House of Commons

Thursday 5th March 2015 Commons Chamber

Thursday 5 March 2015

The House met at half-past Nine o’clock

Prayers

Thursday 5th March 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker in the Chair]

Business Before questions

Transport for London Bill [Lords]

Consideration of Bill, as amended, opposed and deferred until Monday 16 March at Seven o’clock (Standing Order No. 20).

Oral Answers to Questions

Thursday 5th March 2015 Commons Chamber

The Secretary of State was asked—

[Mary Macleod (Brentford and Isleworth) (Con)]

1. What recent progress has been made by the Airports Commission.

[The Secretary of State for Transport (Mr Patrick McLoughlin)]

The Airports Commission recently completed a consultation on 3 February on its assessment of proposals for additional runway capacity. The commission is continuing to undertake further analyses on the shortlist of runway options before publishing its final report in the summer of 2015.

[Mary Macleod]

May I congratulate the Government on their policy on no third runway at Heathrow? Does the Secretary of State agree that the aviation industry would be best served by a solution that encourages competition; can be delivered sooner, cheaper and easier; takes into account the impact on local residents; and does not require billions of pounds of taxpayers’ money?

[Mr McLoughlin]

My hon. Friend has been very consistent in her opposition to any third or fourth runway at Heathrow, and I know she supports the expansion of other airports. I look forward to receiving the commission’s recommendations and report this summer and to my hon. Friend’s comments on it.

[Jim Fitzpatrick (Poplar and Limehouse) (Lab)]

Have we not just wasted another five years? The coalition has delayed building new runway capacity for the south-east because the Liberal Democrats are in denial about aviation being a very important economic instrument. I think the Conservative party now gets it. Why have we had to wait another five years?

[Mr McLoughlin]

I will not take any lessons from a party that wasted 13 years in not doing anything about extra capacity. It is a bit rich of the hon. Gentleman to accuse the Government of not taking action. The truth is that all the options that are being discussed by the commission are very different from the proposals considered by the previous Government.

[Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham) (Con)]

Has the Secretary of State asked the Airports Commission to examine the cumulative impact of any runway extension at Heathrow and how it would affect the local area if it coincided with other projects, such as the construction of HS2, the Amersham waste transfer station and the development of Newland park? What assessment has been made of the impact on the local area?

[Mr McLoughlin]

The commission is doing a comprehensive piece of work looking at all the options relating to aviation capacity in the south-east and the associated infrastructure projects that any project it suggests will affect, so I am sure it will have considered the points made by my right hon. Friend.

[Sir John Randall (Uxbridge and South Ruislip) (Con)]

Notwithstanding whichever decision the Davies commission comes to, does my right hon. Friend agree that connectivity to Heathrow is now being sorted pretty efficiently through Old Oak Common and that there is no further need for the Heathrow spur should HS2 go ahead?

[Mr McLoughlin]

This may be the last time I am able to address my right hon. Friend in this Chamber. It has been a great pleasure to work with him over many years. He has made a huge contribution, not only to the House of Commons and the Conservative party, but in standing up for his constituents in Uxbridge.

I agree with my right hon. Friend that these matters need to be addressed very carefully. Of course, at the moment the whole question of HS2 is being studied by a Committee. I am not going to trespass on the valuable and important work it is doing, but my right hon. Friend makes some valid points. The importance that Old Oak Common will have to the infrastructure of this country is vast indeed, and I hope to be able to say a bit more about that shortly.

[Mr Laurence Robertson (Tewkesbury) (Con)]

2. What recent discussions he has had with train operating companies on increasing the use of rural railway stations; and if he will make a statement.

[The Secretary of State for Transport (Mr Patrick McLoughlin)]

Officials regularly meet train operating companies where usage is a key discussion point. We are working hard with the industry to increase rural station usage. We recognise the important social role of stations in building communities, and have therefore introduced a new policy requirement to develop social and community development plans in new franchises.

[Mr Robertson]

I thank the Secretary of State for that response. Does he agree that one way we can get cars off the road and reduce congestion on our motorways and, indeed, on smaller roads is to develop rural train stations? We have one at Ashchurch for Tewkesbury, which is a very good station, but it is underused at the moment. Can we try to make such stations better used by train operating companies?

[Mr McLoughlin]

The answer to my hon. Friend’s question is yes. Ashchurch for Tewkesbury station has the potential for more use. I would welcome that, as I am sure my hon. Friend would too. For new franchises we ask operators to look at such questions in great detail. I acknowledge his comments, and no doubt Gloucestershire county council will make such points in due course.

[Mrs Caroline Spelman (Meriden) (Con)]

As a result of the landslip on the Chiltern line, kiosks and shops at rural railway stations have suffered a drop of at least 50% in their revenue. Will the Secretary of State urge Network Rail to look at mitigation, such as reducing rents, during the period of disruption?

[Mr McLoughlin]

My right hon. Friend makes a very good point. I hope that there will be an announcement soon about the full reopening of the line. If that has not already been announced, I think it will be announced shortly. I will discuss her very good point directly with the chief executive of Network Rail. People with businesses who are renting from Network Rail have been directly affected by that landslip.

[Nigel Mills (Amber Valley) (Con)]

One issue with encouraging the use of Ambergate station in my constituency is the strange fare system. Even though a fare to the next station is relatively cheap, the cost of a fare to Birmingham from both stations can be very different. Is there any way that the Secretary of State can fix the fare system to get rid of its anomalies?

[Mr McLoughlin]

I know Ambergate station very well, as the line goes up to Matlock and down to Derby. There are indeed anomalies in ticket purchasing on that line, and I am only too well aware of such frustrations. My hon. Friend makes a valid point, which I certainly want to look at. There are huge opportunities in ticketing, including with the development of smart technology.

[Andrew Rosindell (Romford) (Con)]

3. What plans he has to review vehicular access rights to bus lanes.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Mr Robert Goodwill)]

Decisions on the use of bus lanes, including any exemptions or exceptions, are for local authorities.

[Andrew Rosindell]

I am sure that the Minister will be aware that a number of local authorities still do not allow ambulances to drive in bus lanes unless they are responding to an emergency. Does he agree that if an empty taxi returning to a taxi rank can drive in a bus lane, an ambulance returning to a hospital should be able to do so?

[Mr Goodwill]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Although an ambulance can use a bus lane when responding to an emergency, it is otherwise up to a local authority to use its discretion on that matter. Indeed, local authorities such as Labour-controlled Manchester and Sheffield do not allow ambulances in bus lanes. I have written to every local authority in the country to make that point and ask them to bear it in mind when they make their local decisions.

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

The Minister has talked in detail about privatising buses and bus lanes, but the process needs more than warm words from the Government; it means bus lanes with strong local management and control of funding. Why will the Government not sign up to our franchising proposals to allow communities and councils to plan a network that includes the bus lanes they need? Why, instead of real localism, have this Government presided over a failed record, with bus fares up 25% and 2,000 routes cut, and a broken bus market, which lets users down, but which Labour will fix in government?

[Mr Goodwill]

The Government have a very good record on buses. Bus companies, including the one in my constituency, have very full order books, because they are investing as never before in new buses on routes such the one north of Whitby in my constituency. We have a very good record to protect.

[Sir Alan Haselhurst (Saffron Walden) (Con)]

4. When he expects to publish the invitation to tender for the Greater Anglia rail franchise.

[The Secretary of State for Transport (Mr Patrick McLoughlin)]

The procurement competition has been live since the issue of the procurement documentation on 19 February, and applications are due on 15 April. An invitation to tender will be issued in August, with tender returns due in December 2015. Any delays in the process will result in a delay to the provision of any new rolling stock or services on the line.

[Sir Alan Haselhurst]

Is my right hon. Friend aware that a great many of my constituents expect that the successful bidder will be required, or at least incentivised, to bring in new rolling stock on the Great Eastern and West Anglia lines to replace the type 317 and 321 trains, which by now are old, uncomfortable, unreliable and inefficient?

[Mr McLoughlin]

We expect to ask bidders to provide a rolling stock strategy that meets the needs of all passengers in East Anglia, while providing a cost-effective solution. They will be in no doubt of the desire of all passengers using that route for substantially new rolling stock, and the rolling stock that my right hon. Friend rightly describes should be taken out of service in due course.

[Mr Simon Burns (Chelmsford) (Con)]

May I stress to my right hon. Friend that if there is no new rolling stock with the award of the franchise, there will be considerable disappointment among commuters and other users, and it will totally undermine all Network Rail’s improvements to the infrastructure? Current rolling stock on the commuter lines is so outdated that it has problems with acceleration and braking.

[Mr McLoughlin]

I completely understand the desire of my right hon. Friend for new rolling stock on that route and for improvements on the route overall. Norwich in 90, a very effective campaign, has been launched, and services to other towns are also quicker.

[Sir Bob Russell (Colchester) (LD)]

Commuters from Colchester pay some of the highest fares in the country, and successive Governments have failed significantly to improve the railway infrastructure. Does the Secretary of State agree that without implementation of the East Anglia rail manifesto, whoever wins the Greater Anglia rail franchise will find difficulty in improving the service between Colchester and London?

[Mr McLoughlin]

We have just seen the launch of the new east coast main line franchise. It is committed to reducing the cost of rail tickets, and I hope that anyone who competes for the East Anglia franchise will come forward with new ideas that will not only increase the capacity on that line and improve rolling stock, but look at the cost of tickets.

[Richard Graham (Gloucester) (Con)]

5. What plans he has to improve railway stations to cater for increased rail traffic.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Claire Perry)]

To keep up with the unprecedented growth in rail traffic across the country since privatisation, including a 5% jump in passenger rail journeys last year, the Government have committed to significant investment in improving stations across the network by 2019. That includes £160 million in Access for All schemes, £100 million in station commercial projects, and £100 million for the station improvement programme.

[Richard Graham]

The Secretary of State recently had a chance to visit Gloucester and see the importance of an additional entrance and new car park at our train station, which will also be a catalyst for wider growth and regeneration. Will my hon. Friend confirm when she expects the Department’s negotiations with First Great Western on its franchise extension proposals, which include the improvements at Gloucester, to be completed?

[Claire Perry]

I thank my hon. Friend for his specific and helpful recommendations about the development of Gloucester station. He is a champion for rail travellers in his constituency. The Department is currently in negotiation with First Great Western about the new directly awarded contract that will provide services for three and a half years from September 2015. We carried out a public consultation last year, and I expect to conclude negotiations this month.

[Mrs Louise Ellman (Liverpool, Riverside) (Lab/Co-op)]

The chaotic and dangerous scenes at London Bridge station come after the major disruption at Christmas. How can the Minister ensure that the whole rail sector works together to put the interests of passengers first?

[Claire Perry]

Although I am a strong champion of the unprecedented investment programme going on right across the country, including the rebuilding of one of the most complicated and busiest stations in Europe, that cannot be done at the expense of passengers. I have had several conversations with the chief executive of Network Rail—most recently before questions this morning—and we are in constant contact with the station management team. It will take a joined-up approach from operators, Network Rail and the British Transport Police, and the system is feeding that service to ensure that passenger safety and comfort is not compromised. Clearly nobody wants crowded platforms—but this is not crowd control; this is passengers trying to get home after a long day at work.

[Sir Nicholas Soames (Mid Sussex) (Con)]

Further to that point, we all want to see improvements to these stations, but the deplorable failure of Network Rail in what is, of course, a very complicated scheme in any event and the failure of the train operating companies to deliver new timetables within such constraints has led to inexcusable delays and inconvenience for my constituents. Will my hon. Friend consider giving all those people who have had to travel into London Bridge during this period compensation for the cost of their tickets to reflect the very serious conditions with which they have had to deal?

[Claire Perry]

I thank my right hon. Friend, who has been an assiduous commentator and critic of the current system. Like me, he is absolutely determined that this unprecedented investment is felt by passengers. That is why the Government are spending £38 billion on passenger improvements. I completely agree that a compensation scheme is required, and we are currently looking at providing one.

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

Many stations in Yorkshire and the north will be affected by HS2. Has the Minister seen the startling information blogged this morning by Tom Edwards, the BBC transport correspondent, that evidence to the HS2 Committee suggests that hidden costs will raise the overall cost of the HS2 project from £50 billion to £138 billion? Are the Government misleading this country about just how much this folly of HS2 is going to cost?

[Mr Speaker]

I am not sure that what the hon. Gentleman said is as closely related to the terms of the question as he would have wanted, but the Minister is a dexterous character.

[Claire Perry]

I did not see the information because I was on the phone to the chief executive of Network Rail. A budget is a budget. Unlike the hon. Gentleman’s Government, this Government have a track record of bringing in major infrastructure projects such as the Olympics on budget and on time.

[Mr David Heath (Somerton and Frome) (LD)]

Travel to the west country is often massively disrupted by incidents between Reading and Paddington. Given the huge investment that has gone into Reading station, is it not possible to find alternative means of connectivity between Reading and London—Reading is virtually becoming a London station—so that people from the west country can get in and out of London perfectly easily?

[Claire Perry]

The hon. Gentleman—like me, he travels on that line—will have seen the many improvements to Reading station. It is not just a beautiful new station; there has been significant remodelling of the train paths, including a flyover of the freight line to reduce disruption for passengers. The hon. Gentleman will know that the Crossrail interchange, which will go to Reading, will lift about 10% of traffic off the rail network, giving passengers going to Reading a whole series of other options for connectivity right into central London.

[Lilian Greenwood (Nottingham South) (Lab)]

Rail passenger numbers have doubled compared with 20 years ago—thanks to record investment under the previous Labour Government, including in stations such as the magnificent St Pancras. [Interruption.] Conservative Members may not like it, Mr Speaker, but it is true. Government Members try to take credit for projects we began, such as Reading, but we should look at their broken promises and record of failure instead. They make the dodgy claim that they are electrifying 850 miles, but only 18 miles have been finished, while electrification costs have doubled, essential projects have been delayed and the Transport Select Committee has warned that vital schemes may never be delivered. Is it not time for a change of Government, so that passengers get the services they deserve?

[Claire Perry]

It’s the way the hon. Lady tells them. It is not 850 miles of electrification, but 889 miles—as opposed to the 10 miles delivered in the previous 13 years of supposedly record economic growth. I know that the hon. Lady is a frequent traveller from Nottingham station, which has benefited, of course, from £100 million-worth of investment under this Government. We will take no lessons from her.

[Nic Dakin (Scunthorpe) (Lab)]

6. What steps he is taking to develop the north-south road network in Lincolnshire.

[The Minister of State, Department for Transport (Mr John Hayes)]

It says here that strategic roads play a key part in driving economic growth in my Lincolnshire constituency and elsewhere. Most of the north-south roads in Lincolnshire are the responsibility of the local highways authorities. Nevertheless, equipped with our new statutory authority to ensure that route strategies are consistent and coherent with our national road strategy, I will make certain that my Department works with them and the local enterprise partnership to deliver optimal improvements. By the way, I think a meeting between the hon. Gentleman and me might serve that purpose.

[Nic Dakin]

I thank the Minister for his reply. I welcome his offer to meet me and other hon. Members from northern Lincolnshire to discuss the nature of the A15, which is a significant link from the developments on the Humber port down to Lincoln. It is a neglected road. The road system south of Lincoln is good; it is this bit of road that really needs looking at. I welcome the Minister’s offer and look forward to taking him up on it.

[Mr Hayes]

I know the road well and I think there is a case for further improvements on the A15, A16 and A17 in Lincolnshire. Of course, the A15 is Ermine street, a Roman road. It seems to me we should be no less ambitious for our world than the Romans were for theirs.

[Martin Vickers (Cleethorpes) (Con)]

I welcome what the Minister has to say. As he will know, the A15 is a vital road for access to the port of Immingham in my constituency, the largest port in the country. It is Government policy to improve access to ports. Will he make that a major consideration when he meets me and the hon. Member for Scunthorpe (Nic Dakin)?

[Mr Hayes]

I am conscious that Humberside MPs met, I think in 2013, to discuss just these issues in the Department. I was with my hon. Friend in his constituency very recently looking at transport matters. Actually, I think the Government can do better in co-ordinating the relationship between road investment and ports and other modes of transport. I think all Governments have neglected that and we can do more. I will certainly take up what my hon. Friend suggests.

[Stephen Timms (East Ham) (Lab)]

8. What steps he is taking to increase levels of cycling and walking.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Mr Robert Goodwill)]

The Government are committed to increasing walking and cycling. We have more than doubled the funding compared with the previous Administration. We added a section to the Infrastructure Act 2015 that places a commitment on Government to produce a cycling and walking investment strategy. In addition, our funding for bike and rail has put us on track to triple the number of cycle places at rail stations.

[Stephen Timms]

I am delighted that an excellent campaign forced Ministers to concede the cycling and walking strategy in the Infrastructure Act. When are we now going to get a strategy with proper resources and targets? When will Ministers implement the powers in part 6 of the Traffic Management Act 2004, so that councils outside London are finally able to enforce those powers against driving in cycle lanes?

[Mr Goodwill]

I am very proud of this Government’s record. Indeed, when we discussed this with officials on the Infrastructure Act they said, “But Minister, it doesn’t need to be in there. You are doing this already.” I said, “Put it in anyway to underline that fact.” I am very proud that, while we inherited £2 a head spending on cycling, we have increased that to £6 a head and in our cycling ambition cities we are already delivering £10 a head. However, I know that driving in cycle lanes is an issue of great concern to cyclists, whose safety is paramount.

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

I suspect the Minister will be too busy in May to attend the Isle of Wight walking festival, but if he would like to see initiatives that really work to increase the level of cycling, and indeed tourism, may I invite him to attend the Isle of Wight cycling festival in September?

[Mr Goodwill]

I must make a terrible admission: I have never visited the Isle of Wight, but I now have two very good reasons for doing so.

[Maria Miller (Basingstoke) (Con)]

Thanks to this Government, more than £35 million is being invested in roads in Basingstoke to reduce congestion. Will the Minister explain what he will be doing to ensure that that important investment will also benefit cyclists?

[Mr Goodwill]

We have made it absolutely clear that all our new road schemes must be cycle-proofed to ensure that we do not have a situation where a new roundabout or bypass prevents cyclists from making their journeys too.

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

Confidence in road safety is key to increasing rates of cycling and walking, but after decades of progress, last year saw three consecutive increases in road deaths. Answers to parliamentary questions have revealed a dramatic reduction in the number of prosecutions for dangerous drink-driving and mobile offences at the wheel. With the number of traffic officers down by 23% since 2010 and apparently two years without any at all in Devon and Cornwall, whether these things are the fault of Transport Ministers, Home Office Ministers or even the Prime Minister himself, is it not the reality that the Government have failed to protect front-line policing and keep our roads safe? Is it not right for the next Labour Government to reintroduce proper targets to cut the number of deaths and serious injuries on our roads?

[Mr Goodwill]

We do have targets for the Highways Agency network, which we have control over. Other roads are the responsibility of highways agencies. When I stood at the Opposition Dispatch Box five years ago and put it to the Labour Government that we should introduce drug-driving legislation, they said it was impossible. I am proud to say that on Monday this week we gave the police the tools they need to prosecute those who put other road users in danger by drug-driving, and we now have the legislation on the statute book to do that—something that Labour said was impossible.

[Mr Nigel Evans (Ribble Valley) (Con)]

I note that the Minister has not been to the Isle of Wight, but has he been to Ribble Valley, where we have some of the best cycling areas and walking routes through some of the greatest beauty that one will find in England? Does he believe, like me, that if we can encourage more youngsters, in particular, to cycle and to walk, that could help with the problem of obesity, and that perhaps we could get Government, schools and local authorities working together to encourage people to have step monitors to give them some focus so that they can become healthier human beings?

[Mr Goodwill]

I have indeed been to Ribble Valley, which is a very beautiful part of the country despite not being in Yorkshire. It is very important that we get young people on their bikes. That is why I am delighted that we have delivered 1.6 million Bikeability places, mainly to young people, and we expect a further 280,000 places between April 2015 and March 2016.

[Guy Opperman (Hexham) (Con)]

9. What recent progress his Department has made on the feasibility study on dualling of the A69.

[The Minister of State, Department for Transport (Mr John Hayes)]

A round-table discussion was held with Transport for the North, local authorities and other interested stakeholders at the end of February 2015 regarding the scope of the northern trans-Pennine strategic study. That study will consider the possible dualling of the A69 or the A66, or both, and technical work will start in the summer of 2015.

[Guy Opperman]

Dualling the A69 is needed for the long-term economic plan of the true north and is supported by all the local MPs and businesses, and by a number of petitions put forward by constituents of mine and constituents in Carlisle. My hon. Friend the Member for Carlisle (John Stevenson) and I were able to show those to the Under-Secretary, my hon. Friend the Member for Devizes (Claire Perry), last week, and I urge the Department to keep acting on them.

[Mr Hayes]

You know, Mr Speaker, that Ruskin said that quality is never an accident and always involves intelligent effort, and my hon. Friend’s effort has been intelligence at its very height. He is right that this road, which runs alongside Hadrian’s wall, is an important route, for the reasons he gave—for the well-being of local people and the local economy. That is well understood by this Minister and by this Government.

[Mr Speaker]

From the Romans to Ruskin: the right hon. Gentleman, who is, by common consent in the House, an extraordinary individual, never disappoints.

[Tim Loughton (East Worthing and Shoreham) (Con)]

10. What recent progress has been made on the proposed improvements to the A27 between Worthing and Lancing.

[The Minister of State, Department for Transport (Mr John Hayes)]

Prior to the announcement of the road investment strategy in December 2014, I had the joy of touring the A27. Since then, the Highways Agency has started to realise our commitment to improve that road at Worthing and Lancing. To date, agency officers have held initial meetings with key stakeholders and begun work on the detailed traffic models required for this exciting scheme’s development.

[Tim Loughton]

The Minister will recall that there was dancing in the streets back in December when the Secretary of State announced the enhancements to the A27 around Arundel and Worthing. That dancing has subsided a little as the feasibility studies go on. Will he update the House on progress, on when we will hear further news about the likely work, and on the possibility of including some tolling at pinch points and flyovers, including on the old Roman bit?

[Mr Hayes]

It has been said, Mr Speaker, that I never disappoint, but I do sometimes surprise. I am delighted, therefore, to tell my hon. Friend that I will not merely update him on progress but can reveal that we will publish the feasibility study, a result of his efforts and our endeavour, immediately. I will let him have this report, which details exactly how we intend to move forward, shaped and informed by his efforts and those of his friends.

[Heidi Alexander (Lewisham East) (Lab)]

11. What recent assessment he has made of the adequacy of compensation payments to passengers for delayed rail travel.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Claire Perry)]

It is absolutely right for passengers to be compensated when their journeys are delayed. The Government have introduced tough new measures to ensure that that happens, and compensation payments across the network have increased sixfold since 2011. As the hon. Lady will know, we are introducing a 30-minute “delay repay” scheme on lines that have not already been making payments—as well as other enhanced compensation opportunities—during franchising negotiations and, when we can, during existing contracts. However, recent estimates by Passenger Focus suggest that only 12% of passengers who are delayed by 30 minutes or more go on to claim compensation. I am determined to address that, and, as operators will know, I believe that they need to do much more in this respect.

[Heidi Alexander]

The right hon. Member for Mid Sussex (Sir Nicholas Soames), who is no longer in the Chamber, was entirely right to call for compensation for commuters who experience severe disruption because of the works at London Bridge. Overcrowding on trains from Lewisham is even more severe than normal, and is actually dangerous. How can a compensation regime that pays up only when services are delayed by 30 minutes or more be relevant to my constituents, who can barely get on to a train irrespective of whether it is late or not?

[Claire Perry]

I genuinely pay tribute to the hon. Lady, who is an assiduous campaigner for commuters in her constituency. It is very refreshing when Members in all parts of the House participate fully in the cross-party summits at which we hold the industry to account.

The hon. Lady is right. There is not adequate compensation under the scheme to cover the metro-style train journeys that many of her constituents take. As she will know, some operators which have similar service patterns, such as c2c, have introduced minute-by-minute refunds—or will be doing so—but I intend to continue to work on a compensation scheme specifically for those affected by the works at London Bridge.

[Duncan Hames (Chippenham) (LD)]

12. When he expects negotiations on the Great Western rail franchise to be completed.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Claire Perry)]

The hon. Gentleman will be pleased to learn that we expect to conclude negotiations with First Great Western and to finalise the second directly awarded franchise contract during this month, and expect the provision of services to start in September.

[Duncan Hames]

I thank the Minister for that news. When I led a group of 10 Members of Parliament from both sides of the House to meet the Secretary of State before Christmas, we urged him to include in the new franchise local services on the existing line between Oxford and Bristol. Does the Minister accept that even a service between Swindon and Bristol would be a great start in relieving overcrowding on that part of the line, and would be a vital first step towards the reopening of the station at Corsham?

[Claire Perry]

The hon. Gentleman continues to make a persuasive business case for that new service. As a Nailsea girl who was lucky enough to go from Nailsea comprehensive to Oxford university, I can tell the hon. Gentleman that it would have been a great service for me. As he knows, the Secretary of State has invited Members whose constituencies are on the route to work with their local authorities and the local enterprise partnership to present a collective business case. He may be right in saying that, as a minimum, a westward service from Swindon would be helpful.

[Glyn Davies (Montgomeryshire) (Con)]

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

[The Secretary of State for Transport (Mr Patrick McLoughlin)]

My Department has continued to operate apace as we move towards the Dissolution of Parliament. Last week we introduced the new invitation to tender for the Northern Rail and TransPennine Express services, and transferred East Coast back to the private sector. That is a major step in a franchising transformation that places passengers at the heart of services.

We also continue to invest in our roads. Fifteen strategic road schemes have been completed since 2010, and a further 16 are under way. Because local roads are equally important, we have committed £6 billion to them, up to 2021, in addition to the 27% increase in funding that has taken place since 2010. Funds for cycling have doubled since 2010, and we are committed to a new long-term investment strategy.

[Glyn Davies]

In my constituency and that of my right hon. Friend the Member for North Shropshire (Mr Paterson), there has been a decades-long campaign for a new bypass at Llanymynech, which lies between the two constituencies. Will the Minister join the Welsh Government in developing a scheme for that purpose?

[Mr McLoughlin]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for raising this issue. Such a scheme has been identified in the draft national transport plan for Wales as contributing to access to services. We will discuss the matter further with Welsh Government officials to assess their priorities, but no one could have campaigned harder for it to be examined than my hon. Friend.

[Michael Dugher (Barnsley East) (Lab)]

This week, following the Government’s privatisation of East Coast, Stagecoach released a trading update announcing that the privatisation would “significantly enhance” its profits. We know that the chief executive of Stagecoach, Martin Griffiths, is scraping by on £2.2 million a year—which, by the way, makes him eligible for the Government’s tax cut for millionaires, so his week is getting better and better. At the same time, Stagecoach is threatening to withdraw its buses from the north-east, simply because the local transport authority wants to do something about the fare rises and bus route cuts that have marked the Government’s failure and broken promises. When will Ministers condemn what Stagecoach is doing in the north-east? Do we not need a Government who deliver for the travelling public, not for the Stagecoach shareholders?

[Mr McLoughlin]

What we need, and what we have, is a Government who are investing record amounts of money in our transport infrastructure—far more than the last Government invested in both capital projects and revenue projects. I can only take what was said in Transport Times by the editor, David Fowler, in his latest edition this week:

“On rail franchising and speed cameras”

Labour’s policies

“seem to be going against the weight of evidence.”

We have seen a dramatic improvement in our services, provided by the private sector. The Labour party is so opposed to the private sector and everything it stands for that it wants to destroy it, on the back of our seeing one of the most successful turnarounds of the rail industry in this country.

[Christopher Pincher (Tamworth) (Con)]

T3. I am grateful to the Minister of State for meeting me to discuss problems at the A5 Wall island, but while he is considering it will the people’s Minister ask the Highways Agency to look at the other end of the A5, the congestion from Tamworth to the M42—congestion made worse by more traffic trying to merge on to the A5 from Pennine way?

[The Minister of State, Department of Transport (Mr John Hayes)]

Every meeting I have had with my hon. Friend has been a joy, as was the one yesterday. I have diagrammatic and photographic representations of the issue he raises, which I will deliver to you, Mr Speaker, and make available to Members on request. I will send officials not only to look at the matters we discussed yesterday, but to look at the matter my hon. Friend raises today, to see what can be done, but I have to say I think we should act in accordance with his recommendations, because I know he always champions his constituents’ interests.

[Jessica Morden (Newport East) (Lab)]

T4. Fare evasion is obviously a serious issue for the rail industry, but I have seen a number of recent instances where train companies have over-zealously pursued minor cases against constituents who have either been given the wrong information or might have made an innocent error. What is the Minister doing with train companies such as Arriva to ensure that there is clarity for travellers and to make sure that the rules are applied reasonably?

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Claire Perry)]

The hon. Lady raises an important point. I recently launched a public consultation on exactly this matter, and I have urged the train companies to pursue such cases where necessary—where there is genuine fare evasion—but to be much more sensible where there are genuine mistakes. She is welcome to make her views and those of her constituents known in that consultation, and I would like to make those changes.

[Duncan Hames (Chippenham) (LD)]

T5. Tactile indicator cones play a valuable role in making pedestrian crossings safer for all people, and especially those who are blind and partially sighted. Unfortunately in Wiltshire they cannot be sure of finding these cones at pedestrian crossings when they need them. Will the Government incentivise all local authorities to retrofit these tactile indicator cones to pedestrian crossings and open up our streets to everyone?

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Mr Robert Goodwill)]

Tactile cones are probably one of the best kept secrets of our transport system. If one feels underneath the box on a pelican or puffin crossing, there is a small cone which, if held, rotates when the lights turn to green. It is very helpful for people with vision problems. They were developed by the university of Nottingham and there are 10,000 out there, and I encourage local authorities to retrofit as many as possible.

[Sir Hugh Bayley (York Central) (Lab)]

T6. In October last year the Prime Minister visited York and expressed publicly concern about congestion on the outer ring road, and in January a petition from business leaders in York asking for the dualling of the ring road was delivered to Downing street. What action has the Department taken since the petition arrived?

[Mr Goodwill]

I had a meeting with the chief executive of North Yorkshire county council, who works closely with City of York council, on addressing the problems on the northern ring road, and I hope that any scheme that is brought forward can also mesh in with the Hopgrove roundabout project which has already been announced. If City of York council wants to help the motorist it should think back to what it did on Lendal bridge and the atrocious way it persecuted motorists using that route.

[Caroline Dinenage (Gosport) (Con)]

T8. I recognise this Government’s enormous investment in our railways, but I am keen to know when we might see some improvements to the London to Portsmouth line. It is still faster to get to Doncaster, which is twice as far.

[Claire Perry]

My hon. Friend will know that the Portsmouth to London line is not only hugely important for her constituents but a vital artery for people who are travelling up and down through the counties. One problem has been the inability to run longer trains into Waterloo station, where the “throat” has effectively been blocked for many years. We are now investing to increase platform lengths there, to unblock some of that complexity. Also, the draft Wessex route study is being undertaken right now to determine how faster trains can be run from my hon. Friend’s constituency.

[Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)]

T7. I hope that the Minister will have been given notice by Baroness Kramer’s office that she is due to sign off £200 million-worth of funding for a bus rapid transit scheme in Bristol. I am very keen for the overall scheme to go ahead, but we have real concerns about one particular element of it in my constituency. Will the Minister tell me whether it is too late to seek alternatives to that element, which would ruin a wonderful community food project on my patch?

[Mr McLoughlin]

If I am correct, the hon. Lady is talking about the opposition to the M32 bus-only junction. It is not for the Government to determine the design of the scheme, which is being promoted by the local authority as it knows the area best. Local authorities should listen to the campaigns led by local Members of Parliament relating to that scheme, to see whether the concerns can be addressed, but it would be difficult to change the scheme at this late stage and I know that the hon. Lady would not want to put it in danger of not being signed off in the next few days.

[Robert Jenrick (Newark) (Con)]

T9. Ever since the Romans built the Fosse way and the Great North road through our town, road hauliers have been an integral part of Newark’s economy. However, those hauliers have had to compete with foreign competitors on an uneven playing field for too long. Will the Minister update us on the success of the HGV road user levy?

[Mr Goodwill]

They say that Rome was not built in a day, but I was not the foreman on that particular job. I am delighted to report to the House that, despite being told when we were in opposition that we could not introduce a lorry road user charge for foreign trucks, we have done so. We predicted that it would yield £25 million in revenue, but it is on track to yield more than £45 million in the first year, levelling the playing field for hard-working British hauliers.

[Mr Stephen Hepburn (Jarrow) (Lab)]

T10. Sadly, but unsurprisingly, the Government ignored the views of the people of the north-east when they ploughed ahead with the privatisation of the east coast main line. Will they back the wishes of the people of the north-east in introducing a quality contract scheme for the operation of our bus services, so that the buses can be put into the people’s hands and taken out of the hands of profiteers?

[Mr McLoughlin]

The simple fact is that we will see fantastic benefits from the new operation on the east coast main line. We will see more services to towns that have not been served before, and more services to the north-east. One of the things I was keen to do last week, in relation to the invitation to tender and to the north-east, was to consign the Pacer trains to the rubbish heap. It is important to get rid of them, and that is something that this Government, unlike the last Government, will deliver on. The bus scheme for Newcastle and the north-east is currently before the Department, and it would be inappropriate for me to take a view on it at this time.

[Several hon. Members]

rose—

[Mr Speaker]

Time is against us, but I call Mr Alan Reid.

[Mr Alan Reid (Argyll and Bute) (LD)]

Thank you, Mr Speaker. I am glad that Machrihanish is on the shortlist to become the UK’s first spaceport. It is far from any centres of population, it has a 3-km runway and the facilities of an RAF base, and I believe that it is the ideal candidate. I hope that the Department for Transport will support Machrihanish’s case.

[Mr Goodwill]

We are certainly looking at all the candidates in Scotland, Wales and England, and we believe that Britain will be at the forefront of the space race to get satellites into space cheaply and to introduce space tourism.

[Several hon. Members]

rose—

[Mr Speaker]

Order. I am sorry, but we must now move on.

The right hon. Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross, representing the House of Commons Commission, was asked—

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

1. What recent representations he has received from catering, maintenance and other staff of the House on the management of the House.

[John Thurso (Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross)]

The Commission has received no recent formal representations from staff in those areas on the management of the House. The staff have, however, had a number of opportunities to express their views to the management, including in the recent staff survey.

[Mr Sheerman]

The right hon. Gentleman will know of my long campaign for the House to be not just an average or good employer but the very best exemplar of an employer. It is no secret that I want us to adopt the John Lewis model for the staff in this place, who work so hard for us. When are we going to engage those members of staff and stop employing them on short-term contracts or using agency staff on a long-term basis? Let us have secure employment and a decent way of living.

[John Thurso]

I have enjoyed throughout this Parliament the exchanges I have had with the hon. Gentleman on this matter, and the direction of travel he indicates is one that we are very much seeking to take. The recent leadership and management survey shows that on all leadership and management criteria we have improved our score over that of the civil service generally, and on nine out of 10 such criteria we have improved our score on last year’s. There have been some uncertainties, for example, on the security services, and we have done the right thing in bringing those in hand. That has reduced uncertainty and is very much in line with what he wishes. I am sure that in the next Parliament the Commission will continue in that direction.

[Sir Alan Haselhurst (Saffron Walden) (Con)]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that one of the best ways in which Members of this House could show their appreciation for their staff and ensure the security of their employment is by using our facilities much more heavily than they do?

[John Thurso]

I entirely agree with my right hon. Friend and salute all he has done with his Committee to make that a realistic possibility.

The Leader of the House was asked—

[Sir Hugh Bayley (York Central) (Lab)]

2. How many sittings of Public Bill Committees took place in the last Parliament; and how many such sittings have taken place in this Parliament to date.

[The Deputy Leader of the House of Commons (Tom Brake)]

There were 935 sittings of Public Bill Committees in the 2005 to 2010 Parliament, and there have been 797 sittings so far in the current Parliament.

[Sir Hugh Bayley (York Central) (Lab)]

It is clear that the work rate of Public Bill Committees in this Parliament has been considerably lower than that in the previous Parliament, and I say that as a member of the Panel of Chairs. Will the Government now look at allocating more time for Public Bill Committees to consider private Members’ Bills, so that more private Members’ Bills get through the House and get Royal Assent?

[Tom Brake]

First, I should perhaps correct the impression that the hon. Gentleman wants to give that this Parliament has not been busy. The 2010 to 2015 Parliament will sit for 734 days, which compares with the 718 in the 2005 to 2010 Parliament. Of course, for individual Bills there have been more Public Committee days or sittings than there were under the previous Government. I have heard what he has said about private Members’ Bills. I know that the Procedure Committee has some strong views about private Members’ Bills, and I suspect that we may have to return to the matter in the next Parliament.

[Thomas Docherty (Dunfermline and West Fife) (Lab)]

The reality is that too many Bills have been leaving the House of Commons without adequate scrutiny and have to be salvaged in the other place. My hon. Friend the Member for Wallasey (Ms Eagle) has proposed a new stage for Commons scrutiny—the whole House scrutiny stage. Does the Deputy Leader of the House accept that we need to improve scrutiny in this place, rather than simply using the Lords to bail us out?

[Tom Brake]

I do, of course, accept that in this House we need scrutiny, but the Labour party is responsible for scrutiny and what we have seen in this Parliament is that far more Bills have finished early than was the case in the previous Parliament. I am afraid that is because the Opposition are not undertaking their job of scrutiny effectively.

[Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)]

3. What assessment he has made of the effectiveness of parliamentary mechanisms in holding the Government to account since 2010.

[The First Secretary of State and Leader of the House of Commons (Mr William Hague)]

Changes introduced during this Parliament have increased the House’s ability to hold the Government to account. The introduction of the Backbench Business Committee, the election of Select Committee Chairs and allowing adequate time for debating legislation have all contributed to an increase in scrutiny of the Government.

[Mr Nuttall]

As these are the last questions to the Leader of the House before my right hon. Friend leaves the House, may I just thank him personally, and on behalf of his many admirers in my constituency, for his 26 years of service to this House and to the country?

Does my right hon. Friend agree that the value of the Backbench Business Committee, to which he referred, can be demonstrated by reference to the debate it gave me time for on the holding of a referendum on our membership of the European Union? Even though the motion was defeated at the time, it subsequently led to Government policy being changed, at least in the Conservative part of the coalition.

[Mr Hague]

I, in return, pay tribute to my hon. Friend and to his constituents; I have never forgotten the black pudding I ate in Bury market during the last general election campaign and I look forward to still more in the future.

The Backbench Business Committee debates have often had an influence. I hope the debate he refers to will have been the precursor of a referendum on the European Union before the end of 2017, held by a Conservative Government. But other debates on issues, such as VAT on air ambulances, Hillsborough and contaminated blood, have also contributed to changes in Government policy.

[Philip Davies (Shipley) (Con)]

Does the Leader of the House agree that one of the essential ingredients in effectively holding the Government to account is Back Benchers who are prepared to be critical of the Government and to vote against them from time to time?

[Mr Hague]

Of course, up to point. My hon. Friend’s question allows me to pay tribute to him, as he is obviously referring to himself. I do pay tribute to him and would only point out that there are many, many occasions on which Government policies merit support as well.

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

For once in my lifetime, I agree with an intervention of the hon. Member for Shipley (Philip Davies). Would not holding the Government to account be more effective if Government Members resisted the urgings of the Whips to put questions to the Prime Minister, particularly at PMQs, or to Ministers on other occasions? That does not show independence of mind and it certainly does not show the sort of accountability that is required. In some respects, it makes a mockery of Prime Minister’s questions, which is the unique way of holding the Government—and the Head of Government—to account. It should not be undermined in the way I have described.

[Mr Hague]

The hon. Gentleman is speaking after two of my hon. Friends who are very skilled at resisting any orchestration by the Whips or anybody else. I do not think he can accuse them of that. I must say that I have noticed on occasions a certain degree of co-ordination—not necessarily very successful—of Prime Minister’s questions on the Opposition Benches.

The right hon. Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross, representing the House of Commons Commission, was asked—

[Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)]

4. What training and advice is provided to House staff on how to deal with transgender people visiting the parliamentary estate.

[John Thurso (Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross)]

All House staff dealing with the public are expected to undertake mandatory diversity and inclusion training, and the same standards are expected from all service providers, including the Metropolitan Police Service.

[Kerry McCarthy]

On 4 February, there was an LGBT history month event here. I had complaints made to me by two people who attended the event that security guards at the Cromwell Green entrance had repeatedly addressed them as “sir”, even though they had made it quite clear that they did not wish to be addressed in that way. The Met is looking at this—I think the House of Commons Commission has referred it to the Met—but will the right hon. Gentleman make sure that they do not have to suffer such treatment in future?

[John Thurso]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady for bringing that case to our attention. Indeed, as I believe she knows, this has been referred to the Metropolitan Police Service, whose staff these were. It is taking this extremely seriously and we have made it clear to the Met how seriously we take it. As far as our own staff are concerned, diversity and inclusion is a key part of the core induction and training for all visitor assistants and all staff generally. We take these matters very seriously and we are determined to make sure that this is not repeated.

The Leader of the House was asked—

[Sir Greg Knight (East Yorkshire) (Con)]

5. How many e-petitions which have been signed by 100,000 or more people have been debated in the House?

[The Deputy Leader of the House of Commons (Tom Brake)]

Since the launch of the Government’s e-petitions site, more than 3.7 million individuals have given their support to the 37 petitions that reached the qualifying 100,000 signature threshold for debate. The topics of 32 have been the subject of debate in the House of Commons, most as a direct result of the e-petition.

[Sir Greg Knight]

Will the Minister join me in congratulating the Procedure Committee on its work on this and other issues? Does he agree that the introduction of e-petitions has perhaps done more than anything else to start to reconnect this Parliament with the public?

[Tom Brake]

Yes, I am very happy to join my right hon. Friend in congratulating the Procedure Committee on the work it has done on this issue. It is a fact that since August 2011, more than 10 million individuals have signed one or more of the 30,000 petitions initiated. I, and I hope all Members of the House, look forward to a Petitions Committee being established in the next Parliament, which will allow perhaps a wider range of petitions to come before the House and, for instance, for petitioners to come and give oral evidence to that Committee.

The right hon. Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross, representing the House of Commons Commission, was asked—

[Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)]

6. What proportion of waste on the parliamentary estate was recycled in (a) 2010 and (b) the most recent period for which figures are available.

[John Thurso (Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross)]

The percentage of all waste arising from the parliamentary estate that was recycled or recovered in 2010 was 52.1%. In 2014, it was 62.8%. This shows a fairly considerable improvement; however, we are a little below what we need to be to make sure we are on track for our 2020 target.

[Mr Hollobone]

Which recyclable waste streams are in practice the least recycled, and what are the plans to improve that in the next Parliament?

[John Thurso]

My hon. Friend asks me a question to which I do not have an accurate answer—or, rather, to which I do not have an answer. I am sure that an accurate answer exists, but I just do not have it. I should make that distinction quite clear. However, what we do is operate to the waste hierarchy, of which I am sure he is aware. First, we try to ensure that the waste does not happen. When it does happen, we seek to recycle it in the most effective way possible. We only dispose of it if it is absolutely necessary.

The Leader of the House was asked—

[Chris Heaton-Harris (Daventry) (Con)]

7. What assessment he has made of the effectiveness of Select Committees since 2010.

[The First Secretary of State and Leader of the House of Commons (Mr William Hague)]

During this Parliament, reforms have been implemented to elect Chairs of Select Committees and to allow them to make statements on the Floor of the House and in Westminster Hall. That has led to a stronger mandate for Chairs of Select Committees, increased visibility of their recommendations and therefore a corresponding increase in their effectiveness.

[Chris Heaton-Harris]

Using his 26 years of experience of this place, will the Leader of the House agree that the election of Select Committee Chairs has been a significant development in the reform of this place and in giving power back to Back Benchers? What ideas does he have to give more power to Back Benchers in the future?

[Mr Hague]

It has been a very significant reform. Indeed, it is one of the most significant reforms since the establishment in 1979 of the Select Committee system as we know it today. Both that reform in 1979 and this reform in 2010 took place under Conservative Leaders of the House of Commons. Members across the House will continue to use the increased opportunities that are now provided for greater independence for Back-Bench Members, but consideration of what procedural changes are needed for that are really now matters for the next Parliament.

[Mr Speaker]

I confess that I have several ideas on that front. I will send the hon. Member for Daventry (Chris Heaton-Harris) a copy of my lecture to the Hansard Society of last Monday. If he fancies a cup of tea with me at any time I am happy to encourage him.

[Kelvin Hopkins (Luton North) (Lab)]

I speak as a member both of the Public Administration Committee and of the European Scrutiny Committee. Does the Leader of the House accept that the effectiveness of such Committees depends more on the Government responding to their conclusions and recommendations than on what the Select Committees do?

[Mr Hague]

Of course that is an important part of it. The Government do respond thoroughly to Select Committee reports and bring many recommendations to the Floor of the House. We will be announcing in Business Questions a debate on the Floor of the House on two recommendations of the European Scrutiny Committee. Of course it is important for Governments to respond constructively.

[Maria Miller (Basingstoke) (Con)]

Select Committees are a highly effective way of holding Governments to account. Does the Leader of the House agree with the all-party group on women in Parliament, ably led by my hon. Friend the Member for Brentford and Isleworth (Mary Macleod), that, on the day we will be debating international women’s day, it is time to set up a women and equalities Select Committee, which is led by this House, to ensure that continued progress on these important matters is maintained?

[Mr Hague]

The all-party group on women in Parliament made some very interesting and important recommendations that need to be considered by parties in the House as well as by the House as a whole. With regard to the specific recommendation to set up a Select Committee, it is not feasible to do so in the final few weeks of a Parliament; that is a matter for a new Parliament. Personally, I have a lot of sympathy with the idea, but it will be necessary to find a reduction elsewhere in the number of Select Committees to accommodate a new one.

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

Does the Leader of the House agree that sufficient time should be allowed for the pre-legislative scrutiny by Select Committees? For example, the Political and Constitutional Reform Committee, of which I am a member, was critical of the way in which the Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill was steamrollered through Parliament by the Deputy Prime Minister in 2011.

[Mr Hague]

It is of course important to carry out such scrutiny whenever possible. In this Parliament, we have a good record in that regard; there has been more pre-legislative scrutiny than has happened before under any previous Parliament. There will still be scope for improvement in Parliaments to come.

Business of the House

Thursday 5th March 2015 Commons Chamber

10:34

[Ms Angela Eagle (Wallasey) (Lab)]

Will the Leader of the House give us the business for next week?

[The First Secretary of State and Leader of the House of Commons (Mr William Hague)]

The business for next week is as follows:

Monday 9 March—Remaining stages of the Armed Forces (Service Complaints and Financial Assistance) Bill [Lords], followed by consideration of Lords amendments to the Consumer Rights Bill, followed by motion to approve a European document relating to the Commission work programme 2015, followed by general debate on the forthcoming nuclear non-proliferation treaty review conference. The subject for this debate was recommended by the Backbench Business Committee.

Tuesday 10 March—Consideration of Lords amendments to the Deregulation Bill, followed by motion to approve statutory instruments relating to counter-terrorism, followed by motion to approve a European document relating to subsidiarity and proportionality and the Commission’s relations with national Parliaments, followed by debate on a motion relating to school funding. The subject for this debate was recommended by the Backbench Business Committee.

Wednesday 11 March—Opposition day (19th allotted day). There will be a debate on a motion in the name of the Democratic Unionist Party. Subject to be announced.

Thursday 12 March—Debate on a motion relating to defence spending, followed by debate on a motion relating to education regulations and faith schools. The subjects for both debates were recommended by the Backbench Business Committee.

Friday 13 March—The House will not be sitting.

The provisional business for the week commencing 16 March will include:

Monday 16 March—Motion to approve statutory instruments relating to counter-terrorism, followed by motion to approve the draft Drug Driving (Specified Limits) England and Wales (Amendment) Regulations 2015, followed by the Chairman of Ways and Means has named opposed private business for consideration.

Tuesday 17 March—Consideration of Lords amendments to the Modern Slavery Bill, followed by motion to approve a statutory instrument relating to counter-terrorism, followed by debate on motions relating to the reports from the Committee on Standards on the code of conduct and on the standards system in the House of Commons, followed by business to be nominated by the Backbench Business Committee.

Wednesday 18 March—My right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer will open his Budget statement.

Thursday 19 March—Continuation of the Budget debate.

Friday 20 March—Continuation of the Budget debate.

I should also like to inform the House that the business in Westminster Hall for the remainder of March will be:

Thursday 12 March—General debate on the relationship between police and children, followed by general debate on violence against women and girls.

Monday 16 March—General debate on a petition relating to veterans’ pensions.

Thursday 19 March—General debate on the future of local newspapers.

Monday 23 March—General debate on an e-petition relating to proposed increase in fees for nurses and midwives.

[Ms Eagle]

I thank the Leader of the House for announcing next week’s business. On Sunday, we will celebrate international women’s day. We have our pink bus, which is generating fantastic enthusiasm wherever it goes in the country, and half our candidates in target seats are women. Will the Leader of the House tell us what the Conservative party is doing to involve women properly in politics?

On Monday, we will consider Lords amendments to the Consumer Rights Bill, including proposals for a crackdown on ticket touting. Despite widespread evidence of touts fleecing the public and calls for action from across the leisure industry, the Government have spent more than a year opposing the measures and the Culture Secretary described ticket touts admiringly as “classic entrepreneurs”. Will the Leader of the House confirm that following their humiliating climbdown in the Lords the Government will support these proposals in the Commons and finally protect the public from this exploitation?

There are strong and powerful arguments in favour of plain packaging for cigarettes, but this Government have had to be dragged kicking and screaming into accepting them. First, they were for a vote on plain packaging, then when they took tobacco lobbyist Lynton Crosby in to the heart of Downing street they were suddenly against it. Now after five years of inaction, in the dying days of this Parliament, they are for it again. I note that the plain packaging regulations will finally be taken in Committee on 9 March, but why did the Leader not schedule a debate on the Floor of the House? Is it because he knows that his party is split right down the middle on this important public health measure but he does not want the public to notice?

Yesterday the Prime Minister repeatedly refused to acknowledge his complete failure to keep his “no ifs, no buts” promise on net migration, which is not in the tens of thousands that he promised but nearly 300,000 this year alone. In a desperate attempt at a diversionary tactic, he treated us to a selective list of things that he thinks he got right, while continuing to refuse to make himself available for scrutiny on any of them in a head-to-head TV debate with my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition.

I greatly enjoyed the Leader of the House’s speech at the Press Gallery lunch last week, decoding what he called civil service-ese and revealing that when civil servants say, “We are scaling up our response,” they actually mean, “We never expected this to happen.” So I have been doing my own decoding of the Prime Minister’s pre-election promises. When he said:

“We have absolutely no plans to raise VAT”,

what he really meant was, “ I will raise VAT when the election is safely over.” When he said, “We will not balance the books on the backs of the poor”, what he really meant was, “We will not balance the books at all.” When he said in 2009:

“I have always believed in live television debates. I think they can help enliven our democracy.”,

what he really meant was, “I will only debate with people when I’m not scared I might lose.”

In his pre-2010 election contract with the British people, the Prime Minister wrote:

“If we don’t deliver our side of the bargain, vote us out in five years’ time.”

Mr Speaker, there are only nine weeks to go.

The Liberal Democrats are no better. This week we have learned what their red line in any future coalition talks would be. Having campaigned to scrap all tuition fees during the last election, only to vote to triple them after the election, they now plan to veto Labour’s plan to cut fees by a third and increase grants for poor students. I wonder whether we could have that in writing, because then we will know for sure that they will do the exact opposite.

It is not surprising that the Lib Dem right hon. Member for Lewes (Norman Baker) has decided that he needs to take matters into his own hands. On Tuesday he held an Adjournment debate on the plight of endangered species, and he has written about it on Politics Home. He laments:

“The facts are stark. … numbers have fallen … the poachers are highly organised. … we are in a race against time.”

Before long, the Liberal Democrats will be going the way of the woolly mammoth.

I have learned this week that the Conservative party is busy preparing for a Labour victory in May. The Chancellor has apparently hatched a long-term cunning plan to curb the regicidal instincts of the Conservative party—good luck with that—and keep the Prime Minister on as leader after 7 May even if it loses. According to one Back Bencher, “He either wins or he goes.” Once again showing his strategic prowess, the man he has chosen to assist him in this mission to avoid a leadership battle is the ever-absent Tory Chief Whip. Apparently they are going to form a protective ring around their leader and claim that he won a moral victory even if the Conservatives lose. Is this why the Chief Whip is never here, Mr Speaker? He is too busy forming a protective ring around the Prime Minister to bother to come to this Chamber. Having just listed some of their broken promises, I feel I should offer some comfort to the Conservatives. If there is one target that I am confident the Tories will not miss, it is the one on the Prime Minister’s back.

[Mr Hague]

The shadow Leader may not be in a strong position this week to talk about party leaders since this is the week in which the Doncaster Free Press released its power list and revealed that the Leader of the Opposition was the fourth most influential person in Doncaster, ranking, interestingly, behind the star of One Direction who just happened to grow up in Doncaster. The right hon. Gentleman is regarded as having less influence on the town than that. We will return to these matters in a moment.

On the hon. Lady’s specific questions, she asked, rightly, about international women’s day, which we look forward to commemorating on Sunday. She referred to the pink bus that has caused so much amusement around the country and asked what the Government have been doing. We have been achieving more women in work than ever before in history—up by 839,000 since May 2010. There are more women-led businesses than ever before in the history of the country and 37% of start-up loans are now going to women. There are more women on FTSE boards than ever before in the history of the country, with no all-male boards remaining. More than half the people lifted out of income tax altogether—58% of them—are women, and the state pension reforms have particularly benefited women, who have historically done poorly under the complicated two-tier system of pensions. That is a tremendous record of achievement, which is superior to any previous Government’s record in assisting the welfare of the women of this country.

The hon. Lady mentioned students—rather bravely, in a week in which the Joseph Rowntree Foundation said that Labour’s proposed reform of tuition fees

“sounds progressive. . . Sadly, it isn’t.”

It

“will mainly benefit mid- to high-earning graduates who would otherwise have been repaying all or most of their loans.”

That is the position bizarrely adopted by the Labour party on which it is now condemned to fight the election.

It was brave of the hon. Lady, too, to mention migration, as it was a completely open door under the previous Government which brought millions of people to settle in this country.

Following my extensive translation of civil service-ese at the Press Gallery lunch, the hon. Lady did a translation of Prime Ministerial statements, but I have my own translation of what the Leader of the Opposition was saying yesterday when he was calling for a debate, which means, “I am desperate because the election is slipping away from me and I have nothing else to ask about at all.” That is the translation of that. When I was Leader of the Opposition in 2001, I recall asking Tony Blair for a television debate. There was not even an offer of a debate from Tony Blair, not even the pretence of a debate. There was a very clear “No debate whatsoever.” This Prime Minister is offering a debate and that is an offer that should be taken up, which was never offered by Tony Blair in similar circumstances.

Talking of debates, the hon. Lady asked about the debate on the plain packaging of cigarettes. As she knows, because of EU procedures it has been possible to lay regulations but not to make them until after 3 March. That is the reason for the timing. It is normal for such statutory instruments to be considered in a Committee after going through the scrutiny procedures and, subject to the deliberations of that Committee, it will then be possible for the whole House to vote on the outcome of that Committee’s deliberations.

I should have thought that the hon. Lady would welcome the Government’s move in the other place on ticketing. She did not ask about the economic situation in the country, but what has defined the past couple of weeks is what has happened on the economy. Today we heard that new car sales for February were up 12% on last year. This week we heard that average household incomes have returned to pre-recession levels. In the past two weeks we have seen growth in manufacturing and construction up, public sector borrowing fall, and small firms win more than a quarter of Government contracts—the highest percentage ever. That is very clear evidence as we move to the end of the Parliament that a long-term economic plan is right for this country and is working.

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

My right hon. Friend is known for writing bestsellers, in one of which he wrote about the history of Parliament sitting in York. One of the issues that will exercise both Houses in the next Parliament is where to sit while major works are taking place here. I hope that he will look no further than his and our main city of York for that purpose.

[Mr Hague]

The suggestion is dear to the hearts of all us Yorkshiremen, although I have to tell my hon. Friend that it might not go down very well in Lancashire. If it becomes necessary for the House to move, I suspect that somewhere closer to its current location might be found. The important decisions on restoration and renewal need to be made in the next Parliament—it would not be appropriate to make them now—so I cannot give her a definitive answer.

[Sir Gerald Kaufman (Manchester, Gorton) (Lab)]

Has the right hon. Gentleman seen my early-day motion 840 on Sejal Koyani and the London School of Business and Finance?

[That this House condemns in the strongest terms Sejal Koyani of the London School of Business and Finance, who has stolen thousands of pounds from a constituent of the hon. Member for Manchester, Gorton, and has failed over a period of months to reply to letters from the right hon. Member; calls on the Home Secretary to remove any recognition from this criminal, on the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills to look into these larcenous activities, and on the Metropolitan Police to investigate; and advises any potential clients to have nothing to do with these thieves.]

Behind it lurks the theft of £3,600 from my constituent, which that thief and that college promised to give back 45 days after last October. They have not got back to him or to me, despite repeated letters. They still have that stolen £3,600, which belongs to my constituent. May we have action on that in the way I request in the early-day motion as a lesson to teach those people that they cannot steal?

[Mr Hague]

The right hon. Gentleman speaks up strongly for his constituent and has obviously been pursing the case assiduously, as usual. I will certainly refer his early-day motion, and the fact that he has raised the matter on the Floor of the House, to my ministerial colleagues so that they, too, can investigate.

[Sir George Young (North West Hampshire) (Con)]

If the prospects of a debate in this Parliament on the options for English devolution are receding, can my right hon. Friend at least publish the draft Standing Orders for his preferred option?

[Mr Hague]

I think that there is a good chance that I will be able to do that. I have been working on the draft Standing Orders. Whether or not there is a debate, it is very important that people are able to see the detail of what is proposed, so I will give further consideration to my right hon. Friend’s request.

[Roberta Blackman-Woods (City of Durham) (Lab)]

Opposition Members are proud of our policy commitment not only to reduce student fees from £9,000 to £6,000, but to increase maintenance grants. However, it is unclear what the Government would do to better support students and universities. Will the Leader of the House find time for a debate so that my constituents can get a better understanding of what the Government would do? Will he also make a commitment that his party will not seek to lift the fee cap?

[Mr Hague]

We have delivered record numbers of students and university applications, against many predictions, following the change in the policy on tuition fees introduced early in this Parliament, so that change is standing the test of time. Of course, these matters are legitimate subjects for debate in the general election campaign. Given that there are only three weeks remaining before Dissolution, it is becoming unlikely that we will be able to have an additional debate on the subject.

[Philip Davies (Shipley) (Con)]

The Leader of the House was rather unfair to the Leader of the Opposition; he did indeed come fourth in the Doncaster power list, but it was churlish of my right hon. Friend not to mention that he has gone up two places since last year, when he was sixth.

Last August The Times reported that the Prime Minister had promised to double magistrates’ sentencing powers from six to 12 months by the end of this Parliament, which was a very welcome announcement. Given that we are rapidly running out of time, can the Leader of the House tell us when that will be brought into effect in the last few weeks of this Parliament?

[Mr Hague]

On my hon. Friend’s first point, that is a faster rate of advance than normal by the Leader of the Opposition and it means that he may be in with a chance of running Doncaster by 2018. I welcome my hon. Friend’s analysis.

I cannot give my hon. Friend a specific answer about when the Government’s commitment will take effect, but I will draw his question to the attention of my ministerial colleagues and ensure that he gets a direct reply.

[Jeremy Corbyn (Islington North) (Lab)]

The Leader of the House is well aware that a number of colleagues have raised the issue of the Chagos islands many times during business questions. When he was Foreign Secretary, he commissioned the KPMG report on the feasibility of right of return. We are waiting for a statement to be made to the House so that Ministers can be questioned and the issue debated. It was promised that the issue would be resolved before the end of this Parliament, but we have only a short time to go.

[Mr Hague]

This is an important report on an important issue and the hon. Gentleman and I have often discussed it. Indeed, as Foreign Secretary I set up the new feasibility study. A very extensive and detailed report has now been produced, and my ministerial colleagues in the Foreign Office are considering it in detail. It will also need to be considered across the whole of Government. I am sure it is better to look at it in great detail than to rush to decisions about it, so I cannot give the hon. Gentleman a timetable for any announcement, but I will tell my colleagues that he is asking about it and that there is interest in it in Parliament. We will consider it within Government as rapidly as possible.

[Mr David Heath (Somerton and Frome) (LD)]

Despite the fact that I have made it plain that I am standing down at the next election, inexplicably I am getting a lot of e-mails asking me to commit to opposing things in the next Parliament, particularly the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership, which, strangely enough, I have not seen the details of because nobody else has—it has not been negotiated yet. For the avoidance of doubt, yet again, will the Leader of the House arrange for a Government statement—he may care to make it right now—making it clear that TTIP has nothing whatsoever to do with any risk to the future of the NHS?

[Mr Hague]

It is absolutely clear that it is for local NHS commissioners to take decisions on which providers should deliver health care services in the best interests of their patients. TTIP will not change that in any respect. I can give my hon. Friend not only a Government statement, but the statement of the EU Trade Commissioner, who said on 13 September:

“Public services are always exempted—there is no problem about exemption. The argument is abused in your country for political reasons but it has no grounds.”

That should be reassuring to people around the country who might think there is some merit in the arguments put by trade unions and the Labour party, which are designed to scare people not to arrive at a good trade deal for this country.

[Mr Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP)]

May I draw the attention of the Government and the House to a new film drama, “A Dark Reflection”, which is about air that is contaminated by organo- phosphates entering the aircraft cabin as a result of oil breakdowns in engines, which is where the cabin air is drawn from or, from auxiliary power units or even de-icing fluids. Is it not time to have a debate about fitting air detection systems to aircraft to protect passengers and crew from aerotoxic poisoning?

[Mr Hague]

That is, of course, a wholly legitimate question to ask. We have just had questions to Transport Ministers and the hon. Gentleman’s question sounded a little bit like it had been left over from that. I have no doubt that Transport Ministers will notice that he has raised the issue. I cannot offer him a debate in the remaining small number of days before the end of the Parliament, but he has now managed to raise the issue on the Floor of the House.

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

I have the honour of being the chairman of the all-party group on fire safety and rescue. Given that the Chief Fire Officers Association is very concerned that very few newly built schools have automatic sprinkler systems fitted, will my right hon. Friend find time for a debate on the issue?

[Mr Hague]

I am advised that the Government’s policy is that such sprinkler systems should be installed in new school buildings where there is a real and significant risk, as identified in a fire risk assessment. There will also be other situations where sprinklers are fitted because they form an integral part of the school building design and are good value for money. It is unlikely that we will be able to have a debate on the issue at this stage of the Parliament, but the House will have noted my hon. Friend’s strong interest in it and I have every confidence he will be able to return to it in the new Parliament.

[Mrs Madeleine Moon (Bridgend) (Lab)]

May we have a statement on what constitutes “offshore”? The Health and Social Care Information Centre, the national provider of IT for health services, has apparently objected to CGI—a Canadian-owned but Bridgend-based IT company—bidding for a health IT contract on the very bizarre basis that Wales is offshore. May we have clarification? The Severn is wide, but not that wide.

[Mr Hague]

Having recently purchased a property in Wales, I can confirm that it is not offshore. That can be regarded not only as a personal statement, but as an official statement from the Government. The notion of Wales being offshore seems a strange one in relation to the matter the hon. Lady raises. It would be best to pursue it directly with Health Ministers, and I will tell them she has raised it in the House.

[Dr Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)]

The director of ExxonMobil Chemical, in my constituency, has written to the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills about a threat to the industry caused by the Danish Environmental Protection Agency’s decision to seek a further assessment of a plasticiser, a key product that has just been given a relatively clean bill of health by the appropriate European body. The director has yet to receive a reply, but the House needs an urgent statement from the Secretary of State about this threat to such an important industry in Hampshire.

[Mr Hague]

The industry is very important for Hampshire and, indeed, the whole of the United Kingdom. I am sure it provides employment for many of my hon. Friend’s constituents, so he is quite right to raise the issue. I cannot give him an immediate answer, but I will refer his interest to my hon. Friends at the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills. Although we do not have much of this Parliament left, there will be questions to the Business Secretary on 26 March. I will ensure my hon. Friend’s urgent interest is registered with BIS, and he may be able to return to it then.

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

The First Secretary of State has always seemed to me a pretty robust and courageous politician, so will he join me in calling for an early debate about what many people in my constituency and this country believe to be their right—to see the leaders of the great parties having a robust and courageous discussion on television so that the British people can make an informed decision? What is going on when this House remains nearly mute, after what has become almost a constitutional convention is taken away by one person—the not so courageous Prime Minister?

[Mr Hague]

I do not think that constitutional conventions are set by broadcasters in this country. The hon. Gentleman, with whom I have debated so many issues over the years, was in the House throughout the time that Tony Blair was Prime Minister. When he refused to have any debates on television, I do not recall the hon. Gentleman rising to say that Tony Blair ought to reconsider his position, that such a debate was vital to the British constitution or that it was an important right of the hon. Gentleman, constituents during an election campaign. I assure him that his constituents will see a great deal of all the party leaders during the general election campaign—which can only improve the prospects of the Conservative party.

[Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham) (Con)]

Just as time is running out on this Parliament, time is more poignantly running out on the young boys who suffer from Duchenne muscular dystrophy, such as my constituent Archie Hill, whose parents Gary and Louisa have campaigned tirelessly for a new drug called Translarna to made available for him and other sufferers. Will the Leader of the House tell us whether we have any time left during which we can bring more pressure to bear on NHS England? We have met the Prime Minister, who has written supportively, and the Under-Secretary of State for Health, my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Norfolk (George Freeman), who is the Minister for life sciences; only NHS England stands in the way. How can my right hon. Friend help?

[Mr Hague]

My right hon. Friend may well know that there is a clear process and timetable for this, and for rare conditions the decision to fund treatments and drugs is made by NHS England. A draft clinical commissioning policy on the use of Translarna for the treatment of DMD has been developed, and it is now being considered for funding. The consultation runs until 27 April, so it has another six or seven weeks to run. I urge my right hon. Friend and other colleagues who have raised this issue in the House to make their views known to NHS England throughout that process.

[Wayne David (Caerphilly) (Lab)]

Joanna Michael, the daughter of my constituent Angela Michael, was brutally murdered in 2009. The Independent Police Complaints Commission ruled that she was failed by the police, yet the Supreme Court has ruled that a negligence claim cannot be brought against the police because they have immunity. May we have a debate with a view to changing the law so that the police are held to account in the same way as doctors, teachers and the armed forces?

[Mr Hague]

The hon. Gentleman raises an important point about a disturbing case. I will refer it to my ministerial colleagues, and there will be further questions to Ministers at the Ministry of Justice before the Dissolution of Parliament. I will ensure that Ministers consider the matter he has raised.

[Jeremy Lefroy (Stafford) (Con)]

It is estimated that the elephant population of the Selous reserve in Tanzania has fallen from 55,000 in 2006 to about 15,000 now. As chair of the all-party group on Tanzania and a long-term resident of that country, that greatly distresses me and hundreds of people around the world. May we have an urgent debate in this House on the factors that fuel demand for ivory, rhino horn and other illegal wildlife products?

[Mr Hague]

My hon. Friend is right, and this is a deeply disturbing situation not only in Tanzania but internationally. The British Government are playing a leading role in fighting this. As Foreign Secretary, in February last year I hosted an international summit on the issue, which the President of Tanzania addressed. I now chair a taskforce on how to prevent the transportation of illegal ivory, at the request of His Royal Highness the Duke of Cambridge. As my hon. Friend says, it is ultimately a matter of demand in countries such as China, Vietnam and Thailand, and it is welcome that such issues are being debated with China during the visit of His Royal Highness this week.

[Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)]

May we debate debating? I recall that when I succeeded the right hon. Gentleman many years ago as president of the world’s most famous student debating society, he was in favour of debating—indeed, he was in favour of it as late as 2001 when he was Leader of the Opposition, as he told the House today. If we had such a debate, would we at least get one more opportunity to see the Leader of the House in full flow, showing the skill he developed all those years ago of being able to defend the indefensible—namely, the Prime Minister’s craven approach to debating head to head on television with the Leader of the Opposition?

[Mr Hague]

The Prime Minister has debated every Wednesday for years with the Leader of the Opposition, and he has almost invariably come off best in those debates. The hon. Gentleman’s characterisation is not right. He and I have always been committed to debating through our background in the Oxford union, and the Prime Minister has offered the terms of a debate to broadcasters and the other parties. As I pointed out earlier, such an offer was never made to me by the Prime Minister of the day when I was Leader of the Opposition.

[Mr Nigel Evans (Ribble Valley) (Con)]

Domestic drones were the must-have gift last Christmas—needless to say I did not get one, although I did get a Dyson cleaner. The usage of drones is governed by the Civil Aviation Authority, and there was a near miss between a drone and an A320 last summer. May we have a debate to ensure that rules on the use of drones are fully known, so that we can guarantee the serenity and safety of residents in the United Kingdom?

[Mr Hague]

I hope my hon. Friend finds his Dyson cleaner easier to control than some people find their drones. I am sure he will. This will be an important subject for consideration, but I cannot offer a debate before the Dissolution of Parliament. Important privacy and air safety issues are at stake, which I know have been considered by the Civil Aviation Authority. This activity will continue to develop, so I would be very surprised if Parliament did not consider it in the coming months—most likely, of course, in the new Parliament.

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

Some villages in Coedpoeth and Brymbo in my constituency face very large bills through no fault of their own because they have to fund remedial work resulting from historic lead contamination. This is an anomalous situation, as our law generally follows the principle that the polluter pays, but here there is no traceable polluter. Last year in Blanefield in Scotland, the UK Government reached a deal with the Scottish Government and the local authority jointly to fund work in a parallel situation. The Welsh Government would like a similar solution in this case. Will the Leader of the House grant an urgent debate, to be answered by a Treasury Minister, so that the UK Government can lay out a consistent position on funding criteria?

[Mr Hague]

The hon. Lady raises an important issue for her constituents. I do not know what the prospects are of the consistent position she has called for emerging, but Treasury questions take place next Tuesday, 10 March, providing an early opportunity for her to raise the matter with Treasury Ministers. She will be able to pursue it with them by every other avenue. I think it unlikely that we will be able to have such a debate before Dissolution, but the hon. Lady has those opportunities to raise the issue.

[Mary Macleod (Brentford and Isleworth) (Con)]

My right hon. Friend will be greatly missed by the House. He has done outstanding work and left a lasting legacy on the issue of sexual violence in conflict. It is important to address issues relating to women and equalities. I ask him, perhaps as a parting gift, to urge all hon. Members to support the establishment of a Select Committee on women and equalities, so that we can carry on scrutinising these issues, holding the Government to account on them and ensuring that we make progress for women in this country and elsewhere throughout the world.

[Mr Hague]

I am very grateful for my hon. Friend’s remarks, and I pay tribute to her and the work she has done on preventing sexual violence. I have seen her working in her constituency and across London on this issue, and I know her work is appreciated by other London Members. As I mentioned earlier, I have a lot of sympathy with the case for establishing an equalities Select Committee of some kind. The establishment of Select Committees will have to be decided in the new Parliament. I add that the number of other Select Committees would have to be reduced by one in order to accommodate this one.

[Kelvin Hopkins (Luton North) (Lab)]

The major supermarkets, Eurotunnel, major hauliers and others support the building of a dedicated rail freight line capable of carrying full-size lorry trailers on trains and linking all the major economic regions of Britain with each other and the channel tunnel. There is such a scheme, called the GB freight route, which could be built easily, quickly and economically and would take 5 million lorry journeys off our roads every year. This is significant for a number of Government Departments, including the Treasury, the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills and the Department for Transport. Will the Leader of the House use his good offices to encourage Ministers from all those Departments to consult the relevant companies about advancing this scheme?

[Mr Hague]

I will certainly inform my ministerial colleagues in the relevant Departments of the matter the hon. Gentleman has raised. As I said earlier, we have just had Transport Question Time, and I think I shall have to make a list for Transport Ministers of the questions left over from it and asked during business questions. I am happy to provide that service on this occasion, and the hon. Gentleman has managed to raise the matter on the Floor of the House.

[Julian Sturdy (York Outer) (Con)]

This is not a transport issue, but may we have a debate in the short time left on recent changes to the rules governing community amateur sports clubs, with specific reference to rate relief thresholds? The York Railway Institute, which provides fantastic sporting facilities to many of my constituents, is under financial threat as a result of the changes. It could close or be broken up to offset them, after serving the public of York since its foundation in 1889.

[Mr Hague]

The Government have given local authorities the power to offer business rate discounts beyond predefined reliefs at their discretion, including to sports clubs, to be funded 50% by central Government and 50% by local authorities. I recommend that the club discuss this with its local authority. The Treasury would expect local authorities to take full account of the funding provided by central Government for discretionary rate relief when making their decisions.

[Steve McCabe (Birmingham, Selly Oak) (Lab)]

Birmingham and other midlands licence fee payers contribute £942 million to the BBC coffers, but less than £80 million of that was invested in our region last year. That is less than it manages to spend in London over 12 days. May we have a debate before the end of this Parliament on the renewal terms for the BBC charter, so we can agree some rules for fair funding and an end to our subsidising the London luvvies broadcasting corporation?

[Mr Hague]

Personally, I have a good deal of sympathy with the need for the BBC to invest around the country. We had a statement just last week by the Chair of the Culture, Media and Sport Committee, so there have been recent opportunities to raise the implications of that on the Floor of the House. I am sure there will be other debates on the future of the BBC, but I cannot offer one in the remaining 14 days the House is sitting before we come to the general election campaign.

[Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)]

I bring good news from Kettering, where the £4 million upgrade of the maternity department at Kettering general hospital has just begun, due for completion in December. Ten babies a day, on average, are delivered at the hospital. This is part of an £18 million investment package for the hospital, which comes ahead of a potential £30 million for developing a new urgent care hub facility on the site. Will my right hon. Friend encourage our right hon. Friend the Chancellor to include in his Budget statement a paragraph making it clear that such massive investment in our local NHS hospitals is possible only because of the success of our long-term economic plan?

[Mr Hague]

My hon. Friend has again brought important good news from Kettering, as he has done in recent weeks concerning the economy, employment and the success of the town, and all that is related to the success of this country. He mentions investment in the national health service, which is now conducting 1.3 million more operations, 6 million more out-patient appointments and 3.5 million more diagnostic tests than it did five years ago. His central point is important and absolutely correct: such investment is only possible with a growing economy. That is what is at stake in the coming general election.

[Paul Flynn (Newport West) (Lab)]

When can we debate early-day motion 839?

[That this House is appalled at the demeaning spectacle of Prime Minister's Questions, where the Leader of the Opposition’s questions are not answered by the Prime Minister, who uses the occasions as a bully pulpit for his own chosen issues; notes the widely expressed public revulsion at this ill-mannered, pointless spectacle; and calls for its replacement by meetings where the Prime Minister will answer questions from 20 randomly-selected backbenchers in a committee room in an atmosphere of calm and dignity.]

This House was brought into further disrepute by the disgraceful behaviour of two senior Members recently, who shamed themselves and this House on the “Dispatches” programme. However, weekly the House is brought into disrepute by the spectacle of Prime Minister’s Question Time, which consists of little more than repeated tedious mantras, crude insults and answers that do not reflect the questions asked. Prime Minister John Major and Neil Kinnock made a valiant effort to reform question time, as has the present Speaker, but I believe the present format is unreformable and we have to look to a new way of presenting Prime Minister’s Question Time—in a manner that is robust, but calm and dignified.

[Mr Hague]

As the hon. Gentleman will know, the two right hon. Members in question have referred themselves to the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards. That has been the correct thing to do, and the matter will now be investigated.

On Prime Minister’s questions, I am sure that in future Parliaments—in the next Parliament—the Procedure Committee and the House as a whole can consider any suggested changes. We can always change and improve our procedures, and it is always important to have an eye on doing so. I would only add that in my experience all over the world as Foreign Secretary for most of the past five years, our Parliament and its proceedings are widely admired. Many people in countries all over the world have expressed to me the wish that they could question their Head of Government in the same way we can here in this House, and so we must not lose that central aspect of our proceedings.

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

Reports this week of a woman acting as a surrogate to give birth to her own son’s baby have shocked many people, not least because the procedure was reportedly carried out in a clinic licensed by the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority. Will my right hon. Friend, as one of his final acts, find time for an urgent debate on the actions of the HFEA and the fertility clinic involved in this case? If an urgent debate is not possible, what will he do?

[Mr Hague]

Given the time constraints that I have mentioned several times, an urgent debate is not possible. I do not know the details of the case my hon. Friend has raised. Nevertheless, I can understand the debate and concern about such issues, so I will inform my colleagues at the Department of Health of his interest in this matter and the fact that he has raised it, and ask them to respond to him.

[Chris Heaton-Harris (Daventry) (Con)]

Thank you, Mr Speaker, for the offer of a cup of tea earlier. That is the closest thing I have had to an offer of a hot date in a very long time.

May I ask the Leader of the House for a debate on the future of the Planning Inspectorate, which seems to be wantonly ignoring the views of local people and going against adopted local plans, especially, for example, in the village of West Haddon in my constituency?

[Mr Hague]

There are debates on planning. In fact, there is a debate today in Westminster Hall on the national planning policy framework, so my hon. Friend may be able to raise such matters during it. I cannot otherwise offer a debate in the time available. Communities and Local Government questions will take place on 16 March—a week on Monday. There are therefore a few remaining opportunities for him to raise the issue in the House.

International Women’s Day

Thursday 5th March 2015 Commons Chamber

11:23

[Maria Miller (Basingstoke) (Con)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered International Women’s Day.

This motion in support of international women’s day also stands in the name of my right hon. Friend the Member for Meriden (Mrs Spelman) and my hon. Friend the Member for Erewash (Jessica Lee). I should say that my hon. Friend the Member for Erewash did the heavy lifting on all this but was detained elsewhere and unable to go to the Backbench Business Committee on the day we put our bid in. I thank her, and all the right hon. and hon. Members across the House who supported our application for this important debate. It is one of the rare parliamentary moments in our calendar when, across the Chamber, there is more that unites us than divides us. I thank the Backbench Business Committee for its support in making the debate possible.

It is an enormous privilege to open this debate. It is not only here that international women’s day will be marked—more than 300 events will be held in the UK to mark the economic, political and social achievements of women across our globe. Our enduring thanks have to go to organisations such as the United Nations, Oxfam, Women for Women International, CARE International and the World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts, which bring this event alive for thousands of people across the United Kingdom.

Each international women’s day gives us an opportunity to pause and take stock of the progress that we are making throughout the world in gaining a fundamental right: the right to be treated equally, regardless of our gender. The breadth of today’s debate is daunting, and I do not think that any one speaker can hope to cover every aspect of the important work that many Members are doing in the House, whether it is connected with domestic violence towards women, female genital mutilation, or a host of other issues that are equally important. I want to focus on two issues: the role of women in the workplace and their role in this place.

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

I congratulate the right hon. Lady and her colleagues on initiating the debate. Does she agree that we still have a long way to go before women have parity with men in terms of pay?

[Maria Miller]

I think we have made important progress in that regard, particularly under the present Government but previously as well. For women under the age of 40, the gender pay gap has all but disappeared, and when we disaggregate the overall data, we see that progress has been made. As the hon. Gentleman says, it is worrying that the gap has not disappeared completely, but, as I am sure he knows, that has much to do with some of the choices that women are making about how they want to lead their lives, which they have an absolute right to do, and also with some of the choices that they are making early in their educational careers. We need to ensure that they are fully aware of the implications of those choices.

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

The right hon. Lady said that the pay gap for women aged 50 and over had increased, and suggested that that might be partly to do with choices that women make. Is the enormous increase in unemployment among members of that group, compared with the decrease in unemployment in every other cohort, a result of choices that they have made?

[Maria Miller]

I think the hon. Lady misheard me. I referred to women over the age of 40, and I did not say that the gap had increased. However, she is right in one respect. I am sure that there are many reasons for the pay gap to continue, and I think that she and I share a desire for the position to change. I shall say more about that later.

[Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham) (Con)]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that one of the Government’s major changes has been taking people out of income tax at the lower end of the scale, and is it not a fact that 58% of those workers are women?

[Maria Miller]

As my right hon. Friend says, the Government have made real progress in not only giving more women access to child care, but helping women on lower incomes, as well as women of pensionable age. I am not suggesting to the hon. Member for Slough (Fiona Mactaggart) that all the problems have been solved, but I think she would want to join me in ensuring that praise is given when it is due.

As I said at the beginning, I want to focus on both the workplace and this place. On a day like this, we should never forget what our forebears did to ensure that we would all be here as women Members of Parliament. There is also much to celebrate in the country more widely in respect of the role of women in our society. Over the past year, we have seen the appointment of the first woman bishop, the first female president of the Royal College of Surgeons, and—this is of particular interest to me—the first female Formula 1 driver, Susie Wolff. Many more women are breaking through and providing role models for us all, which can help to change attitudes and, importantly, raise aspirations.

Let me add one more name to that list: Fiona Woolf. I think that she deserves a particular mention. Although she was not the first female Lord Mayor of London, I believe that she did more than any other Lord Mayor to tackle the issue of gender equality in business, championing women and their contribution to the City of London, and taking that further with the City’s first Pride dinner in celebration of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender City workers. I think we should put on record our thanks to her for all she did in that role.

I shall now focus on the role of work in women’s lives, knowing full well that other colleagues will pick up the other vital threads. Last week the head of the International Monetary Fund, Christine Lagarde, wrote:

“In too many countries, too many legal restrictions conspire against women to be economically active”,

yet we know that the right to work is fundamental to the story of women’s equality. Christine Lagarde was prompted to say that by an IMF report which found that, despite the progress made on gender, almost 90% of countries surveyed still had legal restrictions based on gender that can stop women having the same opportunities to work as men.

While progress has been made, we should start this debate in the full knowledge that for many of our sisters around the world progress can be almost impossible to see. That is why the work of my right hon. Friend the International Development Secretary is so critical in supporting our aims.

[Jeremy Lefroy (Stafford) (Con)]

I congratulate my right hon. Friend on her speech and on this debate. Will she commend the work of my hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Sir William Cash) in bringing forward his gender equality Bill for international development? It is absolutely critical that our international development programme, which our right hon. Friend the International Development Secretary so ably leads, ensures that gender equality is embedded in everything it does.

[Maria Miller]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right to remind me of that important Bill, because through such legislation we can ensure that Britain continues to lead the way, as we are doing in our Government policy, prioritising women and girls in overseas work, helping more than 2 million women overseas to get jobs and over 5 million girls to attend school. That sort of leadership can make a real difference.

[Mary Macleod (Brentford and Isleworth) (Con)]

Will my right hon. Friend also welcome the news today that the Mayor of London, Boris Johnson, has given this great city £5 million to tackle domestic abuse and violence?

[Maria Miller]

Absolutely, and I pay tribute not only to the Mayor of London for the excellent work he does in his office, but to my hon. Friend, who has shown real leadership on this issue not only in her constituency, but across London. With women like her on our green Benches, we can make real progress in these areas.

The theme of this year’s international women’s day is “Make it happen”, and it is incumbent on all of us to make sure we are making it happen for women not only in the UK, but around the world. The Commission on the Status of Women, the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, and the team of dedicated people at the Government Equalities Office led by Helene Reardon-Bond work tirelessly to support change around the globe, to take the experience of our country abroad, and to advocate and deliver the change that is needed. They and the ministerial team ably led by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Education, and the Ministers on the Front Bench today as well, play a critical role and I applaud them for their enduring hard work and urge them on.

What the IMF report to which I have referred underlines is that laws, however apparently benign, can affect the true opportunities women have, and I would like to draw the attention of the House to a problem raised by one of my constituents: the posting of revenge pornography online, an act that I believe was designed specifically to intimidate and undermine the women who were the victims. It is a very female-based crime, yet I was advised by the police that it was not necessarily a crime at all at that point. All the victims I have met are women, although I am sure there are some men who are affected, too. These women endured enormous trauma, and some even blackmail, and almost all cited a direct effect on their work and family life as a result of being the victims of this appalling and despicable behaviour. It is a testament to the commitment of the Lord Chancellor on these issues that when I raised this with him directly, he acted at once. We must ensure that we are responsive to the new crimes that the internet can create, and I believe this Government have done just that. It is now, after one short year, a crime to post nude or sexually explicit images online without consent, and I applaud my right hon. Friend the Lord Chancellor for taking that swift action.

The British workplace was designed by men for men, and so were many of the laws that are assigned to it. That is why the task of workplace modernisation is so important. There is now a record number of women in work—more than 14 million—and 80% of the growth in female employment in the past four years has been in managerial, professional and technical sectors. The Under-Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, my hon. Friend the Member for East Dunbartonshire (Jo Swinson), was instrumental in pressing for extending the right to request flexible working and in introducing a system of shared parental leave. Increasing early-years education for three and four-year-olds and the most disadvantaged two-year-olds, and making tax-free child care available to all for the first time, are also clear ways in which this Government have taken action to modernise the workplace for women in the past five years.

We have removed some of the most entrenched barriers, helping women to gain greater financial security through work and also in retirement. Our state pension reforms will improve the lives of the more than 600,000 women who will benefit from the single tier pension and receive an average of £8 a week more as a result of this Government’s actions. There are now more women-led businesses than ever before. One in five small and medium-sized enterprises is now led by a woman. There are more women on FTSE boards than ever before, and there are now, for the first time ever, no all-male FTSE 100 boards. These are significant achievements, and the Government should be recognised for what they have done. I believe that we shall see this legacy come to maturity in the next 10 years.

When it comes to promoting gender equality, one of the key indicators alongside work is the proportion of seats held by women in a national Parliament. I should like to pay particular tribute to the work of the all-party parliamentary group for women in Parliament, which is ably led by my hon. Friend the Member for Brentford and Isleworth (Mary Macleod). She has worked assiduously to ensure that female representation in this House remains firmly on every party’s agenda. Her report published last summer rightly made a number of recommendations of which every Member of the House should be aware.

One recommendation, which has already been mentioned, is that we should not miss the opportunity to ensure that matters relating to women and equality are properly scrutinised. The establishment of a women and equalities Select Committee, to ensure proper scrutiny both for Government and for those outside Government on equality issues, is one of the report’s most powerful recommendations. Lord Davies’s work on women’s representation on boards has demonstrated how effective it can be to establish an expectation when it comes to gender. Through his work, he has almost doubled the number of female company directors in FTSE 100 firms by putting in place a target and monitoring it, and by generating a great deal of good will behind the issue.

It is almost unbelievable that we do not have a scrutiny body on women and equality led by the House of Commons. As a former Minister for Women and Equalities, I can tell the House that I would see such a body as a very effective tool indeed. I was pleased to hear the personal commitment from the Leader of the House earlier today. Putting in place such a Select Committee and ensuring that people would be held to account would have just the kind of nudge effect that is so popular among modern-day economists. That would be an important way we could improve the processes of this place.

The all-party parliamentary group also recommended changes to the working practices of the House as an important way of encouraging more women to stand for elected office. Clearly, we have to create an environment that women want to work in—one where they feel their face will fit. When I was asked to consider becoming an MP in 2000, my reply was, “People like me don’t become MPs.” I was born in a council house, I went to my local comprehensive school in Bridgend in south Wales and I had been working for 15 years in business, where I was a working mum, with two small children at the time. But my party never saw any of those things as an obstacle. I believe it is less about those things being obstacles and more about the perception people have about this place—that is what we need to overcome.

[Mary Macleod]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that all parties need to do a lot more outreach to women right across this country to say that their country needs them? They need to take a role in public life, participate in our debates and really make a difference to the future of this country.

[Maria Miller]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right about that. I hope I am able to say this without betraying any confidences from the evidence sessions held in her Select Committee, but I certainly had the overwhelming impression that recruiting women was not a problem in any individual political party; the problem was more to do with encouraging women to be interested in this as part of their career or part of how they could contribute something to the society in which they live.

[Mrs Gillan]

My right hon. Friend is making a powerful speech, and she has been a rich addition to the House. What has alarmed me is that the experience she reports in 2000 is the same as my experience back in the late 1980s and early 1990s. I came into this place in 1992 and am now the longest serving woman on the Conservative Benches. How are we going to make sure that our message goes out beyond this place that this is a very good place for women to represent their constituencies and a very good place for women to do business?

[Maria Miller]

My right hon. Friend asks one of the biggest questions to be answered in this debate today. It is not only incumbent on us in this place to deal with it—I know you take a deep interest in this too, Mr Speaker—but we also have to look at the way in which women who hold these jobs are represented. I know that one of the biggest concerns many women have about coming into Parliament is the problems that they can encounter in terms of the scrutiny of themselves and their personal lives. There are a great many questions to be answered in that regard, too.

[Mr Jim Cunningham]

One way in which women could be helped, particularly younger married women with families, is by our having a look at the crèche facilities in this place.

[Maria Miller]

I know that we have crèche facilities, although I am not sure that my 12-year-old would be too excited about going there. The hon. Gentleman raises an important point, which is that at the beginning of the next Parliament, when we start to think about the working hours of this place—I know that there are many different competing demands, with people living in various parts of the country—we have to ask ourselves the questions. If, as the Conservatives will, we have many young women coming into Parliament who may have not yet started their families, and if we are to encourage them to stay here for as long as possible, we have to address the sort of issue he is talking about. I want to encourage more women who have families into Parliament. At the moment, 40% of women MPs do not have children and that is not representative of our population as a whole. In addition, women tend to have shorter parliamentary careers than their male counterparts and tend to have older children, too, so there are some forces at play that he is right to pick up on.

[Emily Thornberry (Islington South and Finsbury) (Lab)]

The right hon. Lady is making an interesting speech. I wonder whether she shares my experience, which is that at surgeries or even when knocking on doors it tends to be the women who come forward to discuss things. I have had surgeries where the man has been brought along but does not open his mouth and the woman speaks on his behalf. I wonder whether it is a shared experience among women MPs that the level of engagement by women is very high indeed.

[Maria Miller]

The hon. Lady is making an important point. I wish to pay tribute to my local Basingstoke and Deane borough council, particularly its Conservative group, because more than a third of our councillors are women and that is well in excess of any other party. I think there is something else at play in what she says; perhaps as she and I are women MPs, women feel more empowered to take a more assertive position with us because they see women in their community taking a role that they can follow.

I believe that each party is doing good work to encourage more women to stand. I pay particular tribute to the work of Women2Win for my party, under the careful guidance of my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary and the noble Baroness Jenkin in the other place, and to my hon. Friend the Member for Truro and Falmouth (Sarah Newton)—an extraordinarily dedicated group of colleagues, who have ensured that an extraordinary group of talented women are set to join us on these green Benches in May. More than a third of our candidates in winnable seats are women. I pay particular tribute to Suella Fernandes, who was selected for Fareham, in my home county of Hampshire, just a few weeks ago. With all her experience, I know that she will be an excellent addition to this place.

My right hon. and hon. Friends here today, many of whom have been MPs for longer than me, have noted many things about this place, but one thing that I was concerned about when I came here was the lack of visibility of the contribution made by the women who had already been in Parliament before me. Since that point, we have seen some progress, but we need to continue under your careful guidance, Mr Speaker, to make progress on that. We have seen the unveiling of the statue of Margaret Thatcher in Members’ Lobby and just this week we have seen an inspiring exhibition of photography and portraiture, which has really started to crystallise the contribution of the extraordinary women we have already seen in this place.

I know that you are one of our great supporters, Mr Speaker, but let us make sure, perhaps as a testament to this international women’s day, not only that we have an exhibition of women’s portraiture and photography in Portcullis House, but that those images creep their way down the corridors to the Palace of Westminster itself and on to the walls of our Committee Rooms, so that the next time I sit on a Delegated Legislation Committee, I do not have to endure two or three hours of simply looking at previous male colleagues on our walls. I think that is perhaps what would be expected, all these years on from the first woman having sat in the House of Commons.

I will close there, because I know that many hon. and right hon. Friends want to contribute to this debate. I look forward to an excellent discussion of the issues that really matter to women in Britain today.

[Several hon. Members]

rose—

[Mr Speaker]

Order. Colleagues might wish to produce a list of the distinguished female parliamentarians of whom they would like to have portraits in prominent positions in the Palace in the course of the next Parliament. If that choice is made known, I would be very happy to be a cheerleader for it. Far too few prominent female parliamentarians have portraits in this House.

11:47

[Emily Thornberry (Islington South and Finsbury) (Lab)]

May I begin by saying that a statue of Emily Wilding Davison would be at the top of my list? She was not a parliamentarian, but she was certainly someone who made a huge impact in this place, not least by breaking into the House on a number of occasions, locking herself in and making a complete menace of herself, furthering the place of women hugely. The very fact that she was not a parliamentarian should not continue to exclude her from recognition in this place. You know my very strong views on this issue, Mr Speaker, and as the first and only Emily ever to be elected to this place I will continue to press for that.

I congratulate the right hon. Members for Basingstoke (Maria Miller) and for Meriden (Mrs Spelman) and the hon. Member for Erewash (Jessica Lee) on their work in securing today’s debate. International women’s day has a distinguished history. The first formal observance of a women’s day was in the United States in 1909, to mark the first anniversary of the women garment workers’ strike in New York in 1908, when 15,000 women went on strike to demand their economic and political rights. It is right in many ways that international women’s day is founded in the movement for more justice in the workplace.

I have some young girls coming into Parliament today from the Elizabeth Garrett Anderson school, which is based in my constituency. Elizabeth Garrett Anderson was a distinguished woman who fought her way into becoming a medical doctor despite the rules and managed to slip through some loopholes, which the medical profession then closed after her, so that she was alone as a woman doctor for many years. She established a women’s hospital in my area, was the first woman mayor in the country and her sister was Millicent Fawcett—quite a history, and these are quite some girls I will be seeing. They are 11 and 12-year-olds. As a woman in my mid-50s, it is difficult for me to give them advice. They have had advice from many people, including from Michelle Obama who visited. I do not think that my advice will rival that of the President’s wife.

When speaking to girls who are just beginning their lives and looking forward to womanhood, one has to be realistic about the difficulties that they will face. The truth is that no matter what decision they make, they will feel that it is the wrong one. If they remain at home, they will feel that they have not been ambitious enough. If they go to work, they will feel that they have let their families down. If they try to work part-time, they will not do sufficiently well professionally and their children will still resent the time that they are out. They will find that, even if they are at home looking after their children, the demands of the older generation will be put on them. It does not matter which way we turn, we are always wrong. Women’s liberation was not supposed to look like this.

We have more that we should do, that we must do and that we can do, but fundamentally, as long as women continue to do two thirds of the unpaid work—work at home is important—we will not get equality. The younger generation of men have changed their attitudes in many ways. It is good to see that they are prepared to change nappies, and that they are prepared to be involved in child care.

[Mr David Hamilton (Midlothian) (Lab)]

I used to do that.

[Emily Thornberry]

I understand that some people from an older generation who are sitting in the Chamber used to change nappies, but the question is: do they clean the loo?

[Mr Hamilton]

Yep.

[Emily Thornberry]

Do they do the ironing?

[Mr Hamilton]

Yep.

[Emily Thornberry]

Do they do the hoovering?

[Mr Hamilton]

No.

[Emily Thornberry]

Do they sort out the shopping? If there is no breakfast cereal, is it my hon. Friend or his partner who ensures that there is breakfast cereal on the table the next morning? The reality is that many of us have partners who are enlightened and wonderful and we love them greatly, but in the end they believe that they are helping us. Why are they helping us? Why are we not helping them? Until we begin to re-establish the relationship between men and women and unpaid work, we will not get far, because that is the biggest problem we have.

In the meantime, while we are waiting for the halcyon day when men clean the loo, we need to be working much harder at ensuring that we have proper flexible working. Some changes made by the Conservatives have been positive, but there have been restrictions in what they have introduced, which have been counter-productive. It is certainly to the benefit of all of us that people, no matter what their circumstances, can apply for flexible working and that that request is taken seriously. The difficulty is that the employer can be completely within their rights to insist that they will take three months to consider it. If someone’s mum has fallen down and has gone into hospital and they need to visit her, see that she is okay, help her out of hospital afterwards, and ensure that she is back in the community and properly supported, and their employer is taking three months to decide whether they can work flexibly, what do they do? They are likely to take demotion, leave, or work part-time. It is not a feasible system for the real lives that real people live today. We should be looking further at flexible working. It is to be greatly applauded that we encourage men and women—men particularly—to take time off when children are born, but the needs of children continue throughout their teenage years and, in my experience, into early adult life. The continuing caring responsibilities that people have for an older generation remain and should be shared by men. We have a long way to go in relation to that. I put that down as my first marker.

[Jeremy Lefroy]

Does the hon. Lady agree that the long-hours culture in this country is counter-productive for everybody? It is particularly so for women, because if they want to get into a profession and are expected to work all hours, as indeed are men, that puts them off. This place is not an exception.

[Emily Thornberry]

I could not agree more with the hon. Gentleman. We have got ourselves into an odd place in which it is accepted that women have to limit the hours they work—that full time may mean just full time and not all the hours of overtime. In many workplaces, if a man wants to be able to get home at six o’clock to see the children there is in some ways more prejudice against him than there might be against a woman, as it would be accepted that she would need to get home. It would be to the benefit and liberation of us all if we looked again at our equal and shared responsibility for unpaid and paid work and allowed people to make choices that are appropriate for them and not based simply on gender. It happens too often and it continues to happen.

My stepmother was a great feminist in the 1970s who translated “The Little Red Schoolbook”, which was a great call to arms at that time. I remember her saying that she was doing that work not for herself—she did not expect it to work for her—but for me. I continue to work, not necessarily for me but for the girls at Elizabeth Garrett Anderson and for my daughters. We go down the generations, but although things improve we still have such a long way to go. We must not be complacent.

There is an area in which there is an element of complacency, with the greatest respect to the right hon. Member for Basingstoke, and that is equal pay. Work still needs to be done. The Equal Pay Act 1970, passed some 45 years ago, has run into the sand and we have a number of difficulties with it. First, it was based on the idea of individual women taking out individual complaints about their individual circumstances. They cannot be representative of a class of women or of an entire employment establishment; they do it on their own behalf. They can of course be bought off and there can be a gagging clause in any agreement that is made instead of their going to court, so there is therefore no end to it.

Increasing numbers of cases have taken years and years. The idea of the Dagenham work force going along to a tribunal, representing themselves and it not taking very long is long gone. It can take five years for the preliminary issue in the case to be decided. This process has become counter-productive. As we have established our law on the basis of a form of contract law, the European Court of Justice has said that women should not just get two years’ compensation but six years’ compensation for not being paid equally with men. That has had a chilling effect on employers, who will fight every single case.

In increasing numbers of cases, trade unions and employers come to a negotiated deal on equal pay between men and women only for the trade unions to be sued. We are getting mired in difficulties, but the gender pay gap remains stubbornly at about 10% for women on full pay and at 17% for women who work part time. We should not turn our backs on that.

[Maria Miller]

I reassure the hon. Lady that in no way should she sense any complacency from me on that issue. I was simply pointing out that disaggregating the data uncovers a slightly different issue. I recognise the problems with equal pay and other pay complaints that she has cited, but if we disaggregate the data we can see that the challenge for women over 40 is not focused on enough.

[Emily Thornberry]

There are other problems with the Equal Pay Act. The fact that there are fees has put women off taking cases; there has been a decline of 70% or 80% in the number of women taking cases on equal pay.

I have talked about settlements and about the need for six years’ compensation and its chilling effect, but in addition the Equal Pay Act was based on another way of working in another world. It does not comprehend outsourcing, agency working, bogus self-employment and all the things that have, in my view, often been used to circumvent equal pay. We need a new pay Act that would ensure that such difficulties are directly addressed.

All sorts of increasingly bizarre loopholes have developed in the law. For example, if a woman is replaced by a man and the man gets paid more, it would seem that she is not allowed to compare him with herself and to compare his level of pay to show that she has been discriminated against. In my view, that is nonsense. If a man is paid more than a woman it is a defence for the employer to say that that is not discrimination because it is owing to some other material factor—historical or mistaken. Obviously, that is also nonsense. There is even an argument, which has been upheld in some court cases although not all, that if a woman compares herself with a man who is employed by the same employer but works in a different building, it is not a fair comparison. That is obviously another piece of nonsense that needs to be swept away in a new equal pay Act.

The fundamental problem with the Equal Pay Act is that it is based on individual women taking complaints about their individual circumstances. We should accept, in clause 1 of a new Bill, that it is the responsibility of all of us to ensure that there is equal pay between the genders, so we need to work together to do something about it. A new Act should have a code of practice with some legal standing attached to it so that employers know that they will not be sued so long as the agreements negotiated with the trade unions are made within the code. Employers could volunteer to have proper pay audits, job evaluations and skills audits. If they out sourced that to recognised experts and acted on the basis of their recommendations, that would be a complete defence against any equal pay claim.

[Mary Macleod]

Does the hon. Lady agree that some of the “Think, Act, Report” work, in which the Government have pushed organisations to be transparent on diversity issues, for example by revealing the number of employees at each level within the organisation and the gender pay gap, is the first step to making life fairer within a business?

[Emily Thornberry]

Section 78 of the Equality Act 2010 was introduced by the previous Government and has not been implemented by the current Government, which is a great shame. Section 78 orders all businesses with more than 250 employees to have a proper pay audit. The devil is in the detail, and it could well be a modest change, even if it was implemented. The requirement to make available proper pay information so that pay can be compared across different stratums of equivalent work is an important call to arms to which the Labour party has committed itself as a first step, but a new equal pay Act would give substance to that.

I was talking earlier about the idea of collective responsibility and of businesses volunteering to have a proper root-and-branch look at how they pay people. If the agreements reached are a complete defence so that they are not scared about changing the way in which they pay men and women or about paying six years’ compensation, we may well find that more businesses come forward. If we have a code of practice under which the trade unions can negotiate equality between the sexes and eradicate the gender pay gap, we can all move together towards the sort of world that we want, in which there is not discrimination between men and women.

We need to look again at the powers of employment tribunals and the way in which they act. In serious and complicated cases, senior judges—High Court judges or whoever—should be brought in to make sure that the cases get through the system quickly and efficiently and there is no time wasting. We should bring back the questionnaire. Why the Government got rid of it, I do not understand. It should be two pages that a woman can send to her employer and say, “Could you give me information on this?” Let us keep it short and punchy, but let us enable women to get some information so that they know whether they have a case.

Perhaps the most important thing is to treat women not as individuals taking individual cases but as whistleblowers. If they go before an employment tribunal and explain that in the culture of a company or organisation they and their sisters are being discriminated against, the tribunal should have the power to step in and order a proper pay audit and skills evaluation. Then there should be a plan. I appreciate that the Government have introduced the power for tribunals to order an audit if a case is lost, but the law is silent on implementation. So let us implement it. Let us not just have a little bit of window-dressing. Let us make sure that there is a proper study of the cultures within organisations where there has been discrimination, and let us make sure that there is a plan for change. I respectfully suggest that that plan for change should be overseen by the Equality and Human Rights Commission and that the commission should make sure that the plan is implemented. Failure to implement it should be treated as a form of contempt of court. The organisation can then be brought back and a penalty imposed.

We need new legislation which is fit for the 21st century, which is based not on individuals, but on collective responsibility, which in the end ought to be the responsibility of our whole society. This seems to me the sort of thing that we could do. There could be particular powers over a short period of five years—for example, compensation of just two years instead of six years for a period of five years; no tribunal fees for a period of five years; a business not needing to pay compensation for five years if it conducts a root-and-branch audit of the way in which it pays people. Such steps could push matters forward, and at long last we could address at least that part of what holds women back. Unless we do something about it, it may hold back the girls from Elizabeth Garrett Anderson. We will deal with flexible working and unpaid work at another stage. Let us take one step at a time. That is what I propose for a new equal pay Act.

12:06

[Mary Macleod (Brentford and Isleworth) (Con)]

I am delighted to have the opportunity to speak in the debate and to follow the hon. Member for Islington South and Finsbury (Emily Thornberry), who is passionate on these matters. I thank my right hon. Friends the Members for Basingstoke (Maria Miller) and for Meriden (Mrs Spelman) and my hon. Friend the Member for Erewash (Jessica Lee) for bringing the debate to the Floor of the House. It is important that we celebrate international women’s day and show that in Parliament we put women at the top of our agenda and make sure that everything we do is about maximising the potential and abilities of everyone across this country, including women.

International women’s day is a day for celebrating the contribution of women, as well as for reflecting on what more we can do to support women and young girls across the world and what we can do to inspire the next generation. It was great to hear the hon. Member for Islington South and Finsbury talk about the school pupils who are coming to visit today. Many girls from schools in the constituencies of Members across the House are coming to Parliament next Thursday to celebrate international women’s day. That will be a chance for them to hear about the work that is being done in this place and out in our communities. We hope they may be inspired to make some contribution in their own communities.

I shall focus on how we make it happen—the theme of international women’s day this year—for women and enterprise. I spent about 20 years in business, and I still do what I can to support women in business. I am a patron of the London Women’s Forum and speak often in the City to encourage women at all levels in many organisations to continue to use the support available to them, to encourage each other to fulfil their potential, each and every one of them, and to be part of UK plc. The contribution that they can make is incredibly important.

The number of women in the UK choosing to set up their own business has doubled in the past six years. That is not just in traditional sectors, but in areas such as software development and website design. However, we still have a long way to go. We would probably have more than 1 million more entrepreneurs if women were setting up businesses in the UK at the same rate as men. That would be worth billions of pounds to the UK economy.

[Margot James (Stourbridge) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend share with me a very positive response to the fact that 37% of candidates for start-up loans provided by the Government are women, and 35% of successful candidates for the new enterprise allowance provided by the Government are women?

[Mary Macleod]

I could not have put it better myself. I absolutely agree that the statistics show that progress has been made, and hopefully that will inspire more women to go and get the start-up loans required, which is really important.

We also have some great role models. If we look across the country, we see women such as J. K. Rowling, who came up with the idea for Harry Potter in 1990—it just popped into her head on a crowded train to Manchester. Michelle Mone left school at age 15 without a single qualification, and she had the idea for Ultimo lingerie when she wore a particularly uncomfortable bra and thought that she could produce something better. Linda Bennett, of L.K. Bennett, worked as a shop-floor assistant in north London branches of Whistles and Joseph before going on to establish her own massively successful fashion line.

Specsavers co-founder Dame Mary Perkins is the UK’s first female billionaire. She was born and raised in a Bristol council house before studying optometry at Cardiff university. Friends Sophie Cornish and Holly Tucker established the retail site notonthehighstreet.com in 2006. It has since turned over £100 million in trade. Rita Sharma is the UK’s richest Asian female entrepreneur. She dropped law after one term at Sussex university to begin Worldwide Journeys, a travel agency that now has a net worth of £7 million.

Business Dragon and the founder of Weststar Holidays, Deborah Meaden, began her first company, a glass and ceramics business, aged just 19. Hilary Devey was continually refused support by bankers she approached about her proposed venture for the freight network Pall-Ex. It now has a combined turnover approaching £100 million. We have great examples out there, with the likes of Jo Malone and The White Company. There are so many female entrepreneurs who have made a real difference.

[Jenny Willott (Cardiff Central) (LD)]

Does the hon. Lady agree that that is often a particularly good way for women with young children to branch out and set up their own business? We had an event earlier this week with the National Childbirth Trust on the cost of child care, and there were a number of women there with lots of small children—always refreshing in Parliament—who had changed career because of the cost of child care and were setting up their own businesses, which in years to come will have huge potential to contribute to the economy.

[Mary Macleod]

I completely agree. Only recently the Exchequer Secretary visited Chiswick to meet female entrepreneurs and women who were thinking about setting up a business, and they said exactly the same. They needed something more flexible and perhaps part time, but something they could establish for themselves in that way.

In my west London constituency, in Chiswick, Brentford, Isleworth and Hounslow, one of the most well-known female entrepreneurs is Cath Kidston, who opened her first shop in 1993 and now has 59 stores in the UK and 54 across Spain, Japan, the Republic of Korea, Thailand, Taiwan, Hong Kong and China. She started making wash bags and aprons because she had over-ordered fabric.

Another entrepreneur from Hounslow is Shavata Singh, who is now famous for doing the eyebrows of the stars. Almost every department store now has a Shavata concession doing eyebrows—if you ever need them done, Mr Deputy Speaker. She has now established her flagship store in Knightsbridge and is doing amazing work. Angela Lyons-Redman, of My Plumber, is based in Brentford and Chiswick. She left her job as a solicitor because she thought she could offer a better, faster service in the plumbing world—initially working from her bedroom, with a plumber on a motorbike—and now employs 38 people and several apprentices. She is doing a great job with that company.

Lorraine Angliss created Annie’s, a lovely, quirky and comfy restaurant in Chiswick and Barnes, and now has a sister restaurant in Richmond, and they are much loved by locals. Julia Quilliam set up a property business in Brentford, an independent family-run estate agent. Anila Vaghela, of Anila’s Sauces, which is also based in Hounslow, makes curry sauces. She set up the business in her 50s after being made redundant. She has won many Great Taste awards, and her sauces are all about love and harmony.

I have a range of other examples of great local female entrepreneurs, such as Charlotte who set up Badger & Earl, Maggie who set up Maggie & Rose, Anette who set up Chateau Dessert, Esther Gibbs who set up LondonMummy.com, Sarah who set up Sprinkled Magic, and Martha Keith. They have all made their mark by setting up their own business.

Martha Keith has an interesting story. When I entered this place, I wanted to encourage more women to set up businesses. I feel that in many sectors we just need to encourage more women. I attended a Commonwealth meeting of female parliamentarians in Edinburgh. We were a group of 15 women all standing together, and we all said that we got into Parliament because someone had tapped us on the shoulder and said, “Why don’t you do it? You’d be great.” It strikes me that we need to encourage women constantly. We know that they have the ability and the skills, but we need to encourage them to take that step.

[Maria Miller]

Does my hon. Friend agree that alarm bells should be ringing for the large corporations in this country that for whatever reason seem unable to retain the talented women she has just talked about? They should be looking at that very carefully, because in future they might see a real haemorrhaging of talent from their training programmes into self-employment.

[Mary Macleod]

Absolutely, and it is a real loss to their business when they cannot retain that talent. There is a simple and proven business case that shows that they need to keep hold of that talent. They have to look at every single part of the pipeline to ensure that women stay in their organisations. If they have a short time away from work because they are on maternity leave or have to look after young children, those companies need to encourage them and support them back into the workplace.

I met Martha Keith when I decided to conduct an experiment in west London by setting up three entrepreneurship workshops—I called it the start-up challenge—in Hounslow, Brentford and Chiswick. I leafleted the whole area, going from door to door to hand out a really positive flyer that said, “I believe you can do it, so please come and find out how. Let’s work together to make this happen.” We were inundated with women who wanted to find out more and see if they could do it. The inspirational part of those events was hearing the entrepreneur’s story; a women standing up and telling her story, explaining what she had done in her business—the good, the bad, the challenges and the obstacles—and how she eventually succeeded. The women listening realised that maybe they could do that too.

Martha Keith came along to one of those events. She had left a good job in GlaxoSmithKline to set up her own business, Love Give Ink, which makes brilliant stationary. I also introduced her to the Prime Minister when he visited Brentford, and he then used her as an example in his speech to the Federation of Small Businesses last year. She now employs several people, is doing a great job and has never looked back. People like Martha can make a difference not only by changing their own lives and contributing to the economy, but by doing something new and different or better than anyone else.

Creating opportunities for women and encouraging them to do something that will make a real difference to their lives is so important. The Government have helped with that, as we have heard from my hon. Friend the Member for Stourbridge (Margot James), by clearly signposting businesses on the Great Business website, because we have so many great women in this country that we want to promote what they do by building on the Great brand; handing out 25,000 start-up loans, a third of which have gone to women; changing the tax code so that home businesses do not typically have to pay business taxes; introducing growth vouchers to help small businesses access specialist advice; and opening up the banking industry to challenger banks, encouraging crowdfunding and hopefully doing more on alternative finance.

It is great to hear that more women than ever before are starting up businesses. Some 20% of small and medium-sized enterprises are run either by women or by a team that is over 50% female, which is an increase of 140,000 since 2010. There are other things that we are doing to support women in their roles. For example, 2 million families will benefit from the new tax-free child care scheme. The increase in the number of free hours of early education for three and four-year-olds will make a difference, as will extending free early learning places to 40% of the most disadvantaged two-year-olds.

I urge the Government to continue doing all they can to support small businesses; to consider the contribution women can make to enterprise; to celebrate the contribution that women who have set up their own businesses make to the workplace; and to promote role models. If we talk more about role models, perhaps more women will get involved. It would inspire not just our generation, but the next generation of girls to feel that they can take the same route. By talking about all the great people who have succeeded in the world of enterprise and the women who have made a contribution to this country, I believe we can make that happen locally, nationally and across the world.

12:20

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

I have been reflecting on the function of Back-Bench debates. It is important that we get things out of them rather than just listen to ourselves. This is a debate about an issue on which there is not an enormous difference between parties. The first task of such debates is to move culture on; the second is to do things and get allies to change things; and the third is to advance policy.

On shifting our culture in relation to the role of women, I want to give the media some faint praise. It is great that the BBC has aired the documentary about the rape and murder of a woman in India. It is deeply shocking that the documentary has been banned in India and utterly horrifying that Mukesh Singh, who was responsible for the murder, suggests that women are more responsible for rape because they go out late at night and look pretty, as though men are helpless in the face of how women look. We can use this Chamber to make it clear to each other, the UK media and India that that attitude to women is unacceptable, that it damages the reputation of India internationally, that we are standing up against it and that we are proud that we have shown the documentary in the UK.

The media have done another helpful thing in relation to women and politics. Michael Cockerell’s recent programme about this House started with two young women MPs. It was very important to be able to see that the activists and Members in this House who represent constituencies are not just fusty old guys in suits—I speak as a fusty old woman in a suit—but represent some of the different parts of our society. It is a failure in democracy that people are becoming less committed to believing that it is the best way to run a country or, as Churchill put it, the worst form of Government except for all the others. People feel less comfortable about it and I think that one of the ways in which we can make them feel more comfortable is by letting them see people like them in this Chamber. It is a big challenge for all of us to make sure that the diversity of all our communities is represented in Parliament.

When Mr Speaker was in the Chair, he challenged us to name women whose portraits should be in this place. I nominate Baroness Ros Howells from the other place, who did so much, following the fire that killed so many teenagers in Deptford, to bring that evil murder to light and get justice for the community. Perhaps Mr Speaker will read Hansard and commission a portrait of her.

I started by talking about the rape and murder in India. We have to focus on how many women are murdered, because it is a terrible problem across the world and in the UK. The recent Femicide Census showed that 694 women had been killed by men over four years and that 46% of them were killed by men they loved.

[Mary Macleod]

Does the hon. Lady agree that domestic abuse statistics in the UK are still intolerable? Two women a week still get killed in the UK by a partner or former partner.

[Fiona Mactaggart]

Yes, I do—that is absolutely horrifying—and I am really worried that the reduction in quality refuge provision for women who are at risk means that more women will be murdered.

As I have said, we should not just shift our culture and understanding, but change things. I invite every Member to vote on Tuesday week for a real change for a very vulnerable group of women: domestic workers who are grossly exploited by their employers. The other place has tabled an amendment to the Modern Slavery Bill and we have an opportunity to support it when it comes back to this House. I am absolutely certain that the Government have no intention of doing that, but following this debate we could decide that our commitment to those women—bold, brave women who have their passport taken away and are expected to sleep on the kitchen floor and, in some cases, to work for 24 hours for no money—is more important than our commitment to our party Whip. If we did that, we would demonstrate that this debate expresses solidarity among women—because, overwhelmingly, domestic workers are women and they are enslaved here in Britain—that we will not put up with it and that we will be prepared to stick out our sharp elbows and make a difference for that group of women.

As I have said, the third role of Back-Bench debates is to advance policy. Over the past few years I have been banging on about older women—a category that I never particularly expected to get into, but it crept up on me and bit me on the bum. It is a real issue that the peak earning point for men comes when they are in their 50s, while the peak earning point for women comes when they are about 40. The narrowing of the pay gap is being achieved not by Government policy, but by history, because, although it has narrowed for younger women, it is enormously wider for older women.

It is great for Government Members to say, as the right hon. Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs Gillan) has, “Look at all these people we’ve taken out of tax,” but if we look at women’s income, we will see that the majority of them have not benefited from that. The average pay of women entrepreneurs—lone, self-employed women—is £9,600, according to the Office for National Statistics. That group of women has not benefited one jot from the increase in personal allowance.

[Emily Thornberry]

Is it not also right that, if the minimum wage was raised to a living wage of £7.65 outside London and £8.80 in London, 1 million more women than men would benefit from it?

[Fiona Mactaggart]

Absolutely—my hon. Friend is quite right.

After the election of 101 Labour women in 1997, I did a piece of work about how much difference was made by having a lot of women in Parliament. One of the most obvious differences was a shift from the wallet to the purse. Fiscal decisions made by that Government hugely increased the income of women and, to a lesser extent, benefited men. The problem is that precisely the opposite has happened under the present Government. I am really sad about that. I do not believe that that was intended by Government women and I want them to be allies in trying to remedy the problem.

I want to talk specifically about older women and work, because there is a real crisis about keeping women in work. One statistic that is burnt on my brain is the fact that two thirds of the people who work beyond retirement age are women. Two thirds of those women earn entry-level wages, while two thirds of the men, who are the other third of people who work beyond retirement age, are on top-level wages. The story is that the guys keep going because they are enjoying themselves—they have chauffeurs, and there are all the nice things about being on the board—but women continue to work because their families need the money.

In public services, we do not have an intelligent way of keeping women in touch with the workplace. I praise the Government for appointing Dr Ros Altmann to look at the needs of older workers. I am very glad that she is about to produce a report that, for example, will look at women and the menopause. From talking to organisations such as the Royal College of Nursing and the National Union of Teachers, I know that the people for whom they are taking employment cases are women in their 50s and 60s who have been managed or pressed out of their careers. As one woman in my constituency said, “What happens is that you are always first in the queue for redundancy and last in the queue for a new job.” It is very striking that our jobcentres do not make enough of a difference for such women. The Work programme has found sustained employment for just over 10% of the women over 50 referred to it, which is much lower than the level for men of the same age group and lower than the level for every other group. We do not have an intelligent strategy to help to keep older women in the work force.

What is worse is that one reason why older women come out of the work force is that we are the default carers, as other Members have said. We not only make sure that there is breakfast cereal on the table, but we look after the children, the grandchildren, the elderly relatives and our husbands when they have a sudden illness. Yet we do not have proper policies to ensure that a women who suddenly has to do unexpected caring can have a period of adjustment in her employment to work out whether the person she is caring for is going to die, which means that she could go back to work at that point, or whether they will have long-term caring needs. We do not have a policy on adjustment leave in the UK—some individual employers do, but the majority do not—and it seems to me a no-brainer that the Government should legislate to provide for such leave.

The Government should also legislate to enable women who take time out to stay in touch with the workplace. When they have to leave to look after someone, they lose contact with the workplace and cannot find help to get back into it. In a recent e-mail to me, Ms Altmann wrote:

“I would like to see special programmes introduced to help women carers (and male carers…) back into the workplace after they have taken time out, or more flexible working to allow them to combine work with caring.”

The Government may have to incentivise employers to do that, but it is a no-brainer: if we want to use all the talent that exists in our community, we need to let women make such adjustments.

The problem with policies made when women are not in the room is that women are regarded as “not men”—as though their lives were the same as men’s lives when actually they just are not. For example, women’s prisons are very ineffectual at helping women to rehabilitate themselves. Why? Because they think that work is the best form of rehabilitation. That is absolutely true for men, but the best form of rehabilitation to prevent women from reoffending is being able to look after their children. If a woman is given the chance to be reunited with her kids and to look after them, she is enormously less likely to offend. Yet despite all the insights of the Corston report, we do not have a national programme to ensure that that happens for every woman, which is just sad.

That is an outcome of not ensuring that women can think through every bit of policy. In Back-Bench debates, we can criticise policy and say that we have better ideas, but we need to be on the Cabinet Committees and in on every decision. If we were, instead of women being treated as men who menstruate, we could treat them in accordance with the reality of their lives, and we could devise policies to ensure that we employ women’s talents in the work force, use women’s ability to care for our families and have a society in which women play the role of which they are absolutely capable, but which they cannot currently play.

12:36

[Mrs Caroline Spelman (Meriden) (Con)]

Through you, Mr Deputy Speaker, may I thank the Backbench Business Committee for allowing us to have this debate in the Chamber of the House of Commons? When I went with my right hon. and hon. Friends to ask for it, the Committee listening to our petition was entirely made up of hon. Gentlemen, so we particularly appreciate the courtesy they have afforded us in allowing this debate to take place in the Chamber. Last year, the debate I had secured was held in Westminster Hall, and that was noticed by people outside Parliament.

[Mary Macleod]

Does my right hon. Friend not think that the fact that half the constituents of all hon. Members are women shows the importance of this debate?

[Mrs Spelman]

Indeed. My hon. Friend nudges me to make, for the record, an observation about the choreography in the Chamber. I believe that nine women on the Government Benches and three women on the Opposition Benches are going to speak—from time to time, an hon. Gentleman has entered the Chamber, and we are very grateful to those who have intervened—which is incredibly important. I never know whether we should refer to this, but I want to record that a lady is sitting in the chair of the Serjeant at Arms. All that is incredibly important to the outside world, but there are not enough of us in the Chamber for a debate of this importance about more than half the population.

[Mrs Gillan]

When I was reading through some of the debates from the 1992 to 1997 Parliament, I noticed that in one such debate—I will talk about it if I catch your eye, Mr Deputy Speaker—nine or 10 men spoke or intervened. I regret that there are not more Members in the Chamber for this debate, particularly those who are not of the fairer sex.

[Mrs Spelman]

I hope that today’s Hansard will be read, and that more hon. Gentlemen will be in the Chamber in subsequent debates on international women’s day. We sought this debate to mark that day, of which this year’s theme is entitled, “Make it happen”. It is important for us in Parliament to mark the day, and in doing so we are standing with women all around the world who will mark it in their own forums and in their own way.

The year 2015 is an auspicious one for international women’s rights, because it is precisely 20 years since the Beijing declaration and platform for action, on which my right hon. Friend the Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs Gillan) led the UK delegation. That occasion really moved forward the world’s understanding, with an agenda for women’s empowerment which particularly focused on health care, education and violence against women.

2015 is an auspicious year for a debate on international women’s day because the millennium development goals come to fruition and the post-2015 framework that will follow them is in the throes of being decided. It is important to ensure that the concerns of women are at the heart of that debate because, as is often said, globally, poverty has a woman’s face. In 2015 the World Bank will also announce its social safeguards, including gender equality throughout its work.

Let me mention the important work of the United Nations Women organisation, which was established in 2010, and its head and executive director, Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka. It works on several key areas: leadership and political participation, as well as ending violence against women. I wish to focus on its work on economic empowerment, and what it is doing to make that happen. It is important to increase gender equality, reduce poverty and encourage growth, but empowering women to work and empowering women economically is necessary to break down the disadvantage they suffer from. When more women work, economies grow. If women’s paid employment rates were raised to the same level as men’s, the United States’ gross domestic product would be an estimated 9% higher, that of the eurozone would climb by 13%, and Japan’s would be boosted by 16%. Therefore, in 15 major developing economies, per capita income would rise by 14%. That is the evidence produced by UN Women.

[Mr Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP)]

I am listening intently to the right hon. Lady, and she is making a good argument that I have heard in many places. It is essentially an argument for equality—gender equality, but also social equality across the income bands in our country. In Sweden and other Nordic countries, we see the benefits of the argument she is making to all in society, compared with more unequal societies and the disadvantages that follow on from that.

[Mrs Spelman]

The hon. Gentleman makes a good point, and he has cited the Scandinavian countries that demonstrate best practice. Sadly, so much of the riskiest, lowest paid work in the world is performed by women, compounding the disadvantages they suffer from, and that is what UN Women has sought to tackle. Evidence from a range of countries shows that increasing the share of household income controlled by women changes spending in ways that benefit their children disproportionately. There are wide-ranging benefits for societies in empowering women economically. In the global economic context, women are still seriously disadvantaged in the workplace, and they have lower participation rates and higher rates of unemployment. They also have a greater propensity to be in vulnerable types of work. A wage gap still exists and women are over-represented in lower-paid jobs. The situation is bleakest of all in the developing world, where poverty is still rife.

I pay tribute to the work of the Department for International Development and its recognition that we must help the needs of women more. The UK has made a significant achievement in reaching the target of 0.7% of gross national income for aid. That money is spent on a wide range of areas, but one of DFID’s key priorities is to improve the lives of girls and women in the world’s poorest countries. Before you entered the Chamber, Mr Deputy Speaker, Mr Speaker invited us to make a few suggestions about how we might dilute the preponderance of male portraiture in politics that adorns the walls of the Houses of Parliament at both ends. To add to the gradually increasing list, I suggest that we consider former International Development Secretaries such as Baroness Chalker, who became so well known for what she had done for the world’s poorest people that she enjoyed the lovely nickname of “Mama Africa”. No doubt in due course the Secretary of State for International Development, my right hon. Friend the Member for Putney (Justine Greening), will find her place among the political portraits.

Let me return to the serious subject of what DFID is doing to address the needs of girls and women, which it states clearly lies at the heart of everything it does. We must stop poverty before it starts, because a girl starts at a disadvantage even before she is born. Much has already been achieved. DFID’s actions have helped 2.3 million women to get jobs and 18 million women to use financial services such as bank accounts and insurance. It has helped 4.5 million women to own and use land by supporting reforms to land and inheritance rights. Those things begin to reduce the serious disadvantages from which women suffer. The work of UN Women on economic empowerment includes improving access to jobs for women, reducing wage disparities, and helping women to accumulate economic assets and increase their influence on institutions that govern their lives.

[Jeremy Lefroy]

The first director of UN Women was Michelle Bachelet, now President of Chile for the second time. Does my right hon. Friend agree that one great thing that could be done to advance this cause would be for the next Secretary-General of the United Nations to be its first female head?

[Mrs Spelman]

My hon. Friend makes an important suggestion, and no doubt there are candidates preparing for that. Let us hope that a sufficient number of women come forward as candidates, as that is always the difficulty with top jobs such as that. I hope they will heed his encouragement.

UN Women has noted with particular concern the marginalised groups of women, which include

“rural women, domestic workers, some migrants and low-skilled women”,

and it is right to focus on those categories. As well as practical action to empower women and increase their economic independence, we must also tackle prevailing social norms that act against women in their economies. In many countries, social norms mean that some jobs are seen as unsuitable for women, or that female labour is always seen as low-skilled. Social norms can also mean that women’s income is seen as “additional pocket money” rather than essential income for their households. It is good to mention men who have advocated on behalf of women, so let me mention the well-deserved accolade that the central banker for Bangladesh, Dr Atiur Rahman, received for his initiative to enable mobile phone banking for garment workers in Bangladeshi factories. Such practical initiatives make a big difference.

The United Nations’ HeForShe campaign, which invites men to advocate for women, was launched by our very own Emma Watson last year. More than 227,000 men have signed up so far globally, including 28,000 in the UK—we might encourage hon. Gentlemen in this House to sign up. It is about recognising that equality and empowerment is not just a women’s issue—hence the need to involve men in the process to achieve it. In her speech launching the campaign, Emma Watson said:

“We all benefit socially, politically and economically from gender equality in our everyday lives. When women are empowered, the whole of humanity benefits. Gender equality liberates not only women but also men, from prescribed social roles and gender stereotypes.”

A very astute observation. It is also good to applaud the work of my hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Sir William Cash), who has taken up the cause of women, including difficult subjects, all of which helps the status and standing of women.

Some progress on the economic empowerment of women has been achieved through the millennium development goals, in particular goal 3, which is to

“promote gender equality and empower women”.

As Ban Ki-moon pointed out:

“The Millennium Development Goals recognised that gender equality and women’s empowerment are essential to tackling poverty, hunger and other global problems”.

As we look to the post-2015 development agenda, we need to ensure that women are at its very heart.

The year 2015 also provides an opportunity to review the Beijing platform for action, as this year’s commission begins next week. It takes place from 9 to 20 March, and will be attended by representatives of all member states, UN entities and non-governmental organisations from around the world. Where men and women have equal rights, societies prosper.

“Equality for women means progress for all”.

Those are not my words, but those of the Secretary-General.

[Mary Macleod]

I attended the UN Commission on the Status of Women during both the last two years, but last year I was disturbed by the lack of media coverage in the UK during the event and afterwards. Does my right hon. Friend have any thoughts on how we could raise the profile of the commission and what it discusses, given that it is so important for women around the world?

[Mrs Spelman]

rose—

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)]

Order. We need to speed up the debate a little because we are running out of time. There are still a number of speakers waiting to contribute. I ask subsequent speakers to aim for speeches of 10 to 14 minutes, which would be very helpful.

[Mrs Spelman]

I thank you for your guidance, Mr Deputy Speaker. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Brentford and Isleworth (Mary Macleod), who has done outstanding work on the all-party parliamentary group on women in Parliament, leading to the report “Improving Parliament”. I hope it will be taken up and that the changes it calls for will be made.

Let me deal briefly with economic empowerment in the United Kingdom, without repeating what others have said. I want to take up a theme about FTSE 100 companies. It is true that significant progress has been made in ensuring that every single FTSE 100 company now has a female on the board, yet still only 6.9% of their directors are female. I throw out a challenge to a female figure in the City—Fiona Woolf, for example—to invite all the chief executives from the FTSE 100 companies to come and present their female board members and two mentees from their own organisations whom they seek to promote to senior leadership roles. There are examples of good practice. Antony Jenkins, the chief executive officer at Barclays, set a target of 26% of senior leadership positions being held by women, and Barclays is on track to meet it. There are other such examples.

The Government have taken important action to empower women in our country economically, looking at issues such as the pay gap, recruitment, retention and promotion. I agree with the hon. Member for Slough (Fiona Mactaggart) that we should work together across the House to deal with anomalies such as women, particularly older women, being seriously left behind on wage differentials. We should take action on a cross-party basis.

There are still many areas for improvement. Research produced by Cambridge university’s Murray Edwards college, entitled “Women Today, Women Tomorrow”, clearly showed that the most difficult challenge its respondents faced in their careers was still the non-supportive culture of their workplaces.

The workplace of Parliament is a difficult workplace for women. I call on you, Mr Deputy Speaker, as well as the Front Benchers, to take forward the recommendations in “Improving Parliament”, particularly that calling for the creation of a new Select Committee on equalities to consider departmental policies and programmes and scrutinise Government performance on equality. It is significant that the House’s own workplace equality network, principally a staff network, strongly supports the call for such a Select Committee to be created—the conditions in which women work affect our staff just as much as female Members of Parliament.

Let me finish with the simple observation that we need more women in this place—and, in the spirit of this year’s theme, we need to make it happen.

12:54

[Ann Clwyd (Cynon Valley) (Lab)]

I apologise for not being here at the start of the debate. I had not originally intended to participate, because I have taken part in similar debates in the Chamber as well as Westminster Hall many times over the past 30 years, and in those debates a variety of Members, male and female, have joined in the call for greater equality for women in this place and elsewhere.

To strike a consensual note at the beginning, I agree with the right hon. Member for Meriden (Mrs Spelman) about Lynda Chalker. I shadowed Lynda Chalker for a number of years, and always thought she should have been in the Cabinet—Margaret Thatcher should have put her there. I am therefore pleased to support the idea of having a portrait of Lynda Chalker somewhere on the parliamentary estate. She was an excellent Minister and she continues her work elsewhere.

I am here because I was listening to the debate and realised that no one was going to mention female genital mutilation. I introduced legislation to amend the Prohibition of Female Circumcision Act 1985, yet there have been no successful prosecutions. I view prosecutions as essential, because they will provide a real warning to the people who continue to carry out this practice. Unfortunately, I doubt whether it will be stopped without prosecutions. An attempt at a prosecution was mounted a few months ago. A piece I read about it was headed: “FGM Trial. Why has no one ever been convicted in Britain despite the practice being illegal for 30 years?”

Everybody knows that “female genital mutilation” is a collective term for a number of procedures, including the removal of parts, or all, the external female genitalia for non-medical reasons. FGM has no health benefits, and its dangers include severe bleeding, problems with urinating, infections, infertility, complications in childbirth and increased risk of death for the new-born. It is internationally recognised as a violation of the human rights of girls and women.

The World Health Organisation estimates that more than 125 million girls and women world wide are currently living with the consequences of FGM. The UK Government estimate that up to 24,000 girls under the age of 15 are at risk of FGM in the UK. A report from City university London, undertaken in collaboration with Equality Now, estimates that approximately 60,000 girls up to the age of 14 were born in England and Wales to mothers who had undergone FGM.

There is a large minority Somali community in some areas, particularly in Wales. I recently attended a talk by an assistant police commissioner who failed even to mention the subject of FGM. I wonder whether the efforts made in education, medical circles and so forth are enough to contribute to stopping this practice in those communities. The legislation that I pushed through Parliament in 2003 raised the maximum penalty for FGM from five to 14 years in prison, and made it an offence for UK nationals or permanent UK residents to carry out FGM abroad, even in countries where it is legal. I hope there will be lots of campaigns. One led by Fahma Mohamed and supported by The Guardian and change.org. called on the Government to require all schools to teach about FGM and raise awareness of its associated dangers. A related e-petition, “Stop FGM in the UK Now”, has been signed by more than 200,000 people. As a result, the Education Secretary wrote to all schools and issued new guidance on the teaching of FGM.

[Nic Dakin (Scunthorpe) (Lab)]

I have been listening carefully to my right hon. Friend’s contribution to this very important debate. I am sure she will be pleased to hear that I shall be joining an assembly at Frederick Gough school tomorrow at which an outside organisation will be giving a presentation on the very matter she is talking about. Education is going on today in our schools.

[Ann Clwyd]

That is very welcome information. I am sure those on the Front Benches will have further information on measures that have been taken to stamp out this abhorrent practice.

[Mary Macleod]

Just to emphasise the right hon. Lady’s point, last year in my constituency in West Middlesex hospital there were 50 cases of FGM. They were noted only because those women happened to be giving birth. I think this is far more widespread than we can imagine.

[Ann Clwyd]

I thank the hon. Lady and agree with her on that point. I think a lot is going on under cover and has not yet been exposed. There is a real need for proactive and determined enforcement and prevention, including sex and relationship education in all schools.

I believe wider action is needed to prevent young girls from becoming victims, and to prosecute those who practise FGM. This should be a key part of any strategy to tackle violence against women and girls. It is simply wrong for there to have been no successful prosecutions for FGM in all this time. If they can do it in France, why can we not do it in the United Kingdom?

13:01

[Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham) (Con)]

It is a great pleasure to follow the right hon. Member for Cynon Valley (Ann Clwyd) and I pay tribute to her. She was first elected to this House in 1984, and I think it was in 1985 that she had the opportunity in the private Members’ Bill ballot to introduce legislation. Having been in that position myself, I know how inundated with suggestions Members are when they strike it lucky in the ballot, but she chose the banning of female circumcision. It is a tribute to her and her work that it became law in 1985. I think it was amended in 2003. Like her, I cannot believe that we have not had a single successful prosecution to date in the UK. I hope that is something that those listening to this debate outwith this Chamber will take on board, and make sure that this absolutely abhorrent practice is stamped out in the UK, if not in the whole world.

[Margot James]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that the Government’s recent announcements and the placing of responsibilities on the health service and schools for reporting suspicions of FGM should help to bring about a prosecution, and hopefully many more prosecutions in the future?

[Mrs Gillan]

I very much hope so. We need to pay more attention to this. My hon. Friend may know that I have been a great supporter of mandatory reporting of sexual abuse for a long time, because of the efforts of my constituent Tom Perry. I think this falls into a similar category, and I hope we make good progress.

The right hon. Member for Cynon Valley entered the House in 1984. I think she is the longest-serving Member in the Chamber at the moment, and I am probably the second-longest-serving Member. [Interruption.] The hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar (Mr MacNeil) makes a comment from a sedentary position. I am certainly the Mother of the Government Benches in this debate, although I am not sure how much good that does. In the 23 years I have been in Parliament, I have seen an awful lot of changes: changes that have been good and changes that I am surprised have not happened. Sadly, we still have an awfully long way to go at home and abroad before women truly have equal roles and responsibilities in politics, public life and business, and have true equality. I join my right hon. Friend the Member for Meriden (Mrs Spelman) in calling for the implementation of the report she referred to in her contribution.

I hope we can build on what I and colleagues in the 90s originally called the “mainstreaming” of equality issues in legislation and in this House. It is sad that today, all these years later, we are having to contemplate setting up a Select Committee to deal with this. But as we have not mainstreamed gender issues in our legislation and in the activities of this House and in the wider world, I add my voice in support of a Select Committee of this nature, as I would support the calls for Baroness Chalker to be immortalised in bronze, in oils or something else entirely. It is important to remember, Madam Deputy Speaker, that in my time in this House I saw the first female Speaker, in the form of Betty Boothroyd. I am second to none in my admiration for the contribution that that woman made in the Chair. Our two female Deputy Speakers also make an excellent contribution to this place. [Hon. Members: “Hear, hear.”]

May I just bang the drum a little bit for my party? I am pleased to say that Baroness Shepherd was in fact the first Minister with specific responsibilities for women’s issues in Government. Time moves on and we seem to forget that both the Labour party and the Conservative party—with other parties, I would admit—have tried to forge the way forward for women. When I was looking at some background papers for this debate, I was particularly pleased to see that under this Government all the FTSE 100 companies have at least one female board member. There are more women in work—they now number some 14.4 million—than ever before. Colleagues have mentioned other firsts, but I would like to mention one close to my heart, which is the Right Rev. Libby Lane becoming our first Church of England bishop. That is a milestone. Wing Commander Nikki Thomas this year became the first woman to command an RAF fast jet squadron. I remember when I was doing my armed forces and parliamentary fellowship with the RAF that much was made of Jo Salter, who was our first RAF fast jet pilot. It is good to see women taking their place in the front line, quite rightly, and we should continue to allow that to happen.

I am proud to have been the first female Secretary of State for Wales, and I am pleased to be joined on these Benches by two other colleagues who have served as full Cabinet Members. It is right that we need to have more women progressing up the political ladder and that they have the opportunity to make a contribution to this country, particularly at Cabinet level. I pay tribute to my right hon. Friends the Members for Basingstoke (Maria Miller) and for Meriden (Mrs Spelman) who both made very valuable contributions to the government of this country.

These debates are not new to me. In fact, on 7 March 1996, as the Under-Secretary of State at the Department for Education and Employment with responsibility for women’s issues under Baroness Shepherd—what a long title that was!—I was able to introduce the debate on international women’s day. It was, I believe, for a Conservative the first debate on the Floor of the House in Government time. It is sad that we have gone backwards, having to apply to the Backbench Business Committee to have this debate, and that it had been relegated to Westminster Hall. Mainstreaming of this matter should mean that the Government of the day, of whatever complexion, secure this debate on or around international women’s day on the Floor of the House every year. It should enter the political lexicon.

When I introduced that debate, I had recently returned from Beijing where I had led the UK delegation at the UN conference on women. Baroness Chalker was alongside me, again fighting the good fight, as was Baroness Browning, who was then the Member for Tiverton and Honiton. I have to say that I greatly miss Baroness Browning in this House. Among her other nicknames from male colleagues she was often referred to, in a friendly fashion, as Boudicca. At least Boudicca is immortalised in public art in a bronze not far from here. Perhaps we could do with a few more women outside among the bronzes that decorate our city.

We were in Beijing to consider the progress made on women’s issues since 1985 and negotiate the very large document on the global Platform for Action. We had taken 18 months to prepare for the conference, working with the most amazing women’s organisations and non-governmental organisations, including the Equal Opportunities Commission, which was headed that year by Kamlesh Bahl, and the Women’s National Commission. They put in the most tremendous work.

[Fiona Mactaggart]

Does the right hon. Lady share my regret about the abolition of the Women’s National Commission?

[Mrs Gillan]

I think, as with everything, time moves on. Not least, devolution has broken up what used to be the Equal Opportunities Commission of Great Britain and Northern Ireland in the days when I was responsible for it. However, there is still a requirement for organisations that represent equal opportunities, and so perhaps in that sense I do join the hon. Lady in regretting it.

The Beijing conference was inspirational. There were 17,000 participants and 30,000 activists. The NGOs were based some way out of Beijing, and there was inclement weather. Many of these women and champions of women attended the conference in some of the most amazingly awful conditions of mud and deprivation because they were so desperate to pursue their single purpose of gender equality and the empowerment of women.

As my right hon. Friend the Member for Meriden mentioned, this is the 20th anniversary of the Beijing conference. The UN has given its main campaign the title “Empowering Women, Empowering Humanity: Picture It!” with “Make it happen” as the subtitle. The platform for action was the most progressive blueprint ever for advancing women’s rights. UN Women says that even 20 years later, the Beijing declaration and Platform for Action remain a powerful source of guidance and inspiration. With no fewer than 189 Governments involved in its drafting, one can imagine what was involved. The civil servants on my team spent many hours, including through the night, fine-tuning the document so that we could all sign up to it. In many countries, the tenets it set out have proved to be a platform for improvements for women. Around the world, UN Women says that more women and girls than at any previous point in time now serve in political office, are protected by laws against gender-based violence, and live under constitutions guaranteeing gender equality. I would say, however, that no country has yet finished the agenda. I really hope that in this 20th year since the declaration we can give more impetus to progressing the critical areas of concern that were set out. I hope that in winding up this debate or in any declarations that are made on 8 March the Minister will ensure that the Government set out what they are going to do to build on the platform for action.

In the mission statement of the declaration, we stated that one of the objectives was the

“full realization of all human rights and fundamental freedoms of all women”

and was essential for the empowerment of women. I want to explore this a little further in the light of propositions that are being made to change our own human rights legislation and our relationship with the European Court of Human Rights. I declare an interest in that I am a member of the Council of Europe and serve as vice-president of the Political Affairs and Democracy Committee in that capacity. I am today seeking assurances that we will not be taking any action that would weaken the protections afforded to British citizens and, in the context of this debate, particularly women.

For example, one of the proposals is to limit the reach of human rights cases in the UK so that British armed forces overseas are not subject to persistent human rights claims that undermine their ability to do their job and keep us safe. That sounds very sensible and something we could all agree with. However, this change could prevent, for example, a case that was brought recently under article 2 of the European convention on human rights, which enabled the tragic death by suicide of a female Royal Military Police officer after reporting that she had been raped in Germany by two colleagues to be re-examined in a fresh inquest. That re-examination allowed the full circumstances of the background to her suicide to be taken into account, and the Army has now introduced a special code of practice exclusively to deal with blue-on-blue rape and sexual assaults. We have to ask whether, if we limited the reach of human rights cases to the UK, it would be possible to pursue that case.

The current situation on human rights has afforded much needed justice in many cases involving women. The tragic case of my namesake, Cheryl James, who was found dead at the Princess Royal barracks in Deepcut, has taken a long path since her death in 1995 to July 2014 when Liberty successfully used article 2 of the ECHR—the right to life, which includes the right to an effective and independent investigation when there is a state involvement in the death—to gain the High Court order for the original verdict to be quashed and a fresh inquest to take place.

Let us consider modern problems. Liberty persuaded Dorset police not to return intimate photographs of sexual abuse victims to their abuser by using article 8 of the ECHR, which provides for a right to private life. If any proposal is going to restrict the use of human rights laws to the most serious cases, this sort of action and protection may be prevented and may be unable to be brought. The photographs of the abused children were just family photographs—they were in swimsuits enjoying themselves—but their potential return to their abuser on his mobile phone after he came out of prison added to their feelings of exploitation and powerlessness. I would be very concerned if this sort of protection, and the means whereby it could be invoked, were to disappear. I hope that no changes that we make to human rights law would prevent what I consider to be an important plank in the protection of women and children in this country.

As we celebrate women and their achievements here and throughout the world, I hope we can use the 20th anniversary of Beijing to refresh our efforts to achieve the vision we aspired to for a world where women and girls can exercise their freedoms and choices, and realise all their rights. I hope that we would not contemplate a narrower set of laws that may be regressive and may not allow future generations of women either here or abroad to be fully protected from the sorts of circumstances that I outlined in the latter part of my speech.

13:17

[Jessica Lee (Erewash) (Con)]

I, too, thank the Backbench Business Committee for its support for this debate. I particularly thank my right hon. Friends the Members for Basingstoke (Maria Miller) and for Meriden (Mrs Spelman) and others for leading the application, holding the fort before the Committee, and securing a debate in the main Chamber. I join my right hon. Friend the Member for Meriden in saying how important it is that we take every opportunity to hold this debate in the main Chamber. I think we are all very pleased to be here today.

International women’s day unites us all across the planet and gives us an opportunity not only to discuss issues where there has been significant progress on supporting women but to highlight issues where there is still much more to be done. The theme this year, as we have heard, is “Make it happen”, and I know that we are all united in trying to achieve everything we can.

One of the huge privileges of having the role of Member of Parliament is the chance to visit businesses and local organisations in our constituencies. Over the past five years, I have had the chance to meet many inspirational women leaders in my constituency. They probably do not realise it, but they are true role models for many others, particularly young women in the area. Let me give a few examples. Furniture making and upholstery is a long-standing traditional industry in my constituency. We are still world leaders in that field. For example, we have Steed Upholstery. Caroline Steed is one of the family members leading that business extremely successfully. She is a very knowledgeable, intelligent business woman who is very calm in her approach and has always been extremely helpful, particularly to a new Member of Parliament who had not previously seen how a sofa is made from scratch but is now, I can assure all Members, quite in tune with it.

I think of our local head teachers. Women are leading many of our junior schools in Erewash. I think of the voluntary sector as well. I am a big fan of the girl guides. We had a summit in Erewash, and girl guides, rainbows and brownies from all over Derbyshire descended on it, along with their leaders, who are wonderful women. They give up so much time to support girls and young women, and theirs is such a brilliant organisation.

Many people have been praised by other Members for their contributions to business and society, and indeed politics, in Britain. I want to mention Julie Bentley, who leads the girl guides movement. She is a fantastic leader, and has described the girl guides as “the ultimate feminist organisation”. I have had the pleasure of sharing a platform and a debate with her. She was truly remarkable: a very impressive woman. I do not know whether any Members had an opportunity to hear her being interviewed on “Desert Island Discs” in the last few months, but it was a fascinating programme. You will be relieved to know, Madam Deputy Speaker, that one of her choices was Eminem—I shall not repeat the lyrics of any of his songs—but she also chose Eurythmics and Aretha Franklin singing “Sisters Are Doin’ It for Themselves”, which, perhaps, makes our point.

The Erewash Partnership provides support for businesses, networking and leadership. This year, to mark its 25 years of success, it moved to new premises, which were opened by another local woman, Saira Khan. As some Members may recall, she appeared in the first series of the television programme “The Apprentice”, and she has gone on to have a successful career in business and the media. We were very lucky that she came to the constituency to support the partnership.

The role of women who have gone before us, particularly those in public life, has already been mentioned. Members have cited, for instance, suffragettes and politicians. I want to tell a story which, although it may be sad, is very important. It concerns a young woman who has made a huge impact, which she probably never realised would happen. That young woman was also called Jessica—Jessica Gauntley. I had the privilege of meeting her family, but, sadly, I never met Jessica. She lived in my constituency, but at the age of 15 she fell very ill, and she lost her battle against a brain tumour.

I have no doubt that that young woman has left not only a deep void among her loved ones, but a huge legacy which has had an impact on a great many people in my constituency. She was such a vibrant, intelligent, energetic young woman. She inspired a campaign, the Jessica Hope Foundation, which has raised a huge amount of awareness of brain cancers, and has done a huge amount of fundraising.

As I said earlier, that is a very sad story about a young woman, but I think it important that her legacy lives on. She is one of many women who have been able to achieve such a thing, and we thank her for it. I also thank her family for their kindness, and for involving me in their campaign when it has been possible for them to do so.

Members have referred to the founding of international women’s day. It was originally concerned with justice in the workplace, but has expanded to include many other important matters that are relevant to women. As others have said, when it comes to women in business and the workplace there is always much more to do, but we have made progress in this country. There are now 14.4 million women in work—more than ever before—and more women lead businesses than ever before. In the 12 months to September 2014, 80.1% of women aged between 16 and 64 were employed in Erewash, compared with 71.5% of men. Historically, when a number of traditional industries in my constituency have declined, women have taken the lead in acquiring senior managerial roles in local businesses.

Near my constituency is a branch of Roll-Royce International, which does a huge amount to promote women, particularly as apprentices, and to promote their careers in science, technology and engineering. Bombardier plays a similar role. We are lucky to have those companies, because they set a great example. There has been a big campaign to attract more women to science and engineering, and those businesses are doing just that.

[Margot James]

My hon. Friend has given the excellent examples of Rolls-Royce and Bombardier, which have been encouraging women to take up careers in engineering. Such careers require scientific qualifications. Does she agree that it is imperative for us to encourage girls to stick with the sciences when they are very young and have the necessary aptitude? Is that not crucial to their potential career choices when they become adults?

[Jessica Lee]

I entirely agree. We must ensure that, from an early age, girls are interested and motivated, that they are aware of the variety of jobs that they can obtain through science and engineering, and that they understand why those important subjects are relevant and can create a fascinating career path.

[Jenny Willott]

Does the hon. Lady agree that we should also think about the toys that children play with when they are extremely young, and ensure that they have a variety of experiences? Should we not encourage girls to play with science and engineering kits, rather than confining those exciting toys to the boys’ aisles in supermarkets so that girls think that they can only dress up, play with dolls and so on?

[Jessica Lee]

I am all for that. As a child, I was never happier than when I was playing with Lego. [Interruption.] No, I do not still play with Lego. I focus entirely on my work.

As I was saying, more women are taking managerial and other senior roles in companies in my constituency. In many households, they are the main breadwinners. I grew up near my constituency, and I need look no further than my own family for strong female role models. My mother was our main breadwinner. She was a paediatric nurse in the NHS for more than 40 years. Looking back, I have no idea how she managed to run a household, to bring up three children, some of whom were more trouble than others—I was no trouble at all, of course—and to work full time for very long hours, doing night shifts at Queen’s medical centre in Nottingham.

My interest in current affairs was sparked by my maternal grandmother. I remember clearly being shown the newspapers by her as a child. We were not a political family—there was no party politics—but she used to show me the international pages, saying, “You need to learn about the world around you. You need to know about current affairs, and what is happening all over the globe.” She also said, “Politics is not just for the boys at school, you know.” That is what sparked my interest in politics, and I am happy to have the chance to mention my grandmother in the House today.

We need to encourage women to enter public service and all the professions. I must say that, although I might not have succeeded for many other reasons, it never occurred to me that because I was a woman I could not, would not or should not go into politics. That never even crossed my mind. My basic motivation—I think that the same applies to many women in the House—was to get things done. We may disagree across the House about exactly how we are to achieve that, but surely we all agree that we go into politics to get things done.

When I talk to young women in my constituency, particularly sixth-formers, I tell them that although the 30 minutes of theatre that is Prime Minister’s Question Time has its place and its tradition in the House, it is during the week that the valuable cross-party work is done, in Select Committees and all-party parliamentary groups—and, of course, there is the Backbench Business Committee. The list goes on and on. Those rewarding projects, involving cross-party work and themes on which people are united, are extremely satisfying, and that is often the way in which things get done.

[Mary Macleod]

I always felt that I could do anything in life. That was partly due to my mother—I have that in common with my hon. Friend—but there was also the example of people such as Baroness Thatcher, who was Prime Minister when we were growing up. She was an incredible woman, and she showed us that anyone could achieve anything.

[Jessica Lee]

I entirely agree. One of my earliest memories of watching current affairs programmes is of watching programmes about the miners’ strike and, before that, the Falklands war. I remember asking at home, “Who is this person?”, and being amazed and impressed that we had a woman Prime Minister.

As for the message that we should convey, it is true that we need longevity in the House, but I think it a great idea to tell women who may be thinking about becoming Members of Parliament but do not want to be in the House of Commons for ever, that that is fabulous too. We need to support the choices that women make, or want to make, so that they can achieve the goals that they want to achieve, while juggling all their other responsibilities.

[Mr MacNeil]

The hon. Lady is making an excellent speech. Both it and today’s debate are about closing the gaps in society. At the root of these gaps are economic gaps between men and women. That is part of the equality agenda, too, as I mentioned earlier. The gaps between the richest and the poorest are reflected in male-female issues, and she is highlighting very well the role models who are helping to change the situation, particularly in her own constituency. These are the people who lead, and others do follow. I congratulate her on her speech.

[Jessica Lee]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his kind comments. There has been progress. This is not a party political speech, and we have made huge steps in this Parliament towards having more women in the workplace and closing that gap, and taking more women out of tax entirely. A high proportion of the millions of people who are now out of tax are women. These things are important in giving women choices about their lives and they help them to make decisions for themselves and their family.

Today is international women’s day and others have spoken with far more insight and experience than I have about the issues on the international agenda. For my part, in the course of this Parliament I have had the opportunity, through the Conservative party, to go to Kenya and work with women politicians there, to deliver training on democracy and modern social media campaigning skills for elections, although I am sure I learned far more from them than they ever learned from me. That group of motivated, intelligent, dedicated women politicians was extremely formidable and capable. I felt very united with women in another part of the world who felt the same way: they wanted to get on and get things done. That is the key to being passionate about public service.

I am looking forward to celebrating international women’s day and I feel that my service as an MP has enriched me in celebrating it. I believe I have more knowledge and am far better informed, motivated and committed to fighting the corner for women across the globe as we celebrate this very important day.

13:32

[Seema Malhotra (Feltham and Heston) (Lab/Co-op)]

I am delighted to have the opportunity to speak in this important debate. I thank the right hon. Members for Basingstoke (Maria Miller) and for Meriden (Mrs Spelman) and the hon. Member for Erewash (Jessica Lee) for securing the debate, and I thank the Backbench Business Committee, too.

We have had an extremely wide-ranging debate and important issues have been raised on both sides of the House. Indeed, Parliament has an important tradition of marking international women’s day at a time when we must recognise the challenges we face in achieving gender equality in Britain and around the world, as well as celebrating the achievements of women. The right hon. Member for Basingstoke was right to focus on Formula 1 female driver Susie Wolff and on the first female bishop, as well as on important issues about equality in the workplace and in politics, and securing a commitment from the Speaker to put up a new set of women’s portraits based on the recommendations of Members.

My hon. Friend the Member for Islington South and Finsbury (Emily Thornberry) made some very passionate remarks, not least on the need for men to do more housework, but also on the importance of equal pay and checking that our law is still fit for purpose.

The hon. Member for Brentford and Isleworth (Mary Macleod) called for a new Select Committee, and I congratulate her on the important work she has done in the all-party group for women in Parliament. She also talked about women and entrepreneurship, and as a fellow Hounslow Member of Parliament I certainly recognise the importance of supporting women in business across our borough.

My hon. Friend the Member for Slough (Fiona Mactaggart) made a passionate speech and raised some sensitive and important issues about making sure that there is no cultural excuse for violence against women and girls. She also talked about the documentary “India’s Daughter”, which was shown on BBC 4 last night, and the issues it raised about cultural attitudes to gender and the place of women in society and the rights of women as equals not just in one nation but across the world. She also raised some important issues around older women and access to work and equal pay, and also women in prison and how their rehabilitation differs from that of men.

The right hon. Member for Meriden raised some important issues about the empowerment of women economically. The HeForShe campaign makes clear the important principle that gender equality is not just a matter for women; it is also a matter for men to engage with.

I also recognise the efforts of my right hon. Friend the Member for Cynon Valley (Ann Clwyd), who has done an incredible amount of work to move forward legislation around female genital mutilation, and who remains a passionate campaigner on that cause and on ending FGM within a generation.

The right hon. Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs Gillan) talked about gender-based violence as well as child abuse and the protection of young girls at risk. She also referred to the importance of ensuring that the Beijing Platform for Action continues to be recognised and built on for future generations, until we realise its goals.

The hon. Member for Erewash talked of Girlguiding and its work, as well as the representation of women in business and science and representation more generally.

I would like to make a few general points recognising the importance of international women’s day across the nation. It will be marked by a range of events, not least in Hounslow on Saturday where up to 1,000 women from all faiths and communities are expected to come together, recognising the role women play in working together to build strong networks in society and sharing that common goal of tackling inequality.

The “women of the world” festival at the South Bank is also holding a range of events connecting politics and civic society, and this year’s global theme of “Make it happen” is incredibly important in continuing to inspire the work done by so many organisations. We have heard mention of Plan UK, Women for Women, Co-ordinated Action Against Domestic Abuse, and the violence against women and girls campaigners across the country, including on FGM, RISE UK, Women’s Aid, Refuge, the Hollie Gazzard Trust and the White Ribbon Campaign.

Two weeks ago I joined my right hon. Friend the Member for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford (Yvette Cooper) and my hon. Friend the Member for Walthamstow (Stella Creasy) and the tireless campaigner Lynne Franks for “one billion rising”, a campaign that recognises that over the course of their lifetime one in three women on the planet will be raped or beaten; staggeringly, that is 1 billion women. We also know that one in 20 children under 18 is sexually abused in the UK, 90% by people they know. We have also heard mention of the fact that two women are killed each week by their partner or their ex here in the UK, and that a staggering 1.2 million women reported incidents of domestic violence last year.

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

Some of us have been in Committee during this debate, but some of us have very powerful women in their family; I have three daughters and a wife, and also a lot of women constituents. Those of us who served on the anti-stalking campaign know that there are many challenges still to meet. Does my hon. Friend agree that, looking at the recent cases of abuse against young women and girls, we need to think seriously about changing the age of consent—moving it up a year, just as a signal—and doing something about the way the police take things for granted and become very casual about whether it is proper to prosecute for statutory rape after the age of 12?

[Seema Malhotra]

My hon. Friend makes some important points. I will be touching on a couple of issues around girls’ safety and recognising that we have a particular role in making sure that the world is safer for young women growing up today.

I have been undertaking a series of girls’ safety summits around the country, and what I have found staggering is the commonality of experience, whether among young girls in Rotherham, in Croydon or in Hounslow. They have a sense that society is not on their side as they go about their ordinary lives, even going to and from school. They do not always feel safe, and to some extent, adults have buried their heads in the sand when it comes to the reality of young people’s lives today.

I want to make a couple of points about equal pay. Women today still earn only about 80p for every male-earned pound, 45 years after Labour’s Barbara Castle passed the Equal Pay Act 1970. That is why I am proud that Labour has backed the ten-minute rule Bill introduced by my hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham (Sarah Champion), which demands that large companies show their commitment to equal pay for men and women by publishing their gender pay gap. Parliament voted in favour of her Bill, but the Government have so far refused to implement it.

I am also proud of the role that successive Labour Governments have played in ensuring progress by breaking down barriers and enabling women to smash the glass ceiling. Labour introduced the Equal Pay Act 1970 and the Sex Discrimination Act 1975, as well as introducing the national minimum wage—which we are committed to raising to £8 an hour—which helps around 1 million people a year, the vast majority of whom are women. We extended maternity leave and doubled maternity pay. We also introduced paternity leave, which I believe has shifted our national culture and indeed the debate about the role of men in the home—the other side of the coin as we also debate the role and progress of women in the workplace.

I want to move on to political representation. I think there will be agreement on both sides of the House that it is a matter of shame for our nation that only 23% of Members of Parliament are women. Internationally, we rank either 57th or 74th—depending on the measure used—out of 190 countries for the number of women in Parliament. That is hardly a record of which we can be proud, given that we are referred to as the mother of Parliaments. Political representation matters, because it is through diversity in decision making that we get the best decisions. We bring the reality of women’s lives into our parliamentary debates. We have 650 MPs today, yet only 370 women have ever been elected to Parliament, in total. I am told that I was the 366th.

However, although the number of women MPs in Westminster has increased, representation at the most senior level has decreased. Five women currently hold Cabinet positions—around 14%—but what matters is not only representation but women’s access to positions of power. It is significant that around 45% of Labour’s shadow Cabinet are women. Should Labour win in May, we will form the most gender-balanced Government that Britain has ever seen.

Positive action has been taken in the Labour party to increase women’s representation in Parliament, but positive action is not enough on its own. We need to see more women from all backgrounds coming forward to stand for election—women of different ages, from different ethnic minorities and from different parts of the United Kingdom. I pay tribute to the groups that campaign for and encourage women to come forward in politics, including the 50:50 Parliament campaign, EMILY’s List, the Labour Women’s Network, the Fabian Women’s Network and the equivalent Conservative and Liberal Democrat groups. Women’s political rights can be meaningless unless they are matched by social and economic rights. A woman with the vote is not equal if she is subject to violence, poverty and exclusion from society. Politics has to be connected with our campaigns for social and economic progress, and the representation of women in Parliament is vital to achieving all those goals.

This has been an excellent debate. The gender agenda needs to stay on Parliament’s agenda. We should be confident and proud of our role in the world. We must ensure that we make progress on the rights of women and girls, progress on their need for education, safety and clean water, and progress in the workplace. These arguments must be heard at every level of Government and of the international political decision making bodies. We must do our job of keeping the law up to date in support of equal rights, and this place needs to lead the fight to empower, encourage and inspire girls and women in Britain and across the world to achieve their dreams. In doing that, we will make progress for future generations.

13:44

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Women and Equalities (Jo Swinson)]

It is a great pleasure to respond to this important and enjoyable debate and to follow the hon. Member for Feltham and Heston (Seema Malhotra). I join her in congratulating the wide range of groups and organisations that do so much to campaign for the rights of women and girls, particularly on the subject of representation, which is key to this whole agenda.

We have heard excellent speeches today from Members on both sides of the House, although not quite enough men have contributed to the debate. I hope that in future years more of our male colleagues will be tempted to take part, and I offer my sincere thanks to those hon. Gentlemen who have taken part today.

[Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)]

I should like to intervene at this point.

[Jo Swinson]

I shall certainly give way to my hon. Friend.

[Bob Stewart]

One of the reasons I came to listen to the debate today was that I want to applaud women. In my experience—I am talking about my military experience—they are not just equal; they are sometimes at a higher level. Women are fantastic at running operations rooms, for example. They are better than men at doing that. Also, I often used to choose a woman, rather than a man, to run a negotiation or a mediation. On international women’s day, we should not only applaud women for being equal but emphasise the fact that they can be much better than men at doing some things.

[Jo Swinson]

My hon. Friend makes the case for having diversity within teams so that a wide range of skills can be brought to any given task.

We need to strike the right balance in these debates between celebrating progress and harnessing energy for change. It is right that we should celebrate the great progress we have seen in the past five years. We have seen a huge increase in the number of women on company boards, for example, and the first woman bishop. Also, the First Secretary of State and Leader of the House of Commons, my right hon. Friend the Member for Richmond (Yorks) (Mr Hague), has done excellent work to propel up the international agenda the issue of preventing sexual violence in conflict. We have seen changes in employment law to extend the right to request flexible working and to introduce shared parental leave. Tax threshold changes have taken 3 million people out of taxation, 58% of whom are women, and there has been new legislation to criminalise forced marriage, to expand the definition of domestic abuse and to introduce new stalking offences. And of course, there are more women in work than ever before.

However, we should not kid ourselves that it is all fine, because it is not. It is not okay that three quarters of company directors in the FTSE 100 are male. It is not okay that girls and women face a continual stream of sexist insults and abuse, as documented by the Everyday Sexism project. It is not okay that there is still a 19% gender pay gap. It is not okay that two women a week are killed as a result of domestic violence. It is not okay that 40% of teenage girls report being coerced into having sex. It is not okay that a pregnant MP who dares to aspire to a Cabinet role should be subjected to a sexist diatribe by various sections of the media. And it is not okay that three quarters of MPs are men. So we still have a lot more to do.

In the debate today we have heard not only celebration but a call to arms for the tasks and battles ahead. My right hon. Friend the Member for Basingstoke (Maria Miller), the former Minister for Women and Equalities, has undertaken excellent work to ensure that revenge porn is properly criminalised and that action is taken in that regard. She made the case for a House of Commons Select Committee on women and equality, as has the all-party parliamentary group for women in Parliament. That is long overdue. There seems to be an obvious gap in our Select Committee structure and, although this is not a matter for the Government, I hope that the powers that be in the House will give the matter serious consideration when the new Parliament convenes in a few weeks’ time.

We have also heard that more progress is needed on finding ways of celebrating women around Parliament, including perhaps through portraits. We heard many good suggestions from various contributors, and I am sure that Mr Speaker and others will look at them with interest in Hansard.

We heard from the hon. Member for Islington South and Finsbury (Emily Thornberry) about a range of issues. She talked movingly about how women, whatever they decide, will always feel that they have made the wrong decision. It reminded me of a piece I heard on Radio 4’s “The News Quiz”, where Sandi Toksvig, in an answer, said, “Of course women cannot get it right, can they? If they have no kids, they are heartless. If they have children and stay at home, they are lazy. And if they have children and go out to work, they are selfish.” In response to silence from the other panellists she then said, “It’s not a joke. It’s just a rant.” I very much enjoyed that rant, and she was just stating a point of fact: women are judged for whatever they decide to do. We should be much more accommodating in recognising that people make different decisions.

The hon. Lady also talked about how women are still doing two thirds of the unpaid work, and I wholeheartedly agree that that is one of the major barriers to equality. It is one of the reasons why I am so enthusiastic about the changes we have made to introduce shared parental leave, because I do not believe we will be able to get equality in the workplace until we get more equality at home. Interestingly, Sheryl Sandberg points out in her excellent book “Lean In” that one of the important choices a woman makes for her career if she wishes to have a family is what the partner she chooses to do so with is like, because the attitudes he takes will have a massive impact on how she is able to juggle career and family responsibilities.

My hon. Friend the Member for Brentford and Isleworth (Mary Macleod) talked about women in business, giving a huge range of examples of successful business women, many of whose websites and shops I have to confess to using. I appreciate what they do from both a business perspective and a consumer perspective. I also pay tribute to the work my hon. Friend has done for business women in her constituency and more widely, particularly with the all-party group.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff Central (Jenny Willott) talked about the importance of many women with young children setting up businesses, and using that as a catalyst to make the change, and that of course can lead to great success. She also mentioned the important issue of how we set expectations early as to what girls and boys should be interested in, and whether they take on scientific or more domestic roles. She discussed how the toys they use at an early age can have an impact. That is so important because, as the recent Department for Work and Pensions campaign “Not just for boys” shows, we have a massive shortage of women in many sectors such as science, engineering and technology, and it is important that we address that. I have to say that #notjustforboys is a pretty good hashtag, but it does not compete with one of the best hashtags ever, #dinosaursforall. That is about a campaign set up by women who are very frustrated that Marks & Spencer has launched a new range of clothing, in conjunction with the Natural History museum, that has dinosaurs all over it and, surprise, surprise, it is marketed only at boys, because girls could not possibly be interested in dinosaurs. Tell that to my niece Charlotte—she would certainly disagree. Although these sometimes appear to be more light-hearted examples, the messages we send to children are very important in terms of what they grow up thinking they can and cannot do.

The hon. Member for Slough (Fiona Mactaggart) spoke movingly about the recent documentary on the rape in India, and I agree with her that it is to the credit of the media in this country that they do showcase these issues and highlight these problems. She is absolutely right to say that we must demolish these rape myths—the victim is never to blame. She also talked about older workers and said that she is looking forward to the report from Ros Altmann, as am I. We are recognising some of the specific challenges that older women might face, particularly carers. That goes back to the point made by the hon. Member for Islington South and Finsbury, who said that women tend to do two thirds of the unpaid work, because older women often have those caring responsibilities. That is why we have recently launched a £1.6 million project to run pilots with local authorities on how we can get carers into employment and make sure they are properly supported. I hope the results of those pilots can show us some good evidence about how we might take further projects forward. The hon. Member for Slough is also absolutely right to say that women need to be around the Cabinet Committee tables and in those positions of power. This is about power, and much as I dearly love my male colleagues, who do a fantastic job in standing up for their women constituents, we need diversity of representation if we are truly to get the action we need on this wide range of issues.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Meriden (Mrs Spelman) talked a lot about the international elements of international women’s day and highlighted the HeForShe campaign, which I agree is hugely important; men do have a vital role to play in this. Like her, I found the way Emma Watson kicked off that campaign absolutely amazing. Listening to the power of the speech given by that young woman, I thought she was a credit to the entire country in setting out the case so brilliantly.

The right hon. Member for Cynon Valley (Ann Clwyd) talked about FGM and was absolutely right to highlight this abhorrent crime. We are taking strong action on that. We have set up a specialist unit to deal with FGM—we held the girl summit last year—and to take global leadership. However, in no way do we think that this is not a problem in the UK—it is, as well as in other countries. That is why we are introducing a mandatory requirement for all health care and social care professionals and teachers to report FGM to the police. The lack of prosecutions is a problem, but that mandatory reporting will enable the evidence to be gathered. I hope and believe that situation will change in the future.

It was wonderful to hear from my right hon. Friend the Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs Gillan) about the original Beijing conference and Platform for Action that she attended, along with the drafting process of 189 Governments having to agree the text. That sounded interesting and it showed that Members of the House have obviously been working on this for a long time. [Interruption.] It is 20 years since that Beijing conference, but there is much more to do.

[Mrs Gillan]

The Minister is making good progress in her wind-up. It really brought it home to me when I said to my researcher that I did this back in 1995 and she said, “Oh, I was four then.”

[Jo Swinson]

Indeed. Interestingly, my right hon. Friend said that the text prepared then is still incredibly relevant. That is not only a testament to excellent drafting, but, in a sense, it is slightly depressing. She raised a specific issue about human rights protection, its extension and the armed forces case, and I will endeavour to write to her with more detail on that specific legal point.

My hon. Friend the Member for Erewash (Jessica Lee) spoke movingly about her constituent, and the legacy that young Jessica has left from her campaigning. My hon. Friend also spoke about support for Girlguiding UK, which I agree is a fantastic organisation, and its campaign to get girls’ voices heard in the forthcoming election is to be commended. I believe my hon. Friend is the only contributor today who has announced that she is standing down, so may I say that it should be noted that in just five years she has made an excellent contribution to this House? It is sad that she has decided to stand down. She will be missed, but I am sure she will continue with her contribution and campaigning in other guises.

In conclusion, I have certainly found it a huge privilege to serve as Minister for Women and Equalities. I have been supported by some wonderfully passionate and dedicated officials at the Government Equalities Office, and I wish to put my thanks to them on the record. It is absolutely right that we celebrate progress, but whatever the outcome of the election, whatever the colour of the Government in office and whoever is the Minister for Women and Equalities—I dearly hope to be able to continue this work—there is still a huge amount to do. We must continue to be impatient and create that change.

13:58

[Maria Miller]

I thank all right hon. and hon. Members who have supported and contributed to today’s wide-ranging debate. I particularly thank the Leader of the House, who earlier gave his personal support for the idea of establishing a women and equalities Select Committee, and Mr Speaker, for agreeing to consider the need to put women front and centre in this place through the portraiture that is on display. Those are practical changes, but the improved scrutiny can make a real difference. I also thank the Backbench Business Committee for its support and its understanding of the importance of holding today’s debate in this Chamber. As the hon. Member for Slough (Fiona Mactaggart) said, it is our responsibility through debates such as this to shift culture, forge alliances and achieve policy changes. This debate, in some small way, will have contributed to the objectives she set, particularly in highlighting the issues that still need to be addressed. The debate has also demonstrated that women are here at the table participating, not observing, and determining the future of our country.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Mrs Eleanor Laing)]

Rarely have I found it as difficult to sit in this Chair and say nothing as it has been this afternoon. I have achieved that, but I think I can preserve my impartiality while congratulating all those who have taken part in an excellent and essential debate—it is essential that it should take place in this Chamber.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House has considered International Women’s Day.

Welsh Affairs

Thursday 5th March 2015 Commons Chamber

14:00

[Glyn Davies (Montgomeryshire) (Con)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered Welsh affairs.

It is almost five years since I was elected Member of Parliament for Montgomeryshire. I wish to take this opportunity to say what a huge pleasure it has been for me to serve the constituency in which I have always lived. It is a great honour for me to open this debate today.

I am very grateful to the Backbench Business Committee for allowing a St David’s day debate, even if it is four days late. I hope our patron saint will forgive us for that. The normal business schedule of the House, which usually timetables such debates on Thursdays, means that we can hit the right date only once every seven years.

The general nature of this debate allows us to speak about a wide range of issues that impact Wales, and I am sure that Members will speak about many different things. I wish to begin by making a few introductory comments before turning briefly to the economic well-being of rural Wales. I shall end with some initial thoughts on the Command Paper, which was issued by the Secretary of State last week in response to the Silk commission recommendations.

In preparation for this debate, I have researched a little of the history of St David. It seems that he travelled widely before settling down in Pembrokeshire, which is one of the most beautiful parts of Britain. If he had been alive during the eight years that I represented mid and west Wales as an Assembly Member, he would have been one of my constituents, so I feel a special connection with him.

[Mr Elfyn Llwyd (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)]

He probably would not have voted for you.

[Glyn Davies]

Indeed. St David did many wonderful and awe-inspiring things in his long life, including preaching with such passion and fervour at Llanddewi Brefi that the earth rose up around him to form a hill. The most amusing reflection on that stunning achievement was made by the late great Dr John Davies, who said that he could not

“conceive of a miracle more superfluous than the creation of a new hill at Llanddewi Brefi.”

That is a good reflection on Dr John Davies as well as on St David. But It was an impressive trick none the less.

Holding a Welsh affairs debate on or near St David’s day is not an old tradition of this House. I discovered that while I was reading through the speeches of those who had previously opened what is now the annual Welsh debate. I was hoping that one of my great political heroes, David Lloyd George, had opened a Welsh debate at some stage so that I could say I was following in the great man’s footsteps. However, the first Welsh debate was not held until 1944 by which time the great man had retired from the House. None the less, the first Welsh debate was opened by a Lloyd George—it was Dame Megan Lloyd George, the great man’s daughter, who represented Ynys Môn before the rise to power of Cledwyn Hughes and, indeed, that of the current excellent Member of Parliament for Ynys Môn.

That leads me to the second part of my speech, which is the economic temperature of mid-Wales, specifically of my constituency of Montgomeryshire. Reading Dame Megan Lloyd George's speech in 1944, it struck me how little has changed in 70 years. In 1944, Dame Megan spoke of a crisis in the dairy industry, a focus on south Wales at the expense of other parts of Wales, and an almost total absence of concern for mid-Wales. I could so easily have spoken about those same issues today.

One memorable line from Lady Megan’s speech caught my eye. Sometimes I am not sure whether some of our colleagues representing English constituencies fully understand how we Welsh function. Lady Megan understood that very well. She said:

“No Englishman can understand the Welsh. However much he may try, and however sympathetic he may feel, he cannot get inside the skin and bones of a Welshman unless he be born again.”—[Official Report, 17 October 1944; Vol. 403, c. 2237.]

I hope that that explains some of the ways in which we Welsh behave in this House.

In 1944, my constituency of Montgomeryshire was in serious long-term decline. The population had dropped from more than 50,000 to 36,000 and was falling like a stone. There were very few employment opportunities for ambitious young people, who were forced to leave the area in search of work. Regional policy had not been yet introduced to rural Wales. It was 20 years later that such policies were introduced by a Labour Government and they continued under successive Conservative Secretaries of State.

Montgomeryshire has now been transformed. Today it is a genuine success story, with thriving businesses and the lowest unemployment in Wales: only around 500 people are registered as unemployed. The population of Montgomeryshire is now 63,000 and rising. It is not just that new businesses have moved in, but that much of the area has been built up by local entrepreneurs. Coincidentally, I visited some entrepreneurs last Friday. Members may have seen the yellow Alun T. Jones lorries around Wales. I knew Alun when we were teenagers. He has grown to be the Eddie Stobart of Wales, employing very large numbers of people. I then went to the impressive mid-Wales airport, which was established by the late Bob Jones who was tragically killed in an air accident, and is now run by his wife Linda. It is entirely a private sector company. Again, I knew Bob when we were teenagers.

I then went to a water bottling plant, which is run by Paul Delves in Churchstoke, where another 70 are employed. He is another local lad who has done well, and I could list dozens more. Over the past five years, the level of confidence in Montgomeryshire business has grown hugely, built on the stability and sound economic policies of the Conservative Government. Of course there is more to do. We want to restore the economy to where we want it to be, but none of the businesses wants to risk a return to more public spending and more public debt.

Finally, I wish to mention the Command Paper, which was published by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State last week. It outlines a St David's day package of changes to the devolution settlement between the UK Parliament and the National Assembly for Wales. Its publication was a very significant constitutional event for Wales, and represented a major step forward in the process of Welsh devolution. It is too early for any of us to have made a full assessment of the detail of the package, which will have to await the Wales Bill in the next Parliament.

At this stage, there are just four issues I wish to mention. First, I greatly welcome what I consider to be the most important proposal in the Command Paper, which is the move to a reserved powers model of Welsh devolution. It is sensible that everything should be considered devolved, unless it is specifically reserved to Westminster. Soon after I was elected to the National Assembly for Wales in 1999, I realised that the reserved powers model was needed to give clarity and greater stability to the devolution settlement. There may well continue to be occasions when a Supreme Court is needed to establish a competence, but under a reserved powers model it would be far less likely. That is the most important change included in the St David's day package, and I hope that we can deliver it in the next Parliament.

The second important issue is the devolution of income tax powers, and here I fear I take a very different view from many other MPs, particularly those on the Labour Benches. I see the proposals as a complete package, which includes the responsibility of levying a significant proportion of income tax in Wales. I have spoken on that issue several times before in this House. I feel so strongly about it that I do not believe we should devolve one iota more power to the Welsh Government until income tax powers are devolved. I accept that any new Wales Bill will have in it a commitment to a referendum on the issue before it becomes a reality, but for the life of me I cannot understand why.

If returned as a Member of Parliament on 8 May, I shall table an amendment to any future Wales Bill to remove the need for a referendum, and I expect to be supported by Members of every party in this House except Labour, which is desperate to avoid any fiscal accountability to the people of Wales. The Welsh Government simply want to carry on claiming credit for what voters like and blaming Westminster for what the voters do not like, avoiding any tough decisions and preferring comfortable impotence to facing up to the tough decisions that Governments must take. How can it be thought right to refer to the Welsh Assembly as a Welsh Parliament, as we all want, while clinging to a position that means it is in reality not a great deal more than a spending body?

Another proposal I greatly welcome is the commitment to a Barnett floor. We know that Wales has been underfunded through public spending granted through the block grant for decades, but changes to public spending by the coalition Government mean that underfunding has fallen to a virtually insignificant level. The Secretary of State has pulled off a historic victory for Wales by securing agreement to retain the current level of comparative spending as a floor below which UK Government support to Wales via the block grant will not fall no matter what changes to public spending are made in future. It is a huge win for Wales, and every party in this House should welcome it.

When a devolution of income tax powers was first proposed, the First Minister of Wales said that should not happen until the lockstep was removed. It has been removed. Then there was the Barnett deficit, but that has been removed as well. Now it is something else, and then it will be something else again. The truth is that Welsh Labour hates the thought of being financially accountable to the people of Wales.

[Mr Llwyd]

I partially agree with the hon. Gentleman about the Barnett floor, but there is one other glaring omission: there is no discussion about taking fair funding for Wales forward. That is a big mistake and should have been considered within the purview of this Command Paper.

[Glyn Davies]

The right hon. Gentleman is a man for whom I have huge respect as a Member of this House. He is retiring, so may I wish him well in the future and say that he has made a wonderful contribution to this House?

This is an area on which I am a bit unsure. To my mind, the win we have tackles that problem. We have virtually eliminated the deficit and if that becomes the Barnett floor, funding can rise but cannot fall below it. That is an absolutely fantastic win, and I would be surprised if the Secretary of State did not go in to a little more detail about it in his speech.

[Owen Smith (Pontypridd) (Lab)]

As ever, the hon. Gentleman is giving a thoughtful and heartfelt speech. I forgive him for suggesting that the deficit has been dealt with, as he put it; it was still £75 billion the last time I looked. However, does he think that Wales would definitely be better off or worse off if we were to have and exercise tax-raising powers? That is the great lacuna in the Tory proposals.

[Glyn Davies]

This is how the antipathy towards being responsible through income tax in Wales manifests itself in questions and comments from the Opposition. There should not necessarily be any difference. We will be responsible just as we are now; it is just that the people of Wales will have a responsibility to know what the Welsh Government are doing. If the Welsh Government want to raise more money, they can suggest it and they can become accountable for what they doing rather than just blaming Westminster for virtually everything that people do not like.

My final point is about the proposal to devolve power over energy projects of up to 350 MW to Wales. I accept the logic of the proposal and supported it during most of my eight years as an Assembly Member, but since 2005 the obscene determination of the Welsh Government to desecrate mid-Wales with hundreds of wind turbines and pylons has made it impossible for me to continue to support it. The behaviour of the Welsh Government, and particularly the First Minister, has been shocking and has demonstrated total contempt for the people of Montgomeryshire, whom I represent. It should be a real concern to every Welsh MP that because the people of Powys have refused to bow down before the Welsh Government’s bullying, the First Minister intends to remove planning powers from local planning authorities and to take them for the Government in an act of power centralisation, to ensure that the Welsh Government can push things through despite any local resistance. The Secretary of State may well want to comment on this anti-devolution tendency.

While we talk about devolution in this place, we have a Welsh Government who are bringing everything back to themselves simply so they can get their own way in the parts of Wales that do not do exactly what they—the Welsh Government—say. In England, we are seeing a drive to devolve powers to city regions and local councils, whereas in Wales we are seeing a centralisation of power in the hands of the Welsh Government.

St David chose Wales as his home. He was a very wise man. He created a hill that, together with thousands of other hills, makes Wales the wondrous landscape that it is today. I was born among those hills, I shall always live among them. We have a duty to protect Wales for our children so that they can enjoy it as much as we have and as we do today.

14:15

[Paul Murphy (Torfaen) (Lab)]

I remind the House that this used to be called the St David’s day debate. This is not St David’s day, but the feast day of St Caron of Tregaron, a third century Cardiganshire saint. I hope that we can remember him during the course of the day. I do not know whether this will be my last speech in this Chamber, but it might be. It will certainly be my last speech in a Welsh day debate.

The hon. Member for Montgomeryshire (Glyn Davies) mentioned the first time that the House met to consider Welsh affairs in this format in 1944. I cannot remember that, as old as I am, nor can I remember Lady Megan Lloyd George in the House, although I remember her. However, I remember my first contribution to a debate on Welsh affairs 27 years ago, from the Opposition Benches. Peter Walker was the Secretary of State and the late Alan Williams, whose life we have commemorated and celebrated this week, was the shadow Secretary of State. When I looked at the speeches that I and others made on that occasion, I could see that things have not changed all that much. We had a Conservative Government with Mrs Thatcher as the Prime Minister and the burning issue was the poll tax. Today, of course, we have the right hon. Member for Witney (Mr Cameron) as Prime Minister and in the valleys of south Wales and elsewhere we have the bedroom tax as the poll tax mark 2, something that will undoubtedly be a major issue in the weeks and months ahead and in the general election.

I was interested in the points that the hon. Member for Montgomeryshire made about accountability and fairness and about the need not to blame Westminster all the time for the ills that confront Wales. Let us remember that when we were debating Welsh matters 27 years ago, there was no Welsh Assembly. There was a Welsh Office and the Secretary of State was a Member of the British Cabinet. In 1987, the amount of money being taken away from Welsh local authorities was significant, and that has not changed either. Many local authorities in Wales are setting their budgets this week. Mine in Torfaen set its budget yesterday; the very able Councillor Anthony Hunt presented the budget to the local authority. He said that he had to see a reduction of £6 million this year from my local authority’s budget on top of £6 million last year and probably another £6 million next year. The Government have reduced the amount of money given to the Welsh Government, so £1.5 billion has been cut from the Welsh budget. Cuts are being pushed from one tier of government to another, so ultimately the local council has to implement the decisions that result from that. Those cuts have come indirectly from Whitehall to Cardiff, whereas 27 years ago it was a more direct route, but the effect is exactly the same. Local authorities today and then face enormous difficulties in dealing with them.

I want to turn the attention of the House to the nature of Welsh matters in this Parliament after the general election of 7 May. My hon. Friend the Member for Ynys Môn (Albert Owen) and the hon. Member for Montgomeryshire did well to go to the Backbench Business Committee and secure this important debate, but I regret that they had to. It is not as well attended as it would normally be, for obvious reasons; we face a general election in some weeks time. The Welsh day debate was set up in 1944 to ensure that there was a forum here in the House of Commons not just for Welsh MPs to discuss here in Westminster what matters in Wales, but for every Member who wished to do so take part.

[Mr Llwyd]

I agree with what the right hon. Gentleman says. He will recall that a couple of years ago he and I applied for such a debate and were eventually successful. The point that he makes is correct. Everyone should be able to participate in the debate, not just Welsh Members. It is important that that should be so.

[Paul Murphy]

As an aside, I add my tribute to my right hon. Friend. He is leaving, like me. We have been good friends for a long time, and we have attended these debates in the House over many years. It is important that we retain the Welsh day debate, the Welsh Grand Committee and the Select Committee on Welsh Affairs, chaired very ably by my neighbour the hon. Member for Monmouth (David T. C. Davies). It is important that we retain the position of Secretary of State for Wales, to be held either by my hon. Friend the Member for Pontypridd (Owen Smith) or by the right hon. Member for Preseli Pembrokeshire (Stephen Crabb), the current Secretary of State, after the election. I have nothing against the current Secretary of State—he is a fine man—but I hope that the positions are reversed, for obvious reasons.

If we do not ensure that the institutions affecting Wales are retained here in the United Kingdom Parliament, we will affect the way in which our country, by which I mean the United Kingdom, goes forward constitutionally in the decades ahead. We have already seen an enormous change in the political landscape, not simply because we have had devolution for 15 years or so in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. The changes have been beneficial to the people of Wales and undoubtedly, as a consequence of the Command Paper, that will continue. However, we face even greater seismic change.

The Scottish referendum was won—ish—by we who opposed separation for Scotland, but in a sense it was a pyrrhic victory. I do not know what is going to happen—obviously, no one does—after 7 May, but an earthquake may well occur in Scotland if the Scottish National party gains the number of seats that pollsters and Lord Ashcroft have predicted only today. They suggest that almost every seat in Scotland will be represented by the SNP. I do not think that that will be the case—I certainly hope that it is not—but clearly a big change is happening. We have to reflect on all the changes and how they impact on this place.

I think that the Prime Minister made a fundamental mistake the day after the referendum by referring to the issue of English votes and English laws. I am not saying that there is not an issue; the so-called West Lothian question has been an issue for every year that I have been in this place. It has to be resolved, but in a consensual manner. The impression that was given in Scotland, and indeed beyond, the day after the result of the referendum was, “Okay, you voted to stay in the United Kingdom, and now we are going to take away the powers of Scottish Members of Parliament.” That was a grave error, not in terms of the constitutional question—we have to resolve that one way or the other—but presentationally. It meant that those of us who wanted the Union to continue, especially in Scotland, were put in a difficult position. We were told that, despite the so-called victory for those who wanted the Union, they would have to be denigrated as Members of this House.

So when everyone except a few of us is returned to this House of Commons from Wales, we will have to reflect seriously on the responsibility and role of Welsh Members of Parliament as Members of a United Kingdom Parliament. I am a British Member of the United Kingdom Parliament who happens to represent a Welsh constituency. Everything that I do can be done by any other Member, whether they represent Scotland, Northern Ireland or England. That in my view should be the case. We may be able to change the methods by which the House of Commons works in order to deal with the West Lothian question, but essentially we are all the same in this place.

I have done a bit of research on other countries, and I can find no country in Europe or beyond that makes a distinction between Members of the federal Parliaments and their national Parliaments in what they can or cannot do. Therefore, although many English Members are aggrieved, their grievance cannot go to the extent that it undermines the fundamental nature of the United Kingdom and this Parliament. It would be a grave mistake if we went down that particular line.

I have had the great privilege of doing the job of Secretary of State for Wales on two occasions under two Prime Ministers, and I believe that there is a job to be done by whoever holds that office, from whatever party. I am not speaking in a partisan way. In fact, those hon. Members who have known me for some years will realise that that is not my style. Often in the House most of us agree on most things—not always; that is the nature of politics, and nor should it be.

On this matter we should agree. If we did away with the territorial Secretaries of State, the link between the devolved countries and Westminster and Whitehall would disappear. The role of the Wales Secretary is to represent Wales in the Cabinet and to represent the Government in Wales. We would be foolish to do away with that vital link between two Governments and two Parliaments. I can quote dozens of occasions when journalists here in London who do not understand the nature of devolution said, “Let’s put them all together. Let’s do away with the Secretaries of State.” Indeed, many Members of this House believed in that, too, not understanding the very nature of the job. No one is going to take much notice of me, but I make a plea to whoever becomes the Government and the Prime Minister to retain the territorial Secretaries of State. If we do not, it will be another nail in the coffin of the Union, which is so important for all of us as Members of this British Parliament.

I have had the great privilege of representing my constituency for nearly three decades. I have represented the good people of the eastern valley of Gwent. I hope that whoever succeeds me will have the same duties, responsibilities, privileges and rights. I have been the Member for Torfaen, but also a Member of Parliament of this United Kingdom like any other Member. If we do not maintain that, not only the House but our Union will be in danger.

14:30

[Mr David Jones (Clwyd West) (Con)]

May I say what a great privilege it is for me to follow the right hon. Member for Torfaen (Paul Murphy), who has been such an outstanding Member of the House? I am sure I speak on behalf of all the Members present when I say that we all wish him a very happy retirement, although I half suspect that we may be seeing a bit more of him in the years to come.

The right hon. Member for Dwyfor Meirionnydd (Mr Llwyd), too, will be leaving this House after a distinguished career. He and I have known each other for a very long time—longer than either of us would care to mention—since we were both practising law in the magistrates courts of north Wales. I wish him, too, a very happy retirement.

I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Montgomeryshire (Glyn Davies) for his opening speech and the Backbench Business Committee for agreeing to this debate. It is an important debate, which we should have every year because it is, as the right hon. Member for Torfaen points out, extremely important that the unique issues that concern the people of Wales should be ventilated in this Chamber.

We are in the final weeks of this Parliament and this debate is as useful an opportunity as any for us all to take stock. In constitutional terms, Wales has seen great changes, some of which were initiated by my right hon. Friend the Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs Gillan), who gave strong and sterling service as Secretary of State. But there are more changes to come, which were announced by my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister in Cardiff last week. These will be matters for the next Parliament and we will all have our views as to the course that those changes should take, but this is a useful opportunity to consider what has happened over the past five years.

In 2010 the incoming coalition faced the worst set of economic circumstances that any incoming Government had faced since, possibly, the 1930s. The country was still reeling from the crash of 2008 which, although a global catastrophe, was more keenly felt in Britain than perhaps in any other country in the developed world because Britain was carrying the worst structural deficit of any major country, largely as a consequence of what I would term the economic mismanagement of the Labour Government. The coalition Government therefore, in which I had the privilege to serve for more than four years, had difficult decisions to take. We are constantly criticised for what are styled as cuts by the Opposition, but cuts were essential. It is the easiest thing in the world for any Government not to take the difficult decisions. We took those difficult decisions.

[David T. C. Davies (Monmouth) (Con)]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that one of the biggest cuts that we have made is in the amount of interest that we are paying the banks on the increasing amount of money that we were previously borrowing, and that that is one cut we should be making?

[Mr Jones]

The interest is declining—that is the point. Had we not taken those difficult decisions, we would be spending more money on paying interest to banks than on providing services to the people of this country, so my hon. Friend is right.

Five years on from that—

[Owen Smith]

Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that the styled cuts, as he put it, also resulted in a massive increase in in-work poverty, resulting in an extra £9 billion spending on social security under this Government?

[Mr Jones]

The decisions that we took were difficult and, clearly, people have felt pain. But people across the board have felt pain. It is interesting to hear the criticisms from the Labour party. What would have happened if that party had remained in power? Where would we be now? Under this Government 1.85 million new jobs have been created. That is 1.85 million people with the security of a pay packet every week and the dignity that employment brings.

[Owen Smith]

rose—

[Mr Jones]

No, I will not give way. I will continue for a while.

Those new jobs would not have been created, had the hon. Gentleman’s party been in power.

In my constituency, Clwyd West, the improvement is tangible. The last Labour Market Statistics showed that over 12 months, the number of people claiming jobseeker’s allowance or not in work and claiming universal credit fell by 519 over 12 months—an annual decline of 34.5%. Those figures are mirrored right across Wales and right across the UK. In January, the International Labour Organisation measure of unemployment was 1.86 million people, down 486,000 on the previous year.

[Owen Smith]

rose—

[Mr Jones]

No, I will not give way for the moment.

These are strong, substantial changes, which we should all welcome, even the hon. Member for Pontypridd (Owen Smith), while acknowledging the task ahead. [Interruption.] He will have plenty of time to speak.

I would like to focus my attention today primarily on north Wales, which is the part of Wales in which I have lived nearly all my life and which I know best. I was brought up in the village of Rhosllanerchrugog near Wrexham, a very unusual, strange, unique and wonderful village. At the time of my boyhood, most of the working men were employed in coal mines and in the steelworks. Since then, there have been huge changes. We all know that the coal industry has virtually gone and the steelworks in north Wales are much smaller than they used to be. But now, north Wales is the home of dynamic new industries.

The wings of every Airbus aircraft that flies anywhere in the world are made in Broughton, in north-east Wales. Close to Broughton is the Deeside industrial estate, part of which is now an enterprise zone. There, high-tech industries serve customers across the globe. Deeside is one of the most dynamic, forward-looking, thrusting industrial areas of the United Kingdom and we should all take huge pride in it. On the other side of the region of north Wales is the island of Anglesey, where we see the Wylfa nuclear power station, which will soon, I hope, be replaced by a new power station, Wylfa Newydd. That will be a gigantic project employing many thousands of people for many years during the construction phase, and many people for decades after the station is up and running. It will provide the opportunity for the creation of centres of excellence in skills, education and training and I am tremendously pleased that the island of Anglesey has welcomed the developers so warmly.

Wylfa is only one element of what I believe is a bright future for north Wales as an energy hub. Out to sea, we have the Gwynt y Mor, Rhyl Flats and North Hoyle offshore wind farms, one of the largest groupings of offshore wind farms anywhere in the world. Let me be frank: as many hon. Members know, I have never been a huge fan of wind power. I believe that it is unreliable, supplying only intermittent and unpredictable energy, and it is far too heavily subsidised. Furthermore, onshore wind, and to a certain extent offshore wind, blight—as my hon. Friend the Member for Montgomeryshire put it—the spectacular landscapes, both onshore and offshore, of north Wales.

Nuclear power, by contrast, provides predictable and reliable base-load generation, which is precisely what is needed. However, nuclear must be seen as part of an energy mix. Wind is currently part of that mix, but I was extremely pleased when the Prime Minister indicated only a few weeks ago that subsidies for onshore wind farms will be phased out under the next Conservative Government.

A new technology, and one that has been developed in Wales, is that of tidal lagoons. I remember taking evidence on tidal lagoons several years ago when I was a member of the Welsh Affairs Committee. I was immediately struck by what a tremendous opportunity they represented for Wales, given its huge tidal ranges. The technology has been slow in coming, but it appears that it will soon be here. The company Tidal Lagoon Power has not only made an application for development consent for a new lagoon in Swansea, but has ambitions to create a chain of lagoons stretching from Lancashire in the north, right around the coast of Wales, to Somerset in the south. Only a few weeks ago I chaired a meeting in Colwyn Bay to discuss proposals for a huge tidal lagoon there. It would have a potential generating capacity of 4 GW, which is equivalent to a very large nuclear power station.

Lagoons have the advantage of being green—they produce no carbon emissions—but they also have what wind power lacks: they are entirely reliable. Nothing on the planet is more reliable than the ebb and flow of the tide. As a result, each tidal lagoon would have the capacity to generate for 22 of every 24 hours. This is a new technology, and a British technology. Moreover, it could be centred in Wales. I believe that Wales could become a leader in what could rapidly become an important export industry.

Obviously there are environmental issues to consider, not least with regard to transmission infrastructure, which is having a catastrophic effect across Wales. My hon. Friend the Member for Montgomeryshire mentioned the impact that transmission lines would have in Montgomeryshire. Equally, in my constituency of Clwyd West there is now a strong campaign aimed at requiring the transmission lines serving the new Clocaenog wind farm to be buried underground. Saving the planet should not mean at the same time trashing our landscapes and seascapes. I therefore strongly support the proposition that developers of wind farms, which are heavily subsidised, should be required to pay the cost of laying transmission cables underground.

I would like to touch on transport in north Wales. The railways are increasingly important in north Wales, and they are being used increasingly heavily, as is the case across the country. Journey times have improved tremendously. When I was first elected to his House some 10 years ago, the journey back to London from Colwyn Bay on a Sunday took some four and a half hours. As a result of efforts by both the previous Labour Government and this Conservative Government, that has been reduced dramatically—the same journey now takes almost exactly three hours. The fast train, which I hope to take tonight, takes approximately two and three quarter hours.

That is all commendable, and it is a tribute to the work done by Network Rail, but we must look to the future. We know that HS2 will be built and that it will go to Manchester. It is important that north Wales should benefit from it, which is why I believe that the new hub proposed for Crewe should be built and that there should be a fast connection right through to Holyhead. We must bear it in mind that north Wales is very much part of the north-western economic region; economically, the region has always looked to the great cities of the north-west, Liverpool and Manchester. I was therefore delighted when last year the Chancellor announced funding for the reopening of the Halton curve, which will put Liverpool and the expanding Liverpool John Lennon airport within easy travelling distance of north Wales.

In north-east Wales we should seek to maximise the economic benefit we can derive from the new enterprise zone at Deeside by encouraging synergy with the new enterprise zone at Wirral Waters in Birkenhead. There is a railway line linking Liverpool and north Wales, but the difficulty is that passengers have to change at Bidston from an electric train to a diesel one to take them through to Wrexham. I believe that a very good improvement, and one that could be achieved at relatively low cost, would be to electrify that line, certainly between Bidston and Shotton, where a new interchange is proposed. That would mean that the two great enterprise zones at Deeside and Wirral Waters would be within easy commuting distance of each other.

Tourism has always been the mainstay of the north Wales economy, but I believe that more could be done for it. One simple measure that is acquiring support from hon. Members from all parties is to give serious consideration to reducing the rate of value added tax on tourism businesses. That has been tried out in competitor countries, not least Ireland, and has been found to be entirely successful. It has been calculated that the immediate loss of revenue would be made up within four years. The big problem is that, in areas such as north Wales, most tourism businesses are run by small family undertakings that, in order to remain competitive one way or the other, try desperately to avoid being registered for VAT, the consequence of which is that they are deterred from expanding and improving their businesses because they cannot have the benefit of input VAT to set against the cost. Therefore, one measure which should appeal to my right hon. Friend the Chancellor, and to which I hope he will give serious consideration in the impending Budget, is to reduce the rate of VAT for tourism businesses to 5%.

Finally, I want to touch on a matter that is worrying to everybody with a constituency in north Wales, namely health care. I know that the issue is a hot potato in this House and that Government Members are frequently criticised for criticising the Welsh Government’s delivery of health care. The fact is, however, that areas such as north Wales are almost entirely reliant on the north-west of England and the midlands for very specialist medical care. It has been a concern for many years that north Wales patients have to wait considerably longer than their English counterparts for elective surgery in English hospitals, simply because of the way in which the Welsh Assembly Government fund health care.

The situation is getting worse. Yesterday in Prime Minister’s Question Time the hon. Member for Arfon (Hywel Williams) mentioned his constituent, Mr Irfon Williams, who has been obliged to move out of Wales to Ellesmere Port in order to access drugs that he would have got routinely had he been resident in England. He is not by any means a unique example. I have a number of constituents who, because they live in Wales, simply cannot access the medicines they need. They have to go through the most byzantine consenting procedures if they are to have specialist treatment. Frankly, the matter is causing huge distress in north Wales. The situation was compounded recently by the decision of the Betsi Cadwaladr university health board to downgrade maternity care in Glan Clwyd hospital, because it is finding it difficult to attract staff of the necessary calibre and quality.

I believe that that shows that there are structural difficulties with the health care system in Wales under the Welsh Government. It is suggested that the Welsh Government have been subject to cuts, but the fact is that the Barnett formula protects the health budget in Wales. The simple fact is that the Welsh Government, of their own volition, decided to cut the health budget, and the consequence is that patients in my and other north Wales constituencies are suffering.

I am rapidly coming to the view that the Welsh Government are finding it almost impossible to run a decent health system in Wales. Before I sit down, I plead with them to look very carefully at the misery being inflicted on a lot of people in north Wales and to turn to the Department of Health in Westminster for advice. They should not be too proud to do so. Until they do so, I believe that health care in Wales will only continue to decline.

[Several hon. Members]

rose—

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Mrs Eleanor Laing)]

Order. We have plenty of time for this important debate this afternoon, but if hon. Members take an inordinately long time they will deprive their colleagues of the opportunity to speak. That may be their intention, but to have a degree of fairness I implore hon. Members to take about 12 or 13 minutes. That is a long time: if they have something to say, they can say it in 12 minutes.

14:50

[Mr Elfyn Llwyd (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)]

I congratulate the hon. Members for Ynys Môn (Albert Owen) and for Montgomeryshire (Glyn Davies), who were instrumental in bringing this debate to the Floor of the House, and I am grateful to the Backbench Business Committee for granting permission for it.

Ultimately, however, I believe that it is a great shame, as was said by the right hon. Member for Torfaen (Paul Murphy), that the Government have not ensured there is always a St David’s day debate in the calendar. That is especially true this year, given the St David’s day announcement last week, to which I shall turn later. It is right and proper that the Government Command Paper should be debated on the Floor of the House, as it is that Welsh Members should get to debate Welsh matters on or as near as possible to St David’s day each year. It is to the Government’s great shame that such debates have not been secured. By making this plea, I once more hope that somebody somewhere will listen and we can revert to the ordinary processes that used to take place.

I shall talk about the Command Paper, the so-called St David’s day agreement, in greater detail in a moment. Suffice it to say at this stage that the proposals will still leave Welsh devolution far behind that in Scotland and Northern Ireland. The announcement on funding public services still leaves Wales considerably worse off, to the tune of about £1.2 billion per annum, compared with Scotland.

If I may, I will say a brief word about the discussions that led up to the Command Paper. It is almost an open secret that the main obstruction to any meaningful progress during the discussions was, unfortunately, the London Labour leadership, which it seems to me was often at loggerheads with its Cardiff Bay counterpart. In the end, it is the Westminster wing of the Labour party that has the final say over its colleagues in Cardiff, a point which the electorate will do well to heed on 7 May.

[Owen Smith]

I pay tribute to the right hon. Gentleman for his long and excellent service in this House. He sat alongside me in several of the meetings, so he knows that what he has just said is simply not consonant with the facts. Given that the Welsh Labour Government and I, on behalf of the Labour party, have spoken about going further than the current Government on the devolution of the Work programme and policing, what elements of the programme is he suggesting I have blocked?

[Mr Llwyd]

If the hon. Gentleman wants me to tackle him on this, I shall do so. I will throw one in straight away. He argued strongly and vehemently against the devolution of policing.

[Owen Smith]

rose—

[Mr Llwyd]

Just a moment. The Silk commission very strongly suggested that we should devolve policing. The hon. Gentleman said that there was no call for that in Wales.

[Owen Smith]

rose—

[Mr Llwyd]

Let me finish. If the hon. Gentleman had read the evidence to the Silk commission, he would have seen that four of the forces in Wales were in favour of it, and only one police and crime commissioner—Mr Salmon—said that he was not. All the evidence was in favour and the Silk commission strongly suggested it, but the hon. Gentleman vetoed it.

[Owen Smith]

I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for giving way again to let me put the record straight. I hesitate to suggest that he is in any way misinforming the House, but that is not my recollection of the conversations we were involved in. My recollection is that we had misgivings about the immediate devolution of criminal justice, but the fact that I announced a fortnight ago at the Welsh Labour conference that we would devolve aspects of policing to Wales—neighbourhood policing and an all-Wales policing plan—gives the lie to what he has just said.

[Mr Llwyd]

No, it does not. I saw the hon. Gentleman sitting next to the First Minister who, while we discussed policing, put his head in his hands when he understood that devolution had been vetoed. We discussed that then, and I made a point of referring to what I have just said in the hon. Gentleman’s presence. It is all very well for him to throw in a sprat later on—some minuscule part of policing—just to salve his conscience and get back on speaking terms with the First Minister, but that is not good enough for me, and it is not good enough for anybody else in the Chamber. I have made the point.

[Owen Smith]

rose—

[Mr Llwyd]

I give way for a final time, because I need to get on.

[Owen Smith]

For the third time, and for the avoidance of doubt, the right hon. Gentleman is not representing matters accurately in the House. I am clear that, and the leader of the Labour party announced at our party conference that, we would be devolving an all-Wales policing plan, including statutory power over neighbourhood policing and the structures of policing, to the Welsh Government. That is the fact, and he cannot gainsay it.

[Mr Llwyd]

Right. Well, I will not go further on that, but the Secretary of State is in the Chamber and he will no doubt make some comments in due course. He was party to those discussions so perhaps his recollection will be useful, to see whether he agrees with me or with the hon. Gentleman. In any event, I will move on.

The Command Paper is not an agreement in the full sense. Obviously, we have all been discussing for some months what should or should not be included in it, and there is a promise to legislate after the election. The proposals would still leave Welsh devolution far behind that in Scotland and Northern Ireland, and despite what the hon. Member for Montgomeryshire said, the announcement of the Barnett floor leaves Wales worse off compared with Scotland. We are unable to celebrate proposals that amount to a row-back on a compromise that already existed in the Silk commission.

[The Secretary of State for Wales (Stephen Crabb)]

I am grateful for the incredibly constructive and principle-led way that the right hon. Gentleman engaged in our discussions in the run-up to the St David’s day announcement. He says that the package is not as advanced or radical as he interprets the Scottish package to be, but does he genuinely believe that the people of Wales, given the centre of gravity of Welsh public opinion, want a devolution settlement that is the same as Scotland’s?

[Mr Llwyd]

I would argue yes, because we need to get away from this pattern of asymmetrical devolution, which is complicated, time-consuming and ends up in references to the Supreme Court and so on. I know the reserved powers model will assist there. Yes, I do believe that. The major problem—I say this quite sincerely—is that we are not hitting on a fair funding formula for the future. The right hon. Gentleman knows that we discussed that issue in Committee and that the Barnett floor is of assistance. He also knows, as I have said before, that it is not the be-all and end-all or the ultimate answer to fair funding for Wales.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Wales (Alun Cairns)]

When talking about a funding settlement, does the right hon. Gentleman acknowledge that Wales’s current settlement falls within the Holtham recommendation at £116 for every £100 spent in England? His recommendation was a figure between £114 and £117.

[Mr Llwyd]

My point is that the way the Barnett formula operates in Wales is still unfair in comparison with the amount paid out in Scotland—I am sure my friends in the Scottish National party would hit me over the head if they were here, but I will take advantage of the fact that they are not. It is a difference of £1.2 billion per annum, which is a lot of money. I remind Members that the current process on further powers for Wales began about four years ago. The issue of funding was then outside its remit, which I believe was a mistake, whether deliberate or not. Fair funding for Wales has gone for the time being, and it continues to be a major issue that the commission could have settled or commissioned work on for the future.

We entered these discussions in good faith and attempted to be constructive, as the Secretary of State said. I am not jumping up and down and screaming about the result—there are good things in the Command Paper, which I will refer to in a moment. However, we have missed an opportunity to have all the tools further to develop the economy of Wales, and to give the Welsh people further accountability for and control over the way they run their lives, and over the way money is spent for the economic good of Wales.

[Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)]

I would like to take the opportunity to wish the right hon. Gentleman all the best for when he leaves this House and to thank him for his service to it. Is not the logic of the position he outlined on Barnett that, since the unfairness exists between Wales and Scotland, his recommendation would be to take money from the Scottish settlement and redistribute it to Wales, rather than take it from the English settlement to achieve the same thing?

[Mr Llwyd]

No, it is not. The argument I am making is that we should look for a fair funding formula that will stand the test of time, so that we do not have to keep coming back and forth discussing this issue all the time. I do not want to take money from any other constituent part of the UK. It is certainly not my remit to do that, and I would not even argue for it. We have missed an opportunity to address this issue.

The commission recommended a package of powers, which was agreed as a compromise by all four parties in Wales. As I have said, we in Plaid Cymru wanted to see more powers devolved, but we agreed on the commission’s recommendations as a compromise package providing a way forward. As we remember, the Government initially sought to water down the recommendations through their publication of the Wales Bill by adding a lockstep to income tax powers and omitting to devolve short-haul air passenger duty. To the credit of my Plaid Cymru colleagues—and, I would add, of various other Back-Bench Members of all parties—the Government were forced to change tack and ensure that many of the blocks and caveats that limited the powers on offer were ultimately removed from the Bill. Unfortunately, APD is still omitted from the Command Paper, despite its appearance in the original package.

We warned all along that the powers on offer to Wales from the Government would probably be superseded by the events of the Scottish independence referendum. We were proved right. As the campaign was hotting up and the Government were falling over themselves to offer greater powers to Scotland, it immediately became apparent that Wales would be left behind. It was, I am afraid, the Westminster parties that promised devo-max and home rule in something of a blind panic when they thought they might lose the referendum, yet they have subsequently failed truly to deliver what they promised. The people of Scotland will doubtless reflect on that in May—indeed, they already are, if the opinion polls are to be believed.

I note with interest what is happening with the Government’s plans to create a so-called northern powerhouse in England. Significant fiscal powers are set to be devolved to Manchester—dubbed Devo Manc. In that light, the third-rate devolution being offered to Wales is more of a “devo manky”, in a stale and worthless sense, rather than a dynamic and lasting solution to the hunger for greater powers that exists in Wales.

We remain sceptical of the need for a referendum on the technical matter of devolving such a small share of income tax powers. The principle of fiscal devolution has been conceded with the devolution of the minor taxes. We maintain that any referendum should be on a much wider remit of powers or for a much greater share of income tax. Ideally, the parties will include powers for devolution in their manifestos and the next Government will proceed to devolve on that basis.

Some of the things included in the Command Paper are most welcome, particularly control over fracking, devolving port development, increasing power over energy production and the significant step of implementing a reserved powers model. There are several other useful aspects, too, so it would be silly of me to suggest that this was not a useful step forward. Overall, however, it falls short of the powers that I believe could help us to strengthen our communities in Wales. It goes nowhere near getting the funding settlement that I have said Wales is owed after decades of disadvantage.

I am dismayed at the fact that policing is not devolved, given what the Silk commission said about it and the overwhelmingly strong evidence in favour of doing so. Furthermore, Wales is, I think, the only country in the world with its own legislature but without its own judicial system. Putting that right is long overdue. As the Government and the country wrestle with the question of EVEL—English votes for English laws—it brings that issue into still higher and more urgent profile.

It is a matter of common sense, too. I am returning to practising law, and there is a corpus of Welsh laws already: Welsh criminal law, Welsh family law, Welsh environmental law, constitutional and administrative law. The time has come to look at putting together a judicial system for Wales. I am heartened that barristers of all political opinions and none who practise in Cardiff—there are a couple of hundred of them—have come together to form an organisation to campaign on this issue. I am heartened that they see the need for it. It could deliver economic benefits to Wales, as much as anything else. I do not quite understand why the Silk commission said the Welsh Government should speak with the UK Government in eight years’ time to see whether they can do something then. More than two of those years have already gone, and I would argue that the time is now, rather than sitting down over a cup of tea in another six years’ time.

On the Barnett floor—yes, it is a floor and I understand how it works—the Holtham Commission noted in its report:

“politicians (and voters) may well take the view that maintaining relative funding at current levels is inadequate given Wales’s relative needs.”

The commission conceded that a floor under Barnett would lock in underfunding of £400 million a year, but saw its introduction as a short-term measure only to stop the underfunding getting worse at a time when funding was increasing, and therefore convergence was an immediate concern. I know things have changed and that £400 million is no longer anywhere near a correct figure. It is probably nearer £125 million or £135 million at the moment, because of cuts in expenditure and so on. My point is that a floor does not guarantee that the underfunding will not increase in future years if the relative needs of Wales increase. If, for example, the relative funding needs of Wales increased by 2%, the underfunding would increase up to £700 million a year and the floor would provide no protection. The weak negotiating position of the Labour Welsh Government has been exacerbated by their lack of ambition in setting out clearly their demands for fair funding in Wales.

So where does all this leave the people of Wales? I say way behind. Wales is a nation—something I have never ceased to believe in all my years in this place, having the privilege of representing the people of Meirionydd Nant Conwy and, latterly, Dwyfor Meirionydd. Wales is a nation and it deserves to be treated as an equal. Both I and my Plaid Cymru colleagues demand adequate funding for our country. We should be pushing for greater powers for Wales to stand on its own two feet, and for the economy to be developed in a sympathetic, sensible and sustainable way, and we are dismayed that this has happened.

As I look back over all the years I have had in this House, I remember with great pride working towards securing advances in devolution—first, in the devolution big bang at the end of the 1990s—and in securing the advances in powers for the National Assembly since then. I spoke at an awards ceremony in Cardiff city hall a couple of months ago. I opined then, and I continue to hold that opinion, that 99.9% of Members of Parliament are hard-working decent people who are here to make a difference. I am proud to say that over the years I have made friends in all political parties. I pay tribute to the right hon. Member for Torfaen (Paul Murphy). He was an excellent Secretary of State for Wales and for Northern Ireland and a man one could always do business with. It was a pleasure to do so.

I am standing down at the election. I hope Liz Saville-Roberts will be returned as my successor. She is of the highest calibre. She will be a hard-working Member of Parliament: a thoroughly decent, honest and hard-working Member to add to the substantial number we have already. I thank the electors of Dwyfor Meirionnydd and Meirionydd Nant Conwy for the honour of representing them over the past 23 years. I will finish by saying that if I could wind back the clock, I would do it all again.

15:09

[Mr Mark Williams (Ceredigion) (LD)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Montgomeryshire (Glyn Davies) and the hon. Member for Ynys Môn (Albert Owen) on securing this debate. I appreciate the comments that my hon. Friend the Member for Montgomeryshire made about Dewi Sant. I was in Llanddewi Brefi on Sunday with 200 members of the Ceredigion Women’s Institute, and they were very mindful of the importance of Dewi Sant. I thank the Backbench Business Committee for allowing us the opportunity for this debate, which is very important, as the right hon. Members for Torfaen (Paul Murphy) and for Dwyfor Meirionnydd (Mr Llwyd) said.

I, too, pay tribute to all the Members who will be retiring from this House in a few weeks’ time. First, I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Aberavon (Dr Francis), who is not in his place. When I first came here in 2005 with a slight sense of trepidation, having not exactly expected to be here, it was a privilege, having been thrust on to the Welsh Affairs Committee, to serve under somebody of such distinction. The inclusive way in which he chaired that Committee was much appreciated. I should say that it is run in very much the same vein by the hon. Member for Monmouth (David T. C. Davies). I also thank the right hon. Member for Torfaen. I remember retreating to the Tea Room immediately after making my maiden speech, and the kind words he said to me there in recollecting one of my predecessors in Ceredigion, the late Geraint Howells. That was appreciated.

The right hon. Member for Dwyfor Meirionnydd and I share a border, albeit a river—the River Dyfi. His reputation goes before him in this House, but, on a local basis, I have enjoyed the occasions when we have worked together on behalf of our constituents on both sides of the border on issues such as tourism, the need to protect and advance Aberystwyth university—he is an Aber alumnus, like me—and the future of our national health service, particularly at Bronglais hospital. Going round the wards of Bronglais hospital at Christmas, even if it were appropriate to canvass there would be no point, because a third of the people there are from Barmouth, Towyn and Aberdovey, another third are from Montgomeryshire, and some from as far away as Llanidloes. We shall miss both right hon. Gentlemen, and I wish them well in their retirement.

The collaborative approach that I alluded to has been a feature of the political discourse in the past few weeks. I congratulate the Secretary of State on the opportunity provided by his leaders’ summits. My party has one Welsh leader—Kirsty Williams AM—so I felt like a bit of an interloper on those occasions. The many meetings that we had were very interesting, and I believe they have had a productive outcome.

I applaud the attempt to reach a consensus on advancing Silk II. Speaking as a Liberal Democrat whose leader, the Deputy Prime Minister, had already signed up to Silk II in its entirety, long before the process began, I believe that the St David’s day document falls short in a number of areas, not least, as we have heard, in policing, justice and youth justice. However, as a member of a party that is committed to home rule and did not envisage this initiative, I still think that it represents an important step forward. It is a tribute—I have heard lots of references to the Conservative Government on the Government Benches this afternoon—to this coalition Government. I think that the Secretary of State would acknowledge that, because his ministerial colleague and my party colleague Baroness Randerson has worked on these matters as well. This has been a collective effort by both coalition parties.

It was a great satisfaction to see consensus between all four parties on the vast majority of Silk II recommendations, although there were areas of disagreement. I suspect that members of two political parties at either end of the M4 may, at some later date when we write memoirs, acknowledge that there have been slight divergences of opinion, but that is perhaps a debate for another day. Two parties in the discussions were consistent on policing and justice: Plaid Cymru, to its credit, and my party have consistently said that those matters should be devolved. That remains our position. It is not in the document because consensus was not reached, but it will be a feature of my party’s general election manifesto.

Reference has been made to Megan Lloyd George. I too have done a bit of historical research. In 1950, when she was trying to defend, as a Liberal, the great constituency of Ynys Môn, she was charged with delivering a UK-wide party political broadcast. Much to the annoyance of the BBC, she ended it with the phrase “hunan-lywodraeth i Gymru”. Not many people in the United Kingdom understood that message, but people in Ynys Môn did, and she held the seat for a little longer—as a consequence, I like to think.

The drift, or rather the march, towards home rule remains my party’s objective, and in that sense what we have heard about the floor is welcome. In Cardiff on Sunday, the Chief Secretary to the Treasury talked of his hope that Gerry Holtham—a man who is greatly respected by both the United Kingdom Government and the Government in Cardiff—would undertake some work on the shortfall. That may be the Chief Secretary’s aspiration, but I should be interested to hear from the Secretary of State whether such work can be commissioned, because it is important. Before we can move on to the funding issues, we need to have that respected assessment of how extensive the shortfall is.

Let me now refer to two issues that have been much discussed here in recent weeks: the dairy sector and tourism. Both are critically important to my constituency, and more widely. The severity of the challenges faced by the dairy industry cannot be overstated. I have used the word “industry”, but we should bear in mind the fact that behind that word are many family farms which are essential to the vibrancy of the rural economy, and that the livelihoods of many families are being jeopardised. Over-supply in the sector, reduced demand globally, the downturn in global commodity prices and, crucially, the constant pressure from supermarkets to produce goods at low prices have led to significant reductions in the prices that farmers are receiving. That is a long-term worry. If we lose the enthusiasm of young farmers wishing to join the industry, we will lose the industry of the future. Farmers are going out of business as we speak, and the National Farmers Union estimates that in recent weeks £800 million has been wiped off the incomes of UK dairy farmers. That is having a highly damaging effect on the local economy,

We are all familiar with the reports produced by the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee, the work of the Agriculture Minister in the Welsh Assembly Government, Rebecca Evans, and the findings of the Richardson inquiry. Our own Welsh Affairs Committee has begun to take evidence, and took evidence from the unions last Tuesday. That is important work, but it cannot be completed fast enough.

One recommendation that is currently being discussed concerns the role of the Groceries Code Adjudicator, which is hugely significant. The adjudicator should be given jurisdiction all the way down the food chain, and should be allowed to give powers to producers to ensure that the balance of power between producer and buyer becomes equal again. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for St Ives (Andrew George) and the hon. Member for Ynys Môn, who pressed for the appointment of an adjudicator for many years until the end of the last Parliament. Now, very belatedly—and I say that as a Government Member—we have given the adjudicator the power to fine supermarkets, which is an important step.

[Kevin Brennan]

At the risk of blowing my own trumpet, may I point out that I was the Minister in the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills who gave the go-ahead for the establishment of the adjudicator at the end of the last Parliament?

[Mr Williams]

I stand corrected. I had forgotten that, or, rather, my excellent researcher Chris had not written it down. I apologise to the hon. Gentleman, and pay tribute where it is due. The fact remains that this Government have now introduced the adjudicator, and we now have the capacity to fine supermarkets. That could not have come too soon, but we need to see the remit of the adjudicator extended down, for reasons of confidence among our farming community. When I make that point to my farming unions in Ceredigion, they support it as important, but it is also important for us to start articulating speedily some very positive direct measures to support the farming industry. One is to do with the role of Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs. If, as the Prime Minister has mentioned, work can be undertaken to ensure that farmers can spread their tax payments over a longer period, that will be incredibly helpful to many of our constituents.

Farmers want to invest. They want to invest in the future; they want to develop their parlours, and they want to invest in the infrastructure on the farm. Tax allowances for machinery are a good thing, but we need tax allowances for building their infrastructure on the farm as well. I look to the Wales Office to reflect on those things and help us to make those points to the Treasury.

There are no easy solutions, but I jotted down a few things we need to look at. We need to look at the powers of the adjudicator. We need to enhance the grocery supply code. We need proactive help on exports. The EU needs to look at the intervention price of 15p and how low that is. We need to look at labelling. Public procurement remains an issue, and Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs needs to look at its expectations of the people it is acting very irresponsibly against in many cases.

I shall deal briefly with tourism and endorse the campaign. I chair the all-party group on the tourism and hospitality industry in Wales. Many Members here today have come along to the meetings. At the last one, my right hon. Friend the Member for Clwyd West (Mr Jones) and the hon. Member for Ynys Môn were present and heard the case made for the benefits to our tourism sector. Fragile rural economies such as Ceredigion rely on agriculture and tourism, but more critically the opportunities for growth really are there. It has been estimated that a reduction in VAT to 5%, something all but four countries in the EU are undertaking, could mean another £5.3 million in the Ceredigion economy, and another 166 jobs directly in the tourism sector. We are not talking about low-wage jobs; we are talking about the potential for good jobs, enhancing the salaries of people already working in the industry, and about the benefits to subsidiary employment as well.

Of course the Treasury concern will always be the initial loss in revenue in the first year were this measure to be introduced, but the most recent figures released by the Cut Tourism VAT campaign have said this will generate far more for the Exchequer, and over 10 years could generate £3.9 billion. That is without taking into account the greater spending and growth in tourism and the knock-on effect on the wider economy. It would bring the UK into line with competitor destinations in the EU. It would increase the competitiveness of regional tourism hot spots, generate more investment for regional businesses and support wider regeneration in the areas we represent.

We have some marvellous attractions in Ceredigion, such as the coastal path going around the coast of Wales and the wonderful stretch of coastline along Cardigan bay from Cardigan to the Dyfi. I was at the National Library of Wales a few weeks ago, and the librarian was talking about a proactive attempt he is making to make the library not “That wonderful great white building on the hill” but something really inclusive to celebrate Welsh history, culture and art. We have a new soon-to-be-opened Cardigan castle, which the Secretary of State knows very well—the scene of the first national Eisteddfod. A huge amount of money is going into that project. It will be an iconic attraction in west Wales. We have, and always have had, the ingredients to entice people to come and spend money. We have the Cambrian mountains, too, and we have the best food in the world. There is so much more we have to offer people, but we need to give this jolt; it needs to be a financial jolt, and the VAT issue needs to be addressed. I believe there are certain things that colleagues in the Wales Office could do, and I hope that they will be increasingly convinced by this argument. They will have representatives of the Wales Tourism Alliance on the doorstep of Gwydyr House soon to make the case for this change, and I sincerely hope that they will be able to help us to put our case to the Treasury.

I am not renowned for my use of or appetite or enthusiasm for high tech in any guise, but it is worth remembering that the internet and the use of websites are critical to promoting Wales. That is the perception now. When people book holidays, they want to use the internet, and I am really pleased that the generic top-level domain names .wales and .cymru have come into widespread use since St David’s day. That is important for Welsh tourism businesses.

I celebrate St David’s day, belatedly, today. I hope that I shall still be here in a year’s time, and I bid a fond farewell to all those who are knowingly retiring from the green Benches.

[Several hon. Members]

rose—

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)]

Order. I do not want to impose a time limit, but unfortunately I shall have to if Members stray over the 12 minutes that I have advised. But please, use up to 12 minutes by all means. That way, we will fit everyone in.

15:26

[Albert Owen (Ynys Môn) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Ceredigion (Mr Williams), who is a doughty fighter for rural communities in Wales. On a lighter note, I met his cousin this morning. She works for the hon. Member for Broadland (Mr Simpson), and she has a cousin who works for a Labour peer down the corridor in the House of Lords. So—a little bit of friendship across the parties there.

It is a genuine pleasure to have co-sponsored this debate with the hon. Member for Montgomeryshire (Glyn Davies). He rightly talked about the first Welsh day debate in the 1940s, whose motion was moved by my predecessor, Megan Lloyd George. That was the first such debate and it was moved by the first woman MP in Wales. I am proud to follow in her footsteps.

I echo the tributes that have been paid to our colleagues who are retiring at the next election, particularly the two who have spoken today. The right hon. Member for Dwyfor Meirionnydd (Mr Llwyd) and I have worked together on many issues, despite being from different parties, and I pay tribute to him. We have big differences, however, and the biggest is probably the fact that I am an Everton supporter and he is a Liverpool supporter. I genuinely wish him well for the future. I know that we will see a lot of him in Welsh public affairs, and perhaps in the Welsh judiciary, in the near future. Perhaps he is keen to get going because he wants to play a massive role in that regard.

I also want to pay special tribute to my right hon. and very good Friend the Member for Torfaen (Paul Murphy). He was there alongside me following my first election success in 2001. We have been alongside each other ever since I came into this House and I shall miss him greatly when I return, hopefully, in May. I know that he, too, will continue to play a big role in Welsh public life, and I pay tribute to him for the work that he has done thus far.

The Welsh Affairs Committee was successful in securing this debate through the Backbench Business Committee and I pay tribute to it for doing so. However, I am a little disappointed that it has been downgraded from a full-day debate in Government time. Wales deserves better, and I hope that we can return to having a full St David’s day debate in the next Parliament. Wales is an integral part of the United Kingdom. I have mentioned my predecessor, Megan Lloyd George. She and many others have fought for Wales in this House and we deserve a full day’s debate.

I shall resist the temptation to talk about the Command Paper. No disrespect to the Secretary of State, but the most important event of the past week was of course Wales’s victory in Paris when we beat the French. My mind was distracted from the subject of devolution as I concentrated on the important matter of beating the French.

I want to talk about two issues: energy security and production; and food security and production. I raised those issues the first time I spoke in this Parliament, in the Queen’s Speech debate, knowing that they would be huge ones in the Parliament, not only locally in my area, but nationally and globally. Let me start, however, by discussing a cloud that has recently come over Anglesey: the announcement only last week by 2 Sisters Food Group that it intends to make up to 200 to 300 people redundant. I have written to the Secretary of State and am to have a meeting with him, for which I thank him, because these are important jobs.

Let me briefly outline the situation. Only two years ago, that company took on additional jobs, when they had been displaced from another factory closure. A lot of help and support was given, by the Welsh Government, the UK Government and the local authority, working with agencies, myself and other elected representatives. There was a change from a one-shift system to a two-shift system, and lots of financial and political support was involved. It is very disappointing that in just two years the company has decided to announce redundancies. I am working now, in a consultation period, with the trade unions. I hope we can stem those job losses, because the jobs are much needed in the food production industry, which is important in Wales and in the rest of the United Kingdom. I hope we will be able to work to minimise any job losses. Furthermore, I hope we will look forward and have a strategy for the food industry in Wales, and I will be working with the Secretary of State and the Welsh Government on that.

Let me again touch on the jobs issue. I am not making a partisan point when I say this, but there is no jobs miracle. As you will know, Mr Deputy Speaker, before I came into this House I ran a centre for the unemployed, and I worked closely with the long-term unemployed and the young unemployed. I very much welcome the fact that they have been given the opportunity to go into the work force. When I was an activist in the ’80s and ’90s, unemployment in my area was twice the national average. It is now below the national average, and that is a good thing. But, unfortunately, many of the jobs are now zero-hours contracts, part time and lack the permanency that people want. Some temporary contractors working in my constituency have been on a part-time contract for many years. That does not allow them to build up pension pots, and to get the credit facilities or mortgages enjoyed by permanent employees.

We need a proper strategy to examine how we can avoid this exploitation of short-term contracts and of zero-hours contracts, so that we can get the work force to contribute fully in society—so that they can contribute towards their own pensions, towards taxation and towards the local community. It is important that an incoming Government look at these issues seriously, and I am pleased that my party is looking at the zero-hours contracts, at increasing the minimum wage and at moving towards a living wage. Cross-party support is forming on the living wage, in the same way as it is now accepted that we have a minimum wage. I understand the argument about taking people out of taxation, but as I asked individuals who are on the minimum wage and could have the threshold raised: do they want to be trapped in low wages and not pay tax? The answer is no, they want to have an increase in their livelihoods and in their wages, so that, as I indicated, they contribute fully to society. I hope that we do that.

The two areas I want to concentrate predominantly on are energy and food production, as my area has a long reputation for both. It is known as the mother of Wales, because as a farming community we were able to feed large parts of Wales centuries ago when neighbouring kingdoms were fighting against each other and princes of Wales. We held off the Romans as well. So we were able to feed the Welsh nation, and I am proud of that. In recent years, we have been pioneering in energy production. We had the early—and now controversial—onshore wind farms in the ’80s and ’90s. I am in favour of them going out to sea, because of the sheer scale of them and because there is a better wind resource there. We should have wind farms of greater magnitude that produce more energy.

I am also very pro-nuclear, because we need the base load and because I believe nuclear to be safe energy production. I have lived in the county of Anglesey all my life and my father worked on the construction of the first power station. My peers in school—I left at 15—are still working at the Wylfa power station. They have senior roles and have enjoyed continuity of employment all those years. There are very few industries that can claim to offer a job for life. Energy and nuclear power is one sector that can make such a claim. The right hon. Member for Clwyd West (Mr Jones) mentioned wind farms and renewables, but I believe that we need a mix of energy. To meet demand at its peak and then to come down off that peak, we need to be able to switch something off. It is very difficult and expensive to switch off a nuclear power station or a gas power station, but easier to switch off some of the renewables, albeit with the tidal arrays that I hope we get in the future. Wind farms, too, are easy to deal with in that regard. We need to be able to switch off capacity at times, which is why we need a balance of power.

I have been a member of the Energy and Climate Change Committee, and we have had some very interesting debates in this Parliament. We have shed light on some of the downfalls in the energy market, which will, I think, improve things.

One area on which I wish to focus is the distribution and transmission of electricity. Companies, including National Grid, have monopolies in the regions, and we need to break them up, either by having not-for-profit organisations or competition within the distribution centre. Some 20% to 25% of the bills that we pay go to transmission and distribution—much more than the cost of green levies.

Food production is a very important industry.

[Kevin Brennan]

On the point about distribution companies, does my hon. Friend think that companies such as Western Power Distribution should be interested in innovations such as the one by a company called Iviti in my constituency, which produces LED light bulbs that stay on after a power cut? As part of its social responsibility, perhaps the distribution company should look into distributing those light bulbs to vulnerable customers who might face power cuts and hardship.

[Albert Owen]

My hon. Friend makes an important point. I talk about being pro-nuclear and pro-renewables, but I am also pro-energy efficiency. The more we can improve efficiency of energy consumption the better. The model to which he refers is an old proven technology and we should be improving it for the future.

Before I move on from energy, let me just say that I had the privilege of acting as host for my right hon. Friend the Member for Don Valley (Caroline Flint). We went to visit not only a number of projects, including a biomass plant on Anglesey, but an energy centre, where we met 17 and 19-year-old engineering apprentices. When we sat down with them around the table, we saw that they wanted exactly the same thing that our generation wanted, which is job security, and that is what they are getting. I am proud of the skills in that sector. It was the decision of the Leader of the Opposition when he was Energy Secretary to go ahead with some of these projects. I pay tribute to him for that work as we are now seeing the result, which is highly skilled and highly trained young people ready to take this country into the future.

On food and farming, I supported many of the things that the hon. Member for Ceredigion (Mr Williams) said. We should be lumping together food, farming and tourism in one big sector, because they are interlinked. The food that we produce locally and nationally could be consumed locally and nationally, as well as being exported. The farming industry has been through difficult periods, and I do not think that it can survive the vagaries of the market. There needs to be a proper food and farming plan at a Welsh Government level, a UK level and a European level. We are moving in that direction. It is important that dairy farmers have a dairy plan. Those of us who know about the dairy industry—the first job I ever had was as a farm boy milking cows in a parlour—understand that it is not possible to switch on and off from dairy farming and it is hard to diversify. People have to invest for a long time in the calves and heifers that go through to the milking stage. Support is what those dairy farmers need. I am working with colleagues across the House to ensure that there is a viable future for dairy farming in Wales. I am talking about the smaller farms as well as the larger farms across the United Kingdom.

On the tourism link, it is important that we have top-class assets and facilities in our area which people can come and visit, and that they have food and farming produce that has been procured and sourced locally. We can do the brand Anglesey and the brand Wales.

I finish off by saying that I am very proud of having an Anglesey day to showcase the county of Anglesey here in the House of Commons. It is our duty to show the best of what we have, and Wales has a lot to offer the rest of the United Kingdom and the rest of Europe. That is why we need an all-day Welsh debate, so that we can stand up, champion and bang the drum for Anglesey and Wales.

15:40

[David T. C. Davies (Monmouth) (Con)]

I, too, thank hon. Members for securing the debate. It might not be obligatory, but I hope that we are setting a precedent of having a St David’s day debate that will be repeated annually.

Let me also pay tribute to the right hon. Members for Torfaen (Paul Murphy) and for Dwyfor Meirionnydd (Mr Llwyd). Although I have disagreed with them on many occasions about many things, as the right hon. Member for Torfaen says, we can also agree on many things. Both said much that I could agree with in their speeches. It has been a pleasure to have served in this House with them both and on a personal level many of us will miss them greatly. I wish them well.

It has also been a pleasure to serve as Chair of the Select Committee on Welsh Affairs. I was counting it up and I have served on seven Select Committees, or their equivalents, both here and in the Welsh Assembly. The Welsh Affairs Committee is rather lucky, because it can have an examination or inquiry into anything. Anything that affects Wales can be considered by the Committee and everything affects Wales, so we have pretty well considered everything that one could imagine.

The one thing on which we have always been able to agree is the topicality of those inquiries. We have looked into agriculture, broadband, industry and tourism and, by and large, we have been able to make recommendations that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State and my hon. Friend the Minister, to whom I also pay tribute, as well as their predecessors, have taken seriously. I want to mention one or two and to inject a few personal thoughts, as well.

For example, we have considered broadband, which has been a particular issue in many areas and for many people in Monmouthshire. Without going into great detail about what is in the report, I want British Telecom to come out and say which areas will get broadband in the short term and which will not. We know that many areas will, frankly, never be reached by high broadband speeds and it is important that people in those areas know that they are there. That will allow them to go off and make use of other technologies such as satellites. The trouble I see at the moment is that far too often BT effectively tells people to hang on a couple of months, or another year or so, and they will be connected up to fibre, but it never quite seems to happen. We need more openness and transparency on that issue.

We considered the importance of a proper funding settlement for S4C. I am glad that that seems to be working out and that there seems to be consensus.

[Albert Owen]

The hon. Gentleman mentions the work that his Committee has done, but on broadband there is a plan in Wales, which is run jointly between the Welsh Government, BT and the European Union, which have funded it. That has enabled my area to be the first rural area to have the roll-out, along with Blaenau Gwent. There is a structure; it might not be reaching parts of Monmouth at the moment, but it is reaching parts of Anglesey.

[David T. C. Davies]

Perhaps the hon. Gentleman’s relationship with BT is better than mine. I do not know, but there are certainly parts of Wales that broadband is not reaching and Monmouthshire is among them.

[Alun Cairns]

I remind my hon. Friend and the hon. Member for Ynys Môn (Albert Owen) that the scheme the hon. Gentleman talks about includes significant taxpayers’ money from the UK Government, as well—that is, £70 million. A higher level of funding comes from the UK Government through the UK taxpayer than from the Welsh Government in that process.

[David T. C. Davies]

There we have it. There is money aplenty going in to it from the Welsh Assembly, the British taxpayers and the European Union, but it is still not getting to Monmouthshire. Perhaps we should return to that point. I appreciate the co-operation between members of the Committee. People outside the Committee could perhaps take a lesson on it. I do not want to be too critical of anyone on this Thursday afternoon, but it was interesting that we found in one of our inquiries that there was not quite the co-operation between International Business Wales and UK Trade & Investment that one would like. When the First Minister, or indeed my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Wales, goes off to sell Wales, they should go as part of a joint trade mission so that we can show investors from the far east or elsewhere that the Welsh Assembly and the national Government are speaking with one voice on the importance of inward investment. Whether politicans are Labour, Conservative, Liberal Democrat, Plaid Cymru or from some other party, in the Assembly or Parliament, we all agree on the importance of getting investment into Wales.

[Stephen Crabb]

The Chairman of the Select Committee is making an important point about inward investment. It is worth putting it on the record that last year saw the highest level of inward investment in Wales for almost 25 years. The crucial point, which I think is what he is implying, is that almost all the inward investment projects were secured with the backing and support of UKTI. So collaboration between the Welsh Government and UKTI is vital.

[David T. C. Davies]

I accept that. I am trying not to be too critical of members of other parties. I simply make the point that co-operation is important not only in business but in tourism. I was surprised to learn that VisitBritain and Visit Wales do not have that many discussions with each other. I believe that the Welsh tourism Minister has not met senior people in VisitBritain and vice versa. That is disappointing, frankly, because they all have an interest in making sure that when tourists come to London they are told that the Principality of Wales is only two hours away by train and are encouraged to come and have a look at it.

One of the most topical issues that the Committee has looked at and that I suspect whoever chairs the Committee after the election will want to have another look at is the Severn bridge. The money to be returned to Severn River Crossing will have been paid by 2017. At that point the Government, whoever they are, will have to make a decision on whether to carry on using SRC or some other private company to collect the tolls or to bring the bridge back into public ownership.

[Paul Flynn (Newport West) (Lab)]

Nationalise it.

[David T. C. Davies]

I am not normally known as a supporter of nationalisation, but if the bridge is run by a public body—the Government or the Welsh Assembly—the VAT of 20% will no longer be payable. That would be a 20% cut in the tolls overnight. On that basis, I think that I am willing to set aside decades of Conservative thought and call for the nationalisation of the Severn bridge. It would be of enormous benefit to everyone who uses it, including many of my constituents. Furthermore, my Committee looked at the current level of the tolls and we calculated—it was a little bit of a back-of-an-envelope calculation, but no one has yet contradicted it—that the tolls could be set at about one third of the current levels, and that that would be enough to maintain the bridge. No one has ever denied that, and I would be interested to see if anyone can.

Clearly, it is expensive to maintain the bridge. I have been down there and been shown by the engineers how it moves around the whole time. Both bridges are extraordinary structures based at the estuary with the second highest tide in the world. I do not realistically believe that we will ever get rid of the tolls completely, but it would be utterly wrong for the Treasury to use the tolls as some kind of milch cow. The people of Wales and south-west England deserve better than that. The tolls should be drastically cut on top of the cut that should come about as a result of the removal of VAT.

I have discussed this with the Department for Transport, which said, “But we had to spend extra money on the old bridge.” That is true, and it has given me the figures for that. But it is also true that other changes to taxes—VAT, which I have mentioned, and the industrial buildings tax—meant that the Treasury got something of a windfall as well, albeit one that it was not expecting. That windfall, I believe, exceeds the amount of money that was spent on the old bridge. So it is time for a fairer deal for Wales on this issue. I invite my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State and my hon. Friend the Minister—I very much hope they are in their jobs after the election—to think about some sort of plan for what we will do post-2017, when the issue will have to be faced by us.

Members of the Committee, whoever they may be after the election, may want to look also at the proposed new M4 relief road. I appreciate that transport affects all of Wales, and north Wales transport links are just as important. Obviously, I know a little bit more about this one, which has greater relevance to my constituency, but it is an all-Wales issue, because the Welsh Assembly is planning to use its new borrowing powers to pay for that route. There is a great big argument going on now about whether it should do that. I put my cards on the table: I am not particularly sympathetic to the environmental arguments being put forward, because many of the people putting forward those arguments would put them forward whatever. They are opposed to any kind of development whatsoever, anywhere. Whether it is houses, roads or anything at all, there are people out there who simply do not like development. I find myself, unusually and perhaps for the first time ever, on the same side as the Welsh Assembly’s Minister for Economy, Science and Transport. That is probably a shock to us both.

Two other issues have been mentioned today which the Committee will clearly want to look at—energy and where we are heading with devolution. On devolution, with the utmost respect, I beg to differ from my hon. Friend the Member for Montgomeryshire (Glyn Davies). I am very concerned about what has been happening over the past 15 or 16 years. Every couple of years the Welsh Assembly asks for extra powers, and some sort of committee is set up or somebody is sent off on a roadshow somewhere to hold meetings in village halls at which only a few people turn up, then they come back and write a long report recommending that all sorts of extra powers be given to the Welsh Assembly. Not surprisingly, whoever is in government thinks, “Let’s keep them quiet and give them the extra powers.” On and on it goes, and no thought has been given to where this is going to end.

Scotland always seems to be a few jumps ahead and has now, in effect, got home rule. Northern Ireland has another set of powers and a structure which is rather difficult to understand, but which is obviously shaped to try and keep the peace over there. All these bodies look around at what the others have got, and they will always find something that one lot has which they do not have, and they will say, “It’s not fair. We are being treated unfairly. Why have the Scots got this and we haven’t?” Nobody is looking at what has happened—or rather, what has not happened—in England.

I share the instinctive Unionism of the right hon. Member for Torfaen, but I see the solution as lying in some kind of federal settlement, English Parliament or English votes on English laws, because a failure to address this problem now will mean ever more powers leeching away to Scotland and Wales. Probably in the next 15 or 20 years, but maybe even sooner, there will be another referendum in Scotland. I would not be at all surprised if in my lifetime the Scots voted for independence. Wales will be constantly looking at it, and people will say, “They’ve got it. They can do it. Why can’t we have it? Why can’t we do it as well?”

I genuinely fear that in my lifetime Wales could become an independent nation. There may be some who want to see that happen. I personally do not, and the only way that I think we could stop that is to lock everything into place, possibly through some kind of federal solution, perhaps with a federal parliament overseeing defence, taxation and foreign affairs, but making certain that nobody can go beyond the line. There is no line in the sand at present and we have to draw one, even if that means giving a few extra powers to the Welsh Assembly. If at some point we can say, “There you are. That is it. You can’t have any more because nobody else would be able to have anything more either”, we might be able to lock things up and ensure that there is no further move towards complete independence for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

I was interested to hear the right hon. Member for Torfaen say that he had researched what is done in other nations around the world. I think that we need to look at other nations that have a tradition of British law, such as Canada or perhaps South Africa, and those that do not. I do not think that any country has ever embarked on a process of giving away powers in such an ad hoc fashion. We need to start thinking very carefully and seriously about how we can all agree on a way to prevent devolution leading to fragmentation and the break-up of the Union.

Finally, I want to talk about energy, which the Welsh Affairs Committee takes very seriously. We have looked at issues such as shale gas, but I think that we should also look at nuclear and renewables. The shadow Secretary of State has decried my so-called flat-earth speech. I am sceptical about a lot of what is said about global warming, but I think that many of us agree that taxing carbon and increasing energy prices in a way that hits manufacturing industries in Wales, including some very notable ones, might lead them to consider closing down and taking their business elsewhere, which is something none of us wants to see. We therefore need to think very carefully about any energy policy that will make it harder for our manufacturing industries.

I have very much enjoyed carrying out my role as Chair of the Welsh Affairs Committee and working with hon. Members, on both side of the House. I thoroughly agree with the sentiment expressed here that we need to continue having a Secretary of State dedicated to Wales and—dare I say it?—a robust Select Committee that ensures that whoever has that post is doing a good job.

15:56

[Paul Flynn (Newport West) (Lab)]

The message I have heard is one of optimism. I might have to disappoint the hon. Member for Monmouth (David T. C. Davies), whom I thought was about to apply to be the Labour candidate in his constituency, because we already have a splendid candidate there. I welcome his epiphany in calling for nationalisation. I am sure that he will be calling for the nationalisation of the top 50 companies next, on his continuing journey to the far left, which I have watched for some time, having known him since he was a schoolboy.

There is so much that is great going on. One of the joys of having been born when I was is rejoicing in the Welsh history that I have lived through. I remember the depressing history of the campaign for hunan-lywodraeth i Gymru through organisations such as Undeb Cymru Fydd and how it collapsed on 16 January 1896 at a meeting in Newport of the two federations of the Liberal party, which of course was almighty at that time. Lloyd George was not allowed to speak, because they were terrified of his persuasive oratory. A Liberal Member for Merthyr stuffed the meeting with people opposed to independence for Wales. We could well have gone down a very different path. The result was that Lloyd George lost enthusiasm and went to campaign against the Boer war.

The story of Wales throughout the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries was one of people going to Westminster, having made all kinds of promises about how they would serve Wales, only to disappoint after being seduced by this place. It is a matter of great pride that I have been in this building when we delivered. My generation has delivered in Wales, and I believe that will eventually lead to strong government, if not independence. We are in a situation in which the forces are moving beyond our control. It will not be little agreements that do it; it will be the force of what happens in Scotland at the general election. Consider the extraordinary change in Ireland when the Queen turned up in a green frock and went to Croke park to bow her head in penitence at the site of an atrocity there. That had a profound effect on Irish thinking. Of course, 200 years of antagonism did not disappear, but it certainly had a great effect. I believe we will see a pattern based on the federation of five nations—not within 10 years, but possibly in 20 to 25 years—and we will have an asymmetric form of devolution that will be appropriate for each one.

I am proud of what is happening in my own city. We have gone through a few rough years, but there is room for great optimism. Our problems are temporary and we can deal with them, but our great treasures and strengths are permanent and will remain, including the mixed character of the people, which is made up of many nations and has a special vigour and enthusiasm and a robust personality. We also have great institutions, including the Celtic Manor. Even though the Prime Minister cannot see the difference between Newport and Newport far west, which is sometimes called Cardiff—he mixed them up yesterday—we have a wonderful hinterland, including the glorious Roman treasures in Caerleon, which represent great strength and beauty in the city. The future is bright.

We have a chance to celebrate our Cymreictod. What a change there has been! In 1962, Saunders Lewis, in his great lecture, “Tynged yr Iaith”, talked about a time in this century when no one would speak Welsh, and Islwyn Ffowc Elis’s book, “Wythnos yng Nghymru Fydd”, was similarly about the death of the Welsh language. But it has not died—it is in vigorous form. A couple of months ago I had the great joy of visiting Ysgol Gwynllyw and talking with the fluent sixth-formers about all the political problems of our day in great detail. It is possible to go to any school in Newport and have a conversation with pupils in simple Welsh at the very least. That is a great triumph. The first school that taught through the medium of Welsh in Newport had 12 pupils in 1970 and they are now 50 years old, and we will see very soon the opening of a secondary school in Newport.

[David T. C. Davies]

I think that school was Clytha primary, which I attended. At that time, the problem was that there was a separate Welsh unit and not much interaction between the two, but I think that has also changed for the better and is supported by Members on both sides of the House.

[Paul Flynn]

Yes, it was St John’s, the old school on the other side of the river, which became part of Clytha primary.

The school was set up in the teeth of all kinds of very powerful opposition, but some of those first pupils who are now 50 years old are now teachers of Welsh themselves in other schools. We are seeing the great triumph of the Welsh language and the great strength that it has now. That is very moving and we should celebrate it. Whenever people ask, “What’s special about the Welsh language?”, I point to its beauty. On Radio 4 last Saturday, somebody who teaches it in Brighton talked about the cadence of the language. Listen to the magic of the words, the soft, seductive words:

“Nant y Mynydd groyw loyw, Yn ymdroelli tua’r pant, Rhwng y brwyn yn sisial ganu; O na bawn i fel y nant!”

The language is also muscular:

“Argoed, Argoed y mannau dirgel, Ble’r oedd dy fryniau, dy hafanu dyfnion, Dy drofau tywyll, dy drefi tawel?”

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)]

I think we may have to help the Hansard reporters at this rate. We need to try to ensure that they are not struggling too much.

[Paul Flynn]

Among the improvements we have seen is that there are now Hansard reporters who are proficient in Welsh. We do not have problems now.

I want to talk about the neglect of our history. As a member of the Political and Constitutional Reform Committee, I am bored stiff with Magna Carta. It was significant because it gave some kind of democracy to about 25 barons and their families and took a bit of power away from the King, but to compare it to cyfraith Hywel Dda is nonsense. After Magna Carta, the English were living in the dark ages compared with 10th-century Wales under cyfraith Hywel Dda.

[Mr Llwyd]

The hon. Gentleman is making a very powerful and interesting case, but Magna Carta did in fact acknowledge that the Welsh laws of the time should stay as a distinct body of law because they were preferable. There are a few lines in Magna Carta about that.

[Paul Flynn]

Before I return to that, I want, in relation to Welsh education, to say a word of thanks and tribute to Wyn Roberts. If anyone was responsible for the education in a second language in Wales it was him. I remember him saying in the corridor outside the Chamber, “Rhaid i ni fod yn gadarn! Rhaid i ni wneud safiad!” He was absolutely right. It was very courageous of him, as a Conservative, to have Welsh taught in the constituency of the hon. Member for Monmouth and various other parts of Wales, but it now exists and will continue to do so as a treasure for all the children of Wales, and we can hear it on their lips. If we go back to the time of the Romans in Caerleon, they spoke two languages: intra muros, they spoke Latin; and ultra muros, they spoke in Welsh. We do not hear a lot of children speaking Latin these days, but Welsh is still on the lips of children, which shows something about the vigour and endurance of the language.

Cyfraith Hywel Dda was arranged not by a gang of barons, but by people from each cwmwd or tiny area. Seven people were brought together to pool their wisdom, and what they did was extraordinary. We could have discussed this during the earlier debate on women’s rights.

No country in the whole of Europe was anywhere near as advanced as Wales on women’s rights. There were rights, which were very rare, for divorce. If the marriage had gone on for seven years, the wife was entitled to half the property: she had the sheep, and the husband had the pigs. She also had other rights. If the husband was unfaithful, he had to pay. Punishments throughout Europe at the time involved chopping off various bits of people—heads and arms, and everything else—but Wales was very advanced in that punishments mostly took the form of compensation. To give hon. Members some idea of the compensation, the price of a cat was a penny before its eyes opened, tuppence after its eyes opened and 4p after it had caught a mouse. A husband who was unfaithful to his wife had to pay 5 shillings, and if he did it a second time he had to pay £1, or the equivalent of losing 20 cats—that would dampen the ardour of any would-be adulterer.

Women had better rights than had existed in many countries for 1,000 years. England had 220 laws involving capital punishment in the 18th century, including for chopping down a tree or raiding a rabbit warren, but in 10th-century Wales hardly anything resulted in capital punishment. Regarding itinerants, there was an extraordinary law that if somebody who was poor and starving was refused food at three villages, they were entitled to steal without punishment—eat your heart out, Shelter and Crisis—which was an admission that the problems of the poor were not necessarily their fault.

We know that Cyfraith Hywel Dda was arranged in Hen Dy Gwyn ar Daf, but unfortunately we do not know when. It was a serious venture, because they stocked up with six weeks-worth of bread beforehand. As we are now celebrating the laws of Magna Carta—a significant event, but minor in terms of women’s rights and the progress of society—we need to give a lot of thought to the triumph of Cyfraith Hywel Dda.

16:09

[Mrs Madeleine Moon (Bridgend) (Lab)]

The Parc Slip Margam open cast coal site spreads across the Bridgend, Ogmore and Aberavon constituencies. The majority of the site lies within Neath Port Talbot council area, which tends to take the lead in negotiations with a company called Celtic Energy. That company exploited the site for many years, but the major settlement affected by the open cast site is in the Bridgend county borough area, and the largest community is in my constituency of Bridgend.

The mine is a mile and a half scar on the valley floor running from Cefn Cribwr to Cynffig hill, and it includes a huge deep void that is filling with water. The site is a blight on the environment, and it poses a risk to local children who unfortunately use it for motor cycle scrambling, or swim in the fetid water in the void. Local residents live in fear of water cascading into their homes and polluting local rivers. The site urgently needs restoration, and for local people the questions are simple: who has responsibility for restoration? How can they be made to accept that responsibility? Where will the almost £60 million needed for the work come from? If any budding script writers out there want a plot with twists and turns, a tale of Government failure, of political failure at national and local level, or of financial greed, dodgy practices and legal failure, this is the story for them. If Erin Brockovich has nothing to do, I invite her to come to south Wales and try her hand at Parc Slip.

Coaling at Parc Slip goes back to before 1985 and the British Coal Corporation. Between 1985 and 1994 applications to extend the open cast were made, refused and overturned at public inquiry, with permission always bringing with it responsibilities to restore the site. The Coal Authority Act 1994 privatised the coal industry, and a company that later became Celtic Energy bought the freehold for a number of sites in south Wales, including Parc Slip. In his ruling in Cardiff on 18 February, Mr Justice Hickinbottom stated that all those arrangements required Celtic to restore the land to countryside and agricultural use once mining was complete.

Mr Will Watson, chief executive officer of Celtic Energy, and until March 2010 the corporate director of environmental services at Neath Port Talbot council, claimed in an e-mail to me:

“The situation has been exacerbated…by the decision in 1994 made by the Government of the day to take a larger cash receipt for the sale of the company in return for a 10-year bond free period. Had escrow funds been put away for example at today’s level of around £10 million per year for the years 1994 to 2004, then the fund would now stand at around £155 million (assuming it was invested to simply cover inflation)…Since the UK Government had the £100 million in 1994 (worth around £178 million with inflation today) it seems reasonable to me to ask the UK Government to contribute to a solution at Margam.”

There needs to be a clear answer to this from the Government. Mr Justice Hickinbottom said that responsibility lies with Celtic, but Celtic claims that it lies with the Government. Which is it? My constituents need to know. Does Her Majesty’s Treasury have any responsibility at all for the restoration of part of this site because of the nature of the sale in 1994? Yes or no? We need an answer.

When mining at Parc Slip finished in 2008, further planning permission to continue mining was denied and it was time for Celtic to fulfil obligations to restore Parc Slip. Mr Justice Hickinbottom describes how, around this time, some of Celtic Energy’s directors and executives came up with a plan called “the big picture”. They arranged the creation of a series of companies and parent companies in the British Virgin Islands. The ultimate owners and financial beneficiaries of those companies were the men themselves, and it was arranged to sell to one of them—Oak Regeneration—the land and the attached responsibilities for restoration.

After the sale, many of the provisions for restoration that Celtic Energy had held in its accounts—around £135 million—were released by the auditors. The six members involved in planning the transaction were then awarded large bonuses. The sale to Oak must have seemed strange to the auditors and non-executive members of Celtic Energy’s board. The group, however, had paid a fee of £10,000 for legal advice from Stephen Davies, QC, who advised that it would not be a successful way of transferring the restoration responsibilities to another company. A further fee of £250,000 for further advice from Mr Davies resulted in advice that the sale would in fact be a successful way of transferring restoration responsibilities. Mr Davies’s statement was used to show Celtic’s auditors that the provisional restoration funds could be released, which they were. The fund was reduced to £67 million, and Celtic now claims that the money did not really exist. Mr Watson claims that the figures are “provisional” for liabilities on the balance sheet and do not represent any assets in any form—cash or otherwise.

During the course of the Serious Fraud Office investigation, it was not clear whether the transactions had been effective in transferring liabilities, and so the accounts were amended to put back the provisions until the matter was resolved. The company will revisit the position once more. My constituents need to know this: is that sound accountancy practice? Can there be millions of pounds in accounts that are liabilities on a balance sheet but do not represent assets in any form—cash or otherwise? Or is the money there and capable of being pursued to provide the restoration at Parc Slip?

I have made a number of references to Mr Justice Hickinbottom’s judgment in a case brought by the Serious Fraud Office against the people who benefited financially from this asset transfer scheme: three solicitors at a company called M&A—Eric Evans, David Alan Whiteley and Francis Bodman; Stephen Davies, QC; Richard Walters, the managing director of Celtic; and Leighton Humphries, the financial director of Celtic. The SFO claimed that the responsibilities for restoration had not been transferred to Oak. However, half way through the case, the argument was changed to say that the responsibilities had in fact been transferred and that the problem was that the local authority would not be able to secure restoration from Oak, which had zero assets. Mr Justice Hickinbottom decided that this later change was not illegal. The first was never pressed or explored, and in his ruling the judge quoted one of the defendants who had called the asset transfer “just good business”.

The case against Celtic and its legal henchmen has not been tried. The SFO case collapsed because of the legal judgment by Mr Justice Hickinbottom that said

“a dishonest agreement is not actionable as a crime at common law unless a proprietary right or interest of the victim is actually or potentially injured.”

The victims were deemed to be the Minerals Planning Authority and the Coal Authority, which he felt had no such proprietary rights or interests. Adding insult to injury, the lawyers and Celtic are to have their legal fees paid by the Government. To say that the taxpayer has been completely ripped off by this company is an understatement.

The legislation privatising coal failed to protect the taxpayers of Cynffig Hill; the Coal Authority and the planning laws failed to protect them; and the best legal minds at the SFO failed to protect them. Where are they to go now? The mineral planning officers appear to have five options. The first is to do nothing, which is totally unacceptable. The second is enforcement, but they have been told by Celtic that if they do that, there will be further legal difficulties. Celtic would put itself into receivership and disappear. The third is exploration of alternative restoration with coal extraction, which is totally unacceptable to the people of Bridgend. Then there is exploration of alternative restoration with no coal extraction, and finally there has been a suggestion of using an existing £5.7 million escrow account to do a restoration lite. This is a desperate situation.

I secured a debate on this on 29 January when the Minister of State, Department of Energy and Climate Change, who is also the Minister for Business and Enterprise, the right hon. Member for West Suffolk (Matthew Hancock), assured me that he would meet me to discuss the issue. I had hoped we would be able to debate where the discussions had taken us. The clock is ticking. We have three weeks until Dissolution and my meeting has not taken place.

In his ruling, Mr Justice Hickinbottom said:

“conduct that some may regard as morally reprehensible is not open to be set aside, let alone be the possible subject of criminal sanctions, because Parliament has determined that those sanctions should not apply in those circumstances”.

Parliament has the legislative competence and moral responsibility to deal with this mess. I hope that today we can agree that one of the first priorities of whoever sits on the Government Benches in May will be to work with the Welsh Assembly Government, the Minerals Planning Authority, the Coal Authority, Natural Resources Wales and any other relevant statutory body to send a clear message to Celtic that it must face its responsibilities and that we will pursue it. Even if legislative reform is needed, it must face its responsibilities.

Communities should expect, as victims of incompetence and chicanery, to have the full support of this House to resolve this situation. I urge the Minister to give a sense of hope that we will unite to tackle the problem by calling a meeting of Government, the Welsh Assembly, local authorities and others to begin to thrash out a way forward, and to make a commitment that we will work together to seek a resolution to this appalling situation.

16:21

[Jessica Morden (Newport East) (Lab)]

Like my hon. Friend the Member for Ynys Môn (Albert Owen), I want to talk about jobs. In part, I want to do so because yesterday at Wales questions the Secretary of State said that Opposition Members were

“peddling a gross caricature of the Welsh economy”—[Official Report, 4 March 2015; Vol. 593, c. 928.]

when we talked about the rise in low-paid insecure work in Wales. I say gently to the Secretary of State that he talks about a recovery bearing fruit, but not for the many of my constituents who come to see me week on week with their experiences of what it is like trying to find work out there. It is harder now to find a job with decent pay, predictable hours and security than it was before the financial crash.

We must of course all welcome unemployment coming down. I certainly do. We all want to see more people in work. However, we should not repeatedly ignore what is certainly the reality for many workers in Wales. We should not kid ourselves that everything is fine. The number of people in temporary employment in Wales since 2008 is up by 28%. The number of full-time jobs is down according to some estimates by about 51,000. There are 100,000 minimum wage jobs in Wales and 260,000 people earning less than the living wage. That is about a quarter of the work force, which is much higher than the UK average.

As we heard earlier, the Office for National Statistics estimated last week that about 1.8 million people were working zero-hours contract jobs, a statistic that could equate to about 90,000 workers in Wales on zero-hours contracts. These are often jobs without holiday pay, sick pay and pension rights. It is not always bad to be on a zero-hours contract—for example, there are students who hope that it will tide them over—but for many others, as my hon. Friend said, it is about financial security and the ability to plan for the future. Many of these jobs pay on average about £300 less a week than other jobs. Figures last week from the Office for Budget Responsibility show that the taxpayer has been hit with a bill of about £90 million for top-ups such as tax credits, because many of the new jobs are so low paid.

[Stephen Crabb]

The hon. Lady is of course absolutely right to describe the insecurity people feel when they are doing jobs that do not give them enough hours, or minimum wage jobs that do not bring home enough money to provide for their families. However, the ONS last week was very clear that the 1.8 million figure refers to the number of contracts in the British economy, not the number of individuals on zero-hours contracts. We have to be very careful. The actual, correct figure—I should have come back to the shadow Secretary of State yesterday on this—for the number of people in Wales on zero-hours contracts is 35,000. That represents less than 3% of all employees.

[Jessica Morden]

But 35,000, even if it is that figure, still represents a huge number of workers in insecure work who cannot plan for the future because they do not know what their weekly income will be.

There is now an extra bill for topping up pay with things such as tax credits because so many of the new jobs in the economy are so low paid. We can debate the figures, but we also need to think about the issues that people bring to me week after week. It is only fair in such debates that I give a voice to some of the people I have seen recently. Last week, a man contacted me about a jobs issue facing members of his family. A Newport company had changed its cleaning contract, presumably to save money, and the new contractors told the staff that they would have to work for six weeks before they were paid, and then they would be paid only for four weeks. That is how they were to keep their just-above-minimum-wage jobs that they had had for 10 years.

I met a graduate who works for a sports shop on a zero-hours contract and who had lots of hours before Christmas but is now being offered one or two shifts a week if she is lucky. She is a graduate who wants a long-term career, but she is having to hang on to that job because that is all there is. A constituent who is in the same boat is working in the care industry on a zero-hours contract. She is struggling to get any kind of mortgage because her weekly take-home pay is so insecure. A construction worker’s pay is being reduced because he is being paid through an umbrella company that is owned by the contractor he is working for, which then deducts unnecessary fees from his take-home pay. I am glad that that practice has been outlawed by the Welsh Government, particularly for the work on the heads of the valleys road, but it should be outlawed more widely, and I hope it is.

I recently spoke to a group who volunteer to work in food banks across south Wales. They said that the rise in the number of people going to food banks is due to welfare changes, but also that they are seeing more people who are in low-paid work. One of the volunteers asked me, quite reasonably, “Why won’t Government Ministers come and talk to us on the front line so that they can see the reasons why people are coming to use food banks and act on it?” I told her about the inquiry by the all-party group on hunger and food poverty, led by the Bishop of Truro. It has produced an extremely comprehensive and readable report called “Feeding Britain” that has come up with some very sensible recommendations. The report said that, yes, welfare changes, sanctions and the bedroom tax are all factors in the rise of food banks, but it is also due to the fact that a quarter of people using them are in low-paid work. I had to say to her that groups like this have been doing this work, and they have gathered the evidence, but the Government are choosing not to hear it.

We need decent work and decent pay. That was recently the subject of a Wales TUC campaign. I hope that a future Labour Government will pledge to take action on the minimum wage, encourage more people to pay the living wage, tackle zero-hours contracts, and begin to put some of this right.

I know that it is nearly time for the main act, but I want to talk about one more thing that I hope we get right in future. It was mentioned by the hon. Member for Monmouth (David T. C. Davies) and is probably one of the few things on which I agree with him. It is the thorny issue of the Severn tolls, which are, as we repeatedly say, the highest tolls in the UK. That is felt most keenly in constituencies such as mine, by commuters, by businesses and by hauliers. The concession has not served us well, and we hope that it will end in 2018. Every time we ask when it will end, the period extends and extends again. That indicates how difficult the issue has been. It is now time for us to start to make sensible decisions about tolling levels in future. We all want the tolls to come down, and I think we should consider creative options such as off-peak travel for hauliers and concessions for people who live locally. The Welsh Affairs Committee has done some excellent work which I think could form the basis of a solution. I hope that we can cut those tolls dramatically, and ensure that high tolls are not used as a cash cow for the Government in the future. That—along with persuading First Great Western to increase its capacity on commuter routes such as the one from Bristol to Cardiff—would go some way towards resolving some of the transport problems in my part of the world.

Let me end by wishing a very happy retirement—well, it is not strictly a retirement, but it is a retirement from the House—to the right hon. Member for Dwyfor Meirionnydd (Mr Llwyd), and also to my right hon. Friend the Member for Torfaen (Paul Murphy), who has given fantastic support to me over the years, both in this place and in my former job. I know that we shall miss him greatly.

16:30

[Owen Smith (Pontypridd) (Lab)]

It is a great pleasure to wind up this important debate on behalf of the Opposition. I join others in congratulating the hon. Member for Montgomeryshire (Glyn Davies) and my hon. Friend the Member for Ynys Môn (Albert Owen) on securing the debate, and I thank the Backbench Business Committee for allowing it.

We have heard many excellent and diverse speeches, to which I pay tribute. The right hon. Member for Clwyd West (Mr Jones) spoke without a trace of irony of his desire for a reduction in the level of VAT applying to Welsh tourism businesses—failing, of course, to mention that he was a member of the Government who raised the level of VAT applying to tourism and, indeed, to everyone in Wales. However, he spoke extremely well about Wales, with great passion and conviction.

I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Ceredigion (Mr Williams), who spoke mainly about the tourism and farming industries in his part of Wales. I also pay tribute to the hon. Member for Monmouth (David T. C. Davies), the Chair of the Select Committee, who spoke with his customary verve and chutzpah, and, with his customary diligence, managed to reprise the “flat earth” speech which is so dear to me and which we have heard so many times in this place. My hon. Friend the Member for Newport East (Jessica Morden) spoke eloquently and passionately about the realities of the world of work in Wales, and my hon. Friend the Member for Bridgend (Mrs Moon) spoke about the problems of heavy industry and remediation of the open-cast works in her constituency and others in south Wales. I hope that when we, as a Labour Government, succeed the present Government, we will pursue that issue with great vigour.

Let me also pay tribute to the Members who are retiring from the House. The right hon. Member for Dwyfor Meirionnydd (Mr Llwyd) is always—well, perhaps a little less so today—a courteous and wholly accurate contributor. [Hon. Members: “Oh!”] I shall explain what I meant by that later. In fact, the right hon. Gentleman is always courteous in contributing to the life of the House. He will be missed when he retires from this place, but I am sure that he will continue to serve Wales extremely well, and I count him as a friend despite our slight contretemps today.

The speech made today by my right hon. Friend the Member for Torfaen (Paul Murphy) was heard with the usual deference and respect, owing to the experience and sagacity that he has brought to his role. He has been a noble and excellent servant of his community, his party and the House during his long time here. He has twice been Secretary of State for Wales, and he has been a great friend to Wales and to me. I know that everyone in the House will join me in paying great tribute to him.

Along with my hon. Friend the Member for Ynys Môn, my right hon. Friend drew attention to what an important event this is. It is, in effect, the St David’s day debate, although it is not actually taking place on St David’s day as it has in the past. The debate is important because it puts Wales in the spotlight, at the heart of our national conversation in our national United Kingdom Parliament. It is important because we are of course a minority nation of just 3 million people among 60 million, and there is always a danger that, as a minority part of the UK state, our voices are drowned out in the babel of voices from other parts of the UK, in particular of course the lion’s share of people who live in and come from England. This Parliament is in institutional terms the greatest expression of this United Kingdom. My right hon. Friend the Member for Torfaen spoke for me and many on the Opposition Benches, and indeed for many on the other side of the House, when he expressed his concerns about the way in which the voice of Wales has been diminished and is at risk of being diminished to an even greater extent as we move forward. The Government have, I fear, played fast and loose with some of the constitutional arrangements in this country, and have engaged in attacks on parts of this country, notably Wales, as a proxy for attacking Labour, and have failed to appreciate the lasting damage they are doing, and will continue to do if they persist with these attacks, on the social and economic union of Great Britain, the most effective and successful social, political and economic union ever created in the world. That is a theme I intend to return to later.

First, I shall do two simple things: I want to reflect on how the last five years of this Tory-Liberal coalition have impacted on Wales—on our people, our prosperity and our public finances; and I want to reflect on how the relationship between Wales and the rest of the UK has evolved under it, both in terms of the business of government and the attitudes of the Welsh people to the governance of our country.

It may have escaped your notice, Mr Deputy Speaker, and it certainly escaped the notice of many people in Wales, that the Prime Minister has been reflecting on the very same theme in this last St David’s week of this Parliament. Perhaps because he was admonished by the Secretary of State, along with his other Cabinet colleagues, for speaking ill of Wales—told to mind his language when talking about the Land of our Fathers—the Prime Minister has been love-bombing Wales in the last week. He came to Cardiff at the weekend to speak at the Tory party conference, singing Sam Warburton’s praises and resisting, I am glad to say, even a glimmer of gloating at the fact that we lost to the English. Then he hosted the St David’s day reception on Monday, which I was unable to attend. I think I am right in saying that it is the first St David’s day reception—the first for a long while—that the Conservative Prime Minister has held at No. 10. [Hon. Members: “More than one!”] If I am wrong, I happily withdraw that. It is certainly the first one to which I and other Labour Members have been invited, shall we say? So it was a pleasant surprise to receive the stiff card, but I am afraid I was unable to attend. Obviously Conservatives have previously been invited, but we were not.

Throughout this period of love-bombing the Prime Minister has been looking back at the relationship between his Government and Wales. Some of it has been pure fantasy. In one speech he was musing about the prospects of Tory candidates winning seats in the valleys, ousting sitting and prospective Labour Members and wishing our candidates a cheery “da iawn” on coming second. The Prime Minister, I am told, even had to have lessons in pronunciation—

[Stephen Crabb]

indicated dissent.

[Owen Smith]

The Secretary of State shakes his head, but, as he ought to know, the speech was released to the media accidentally with the “da iawn” included in it and some suggestions as to how the Prime Minister ought to pronounce that, but if he thinks there is any prospect of Tories in the valleys ousting our Members I have another bit of Welsh for him: “Yn dy freuddwydion,” which means “In your dreams.”

[Alun Cairns]

rose—

[Owen Smith]

I will happily give way. Is the hon. Gentleman about to correct my Welsh?

[Alun Cairns]

May I suggest that, having made such an attempt at Welsh, perhaps the hon. Gentleman needs some lessons in pronunciation?

[Owen Smith]

I would accept that, as a native English speaker and a failed Welsh learner. I am still trying, although I have not reached the same standards as some, but I think that was a fair attempt at “In your dreams.”

Other examples from the Prime Minister have been pure comedy gold—not weak gags like that. We have had some excellent examples from the Prime Minister. He channelled his Welshness in trying to come up with a nickname for the Secretary of State. There is a great tradition of nicknames in Wales—Dai the Milk, Evans the Coal, and we even had Jones the Jag at one point in this place—but so impressed was the Prime Minister at the way in which the Secretary of State has warmed to devolution, indeed undertaken a damascene conversion, I am told that he referred to him as being known now in Tory circles as “Stevolution”. It has a certain ring to it, doesn’t it? I am not sure that it is the ring of truth, however. I am not entirely persuaded that he is now so devo-friendly that he could be known as “Stevolution” in Tory circles.

What certainly does not have the ring of truth are some of the other claims that the Prime Minister has been making on behalf of the Tories. He claimed this week that it was the Tories who brought Pinewood studios to Wales, despite the fact that the UK Government had nothing to do with it—

[Stephen Crabb]

He did not say that.

[Owen Smith]

Well, I am terribly sorry, but I have read the Prime Minister’s speech, and that is precisely what he said, despite the fact that that was nothing to do with the UK Government. It was delivered entirely by the Welsh Government while this Government were slashing arts funding.

The Prime Minister also claimed that the Tories were responsible for Hitachi rebuilding Wylfa power station, despite the fact that it was of course the last Labour Government who signed the contract for that new generation power station. He even claimed credit for Airbus making wings for the A380 in Wales, despite the fact that the company has been making aircraft at Broughton since the second world war. The most shameless in this series of porkies was the suggestion that the Tories had secured the funding for S4C, when in truth they had cut it by a third.

[Stephen Crabb]

The shadow Secretary of State was doing really well up to this point, but he has now let himself down. The important point that the Prime Minister was making when he referred to all those positive things that are happening in the Welsh economy was not that politicians are taking the credit; he was giving the credit to business. That is the crucial difference between our party and the hon. Gentleman’s party: we praise business; Labour attacks it.

[Owen Smith]

I would fully accept that, were it consonant with the facts. The Prime Minister actually said in his conference speech, after listing all those achievements:

“We need to tell everyone who did all this…it’s us.”

This clearly is not true.

A bigger truth is that the Tories have done precious little to help the economy of Wales, but they have done plenty to hinder it. The people of Wales know that. When they hear the Secretary of State and the Prime Minister claiming credit for creating jobs in Wales, they know that 90,000 contracts or jobs in Wales, not 35,000 individuals, but that might also be right—[Interruption.] No, I said “jobs” yesterday. The Secretary of State should read the Hansard. They know that too many of those jobs are Tory-style mini-jobs involving zero-hours contracts, zero security, low wages and low productivity. They also know that a quarter of Welsh workers earn less than the living wage. Wales has the lowest disposable incomes in the UK.

The people of Wales know that these facts give the lie to the notion that there is a Tory-led recovery, as does the fact that we are £68 billion short on tax receipts and spending £25 billion extra on social security. The price of this failure in Wales under the Tories is a tenfold increase in the volume of people using food banks and £1,700 less in the pockets of Welsh families.

In stark contrast, the Welsh Labour Government have shown that they can get Wales working again. Jobs Growth Wales, designed and built in Cardiff, has got 17,000 young people back to work, showing that local solutions with bespoke ideas can deliver jobs in Wales. So it is inexplicable that the Tory party—the “party of real devolution”, as I am told it now calls itself—is still refusing to devolve the Work programme to Wales, as Labour will when we win in May. Inexplicable, too—to many in Wales—is why fair funding for Wales is being promised only if Wales agrees to raise taxes.

Last week, the Welsh Secretary made some important announcements about his Government’s intentions to take forward the recommendations of the cross-party Silk Commission if—heaven forefend—they are back in government next time. The Opposition agree with many of those extra measures. Putting the Welsh settlement on to the same statutory footing and making the Welsh legislature a permanent part of the UK constitution are proposals that we can agree on. We also agree with proposals to give powers to Wales over elections and energy, and additional powers over ports and marine matters. Indeed, we said all those things first. But we will go further. We will give Wales powers over policing, which is why I was disappointed at the mischaracterisation of Labour’s position by the right hon. Member for Dwyfor Meirionnydd. I am sure the Secretary of State will recall our position during those talks, which was, “Reserved and then announced at the party conference for Labour in Wales.”

Lastly, fair funding for Wales was one of the most important aspects of the talks. It is disingenuous of the Secretary of State now to talk about delivering fair funding, given that his Government have cut £1.5 billion from the funding for Wales and he knows that their plans to cut funding to the rest of the UK back to the levels of the 1930s will have a deeply damaging effect on Wales. Cutting spending back to the level it was when the NHS was just a glint in Nye Bevan’s eye would be devastating for Wales. So we agree with the Secretary of State that there should be a funding floor in Wales, but we want to see the detail and to know precisely where they will set that floor. Only then will the people of Wales trust this Tory Government—

[Alun Cairns]

What detail is the hon. Gentleman prepared to put forward on Labour’s funding floor proposal? The shadow Chancellor said in Cardiff today that Labour would be presenting no detail this side of the election.

[Owen Smith]

We will stand on our record of having trebled the funding for Wales during our period in office. While the Under-Secretary has been in office, the spending for Wales has been cut by £1.5 billion. So we will stand proudly on our record and we can rest assured that the people of Wales will understand that we will deliver for Wales.

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)]

Order. We do need to bring the Secretary of State on, because we still need two minutes at the end.

[Owen Smith]

Lots of Members in this House today have invoked history in this important debate, and I will do that one more time. The Prime Minister, in his amusing recent speech, said:

“The Welsh dragon is roaring again—and it’s not red, it’s blue.”

I suggest that, historically speaking, we ought to invoke another great Welshman, the first leader of the Labour party and former Member for Merthyr Tydfil and Aberdare, Keir Hardie, the anniversary of whose death we celebrate this year. He said that Wales is represented by “Y Ddraig Goch a’r Faner Goch”—the red dragon on the red flag of Labour. That was true in 1915 and it will be true again, I trust, on 8 May 2015.

16:47

[The Secretary of State for Wales (Stephen Crabb)]

It is a real privilege to speak as Welsh Secretary for the first time in a St David’s day debate. We have had a good debate, with a good selection of contributions from Members from across the parties representative of Wales. We have heard from Members from right across Wales in an interesting and stimulating discussion. It is fitting that we should use this St David’s day debate to draw to a close a good week for Wales and to reflect on what this Government have achieved in Wales during this Parliament. I pay particular tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Montgomeryshire (Glyn Davies) and the hon. Member for Ynys Môn (Albert Owen) for securing this debate, and it is important that we do have it every year. Of course, the Wright reforms recognised that as we transferred more days in a Session to Back-Bench control, the territorial debates should be part of that. So today’s debate is entirely in keeping with that tradition.

The opening contribution from my hon. Friend the Member for Montgomeryshire was wise and as insightful as ever. One thing that caught my ear was his saying that no one can really understand Wales unless they are Welsh, and I believe he quoted someone as saying that no Englishman truly understands Wales. I happen to think we have a Prime Minister who does get Wales and does understand why it is different. As a result, he understands far better than any of the other UK leaders the importance of the Union and why devolution matters. Perhaps the Prime Minister gave us a hint at his own St David’s day party on Monday night as to why he understands Wales so well. Of course, he revealed that he has Welsh ancestry, and does not have to go that far back to find that one of his forebears was Llewellyn, a tin-plate maker in Glamorgan. So I think all of us in the House this afternoon from Wales will welcome the fact that we are cut from the same cloth as the Prime Minister.

As I look back, I think 2014 was a great year for Wales. I think it was the best year for Wales since the devolution era began. It was a year for Wales to look upwards and outwards, a year of ambition—a year when the Prime Minister brought the NATO summit to Wales. Indeed, he brought the world to Wales, when the largest gathering of international leaders that the UK has ever seen came to Newport and Cardiff in south Wales. It was a year when Wales’s international profile could not have been higher. Two months later, we brought the international investment summit back to the Celtic Manor in Newport, where more than 150 global investors came to look at why Wales is such a great place to invest. It was the year, as I mentioned earlier, when inward investment for Wales was at its highest level for almost 25 years. At that investment summit, we announced our commitment to electrifying the south Wales and the valleys rail lines—a project that has been discussed for years, but which it took a Conservative-led coalition Government to take forward.

Last year was also a year of reaching for the stars, a year of ambition—a year when Team Wales, the Welsh Commonwealth games team, smashed every one of its targets, up at the Commonwealth games in Glasgow. It was indeed a year of reaching for stars—the year when three Welsh companies participated in that amazing project that landed a probe on a comet travelling at 36,000 mph, 300 million miles from earth. We have some great Welsh companies, and as the economy continues to improve in Wales, we are seeing some of the best innovation anywhere in the UK coming out of Wales.

I will return to the economy, if I have time, in a moment, but it is telling that just before this debate started, I was at the First Minister’s own St David’s day reception, which was hosted by the Foreign Office. He too praised the NATO summit coming to Wales, and said it was even better for Wales given that the UK Government were paying the bills for it. The other important point he made at this afternoon’s event was about the improving economy in Wales. We have a First Minister—a Welsh Labour First Minister—who recognises and praises the economic recovery that is happening in Wales. Unfortunately, he has party colleagues in this place who talk down the economic recovery. One of the great themes of the last two years is the way that Welsh Labour in Westminster faces one way, while Welsh Labour in Cardiff faces another when it comes to thinking, reflecting and talking about what is going on inside the Welsh economy.

Now would be a good moment to pay particular tribute to the contribution from the right hon. Member for Torfaen (Paul Murphy), a distinguished former Secretary of State who has achieved an incredible amount in his lifetime, not just for Wales, but for Northern Ireland, the other great country that he has huge knowledge of and passion for. He reflected on his first St David’s day debate, back in 1987, and talked about some of the parallels that he sees in Wales now in respect of funding. Of course, 1987 was also a time when Wales was attracting some 20% of all UK inward investment; a time when the Welsh Development Agency was achieving great things for Wales. We need to get back to some of those strong points about Wales, which he reflected on.

We also had a superb contribution from the right hon. Member for Dwyfor Meirionnydd (Mr Llwyd), who, like the right hon. Member for Torfaen, is standing down at the general election. He used his contribution to talk about devolution. In his view, the St David’s day process was a missed opportunity, because he would have wanted to go further. Of course he would: he is Plaid Cymru; he is a Welsh nationalist. However, I hope he appreciates that we had good, constructive conversations and that this was a good example of politicians from across Wales thinking about things in a way we have not done before, rolling up our sleeves and trying to be pragmatic. I appreciate the spirit in which he participated in that exercise and the contribution that Plaid Cymru made to the process.

My hon. Friend the Member for Ceredigion (Mr Williams) made a great speech. The first Westminster Hall debate that I secured, almost 10 years ago, when I was first elected, was on the future of the dairy industry. He made a powerful contribution in that debate about the dairy industry in Wales. I guess it is sad that we are still focusing on some of those issues, looking at market imbalances and unfair practices in the way suppliers are treated by large processors and large supermarkets. It is a testimony to his tenaciousness that he keeps banging the drum and fighting the fight for dairy farmers, particularly from west Wales, which is such an important part of our economy.

We had a good contribution from the hon. Member for Ynys Môn, who talked about energy production and food production. I am sure he is aware that the food that was served up at the Prime Minister’s St David’s day reception on Monday night was prepared by a team of chefs from north Wales. They were part of the Welsh Culinary Association. [Interruption.] We will make sure that the hon. Gentleman is down for it next year. Some of the ingredients used were indeed from Ynys Môn. He is quite right that the annual Anglesey day has become an event of almost international renown; on display is a superb array of quality.

I probably do not have time to discuss all the contributions. I was particularly struck by what the hon. Member for Newport West (Paul Flynn) said. He gave an incredibly optimistic, upbeat and bright speech about Wales and its future. As he was speaking, I scribbled the words, “Sunshine and daffodils”, which are perhaps not characteristic of his usual contributions. His comments about the paradise of 10th-century Wales were perhaps slightly rose-tinted, but we are grateful to him for the air of daffodils he brought to this debate.

Two issues were mentioned that the Wales Office needs to follow up, the first of which concerns the 2 Sisters Food Group, with which we are currently dealing. The hon. Member for Bridgend (Mrs Moon) has also written to me about a matter we have talked about on at least two or three occasions. I apologise that the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills has not secured the meeting she wanted. We have been pushing on the issue and will continue to do so. I promise to try to make that meeting happen before Parliament wraps up for the general election. I know she has worked hard on what is an incredibly difficult issue, but she has her teeth into it and we wish her every success in getting to the bottom of it.

In the two or three minutes remaining, let me focus on the economy. We have two counter-narratives going on. On the Government Benches, we say not that the job is done or that everything is rosy in the garden, but that really good progress is being made. We say that the fall in unemployment across Wales is remarkable. It is completely contrary to everything that Welsh Labour had been predicting four years ago. We say that the drop of 39,000 in the number of children growing up in a home where neither mum nor dad are working is not just economic transformation but social transformation, and we want that to continue.

I am proud to be part of a Government who are tackling the abuses of zero-hours contracts. That did not happen under Labour’s watch, but under this coalition Government’s. We have taken steps to ban the exclusivity clauses that are the really pernicious parts of zero-hours contracts. If the moral outrage from Labour over zero-hours contracts was genuine, why are so many Labour councils employing people on such contracts? Why do I read in the press all these reports of Labour MPs employing staff on zero-hours contracts? Let us have a little less of that faux moral outrage, and a bit more realistic and honest reflection on what are difficult issues.

I will wrap up now to allow my hon. Friend the Member for Montgomeryshire to sum up the debate that he helped to secure. I think 2014 was the year in which the economic recovery moved up a gear in Wales; 2015 will be the year in which the people of Wales will start to feel it and share in the benefits. What will put it all at risk is the barrage of anti-business negativity and criticism which has become a dominant theme of the Labour party—certainly the party at Westminster.

16:58

[Glyn Davies]

We have had a thoroughly enjoyable debate, with several entertaining contributions as well as some insightful ones. I hope Members will forgive me if I make special reference to the contributions of the right hon. Members for Torfaen (Paul Murphy) and for Dwyfor Meirionnydd (Mr Llwyd), who showed us the quality of their contributions to this House over many, many years and what we will miss when they have retired. On behalf of everybody, I thank them both for all their work.

It has been an incredibly entertaining afternoon. It is entirely unreasonable for us not to have a six-hour debate. It is unreasonable to restrict a Welsh man or woman to just 12 minutes; we like to talk for much longer than that. We had my right hon. Friend the Member for Monmouth (David T. C. Davies)—[Interruption.] It is only a matter of time. We had my hon. Friend the Member for Monmouth standing up and advocating nationalisation, and then the hon. Member for Newport West (Paul Flynn) suggesting that that was part of my hon. Friend, movement to the far left. We also heard about historical Welsh jurisdiction, which has some basis in sharia law, as far as I can see.

I thank everybody for a wonderful debate. Let us all look forward—those of us who are still here—to the same next year.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House has considered Welsh affairs.

Littlewoods and Telegraph Pension Funds

Thursday 5th March 2015 Commons Chamber

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—(Mel Stride.)

17:00

[Nadine Dorries (Mid Bedfordshire) (Con)]

I am proud to represent the seat of Mid Bedfordshire, but I am also proud to have been born and bred in Liverpool. I have secured this Adjournment debate because I am gravely concerned that the pensions of many thousands of people in Liverpool and elsewhere in Britain, including in my constituency, might be in danger and that if things go badly wrong the British people, via the Pension Protection Fund, will be called on to pick up the pieces.

We must not forget the lessons learned from the Robert Maxwell scandal. Potentially, billions of pounds of public money is at stake, placed at risk by the pension schemes of the companies ultimately controlled by two men, Sir David and Sir Frederick Barclay, also known as the Barclay twins.

The twins are rich men, although perhaps not as rich as they appear to be, and they live in Monaco and in a pseudo-Gothic castle on the island of Brecqhou, off Sark, to avoid British tax. They do not pay their fair share of tax, yet their company, Shop Direct, formerly known as Littlewoods, is suing the British taxpayer for £1.2 billion in compound interest for overpayment of tax on a company the Barclay twins did not even own when the event took place. Some might call that greedy. I do. The Barclay twins are avariciously greedy.

The twins are notoriously reclusive, which is rather weird, as they own The Daily Telegraph, and they are notoriously aggressive in defence of their own reputations. Twice they have sued British journalists in France. The BBC “Panorama” journalist John Sweeney was convicted of criminal libel in France for comments he made on BBC Radio Guernsey. In 2005, The Times was sued by the twins, again in France. Some might call it hypocritical for owners of a British newspaper that regularly dishes out dirt to sue competitor journalists in a foreign jurisdiction. I call that hypocritical. When I wrote a critical judgment of their actions on my blog, they harassed my blog site host with midnight e-mails from lawyers in New York, France and London, forcing my host to close down my blog for a few hours. The Barclay twins are deeply hypocritical.

People who watched the “Panorama” programme “The Tax Havens Twins”, still available on YouTube, saw ordinary people on Sark give witness that they have been bullied by the twins’ representative on the island. The Barclay twins are also bullies.

The danger to public funds from the twins is fundamentally simple, although the details are murky and obscure, perhaps deliberately so. The twins’ companies, including Shop Direct and Yodel, are losing money hand over fist. Yodel has a loan with HSBC worth £250 million pounds, and if we add that to other loans we see that the twins’ companies owe about £l billion to the banks. That may all be with HSBC, and not just the £250 million as reported. In addition, Shop Direct has traded receipts from its loan book for a £1.25 billion facility with a clearing bank, believed to be HSBC.

On the rare occasion when profits are made, they are shelled out of the individual company and transferred to parent and/or grandparent companies often incorporated offshore in the British Virgin Islands, Bermuda and other offshore havens. In plain English, the twins’ businesses are losing massive amounts of cash, and when they do not they are hollowed out. If the pension funds suddenly needed a fresh injection of funds, how easy would it be for the pension trustees to extract that money from this complex maze of offshore accounts?

The answer to the question turns on the strength of the pension fund covenants. Again, the picture is not clear, and that is not good. Let us take the Littlewoods scheme, the Littlewoods plan, the GUS ex-gratia unfunded scheme and the unfunded scheme for members. I will refer to them as “the scheme” for short, and that scheme is worth £1.37 billion.

One of the problems highlighted by the Robert Maxwell scandal was that too many of the pension fund trustees were dependent on Robert Maxwell. How many of the Littlewoods scheme trustees are genuinely independent of the twins? One, maybe two. Of the eight trustees, I can identify five that are not. The Pensions Regulator recommends the appointment of a professional trustee for a large scheme. As far as we can tell, no such appointment has been made. It also recommends two independent trustees. Of the two that are in place, one has been there since 1997, the other since 2008—that is not independent.

With a pension scheme worth £1.37 billion, it is very worrying that the recommendations of the Pensions Regulator appear to have been ignored. That is at the heart of this matter. The dire financial performance of Shop Direct and Yodel, the £1 billion of loans, and the trade of the Shop Direct loan book for a further £1.25 billion give rise to concerns that the trustees must, by law, address. Minister, is that happening?

Recently, journalist Peter Oborne left The Daily Telegraph because, he said, the paper was defrauding its readers. He said that it had gone soft on HSBC because it did not want to lose advertising income. Mr Oborne understated the problem. The Daily Telegraph went soft on HSBC not just for fear of losing advertising money but because the twins’ companies are in so much debt to HSBC—at least £250 million, possibly as much as £1 billion in loans if HSBC is the bank behind the loan book deal. The Daily Telegraph owners may have a further £1.25 billion of reasons to be soft on the tax cheats’ bank. We are talking a cool £2 billion-plus here, not the £250 million that was recently reported.

As I have told the House, the twins are suing the taxpayer in the Supreme Court for almost exactly the same amount as the loan book agreement, which by the way, requires renewal every 12 months, making it very vulnerable. They have already received the simple interest and principal amounting to over £470 million so they have already taken a fair slug of our money. But it is not enough. These offshore, non-UK taxpayers would like the British taxpayer to transfer to their pockets the cost of four operational hospitals or 12 running schools. But they may not win their case in the Supreme Court. The twins’ companies underlying the pension funds may end up in a serious amount of debt, running into billions, just like Robert Maxwell’s companies.

If the twins win their case, how are to we ensure that the £1.2 billion remains on British soil to safeguard the scheme from future poor investment returns? As we know, that happens. It is why the Pension Protection Fund was established—to protect members and contributors from scheme shortfalls. I fear that the money will be siphoned offshore, leaving the taxpayer via the Pension Protection Fund to pick up the £1 billion-plus price tag if the group continues to perform financially as badly as it has been doing.

The Barclays winning or losing their £1.2 billion court case makes no difference to this scenario. If they win, they could siphon the money abroad and the British taxpayer will pick up the bill. If they lose, the British taxpayer picks up the bill by picking up any shortfall in the scheme fund. Can we depend on the Barclay twins to do the right thing should the scheme suffer a shortfall? We can only make that assessment based on their financial track record and character. We know that they are in serious debt. We know that they were criticised for their role in the Crown Agents scandal going all the way back to 1973. As Mr Paddy McKillen, the owner of three London hotels, can testify, they lack scruples. Mr McKillen’s American social security number was stolen in order to gain access to his financial information as part of an aggressive and hostile takeover of his business.

Let us take a look at the experience of the islanders on Sark. For years they have been bullied, blackmailed, threatened and terrorised. People have fled the island, others have woken to find flyers and papers with their personal information posted across the island. When the wife of the seigneur of Sark fell seriously ill, the twins’ man on the island attacked the seigneur, and all because the Barclays want control of the island and for it to be run as they see fit. The character of the twins can be summed up in three words: greedy, hypocritical and bullying.

What assurance can the Minister provide that if the Barclay twins win their victory in court and get £1.2 billion from the taxpayer, the money will stay here in the UK for the benefit of the scheme fund members, should there be a shortfall? What guarantee can he give that if there were a shortfall, the British taxpayer will not be funding the scheme via the Pension Protection Fund? Has the Pensions Regulator looked into this matter, given the poor financial performance and indebtedness of the contributing companies?

The Robert Maxwell pensions scandal happened because too many people— journalists, politicians, pension fund trustees and lawyers—held their tongue for fear of legal threats and intimidation. Today, the Government protect individuals against pension fund loss via the PPF, but that fund could not survive a hit to the tune of £1 billion. I know the Minister will be keen to provide reassurance that all is well with the fund, but all is not well when one considers the existing make-up of the fund trustees. We are not just concerned about today. Just under the surface, things are not well. I urge the Minister to use his good offices and impress on the Pensions Regulator the need to evaluate at the very least the composition and validity of the scheme trustees.

Today the foundations of the Barclay twins’ empire are cracking. Tomorrow the walls may come tumbling down. I hope that as a consequence of the dire financial circumstances of the Barclay twins’ companies, there will be no threat to the long-term security of the pensioners dependent on them. I hope I am wrong, but I fear I may be right.

17:11

[The Minister for Pensions (Steve Webb)]

I begin by congratulating the hon. Member for Mid Bedfordshire (Nadine Dorries) on securing this debate. I will focus my remarks on the Littlewoods and Telegraph pension funds and the matters that fall within my responsibility. I hope that I can respond helpfully to her concerns.

The security of pension scheme members’ pensions is always a matter of concern to me and to the House, and rightly so. It might help to clarify one or two points about the regulatory regime and the protection afforded to members, because it differs according to the type of scheme, and the risk of a shortfall differs according to the type of scheme. Within Littlewoods and Telegraph there are different sorts of pension schemes, some of which are at risk of shortfall and some of which are not. It might help if I put that on the record at the outset.

[Nadine Dorries]

May I clarify one point? Although the title of the debate is Littlewoods and Telegraph pension schemes, I deliberately did not speak about the Telegraph pension scheme because it came to my attention today that it is in the process of changing, for whatever reason, its fund managers, so I felt that it was inappropriate to comment on it.

[Steve Webb]

For the record, the Telegraph pension plan is what is called a defined contribution pension scheme, and it is therefore not capable of having a shortfall and there are no pension promises attached to the plan. There used to be a Telegraph executive pension scheme, which is now closed. I believe it transferred into the Telegraph pension plan, so my understanding is that none of the members of those schemes is at risk of shortfall, regardless of the position of the sponsoring employer.

The hon. Lady raised the Littlewoods and Shop Direct schemes. Both of those are salary-related schemes. The Shop Direct scheme, which is separate from the Littlewoods one, covers around 400 staff. I understand that it is closed to new members and for contributions by existing members. Under the regulatory regime, schemes are valued, their assets and liabilities are measured, and if there is a shortfall, plans are put in place to deal with it. I understand that the assets of the Shop Direct scheme at the last valuation were £120 million, with liabilities of £100 million. So the Shop Direct scheme is currently in surplus, which is relatively unusual for a scheme of this sort.

Let me say a little about how the Littlewoods pension scheme operates. The way in which such pension schemes operate is that there is a triennial valuation. The assets and liabilities are valued and the last triennial valuation of the Littlewoods scheme was in December 2012. Obviously, things have moved on since then and the figures arguably are different now. The last triennial valuation gave assets of £1 billion and a deficit—in excess, therefore, of the assets—of around £176 million. The way the regulatory regime works means that that amount does not have to be found overnight—obviously, the liabilities might run on for decades—so something called a recovery plan has to be put in place, and it has to be agreed by the trustees and the sponsoring employer and signed off by the Pensions Regulator. The company is currently five years into a recovery plan that will run until December 2021, and the fact that it was signed off in 2012 means that the regulator was content that it was appropriate to respond to the deficit and the scheme as it then stood. The Littlewoods pension trust has since been paying around £12 million a year into the scheme, in line with the plan, and I understand that from July 2016 that amount will increase to £15 million.

Obviously I cannot comment on the hon. Lady’s wider remarks on corporate structures and various other matters, but I can say that, as far as we are aware, the recovery plan has been adhered to, it was agreed and signed off by the regulator, and the payments in line with the plan have been made.

[Nadine Dorries]

The Minister has rightly detailed the assets, but can he clarify who would have first call on those assets if there was a shortfall in the scheme, if the company was in dire financial straits and if it had £2 billion of debts: the pension scheme or the banks?

[Steve Webb]

As the hon. Lady says, the pension scheme is underwritten by the Pension Protection Fund. There is a regulatory regime to ensure that companies do not hide money, for example. I will say a little more about that, because she raised the issue of money going offshore. Essentially, the regulator has powers to ensure that, when there is an insolvency event and a shortfall in the pension fund, companies cannot simply walk away with money that has been squirreled away elsewhere. The regulator has powers to ensure that money that should be accessible in the event of insolvency is accessible. If there is still a shortfall, the Pension Protection Fund comes into play. I will respond in a moment to her comment that the Pension Protection Fund is essentially a hit on the taxpayer, because the situation is slightly more complicated than that.

Let me return to a point the hon. Lady made about the governance of the schemes. The members’ interests in any pension scheme of that sort are meant to be protected by trustees. I agree that it is important that the trustees are properly appointed and that they do their job in line with the law. With regard to the Littlewoods scheme, by law there have to be member-nominated trustees. My understanding is that there are four such trustees on the Littlewoods scheme and two on the smaller Shop Direct scheme. As far as we can see, the membership of the trustee board is in line with statutory requirements.

All trustees, whether appointed by the company or nominated by members, have the same fiduciary duty to scheme members: however they got on board, they all have the same duty. If the hon. Lady has any reason to think that any member of the trustee board is not fulfilling their fiduciary duty to scheme members, I encourage her to give the names directly to the Pensions Regulator and provide it with evidence for that assertion. Those founded allegations would then be investigated. We certainly believe that trustees have an important job to do. If there are any concerns that they are not doing that job, she should certainly raise them directly with the Pensions Regulator, with names and evidence. The fact that someone has been a trustee for a long time does not in and of itself make them biased or unfit to be a trustee, but clearly the rules require at least a third of the board to be nominated by scheme members. They are not representatives of the members as such, but they all have a legal duty to all the members.

Let me move on to the regulatory regime that is meant to protect members. The key point is that every three years the scheme has to be valued: we measure the assets and the liability. If there is a shortfall, a plan has to be put in place, as it has been for the Littlewoods scheme. Three years later, a fresh action is taken, with assets and liabilities measured. If there is still a shortfall, a revised recovery plan is brought in. The idea is to strike a balance, ensuring that the scheme is properly funded and that, if there is an insolvency event, members are protected and the Pension Protection Fund is protected, but without killing the goose that lays the golden egg.

We do not insist on an excessively rapid filling in of pension scheme deficits, because it might undermine the solvency of the sponsoring employer, which is the best guarantee of getting the pensions paid. We try to strike a balance. A recovery plan is an agreement between the trustees and the sponsoring employer and it is signed off by the Pensions Regulator. As I have said, the last recovery plan is being stuck to so far, so whatever else might be happening in the corporate group or to the funds of the company, the obligations to the pension scheme, in line with the recovery plan, are being met.

The hon. Lady asked, quite properly, what happens if money goes offshore. I assure her that the Pensions Regulator has powers to act if it believes that money that should properly be available to the employer and then to the pension fund is somehow being concealed and removed from the country. The regulator can issue a financial support direction, which requires the employer or a connected or associated person to put in place financial support for the pension scheme. The regulator has demonstrated that it can take effective action against employers, even when an employer is based overseas.

To give an example from January and the Carrington Wire pension scheme, the regulator issued warning notices to two companies based in Russia and subsequently reached an £8.5 million settlement with them. In addition, the regulator has in the past also taken action against companies based in America, Canada and the Bahamas. Although I absolutely understand the concerns that money going offshore inevitably makes things more complicated—I accept that—the regulator’s powers and ability to act are not restricted to the UK. The regulator can take action in other courts and has successfully recovered money when that has proved necessary.

On the case under discussion, I stress that, as far as we can see, there is a recovery plan and the payments are being met. If the regulator had concerns that payments were not being met, it could take action, but as long as the triennial valuations are happening, the scheme is being properly governed and the payments are being made, that is what is required of the sponsoring employer.

The hon. Lady referred to the Pension Protection Fund as a risk to the taxpayer. To be clear, the revenue of the PPF comes from the assets of pension schemes where there has been an insolvency event. The assets go into the PPF, so there is then an investment return on them. The PPF also raises a levy, which is not taxpayer-funded; the levy is on sponsoring employers of remaining salary-related pension schemes. Obviously, the Pensions Regulator is trying to protect the PPF—we do not want any claims, if possible, on the PPF—but in the event of an insolvency the PPF pays members’ pensions with, roughly speaking, 100% for those who have reached scheme pension age and 90% for those who have not, with some limitations on indexation and some caps. Any shortfall between PPF-level benefits and the amount of money that goes in from an insolvent employer and their scheme is made up from the PPF. That money comes from the levy payers, who are sponsoring employers, and not from the taxpayer.

The only indirect impact on the taxpayer, I suppose, could be if someone’s pension is substantially reduced and they are so poor in retirement that they claim means-tested benefits. There could be a marginal impact on the taxpayer, but the way PPF works means that, if schemes end up in it, the cost—for example, through increased levies—is borne by other sponsoring employers. Of course, we care about that. We do not want other sponsoring employers—“good” and solvent employers responsible for final salary pension schemes—to face any bill in excess of that which they need to face. Of course, it matters to us that people meet their liabilities and recovery plans, but that is not something that will have a direct impact on the taxpayer.

It is entirely proper to seek assurances that we are on our guard and protecting the interests of scheme members. The people in place to protect the interests of scheme members are the trustees. We have looked at the composition of the trustees of these pension schemes and, on the face of it, there is nothing irregular or out of line with what they are legally required to do. However, if the hon. Lady has evidence to the contrary, I encourage her to share it with the regulator.

The funding position of many schemes is in deficit, and some have bigger deficits than in the Littlewoods case. As I have said, one scheme is actually in surplus, which is quite unusual. For a scheme in deficit, there is a process of recovery plans that must be adhered to. We take that very seriously, and we would not accept a sponsoring employer saying that it cannot afford to meet the recovery plan if it turns out that it has money stashed somewhere else.

We have powers to intervene in corporate restructurings. If the Pensions Regulator believes that a sponsoring employer is somehow artificially contriving the structure of its business to shield assets and generate insolvency, meaning that there is suddenly no money to be found, the regulator can take pre-emptive action by refusing to clear various forms of corporate restructuring or, more normally, by placing conditions on corporate restructurings, and that sometimes results in a corporate restructuring not happening.

I reassure the hon. Lady that we are not entirely passive in all of this: we do not sit and wait for things to go wrong. There is a systematic three-year valuation process, and there is a process for agreeing credible recovery plans. We do not let such plans run on into the middle distance in the vague hope that in 20 years’ time somebody will have some cash; we make them realistic so that the deficit is recovered in a reasonable period. We try to make sure that schemes are well governed. The regulator has a trustee toolkit to equip trustees and enable them to do their job properly, and it would act on any concerns about trustees not doing their job properly.

I hope that I have been able to respond to the hon. Lady’s concerns. As we have established, the Telegraph scheme is not of the kind that can generate a shortfall, so that issue does not arise. The Littlewoods scheme does have a deficit, but a recovery plan is in place, and as far as we can see it is being adhered to. If it was not adhered to, we would be in a position to take action, and we would do so. I hope that is helpful to the House.

Question put and agreed to.

17:26

House adjourned.