the need to return to the subject a number of times, would the hon. Lady support an annual deregulation Bill, perhaps driven off the back of Law Commission work? I know from having served on the Joint Committee over 11 months ago that there seem to be a number of other issues that the Government have not been able to include even at late notice, but that should be included in future.

[Chi Onwurah]

As the hon. Gentleman well knows, the Law Commission excellently pursues the identification of regulations that are obsolete and need to be removed, but given what the Government have placed in this Bill, I dread to think what sort of a ragbag of unthought-through measures would appear in an annual Bill. It is clear that this Government have run out of ideas. This zombie Parliament is not short of time—in fact, we have so much of it that I hear rumours that the recess may be moved by a week yet again—so it is particularly strange that Ministers are rushing through proposals in this way.

We will continue to oppose several other clauses in the other place. Clauses 1 and 2 are unwarranted attacks on employee rights, and Ministers have been unable to produce any evidence or facts to make an economic case for the provisions. As my hon. Friend the Member for Luton North (Kelvin Hopkins) suggested, it is simple dogma. Also, clause 1, which deals with health and safety regulations, will create unwelcome confusion that may endanger lives. Clause 17, on insolvency practitioners, is another clause that we oppose. My hon. Friend the Member for Chesterfield made many excellent points about it earlier, and I shall not repeat them.

Despite those misgivings, we shall not vote against Third Reading, as we remain hopeful that the problems that I have highlighted will be rectified in the other place. However, it is clear that the electorate will have to wait until 2015 for a Government who will take action to end the cost-of-living crisis, improve child care, build the houses that we need, end the abuse of zero-hours contracts, and give guarantees of work to young people and the long-term unemployed. That is where our policy development has focused: not on ad hoc tinkering with knitting yarn, but on real action that will deliver real prosperity for hard-working people in this country.

[Several hon. Members]

rose—

[Mr Speaker]

Order. Three hon. Members are seeking to catch my eye. It would be good if all of them could be accommodated, but we shall see. Economy is required.

21:50

[Andrew Bridgen]

Having worked on the Löfstedt review of health and safety reform and served on both the Committee that subjected the Bill to pre-legislative scrutiny and the Public Bill Committee, I can tell the House that no one is happier than I am to see it reach its final stages. It will serve as a further lever to economic growth, and it builds on the Government’s enviable reputation for reducing obsolete, redundant and unnecessary legislation. I am thinking particularly of the duty of care for non-financial regulators to take account of economic growth as a game-changer. It will change the relationship between business and the regulators, and will lead to better regulation. Health and safety reform is good news for our economy, for our wealth creators and for jobs. The “use of land” provisions have brought about an accord between landowners and ramblers which has been welcomed on all sides and which should streamline the process of moving public footpaths for the benefit of both landowners and those who use these greatly valued rights of way.

Clauses 51 and 52 were originally tabled as new clauses in my name and that of my hon. and learned Friend the Solicitor-General. My original proposal was supported by 149 Members on both sides of the House, who formed a coalition across the political spectrum—a rainbow coalition. Such a number of supporters for a Back-Bench amendment to a Government Bill is unprecedented in recent years, and I thank all the Members involved. Of course, I also thank the Government for adopting the measure.

For 20 years, the Magistrates Association has been calling for the decriminalisation of non-payment of television licence fees. It believes that a higher level of compliance can be achieved without recourse to the courts. The BBC itself said that it did not want people to go to prison, but the fact remains that last year 51 people did go to prison, as opposed to 48 the previous year. An e-mail that I received from a barrister stated:

“During my time in Court I was struck by the number of poor people up before the bench who were receiving a criminal conviction for not paying their television licence. Most of them were guilty only because they were very poor. They did not seem to be feckless people, just people who were down on their luck. Prosecuting them was (and is) shameful and remains a blot on our legal system.”

The BBC has responded to the proposal for decriminalisation by saying that it will lead to an increase in evasion and a reduction in its income, so I hope that the review will include consideration of the experience of Scotland, where the number of prosecutions for non-payment decreased from 2,827 in 2004-5 to just 34 in 2012-13, owing to greater emphasis on alternatives to prosecution such as fiscal fines as a result of the Criminal Proceedings etc. (Reform) (Scotland) Act 2007. I understand from the latest evasion figures issued by TV Licensing that the number of evaders in Scotland is 66,000, and the rate of evasion is 5%—exactly the same as it is in England, although we criminalise 180,000 of our fellow citizens every year. The BBC has been guilty of spin on this topic, and trying to spin politicians is a dangerous game to play.

Let me sum up the debate by saying that the Bill builds on the Government’s achievements in cutting the needless red tape that has been allowed to build up on the statute book for many years. I hope that, in the case of BBC licence fee non-payment, it will remove a blot from our legal system.

21:54

[John McDonnell]

I thank the Minister for his courtesy and for the constructive way in which he dealt with the development of amendments 16 and 17, meeting representatives of the National Union of Journalists, editors and others to avoid what could have been a disastrous incursion into the freedom of speech and of written material. None the less, I oppose the Bill overall and will be shouting against it. I will seek to vote against it, if only with a few others, for three reasons.

I believe that the health and safety legislation with regard to the self-employed means that people will be put at risk. It will cause absolute confusion. Only during the debate did we receive from the Minister a list of supposedly dangerous categories of employment, where people who are self-employed will still have the health and safety legislation applied to them, but whole areas of employment were left out, including the docks and some parts of the maritime sector, which are particularly dangerous. I think this will cause absolute confusion and will, sadly, result in loss of limbs and loss of life.

I am also opposed to the Bill because of its reforms relating to taxis and public hire vehicles which, as has been said today, will put the travelling public at risk. There will be no effective control over who will be plying that trade. Last year there were 200 incidents of attacks on people travelling in private hire cars in London, where this type of legislation already applies.

Thirdly, it is a disgrace that we are tearing up legislation introduced by a Conservative Government that ensured there was a proper investigation into the sinking of the Derbyshire and brought at least some comfort to the relatives of the victims. What we are doing now is ensuring that if another such accident occurs, the decision whether or not an inquiry is opened or reopened will be based on the whim of a Minister. That is a step backwards, and it means we have not learned the lessons the Conservative Government did learn in 1995, when they put this legislation in place.

For those reasons, I will seek to oppose this Bill at every possible opportunity.

21:56

[Peter Aldous (Waveney) (Con)]

I want to say a few words about clause 44, which gives individual schools the ability to set their own term times and potentially reduce summer holidays from six to four weeks. I understand the rationale for that measure both from an educational point of view and from the perspective of giving schools greater autonomy, but there is concern that the measure could have a significant adverse impact on the tourism industry, in particular on family seaside attractions such as Pleasurewood Hills and Africa Alive! in my constituency.

Such businesses tend to be concentrated in specific areas, very often on the coast, and they are an important component in the local economy. A good summer season is vital to the viability and profitability of many such businesses. Cutting the traditional summer holiday by a third could be extremely damaging to many local economies around the country. To properly assess the impact of the proposal, will my right hon. Friend the Minister consider carrying out an impact assessment while the Bill is being considered in the other place?

Question put, That the Bill be now read the Third time.

21:58

Division 17

Ayes: 190

---

Conservative: 159
Liberal Democrat: 31

Noes: 6

---

Labour: 3
Plaid Cymru: 2
Green Party: 1

Bill read the Third time and passed.

Business without Debate

Monday 23rd June 2014 Commons Chamber

WELSH GRAND COMMITTEE

Monday 23rd June 2014 Commons Chamber

Ordered,

That—

(1) the matter of the Government’s Legislative Programme as outlined in the Queen’s Speech as it relates to Wales be referred to the Welsh Grand Committee for its consideration;

(2) the Committee shall meet at Westminster on Wednesday 16 July at 9.30am and 2.00pm to consider the matter referred to it under paragraph (1) above; and

(3) the Chair shall interrupt proceedings at the afternoon sitting not later than two hours after their commencement at that sitting.—(Mr Lansley.)

COMMUNITIES AND LOCAL GOVERNMENT

Monday 23rd June 2014 Commons Chamber

Ordered,

That James Morris be discharged from the Communities and Local Government Committee and Alec Shelbrooke be added.—(Geoffrey Clifton-Brown, on behalf of the Committee of Selection.)

PUBLIC ACCOUNTS

Monday 23rd June 2014 Commons Chamber

Ordered,

That Stephen Barclay be discharged from the Committee of Public Accounts and Mr David Burrowes be added.—(Geoffrey Clifton-Brown, on behalf of the Committee of Selection.)

PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION

Monday 23rd June 2014 Commons Chamber

Ordered,

That Priti Patel be discharged from the Select Committee on Public Administration and Mr Nigel Evans be added.—(Geoffrey Clifton-Brown, on behalf of the Committee of Selection.)

Severe Eating Disorders (North-East England)

Monday 23rd June 2014 Commons Chamber

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—(Mr Evennett.)

22:09

Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) Severe eating disorders are a significant and growing issue for too many of our constituents. I pay tribute to the all-party parliamentary group on body image and the Backbench Business Committee for the excellent debate in February on severe eating disorders, which helped raise awareness about this terrible group of mental illnesses. I am also indebted to the many concerned people who have written to me, some with heartbreaking testimony; to the campaigning group, the North East Eating Disorder Action Group; and to the charity, NIWE eating distress service, for sharing their concerns.

This evening, I will focus my remarks on the treatment of severe eating disorders in the north-east, and in particular on the proposed closure of the Richardson unit in the Royal Victoria infirmary hospital in my constituency, the impact it is having on sufferers and their family and friends, and the sorry catalogue of mistakes and omissions by NHS England, which has brought us to the point where very ill and vulnerable patients from Tyneside are being forced to go for treatment to Norwich, Glasgow and London while suitable beds go empty in Newcastle.

The term “eating disorders” refers to a range of conditions, including, though not limited to, anorexia, bulimia and binge eating. They affect 1.6 million people in the UK, more than 90% of whom are women, although the incidence in men is on the rise. Severe eating disorders carry the highest mortality of any mental illness. We should think of that when we consider the situation of those suffering from these disorders, and the emotional turmoil that places on their carers. Do they really deserve to have the stress of travelling hundreds of miles added to that?

Unfortunately, eating disorders are on the increase. The number of hospital admissions is rising across the country, but in the north-east, at 6.5 per 100,000, they are 30% above the national average.

[Catherine McKinnell (Newcastle upon Tyne North) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this really important debate. The point she is making reflects the concerns of a few of my constituents who have contacted me. A couple wrote to me and said:

“No one associated with the unit can understand the decisions being taken at a time when the incidence of eating disorders is increasing. Our daughter relies on the excellent treatment and support provided by the dedicated team at the RVI’s unit. We have no doubt that her own health and those of others would suffer if this service was withdrawn.”

[Chi Onwurah]

My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. Again, the testimony of those most intimately involved speaks to the excellence of the unit and the concern of people in Tyneside.

[Guy Opperman (Hexham) (Con)]

I congratulate the hon. Lady on securing this debate. Like her, I have had many letters of support from constituents who have been helped by the Richardson eating disorder service, and also from individual nurses and doctors, such as Dr Caroline Reynolds, the consultant psychiatrist at REDS, who have provided assistance to people with this terrible disease. Does the hon. Lady think it would be right for the mental health trust and NHS England, together and collectively, to review their decision and, going forward, address how they will recommission the service when the present contract ends?

[Chi Onwurah]

The hon. Gentleman makes an excellent point, and I certainly believe that the decision should and must be reviewed. It is clear that a number of hon. Members have been contacted by concerned constituents. Indeed, the right hon. Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Sir Alan Beith), who cannot attend this debate, asked me to say that he also had constituents who are affected.

Given that admissions in the north-east are 30% above the national average, and that the Royal College of Psychiatrists recommends that six beds per million of the population are needed for average admission rates, the north-east’s 2.8 million people need 23 beds. I will return to that figure, but first a word about the threatened unit that hon. Members have already referred to.

The Richardson eating disorder service is operated by Northumberland, Tyne and Wear NHS Foundation Trust. It is in the centre of Newcastle, with excellent transport links. It is acknowledged to be an outstanding unit, rated excellent by the Royal College of Psychiatrists and the Care Quality Commission. It has just won Beat’s clinical team of the year award. A stable, vastly experienced staff has been treating adult in and out-patients since 1997, and it has saved many lives. One sufferer said:

“I have suffered from anorexia nervosa for over 12 years and unfortunately during that time I have required many admissions to medical and eating disorder units”.

She names a number of them before going on to say:

“The admission to the Richardson was by far the most successful. I made such huge strides towards recovery and was the healthiest I have been since this all began.”

[Mrs Mary Glindon (North Tyneside) (Lab)]

In the light of what my hon. Friend says, and the fact that the unit’s model of partial hospitalisation of out-patient services has been so successful, does she not agree that NHS England should look at that model and perhaps reconsider its decision on the specification of specialised services?

[Chi Onwurah]

My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. Indeed, if the criteria on which this decision was made were publicly available, we could perhaps tell which models NHS England considered and what it hoped to achieve. Unfortunately, there is no transparency, which is one of the key issues.

Problems started in 2010, when commissioned adult eating disorder in-patient beds were tendered and the contract was awarded to Tees, Esk and Wear Valleys NHS Foundation Trust, although it did not then operate an in-patient unit. It quickly established a 10-bed unit in Darlington, but on a site with poor transport links to the north. For clarity for those Members who may not be familiar with the north, Newcastle is to the north of Darlington.

The award was a shock to many people, not simply because of the result, but because of the lack of consultation. I should like to ask the Minister a specific question: against what criteria were proposed services considered to be better than award-winning ones already on offer in the Richardson? If he does not know, I hope that he will promise to find out. Was cost the driving factor? What was the evidence basis for the centralising of these critical mental health services?

The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence guidelines specifically state that for severe eating disorders patients should be treated near their homes, with the support of family and friends. These are often young, vulnerable people, who are not yet independent of their family, either financially or emotionally. As one told me,

“Seriously ill anorexics are often cognitively impaired as a result of severe starvation and separation from loving support, together with that the challenge to dangerous and entrenched behavioural traits is often too much to bear.”

Given the lack of consultation, the north-east specialised commissioning group was instructed to strengthen its relationships with stakeholders and report any other substantial changes or developments to the NHS scrutiny committee.

NEEDAG, formed by carers and patients concerned about the threat to the Richardson, hoped that at least five of the beds in the Richardson would continue to be used by those in the north of the region, given overall regional demand. However, in April 2012, the commissioner increased the number of beds at Darlington to 15—again, without any consultation, scrutiny or performance data by which to make judgments. When challenged, I am told that the commissioner said they were not obligated to consult anyone. I hope that the Minister will correct them on this point. It is possible that the top-down reorganisation of the NHS instituted by this Government may have led to them forgetting their obligations under the NHS constitution.

When Darlington was full, commissioners started sending very ill patients out of the area, instead of to the Richardson, saying that every commissioned bed in England, no matter where it was, had to be filled before a patient from Tyneside could be sent to Newcastle. That is how we have arrived at the ridiculous and tragic situation of our national health service sending vulnerable Tyneside patients to Glasgow, Norwich and London when there are empty beds in the Richardson unit in the centre of Newcastle.

The impact on vulnerable young people of being separated from their families undoubtedly makes it more difficult to recover—hence the NICE guidelines. The cost of visiting for families is enormous, both financially and emotionally. One parent wrote:

“This will then have an effect on our family’s mental health as we are all struggling to come to terms with the condition and to help M recover. I would refuse to let M be admitted so far away from home and would rather give up my full time job to look after her in the familiar and safe surroundings of home.”

Another parent who fought to win a place for their daughter at the Richardson said:

“We were very angry to have been put in the position of having to fight for a bed for our dangerously ill daughter at a time when all our energy was needed to comfort and support her through a very difficult time. The added pressure and anxiety it caused the whole family was dreadful.”

It has been announced that the unit will be closed down, because it was said—cynically and cruelly—that it was not being used locally. If it was not being used locally, it was because NHS England was sending local people hundreds of miles away. Freedom of information requests submitted by NEEDAG show that Darlington’s 15 beds are full; that there are eight in-patients from the north-east in London, Sheffield, Leeds, Glasgow and Norwich; and that five patients have managed to win beds in the Richardson.

[Guy Opperman]

We all understand the need for and importance of centralised specialist services, whether they be stroke services or those under discussion, but given the number of people per capita in the north-east who suffer from this terrible disease, is there not a genuine case to be made for the two services to co-exist?

[Chi Onwurah]

The hon. Gentleman makes an excellent point. That is indeed the case. The number of in-patient admissions in the north-east as a result of severe eating disorders is 30% above the average, which suggests that about 23 beds are required. It would be possible to meet the NICE guidelines and retain the services in Darlington and in Newcastle, yet not meet the increasing demand for in-patient beds. There are a total of 28 in-patients from the north-east, but NHS England says that only 15 beds are needed; that clearly goes against the 23 calculated in accordance with guidelines.

NHS England argues that it is investing in the north-east, and that it is opening an intensive day unit in Newcastle that will reduce demand for in-patient care, but it has provided absolutely no evidence to support its claim. One parent said:

“For my daughter the thought of going back to the local community mental health teams fills her with dread.”

A day centre does not address the issues of isolation and support when in-patient care is needed.

Patients are so worried that two of them have decided to take both the trust and the commissioners to judicial review, based on the lack of consultation transparency. They are applying for legal aid, so we will be in the ridiculous situation of spending public money to both defend and attack a decision taken without the most basic public consultation.

Having written to the Minister of State, Department of Health, the hon. Member for North Norfolk (Norman Lamb), on the subject in the past, I know that he is sympathetic to the plight of sufferers of severe eating disorders and their families and friends. Both he and the Secretary of State have criticised sending patients hundreds of miles for treatment. I want the Under-Secretary of State for Health, the hon. Member for Central Suffolk and North Ipswich (Dr Poulter), to answer the questions I have already asked and the following two in particular.

First, does the Minister support the concentration of mental health services? In the case of heart surgery for children, we are told that concentration saves lives, because surgeons must be operating on many patients to retain their skills, but the mind does not physically work in the same way as the heart. Does he believe that there is something to be gained from making mental health into a production line? Why is it not possible to maintain beds in Darlington and Newcastle? Why is NHS England not following NICE advice? If the aim is to save money, is this truly a cost saving, or merely moving costs from the NHS to the sufferers of this terrible condition and their family and friends? Is it not outrageous that NHS England should be moving costs on to the most vulnerable and risking lives by doing so?

Secondly, on transparency, how can the Minister possibly support a process whereby there is no consultation on decisions that are so important to the lives of patients and their carers? Is that not in itself a reason to reverse the decision, given that the commissioners did not consult the people to whom they are accountable and in whose interests they are paid—and often paid very well—to commission services?

I will leave the last words to someone more intimately concerned with this than I am, who wrote to me:

“My friend’s beautiful and talented daughter has battled this terrible condition for many years with the help of the Richardson and the support of friends and family every single day that she has been in there. I truly believe that if the unit near to home closes and she feels far from this lifeline of support, she will give up her fight and that could be the end not only of her dream to take up her place at University but possibly, it’s not too dramatic to say, her life.”

22:27

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health (Dr Daniel Poulter)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne Central (Chi Onwurah) on securing the debate and not only raising important issues about the provision of services for people with eating disorders in her constituency, but doing so in the context of an important national debate, because many of us are aware that there has not always been a genuine parity of esteem between mental and physical health. If we are to have a holistic health service that focuses on better supporting people in their own communities, mental health will play an important part. In the north-east and elsewhere, it is vital that we try, in the first instance, to prevent people who have anorexia or other eating disorders from becoming so unwell that they need to be admitted as in-patients. That clear priority is not mutually exclusive to this debate, because it is clearly what good medicine and health care—whether for physical or mental health—is all about.

Eating disorders mainly affect young people, and I shall say a little about that as I address the specific concerns in the north-east that the hon. Lady outlined. Anorexia particularly affects women under the age of 25, from the early teens onwards. Research tells us that there might be more than 1 million people in the UK who are directly affected by an eating disorder.

Worse still, as the hon. Lady highlighted, anorexia kills more people than any other mental health condition, and the longer a patient is unwell with anorexia, the more likely the condition is to be fatal. Even before people begin to lose weight, they are failing to put on the bone mass that will sustain them as adults, and the disease is linked to osteoporosis and other conditions in later life associated with bone fracture. As the disease progresses, it becomes life threatening, particularly due to the muscle wasting that occurs to the internal organs, especially the heart. There can come a point, sometimes quite quickly, when as muscle mass deteriorates, it is lost preferentially from the heart. That increases the risk of heart attacks, which can often, tragically, be the cause of death in such cases.

We are also aware that eating disorders afflict young women at perhaps the most formative period of their lives. The peak age of onset of anorexia is 15. For bulimia it is two or three years later. On average, people with anorexia will recover, if they recover at all, after about six years of care. That highlights the importance of good out-patient services in delivering better care. If we can stop people getting to the stage where they become so unwell with anorexia, with better support through talking therapies and other interventions as part of good community-based care, that is a clear priority for mental health services and one that commissioners are taking very seriously in the hon. Lady’s part of the country, as she outlined.

Eating disorders span the transition between child and adolescent and adult services. This has sometimes led to unacceptable variations in care and fragmented services, as we heard. So how do we deal with this? Early diagnosis is key. We have to make sure that treatment is available to minimise the effect of these distressing conditions. But alongside this, and perhaps before this, we need to attack the causes as well. Eating disorders are often blamed on the social pressure to be thin, as young people in particular feel they should look a certain way. In reality, the causes are much more complex than that.

There are several risk factors—having a family history of eating disorders; depression or substance misuse; being criticised for eating habits, body shape or weight; being overly concerned with being slim, particularly if combined with pressure to be slim from society or for a job; and having an obsessive personality or an anxiety disorder. Other key causes of eating disorders are sexual or emotional abuse, the death of people who are close and other stressful situations. There are also issues specific to particular eating disorders, which I will not go into today. There are clear differences between anorexia, bulimia and binge eating disorder. Binge eating disorder has the added complication of the binge eating cycle, leading to increased blood sugar and potential links to diabetes.

It is important that such disorders are not looked at in the context of the mental health service in isolation. When we know that the cause of death may often be due to cardiac arrest in the case of anorexia, and when we know that there may be links between binge eating disorder and diabetes, it is important that an holistic approach is taken to the care of people who become very unwell. There is a link between the physical and the mental health services that are available to patients, and I know from conversations that local commissioners are looking at that in the way they deliver care.

Last year, the Home Office launched a report of its body image campaign, which highlighted the need to ensure that young people have healthier and happier futures where a wider spectrum of healthy male and female body shapes is represented. I am sure we would all support that.

I assure the hon. Lady that children and young people’s mental health, particularly in the north-east, is a priority for the Government. That is why we have invested £54 million in the four-year period from 2011 to 2015 in the children and young people’s improving access to psychological therapies programme, or children and young people’s IAPT services. This provides training in a number of evidence-based psychological therapies, not just the more common cognitive behavioural therapy or CBT, but systemic family therapy and interpersonal psychotherapy.

Given the complexity of the causes of eating disorders, that more holistic basis to the way that children and young people’s IAPT services work to get early intervention in place, and the £54 million supporting that deployment in the north-east and elsewhere, will, we hope, make a difference in the years ahead. We must recognise that we are coming from a baseline where there was no parity of esteem in terms of how the NHS prioritised eating disorders or how the NHS commissioned services for eating disorders. This investment in that early intervention will bring real improvements to the quality of care of people with eating disorders in the north-east and elsewhere. We know that early intervention is key. It is also important that we get a firmer understanding of the scientific basis and the research that underpins good treatment. The South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust has conducted a £2 million programme of research specifically on the treatment of anorexia, which will improve treatment and care throughout the country.

In the north-east, child and adolescent mental health services have been transformed by the introduction of the children and young people’s IAPT services, which I outlined earlier, in the areas covered by three CCGs, namely Teesside, Newcastle, Hartlepool, Middlesbrough and Easington. Between them, they commission CAMH services for 61% of young people in the region already under other CCGs, and the other CCGs have agreed to follow them. Steps are being made in early intervention, in providing better support for people with eating disorders in the north-east.

[Tessa Munt (Wells) (LD)]

I recognise the similarities between what is happening in the north-east and in the south-west. We have young people being discharged from services when they reach the 18-week threshold or because they have reached a body mass index of 18, yet the Minister has accepted that this is a complex condition which sometimes takes five or six years to recover from.

[Dr Poulter]

That is absolutely right, and it is important that there is a strong link between what happens in the community and what happens at the specialist centre. We know that there are advantages to commissioning specialist beds for eating disorders. We know that there is good evidence supporting the fact that that delivers better care for patients. But it is important that there is a strong link between that and what happens to the patient and the young person when they are discharged from that care, and that there is proper support in the community for those people afterwards. That is what will be supplied in this context by the newly commissioned services at Benfield House, which specifically focuses on providing high-quality day services and real support for young people and their families.

[Chi Onwurah]

I considered the importance of continuity of care and the unique nature of in-patient care requirements, and the Richardson unit had both out-patients and in-patients, and that continuity of care was very important. Please will the Minister address the issue of the Richardson unit?

[Dr Poulter]

In the brief time available to me now, I will come on to the Richardson unit specifically. The hon. Lady outlined the decisions made in 2010 and why they were made. We must recognise that under the criteria brought in by this Government, there are now strengthened criteria for public engagement in future decisions about commissioning. In future, they will have to be clinically led by local clinicians and made on the basis of strong public engagement. I would hope that those decisions would not necessarily have been taken in the same way had they been made under the criteria introduced by this Government.

I invite the hon. Lady to have a further meeting with the Minister of State, Department of Health, my hon. Friend the Member for North Norfolk (Norman Lamb), when she will be able to raise more of those concerns with him directly, but it is important to recognise that there is now a change in the way in which consultations are carried out. That was not there at the time, and that is part of the reason why there was not the transparency that the hon. Lady wanted and desired; transparency that we would all find desirable, but unfortunately the criteria were laid down by the previous Government. People often felt done to, rather than done for and cared for. That is why we have changed and improved the criteria.

As well as offering that meeting with my hon. Friend, I want to say that it is completely unacceptable for patients to be travelling long distances for their treatment and care at specialist centres and units. That is not good health care. We know that part of the recovery for people with eating disorders is having a community-based package where there is a strong link with family support. On the basis of that, my hon. Friend and I will raise with NHS England the specific issues arising from this debate, and I would also like the hon. Lady to meet my hon. Friend to discuss this further. I hope she finds that reassuring, and that she also finds reassuring the important early intervention measures that have been put in place in her constituency.

Question put and agreed to.

22:39

House adjourned.