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Grahame Morris (Easington) (Lab)
The Minister for Europe and the Americas (Sir Alan Duncan)
The Foreign Secretary has spoken to Turkish Foreign Minister Çavuşoğlu about the operation in Afrin. We have called for de-escalation for the protection of civilians, while recognising Turkey’s legitimate interest in the security of its borders. It remains in our shared interests to focus on achieving a political settlement in Syria.
Grahame Morris
Does the Foreign Secretary recognise that the Kurdish-led Administration in Afrin has built a secular, democratic system that has worked collaboratively with the international community to defeat Daesh, most recently in Raqqa? Does he accept that the international community owes a debt of honour to the Kurds? Will he step up efforts to stop the bloodshed in and around Afrin?
Sir Alan Duncan
I understand what the hon. Gentleman is saying, but we must also recognise the legitimate security interests of Syria. They consider that, having launched Operation Olive Branch in January, it is in response to attacks from the Afrin area, and they believe that they are in compliance with proper UN standards.[Official Report, 21 February 2018, Vol. 636, c. 4MC.]
Dr Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)
When we make representations to our Turkish NATO allies, can we also make representations on behalf of the tens of thousands of journalists and others who have been locked up by the Turkish Government?
Sir Alan Duncan
I can assure my right hon. Friend that we do, and we do so in all our meetings at all levels with our Turkish counterparts.
Joan Ryan (Enfield North) (Lab)
Do the Government agree that the Democratic Union party—the PYD—and the People’s Protection Units—the YPG—should be included in the Geneva process to end Syria’s war and discuss the country’s future?
Sir Alan Duncan
That is primarily a question on Syria, rather than Turkey. However, I would point out to the right hon. Lady that the PKK is a proscribed organisation in the UK, whereas the organisations to which she principally refers are not and so can be spoken to.
Theresa Villiers (Chipping Barnet) (Con)
Will the Minister make representations to the Turkish Foreign Minister to ask the Turkish navy to cease obstructing vessels seeking to extract hydrocarbons in the eastern Mediterranean?
Sir Alan Duncan
I understand the issue to which my right hon. Friend refers, which is the drilling for oil and gas on the edge of Cyprus. We are assessing what has been reported over the past day or so about what exactly is happening in that area.
Emily Thornberry (Islington South and Finsbury) (Lab)
We on this side of the House unequivocally condemn Turkey for its disgraceful assault on Afrin. We are especially appalled that it has enlisted in its army the very jihadist militias that the Kurdish forces have worked so hard to drive out of northern Syria. If the Foreign Secretary is unable to join me today in condemning Turkey, will the Minister of State at least explain why he believes that “Turkey’s legitimate interest in the security of its borders” gives it the right to brutally attack the innocent Kurdish community in Afrin?
Sir Alan Duncan
I do not think it is exactly as the right hon. Lady says. We need to recognise Turkey’s legitimate interests. Of course we condemn any kind of attacks on civilians and we wish to see a de-escalation of that, but the legitimate rights of Turkey should be recognised.
Emily Thornberry
The truth is that the Turkish assault is part of a broader pattern, where too many foreign parties engaged in the Syrian civil war are now acting just like the Assad regime itself—without any regard for international law. When the Government obtained a military mandate for joining the coalition action in Syria, David Cameron guaranteed in this House that it was “exclusively” to combat the threat from Daesh. Given that that threat is now almost totally gone, will the Minister of State please spell out the coalition’s current military objectives in Syria? When will he seek a mandate for them from this House?
Sir Alan Duncan
I find the right hon. Lady’s analysis extremely bizarre, particularly as the YPG has been reported as wishing to ally itself with the Assad regime in order to fight back against Turkey’s activity.
Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)
Further to that point, what is the Minister’s assessment of the veracity of reports that the Assad regime and the Kurds are joining forces militarily to resist the Turkish incursion?
Sir Alan Duncan
That is exactly the issue to which I have just referred. We are assessing it, and I am sure that there will be further reports later, but it is too early to say exactly what may be happening.
David T. C. Davies (Monmouth) (Con)
Craig Tracey (North Warwickshire) (Con)
The Minister for Africa (Harriett Baldwin)
Girls’ education is a moral imperative. Women and girls have the right to be educated, equal, empowered and safe. This is one of the Foreign Secretary’s top priorities, and he has instructed his officials to put girls’ education at the heart of their work.
David T. C. Davies
Given the appalling revelations about some employees in Oxfam and the subsequent attempts to cover that up, could the Minister assure us that any organisation that is asked to deliver education for girls’ programmes anywhere in the world by the British Government is fit for purpose?
Harriett Baldwin
I share my hon. Friend’s assessment that this is an utterly despicable example. I hope he agrees that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for International Development has shown real leadership by writing to all the organisations with which we contract to ensure that safeguarding levels are raised. I believe that you have allowed her to make a statement on this subject later this afternoon, Mr Speaker.
Craig Tracey
During the Foreign Secretary’s recent trip, what discussions did he have with Burma, Thailand and Bangladesh on the Government’s policy on the education of women and girls?
Harriett Baldwin
My right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary champions this issue at every opportunity, including the opportunity that my hon. Friend mentioned. He will be aware that not only has my right hon. Friend shown tremendous leadership on this issue, but he has appointed a special envoy for gender equality and has really put this work at the heart of the diplomatic network.
Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)
Khwendo Kor provides education at the north-west frontier province of Pakistan, an incredibly dangerous environment for women and girls. UK Friends of Khwendo Kor tries to bring people over to the UK to provide human rights support, but the Home Office often blocks them. What discussion has the Minister had with the Home Office to help this situation?
Harriett Baldwin
The hon. Lady is absolutely right to highlight the important work that a range of different organisations do, often in partnership with us. If she has specific examples on which she would like me to make representations to my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary, I would be delighted to receive her correspondence.
John Cryer (Leyton and Wanstead) (Lab)
Further to the previous question, what discussions has the Minister had with the Government of Pakistan on the education of girls in that country? Can she tell the House what proportion of UK aid to Pakistan goes towards the education of women and young girls?
Harriett Baldwin
It is certainly very significant. Last month, I had the pleasure of meeting two very impressive education Ministers from different parts of Pakistan. As the hon. Gentleman will be aware, education is quite devolved across different parts of Pakistan. As for the specific statistics that he wishes me to provide, I will follow that up in a letter to him.
David Evennett (Bexleyheath and Crayford) (Con)
I welcome the work that my hon. Friend and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office are doing in this field, but does she agree that in a place such as Africa, a huge amount more needs to be done?
Harriett Baldwin
My right hon. Friend is absolutely right. There is a huge amount to be done. Something like 136 million girls around the world are not in education. As my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary has said, this is truly the Swiss army knife of development, because it works in so many different ways. It helps to resolve issues of conflict and is also important to advance global prosperity.
Alison Thewliss (Glasgow Central) (SNP)
CNN recently reported the story of 12-year-old Halima from Yemen, who wants to become a doctor, but whose father is being forced to make the choice to marry her off to make ends meet. He will receive £2,000 as a dowry for marrying off his daughter. What will the Minister do to prevent conflict in Yemen so that young women there can fulfil their potential?
Harriett Baldwin
The hon. Lady is absolutely right to highlight a particular example that illustrates the challenges faced by girls around the world. The UK Government have demonstrated significant leadership on this issue as a way of progressing peace and development around the world, and are urging all parties to the conflict in Yemen to make a political solution.
Patrick Grady (Glasgow North) (SNP)
The Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Boris Johnson)
At the conclusion of the highly successful Anglo-French summit, it was indeed agreed that a committee of wise people, or “comité des sages”, should be established to look at reviving the great tradition of UK-France collaboration in such matters as security, defence, space, genomics, infrastructure, and indeed, infrastructure projects, such as the idea of a new connection between our two countries—an idea, I can tell the House, that was warmly welcomed both by my counterpart, Mr Jean-Yves Le Drian, and by President Macron himself.
Patrick Grady
I note that the Foreign Secretary did not say whether he would be on this committee of wise people. He will be aware of the warning from Maritime UK and many others that the channel ports face gridlock if a transition arrangement for Brexit is not put in place urgently. What is the point of a 20-mile bridge if there is going to be a 20-mile queue waiting to get on to it?
Boris Johnson
I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on crowbarring Brexit into that question. Most people appreciate that the existing channel tunnel is likely, at the current rate, to be full within the next seven years, which is a very short time in the lifetime of a great infrastructure project. It is a curiosity that two of the most powerful economies in the world, separated by barely 21 miles of water, are connected by only one railway line. I think that is a matter for legitimate reflection by our two countries on the way forward.
Richard Graham (Gloucester) (Con)
With regard to links across the channel with France and many other European partners, yesterday the Exiting the European Union Committee heard evidence from Michel Barnier, Guy Verhofstadt and many others, and it is absolutely clear that the deep partnership we are seeking with the European Union will be a unique and specific agreement that will benefit those on both sides of the channel enormously. Does the Foreign Secretary agree that that should be the outcome of the talks that will be starting again soon?
Mr Speaker
Order. On the subject of crowbarring, or indeed shoehorning, I remind the Foreign Secretary—I am sure that he requires no reminding—that the question is not about Brexit; it is about a fixed link across the channel. That is the pertinent matter upon which he will focus.
Boris Johnson
If I may say so, I think that my hon. Friend has hit upon the notion of a metaphorical fixed link: a great, swollen, throbbing umbilicus of trade—I will not say which way it is going—with each side mutually nourishing the other. I very much approve of the note of optimism that he strikes.
Jo Swinson (East Dunbartonshire) (LD)
I am generally in favour of building bridges rather than walls, but may I urge the Foreign Secretary, instead of indulging in fantasy engineering projects, to focus on the important work, which he just mentioned, of building metaphorical bridges with nations that share our values, such as France and other European neighbours, in order to prevent Brexit Britain from becoming isolated and increasingly reliant for trade and influence on regimes that have dubious human rights records?
Boris Johnson
The hon. Lady makes an important point, but she will recognise that we are beefing up our diplomatic representation in the EU and seizing the opportunity to build new links and revive old partnerships around the world. Nobody could have been more eloquent about our unconditional commitment to our friends and partners in the EU than the Prime Minister was in Munich last week.
James Duddridge (Rochford and Southend East) (Con)
In 1971, when French and English counterparts starting talking about the channel tunnel, they were mocked. Can we have more vision and less mockery about ideas on how we can take forward our future relationships?
Boris Johnson
I remind those Opposition Members who have been jeering from a sedentary position about great infrastructure projects that it has invariably been Conservative Administrations who have come forward with these schemes. It was the Conservatives who revived the east end of London with the Canary Wharf project, and it was Margaret Thatcher who green-lighted the first channel tunnel.
Mr Khalid Mahmood (Birmingham, Perry Barr) (Lab)
It is estimated that the Foreign Secretary’s channel bridge could be built at a cost of £120 billion. He wants to build bridges, but at the same time he is pushing for a hard Brexit, pushing us further away from the European Union. Does he think that that money could instead be better spent over the next six and a half years by giving the national health service £350 million a week? Which would he prefer?
Boris Johnson
The hon. Gentleman is possibly too young to remember, but when the first channel tunnel was commissioned it was the vision of the then Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher, that it should be entirely privately financed, and there is no reason why we should not have the same ambition this time. As for his point about the Brexit dividend, as the Prime Minister has herself said, there will unquestionably be substantial sums of money available for spending in this country on the priorities of the British people, including the NHS. If Labour Members are opposed to that, let them stand up and say so now.
Stephen Gethins (North East Fife) (SNP)
Can the Foreign Secretary tell us about any economic analysis that he has had done on the infrastructure that he is talking about, and tell us where it sits in relation to the Government’s new Mad Max dystopian barometer?
Boris Johnson
I hope that the hon. Gentleman will forgive me if I defer the economic analysis to the comité—the committee of wise people. However, the first channel tunnel will be full within the next few years, by the middle of the next decade. I think it incumbent on us to be responsible enough to reflect on the future development of our economies, and I look forward to the committee’s findings.
Stephen Gethins
Does the Foreign Secretary agree with me about the importance of evidence from impartial civil servants? Does he agree with me that evidence in terms of our relationship with France and the rest of Europe is important, and, in that context, does he agree with the former First Secretary of State, the right hon. Member for Ashford (Damian Green), about the
“problem of politicians who won’t accept evidence”?
Boris Johnson
I assure the hon. Gentleman that I have nothing but admiration for the hard work and dedication of the Whitehall civil servants who are preparing the Brexit negotiations. Believe me, they are doing a superb job.
Mr Alister Jack (Dumfries and Galloway) (Con)
Mrs Anne-Marie Trevelyan (Berwick-upon-Tweed) (Con)
The Secretary of State for Commonwealth and Foreign Affairs (Boris Johnson)
The United Kingdom will host an ambitious, high-level illegal wildlife trade conference in London in October this year. I believe that the ambition to crack down on the illegal wildlife trade is shared by the entire British people.
Boris Johnson
As my hon. Friend will know, we are nearing the conclusion of a consultation about a total ban on ivory, which I think many people in the House and in the country would agree is devoutly to be wished for. We will see where we get to, but I think my hon. Friend can count on us once again to be in the lead, and I believe that the October summit will produce some very substantive conclusions on saving elephants.
Mrs Trevelyan
During his recent trip to south-east Asia, what discussions did my right hon. Friend have with palm oil-producing countries about the illegal wildlife trade and deforestation?
Boris Johnson
I am acutely aware of the problems caused by palm oil cultivation. We are in urgent dialogue with our partners to discourage them from deforestation and the consequent loss of species.
Catherine West (Hornsey and Wood Green) (Lab)
China has come a long way in the ivory trade discussions, but what discussions is the team having with Vietnam and some of the other countries in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations?
Boris Johnson
Only the other day, I had discussions with Thailand. We absolutely appreciate the importance of not simply diverting the flow of ivory from China to other countries in south-east Asia.
Mr Gregory Campbell (East Londonderry) (DUP)
Will the Foreign Secretary assure the House, and the people of the United Kingdom, that an international approach is being taken to ensure that nations across the developed globe take a similar position, so that we can ostracise and alienate those who are engaged in this sort of trade?
Boris Johnson
The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. That is why we are hosting a global summit, and the participation rates are already very high indeed.
Jack Lopresti (Filton and Bradley Stoke) (Con)
Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)
The Minister for the Middle East (Alistair Burt)
I was able to meet with both Prime Minister Abadi and Kurdish Prime Minister Nechirvan Barzani in Munich at the weekend, when on behalf of the UK I encouraged the continuing dialogue recently begun between them individually, which is essential to the long-term stability of Iraq. We have no current plans for observers from the UK to attend May’s elections, but we are working with others to ensure efficient and effective monitoring.
Jack Lopresti
Will British diplomats study the Federal Government’s progress in implementing the Iraqi constitution, especially in disputed areas like Kirkuk, where there have been reports of murder, looting and expropriation, and where the autonomy promised under the Iraqi constitution is under threat?
Alistair Burt
There is no doubt that both sides see the opportunity under the constitution to ensure that the relationships between them are strong and good. There has been a great deal of conciliation in an area that could be one of much greater conflict, and the UK is encouraging that dialogue to minimise the risk of the issues that my hon. Friend raises.
Robert Halfon
Will my right hon. Friend accept the Foreign Affairs Committee’s observation that many Kurds feel imprisoned in a country they see as not implementing the commitment to equality for them? Does he also agree that the five month-long blockade of international flights to and from Kurdistan has been a needless outrage, separating families, obstructing medical treatment and impairing the economy, and will he encourage Baghdad to lift the blockade?
Alistair Burt
The issue of the airport is foremost in the discussions between the respective Prime Ministers, and there is a recognition that if the arrangements for the airport could be changed, that would make a difference. It is essential for the future of a Kurdish region in Iraq that it is stable and secure and that rights are honoured on both sides, and that the constitution is seen to be effective.
Ann Clwyd (Cynon Valley) (Lab)
I have just returned from Iraq, and I monitored the first ever elections in Iraq. Elections are important, and the Iraqis in particular would like more technical assistance and advice. They are doing a good job there at the moment, but they need more UK help to bring about reconciliation and progress between the various factions.
Alistair Burt
I thank the right hon. Lady for her steadfast support of Iraq over many years. Indeed, she and colleagues from the Inter-Parliamentary Union were over there to talk to those in the Iraqi Parliament about governance issues, and the contribution she has made over many years is immensely valuable. Of course, technical assistance from the UK to assist in this process is part of the support we provide, and I will certainly be looking into what more we can do in relation to the elections.
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
I know the Minister to be a fair-minded man, so when any of these negotiations are taking place, will he balance loyalty as allies of the Kurdish people over many long years with the track record of President Erdoğan?
Alistair Burt
My right hon. Friend the Minister for Europe and the Americas referred to the Turkish issue earlier. Certainly there is concern about what is happening on the border and a recognition that the needs of the Kurdish peoples, who are represented by a number of different parties, should be recognised. The UK is always conscious of the relationship we have with those peoples, and with the people of Iraq.
Tom Tugendhat (Tonbridge and Malling) (Con)
My right hon. Friend is a noted expert on the region, and it is a pleasure to see him representing Her Majesty’s Government in the middle east, but can he bring a little clarity, which the FAC asked for, on the difference between the YPG and the PKK? We received evidence after evidence that there is indeed no real difference, yet Her Majesty’s Government are supporting a group that appears, at least slightly, to be linked to a group that, as my right hon. Friend’s colleague the Minister for Europe and the Americas said just now, is a proscribed organisation.
Alistair Burt
I thank my hon. Friend not only for his question but for his leadership of the FAC, and we will study its report carefully. It asked for clarity in some situations in which it is genuinely difficult to provide clarity. There will be a full written response from the Foreign Office in due course, but we do designate the PKK as a proscribed organisation; that is the situation at present.
John Woodcock (Barrow and Furness) (Lab/Co-op)
The Minister for the Middle East (Alistair Burt)
We are deeply concerned by recent reports of chemical weapons use in Syria. UK officials are in contact with the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, which is investigating. We condemn all use of chemical weapons and are working with international partners to identify and hold to account those responsible.
John Woodcock
I thank the Minister for that answer. Anyone who seeks to draw a false equivalence in relation to Syria’s grotesque gassing of its own citizens risks aiding and abetting that gruesome activity. The Government’s concern is not enough, and words are not enough. What is the UK actually going to do to take action to stop this activity? This was supposed to be a red line for the international community, but it has been walked over time and again.
Alistair Burt
The hon. Gentleman is right to express concern and anger not only about the use of chemical weapons but about their increasing use. We think that they have been used on perhaps four occasions since the turn of this year. If the use of chemical weapons once again becomes the norm in war, that will go against a century of a united response against them by the world. I took part in the recent conference in Paris led by the French Foreign Minister and the United States Secretary of State to counter activities in the UN, where the joint investigative mechanism has been vetoed on three occasions, by trying to create some other mechanism. We will continue to work through the UN to ensure that the international convention on chemical weapons once again becomes properly effective.
Alison McGovern (Wirral South) (Lab)
I thank the Minister for his responses on this subject, but 2018 has proved to be an absolutely brutal year so far for Syrian civilians. What can we do? We can put in place monitoring in that country. Will the Minister tell us a little more about what UK Government resources are available for monitoring and collecting evidence of these terrible crimes?
Alistair Burt
Since the beginning of the conflict in Syria, the UK has been working to equip civilians on the ground with the tools they need to collect evidence that can be used to ensure accountability and justice. We have been doing that work for some years, and we will continue to do it. The hon. Lady has called attention to the increased use of chemical weapons in the past few weeks, which is an outrage. The world community is entitled to be outraged by it, and we must ensure that, through the UN, we do something effective to bring the perpetrators to justice.
Luciana Berger (Liverpool, Wavertree) (Lab/Co-op)
Alex Cunningham (Stockton North) (Lab)
The Minister for the Middle East (Alistair Burt)
The United Kingdom supports the concept of an international fund for Israeli-Palestinian peace. The Department for International Development’s people-to-people programme has similar aims, and brings together individuals from both sides to build support for a durable solution. We also remain concerned about the provision of healthcare in Gaza, and we are urging all the parties to take the necessary steps to improve conditions there.
Luciana Berger
I think the Minister for his response. With the UK’s increased commitment to funding coexistence projects in Israel-Palestine, which many on both sides of the House have long supported, we have an opportunity to lead the way on the global stage. Will he therefore pledge the UK’s diplomatic support to help to create that international fund, to ensure that our funding is matched by others as part of a sustainable international initiative to build the peace in the middle east that we all long for?
Alistair Burt
Many of us have worried over the years that one of the worst aspects of the conflict has been the separation of peoples. To that extent, we are following the concept of the development of this fund very carefully, and I will continue to take a strong personal interest in it. The sentiment behind it is exactly why we have the £3 million programme, but we will be watching the development of the international fund and giving it support where we can.
Alex Cunningham
A couple of weeks ago, I was humbled to meet a group of young Palestinians and listen to their personal stories about the restrictions on healthcare. A report from the World Health Organisation states that 54 patients died in 2017 while awaiting exit permits to get medical treatment outside Gaza. Will the Minister press Israel to remove the restrictions on patients, to prevent more Palestinians from dying while waiting for medical treatment?
Alistair Burt
The circumstances in Gaza remain dire in many ways. The free movement of patients and medical personnel is vital to the effectiveness of care. We regularly raise concerns about ambulance and permit delays with the Israeli authorities, and we will continue to do so.
Bob Blackman (Harrow East) (Con)
Since September 2015, some 58 Israelis and four foreign nationals have been murdered by Palestinian terrorists in more than 400 separate stabbing, shooting and car ramming incidents. The terrorists have been rewarded with honorary titles, monthly salaries and other opportunities. Will my right hon. Friend make it clear to the Palestinian Authority that, until such time as glorification of terrorism ends, there can be no peace in the middle east?
Alistair Burt
As my hon. Friend is aware, we continue to condemn incitement and violent activities in the region at all times. The attacks that he mentions are absolutely not conducive to peace and should not be celebrated. However, the context of the situation means that we must continue to work for an end to the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians, because only when that happens will the seeds of conflict be taken away. In the meantime, we unreservedly condemn all terrorist and violent attacks.
Liz McInnes (Heywood and Middleton) (Lab)
After the US halved its funding for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency last month, President Trump explained the decision by saying that the Palestinians
“disrespected us…by not allowing our great vice president to see them...that money is not going to them unless they sit down and negotiate peace.”
May I ask the Minister to state, on behalf of this House, that extorting the Palestinian Authority to bend the knee to Mike Pence by removing essential healthcare and education from impoverished Palestinian families is nothing short of a disgrace?
Alistair Burt
The actions of the United States Government in this case have nothing to do with us. Our view on UNRWA remains absolutely clear. I met the director of UNRWA just this morning at the Department for International Development. We will continue to support it and to fund it. To leave refugees in Lebanon and Jordan without support would be a disaster. UNRWA needs to continue to get support, and it will do so from the United Kingdom.
Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)
The Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Boris Johnson)
There was no cost to the public purse.
Chris Bryant
Oh, come off it! Come off it! The right hon. Gentleman must think that we were all born yesterday. The truth is that this was a private party, which was going on on Government premises, sanctioned by the Foreign Secretary. He has been trying to dress up a tinpot bunch of ideological crackpots as an institute, quite against the law, and he has broken the ministerial code. He has been caught in flagrante delicto, hasn’t he?
Boris Johnson
I am under the unhappy duty of contradicting the hon. Gentleman. He is talking the most perfect tripe. The event that took place was completely non-partisan. Members of all parties were present. [Interruption.] Including the Labour party. EU and non-EU ambassadors were represented. It was fully in line with Foreign and Commonwealth Office rules on hosting such events, and I have here a letter from the Cabinet Secretary to confirm that, which I am happy to pass to the hon. Gentleman. I am afraid to say that the Cabinet Secretary has been pestered with complaints from the Labour party about this absolutely blameless event, which was there to support and encourage free trade, which is a major objective of Government policy and should be an objective of the hon. Gentleman—or is it not?
Jeremy Lefroy (Stafford) (Con)
Was the excellent continental free trade area agreement of the African Union, which would bring great prosperity, discussed? If it was not discussed then, could it be discussed at the next meeting? I would be very happy to pay for it.
Boris Johnson
I hesitate for an age before correcting you, Mr Speaker, but it was a serious discussion of the advancement of free trade. The subject of free trade in the African Union, which my hon. Friend raises, is a very good one. The only advice I would give to the African Union is not to acquire a parliament, a court or a single currency.
Mr Speaker
I readily defer to the Foreign Secretary’s knowledge of this important event.
Mr Speaker
I do not know how long he was there, and I cannot say that I greatly care. We have had the answers.
Mary Robinson (Cheadle) (Con)
The Minister for Europe and the Americas (Sir Alan Duncan)
At the previous Foreign Office questions in January, I explained that the UK is leading by example on ocean conservation. The Government are on track to meet their manifesto blue belt pledge, which will deliver marine protection across nearly 4 million sq km of the waters around our overseas territories by 2020. Through the Commonwealth marine economies programme, we are working to enable small island Commonwealth states to conserve and use their maritime space sustainably.
Mary Robinson
In common with my constituents, I welcome the microbeads ban and other measures taken by the Government to protect the marine environment, but we need a global approach. What diplomatic steps is my right hon. Friend taking to engage with the United Nations and other countries to push the blue belt charter up the global agenda?
Sir Alan Duncan
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for recognising the steps that we have taken, such as on microbeads. As for her main point, we are closely involved in negotiations to develop a UN treaty on marine biological diversity in areas beyond national jurisdictions. As chair of the Commonwealth for the next two years, we will work with member states to create a Commonwealth blue charter. In the G7, we are working closely with Canada during its presidency to deliver our shared ambition to tackle the threats facing our oceans.
Mr John Baron (Basildon and Billericay) (Con)
The Minister for Asia and the Pacific (Mark Field)
I welcome the significant contribution made by the British Council to projecting British values overseas, which I regularly witness on my visits to Asia and the Pacific. My officials and I are in regular dialogue with the British Council across the globe to discuss the scope of its important work. We will continue to work with it to ensure compliance with our manifesto commitment to
“place… the British Council on a secure footing”.
Mr Baron
I thank the Minister for that response. Given the importance of the British Council to our soft power, what are the implications of possible cuts to non-overseas development aid funding for the council’s work? How might they affect the Government’s plans for a global Britain?
Mark Field
The council has agreed to reduce its non-ODA grant from the Foreign Office to zero by the end of the spending review period in exchange for additional official development assistance funding. As part of our vision for a global Britain, we want a properly funded and effective council that projects British values right across the world. The council will continue to deliver activity in non-ODA countries through the income generated from other sources, such as its commercial income.
Matt Rodda (Reading East) (Lab)
Bambos Charalambous (Enfield, Southgate) (Lab)
The Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Boris Johnson)
We are seeking a deep and special partnership with the EU post Brexit. Our existing relationship provides a strong foundation for vital continued co-operation on global challenges. We are working to strengthen, reinvigorate and reshape our bilateral relationships with our European partners, focusing on shared values and interests.
Matt Rodda
The Foreign Secretary’s 5,000-word speech on Brexit last week was described by one of his ministerial colleagues as follows:
“He is completely in denial about the complexity of the exit and the negative economic…consequences.”
Will the Foreign Secretary clear something up? Is he in denial or is he just wrong?
Boris Johnson
If I may, I will respectfully resist the alternatives that the hon. Gentleman lays before me. Last week, I was trying to make the point that we now have a massive opportunity to come together—people who voted remain and people who voted leave—to get a positive arrangement and a positive Brexit that will be of massive benefit to people both in this country and in the whole of the European continent. If we are ambitious and positive, I have absolutely no doubt that we can pull it off.
Bambos Charalambous
The Foreign Secretary claimed last week that it would be “intolerable” for the UK not to set its own regulations after Brexit. The next day, a Harvard survey of UK importers and exporters found that the last thing that they want is the dual regulatory burden of having to comply with both UK and EU rules. Will the Foreign Secretary tell us who is right?
Boris Johnson
I think that the Harvard survey is right: nobody wants two sets of regulations to be imposed on the UK economy. That is why the Prime Minister was completely right—wasn’t she?—at Lancaster House and, indeed, in Florence and in sundry other places when she said that Brexit means taking back control of our money, our borders and, above all, our laws. That is what we are going to do.
Michael Fabricant (Lichfield) (Con)
Will my right hon. Friend take the opportunity to praise the work of Her Majesty’s diplomatic service? Is he content that our embassies in the 27 remaining EU countries are sufficiently resourced to represent the United Kingdom effectively after Brexit?
Boris Johnson
I am so glad that my hon. Friend asked that question because we are not only upgrading seven ambassadorial posts in the 27 other EU countries, but increasing our staffing across the network in the EU by 50.
Boris Johnson
Yes we are. Again, I am getting some negativity from a sedentary position on the Opposition Benches. In addition to beefing up our relations with our EU friends and partners, we will open 15 embassies in Africa.
Emily Thornberry (Islington South and Finsbury) (Lab)
It has been pointed out that the Foreign Secretary’s Brexit speech last week was 5,000 words long, but it did not once include the words “Northern” or “Ireland”. That is perhaps the biggest problem that the Government need to tackle, yet the Foreign Secretary did not even mention it. Will he belatedly take the opportunity to explain in simple terms how it is possible for the UK to diverge from the EU in regulations, tariffs and other aspects of trade while retaining the current arrangements on the Irish land border? Will he enlighten us? What is the plan?
Boris Johnson
As the right hon. Lady knows very well, there is no reason whatsoever why we should not be able to exit the customs union and the single market while maintaining frictionless trade not only north-south in Northern Ireland, but with the rest of continental Europe. That is exactly what the Government will spell out in the course of the coming negotiations.
Jess Phillips (Birmingham, Yardley) (Lab)
The Minister for Africa (Harriett Baldwin)
The UK champions peacekeeping financially, politically and militarily. Since 2015, we have more than doubled our commitment to UN peacekeeping, with British forces deploying to South Sudan and Somalia. There are now more than 700 UK personnel deployed on eight UN peacekeeping missions in seven countries.
Jess Phillips
In the light of ongoing reports of sexual abuse by UN peacekeepers, does the Minister agree that increasing the number of women peacekeepers is a vital part of addressing the crisis in the long term? Will she also tell us the proportion of peacekeepers from the UK who are women and what plans she has to increase their representation on UN deployments?
Harriett Baldwin
I appreciate the hon. Lady’s leadership on the issue and her work on all aspects of it. I think that she will admire the leadership role that the UK has played not only in putting the subject on the UN’s agenda last year, but with our Prime Minister’s appointment to the Secretary-General’s Circle of Leadership. I assure her that we will continue to champion that agenda at every opportunity.
On the topic that the hon. Lady raised about women from our armed forces, she will know about the impressive agenda that includes the Armed Forces (Flexible Working) Act 2018, and that we are aiming to increase the proportion of women from 11% to 15%.
Henry Smith (Crawley) (Con)
The Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Boris Johnson)
My immediate priority is to take forward Britain’s response to the humanitarian crisis in Burma and in Bangladesh. I was deeply moved by the plight of Rohingya refugees whom I met in Cox’s Bazar earlier this month. I went to Burma with the express purpose of raising the tragedy with State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi. The UK’s goal is to help to create the conditions for the safe, voluntary and dignified return of the refugees to their homes.
The House will join me in welcoming the Gambia back to the Commonwealth, providing an excellent prelude to the Commonwealth summit in London in April.
Henry Smith
Will my right hon. Friend say what discussions he has had with the Government in Wellington about UK-New Zealand trade and co-operation on Brexit?
The Minister for Asia and the Pacific (Mark Field)
I have just returned from a sun-kissed New Zealand, where I had fruitful discussions—[Interruption.]—indoors in the main, with a range of political figures, including my counterparts the Associate Foreign Minister and the Trade Minister, and with the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee. New Zealand is a valued Five Eyes security partner and a priority for a deeper security and trade agreement once we leave the EU. We have the broadest and deepest friendship with New Zealand.
Helen Goodman (Bishop Auckland) (Lab)
The UK is joint guarantor of rights and freedoms in Hong Kong, yet we have seen booksellers abducted, elected legislators barred and student demonstrators imprisoned, and in Guangdong, in December, 10 people were tried in a sports stadium before being executed. Why did the Prime Minister not raise the issue of human rights in public in Beijing? Was it because she does not care or because she is so desperate to get a trade deal?
Mark Field
I reassure the shadow Minister that the Prime Minister did raise these issues, but we do this not through megaphone diplomacy but in private meetings; we relentlessly raise human rights issues, not least in respect of Hong Kong. As the hon. Lady rightly says, it is vital that Hong Kong’s rights and freedoms are respected. Our most recent six-monthly report states that one country, two systems must continue to function well, and we remain concerned by, for example, the rejection of Agnes Chow’s most recent nomination for March’s Legislative Council election.
Fiona Bruce (Congleton) (Con)
Mark Field
We have fully supported the United Nations resolutions that have imposed increasing sanctions upon the use of overseas labour from the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. Many such workers operate in slavery-like conditions while the DPRK regime takes a large slice of their wages. The latest of those was UN Security Council resolution 2397, which was adopted as recently as 22 December last year.
Stephen Timms (East Ham) (Lab)
Boris Johnson
I appreciate the right hon. Gentleman’s interest in this subject. As he knows, the difficulty is that in the UN Security Council there will be those who would not support such a resolution at present. The crucial thing is that everybody in the region and around the world makes it clear to the Government in Naypyidaw and to Daw Suu that the only way forward now for Burma is to create the conditions for a safe, dignified and voluntary return—and that must mean an independent UN-led agency to oversee the repatriation; otherwise those people are going to be too frightened to return. That is the priority on which we should focus.
Jeremy Lefroy (Stafford) (Con)
The Minister for Africa (Harriett Baldwin)
My hon. Friend is absolutely right to highlight this disastrous situation and the importance of the UK’s role. He will be aware that the DRC is an extremely dangerous place even for the UN peacekeepers; some were killed last year. The UK Government are calling on President Kabila to respect the constitution, to fulfil the commitments made in the Saint-Sylvestre accord and to continue with the implementation path to elections this year.
Mrs Emma Lewell-Buck (South Shields) (Lab)
The Minister for the Middle East (Alistair Burt)
We have one of the strictest arms control regimes in the world, governed both by this House and by the law, and we will continue to abide by that. In the meantime, we are doing everything we can to encourage a diplomatic solution to end the conflict in Yemen. That is the only thing that will bring the suffering of the people of Yemen to an end.
Rachel Maclean (Redditch) (Con)
Boris Johnson
We are totally aligned with what is taking place in Redditch in the sense that, as my hon. Friend the Minister for Africa said earlier, our ambition for there to be 12 years of quality education for every girl in the world, which I believe is the universal spanner that will help to unlock so many other global problems, is at the heart of our Commonwealth summit—
Boris Johnson
The universal spanner—a device that will solve almost any problem. I truly believe that female education is at the heart of solving so many other global problems, which is why we are putting it at the very centre of the Commonwealth summit in April and the upcoming G7 summit. Across our network, female education is at the heart of everything that we do.
Mr Speaker
Order. There is a lot of chortling going on in the Chamber, but we have had an update on the spanner situation, for which we are indebted to the Foreign Secretary.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
What steps is the Department taking to provide training on freedom of religion or belief for its officials?
Mark Field
I thank the hon. Gentleman for his question; I am well aware that this issue is close to his heart. He will be aware that Lord Ahmad and I regularly liaise on the issue with our embassies and high commissions. I wrote a joint letter to those on my patch, in Asia and the Pacific, and I have received replies from Bangladesh, Burma, China, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. I am encouraged that the network takes the issue as seriously as the hon. Gentleman does.
Julia Lopez (Hornchurch and Upminster) (Con)
If Britain is to assume a more ambitious global trading role as we leave the EU, we shall surely need to expand the depth and reach of our network of high commissions and embassies in regions such as North America. What assurances can my right hon. Friend offer the House that critical diplomatic missions in countries such as Canada are being expanded, not cut back?
Boris Johnson
I am delighted to tell my hon. Friend that to the best of my knowledge we have, just in the past 18 months, opened three new trade missions in North America. I cannot comment about Canada specifically, but we are certainly beefing up our presence in the United States in advance of doing a great free trade deal.
Rushanara Ali (Bethnal Green and Bow) (Lab)
The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights described what is happening to the Rohingya people as a military campaign in which
“you cannot rule out the possibility that acts of genocide have been committed”.
Having met the victims in Bangladesh and Myanmar, the Foreign Secretary said earlier to my right hon. Friend the Member for East Ham (Stephen Timms) that a Security Council referral is too difficult. Will he show some leadership and work with our EU partners next week at the Foreign Affairs Council to build support for a referral? The act of a referral will make a difference.
Boris Johnson
As I am sure the hon. Lady knows, Myanmar is not signed up to the International Criminal Court, but there must be no doubt about the gravity of what has taken place. Anybody who flies over northern Rakhine, as I did last week, will see literally hundreds of villages that have been burned or destroyed. Some 680,000 people have been displaced. This has been ethnic cleansing on an industrial scale and it may also have been genocide. It is vital that the evidence is acquired to determine whether any future prosecution can be mounted.
Sir Hugo Swire (East Devon) (Con)
The recent extension of the state of emergency and the arrest of former President Gayoom and two Supreme Court judges has shown President Yameen tightening his grip in the Maldives and the further extinguishing of the democratic institutions there. Given the fact that at any one time there are literally thousands of British holidaymakers on those islands, and that until recently the Maldives was a welcome member of the Commonwealth family, will the Secretary of State agree to head up a mission there, or encourage the UN to establish one? The situation has the potential to bring China and India into an unwelcome regional conflict.
Mark Field
Like my right hon. Friend I am deeply troubled by the declaration of a state of emergency in the Maldives on 5 February and the accompanying suspension of fundamental rights. Last November in London, I met former President Nasheed, whose own time in office was turbulent, and we discussed the deteriorating situation. We will very much take on board my right hon. Friend’s suggestions.
Chris Stephens (Glasgow South West) (SNP)
Is the Secretary of State concerned about weekend reports by human rights observers that the civilians of Afrin have been subjected to chemical gas attacks by Turkish forces? Should we expect that conduct from a so-called NATO ally?
Alistair Burt
As I mentioned earlier, any suggestion of the use of chemical weapons must be independently verified. The degree to which they have become more used in the Syrian conflict by a number of different sources, not least the regime, is a matter of great concern, but any suggestion must be properly identified and verified.
Anna Soubry (Broxtowe) (Con)
The Good Friday agreement has brought about peace for almost 20 years in Northern Ireland. Will the Foreign Secretary give an unequivocal assurance that Her Majesty’s Government will not do anything that undermines the agreement, including pursuing any policy that undermines the principles that led to its creation?
Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab)
Has the Secretary of State had the chance to speak to the Sri Lankan ambassador regarding his defence attaché Brigadier Priyanka Fernando and his behaviour on 4 February, when he made throat-slitting gestures to Tamil protesters? If somebody else incited hatred in that way on our streets, they would be interviewed by the police. Will the Minister make arrangements for Brigadier Priyanka Fernando to be interviewed by the police about that crime?
Mark Field
I reassure the hon. Gentleman that the UK takes this incident very seriously. When I spoke recently to Foreign Minister Marapana, he left me in no doubt that the Sri Lankan Government were treating it with the seriousness that it deserves. They have informed the UK Government that they have ordered the defence attaché to return to Colombo from London with immediate effect for consultations while the incident is thoroughly investigated. I hope that the UK and Sri Lanka bilateral relationship will remain strong and co-operative.
Zac Goldsmith (Richmond Park) (Con)
I know the Foreign Secretary shares my view that our leadership in marine conservation, particularly in respect of the blue belt, is a source of national pride, but may I urge him please to use the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting in April to press our Commonwealth allies, more than half of which are island states, to make that a high priority in the discussions ahead?
Boris Johnson
I congratulate my hon. Friend on the pioneering role he has played in championing the blue belt initiative, which has consecrated millions of square miles of ocean, protecting habitats and species around the world. As he knows, the UK Government have put a further £20 million into that scheme. As he rightly foreshadows, it is our ambition at the Commonwealth summit to go further.
Peter Grant (Glenrothes) (SNP)
The Foreign Secretary will be aware of the plight of my constituents Mr and Mrs Westwood, who were first of all defrauded of their entire possessions in Zimbabwe and then forced to flee for their lives by armed gangs with very close links with the Mugabe regime. Will he explain why the Westwoods recently received a letter that appeared to indicate that the Foreign and Commonwealth Office was no longer willing to give them any assistance? Will he agree to meet me and the Westwoods to give them his personal assurance that the FCO will not abandon them?
Sir Patrick McLoughlin (Derbyshire Dales) (Con)
May I ask my right hon. Friend what his view is of the position with the Ecuadorian embassy in London? The situation has been going on since 19 June 2012. In the first three years, it was estimated to have cost the Metropolitan police an extra £11 million. When are we going to take action?
The Minister for Europe and the Americas (Sir Alan Duncan)
Julian Assange breached his bail conditions in 2012. In upholding the arrest warrant of 13 February, Judge Arbuthnot said:
“He appears to consider himself above the normal rules of law and wants justice only if it goes in his favour.”
In our view, Assange is not a victim of arbitrary detention. He is avoiding lawful arrest. He should step outside the door and face justice. That would bring an end to the matter.
Neil Coyle (Bermondsey and Old Southwark) (Lab)
Almost two years ago, my constituent Adrian St John was murdered in Trinidad. Since then, his mother Sharon and I have been working with Ministers and officials in both countries to secure justice, but progress has been grindingly slow. The case in Trinidad has been adjourned 27 times. Will the Government ensure that Adrian’s murder is on the agenda when the Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago visits London in April, and will Ministers allow time during Mr Rowley’s official visit to meet Sharon and me to help her to secure justice?
Sir Alan Duncan
I commend the hon. Gentleman for the manner in which he is defending the interests of his constituent. I am acutely aware of this case. Adrian was murdered in Trinidad. We cannot interfere in the judicial process, but we are extending every possible support. I advise the House that we understand that a preliminary trial to determine whether there is sufficient evidence to charge the accused with murder will be held on 8 March. I hope that this will mark some progress towards what the hon. Gentleman is seeking.
Royston Smith (Southampton, Itchen) (Con)
Millions of people are celebrating the seventh anniversary of the start of the Libyan uprising and the ousting of Colonel Gaddafi. Fayez al-Sarraj has been the Prime Minister of Libya for nearly two years and progress has been painfully slow. Will the Secretary of State update the House on what his Department is doing to help the Government of National Accord to bring about a prosperous and—more importantly—peaceful Libya?
Boris Johnson
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his interest in a country that is still bedevilled by factional feuding between a very small number of men—a maximum of about half a dozen—who have it in their power to come together and build a better future for Libya. We are trying to back the efforts of UN Special Representative Ghassan Salamé to bring the eastern and western parts of Libya together, with a plan for the whole country—a new constitution, to be followed by elections. That is what we are working for.
Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith) (Lab)
May I ask the Minister for the Middle East what representations have been made in the case of Nabeel Rajab, the president of the Bahrain Centre for Human Rights, who is facing another long prison sentence tomorrow, simply for taking to social media to criticise torture in Bahrain’s prisons and the Saudi-led war in Yemen?
Alistair Burt
There are a small number of those who have been arrested and have had lengthy trials in Bahrain. The United Kingdom has made representations in a number of these cases, including those mentioned by the hon. Gentleman, and we continue to monitor the trials and processes very carefully.
Rebecca Pow (Taunton Deane) (Con)
Estimates suggest that 12 million tonnes of plastic go into our oceans every year, causing immense damage to our ecosystems. Does the Secretary of State agree that we need not only to get involved on the global stage to influence the cleaning up of our oceans, but to lead by example in the UK, not least—it might only be a small thing—by giving up plastic for Lent as far as we can, as many hon. Members are doing?
Boris Johnson
My hon. Friend speaks for millions of people in the country who feel ashamed to see the state of our oceans and wish that they could be cleared up. This country is taking a lead. Cracking down on plastic waste will certainly be at the heart of the Commonwealth summit. I have to admit that I do not know how easily I could give up plastic for Lent. I have a plastic biro in my right hand; I propose to take it out and dispose of it in a suitable manner. My hon. Friend is entirely right.
Medical Cannabis
(6 years, 10 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Urgent Questions are proposed each morning by backbench MPs, and up to two may be selected each day by the Speaker. Chosen Urgent Questions are announced 30 minutes before Parliament sits each day.
Each Urgent Question requires a Government Minister to give a response on the debate topic.
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Crispin Blunt (Reigate) (Con)
(Urgent Question): To ask the Home Secretary if she will make a statement on the case of Alfie Dingley, whose parents and doctors are seeking access to medical cannabis to treat his epilepsy.
The Minister for Policing and the Fire Service (Mr Nick Hurd)
I, personally, and the Government sympathise deeply with the situation faced by Alfie Dingley and his family. I think that everyone on both sides of the House and outside it will understand and respect the desire of the family to try to alleviate his suffering in any way possible. I assure my hon. Friend that we want to help to find a solution within the existing regulations.
As my hon. Friend will know, the current situation is that cannabis, in its raw form, is not recognised in the UK as having any medicinal benefits. It is therefore listed as a schedule 1 drug under the Misuse of Drugs Regulations 2001. This means that it is unlawful to produce, supply or possess raw cannabis unless it is for the purposes of research. Products must be thoroughly tested in the UK to provide the necessary assurances of their efficacy, quality and safety.
We have a clear regime in place that is administered by the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency to enable medicines, including those containing controlled drugs such as cannabis, to be developed, licensed and made available for medicinal use to patients in the UK, as happened in the case of Sativex, as my hon. Friend knows. The Home Office will consider issuing a licence to enable trials of any new medicine under schedule 1 to the Misuse of Drugs Regulations 2001, providing that it complies with appropriate ethical approvals. Cannabis-based products should be treated in the same way as all other drugs, meaning that they should go through the normal testing procedures applied to any other medicines.
The current situation is that outside of research we would not issue licences for the personal consumption of cannabis because it is listed as a schedule 1 drug. However, we are aware of differing approaches in other countries and continue to monitor the World Health Organisation’s expert committee on drug dependence, which has committed to reviewing the use of medicinal cannabis. We will wait until the outcome of the review before considering any next steps. [Interruption.] I am also aware—before the hon. Member for Newport West (Paul Flynn) starts chuntering—that the private Member’s Bill on the legalisation of cannabis for medicinal purposes introduced by the hon. Gentleman will give the House a further opportunity to debate the wider policy.
The whole House will understand that it is a natural desire for parents to do everything they can to make sure that their children do not suffer unnecessarily, but we also need to make sure that cannabis is subjected to the same regulatory framework that applies to all medicines in the UK. We must ensure that only medicines that have been tested for their safety to the correct standard are prescribed for UK children.
Crispin Blunt
I thank my right hon. Friend for saying at the beginning of his response that he is determined to find a solution to this. That will also be welcomed by my right hon. Friend the Attorney General, Alfie Dingley’s MP, who has been working hard, if necessarily privately, on his behalf.
I hope that the Home Office is going to find a way to cease standing behind a 1961 UN scheduling of cannabis as having no medicinal benefit whatsoever. My right hon. Friend mentioned Sativex. However, there are now 12, soon to be 15, states of the European Union and 29 states of the United States of America, and the District of Columbia, that have all found a way to license the medicinal use of cannabis. Is he aware of the position of the Republic of Ireland, which, with a legal framework very similar to ours, gave its Health Minister the explicit power to license use of the medicine in cases such as Alfie’s?
My right hon. Friend’s position, and that of the Government, currently flies in the face of the popular view in the United Kingdom, where 78% of people think that we should find a way of using cannabis-based medicine. Out there, most people instinctively understand the pain and symptom relief that is available from cannabis-based medicines. Here, we know from the Barnes review of 2016, commissioned by the all-party parliamentary group on drug policy reform, that there is good, peer-reviewed medical evidence of the effectiveness of cannabis-based medicines for conditions associated with multiple sclerosis, the side-effects of chemotherapy, and epilepsy.
Failure by the Government to move from their current position will sentence Alfie to the steroid-based treatment he was receiving before he went to the Netherlands, which is likely to give him early psychosis and a premature death. Their position also means that British citizens are being denied all the potential medical and symptomatic benefits that could come from a properly licensed, regulated and researched access programme to cannabis-based medicines. If we do not give people the licences to do the medical research, we will not get the products. Granting the licences would mean that we would not have to rely on the wisdom of crowds and illegally sourced and unreliable products, and would have peer-reviewed, evidence-based treatments produced to pharmaceutical standards.
I urge my right hon. Friend, who is very far from being cruel and heartless—as indeed are the rest of his colleagues in the Home Office—to help either the manufacturers of the drug that will save Alfie’s life, or his doctors or the family to find a way through to get a licence to treat him, and to instruct his officials to assist. It is an indication of just how messed up our management of this issue is that my right hon. Friend from the Home Office is answering this urgent question and not a Health Minister. On health grounds, this is an open-and-shut case.
Mr Hurd
I thank my hon. Friend. I totally respect his position. I should place it on record that the Under-Secretary of State for Health, my hon. Friend the Member for Winchester (Steve Brine), is sitting next to me, very much in listening mode.
I reassure my hon. Friend, and my right hon. Friend the Attorney General, who has made many representations to me on behalf of Alfie Dingley and his family, that there are clearly some special circumstances in this case that need to be respected. I have undertaken to meet the family, and I will do that as quickly as possible. I also undertake to explore every option within the current regulatory framework. I give that undertaking with sincerity.
I know my hon. Friend well enough to know that he will understand the importance of proceeding on the basis of evidence, particularly when it concerns the safety of drugs and of children. We have our position—he is right that it has been established for a long time—and it is supported by expert opinion. However, we are aware that the position is shifting in other countries, and we monitor that closely.
We are also aware that cannabis is an extremely complex substance, and the WHO quite rightly is looking at it from every angle to get an up-to-date view on its therapeutic use. We are monitoring all that closely. Our current regulatory position is what it is. However, I have undertaken to explore every option within the regulatory framework to see whether we can find a solution to this extremely emotive case.
Carolyn Harris (Swansea East) (Lab)
There has been a call to allow a licence for administering medical cannabis to Alfie Dingley, but the Government must thoroughly examine the evidence in this area—both the stated benefits and the supposed risks of medical cannabis. Our policies must always be based on evidence and not frightened of scary headlines or chasing favourable ones. Only in that way can the House come to an informed decision on the wider issues.
Alfie Dingley is a six-year-old boy whose life is blighted by epileptic fits, and it is understandable that his family want him to have whatever medication they feel will help him. They look to us as politicians to facilitate that, but we are constrained by laws. Members supportive of drug policy reform would like the Home Secretary to issue a licence so that Alfie can continue taking the medication, but the Home Office has responded that the drug
“cannot be practically prescribed, administered or supplied to the public”.
Cannabis use is illegal in this country—we do not dispute that. However, we need assurances from the Minister that all the evidence relating to Alfie’s case has been looked at and that all avenues of treatment are being considered. We need confidence that the Minister and his colleagues are doing everything in their power to ensure that Alfie has the best possible quality of life.
This case is the latest in a long line of prominent examples that have led to more calls for legislation to permit the medical use of cannabis. Is it now time for a review of the law, to look at how we can better support those living in chronic pain, those with long-term degenerative conditions and those in the final stages of life?
Mr Hurd
I agree with the hon. Lady that policy should be evidence-led, and I support entirely her point that we need to think very carefully about the implications and consequences of everything we do.
As I said in my statement, outside of research we would not issue licences for the personal consumption of cannabis because it is listed as a schedule 1 drug. However, as in the case of Sativex, the Home Office will consider issuing a licence to enable trials of any new medicine under schedule 1 to the Misuse of Drugs Regulations 2001, providing it complies with appropriate ethical approvals. I repeat that I personally undertake to explore every option within the existing regulations to see if we can find a solution.
Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)
I support the medical use of cannabis and think the Government should be more fleet of foot on this issue. A sensible proposed amendment to the law in a free vote in this House would, I think, be carried.
Mr Hurd
I thank my hon. Friend for his comment. I dispute the allegation that the Government are not fleet of foot on this. As I said in my statement, we are aware that things are changing in other countries and that the WHO is reviewing the evidence, and we will follow that very closely indeed.
Paul Flynn (Newport West) (Lab)
We would have to have a heart of stone if any of our children or grandchildren were in this position and we were told by a stubborn bureaucracy that they had to turn blue up to 30 times a day and have seizures because our law says that that is the situation. Twenty-nine American states have legalised cannabis for medicinal purposes, and in every one of them the use of deadly, dangerous opioids has gone down. Every alternative to natural cannabis is worse. It is not just one case; thousands of people have the choice of suffering terrible pain and seizures every day or criminalising themselves by breaking the law. I urge them to break the law, because the law in this case is an ass, and it is cruel and lacks compassion.
Mr Hurd
I do not have a heart of stone, and I say that not just as a parent of six children. Anyone with or without children could not fail to be moved by this case, but, as the hon. Member for Swansea East (Carolyn Harris) said, we have to look at this through the lens of its implications across the system. We have to look at this through the lens of the existing law, which is set on the basis of expert advice, not least from the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs. It is very clear that
“the use of cannabis is a significant public health issue”,
and, in its words, can
“unquestionably cause harm to individuals and society.”
We cannot ignore that advice. However, as I have said, we are monitoring closely the work done by the WHO and other countries, and precedents elsewhere, and, as I have undertaken to do in this particular case, we will explore every option within the existing regulations.
Michael Fabricant (Lichfield) (Con)
As the hon. Member for Newport West (Paul Flynn) said, it is not just Alfie; thousands of people have such conditions. I have a constituent, Vicky Clarke—now just 5 stone in weight—in St Giles hospice in my constituency, suffering from the very final stages of multiple sclerosis. Her husband has found that the only drug that alleviated her pain was cannabis, and he has twice been investigated by the police. We are not talking about the general administration of cannabis; we are talking about the medical prescription of cannabis. If a doctor says that cannabis is the only cure or a medical professional says that it is the only way to alleviate pain, surely they should be legally allowed to prescribe that drug.
Mr Hurd
Well, they still have to operate within the law. The law does permit the development, licensing and marketing of medicines, including those containing controlled drugs, such as cannabis. I have used the example of Sativex, which I believe provides relief to patients with MS. My hon. Friend talks about lots of other cases like this one. It is worth noting, however, that in the case of Alfie Dingley, I think only nine other children in the world suffer from the same type of epilepsy as he does. That is why I have undertaken to explore every option on his behalf. I make it quite clear that the Home Office and the Government are keeping this area under review, because this is fast moving. The House will of course have the chance to debate it along with the private Member’s Bill.
Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)
The Scottish National party is in favour of the decriminalisation of cannabis for medicinal use, given the evidence of the benefit it has in alleviating the symptoms of many serious conditions, such as that suffered by young Alfie Dingley. In 2016, our party conference heard evidence from a multiple sclerosis sufferer, Laura Brennan-Whitefield, who called for “compassion and common sense” on this issue. She said:
“I’m not advocating the smoking of cannabis, what I’m advocating is a progressive and reasonable, compassionate society where you can access pain relief”.
We urge the UK Government to look again very seriously at decriminalising the use of cannabis for medicinal use. If they are not prepared to do so, we ask them to devolve the power to Scotland, so that the Scottish Government can take appropriate steps. However, we would like to see this for everybody in the United Kingdom.
Mr Hurd
I thank the hon. and learned Lady for her contribution, and this issue will be debated with the private Member’s Bill on Friday. Again, I come back to the point that we have the existing regulatory framework, and we will not issue licences for the personal consumption of cannabis because it is listed as a schedule 1 drug. However, it is possible to consider issuing licences to enable trials of any new medicine under schedule 1 to the Misuse of Drugs Regulations 2001, and there is precedent for doing so.
Several hon. Members rose—
Mr Speaker
Order. Just before I call the hon. Member for Beckenham (Bob Stewart), can I ask him whether he was present at the start of these exchanges?
Bob Stewart
Thank you, Mr Speaker. I certainly was here, just silent. I support the medical use of cannabis, particularly in this case. If the Bill sponsored by the hon. Member for Newport West (Paul Flynn) passes with a sufficient majority on Friday, might the Government fast-track it through the House?
Christine Jardine (Edinburgh West) (LD)
The Minister has heard support from those of us on these Benches, but does he not support the views of his colleagues in the Scottish Parliament, where the health spokesman Miles Briggs said:
“it is time for a comprehensive, UK wide review…and for Parliament to look to reform access to cannabis for medical and scientific purposes”?
Does he recognise that there is widespread support in all parties?
Mr Hurd
There are good reasons for the Government’s current position. As I made clear in my statement, we are looking very closely at the approaches being taken by other countries. We have a keen eye on what the global experts, the WHO’s expert committee on drug dependence, conclude in relation to the therapeutic and medicinal benefits of cannabis.
Sir Desmond Swayne (New Forest West) (Con)
It is Bill number three on Friday. There is not going to be a debate, is there?
Yasmin Qureshi (Bolton South East) (Lab)
I have had a number of constituents in the past eight years who have suffered from different illnesses, such as epilepsy and multiple sclerosis. They told me that conventional drugs have not worked for them. Often, they have had to travel abroad, especially Holland, to obtain and use cannabis, which has helped them significantly. I therefore urge the Minister and the Government to please consider allowing the medicinal use of cannabis.
Mr Hurd
I totally understand the hon. Lady’s point, which underlines why the WHO is undertaking its work. I am sure she will agree, however, that cannabis products must be treated in the same way as all other drugs. That means going through the normal testing procedures that apply to any other medicine.
Stephen Pound (Ealing North) (Lab)
May I help the Minister and suggest that he speak with his colleague the Secretary of State for Health and ask about the extensive trial, known as delta-9, which took place in the Royal Marsden hospital 40 years ago? Cannabis was found to be an excellent prophylactic against nausea caused by ontological medicine. The data is there. The empirical evidence is there. Why does he not save time and trouble by having a word with the Secretary of State and drawing this information to the attention of the House? Let us resolve this matter once and for all.
Mr Hurd
The hon. Gentleman will understand why I approach any offer of help from him with caution, but in this case I will certainly discuss the evidence he mentions with my colleagues in the Department of Health and Social Care. We need to proceed on the basis of evidence, because of the need for safety.
Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (SNP)
The Government have heard several times that cannabis for medicinal use is available in many countries. It is clear that the evidence is there. It is allowed in other EU countries. One of the benefits of being in the EU, while we are still there, is collaboration. We are able to review research that is available elsewhere and come to a quick decision. Will the Minister confirm that there are no barriers at the top level of the Government preventing that?
Mr Hurd
I am not aware of any barriers. What I am aware of is the current regulatory framework, underpinned by expert advice, which continues to be that cannabis in its raw form is not recognised in the UK as having any medicinal benefit. The situation is evolving in other countries and the WHO is looking at it. It is right that we keep an open mind and that we continue to look at the evidence and the precedence from other countries.
Paula Sherriff (Dewsbury) (Lab)
I declare an interest as the chair of the all-party group on epilepsy and as the daughter of an epilepsy sufferer. In addition to the cost in human misery, can the Minister advise on whether any attempt has been made to estimate the net cost of continuous ineffective treatment for epilepsy sufferers who are denied access to cannabis for medicinal purposes?
Sir Edward Davey (Kingston and Surbiton) (LD)
The whole House will welcome the fact that the Minister has agreed to meet the family of Alfie Dingley. Will he also agree to meet the campaign group End Our Pain, which is campaigning to allow doctors to prescribe cannabis when it would help their patients? End Our Pain wants to present to the Minister the evidence that honourable colleagues have talked about and discuss the fact that the Multiple Sclerosis Society has changed its position on the use of medicinal cannabis, based on the evidence.
Dr Rupa Huq (Ealing Central and Acton) (Lab)
I wonder whether the Minister knows the book “The Boy in 7 Billion”, by Callie Blackwell, the mum of Deryn Blackwell who, at the age of 10, was diagnosed with a very rare cancer and then, through the use of cannabis oil, made a miraculous recovery. If he likes, I can lend him my copy. I got one over recess at THTC, a company in my constituency that makes hemp t-shirts—sorry, it does not make them; it supplies them. It is not allowed to make them in this country. It also pointed out that in Mexico, where the medicinal use of cannabis has been legalised, violent crime has dramatically dropped. Does the Minister not think that those things are more than a coincidence, and will he not investigate?
Mr Hurd
The hon. Lady is taking us beyond a UK scope. I do not know the book and I am grateful to her for her offer, but I come back to what I said at the start. The Government have a position based on the listing as a schedule 1 drug and the view of experts, but we review, and keep under review, what is happening in other countries and, most importantly, the WHO’s position.
Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)
We seem to be in some kind of Alice in Wonderland world where words mean the opposite of what we imagine. The Minister said that he is being fleet of foot, yet we have established that we are dragging our feet behind 15 EU member states and 29 US states. I have lost count of the number of times that he has talked about the importance of evidence, yet will he not accept the overwhelming evidence that there are no downsides to the kind of policy change that we are talking about, no matter how hard he looks for them? Why will he not commit at the very least to trials of the regulation of medical-based cannabis? That could, for example, answer questions about how best to distinguish between different types of use and facilitate research that might otherwise be hindered.
Mr Hurd
We are fleet of foot in the sense that we keep abreast of the evidence as it develops. I made it very clear in my statement that the Home Office will consider issuing licences to enable trials of any new medicine under schedule 1 to the Misuse of Drugs Regulations 2001, providing that it complies with the appropriate ethical approvals.
Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab)
Alfie’s mother said that any one of the 30 seizures that he has a day could be life-threatening, so there is incredible urgency. I have heard the Minister say that he is very sympathetic and I do not doubt that for a minute, but I have not heard him say when he will make a decision to help Alfie because of that urgency.
Mr Hurd
I totally accept the point about urgency, and I totally accept the point made by others that we cannot look at policy entirely through the lens of one case. However, I have undertaken to meet the family as quickly as possible, and we are exploring every option inside the existing regulatory envelope.
Ronnie Cowan (Inverclyde) (SNP)
I have heard the Minister say that he is going to monitor the situation and that he is looking for evidence, but we have had that situation for decades. This place created the problem with poor legislation as far back as the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971. We are in a situation where we know that medicinal cannabis is available that will particularly help Alfie. He has been taking it in the Netherlands. It is not beyond the wit of man to facilitate the continuation of that supply, if the will is there.
Mr Hurd
As I said in my statement, the UK has a view, which is that cannabis in its raw form is not recognised in the UK as having any medicinal benefits. As I also said, I recognise that there may be special circumstances in this case, which is why I am absolutely determined to look at every option inside the existing regulatory envelope.
Tonia Antoniazzi (Gower) (Lab)
As a Welsh MP, I am very proud of the Welsh Assembly, which recognises the need to legalise cannabis for medicinal use. Sativex is a very unpleasant, alcohol-based medicine that is unsuitable for many patients, and I hope that the Government will recognise that. However, we as a country are light years behind other countries, so the excuses today are just not valid. Why does the word “cannabis” scare the Government so much? We need to stop hiding and stop making excuses. Can the Minister tell the parents of children such as Alfie and all the other people who need access to medicinal cannabis legally across the UK when that is going to happen?
Mr Hurd
What the Government do is listen to the independent, statutory Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs, which has been very clear that
“the use of cannabis is a significant public health issue. Cannabis can unquestionably cause harm to individuals and society.”
We cannot just ignore that expert advice. As I said in my statement, there is a precedent for medicines, including controlled drugs such as cannabis and Sativex, to be issued with a licence to enable trials.
Mr Speaker
Order. I intend no discourtesy to the hon. Member for Isle of Wight (Mr Seely), but he was certainly not in that place some minutes ago. Whether he has just entered the Chamber, or has beetled there from another part of the Chamber—
Mr Speaker
He has beetled around the Chamber. It is slightly confusing for the Chair when people perambulate around the Chamber. Nevertheless, I am sure that the hon. Gentleman has important thoughts to volunteer, so let us hear them.
Mr Seely
Looking around the world, it seems to me that the case for medical cannabis is somewhat overwhelming, although I understand that the Minister is in a difficult position at the moment. Does he think that there will ever be a time when medical cannabis is legal in this country, so that its benefits can be felt by those who need it?
Mr Hurd
Of course, policy must be evidence-led, so Governments of all colours must keep the evidence under review. I think that the next critical milestone will be the output of the WHO review. Cannabis is a highly complex substance, and the review is looking at it from every angle to try to give us the most definitive, up-to-date view on its medicinal and therapeutic benefits.
Mr Paul Sweeney (Glasgow North East) (Lab/Co-op)
The Minister says that public health concerns are a key driver of policy making, but, as we have seen with the case just for piloting safe drug consumption rooms, the Government stubbornly refuse to acknowledge the overwhelming body of evidence that shows that public health would benefit. Is this not just another example of the Government putting the inertia of the criminal justice system ahead of an urgent public health issue, with drug-related deaths at epidemic levels? Will the Government not change the emphasis in policy making to matters of public health, rather than the inertia of the criminal justice system, which for 40 years has had an obsolete and arbitrary method of regulating drugs in this country?
Northern Ireland
(6 years, 10 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Secretary of State for Northern Ireland (Karen Bradley)
With permission, Mr Speaker, I should like to make a statement on the current political situation in Northern Ireland.
Over recent weeks there have been talks involving the main political parties in Northern Ireland, particularly the two largest parties, the Democratic Unionist party and Sinn Féin, to see whether there is a basis for re-establishing the Executive. The UK Government have facilitated and supported those intensive negotiations. We have been in close touch with all the parties and have responded to requests for advice and support.
The Irish Government have also been involved, in accordance with the well established three-strand approach. I would like to place on the record my appreciation of the contribution made by the Irish Foreign Minister, Simon Coveney, and his team. In addition, my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister has been consistently and closely involved, speaking to party leaders and visiting Belfast last Monday. I have continued to give her up-to-date reports as the talks have progressed.
The aim of the talks has been very clear: to bring about the re-establishment of inclusive devolved government at Stormont, which Northern Ireland has effectively been without for over 13 months. In so doing, we have been able to build on the progress made by my predecessor, my right hon. Friend the Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup (James Brokenshire), whom I warmly welcome back to the House today.
In the Government’s view, all parties, including the DUP and Sinn Féin, participated in discussions seriously and in good faith, and we believe that progress towards reaching agreement on all the key substantive issues has been made. It became possible, in the light of this progress, to identify a basis for a possible agreement to allow an Executive to be formed, embracing how the parties ensured that the Executive was sustainable, how they reached a balanced and fair accommodation on the difficult issues of language and culture, and how this was reflected in a package of legislation. Many other issues were also addressed, if not always resolved.
Unfortunately, however, by last Wednesday it had become clear that the current phase of talks had reached a conclusion without such an agreement being finalised and endorsed by both parties. As I said then, it is important for everyone to reflect on the circumstances that have led to this, and on their positions both now and in the future. What is important today is for me to give some directions on the next steps.
First, as our manifesto set out at the last election, the Government believe in devolution under the terms of the 1998 Belfast agreement. We want local politicians making decisions on local matters to be accountable to a local Assembly. We need devolved government to help deliver a stronger economy, to build a stronger society, and to ensure that Northern Ireland’s voice is properly heard as we leave the European Union. In addition, we want to see all the other institutions of the agreement operating in the way that was intended.
I cannot reiterate too strongly that devolved government is in the best interests of all the people of Northern Ireland, because it ensures that their interests and concerns are fairly and equitably represented. It is also in the best interests of maintaining and strengthening the Union, to which the Government remain fully committed, consistent with the principle of consent. We will therefore continue to explore with the parties whether the basis for a political agreement still exists. As my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister has reaffirmed, we stand ready to introduce the legislation that would enable an Executive to be formed at the earliest opportunity. That is the Government’s clear hope and desire, and I believe that our view is shared widely on both sides of the House.
Secondly, however, matters in Northern Ireland cannot simply remain in a state of limbo. A number of challenging decisions will have to be made. Ultimately, the Government have a responsibility to ensure good governance and the continued delivery of public services. In particular, as the head of the Northern Ireland civil service has made clear, there needs to be certainty and clarity on a budget for Northern Ireland for next year as soon as possible. I intend to take steps to provide that clarity, and I will update the House as soon as I am in a position to do so. This is clearly not where I want to be, but in the absence of an Executive in Northern Ireland I have no other choice.
In the longer term, the Government will not shirk their responsibility to take whatever steps are necessary to provide certainty and stability for the people of Northern Ireland, while maintaining our commitment to govern with rigorous impartiality in the interests of all of them. However, we will do that only once we are sure that all other viable options designed to restore devolved government have been properly considered, including my current statutory obligation to call an Assembly election.
In the absence of devolution, it is also right for us to consider the issue of salaries for Assembly Members. At the end of last year, my right hon. Friend the Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup received recommendations on that from Mr Trevor Reaney, a former Clerk of the Assembly. The Government will need to decide shortly on the next steps. I acknowledge the public concern about the fact that while a number of Assembly Members continue to carry out constituency and representative functions, current salaries are maintained while the Assembly is not meeting.
As for the issue of addressing the legacy of Northern Ireland’s past, the Government have manifesto commitments to consult on the implementation of the bodies set out in the 2014 Stormont House agreement, and to support the reform of inquests. I would much prefer to do that in the context of an agreement that would lead to the restoration of a devolved Executive, but I am conscious of the Government’s responsibility to make progress in this respect to provide better outcomes for victims and survivors—the people who suffered most during the troubles. We will therefore continue to proceed towards a full consultation as soon as possible, so that everyone can have their say.
As the House will know, April marks the 20th anniversary of the historic Belfast agreement. That agreement, along with its successors, has been fundamental in helping Northern Ireland to move forward from its violent past to a brighter, more secure future. The Government’s support for those agreements remains steadfast, as does our commitment to govern for everyone in Northern Ireland.
There is no doubt that Northern Ireland has taken huge strides forward in the past 20 years. In my short time as Northern Ireland Secretary, I have seen a place full of wonderful talent and huge potential, but any commemorations this year will look decidedly hollow if Northern Ireland still has no functioning Government of its own. Everyone must continue to strive to see devolved government restored and to build a Northern Ireland fit for the future, and that remains the clear focus and determination of this Government.
Owen Smith (Pontypridd) (Lab)
May I thank the Secretary of State for advance sight of her statement? I also thank her and her predecessor, the right hon. Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup (James Brokenshire)—whom I am delighted to see back in his place in this House today—for all the efforts they have both made, alongside the Irish Government, to facilitate agreement between the parties.
All of us in this place know that these are very difficult issues, and I commend all the parties in the talks, especially the DUP and Sinn Féin, on the total engagement they have shown on behalf of their communities. I have to say that I must also commend the Secretary of State on the Herculean optimism she continues to hold to in still hoping for a deal to be done and on the clear statement that she is rejecting the calls to accede to direct rule with immediate effect. Optimism is a vital ingredient in Northern Ireland, even when it is at its most difficult to summon, so I will not criticise the Government for remaining hopeful.
But clarity and contingency planning have also been important features of the process, so people know where they are in that process and what will follow if there is no progress. On those questions, I fear that many in Northern Ireland will be little the wiser after the Secretary of State’s statement this afternoon, because she told us, in a crucial passage, that “it became possible” in the recent talks “to identify a basis for a possible agreement” to form an Executive, including “on the difficult issues of language and culture”. That is a very optimistic statement, and it is a view that has been echoed by the Irish Government and Sinn Féin, but it is hotly disputed by the DUP, whose leader told us that there was no prospect of these discussions leading to a deal.
Ambiguity has also played a very important part on occasion in the Northern Ireland process, but both accounts cannot be accurate, and I hope the Secretary of State will accept that she has a duty to provide clarity to the people of Northern Ireland, not just because they deserve to know what is going on in their peace process, but because some, including some in this House, are using this period of confusion to advance their own agendas: to undermine the Good Friday agreement, which some see as an obstacle to Brexit, or to damage the concept of power sharing, which some have never supported. That is a reckless and dangerous game to play, because we in this place must never forget that the Belfast agreement ended a conflict that led to 3,500 lives being lost. Nor should we forget—especially those who are so quick to assert that the Brexit referendum is to be respected—that the Belfast agreement itself was copper-fastened with its own referendums, north and south, and they too must be respected and protected.
So I welcome the Secretary of State’s confirmation that the Government’s support for the agreement remains steadfast, and I ask her to confirm that she sees the Good Friday agreement as the only viable long-term option for the peaceful governance of Northern Ireland, and that the Government believe that its unique form of power sharing is indispensable to the agreement.
Coming back to last week and the events in Belfast, a simple way for the Government to clear up this confusion is to publish precisely where there was agreement and where the gaps remain—not in order to apportion blame, but to provide greater reassurance that progress has been made over the 13 months. So will the Secretary of State commit to providing further detail and to publishing some of those details?
One area where the Secretary of State has offered some further clarity today is on the possibility of a fresh election in Northern Ireland, and she should know that that would be met with glacial enthusiasm. Why does the Secretary of State think there is potentially an advantage in another election, the fifth in three years, in Northern Ireland? What would it achieve? Although she does have a statutory duty to call one at some point, that has been true since 27 March last year, and she and her predecessor have resisted the temptation to date.
The Secretary of State has also said that she is considering how best to give some certainty about the budget in Northern Ireland. We understand and accept that, and urge only that she consults properly with the parties, so that we can ensure maximum acceptance of, and agreements on, those budget allocations as part of the contingency planning. I hope she can commit to that too today.
Finally, may I ask the Secretary of State to consider what she will do to take forward some of the pressing issues facing Northern Ireland if her optimism is misplaced and a deal cannot be struck? It is not just on the issue of MLAs’ pay that people in Northern Ireland want to see action. Vital questions on the treatment of victims, both of the troubles and of historical institutional abuse, need to be resolved not just with consultation, but with legislation. These people have been waiting for far too long, so will she commit to looking at that in the absence of a deal?
Will the Secretary of State also commit to taking forward issues of human rights and social justice that are enjoyed naturally in other parts of the UK but denied to our citizens in Northern Ireland? In particular, can she confirm that one area of discussion between the parties was on the issue of equal marriage, and that agreement was reached to take matters forward through a private Member’s Bill in Stormont? In the absence of a Stormont Bill, would she consider legislating similarly to extend equal marriage rights to Northern Ireland? We believe that she should, and we will support her if she does so. To be clear, a Labour Government would legislate on that if Stormont could not do so.
Political problems are nothing new in Northern Ireland, but the current impasse has left the Northern Irish people without an accountable Government for almost 400 days. This is a profound crisis, and the Government have a profound duty to try to resolve it, and to preserve the Good Friday agreement and the principle of power sharing. We will continue to support the Government in trying to resolve the crisis, and we will support them on legislation wherever it is necessary, but we will hold them to account to preserve the Good Friday agreement in its spirit and its letter.
Karen Bradley
I thank the hon. Gentleman for his comments, and for the tone of them. It is important that we in this House show unity and a unified front when it comes to resolving these issues and re-establishing devolved government in Northern Ireland. If both sides of the House work together with that purpose in mind, we will have all the more reason to hope that that can be achieved. He asked about a number of matters, and I will try to address as many of them as I can.
On the topic of legacy, to which I made reference in my statement, we have been working with the parties and the Victims’ Commissioner on a consultation programme. As I have said, I would very much prefer to do that in the context of devolved government in Stormont, but we clearly have a responsibility to the victims of the troubles, and it is absolutely right that we should deal with that. We will take whatever steps are necessary to ensure that the matter of legacy is dealt with, but as I say, we would much rather that it was done in the context of having devolved government in Stormont. We are committed to the institutions as set out in the Stormont House agreement, and we will be consulting on that.
We are also committed to the Belfast agreement, as I said in my statement, and to all successor agreements. The position in the Conservative party manifesto at the last election, and the position of this Government, is that the Belfast agreement is the right approach. It has led to great success for Northern Ireland, and more success can come. The hon. Gentleman mentioned Brexit. The joint report that was signed before Christmas makes specific reference to a commitment to the Belfast agreement and to respecting the institutions in the agreement.
The hon. Gentleman asked about the talks, and about what the British Government would publish. I want to make it clear that the talks that we have facilitated—we did not impose them—have been between the parties, particularly the two main parties. Therefore, any documentation or anything that has been written down is a matter for the parties; it is not a matter for the British Government. He also asked about an election. I have a statutory duty as Secretary of State to call an election, but I want to ensure that we have exhausted every avenue and every viable option to re-establish devolved government at Stormont. That is what the Government want to see, and that is what we are working towards. We will do all we can to achieve that, and I thank him for his support in that regard.
James Brokenshire (Old Bexley and Sidcup) (Con)
It is good to be back, and I thank colleagues on both sides of the House for their kind, generous and supportive comments over the past few weeks. What is not so welcome, however, is the continuing lack of devolved government in Northern Ireland, which it desperately needs. I commend the Secretary of State for all her work and for her efforts in seeking to bring the parties together. I also commend the Irish Government for their work.
I commend what the Secretary of State said about the Government’s commitment the Belfast agreement. That is our cornerstone; it is the bedrock of what we do. I also commend what she said about the troubles and the legacy of the past, and about making progress on the consultation. I hope that she will agree, however, that we need to remain firmly focused on restoring devolved government. Rather than talking up direct rule, we should continue to focus on talking out the remaining issues that lie between the two parties, and I hope that she will agree that we need to retain that focus in all we do if we are to restore devolved government and give Northern Ireland the bright, positive future that I know its people want to see.
Karen Bradley
I thank my right hon. Friend for his comments and questions, and for his approach. He was an outstanding Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, and he is very much missed in Northern Ireland. I do not think I have been to a single event since being appointed Secretary of State where he has not been mentioned in the warmest and most generous terms. I am fully aware that his are big shoes for me to fill.
I agree with all that my right hon. Friend says about the importance of restoring devolved government for the people of Northern Ireland. The people of Northern Ireland elected the Members of the Legislative Assembly, and those MLAs need to be in Stormont. That fabulous, wonderful Parliament building is empty and bereft, and it needs to be filled with the people who were elected to fill it, taking decisions on behalf of their constituents for all the people in Northern Ireland.
Patrick Grady (Glasgow North) (SNP)
I join others in welcoming the former Secretary of State, the right hon. Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup (James Brokenshire), on his return to the Chamber.
I also thank the Secretary of State for advance sight of her statement, but we share the disappointment we are hearing that, although there has been some progress to report, there has not been enough. We welcome the continued public commitment of the UK and Irish Governments to the Good Friday agreement, noting, as she does, that we are approaching its 20th anniversary.
The Good Friday agreement and the institutions it established were endorsed by the people of Northern Ireland, and the preservation and restoration of those institutions should be the focus of all the parties and interlocutors involved in these vital talks. We also note the Irish Government’s firm position that the agreement, and its subsequent agreements, must be implemented in full, and in that context the Irish Government have reiterated that they do not want to see the introduction of direct rule in Northern Ireland.
I ask the Secretary of State to clarify her timetable for the next steps she has outlined. In particular, given the absence of talks, under what circumstances would she consider calling fresh elections to the Assembly? What consideration has she given to convening the British-Irish Intergovernmental Conference, which was established under strand 3 of the Good Friday agreement?
Karen Bradley
I thank the hon. Gentleman for his comments and for his statement of commitment to the Belfast agreement. On my priorities now, in the past few weeks I have focused on the talks process. I still continue to work and communicate with all parties to see what we can do to re-establish discussion and to help the parties get to an accommodation that will enable a devolved Executive to be established. My priority in the immediate term is clearly the budget, as we need to make sure that the dedicated civil servants and public servants in Northern Ireland have the certainty they need to continue delivering public services.
Several hon. Members rose—
Mr Speaker
Order. Of course this is an extremely important statement, upon which a further 27 hon. and right hon. Members are seeking to catch my eye, but I remind the House that there are two further ministerial statements to follow that might be considered to be on chunky matters eliciting substantial interest, and several people have applied to speak in the debate subsequent to that. There is therefore a premium on brevity, and I appeal to colleagues not to offer us mini speeches, which is not uncommon in these circumstances, but rather pithy inquiries to which I know the Secretary of State will succinctly reply. We can be led in this exercise by someone of no lesser distinction than the former Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, Theresa Villiers.
Theresa Villiers (Chipping Barnet) (Con)
None of us should underestimate the difficulty of reaching accommodation on issues of culture and identity that have divided people for centuries. Will the Secretary of State urge the parties to come together to try to find a balanced package that reflects the cultural sensitivities of all sides of the community in modern Northern Ireland?
Karen Bradley
I thank my right hon. Friend for her question and hers are another pair of shoes that I endeavour to fill. She was an excellent Secretary of State for Northern Ireland. She went through a number of these processes, so she knows only too well how these things operate. I agree wholeheartedly with what she says.
Nigel Dodds (Belfast North) (DUP)
I join others in warmly welcoming the right hon. Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup (James Brokenshire) back to the Chamber. I wish him well.
As the Secretary of State knows, we of course stand ready to form an Executive tomorrow, on the basis of no preconditions and on the basis of the programme for Government that was agreed with Sinn Féin back in December, before Sinn Féin walked out and set preconditions—political demands—that they want to see implemented before they get back into the Executive.
The fact that there is no Executive is not the fault of the Democratic Unionist party. Indeed, it is not the fault of the smaller parties, either—I make that very clear. But in the absence of devolved government, now is the time for the Secretary of State to do right by all the people of Northern Ireland.
I have just come from a meeting of a group of charities and others who want somebody to lobby—a Minister to argue with—about mental health funding in Northern Ireland. There have been no Ministers for 13 months. That cannot continue. Secretary of State, it is time to set a budget. Let the efforts for devolution continue—yes, we want to see devolution—but it is a dereliction of duty to continue without a budget and without ministerial decisions. It is time to get on with it.
Karen Bradley
I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his assertion of the DUP’s commitment to devolved government, which is warmly welcomed by everyone. He and I have had and will continue to have discussions about the budget. The shadow Secretary of State asked whether I would be consulting the parties about the budget. I have committed to do that and will ensure that I work with the right hon. Gentleman and his party’s Members on that. He fervently summed up the reasons why devolved government is so important.
Dr Andrew Murrison (South West Wiltshire) (Con)
I congratulate my right hon. Friend on her statement and warmly welcome seeing my right hon. Friend the Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup (James Brokenshire) back in his place and in fine form.
The head of the Northern Ireland civil service said to the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee on 24 January:
“It will be incredibly difficult for us if we do not have budget certainty by 8 February.”
It is now 20 February. What will the Secretary of State now do to set a budget and therefore the political direction that Northern Ireland so needs?
Karen Bradley
I thank the Chair of the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee. As I said in my statement, I am now working to ensure that we get certainty for civil servants in Northern Ireland—those dedicated public servants—and I will return to the House when I have further information.
Mr Ivan Lewis (Bury South) (Ind)
The Secretary of State was absolutely right to say that she was not willing to conduct a running commentary on the talks, but now that they have collapsed once again, should she not publish the basis on which the talks failed yet again? The people of Northern Ireland have a right to know the areas of difference and what still needs to be resolved.
Karen Bradley
As I explained in my response to the shadow Secretary of State, I was not present at the discussions held between the two parties. I facilitated them, but I was not present during them. It would therefore be inappropriate for me to speculate on exactly where the parties reached in discussing their concerns. It is a matter of public record, however, that I have said that the concerns related to the very difficult issues of language and culture and the sustainability of the Executive.
Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)
Would there be any role for the Northern Ireland Legislative Assembly if direct rule, which nobody in this House wants, were to be instituted?
Karen Bradley
Some Opposition Members were Ministers during the previous period of direct rule—the right hon. Member for Delyn (David Hanson) will be asking a question shortly—and it was clear then that there was no role for Members of the Assembly at that point.
Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)
It is clear from the talks and their failure that the structures of the Belfast agreement have given a power of veto and blackmail to Sinn Féin. Given that there will be no giving in to that blackmail, will the Secretary of State recognise that, in the absence of the ability to set up an Executive, the only way forward for proper governance in Northern Ireland is for her to start taking some of the decisions that are important for the day-to-day running of Northern Ireland?
Karen Bradley
As I said in my statement, I want to see devolved government in Northern Ireland, I want the politicians elected by people in Northern Ireland to be able to take their places and represent them in the Assembly, and I want an Executive in place. That is what I am focused on trying to deliver as best we can, as I think Members on both sides of the House have stated.
Nigel Mills (Amber Valley) (Con)
Will the Secretary of State set out what role, if any, the smaller parties played in the talks last week?
Karen Bradley
All five parties were involved in the talks, including some roundtable talks. However, the clear point is that, for an Executive to be formed, the two large parties need to reach an accommodation. That is what we were working towards, and what I would like to happen in the near future.
David Hanson (Delyn) (Lab)
In the welcome absence of direct rule, of which I had personal experience as a Minister, will the Secretary of State tell the House how she will bring forward the budget, what form the approval of that budget will take and whether, as the hon. Member for Beckenham (Bob Stewart) asked, Assembly Members will make any contribution to the discussions of the proposals in it?
Karen Bradley
I know that the right hon. Gentleman served as a Minister during the last period of direct rule. I have been led to believe that there was a small incident involving a football match—Wales versus Northern Ireland—when he possibly found it difficult to know which side to support. I have said that I will come back to the House on the budget.
Kevin Foster (Torbay) (Con)
I welcome the Secretary of State’s statement. I know that for her, as for me, the priority will be to ensure that the peace process keeps on track. Will she therefore outline in some detail what exactly direct rule would mean for the people of Northern Ireland and for this House?
Karen Bradley
My focus is on getting devolved government back up and running because people want to know that their elected politicians—the people they have elected locally—will make the decisions for them. Those of us who believe in devolution, be it locally in our constituencies or in the devolved Administrations, know that, when local people make decisions, they are more representative of what voters want. That is why it is so important to get devolved government back up and running.
Vernon Coaker (Gedling) (Lab)
I welcome the Secretary of State’s continuing commitment to the Good Friday agreement, but does she agree that being more open and transparent about what happened in the talks—notwithstanding the fact that she says that she cannot do that because they were conducted by the Democratic Unionist party and Sinn Féin—and explaining to the public the problems and where the parties failed to agree might mean that they were in a position to support more properly the leaders of their respective communities who are trying to reach a deal?
Karen Bradley
As I have said, it would not be appropriate for me to speculate on what happened behind closed doors at a meeting between the two parties. They are now working to see what they can do to come back to the table, and that is what I am encouraging.
Edward Argar (Charnwood) (Con)
I join in the tributes to my right hon. Friend for her determination and work on this issue.
Northern Ireland has enjoyed significant economic success in recent years, largely down to the dynamism of the people of Northern Ireland, but also to the conditions that effective, devolved, power-sharing government created. Does she share my view that certainty about a budget and the restoration of a devolved power-sharing Government are the most effective ways in which to ensure that that economic success continues?
Karen Bradley
I agree with my hon. Friend. I have said that I will come to the House about the budget. Last Friday, I met business representatives in Belfast and they were unanimous that they needed their politicians to form an Executive so that they could encourage investment, create jobs and wealth and build on the fantastic success story that is Northern Ireland.
Mr Gregory Campbell (East Londonderry) (DUP)
My party remains committed to total restoration of an Executive on a fair and equitable basis, and I commend the Secretary of State for what she has said. As was mentioned earlier, the head of the civil service said that it would be incredibly difficult for us if we did not have budget certainty by 8 February—we are now two weeks beyond that. Does she therefore agree that the important matters that divide us are not life and death matters that require a budget to resolve them? She has the power to set one—when will she do it?
Karen Bradley
As I said, I need to consult the parties about the budget and I will return to the House at the earliest opportunity with confirmation of my decision on that.
Rebecca Pow (Taunton Deane) (Con)
I welcome the Secretary of State’s continuing optimism and urge her to press on, not least because, with Brexit on the horizon, Northern Ireland needs one voice, provided by a functioning Executive, to make it the best Brexit deal not just for Northern Ireland but for the whole of the UK. Does she agree that, on this issue, time is of the essence?
Karen Bradley
I do agree with my hon. Friend. We need to make sure Northern Ireland’s voice is heard properly through the proper processes in the Brexit process, and that requires a devolved Government.
Conor McGinn (St Helens North) (Lab)
The British and Irish Governments are the guardians of the Good Friday agreement, but its owners are the people of Ireland, north and south, who overwhelmingly endorsed it in referendums. Does the Secretary of State agree that it cannot be usurped by this House, by any party or by any individual in it, and that she will work for its full implementation, alongside the Irish Government?
Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)
By how much is my right hon. Friend going to cut their pay?
Karen Bradley
A quick answer deserves another quick question, does it not, Mr Speaker? Mr Trevor Reaney has made recommendations on the pay of Members of the Legislative Assembly, and I am considering those at the moment.
Kate Hoey (Vauxhall) (Lab)
The people of Northern Ireland will be disappointed in the Secretary of State’s statement. Of course they would like the Executive back, but what they want more than anything is a budget, and agreement on reform of the health service and education, which were all agreed before Sinn Féin walked out. Why is she still dilly-dallying, and waiting and waiting? What does she actually think is going to be achieved in the next month?
Karen Bradley
I am exploring every possible window of opportunity to get devolved government back up and running, while looking at those important decisions that need to be taken. I will revert to the House on those matters.
Lady Hermon (North Down) (Ind)
I warmly commend the Secretary of State for her calm and positive tone in her statement today and her response to questions. I am very pleased that the British Government have not been bounced into moving to direct rule. The people of Northern Ireland want their Assembly up and running—it is their Assembly—and they were extremely disappointed and angry last week when the talks collapsed. I am not pointing the finger of blame, because that is not going to help anybody, but the people of Northern Ireland will also be extremely angry that MLAs are receiving their full salary. What possible justification can there be for paying them a full salary 13 months after collapsing the Assembly?
Karen Bradley
I thank the hon. Lady for her comments. My predecessor did ask Trevor Reaney to look at this matter. I will be considering the recommendations and will come back to the House shortly.
Mr Chris Leslie (Nottingham East) (Lab/Co-op)
Does the Secretary of State share my anxieties at the noises—the drum beat—coming from some of the hard Brexit quarters in the debate about how the Good Friday agreement has “failed” and “outlived its use”? Will she take this opportunity to reassert the Government’s view that nothing—no Brexit ideology and no attempt to justify instituting a new border—should jeopardise this carefully brokered peace settlement and that the Government are fully, 100% behind the Good Friday agreement?
Karen Bradley
I can confirm that the Government are 100% behind the Belfast agreement and that it was specifically referenced in the joint report as being of great relevance and importance to everybody in Northern Ireland.
Jonathan Edwards (Carmarthen East and Dinefwr) (PC)
The common structures of the EU provided the basis of a peace in Ireland via the Good Friday agreement. Is not the reality that the British Government have failed to recognise that in their Brexit positioning and that maintaining the agreement has been a secondary consideration?
Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)
As has been said, in the past 48 hours, a couple of Members of this House and a British MEP have attacked the Good Friday agreement as “failed” and “unsustainable”. Will the Secretary of State join the Tanaiste, Ireland’s Deputy Prime Minister, in condemning such language as “irresponsible”?
Karen Bradley
As I say, I can only set out the Government’s position, which is that we fully support the Belfast agreement.
Mike Kane (Wythenshawe and Sale East) (Lab)
A young generation in Ireland, north and south, and on the mainland have no recollection of violence because of the Good Friday agreement. Therefore, does the Secretary of State agree that those who are playing fast and loose with that agreement for their own terms over Brexit should not be doing so?
Karen Bradley
I agree that people do not remember what it was like; my children visited Northern Ireland recently and were astonished to see that there are still walls between communities. That was a shock to them because they had no idea about what the troubles were like and what it was like for people living there. The people of Northern Ireland have come so far in 20 years, and it is vital that we restore devolved government and maintain the Belfast agreement.
Paul Girvan (South Antrim) (DUP)
I thank the Secretary of State for her statement. In the light of the failure of the talks and what has ultimately happened, the vacuum has been filled by those who wish to bring about more Dublin interference in Northern Ireland. Will the Secretary of State assure us that Dublin will have no say in the running and governance of Northern Ireland?
Karen Bradley
We have been clear that the three-stranded approach has applied in everything we have been doing. Strand 1 issues clearly do not involve the Irish Government. The hon. Gentleman will know that the best way to ensure the protection of the Union and that the people of Northern Ireland have their say is the restoration of devolved government in Stormont.
Ged Killen (Rutherglen and Hamilton West) (Lab/Co-op)
I urge the Secretary of State to get off the fence in respect of same-sex marriage in Northern Ireland. We simply would not tolerate such discrimination against any other group of UK citizens. It is not acceptable that the Government continue to be complicit in discrimination against LGBT people in Northern Ireland. Will the Secretary of State support efforts in this place to bring forward change?
Karen Bradley
This is a devolved matter. I was proud to vote for same-sex marriage for my constituents in this House when we had that vote, but I did not vote to impose same-sex marriage in Scotland. It is not the job of this Government to introduce legislation; it is for the people of Northern Ireland and their elected politicians to make the decision.
Christine Jardine (Edinburgh West) (LD)
Given the Secretary of State’s stated determination to reinstate devolved government in Northern Ireland, does she agree that perhaps the time has come for the appointment of an external mediator to chair the power-sharing talks?
Karen Bradley
I have been clear that I rule nothing out. Everything is under review and I will look at all viable options to ensure that we get devolved government back up and running.
Gavin Robinson (Belfast East) (DUP)
In situations such as this, we will always get verbal excess or an aspirational wheeze from some of the participants. Will the Secretary of State indicate clearly that nowhere in the Good Friday agreement, the St Andrews agreement, the legislation that underpins them or the constitution of this country is there provision for joint authority?
Karen Bradley
I fully respect the Belfast agreement and the successor agreements. We adhere to the three-stranded approach very strictly.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
I thank the Secretary of State for her statement. Will she outline the timeline for the imposition of direct rule as it is legislated for in this place, to ensure that the people of Northern Ireland do not continue to be led by the nose by Sinn Féin, a party that does not have the interests of Northern Ireland at heart but seeks only the destruction of the state of Northern Ireland in an attempt to secure an unwanted and unworkable Ireland that is never, never, never going to happen?
Karen Bradley
My priority, focus and energies are on the restoration of devolved government in line with the Belfast agreement. That is what I will be focusing on and that is what I am determined to achieve, alongside addressing the urgent issues, including the budget, that need to be dealt with in the very near future.
Aid Sector: Safeguarding
(6 years, 10 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Secretary of State for International Development (Penny Mordaunt)
With permission, Mr Speaker, I will update the House on my Department’s response to the sexual abuse and exploitation perpetrated by charity workers in Haiti in 2011, and on the measures we are taking to improve safeguarding across the aid sector.
Let me start by paying tribute to Sean O’Neill of The Times and to the two sets of whistleblowers—those in 2011 and later—for bringing this case to light. On 9 February, The Times reported that when certain Oxfam staff were in Haiti in 2011, they had abused their positions of trust and paid for sex with local women. The incidents happened in the aftermath of the devastating earthquake in 2010 that killed hundreds of thousands of people and left millions more homeless and reliant on aid for basic needs such as food and shelter. That is shocking, but it is not by itself what has caused such concern about Oxfam’s safeguarding—it was what Oxfam then did.
In chaotic and desperate situations, the very best safeguarding procedures and practices must be put in to place to prevent harm, but when organisations fail to report and follow up incidents of wrongdoing that occur, it undermines trust and sends a message that sexual exploitation and abuse are tolerated. We cannot prevent sexual exploitation and abuse if we do not demonstrate zero tolerance. In such circumstances, we must be able to trust organisations not only to do all they can to prevent harm, but to report and follow up incidents of wrongdoing when they occur.
In that duty Oxfam failed, on the watch of Barbara Stocking and Penny Lawrence. They did not provide a full report to the Charity Commission. They did not provide a full report to their donors. They did not provide any report to prosecuting authorities. In my view, they misled, quite possibly deliberately, even as their report concluded that their investigation could not rule out the allegation that some of the women involved were actually children. They did not think it was necessary to report that to the police either in Haiti or in the country of origin of those accountable. I believe that their motivation appears to be the protection of the organisation’s reputation. They put that before those they were there to help and protect, which is a complete betrayal of trust, a betrayal of those who sent them there—the British people—and a betrayal of all those Oxfam staff and volunteers who put the people they serve first.
Last week, I met Mark Goldring, chief executive of Oxfam, and Caroline Thomson, Oxfam’s chair of trustees. I made three demands of them: that they fully co-operate with the Haitian authorities, handing over all evidence they hold; that they report staff members involved in the incident to their respective national Governments; and that they make clear how they will handle any forthcoming allegations around safeguarding, historical or live. I stressed that, for me, holding to account those who made the decision not to report, and to let those potentially guilty of criminal activity slip away, was a necessity in winning back confidence in Oxfam.
As a result of those discussions, Oxfam has agreed to withdraw from bidding for any new UK Government funding until the Department for International Development is satisfied that it can meet the high safeguarding standards we expect of our partners. I will take a decision on current programming after 26 February —at that time, I will have further information that will help me to decide whether I need to adjust how that is currently delivered.
Given the concerns about the wider sector this case has raised, I have written to every UK charity working overseas that receives UK aid—192 organisations—insisting that they spell out the steps they are taking to ensure that their safeguarding policies are fully in place, and that they confirm that they have referred all concerns they have about specific cases and individuals to the relevant authorities, including prosecuting authorities. I have set the deadline of 26 February for replies. We are also conducting in parallel an exercise to make clear our standards to all non-UK charity partners— 393 organisations in total—and to all our suppliers, including those in the private sector, which number more than 500 organisations, and to remind them of their obligations. We are doing the same with all multilateral partners.
The UK Government reserve the right to take whatever decisions about present or future funding for Oxfam or any other organisation we deem necessary. We have been very clear that we will not work with any organisation that does not live up to the high standards on safeguarding and protection that we require. We will share this approach with other Governments Departments responsible for ODA spend. Although that work is not yet complete, it is clear from the Charity Commission reporting data, and lack of it from some organisations, that cultural change is needed to ensure that all that can be done to stop sexual exploitation in the aid sector is being done.
We need to take some practical steps and set up our own systems now—we should not wait for the United Nations to take action. My Department and the Charity Commission will hold a safeguarding summit on 5 March, where we will meet UK international development charities, regulators and experts to confront safeguarding failures and agree practical measures, such as an aid worker accreditation scheme that we in the UK can use. Later in the year, we will take this programme of work to a wide-ranging global safeguarding conference to drive action across the whole international aid sector. I am pleased to say that the US, Canada, Netherlands and others have already agreed to support our goals of improving safeguarding standards across the sector. The UK is not waiting for others to act and will take the lead.
We have been speaking to colleagues across Government and beyond about what more we can do to stop exploitation and abuse in the UN and the broader multilateral system. The message from us to all parts of the UN is clear: they can either get their house in order, or they can prepare to carry out their good work without our money.
We welcome the UN’s announcement on 14 February that it does not and will not claim immunity for sexual abuse cases. That sends a clear signal that the UN is not a soft target, but we must hold it to account for that. Further actions we have taken in the past week include the creation of a new safeguarding unit. We have also promoted our whistleblowing and reporting phone line to encourage anyone with information on safeguarding issues to contact us. We have appointed Sheila Drew Smith, a recent member of the Committee on Standards in Public Life, who has agreed to bring her expertise and her challenge to support my Department’s ambition on safeguarding. She will report to me directly. We have asked to meet leaders of the audit profession to discuss what more they can do to provide independent assurance over safeguarding to the organisations that DFID partners with globally.
I have held my own Department to the same scrutiny that I am demanding of others. I have asked the Department to go through our centrally held human resources systems and our fraud and whistleblowing records as far back as they exist. I am assured that there are no centrally recorded cases that were dealt with incorrectly. Separately we are reviewing any locally reported allegations of sexual misconduct involving DFID staff and delivery partners. To date, our review of staff cases has looked at 75% of our teams across DFID and will complete within a fortnight. Our investigations are still ongoing. If, during this process, we discover any historical or current cases that have not been dealt with appropriately, I will report on our handling of them to Parliament.
DFID, other Government Departments and the National Crime Agency work closely together when serious allegations of potentially criminal activity in partner organisations are brought to our attention. We are strengthening this work, as the new strategy director at the NCA will take on a lead role for the aid sector. I am calling on anyone who has any concerns about abuse or exploitation in the sector to come forward and report them to our counter-fraud and whistleblowing team. Details are on the DFID website and all communications will be treated in complete confidence. Later today, I have further meetings with the Defence Secretary regarding peacekeeping troops, and the Secretary of State at the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport regarding the charity sector.[Official Report, 21 February 2018, Vol. 636, c. 3MC.]
My absolute priority is to keep the world’s poorest and most vulnerable people safe from harm. It is utterly despicable that sexual exploitation and abuse continue to exist in the aid sector. The recent reports should be a wake-up call to us all. Now is the time for us to act. But as we do, we should note the good people working across the world in the sector—saving lives, often by endangering their own—and all those, from fundraisers to trustees, who make that work possible. Since news of this scandal broke just a week ago, UK aid and aid workers have helped to vaccinate 850,000 children against polio. We should recognise that that good work can only be done with the support of the British people. I commend this statement to the House.
Kate Osamor (Edmonton) (Lab/Co-op)
I welcome the Secretary of State’s statement and thank her for advance sight of it. I join her in utter disgust at the stories that have emerged in recent days of incidents of sexual abuse and exploitation, and of the appalling culture of silence.
Let me say very clearly that, for the Haitian women and girls fighting to survive an earthquake who were exploited and abused, it is just not good enough; for the British public and loyal Oxfam supporters who donate time, money, taxes and support, it is just not good enough; and for those of us in this House who support charities such as Oxfam to save lives in crisis and to tackle the root causes of injustice, it is just not good enough. We need reform.
I welcome the fact that the Secretary of State has written to taxpayer-funded charities to ask for written assurance that they have safeguards in place, but I am not convinced that that will do the job. We need each charity to tell us how many cases they are aware of, how they have been resolved and whether there could be others. We need a full, sector-wide picture to be reported back to Parliament. The inquiry must target not only UK charities funded by DFID, but private suppliers, UN agencies, non-governmental organisations in developing countries and charities funded by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, UK embassies and other Government Departments. The Secretary of State says that she has asked those agencies for assurance. Will she tell us the timeframe for that?
I welcome the Secretary of State’s swift commitment to a safeguarding summit on 5 March. Out of that summit must now come a real commitment to reform: tightening international criminal regulations; establishing a global passport or register for humanitarian workers; and setting up an independent regulator or a centre of excellence. Will the Secretary of State tell us exactly when later on this year that will happen, so that the House will know when to expect to see real reforms? Reform must not just improve tools and procedures. Our aid agencies are supposed to set an example and challenge the abuse of power—always, everywhere. Reform must also involve aid agencies themselves looking at their culture, redistributing power, challenging its abuses, and putting people before their reputation. This is what aid agencies must now do, and a Labour Government will help them to do it.
Over the past 10 days, some have tried to use this scandal and weaponise it to call for the UK to end its commitment to spend 0.7% of gross national income on aid. That is absolutely shameful. Our aid budget does not just save millions of lives: it is also our best chance to stop sexual abuse and exploitation. Taking Syria alone, in the first half of 2017, UK aid supported 4,687 survivors of sexual violence. Last year, in the Democratic Republic of the Congo alone, the UK got to help up to 1,979 survivors of sexual violence within the first 72 hours. We owe it to those women and girls to keep some perspective. When an abuse scandal hits Westminster, the Church or the Army, nobody seriously suggests shutting the whole thing down. So let us root out the bad apples, focus on fixing the system, and have the conviction to stand up proudly for the good that UK aid can still do, which, even at this darkest moment, far exceeds the evil.
The Secretary of State has said that she believes in aid, but I have not heard her call out those shameful opportunists, including her own predecessor and many in her own party, who have jumped on this scandal and attacked aid. Well, if she will not, then I will, because it is wrong. It does an injustice to our country and it will distract us from what really needs to happen—reforms that are badly, badly needed.
Penny Mordaunt
I thank the hon. Lady for the support that she has given to the sector, for her recognition of the good work that does actually go on and for her support—ongoing, I hope—for the practical measures that we are taking forward. There are many things that we can do to influence others, but we need to take some practical action. We need, at the very least, to get the UK aid sector in order, with a catalyst effect on others in also raising their game. In addition to the accreditation system, this may include, for example, co-ordinating our requirements in our funding agreements with third parties. That is what will help to drive change.
I do not recognise the caricature that the hon. Lady paints of my predecessor. In fact, I should pay tribute to my predecessor for what she did to try to raise this with the UN. That is important, but it is also important that we work with the component parts of the UN. Ultimately, as I said in my statement, if we cannot be assured of the practices within these organisations, we should not fund them. That is the sanction that we have. I pay tribute to the other Secretaries of State in the Department who set up the systems that I am now able to interrogate to provide confidence to this House and to the public.
Let me turn to the other points that the hon. Lady raised. The activities that I have outlined and that I am undertaking are only part of what is going on. The Charity Commission is the body that is taking a lead, as it has been since we beefed up its responsibilities in 2016 to take a greater role in these issues, with charities having to report to it the numbers of cases involved. I am not going to duplicate that work. However, I want to see that work improving and to see that, where the commission has concerns, they are properly reported to the National Crime Agency. That needs to work better. The Charity Commission is obviously doing its own investigation, and it is right that it takes the lead on that.
For organisations based in the UK, I have set the deadline of 26 February. For other organisations that are not based in the UK, it will be in a fortnight. We need to move swiftly on this. Although I am asking for written confirmation about organisations’ policies and any historical or live cases, that is an important step in allowing people to come forward now if they have any outstanding issues.
The safeguarding summit on 5 March will have a UK focus, with our own charities and organisations, but international partners have also asked if they can attend. We have not finalised a date for the follow-up conference, but we want to do it swiftly. We will be working with other nations to find a suitable time to get the right people in the room. It is important that we do not just talk about this but make some agreements and put some things into action.
I have not heard people attack the aid budget over this. I actually think people have shown maturity in recognising the seriousness of this issue. This is not an event that should cause us not to give money to charity, not to carry out aid work and not to vote some of our budget towards that. That is the approach I have heard, and I hope it will continue as we carry out this important work.
Mr Andrew Mitchell (Sutton Coldfield) (Con)
It is clear that my right hon. Friend has handled these shattering circumstances extremely well and correctly. Can she confirm that none of the trustees or senior management at Oxfam at the time of those dreadful events is still in post today? Will she join me in thanking the overwhelming majority of wonderful people of deep integrity who work in the development sector, often at some considerable risk to themselves, for the remarkable work they do in very difficult places, which reflects so well on Britain and our international development efforts?
Penny Mordaunt
I thank my right hon. Friend for what he says. We should be proud of those people and what they do. I have made it clear to Oxfam that we cannot have confidence in an organisation that still has sitting on its board or among its employees people whose judgment was so fundamentally flawed. I note that following that discussion, Penny Lawrence left the organisation. The Charity Commission is conducting its own investigation, and I know it will be particularly concerned about the role of trustees. I am not going to call for resignations. We need to investigate and look at the facts, and we need to hold the individuals responsible for this accountable.
Chris Law (Dundee West) (SNP)
I thank the Secretary of State for her statement. The Scottish National party is horrified at these revelations. Any form of sexual misconduct is completely and utterly unacceptable. Today’s appearance by Oxfam and others before the International Development Committee has left many questions unanswered. There needs therefore to be a fuller inquiry into the reported sickening events in Haiti and others emerging by the day. Allegations have now been made against Médecins sans Frontières, the Scottish Catholic International Aid Fund, Save the Children and the International Rescue Committee. We hear a lot of apologies, but we need deeds to match those words.
Sadly, a picture has now emerged of a culture of bullying, harassment, sexual abuse and racism among agencies around the world. All the good and essential work of this vital sector has been deeply damaged by not just what has happened but the way it has been dealt with. We heard today that many individuals responsible for these appalling activities were not dealt with and instead were often just passed on to other agencies and charities. There clearly has to be accountability and safeguards put in place to rebuild that trust. Wherever we see this type of behaviour, whether in the aid sector, Hollywood or politics, it must not be tolerated.
It is deeply concerning that some members of this Government have not shied away from their desire to see the aid budget cut. This scandal must not be used by the Secretary of State as a tool for cutting aid funding. I therefore call on her to confirm today in this House unequivocally that organisations will not have funds unduly stripped from them as they go about their vital work in some of the most vulnerable communities on this earth.
The international aid sector does fantastic work, and we cannot let this scandal overshadow the overwhelmingly positive actions done and support given around the world by many. However, we need to get to the root of these events and make sure, with robust safeguards, that they never happen again, or if they do, that action is taken immediately.
Penny Mordaunt
I thank the hon. Gentleman for what he says. We should note that the Charity Commission, as well as doing other work, is liaising with its counterparts in the devolved nations, which will be part of any such work.
It was this Government who brought in the 0.7% target. We think that is right and has helped, and that other nations around the world look to us as a development superpower. If we want to meet the sustainable development goals, we need to ensure that we spend that money really well. I want to get the money to work harder: there are always improvements we can drive. We are committed to the 0.7% target.
On the hon. Gentleman’s final point, I will wait until I have information back, not just about Oxfam, but about all other delivery partners to which I may transfer work. Until I have back that information, I will not make decisions about current programming, because the welfare of beneficiaries and the safety of staff in the field are my prime concerns.
James Duddridge (Rochford and Southend East) (Con)
I thank the Secretary of State for the truly amazing work she is doing. That is quite often said in this House, but having sat through three and a half hours in the Select Committee listening to Oxfam, I came away realising how appalling the situation really is. May I, however, urge her not to leap into action too quickly, given, horrifically, that we have no understanding at the moment of the size of the problem? It is quite possible that predatory individuals, including predatory paedophiles, actually go into international situations, as they go into domestic situations, to abuse others. While I do not want to taint the people who go into such professions either in the UK or internationally, we may very well be on the precipice of a much bigger problem than simply Oxfam and a few others.
Penny Mordaunt
I note my hon. Friend’s concerns, but I think we do need to act now. This has obviously been triggered by a specific case, but we have known for a long time that this is a problem. It is a difficult problem to crack, but we have to start making moves to crack it. Having spoken to my opposite numbers in other nations, I can tell him that they are of the same mind. By getting to grips with this—putting in measures that will not by themselves solve the problem, but will help—we will also send a message to predatory individuals that the aid sector is not a safe haven for them.
Stephen Twigg (Liverpool, West Derby) (Lab/Co-op)
I thank the Secretary of State for her statement, and I commend her for her swift action over the past 10 days. This morning, the Select Committee decided that we will hold a full inquiry into this issue. Does she agree with me that as well as Oxfam having to get its house in order and the action that DFID needs to take, international action will be crucial if we are to prevent another such crisis ever happening again in the future?
Penny Mordaunt
I agree with the hon. Gentleman. I thank him for the hearing this morning and for the inquiry that he is going to undertake, which will help the situation dramatically. He is right: we can get our own house in order and take a lead on this, but, ultimately, the component parts of the UN and other organisations in the international community must also follow suit. We also have to tackle the other enormous issues on the fringe of what we are discussing—in particular, UN peacekeeping troops. These are not easy things to crack, but we have to crack them.
Mrs Maria Miller (Basingstoke) (Con)
Many thousands of incredible people work in the aid sector, helping some of the most vulnerable people on the planet, and it is the betrayal of trust in organisations such as Oxfam that I think has caused the current outcry. Not only has Oxfam tried to cover up sex crimes by its workers, but in doing so it has shown a flagrant disregard for the criminal justice system in Haiti. Should the UK Government ever be working with an organisation that thinks it is above the law in one of the poorest countries in the world, such as Haiti?
Penny Mordaunt
This case is truly shocking and it may be that prosecutions result from what has gone on. We need to take stock of the sector, which is why I commissioned the review of what our partners are doing. It is also absolutely vital that we are very clear with any organisation we work with about what we expect from them. We often say “zero tolerance”, but we have to live that and mean that, and there have to be consequences when people breach the requirements we have of them. I said last week in Stockholm at the End Violence against Children conference that there is no organisation too big, or our work with them too complex, that we will not withhold funding from them if they do not meet those standards.
Richard Burden (Birmingham, Northfield) (Lab)
I thank the Secretary of State for her statement. She will know that this morning’s Select Committee meeting highlighted not only the really grotesque actions of a number of Oxfam staff in Haiti in 2011, but the fact that the whole sector has been far too slow to address the issue of sexual abuse and exploitation. Does she agree that at this stage three things are important: first, there has to be full accountability; secondly, action needs to be taken internationally, and an international register of humanitarian workers would help with that; and, thirdly, recognising the vital work the vast majority of aid workers do, nothing must be done to jeopardise UK aid to some of the poorest and most vulnerable people in the world?
Anna Soubry (Broxtowe) (Con)
I commend the Secretary of State for her statement and gently say to the hon. Member for Edmonton (Kate Osamor) that this is not an issue on which anybody should be seeking to make any form of political capital. This is not the subject of party politics; this is an appalling situation. About a year ago, I went to the Zaatari refugee camp as a guest of Oxfam. I saw the great work that so many of its workers do. Those workers represent the majority of people who work for our great British charities. Can the Secretary of State assure us all that the action she has to take—nobody disputes that—will not affect the beneficiaries of that work and that their interests will be absolutely paramount?
Penny Mordaunt
I can give my right hon. Friend that assurance. That is why, although Oxfam has said it will not bid for any new funding, I have paused what I am going to do with current programming until I have assurances about every other partner operating in the same theatres. I will then take a decision on whether I can have confidence in what Oxfam is currently doing in those locations, or whether I need to adjust how we are doing that aid delivery.
Stephen Doughty (Cardiff South and Penarth) (Lab/Co-op)
I completely share the horror and revulsion about the revelations. I praise the Secretary of State for the very robust and comprehensive way in which she has handled the situation over the past 10 days. As a former Oxfam staff member, I feel let down. I know that many current Oxfam staff members feel completely let down, too, both by the actions of those who carried out these terrible incidents and by the failure to deal with them robustly at the time. The Secretary of State mentioned the situation regarding UN peacekeeping. That area has long been on public record as one where there has been serious sexual abuse and exploitation, with the use of prostitutes and all sorts of terrible things. Will she say a little more about the conversation she is going to have with the Defence Secretary and others about how we can ensure very high standards, in particular when UK funding is being used to support that important work, where there have been serious abuses?
Penny Mordaunt
I thank the hon. Gentleman for his comments. It is good that the message has gone out from this House that we recognise the good work that is done by many people working and volunteering for Oxfam. We can all go into our local Oxfam shop and give them our support at the weekend, and we should do that. We should recognise that our armed forces have already done a lot to raise the standards of peacekeeping troops. We do a huge amount of capacity building. We do a huge amount of work to address gender-based violence and exploitation and to enable people to recover in the aftermath of conflict and war. We have huge expertise and I am very interested in how we can use that expertise. I have spoken to other nations with similar programmes, such as Canada, to see what we can do to help to raise standards. I am open to ideas, but that is the nature of the conversation I will be having with the Defence Secretary.
Paul Scully (Sutton and Cheam) (Con)
I congratulate the Secretary of State on taking a firm and robust stance from day one. Some charities may feel that there is a disincentive in the system to being open and transparent because of the need to bid for Government money and to appeal to the generous British public. Does she agree that the reputation of the big charities, as well as their outcomes, depends on being open and transparent, and not having obfuscation and cover-up?
Penny Mordaunt
I agree with my hon. Friend. If any charity thinks that it is a good idea to put their reputation before their beneficiaries, they need to look at what is happening to Oxfam now. It is also important to set a culture in which people are not afraid to report. Ironically, Oxfam is one of the better organisations for reporting numbers to the Charity Commission. I am also looking at where there are gaps, with organisations not reporting incidents and concerns. Reporting and numbers are not necessarily a bad thing, but it is about the practices surrounding that and what organisations do when they know that something has gone wrong.
Jo Swinson (East Dunbartonshire) (LD)
I welcome the Secretary of State’s statement, her actions on the horrific events and her assurance that the Government’s commitment to helping the world’s poorest is undimmed. This is not only a charity sector problem, a parliamentary problem, or a Hollywood problem; it is a pervasive, persistent problem across sectors, society and the world. Vulnerable people—mostly women and children—are sexually objectified, exploited and abused by people with power, who are mostly men. Given the cross-cutting nature of this gendered violence, what discussions is the Secretary of State having across Government to take action to change the culture on sexual harassment and abuse across the board and to ensure that systems are in place to hold perpetrators to account?
Penny Mordaunt
As the hon. Lady will appreciate, in the immediate case I am concerned with a small slice of that, but I have been asking questions about how we hold Government Departments to account for our safeguarding work. I have also strengthened our whistleblowing practices with external oversight and, as I mentioned in my statement, we have written to other Government Departments that administer official development assistance spend.
This is a cultural change, and the Nolan principles of public life can help with the work that the Government do. Since 2013, we have had the UN’s code of conduct enshrined in our staff behaviour rules, and now that this incident has come to light, we are strengthening those rules by making explicit what we expect from all our staff. It does not matter whether prostitution is legal in a country or not; if someone is working for us, they cannot take part in those activities.
Mr Nigel Evans (Ribble Valley) (Con)
Will the Secretary of State stress that her Department makes no distinction about where a charity gets its money from—whether it is from Government or the charitable giving of British citizens—and that we will judge a charity by its deeds? When bad happens, as in the Oxfam case, the real victims are not Oxfam, which has now lost 7,000 subscribers, but the people on the ground, such as those in Haiti. They are the ones who really suffer.
Penny Mordaunt
My hon. Friend makes a good point. The beneficiaries of aid are the victims in the Oxfam scandal, not anyone else. I absolutely recognise that individuals and members of the public will judge charities on how they respond, how they operate and their practices and responsibilities towards their beneficiaries. My Department has a particular responsibility to investigate those who are in receipt of UK aid, and the Charity Commission will look at the whole sector.
Lloyd Russell-Moyle (Brighton, Kemptown) (Lab/Co-op)
Following the International Development Committee’s hearing this morning, a number of areas for immediate action were raised. One was about charities’ ability to do a Disclosure and Barring Service check—formerly a Criminal Records Bureau check—for all their workers. Will the Secretary of State take immediate action to ensure that they can do that by including them as a regulated class of profession?
Secondly, we were told today that Interpol is ready to open up a register but lacks the finances to do so. Will the Secretary of State ensure that we put all resources into Interpol to make sure that that register is open, to stop paedophiles working in this sector?
Penny Mordaunt
The summit on 5 March will consider what we think needs to happen in the UK aid sector, so it might look at such checks or accreditation schemes and what form they should take. When I was in Stockholm I also touched base with the National Crime Agency’s liaison officer to Interpol and discussed the issue briefly. Funding an Interpol system might not be the answer, but this is an important issue and we cannot deliver our work unless we can ensure that the vulnerable are protected, so we need to resource that.
Gareth Johnson (Dartford) (Con)
I am pleased that the Secretary of State mentioned Oxfam shops because, as she will know, they can operate only because an army of volunteers selflessly and kindly give up their time. Does she agree that the Government should do all they can to ensure that those people are in no way undermined by the wicked actions of a few people?
Penny Mordaunt
I thank my hon. Friend for making that point. We can show our support for those individuals, who are good people and will be dismayed by what the leadership of their organisation has done. I think that they and the public have this issue in balance, because we know that this is not representative of the UK charity sector. We have a unique charity sector in this country—it is a jewel—and this is a stain on it. This is about a minority of individuals, but unless we really tackle these issues, the whole sector will be tarnished. I think that we can all show our support for those individuals who give up their time to do good work.
John Howell (Henley) (Con)
By 2019, next year, we will have helped 7.8 million people in Nigeria have better nutrition. What contingency arrangements does the Secretary of State have in place to ensure that those projects will continue if Oxfam has to withdraw?
Penny Mordaunt
As I have said, I am reviewing all the partners we work with. If during the course of the investigation further things come to light that raise concerns about our ability to deliver aid in a particular location, I want to be sure that we have alternatives available, assessed and in place. We will have those answers after 26 February. I again assure the House that, whatever I do, no recipient of aid will suffer as a consequence.
Mrs Emma Lewell-Buck (South Shields) (Lab)
I thank the Secretary of State for her statement. How quickly will the perpetrators’ crimes be recorded with all the appropriate agencies here in the UK so that they cannot go on to commit these crimes again?
Penny Mordaunt
I am not sure whether the hon. Lady is referring to the Oxfam case. That case is obviously an issue for Haiti, but I have also made it a requirement that Oxfam reports those individuals to their own national Governments, and that has taken place. When these incidents arise, or if organisations receive serious allegations, they should report them to their donors and to their equivalent of the Charity Commission, but it is very clear that they must also report them to their prosecuting authorities.
Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)
I commend my right hon. Friend for the personal grip that she has taken on the issue. She is the named individual in Her Majesty’s Government who has taken responsibility for tackling this. If it is not the Secretary-General, who is the named individual in the United Nations who should be gripping this issue in the way that she has done in this country?
Penny Mordaunt
The Secretary-General is the leader. My right hon. Friend the Minister for the Middle East spoke to him last week, and I spoke to his deputy in person. In the wake of this, they have clarified—if I may put it that way—their line on the issue. But we must also be concerned about the practical realities of them delivering that. We can talk to them and get assurances, press statements and letters, but it is the component parts of the UN that actually have to comply with those requirements. I am afraid that the only way we will do that is by dealing with them directly and, if we are not satisfied, withholding funding from those organisations.
Anneliese Dodds (Oxford East) (Lab/Co-op)
Does the Secretary of State share my concern about the fact that other Ministers, and the Charity Commission, were made aware of worries over safeguarding back in 2015, but no action was taken at that stage? Does it also concern her that the loophole relating to charity shops, as retail venues, remains? That does not apply to Oxfam, which changed its procedures once the activity was discovered to have occurred, but it may persist in the case of other charities. The Secretary of State does not seem to be concerned about that. Will she let us know why?
Finally, does the Secretary of State appreciate that, notwithstanding her assurances, many of my constituents —a number of whom have been employed by Oxfam as international development workers—are desperately concerned about the weaponising of these revelations by people wishing to argue against international aid, and that their concerns should not be dismissed out of hand?
Penny Mordaunt
First, I can assure the hon. Lady that, in respect of the Oxfam case, the Charity Commission was not informed. In fact—I think that this is important—the commission has described the circumstances of which I have informed the House today as “inappropriate sexual behaviour”, “harassment”, and the bullying of employees. That is not in any way an accurate reflection of the events that took place.
I know that my hon. Friend the Member for Chatham and Aylesford (Tracey Crouch), the Civil Society Minister, is looking into all these issues, including the extension of checks to all retail outlets. I think that there are probably smarter ways of doing this, and if we find that if there is more to be done, we will need to do it.
I am sorry, but I cannot remember the hon. Lady’s last point. [Hon. Members: “You have done it.”] Okay—thanks.
Mr Speaker
I know that this involves the constituency of the hon. Member for Oxford East (Anneliese Dodds), but unfortunately—forgive me—if a question is too long, it is quite easy for a Minister to forget some of it. There is a lesson there. The hon. Lady is an extremely dexterous contributor, and we all learn from these situations.
Kevin Foster (Torbay) (Con)
Given the heroism of many aid workers in difficult circumstances, it is literally tragic to hear of a handful who decided to exploit such a situation to fulfil their own sexual proclivities. Will my right hon. Friend reassure me by telling me what work her Department’s new safeguarding review unit will do to ensure that people are protected throughout the aid sector?
Penny Mordaunt
We need to do several things, but, in a nutshell, we need to ensure that every organisation is doing all in its power to prevent such actions from taking place. But if and when they do take place—we must recognise that people are working with a huge number of organisations, including local organisations, in what is, quite frankly, chaos—we must ensure that they are reported and dealt with appropriately, that those who have done things wrong are held to account, and that the whole process is transparent.
Liz McInnes (Heywood and Middleton) (Lab)
Does the Secretary of State envisage that an international register of aid workers will bring the capability to strike off abusers and ensure that they can no longer find work in the aid sector?
Penny Mordaunt
Yes. Since this story broke, we have received a number of suggestions from a number of organisations. We need to decide what we in the UK think is the best course of action, and that is what we will do on 5 March, with experts and representatives of the UK sector. We will then share that work with our fellow nations and do something together. That is the plan of action.
Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)
Are robust vetting systems in place not just for DFID officials working abroad, but for the charities that tend to work abroad in such dreadful situations?
Penny Mordaunt
We have good practices and procedures in place, and I have confidence in what my Department does. However, we work not only with the Oxfams and the Save the Childrens of this world, but with a raft of other organisations further down the supply chain. We must ensure that we can have confidence in the whole of that process. There are individuals whom we can accredit and register, but that will not be possible in the case of other partners on the ground, so we must also ensure that we have the right oversight wherever in the world we are working.
Mr Paul Sweeney (Glasgow North East) (Lab/Co-op)
Extremely serious though they are, we should not allow these ongoing revelations to be used as a pretext to undermine the UK’s financial commitment to overseas development aid. A significant number of influential people who are now being vocal on the issue seem to be trying to exploit them for that, and I welcome the Secretary of State’s reassurances in that regard. Does the Secretary of State share my concern about the ulterior motives of certain people of influence, who are conveniently jumping on this issue, despite being silent on other forms of abuse and sexual exploitation when they occur in other sectors and other parts of our society?
Penny Mordaunt
I do not think that is how people are responding to this situation; I think the bulk of people in this House and in the country want us to get a grip on this particular issue. As I said, we are committed to 0.7%—we introduced it; it has been in our manifesto; we are committed to it. We are also committed to spending it really well and ensuring that, in spending it, we are working with organisations that we can trust and that put their beneficiaries first.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
I thank the Secretary of State for her statement, her determination and her strength of character. A whistleblower hotline has been set up; can the Secretary of State assure this House that those who use it will not be disadvantaged in employment as a result, and can she confirm whether there has been any usage of the hotline so far?
Penny Mordaunt
The hotline itself is not new. It has been in place for some years, and it is a discrete unit, so people are dealt with in complete confidence; neither I, the permanent secretary nor any other part of the organisation are aware of calls that come in, and they are investigated separately and discreetly, but once investigations are concluded, we obviously know the result of them. So, yes, it has been used, and it has been very effective. As I said in my statement, through our interrogation of that system on historical cases, we can say that all those cases have been dealt with appropriately.
Post-18 Education
(6 years, 10 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Secretary of State for Education (Damian Hinds)
With permission, Mr Speaker, I would like to make a statement on the review of post-18 education and funding. While I am not announcing new policy today, I welcome the opportunity to confirm to the House details of a major review across post-18 education and funding, as announced by the Prime Minister yesterday.
Before I discuss the specifics of the review, I should highlight some of the strengths and successes of our existing post-18 system. We have a world-class higher education system. Sixteen British universities are in the world’s top 100 and four are in the top 10. We have record numbers of young people entering university, including from disadvantaged backgrounds. Our student finance system removes up-front financial barriers and provides protections for borrowers so that they only have to contribute when they can afford to do so. A university degree provides significant financial returns to the individual: graduates on average benefit from their university education by over £100,000 over their lifetime.
The Higher Education and Research Act 2017 sets the foundation for further improvements, with the Office for Students a strong voice for students and to ensure minimum standards. The director for fair access and participation will help to drive social mobility. The teaching outcomes and excellence framework measures are in the legislation as well, as is the facilitation of further diversity with new providers and shorter degrees delivered at a lower cost to students.
The Technical and Further Education Act 2017 extends the responsibilities of the Institute for Apprenticeships to include technical education, as well as introducing degree-level apprenticeships. New institutes of technology will be established, which will focus on higher-level technical skills and will be eligible for access to loans and grants for their students. T-levels are in development—a true, equal-standing alternative to A-levels.
We will build on those important reforms in this review. We will also look at parts of the system that are not working as well as they could be. Although we have seen further growth in three-year degrees for 18-year-olds, the post-18 system does not always offer a comprehensive range of high-quality alternative routes for the many young people who pursue a technical or vocational path at that stage. In universities, we have not seen the extent of increase in choice that we would have wanted. The great majority of courses are priced at the same level and three-year courses remain the norm. Meanwhile, although the funding system is a progressive one with built-in protections, those elements are not always well understood.
It is for those reasons that the Government are committed to conducting this major review to look further at how we can ensure that our post-18 education system is joined up and supported by a funding system that works for students and taxpayers. The review will look at four key strands: choice and competition across post-18 education and training; value for money for graduates and taxpayers; accessibility of the system to all; and delivering the skills that our country needs now and in the future. This means identifying ways to help people to make the most effective choices between the options available at and after 18, so that they can make more informed decisions about their futures. It is also about ensuring that there is a more diverse range of options to choose from beyond the classic three-year or four-year undergraduate degrees.
We will look at how students and graduates contribute to the cost of their studies, to ensure that funding arrangements across post-18 education are transparent and do not prevent people from accessing higher education or training. We will examine how we can best ensure that people from all backgrounds have equal opportunities to progress and succeed in post-18 education, including considering how disadvantaged students receive maintenance support, both from the Government and from universities and colleges. We will look at how we can best support education outcomes that deliver our industrial strategy ambitions by contributing to a strong economy and delivering the skills our country needs.
We are clear that we must maintain and protect key elements of our current post-18 education system that work well already. We will maintain the principle that students should contribute to the cost of their studies, and we will not place a cap on the number of students who can benefit from post-18 education. We will not regress to a system like that in Scotland, where controls on student numbers continue to restrict the aspirations of young people.
The review will be informed by independent advice from an expert panel from across post-18 education, business and academia chaired by Philip Augar, a financial author and former non-executive director of the Department for Education. To inform its advice, the panel will carry out extensive consultation and engagement with the sector, with business and with, among others, people currently or recently participating in post-18 education. The panel will publish its report at an interim stage, before the Government conclude the overall review in early 2019.
The UK is truly a world-leading destination for study and research. Record numbers of young people, including those from disadvantaged backgrounds, are entering university. However, we recognise the concerns and we must look at how we can go further to provide choice, to open up access and to deliver value for money for students and taxpayers. We must ensure that the system as a whole is delivering the best possible outcomes for young people and the economy, joining up the vocational, technical and academic routes and supported by a fair and sustainable funding system. I commend this statement to the House.
Angela Rayner (Ashton-under-Lyne) (Lab)
I thank the Secretary of State for giving me advance sight of his statement.
I welcome the Prime Minister’s admission yesterday that the system is not working. She rightly talked about the choices facing a working-class teenage girl today. I faced those choices as a working-class teenage girl myself, but every part of the education system that helped me has been attacked by this Government. I want to ask the Secretary of State first to clarify one simple point. He has claimed that there are now record numbers of students from disadvantaged backgrounds, but the House of Commons Library has confirmed today that, when we include part-time students, there are now 10,000 fewer students from under-represented areas than there were before the Government raised tuition fees to £9,000 a year. And as usual, the rest of the Secretary of State’s announcement leaves us with more questions than answers.
Let us start with the most important question. Will the review be able to recommend extra funding for education overall? The terms of reference state that it cannot make recommendations on tax and that it must follow the Government’s fiscal policies. Does that mean that the review cannot recommend anything that would increase spending? If so, can the review consider restoring maintenance grants, reducing interest rates or increasing the teaching grant? Can the Secretary of State also confirm that the terms of reference make it clear that it is not an independent review at all but one directly run by his Ministers? Given that, will he ensure that the review’s recommendations are put to this House and implemented in primary legislation that we can properly discuss and amend?
The Prime Minister admitted that the current system
“leaves students from the lowest-income households bearing the highest levels of debt”.
Does the Secretary of State acknowledge that that will always be the case with a system entirely based on loans? Does he agree with his predecessor, who has admitted that this Government were wrong to scrap maintenance grants?
Speaking to The Sunday Times, the Secretary of State said that he wants differential fees, with higher prices for subjects with the greatest earning potential. Is that policy, or was the Government’s Education Secretary not speaking for the Government? Does he understand that charging higher fees for the very courses that lead to the highest-paid jobs makes no economic sense and only widens inequality? So much for social mobility.
The Conservative party manifesto promised a review of tertiary education across the board, yet further education colleges form no part of this review, despite the hundreds of thousands of people aged 16 to 18 studying in them. Have this Government abandoned yet another manifesto commitment?
Can the Secretary of State also tell us whether student nurses are covered by the review? If not, will he give this House a debate and a vote on the regulations he is trying to sneak through to abolish their bursaries? He said that he wants funding arrangements to be transparent. The Treasury Committee, chaired by another of his predecessors, found the funding arrangements to be anything but. The Committee highlighted the “fiscal illusion” at the heart of the system, with up to £7 billion of annual debt write-offs simply missing, allowing the Government to artificially reduce the deficit by saddling young people with debt. Perhaps he can tell us whether he will take up the Committee’s recommendations. Will he finally tell us the latest estimate of the resource accounting and budgeting charge and about how it will be written off?
The truth is that a year-long review is an unnecessary waste of time and energy when action is needed now. Let me offer the Secretary of State a simple conclusion to his review: a fully costed plan to scrap tuition fees, to bring back maintenance support and to reverse the rest of the Government’s cuts to education. It is called “For the many, not the few” and that is exactly what our education system should be.
Damian Hinds
I thank the hon. Lady very much indeed for her response. She asked a number of questions and I will try to get through as many of them as I can. She is right to identify the issues of part-time participation in higher education. One of the things the review will look at is the ways in which it is possible to carry on earning in the labour force while studying. The decline in part-time study predates the 2012 reforms and indeed the change of Government in 2010, so we need to look at some of the underlying causes.
The hon. Lady asked what the review will cover. The review will cover the complete range, but the Government also believe in a framework of fiscal responsibility, and rightly so. It is only when we have a strong economy that we can have a strong education system and that we can carry on investing in our public services in the way that we are doing.
The hon. Lady asked whether it is an independent review. It is a Government review and the Government are ultimately responsible to this House and democratically. We make the decisions, but those decisions are informed and advised by an independent panel, the composition of which she knows. The legislative requirements that would follow from any changes would follow the normal processes. The same goes for the statutory instrument she asked about.
I do not want to take up too much time, but I want to set one important thing straight. When we talk about having different fees for different courses, it is about ensuring diversity and choice in the marketplace. That exists along many different axes, including shorter courses, more part-time courses and courses delivered in different ways. It is absolutely not the same as saying that there is some distinction of worth to be drawn between arts courses and science courses. With how the world economy is changing, it is also true that we are going to need more STEM graduates and more people with expertise in coding and so on, but that is a different point.
I will finish by observing that there is no such thing as “free” in higher education. Somebody must pay, and there are only two types of people who can fund higher education: those who have benefited from it and will typically earn much more over their lifetimes, and those who have not. There is a public subsidy that goes towards higher education that rightly reflects the societal benefit, but it is also right that the people who benefit contribute to the cost. The Labour alternative is to have the tab picked up entirely by other taxpayers, many of whom will not have benefited from the advantages. That is a regressive policy that would mean less money going to universities and fewer people going to university. It would be a policy for the few, not the many.
Justine Greening (Putney) (Con)
Like many Members of this House, I was the first person in my family to go to university, and wonderful universities, such as the University of Roehampton in my constituency, are now giving many young local people the same opportunity. I welcome the fact that the panel will talk to young people, which is vital because they need certainty to be able to start making informed decisions about whether to go to university. I have two points. First, does my right hon. Friend agree that social mobility must be at the heart of the panel’s thinking? Secondly, does he also agree that probably one of the worst things we could introduce would be the regressive tuition fee policy proposed by the Labour party, which would simply benefit the better-off at the expense of the worse-off in our society by introducing a cap on student numbers?
Damian Hinds
My right hon. Friend is of course completely right about the alternative policy proposed by the official Opposition, which would benefit the best-off. In contrast, as she says, we should be focusing on what we can do to promote social mobility and build on the strides that we have made in terms of young people from disadvantaged backgrounds going on to study full-time at age 18. She also mentioned the requirement that young people, or indeed older people, applying to university have certainty now. It is important for us to keep stressing that university is a good deal. If you are someone who can benefit from a university degree, we have a progressive system with plenty of protections in place, and if you can make the most of that, you should.
Carol Monaghan (Glasgow North West) (SNP)
I thank the Secretary of State for advance sight of his statement. The Prime Minister’s speech yesterday had plenty of platitudes and good intentions, but there has been absolutely nothing of substance. We have had an admission that the current system in England is not working for students. Admitting that it is wrong is one thing, but failing to correct the situation is simply incompetent. In Scotland, the Scottish National party has restored Scotland’s tradition of free higher education while maintaining the education maintenance allowance for those at school or in further education and the bursary for young people from disadvantaged backgrounds in higher education—[Interruption.] Contrary to the comments from the Government Benches, that support package works. Scottish 18-year-olds from the most disadvantaged areas are now 67% more likely to apply to higher education than 12 years ago, and they graduate with the lowest debt in the UK. Is it not time that we stopped the nonsense and abolished the fees, and matched not just Scotland but the rest of the developed world? Going to university should be based on the ability to learn, not the ability to pay.
If the fees for some less expensive degree courses are lowered, as has been rumoured, has the Secretary of State considered how he will encourage young people to study the more expensive STEM subjects that are so desperately needed in the UK? We have already seen the impact of removing the nursing bursary, with applications to study nursing in England down by 23%. How will the Secretary of State ensure that that does not happen in STEM?
Both the Government and the Labour party are trying to rewrite the history of their responsibility for the tuition fees fiasco, and it is clear that Scotland is leading the policy debate in the UK. With the average debt on graduation in England now at £50,000, how will the Secretary of State ensure that a flow of talent from all backgrounds will continue? How will he ensure that the industrial strategy is supported? Is it not time that fees were abolished?
Damian Hinds
Additional support is already provided in England for some of those key subjects that have a higher cost attached to them, and the review will consider how to incentivise the take-up of such courses. As for the broader point, I said to the hon. Member for Ashton-under-Lyne (Angela Rayner) that, if there were to be a policy along the lines that she suggested, that would mean fewer people being able to go to university, less money going to universities and disadvantaged students being impacted. She only has to look to her left towards the SNP to see exhibit A of how that works.
Several hon. Members rose—
Mr Speaker
Order. Understandably, there is intense interest in this subject, but I advise the House that there is a ten-minute rule motion to follow and that I have been informed that it is the intention of one Member to oppose it. Thereafter, there is the Second Reading of a Bill, to which 20 hon. Members want to contribute. I must therefore insist that we do not have speeches or pre-conceived rants. What is required is a pithy question, and I know that the Secretary of State will provide a pithy answer. If people do not want to deliver that, then they should not bother taking part today, because it is not fair on colleagues. We can always be led in such a matter by the right hon. Member for New Forest West (Sir Desmond Swayne).
Sir Desmond Swayne (New Forest West) (Con)
How few students actually pay 6%?
Damian Hinds
The interest rate, to which I think my right hon. Friend is referring, is currently 6.1%, but it varies with inflation. Critically, it means that those who earn more in their 20s and 30s will pay more—[Interruption.] It applies throughout the study period, as the hon. Member for Wythenshawe and Sale East (Mike Kane) should know. Thereafter, the rate varies depending on earnings. It does serve an important purpose, but it cannot be considered in isolation from all the other aspects of the system.
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
I welcome the Secretary of State to his post, but will he take this matter seriously? Something is deeply wrong with higher education funding. Much has been achieved, but much needs to be reviewed. Will he concentrate on skills in our country? We are not producing the right skills or giving incentives to further education colleges and private trainers—all those who are struggling at the moment.
Damian Hinds
Much achieved, but things to look at again—I could not agree more with the hon. Gentleman, because that is precisely what we are doing. As for skills, some of the ones that we are looking for are being delivered extremely well, but we need to do more. That is why we have had the big expansion in apprenticeships, the Institute for Apprenticeships, the raising of standards and, of course, the introduction of the T-levels, which he will welcome.
Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)
I welcome the review and the direction of travel, but my right hon. Friend will know that a fifth to a third of graduates are not getting graduate jobs and that the number of state school graduates has decreased in the past year. Is it not the case that our higher education system is not providing value for money for many disadvantaged people? That is why the review must focus on skills and on addressing social injustice.
Damian Hinds
My right hon. Friend is absolutely right about the need to focus on skills and to have social justice and equal opportunity at the heart of things. I should also mention that those who do not earn above the threshold do not repay their loan, which is an intrinsic part of the system.
Lucy Powell (Manchester Central) (Lab/Co-op)
According to the Institute for Fiscal Studies, three quarters of graduates will not repay their loans, so is it not the case that the system is not working for the taxpayer, let alone students? Therefore, would the Secretary of State have welcomed a more radical review that could have considered some of the deep-rooted problems of the current system?
Damian Hinds
I can understand why the hon. Lady asks that question, but part of the point of the system is that if someone does not earn up to a certain level, or if by the time 30 years have passed, someone has been out of the labour market, they are not expected to pay back the loan. That is deliberate, to ensure that the system is progressive and fair.
Neil O'Brien (Harborough) (Con)
Thanks to the expansion that fees have enabled, the most disadvantaged students are now nearly twice as likely to go to university if they are in England than if they are in Scotland. I am in the first generation in my family to go to university and I want my constituents to have the same opportunity. Although I welcome the review, will the Secretary of State reassure me that we will not put that progress at risk?
Damian Hinds
I absolutely reassure my hon. Friend that ensuring equal and fair access will be at the heart of what we do.
Nic Dakin (Scunthorpe) (Lab)
The Conservative party manifesto promised a review of tertiary education, so I welcome the Secretary of State’s review. However, when will he fulfil the promise to review the most underfunded part of our education system—16 to 18?
Damian Hinds
The internationally recognised definition of tertiary education is largely post-18. The hon. Gentleman is right about some of the challenges in post-16 education. A moment ago, I mentioned T-levels, for which considerably more funding will come forward. There is also the great expansion in apprenticeships.
David Evennett (Bexleyheath and Crayford) (Con)
I welcome my right hon. Friend’s statement and strongly support his review. It is essential that we deliver the skills that our country needs, and give opportunities for all. Will he ensure that the concerns and views of business and industry are taken into account in the review?
Damian Hinds
It is vital that the views of industry and business are taken fully into account. I know that the independent panel will listen to them carefully.
Dr Roberta Blackman-Woods (City of Durham) (Lab)
The terms of reference that the Secretary of State published say that the review cannot make recommendations on tax policy and that it must make recommendations in keeping with the Government’s fiscal policies. Does that mean that there will be no new money for higher education regardless of the review’s recommendations?
Damian Hinds
As I said, we have a framework of fiscal responsibility, which we will stick to. The announcements on tax and spending are made at fiscal events, but the review has a wide remit to consider all the different aspects of the system and make recommendations.
Michael Tomlinson (Mid Dorset and North Poole) (Con)
The Secretary of State rightly stated the principle that those who benefit must contribute. Does he agree that the alternative is regressive and means a cap and a reduction in student numbers?
Damian Hinds
My hon. Friend is right and he has only to look north of the border to see how that works.
Layla Moran (Oxford West and Abingdon) (LD)
The Secretary of State spoke about choices made at and after 18, but he will know that many students make those choices at 13 when they choose their GCSEs. The National Audit Office report on the higher education market identified high-quality careers advice and financial education as part of how we can fix the system. Will the review include that?
Damian Hinds
The hon. Lady is right to talk about the choices that are made early. That is why drawing attention to the so-called facilitating subjects can be useful for keeping people’s options open for higher education. The point also highlights why we need to make clear early in school the routes to technical and vocational as well as higher education.
Giles Watling (Clacton) (Con)
Does the Secretary of State agree that high-quality apprenticeships are key to addressing the UK’s skills shortages?
Damian Hinds
I agree entirely. That is why we have such bold ambition for what we will do on apprenticeships—not just the numbers, but with the Institute for Apprenticeships, and moving from frameworks to standards to ensure that they deliver what business needs.
Margaret Greenwood (Wirral West) (Lab)
The creative industries generate more than £90 billion for the UK economy. Assessing the value of a university degree course on graduate salary or outcomes risks undermining that important sector. What will the Secretary of State do to ensure that we support universities in producing world-class arts graduates?
Damian Hinds
The hon. Lady makes an important point and, of course, we do produce world-class arts graduates, and we have some of the finest institutions in the world doing that. On what she calls valuing degrees, I have said that at least three different considerations need to be taken account of: the cost of putting on the course, the value in earnings to the individual, and also the value to our society as well as our economy.
Michelle Donelan (Chippenham) (Con)
I am delighted that the review will address value for money for graduates. Does my right hon. Friend agree that the system does not currently have the transparency for students to make informed choices, and that that needs to be addressed?
Damian Hinds
My hon. Friend makes an important point. We have moved forward with what is called the LEO—longitudinal education outcomes—dataset to help students make those analyses directly, and indeed to help those who provide information on courses.
Liam Byrne (Birmingham, Hodge Hill) (Lab)
The madness of the current system is that it costs students and taxpayers a fortune. Student debt is spiralling up to £55 billion, nearly half of which will be written off and picked up by general taxpayers. I urge the Secretary of State to look forensically at how we knit together further education and higher education so that we radically expand the number of earn-while-you-learn degree places, which are collapsing in great cities such as Birmingham, where they have halved in the past 12 months alone.
Damian Hinds
That was a question of two halves. In the first half, I think the right hon. Gentleman was describing what is called sharing the cost, which we do. We believe that it is right that the individual who benefits should take on part of the investment, and the taxpayer also picks up part of it. I agree entirely with the points in the second half of the question: we should have proper join-up between HE and FE. Many universities already do important technical education, and many FE colleges also conduct very good HE. We want more of a join-up.
Nigel Huddleston (Mid Worcestershire) (Con)
Many of us, from both sides of the Chamber, come from modest backgrounds and were the first in our families to go to university. Any kind of cap on numbers could seriously jeopardise the system. Will the review therefore ensure that the unintended consequences of popular but ultimately disastrous policy options are highlighted?
Damian Hinds
The review will look at a range of issues, but highlighting the downsides of some policies that may appear outwardly and initially attractive is an important part of that.
Paul Blomfield (Sheffield Central) (Lab)
Will the Secretary of State guarantee that there will be no reduction in funding for widening participation and fair access programmes as part of the review?
Damian Hinds
As the hon. Gentleman will know, there has been some great progress in widening access in terms of social class and, for example, in terms of people from black and minority ethnic backgrounds going on to university. The access programmes that universities run are part of the reason for that. The director of fair access enables us to strengthen that further, learn from what works best and ensure that we spread best practice.
Eddie Hughes (Walsall North) (Con)
We need to build 300,000 houses a year in this country. Does my right hon. Friend therefore agree that a high-quality apprenticeship in construction is an excellent alternative to incurring any debt through a university course?
Damian Hinds
Different people have different talents and orientations and enjoy different things, and it is important that we present a range. My hon. Friend is right to mention the particular requirement for construction skills, and the apprenticeship route is an important part of fulfilling that.
Steve McCabe (Birmingham, Selly Oak) (Lab)
The review does not touch on the excessive salaries and pension pots that many vice-chancellors claim. Does the Secretary of State think that that is an insignificant factor in the current culture?
Damian Hinds
The overall remuneration of senior staff in institutions that have public support must also enjoy public confidence. The Office for Students will look at how we can ensure that that confidence is maintained.
Kevin Foster (Torbay) (Con)
I welcome the mention of apprenticeships and T-levels. Will the Secretary of State confirm that the review will cover the potential of institutes of technology to deliver them, particularly if one was built in South Devon College in Paignton?
Damian Hinds
I am not at this exact moment in a position to go into detail about Paignton, but I can confirm that institutes of technology are an important part of the piece.
Gareth Snell (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Lab/Co-op)
Further to the answer that the Secretary of State gave my hon. Friend the Member for Scunthorpe (Nic Dakin) on the international definition of tertiary education being post-18, I point out that the Conservative party manifesto included 16 to 18 education as tertiary. Although it is the Secretary of State’s prerogative to choose his timings for inquiries, will he give an actual date for the FE review, because colleges in Stoke-on-Trent want to know?
Damian Hinds
We are constantly improving things. The level 4 and 5 review that is going on will feed into the review that we are discussing. As I have said to several Members, we want to ensure that the two sides are joined up.
Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)
Yesterday, when I looked, there did not seem to be a readily accessible link on the website to the review team. If members of the public want to share the benefit of their views with Mr Augar, will the Secretary of State ensure that there is an accessible, emailable link?
Damian Hinds
I will indeed ensure that it is possible to do that. There will of course be a call for evidence as part of the process.
Deidre Brock (Edinburgh North and Leith) (SNP)
The Secretary of State has simply criticised the Scottish Government and not taken the opportunity to learn from them. Will he join me in welcoming the 2017 UCAS figures, which show a 13% increase in students from Scotland’s most deprived communities going to a Scottish university, and the overall 2% increase in applicants to universities this year from the 20% most deprived areas compared with last year?
Damian Hinds
The gap in opportunity between the disadvantaged and the advantaged in Scotland is well known to all, including the commentators who look at it, and no plucking from the air of a favourite statistic is going to change that. The fact is that the system we have in England has been effective in helping disadvantaged people to make the most of their talents if they want to go on to higher education.
Paul Farrelly (Newcastle-under-Lyme) (Lab)
Student living costs are the most pressing issue at Keele University in my constituency and certainly elsewhere in the country, where it is much more expensive to rent and simply get by. Rather than waiting an age for the conclusions of this review, should the Government not simply address this issue now, as well as the sliding scale of access to maintenance loans and the reintroduction of maintenance grants?
Damian Hinds
Bringing in maintenance loans meant it was possible to get access to more cash, and we know the cash-flow question was an important consideration, especially in enabling disadvantaged students to stay at university. I confirmed in the statement that the review will look at all the different aspects of the system.
Points of Order
(6 years, 10 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text
Mr Speaker
If the hon. Gentleman wants to raise a point of order, he may do so, but with sensitivity to the prevailing circumstances, with huge interest in the subsequent debate.
Neil Gray
On a point of order, Mr Speaker. I understand the pressures on time, so I will be brief. I seek your advice on the public actions of a Member of this House. During a debate on 5 February on social security, the hon. Member for Stirling (Stephen Kerr), whom I have notified of this point of order, intervened on my speech to ask a question, which I was happy to answer. It later came to my attention that he had taken a video clip of his intervention and removed my reply, before stating publicly:
“I got no answer to my repeated question”.
We are left to speculate about the motive for the removal of my reply, but that is not the basis of my complaint.
By posting that clip and suggesting I had not answered his question, he mispresented the proceedings of this House, and he directly challenged my character and reputation. After being challenged, he did post a full transcript of the debate, but I understand that the original posting and statement remain, which I find deeply concerning. I have enjoyed frequent debates with him since he entered the House, and although we disagree politically, I get on well with him personally. However, I wonder whether this type of behaviour is acceptable according to you, Mr Speaker, or to the code of conduct. Can you therefore please advise whether it is in order for a Member to appear to publicly misrepresent the proceedings of this House, to deliberately or otherwise misrepresent another Member or to apparently attempt to mislead the public about proceedings in this House? Can you advise what powers you have to challenge this behaviour?
Mr Speaker
I am most grateful to the hon. Gentleman. I have just made a point about the constraints on time and it would be helpful if people would be sensitive to it, because it is about others; it is not just about what they want to do now. I am grateful to him for advance notice that he wished to raise this point. I note his concern and I understand what he has just told the House, which is that he has brought the matter to the attention of the hon. Member for Stirling(Stephen Kerr). I appreciate that Members in all parts of the House are increasingly using social media to draw attention to proceedings in this House, and that, of itself, is perfectly understandable. Moreover, broadly it is to be welcomed. That said, I urge all Members to take care to ensure that usage of selected clips of debates does not create a misleading impression of what has taken place. I might add that it is one thing for a Member to post a clip of what he or she has said, but to add evaluative commentary or to imply the absence of a reply to a point that that Member has made could fall into the category of knowingly misleading.
As for the code of conduct, what I would say to the hon. Member for Airdrie and Shotts (Neil Gray) is that in the circumstance that he thinks there has been a breach of it, the appropriate action is to write to the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards. I strongly suggest that he do so if he is so motivated and convinced, rather than pursuing the matter further on the Floor of the House. That ruling is relevant not just to the hon. Gentleman, to whom I am grateful for airing the issue, but to other Members. I must say to the House that it would not be desirable if we were regularly to have points of order of this kind. Already we have colleagues complaining about Members visiting their constituencies without prior notification and we do not want a whole new category of constant points of order on matters of this kind, so it is up to Members to help each other.
Mr Speaker
If Dr Offord feels that his views need to be registered to the nation, so be it.
Dr Matthew Offord (Hendon) (Con)
On a point of order, Mr Speaker. In December 2016, the British Government adopted the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance definition of “anti-Semitism”. This definition explains that claiming that the existence of the state of Israel is a racist and illegitimate endeavour is anti-Semitic. Therefore, by the Government’s own measure, the words “Israeli apartheid week” are manifestly anti-Semitic and violate this country’s own definition of anti-Semitism. Given that the Secretary of State and his team are here and that yesterday marked the beginning of Israeli Apartheid Week, may I ask you, Sir, how we can have a statement from the Government condemning these actions and, if appropriate, bringing forward the necessary legislation to prevent them?
Mr Speaker
I do not know whether a Minister is minded to make a statement on the matter, and I am not entirely sure which Minister the hon. Gentleman had in mind. The Secretary of State for Education is in his place, but it is not obvious to me that the matter is for the Secretary of State. Other Ministers are also present on the Treasury Bench and they will have heard what the hon. Gentleman has had to say. I suspect that what he has had to say will be communicated more widely to members of the Government. I think that for today we will leave it there, but I thank him for saying what he wanted to say.
Postal Voting
Tuesday 20th February 2018
(6 years, 10 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Postal Voting Bill 2017-19 View all Postal Voting Bill 2017-19 Debates Read Hansard Text
A Ten Minute Rule Bill is a First Reading of a Private Members Bill, but with the sponsor permitted to make a ten minute speech outlining the reasons for the proposed legislation.
There is little chance of the Bill proceeding further unless there is unanimous consent for the Bill or the Government elects to support the Bill directly.
For more information see: Ten Minute Bills
This information is provided by Parallel Parliament and does not comprise part of the offical record
Damien Moore (Southport) (Con)
I beg to move,
That leave be given to bring in a Bill to make provision about postal voting at elections.
It is great privilege to present this Bill in the mother of all Parliaments, in one of the world’s great democracies. The representation of the people or postal handling Bill escalates two of Sir Eric Pickles’ recommendations made in his review of electoral fraud, which he undertook as part of his remit as the Government’s anti-corruption champion. There is no threat more insidious to a democratic society than electoral fraud, and it is almost beyond belief that so many allegations of fraudulent behaviour have been made during recent council, mayoral and general elections. It is clear that unscrupulous and devious people are intent on subverting the confidence of the electorate and damaging the sanctity of our ancient democracy. The events that occurred during the 2014 Tower Hamlets mayoral election are mercifully rare, but they show us that our democracy cannot be taken for granted. We need to accept that our trust-based electoral system is susceptible to fraudulent practices. International intergovernmental organisations such as the Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights have raised their concerns over what they perceive to be vulnerabilities within the United Kingdom’s electoral systems, and it is essential that we act now.
Of course, fighting corruption and electoral fraud has benefits beyond protecting democracy and the suffrage of our citizens. Crime begets crime, and malfeasance and corruption, once they put down roots in an organisation or institution, are very hard to eradicate. An individual who has undermined the democratic process and attained elected office through casuistic means is unlikely to maintain ethical standards in office; they are likely to lapse into recidivistic tendencies, to the detriment of those they represent.
The law currently allows a voter to hand in their own and other peoples completed and sealed postal ballots to a polling station on polling day or to a returning officer on any day before polling day that is deemed to be too close to polling day to ensure that the postal service will be able to execute delivery of the postal ballot in time. The Electoral Commission has introduced a code of conduct that, in essence, states that no political activist should handle another person’s postal ballot papers, but the code is not enshrined in law.
At present, political activists and campaigners are still legally permitted to handle and deliver an unlimited number of postal ballots to polling stations. Although the simple act of handing in another person’s completed and sealed postal ballot could be completely innocuous, I am certain that most Members will at least be familiar with the concept of postal ballot harvesting. That practice involves political activists gathering up postal ballots, sometimes in their hundreds, and delivering them to polling stations on behalf of the local electorate. As these completed ballots are often handed in to polling stations on polling day, there is rarely a chance to ensure that they have not been tampered with or fraudulently completed by another party.
As Sir Eric Pickles noted in his report on electoral fraud, “Securing the ballot”, the lack of a statutory ban on the handling of postal ballots by political activists leaves scope for the integrity of the voting system to be undermined. Frankly, it is impossible to disagree. In recent years, and perhaps cultivated by increasingly partisan politics, there has been an escalation in instances of intimidation and threats against politicians, after greater schisms than ever between political factions, expressed in the basest way. Of course, there have also been increasing concerns about corruption within our electoral system.
The Bill seeks to allay the possibility of postal ballot fraud, but I also hope that it will go some way towards putting the dignity back into democracy. I hope that Members from all parties recognise that the Bill would introduce pragmatic, sensible legislation into the electoral legal canon. Parliamentarians should be at the forefront of electoral reform, helping to ensure that opportunities for malpractice and criminal behaviour are eradicated.
The Bill would implement a ban on the handling of complete, incomplete or blank postal ballot papers by persons seeking to benefit a candidate or a political party, including candidates, agents and their staff, along with political party officers, members, activists and representatives of pressure groups associated with political parties. Furthermore, the Bill would apply to people or organisations campaigning for or against a political candidate at an election, or, indeed, to people or organisations campaigning for or against a particular outcome at a referendum.
The Bill would enforce a reasonable limit on the number of postal ballots that any individual can hand in on behalf of other voters at a polling station or to a returning officer on polling day. Any individual registered to vote at an election would be able to hand in no more than the prescribed number of postal ballots that were not their own. We envisage that regulations made under the enabling power in the Bill would set the maximum at two.
Individuals could exercise their own right to vote or could hand in their own sealed postal ballot in addition to the others they are returning. That is an important element of the Bill, for it is not always possible to identify the aforementioned subterfuge whereby a party affiliate or campaigner is handling postal ballots and delivering them to polling stations or returning officers. It is rare that an individual could be identified as being part of a political group or as an activist, so it is necessary to apply a limit to the number of postal ballots delivered to polling stations or returning officers for absolutely everybody, without exception.
What of the penalties for those who seek to undermine the will of the electorate through fraudulent behaviour? It is imperative that we enforce stringent sanctions that provide a deterrent to anyone considering committing an electoral offence by deviating from the new measures on postal ballot handling. The Bill would introduce a new offence. Individuals who are banned from handling postal ballot papers that belong to someone else—specifically party affiliates or campaigners—and who do not meet the criteria for an exemption would face the following penalties: a prison sentence of up to two years; a fine; or a prison sentence and a fine following conviction or indictment. Alternatively, in the instance of a summary conviction, they would face up to six months’ imprisonment or a fine on summary conviction.
There are of course exceptions and extenuating circumstances. The Bill would include an exemption for those individuals who are political or campaign affiliates but who are acting on behalf of a family member or another voter for whom they are a carer. That is critical. Although the law must seek to impede fraud and malpractice in elections and referendums, it is equally important that no one should feel that they are unable to exercise their democratic right to vote.
We must ensure that regulations provide polling station staff with the means to examine the intentions and provenance of anyone purporting to hand in someone else’s postal ballot papers. The best way to do that is to enable polling station staff to provide the individual in question with a prescribed form that, through a series of basic questions, would allow those staff to determine whether that voter is permitted to hand in or handle another person’s postal ballot papers. Hopefully, the form would provide a certain structure to the process and instances of calumny during innocuous visits to the polling station would be rare. Guidance would be established to ensure that polling station staff were well equipped to deal with the new requirements placed on them by the Bill.
It is important to recognise that the measures in the Bill have been carefully considered. It is essential that polling station staff do not look askance at voters who enter polling stations and voting booths on polling day, but the Bill would enable greater scrutiny of possible electoral misdeeds. Abstention from voting has often been too high in the United Kingdom, but voter turnout at last year’s general election was the highest in 25 years. I am certain that we parliamentarians can further encourage political engagement from a sometimes “vote shy” public, while examining the ways and means to make elections and referendums as fair and free as possible. Indeed, I hope that the Bill will be part of a wider movement of electoral transparency, decorum in campaigning and public engagement with our democracy. Perhaps most crucial of all is the right for all people to engage in political campaigning without intimidation and the threat of violence.
The Bill would introduce basic changes that would go some way towards addressing perceptions of wrongdoing, with a view to securing a fairer electoral system. I hope that my parliamentary colleagues will consider it with the candour and thoughtfulness that I have come to expect from them. I commend the Bill to the House.
Gareth Snell (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Lab/Co-op)
I rise to speak against the Bill and its contents. First, though, before I am misrepresented, let me be absolutely clear that electoral fraud is a serious crime and should be taken seriously. It is important that police forces throughout the country have the resources necessary to bring about prosecutions when such fraud takes place. Along with my Opposition colleagues, I of course condemn any actions that seek to undermine the integrity of our democratic process.
As well intentioned as the Bill may be, regulation aimed at party campaigners through criminal law is not the answer. Moreover, the arguments put forward by the hon. Member for Southport (Damien Moore) overestimate the scale of the problem. The proposals in his Bill are an overreaction. Unfortunately, some Conservative Members have talked down our democracy with scaremongering stories of voter fraud. Stories of widespread voter abuse have been parroted by Tory MPs, not least by the hon. Member for North West Norfolk (Sir Henry Bellingham), whom I made aware that I would refer to him. On more than one occasion, he has attested to having evidence of multiple voting by students, but he has been unable to produce the evidence when it was requested of him.
Such stories have been used by the Conservative party to justify the piloting of restrictive identification requirements at the local government elections in May. The requirements will disproportionately affect communities with large numbers of old and disabled people and people from black, Asian and minority ethnic communities. Other regulations are being introduced for future metro mayor elections.
Voters across Bromley, Gosport, Swindon, Woking and Watford will be required to produce ID when they next go to cast their ballot. They will need a piece of photo ID, a piece of non-photo ID and their polling card—all that before being issued with a ballot paper. Those without the necessary ID will not be able to participate in the local elections. They will be denied their democratic entitlement.
One would think we were in the midst of an epidemic of widespread voter fraud, but nothing could be further from the truth. The Conservative party says that electoral fraud through voter impersonation doubled nationally between 2014 and 2016. Although the number of alleged cases of voter impersonation rose from a meagre 21 to a whopping 44, the total number of votes cast in those years rose from 29 million to 64 million in 2016.
The question is whether we need new laws to regulate how we and political parties campaign. I firmly believe that the answer is no. First, such matters are best handled by the Electoral Commission’s code of conduct for campaigners. The Electoral Commission is clear that campaigners should not be involved in the process of assisting other people to complete postal or proxy vote applications or handling postal ballot packs. The Labour party makes that very clear to our activists, and we have incorporated it into our existing code of conduct and disciplinary processes.
In a small number of instances, accessibility is improved by individual campaigners assisting people by returning their voting packs directly to the returning officer or to a polling station. That is particularly true for disabled and elderly voters, who are not provided with public assistance to complete absent votes and face low levels of access to polling stations. Indeed, according to Scope, at the 2010 general election, two thirds of polling stations had
“one or more significant access barriers”
to disabled voters. Leonard Cheshire Disability found that a quarter of the people with disabilities it surveyed found it difficult to vote in person at polling stations at the 2015 general election. My fear is that regulation would criminalise the helpful and prohibit assistance that is otherwise unavailable to those voters who need it.
Regulation of the sort suggested in the Bill would be difficult to enforce and breaches would be almost impossible to detect. It would put off honest campaigners without deterring the dishonest ones. That is not just my view, but a view shared by Alan Mabbutt, a current Conservative party board member, who said that regulations targeted at campaigners
“would do little to help. If a person is prepared to ignore the law on fraud and undue influence they would ignore laws here.”
Timothy Straker QC, a barrister who acts for the Electoral Commission, questioned the need for a criminal offence. He said that regulation would be
“unenforceable and would bring the law and the process into disrepute”.
The Electoral Commission has rightly raised the question of how we define “campaigner”. For instance, if I assist my neighbour in taking their postal vote to a polling station, am I suddenly subjected to the law that the hon. Member for Southport wishes to introduce? There is no accepted definition of “campaigner”. I understand why he wishes to codify that in his Bill, but there will always be exceptions and unanswered questions.
The Bill has many regulatory holes and too many unresolved questions. Although I do not intend to force a Division, I want my opposition and that of many of my colleagues to be formally recorded. The hon. Gentleman talked about new forms for polling staff. Like me, he has been a local authority councillor and will know that the people who man polling stations on polling day are of the highest quality and do not need a form to determine whether they understand when voter fraud is taking place. We are best leaving it to the Electoral Commission and the judgment of those staff who make those decisions on the day.
Question put and agreed to.
Ordered,
That Damien Moore, Mr Simon Clarke, Vicky Ford, Eddie Hughes, Andrew Bowie, Giles Watling, Julia Lopez and Lee Rowley present the Bill.
Damien Moore accordingly presented the Bill.
Bill read the first time; to be read a second time on Friday 15 June, and to be printed (Bill 166).
Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Bill [Lords]
Tuesday 20th February 2018
(6 years, 10 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Act 2018 View all Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Act 2018 Debates Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts Amendment Paper: HL Bill 78-I Marshalled list for Third Reading (PDF, 72KB) - (23 Jan 2018)
The Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Boris Johnson)
I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time.
I should begin by paying tribute to my noble Friend Lord Ahmad for piloting the Bill through the other place with such skill and finesse. The aim of the Bill is to grant Her Majesty’s Government full power over British sanctions policy after we leave the EU and, in a memorable phrase, to take back control.
This Government’s driving purpose is to strengthen Britain’s global role and widen the horizons of our foreign policy in order to advance the interests and promote the values of the British people, but if our diplomacy is to be effective, it cannot be solely declaratory: we must have the means to impose a price on those who would threaten to do us harm. In the last resort, that will sometimes mean the use of force—this Government will not resile from acting when necessary—but more often, we back our diplomacy through sanctions. Today, the UK enforces 36 sanctions regimes, targeted on countries such as North Korea, Syria and Russia and terrorist organisations including al-Qaeda and Daesh. In total, about 2,000 individuals and entities are listed for sanctions, varying from asset freezes and travel bans to trade restrictions and arms embargos. At this moment, assets worth £12.5 billion are frozen in the UK.
Our powers to impose those sanctions and measures against money laundering derive almost entirely from the European Communities Act 1972. I am delighted to say that Parliament will soon repeal that Act by means of the European Union (Withdrawal) Bill, which is now before the other place. When that Act comes into force, it will freeze Britain’s adherence to the existing sanctions regimes, but if we do nothing, we will lose the ability to impose new sanctions or remove current ones. That is why the Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Bill is necessary. It will give any British Government the power to impose, amend or lift an independent battery of UK sanctions, and update measures against money laundering and terrorist financing, thereby restoring our sovereignty over a vital tool of foreign policy.
The House will readily understand the freedom of action that all British Governments today and in the future will regain. If, for example, there is an international crisis and we judge that sanctions are the best response, we will no longer be compelled to wait for consensus among 28 members of the EU. The Bill will give us the freedom to decide on national sanctions as we see fit, bearing in mind that Britain possesses the fifth biggest economy in the world and the largest financial centre in Europe.
Hon. Members will know that sanctions are most effective when jointly enforced by many nations. Nothing in the Bill will stop us concerting our sanctions with any measures imposed by the EU, but if there is no agreement in the EU, as there often is not, Britain can act independently or alongside other allies. If the EU shares our position, we can act together. The outcome will be that Britain enjoys both freedom of manoeuvre and the option of working alongside our European friends. In the main, I hope that the latter will continue and that we can act in tandem, because the truth is that Britain and our European neighbours will always confront the same threats and defend the same values.
As my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister has said, Britain’s unconditional and immoveable commitment to the security and defence of Europe will not change one iota when we leave the EU, and this country has always played a leading role in devising EU sanctions—it is thanks to our national expertise in this field that the UK proposed more than half of all the individuals and entities currently listed for EU sanctions. The EU will have every reason to concert its sanctions policy with us in future, just as we will be happy in principle to work hand in glove with the EU. The Bill will place this British Government and our successors in the strongest possible position. We will be equipped with the power to impose sanctions independently, but without prejudice to our ability to co-ordinate with our European allies.
The Bill is also necessary for the UK to continue to play its full part in the struggle against money laundering and terrorist financing. Without the Bill, we should soon find ourselves in breach of international standards. I am proud to say that Britain was the first G20 country to introduce a public register of beneficial owners of companies, thanks to the Conservative-led Government. We are now going further by creating a public register of the beneficial owners of any non-UK entities that possess or buy property in this country, or that participate in UK Government procurement. No other state is compiling such a register, which will be the first of its kind in the world.
Mr Jonathan Djanogly (Huntingdon) (Con)
May I ask my right hon. Friend to confirm this: when he says property, is that all property or just real property?
Boris Johnson
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that intervention—I was referring to real estate. As I am sure he knows, the proposal has the same intention as the tax on enveloped dwellings that was introduced by the former Chancellor of the Exchequer, which has proved, to the best of my knowledge, to be extremely lucrative for the Exchequer.
Dame Margaret Hodge (Barking) (Lab)
Given the Secretary of State’s commitment to the EU’s action on money laundering, is he saying that the Government will implement the fifth EU anti-money laundering directive, which requires that we all have public registers of beneficial ownership by the end of 2019?
Boris Johnson
As the right hon. Lady will be aware, the UK is already out in front of the rest of the world in insisting on public registry of beneficial ownership, irrespective of the implementation of the fifth EU anti-money laundering directive. As I will explain to the House, we already ask the overseas territories to do far more than other jurisdictions that offer financial services advantages.
Dame Margaret Hodge
I would be most grateful if the Secretary of State would give way again.
Dame Margaret Hodge
I am extremely grateful to the Secretary of State. The reason I asked the question is that the EU’s anti-money laundering directive would have an impact on the UK and Gibraltar. I am interested in whether the Foreign Secretary will implement the directive, given that implementation is required by 2019.
Boris Johnson
I do not know the exact stage of the directive at the moment. To the best of my knowledge, we are in the process of implementing it. It should creep in under the wire and will, I hope, have the beneficial effect that the right hon. Lady desires.
Boris Johnson
I will not, if the right hon. Gentleman will forgive me.
As sanctions have serious consequences for the individuals and entities that are singled out, they should be employed only in accordance with the rule of law, so it may be helpful to the House if I describe the scrupulous procedure laid out in the Bill.
Whenever the Government intend to impose a new sanctions regime, a statutory instrument will be laid before Parliament. When selecting targets, we will apply the legal threshold of “reasonable grounds to suspect”, which is the standard that we currently use for UN and EU sanctions. Both the British Supreme Court and the EU’s general court—the former court of first instance—have endorsed the use of that threshold in recent cases, and it is vital that the UK and our international partners continue to employ the equivalent threshold so that our sanctions policies and theirs can be co-ordinated.
The Bill contains safeguards allowing those listed for sanctions to challenge their designation and receive swift redress if it is warranted. Sanctions are not ends in themselves; they must not be maintained simply out of inertia or force of habit once the necessity for them dies away. The Bill will entitle any designated person to request an administrative reassessment by the Secretary of State, who will have a duty to consider any such request as soon as reasonably practicable. The Secretary of State can amend or revoke the designation in response to new information or a change in the situation. As a last resort, the designated person can apply to challenge the Government’s decision in the courts under the principles of judicial review, and the Bill provides for classified evidence to be shared with the court as appropriate.
Britain is obliged by international law to enforce any sanctions agreed by the UN Security Council. If a court in this country believes that such a designation is unlawful, the Secretary of State can use his or her best endeavours to remove a name from a UN sanctions list, bolstered by the fact that Britain has permanent membership of the Security Council. If a Secretary of State declines to seek a delisting at the UN, the relevant individual could challenge that decision before the courts. In addition, the Bill obliges the Government to conduct an annual review of every sanctions regime and place a report before Parliament. The Government are also required to review each individual designation under all regimes every three years.
The Bill allows the Government to grant licences to allow certain activities that would otherwise be prohibited—for instance, to permit any individuals subject to asset freezes to pay for essential needs such as food or medicine. The Bill will also give the Government the power and flexibility to issue general licences that could, for example, allow aid agencies to provide humanitarian supplies in a country subjected to sanctions.
Nigel Mills (Amber Valley) (Con)
Where assets have been frozen—for example, in the case of Libya and its support for the IRA—does the Secretary of State see any scope for a licence to allow that money to be used to help the victims of such outrageous crimes?
Boris Johnson
I completely concur with the objectives espoused by my hon. Friend. Many people would like to see some compensation flowing from a more prosperous Libya to the victims of IRA terrorism and, indeed, to other victims of terrorism. Given what we have done so far with Libya, it would be very difficult to unfreeze the assets; they are not our assets and it would be difficult for us to procure them. On the other hand, there is scope—working with the Libyan Government as Libya gets back on its feet, which is what we are currently working for —to set up a fund for the victims not just of IRA terrorism in this country, but of terror in Libya as well. That is the way forward: the UK and Libya working together to address that historical injustice. I am grateful to my hon. Friend for raising that subject, on which there are strong feelings both in this House and in the other place.
We must never lose the ability to keep pace with the criminals and terrorists who strain every nerve and sinew to confound and evade our efforts. The Bill provides the Government with the power to make, amend or repeal secondary legislation to combat money laundering and terrorist financing. Behind all this lies our primary goal: to restore the independent power of a global Britain to defend our interests and to exert our rightful influence on the world stage, acting in concert with our European friends whenever possible, sure in the knowledge that we are a force for good. I commend this Bill to the House.
Helen Goodman (Bishop Auckland) (Lab)
This is one of many Bills that we need because of our impending departure from the European Union. We agree that sanctions are a crucial lever in our foreign policy armoury. Indeed, their use and usefulness is demonstrated by the fact that we have 36 sanctions regimes on countries ranging from Afghanistan to Zimbabwe, and covering terrorist organisations such as Daesh and al-Qaeda. We accept that the repeal of the European Communities Act 1972 in the EU (Withdrawal) Bill means that the Government must replace it with domestic powers. However, we have a number of questions, criticisms and challenges for the Government about the way in which they are doing that in the Bill.
Money laundering through the City of London is now estimated at £100 billion a year, and the two clauses in the Bill devoted to the matter are wholly inadequate to tackle this massive problem, which is illegal in itself and also hides and enables other crimes, perverts justice, distorts the economy and is seriously undermining our reputation. International standards to prevent it are set out by the Financial Action Task Force and translated—currently via the EU—to national level. We agree that legislation is needed so that we can continue to honour our international obligations.
Lloyd Russell-Moyle (Brighton, Kemptown) (Lab/Co-op)
Does my hon. Friend agree that if we tackled tax evasion and avoidance, we would not see such modest levels of overseas development? Countries around the world—in Africa and Asia—would be able to finance their own basic services. Those places do have the money, but companies are stealing it via evasion and avoidance.
Helen Goodman
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Quite a lot of the money that is hidden is hidden by corrupt regimes, particularly in Africa.
A major criticism of the Bill as first drafted was of its Henry VIII clauses. Throughout, the Bill was giving Ministers the power to make regulations—in other words, to make law that cannot be amended by Parliament and is sometimes made without even any debate. In our consideration of the EU (Withdrawal) Bill, Members across the House complained that the level of the Henry VIII powers was so excessive that the Government agreed to a sifting Committee in order to limit the concentration of the power of the Executive. Arguably, with no sunset clause, this Bill is even worse in this respect. Speaking in the other place, the well-named and noble Lord Judge described it as a “bonanza of regulations” and the “Regulation Bulk Buy” Bill. Their lordships defeated the Government twice in votes on this. I hope that the Government will not now seek to undo those changes to the Bill. If so, we will oppose them.
It is surely obvious to everyone that sanctions regimes are effective only when they are co-ordinated internationally, as the Foreign Secretary acknowledged, and we need maximum support across the world and agreed implementation mechanisms to enforce them. However, he did not really answer some of the questions as to how that is going to be done post Brexit. Half our sanctions emanate from the EU. I am not saying that this is necessarily a matter for legislation, but surely the Government should have a plan for how we are going to be involved in EU decision making on sanctions regimes and the implementation of those regimes. Ukraine is a good example of where that is needed. What specific plans has the Foreign Secretary developed for a framework to provide for continued co-operation with the EU on foreign policy issues after we leave? What discussions have been held on that particular issue in the Brexit talks? What are the Government seeking to achieve in their negotiations with the EU on that matter? We were warned last week by the three spy chiefs that, without co-operation with our EU partners in intelligence sharing, policing and judicial matters, it would be difficult to enforce compliance on sanctions, which are vital for dealing with terrorism and proliferation.
Labour’s view is that the core principles of sanctions policy should be that sanctions are targeted to hit regimes rather than ordinary people; minimise the humanitarian impact on innocent civilians; and have clear objectives, including well-defined and realistic demands against which compliance can be judged, with a clear exit strategy. There should be effective arrangements for implementation and enforcement, especially in neighbouring countries, and sanctions should avoid unnecessary adverse impacts on UK economic and commercial interests. We will seek to amend the Bill to ensure that those principles are adhered to throughout.
One very big and obvious hole in the Bill is its failure to incorporate Magnitsky clauses, which the House has repeatedly supported and voted for. Sergei Magnitsky was a Russian lawyer who uncovered large-scale tax fraud in Russia. For his pains, he was imprisoned and tortured throughout a whole year, finally dying having been brutally beaten up while chained to a bed. We will be tabling a Magnitsky clause that would enable sanctions to be made in order to prevent or respond to gross human rights violations. Such provisions have been adopted in the United States and Canada, and they were also reflected in the Criminal Finances Act 2017. I cannot understand how or why the Foreign Secretary has missed this opportunity; perhaps he has been too busy designing bridges. Such a step is not just about Russia. We are now in the strange position that the United States has tougher sanctions than we do on Myanmar.
Boris Johnson
I hesitate to accuse the hon. Lady of failure to read the Bill, but clause 1(2) makes it absolutely clear that sanctions can be imposed to promote human rights. A fortiori, that obviously involves a Magnitsky clause to prevent the gross abuse of human rights. The measure that she seeks is in the Bill.
Helen Goodman
I am afraid that I do not think the Bill makes that clear. First, it does not include the phrase, “gross human rights abuses”, which the Foreign Secretary just used, and furthermore, it does not refer to public officials. This is a matter that we can debate upstairs in Committee, and I will be happy to do so with the Minister.
Another key area that the Government have failed to address properly is the position of refugees and victims of human trafficking. Last month, the House unanimously resolved:
“That…conflict resolution…and the protection of human rights should be at the heart of UK foreign policy and that effective action should be taken to alleviate the refugee crisis”.
There are now 66 million refugees—more than there have ever been and more than the population of the United Kingdom. The flow of desperate people across the Mediterranean and through Turkey is continuing. Yet the Bill gives no impression that Ministers have given any thought whatsoever to the plight of these people, who are seeking refuge from desperate and protracted conflicts around the world.
The Minister for Europe and the Americas (Sir Alan Duncan)
May I draw the hon. Lady’s attention again to clause 1(2)? Paragraph (e) mentions exactly what she is talking about—promoting
“the resolution of armed conflicts or the protection of civilians in conflict zones”.
Paragraphs (f), (g) and (h) refer exactly to the human rights abuses that my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary mentioned in response to her earlier comments.
Helen Goodman
That is absolutely true, but if the Minister reads a little further into the Bill and looks at clauses 6 and 7 on aircraft and shipping, he will see that there are some problems at that point. Again, we can come back to this in Committee.
The Bill states that prohibitions can be applied to UK nationals and companies based in the United Kingdom, but not against companies based or incorporated in the British overseas territories. Recent reports from UN monitors implicate territories such as the British Virgin Islands in the setting up of front companies that helped North Korea to evade the sanctions imposed on it. The problem of sanctions avoidance is very serious. Last week, I was told in answer to a written parliamentary question that the total cost of financial sanctions reported as having been breached last year was £170 million. This afternoon, I received a letter from the Treasury, which has looked at the numbers again and says that the number is £1.4 billion. We need to look at this in more detail in Committee.
I now turn to the anti-money laundering provisions—what one might call the McMafia section of the Bill. To set this in context, the Home Affairs Committee report of June 2016 found:
“Money laundering is undoubtedly a problem in the UK…It is disgraceful that at least a hundred billion pounds is being laundered through the UK every year. If the UK is to remain the centre of global finance, this must be addressed.”
It pointed out that
“money laundering takes many…forms…from complex financial vehicles and tax havens around the world through to property investments in London…and high value jewellery. It is astonishing that just 335 out of some 1.2 million property transactions…were deemed to be suspicious. This suggests to us that supervision of the property market is totally inadequate”.
At the moment, it is far too easy—
Layla Moran (Oxford West and Abingdon) (LD)
Is the hon. Lady aware of the geographical targeting orders piloted by the USA that we were told about in the Public Accounts Committee during our trip to Washington last week? Does she know that 30% of the properties investigated were found, in the end, to be owned by nefarious people?
Helen Goodman
That is very shocking. I did not know about it. I hope that the hon. Lady will dilate on the matter further during the debate.
It is obviously possible for people to buy a property, take in rent in perpetuity and have a clean income. In evidence to the Home Affairs Committee, the surveyor Henry Pryor said:
“we do have the equivalent of a welcome mat out for anybody to come if you want to launder your money.”
Money laundering enables the corrupt to live in comfort and security. It is also used to finance other serious and organised crime such as drug dealing, human trafficking, terrorism and even the illegal arms trade and WMD sanctions busting. The click of a computer mouse in London or the overseas territories can mean untold misery across the globe. The Government’s own impact assessment for the Bill says:
“As a global financial centre, the UK is particularly exposed to the threat of being exploited as a destination or transit point for illicit funds”.
Ministers know that this is a problem. Between 2013 and 2016, David Cameron’s Government issued increasingly strong statements and promises, culminating in the May 2016 global summit. There were three specific proposals: a transparent register of beneficial owners of all companies registered in the UK, similar registers in the British overseas territories and Crown dependencies, and a public register of foreign owners of UK property. However, the implementation has been halting, under-resourced, partial and confused. Currently we have at least 25 different regulatory bodies. It is true that we can now see on the Companies House register who the person is with significant control, but last year 400,000 companies failed to submit the information. Companies House has no due diligence procedure and employs only 20 people to supervise 4 million entries.
Lloyd Russell-Moyle
Does my hon. Friend share my concern that, when one of my constituents reported a fraudulent entry in the Companies House register, the response from Companies House was that it does not do the enforcement, but is just the registry? This fraud is a mockery of the whole registry system.
Helen Goodman
My hon. Friend has brought precisely the point to the House in highlighting that unfortunate episode.
Registers have been introduced in some of the British overseas territories, but they can be accessed by the authorities in London only when the authorities have a reason to be suspicious. The inadequacy of that approach was demonstrated by the publication of the Panama papers and the Paradise papers. According to the Guardian investigators, the law firm Mossack Fonseca, operating out of Panama, acted for 113,000 companies incorporated in the British Virgin Islands, which hosts 950,000 offshore companies. That is a country with a population of 30,000. This is public interest journalism at its best—fearless, determined and forensic. Had it not been for the excellent investigatory journalism, we would not have known that Britain’s high street banks processed $740 million from a vast money-laundering operation run by Russian criminals through anonymously owned firms, nor that Mukhtar Ablyazov, who fled Kazakhstan in 2009 after $10 billion went missing from the bank he chaired, had a Cayman Islands trust set up by law firm Appleby.
Significantly, HMRC has been able to use the information revealed in Panama and Paradise to open civil and criminal investigations into 66 people and pursue arrests for a £125 million fraud, tackle insider trading and place dozens of high net worth individuals under review. Imagine how much more effective it could be if transparency were the rule and not the exception.
Mr Paul Sweeney (Glasgow North East) (Lab/Co-op)
My hon. Friend makes a good series of points about the nature of the British overseas territories and Crown dependencies. Given that the Bill considers the whole nature of our governance structures after Brexit, does she agree that we should look in a broader sense at the curious structure of British overseas territories and Crown dependencies? We should perhaps follow the example of France, which has incorporated its overseas territories into its metropolitan country and given them a democratic place in its legislature. We could consider the same thing.
Helen Goodman
My hon. Friend is right that the situation is complex—we have one legal regime for the overseas territories and another for the Crown dependencies—but I think that that would be beyond the scope of the Bill.
The all-party parliamentary group on responsible tax, led by my right hon. Friend the Member for Barking (Dame Margaret Hodge), has been pursuing this agenda energetically for several years now, and across the House, Members want effective action.
Another scandal is the use of London property by oligarchs, corrupt officials and gangsters from across the globe. I am talking about people like Karime Macías, the Mexican wife of the former Veracruz Governor Duarte. He has been imprisoned and charged with corruption, money laundering and involvement in organised crime. His years in office saw a spike in disappearances and murders, while she claims to be a fugitive in London.
When I was young, if you drove through Chelsea at night, it was full of light because people actually lived there. Now, swathes of London are pitch black, as properties are bought simply as money safes. Meanwhile, in the outer boroughs, which the Foreign Secretary never visits—
Boris Johnson
As the hon. Lady may recollect, I was never out of the outer boroughs when I was Mayor of London, and the former Mayor of London visited Havana more often than he visited Havering.
Helen Goodman
I wish the Foreign Secretary was as energetic in his pursuit of the corrupt in this Bill as he is concerned to defend his own record on travelling around the London underground.
In the outer-London boroughs, new buildings are bought off plan and some never even have the cellophane unwrapped. Global Witness has found that 86,000 properties in this country are owned by companies in secrecy jurisdictions. The Cayman Islands representatives told me, when they came to see me in preparation for the Bill, that they were responsible for 11% of the property investment in Britain, pushing up prices so that they are unaffordable, and young people’s home ownership in this country is now at an all-time low.
The new register promised by the Government in 2015 has been put back by six years. There must be a suspicion that this secrecy continues because some senior Tories use it. Just one example will suffice. Lord Sassoon was revealed by the Paradise papers to have been a beneficiary of a Bahamas trust fund that has sheltered a family fortune worth hundreds of millions of dollars, yet he was a Treasury Minister and the man charged with presiding over the Financial Action Task Force—the very body tasked with setting the standards to combat money laundering.
We are going to pursue all these issues over the coming weeks. I cannot do better than quote the global summit communiqué, which said:
“Corruption is at the heart of so many of the world’s problems. It erodes public trust in government, undermines the rule of law, and may give rise to political and economic grievances that…fuel violent extremism. Tackling corruption is vital for sustaining economic stability and growth, maintaining security of societies, protecting human rights, reducing poverty, protecting the environment for future generations and addressing serious and organised crime…We need to face this challenge openly and frankly”.
Mr Andrew Mitchell (Sutton Coldfield) (Con)
I draw the House’s attention to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests.
I want to start by making it clear that I think this is a very good Bill. It is clearly the right approach to take in these circumstances and a good administrative measure. It delivers sensible and orderly governance and addresses quite rightly the post-Brexit situation and the new framework for implementing sanctions. My purpose in this debate is to suggest two ways in which the Bill can be improved further.
First, I draw the Foreign Secretary’s attention to an area of the Bill that the Minister for Europe and the Americas understands extremely well. Sanctions regimes inevitably affect the peace-building work that humanitarian agencies do in some fragile and difficult places, and in particular key NGOs operating in sanctioned countries. I pay tribute to the remarkable work that is being done by British NGOs in some very difficult parts of the world; I am thinking, for instance, of Syria and Yemen.
Clare Short, the distinguished former International Development Secretary—she set up DFID—and I gave evidence to the Select Committee on the difficulties that can arise for the agencies on occasion. They can fall foul of terrorism measures, which adversely affect their life-saving work. There are difficulties in working in lawless areas, which inevitably involves negotiating with some extremely bad people. Under the regime that the Foreign Secretary is ushering in, the Bill will bring much greater clarity for donors who deliver via NGOs and for banks worried that they may fall foul of the regulations. It will help to reduce bank de-risking—I have heard of NGOs not being able to maintain access to their bank accounts or to transfer funds because of the regulations—when banks fear that they may breach sanctions by providing banking services. I hope the Bill will reduce banks’ concerns, assist transport and logistics companies in their work, help NGOs to access formal banking channels, and reduce or eliminate possibilities for remittancing, which, as Members on both sides of the House will know, involves a far bigger transfer of funds to the poor world than international aid.
The Geneva convention states that humanitarian aid be provided to those most in need, without discrimination. The Bill has the capacity to empower leading UK and experienced international charities to carry out our international obligations under such conventions yet more effectively. Building on that, we want to see a general licensing system for financial transactions for the provision of goods and services, which are essential to the delivery of critical aid, for individuals and entities that may be located in areas covered by sanctions.
My first point is that, while accepting that the Government have international obligations in respect of sanctions regimes that inevitably have an impact on the Government’s ability to deliver those commitments in full and on all occasions, the Bill nevertheless has the power to improve this area greatly. I hope the Minister for Europe and the Americas—as I have said, he has a very strong understanding of these matters from his time as an International Development Minister—will say a word or two about that tonight.
My second point is also about an area in which the Bill can be improved. This was mentioned by the hon. Member for Bishop Auckland (Helen Goodman), who led for the Opposition. It builds on the important comments made recently by David Cameron, the former Prime Minister, about the Magnitsky rules and the Magnitsky amendment, and I hope that the Bill is susceptible to improvement in that respect.
In spite of our self-image as a country that lives by the rule of law, the reality is that officials from autocracies around the world who are guilty of appalling crimes come to London to live safely and comfortably without much interference from us. There is now a mechanism to prevent this, which is used by the United States and other countries, called the Magnitsky Act. It is named after the Russian whistleblower Sergei Magnitsky, the appalling treatment of whom was described by the hon. Lady. The Magnitsky Act freezes the assets and bans the visas of human rights violators from around the world. The State Department recently published its Magnitsky list, which includes the son of Russia’s general prosecutor, a general from Myanmar implicated in ethnic cleansing, the ex-dictator of Gambia, a shady international fraudster from Israel and a retired Pakistani colonel suspected of organ trafficking. Alarmingly, every single person on that list is able to travel to the United Kingdom.
Last year, Parliament took an important step to combat this impunity by passing the Magnitsky amendment to the Criminal Finances Bill, under which human rights violators can now have their assets frozen by the Government. Unfortunately, the law is narrowly defined and does not match the standard of other Magnitsky laws around the world. For example, it does not address the issue of visas, and it places a huge burden on the Government in going to court to obtain an order to freeze assets, rather than giving my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary the power to do so by decree.
The Magnitsky amendment to this Bill—I very much hope it will be considered in Committee or, if not, on Report—would bring our legislation into conformity with Magnitsky Acts around the world. Any amendment would define precisely the types of human rights violators to be sanctioned, and most importantly, it would follow an example set by the United States and other countries by placing a requirement on the Government to report annually to Parliament on how effectively the sanctions regime is being used. In my judgment, we should not allow the Government to declare victory over human rights violators with the passage of a law that never gets implemented. I believe that such an amendment may well attract support from all right hon. and hon. Members on both sides of the House. I submit that, if passed, it would bring this aspect of UK law up to international standards.
John Penrose (Weston-super-Mare) (Con)
As the Prime Minister’s anti-corruption champion, I am listening very carefully to what my right hon. Friend is suggesting. He mentioned existing legal powers. Does he have any sense of how often they are being used at the moment, even though he believes they are relatively narrowly defined?
Mr Mitchell
It is early days, but I think the existing powers are being used rather less than my hon. Friend and I would wish, and I have read out a list of people who are sanctioned by other countries, but not sanctioned by the UK. That was my second point.
My final point relates to the much discussed issue of open registers and the overseas territories. The House will recall the actions of the coalition Government and Britain’s leadership at the G8 in tackling tax evasion and tax havens. I thought the hon. Member for Bishop Auckland was a touch too curmudgeonly in acknowledging the extent to which the coalition Government made real progress on those matters. The UK has introduced publicly accessible registers of people with significant control, abolished bearer or anonymous shares and introduced unexplained wealth orders, while the anti-bribery law was finally introduced by the coalition Government. Britain has a proud record of world leadership on this under a Conservative-led Government.
This is the fourth occasion on which I, along with my right hon. and hon. Friends—under the able, cross-party leadership of the right hon. Member for Barking (Dame Margaret Hodge)—have tried to coax the Government into visiting on the overseas territories the same level of openness and transparency as we have in this country. Let us be clear on the constitutional position, which the Government set out in 2012:
“As a matter of constitutional law the UK Parliament has unlimited power to legislate for the Territories.”
The overseas territories themselves recognise that they gain hugely from their relationship with the United Kingdom.
The overseas territories have been resistant to this argument for three reasons. The first—let us call it the Dutch Antilles argument—is that if they have open registers, all the hot money will head off to other less law-abiding jurisdictions. Leaving aside the issue of whether any decent person should wish to handle hot money obtained through corruption or worse, the fact is that the international consensus is to bear down on such havens, and their footprint is narrowing. Indeed, havens that embrace such transparency will secure a business advantage precisely because their legitimate business will no longer be tainted by fears of the reverse. There is an understanding of this point in at least some of the overseas territories, which, if I may put it this way, camp on the prayer of St Augustine: “O Lord, make me chaste, but not yet.”
The second argument, which we must address head-on, is that the overseas territories’ private registers are already available to lawmakers and regulators such as the Inland Revenue. The territories proudly say that they can turn around inquiries from HMRC within hours. This is commendable, but it completely misses the point. That fact is underlined by the recent release of information by journalists, which the hon. Member for Bishop Auckland mentioned. Registers must be open—to civil society, the media, journalists, non-governmental organisations—if all the relevant dots are to be joined up, as the release of the Paradise papers so clearly shows. With the best will in the world, the regulatory authorities are not in that business, and narrow questions from regulatory authorities simply do not suffice.
Finally, I come to the point made movingly by the Foreign Secretary that many, although not all, overseas territories suffered an existential calamity from the recent hurricanes. The whole House will share his concern. I am sure the whole House can assist by agreeing, in any amendment, a longer but definitive period of time in which this reform in the overseas territories should take place.
Around the world, the UK is looked to and respected for its leadership on international development. Helping the poorest in often far-flung places is written deep into this country’s DNA. It is who we are as a Parliament. The appalling but temporary crisis afflicting Oxfam will not change that. We have an obligation, not least to our own taxpayers, to champion transparency and openness, and to have zero tolerance towards corruption. The highly respected Africa Progress Panel has shown that in the Democratic Republic of the Congo more than £1.5 billion of stolen funds and taxes have disappeared. These are funds stolen from some of the poorest people on the planet, who by contrast live in one of the richest mineral and resource-endowed countries in the world. As the World Bank has made clear, the money stolen from the people of Africa through unpaid taxes or concealment dwarfs all the foreign direct investment and international development money that flows into Africa each year. Much of that money ends up salted away in the tax havens I have described. We owe it to the poor of Africa, as well as to our own taxpayers, to take the action we can to bring about an end to this scandal.
I urge the Government, on this fourth occasion, to look very seriously at the amendment that will undoubtedly be tabled by the right hon. Member for Barking (Dame Margaret Hodge) on Report, if not before. Four times we have been around this track. There is significant support on both sides of the House for that amendment. I urge those on the Treasury Bench to look very seriously at whether they can accommodate the House of Commons on this point.
Alison Thewliss (Glasgow Central) (SNP)
This is another Bill that has been caused by Brexit. EU co-operation has been crucial to sanctions and anti-money laundering, and we have moved quite far along the road together as friends, neighbours and colleagues. A lot of concerns about the Bill have been voiced in relation to the justification of proportionality, and whether it takes us in the right direction to give us the opportunity to correct the flaws in our own systems.
Sanctions, as other hon. Members has said, are effective when we have co-operation, particularly as an EU block. That reflects the limitations of sanctions from the UN Security Council, because there is not always agreement among its permanent members. We need to find our place. Our place is not in the EU, as it was, but it is not entirely as other states are in the world. We need to find out where we are. Tom Keatinge from the Royal United Services Institute has said that we may have greater flexibility, but we will certainly have less influence. Ministers need to be reminded of that. I see that the Foreign Secretary has scuttled off without hearing me, which is kind of him. Without the active co-operation and engagement of Ministers with the EU, we will not be able to be the most effective at imposing sanctions. We should not pour our own collective efforts over the years down the stank just because we are leaving the EU. Unilateral sanctions bring with them a recognised risk that while we might want to do the right thing there may be repercussions. Being a part of EU collective action cushions us to an extent from that risk. We do not want to be marginalised in the world. We must take care to make sure that does not happen.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
The hon. Lady makes a valid point, although I have a different opinion on Brexit. Does she not agree that our ability to implement sanctions and address money laundering are essential components of our exit from Europe and that it is vital we have the same protections in place in the international market? We must look at the possibility of even enhancing them and making them even stronger.
Alison Thewliss
I agree that we perhaps can and should enhance what we do, but we must take care not to lose what we have so far. We must not lose that co-operation and sense of common purpose against evils in the world, which we have had as a part of the EU.
I support the points on human rights made by the hon. Member for Bishop Auckland (Helen Goodman). Ministers did not quite recognise the point that paragraphs (e), (f), (g) and (h) in clause 1(2) are in the Bill because they were put there by a Labour Lord. She may have made that point, but I did not want to let it pass without having recognised it. The Government should not be taking credit for things they did not do and did not put in the Bill. Those paragraphs should be in the Bill. Anything that can enhance the importance of human rights in the Bill should be there.
The NGO sanctions and counter-terrorism working group, chaired by Bond and the Charity Finance Group, has asked for protection in law for humanitarian and peace-building work, as that is, to a degree, currently inhibited by the EU regulatory framework on sanctions. As the right hon. Member for Sutton Coldfield (Mr Mitchell) set out, aid operations in parts of the world that are extremely dangerous and under sanctions from the UN and the EU still have to have aid workers. They have to build up relationships on the ground. They may not be comfortable with them and they may be difficult, but aid would not happen without them.
Currently, there is not sufficient protection in the Bill. There is reference to general licences with a bit more focus on guidance. Clause 37(1) states that the Minister who makes the regulations must issue guidance, but clause 37(2) states only that guidance “may” include guidance about compliance enforcement and disregards. That is not concrete enough. The guidance should be more certain, so that people know the regime they are working under, know the risks involved in what they are about to do and know if there will be any comeback from the actions they take. I do not think that that is clear enough, and I would like to see improvements in this area of the Bill. More concrete assurances are required.
That concern is shared by the banks. The UK Finance briefing on the Bill says that there is a fear of misuse, but there has to be a way to get around that. It provides the example of banks avoiding any transactions whatever with Iran, due to the risk of being sanctioned by the US—its sanctions regime is far-reaching. That risk alone has a chilling effect on its transactions in that area, regardless of any actual certainty. Sanctions will have an impact on such countries for many years to come, even after sanctions have ended. Banks need to have the confidence that they can deal with a country consistently over a number of years without falling foul of sanctions that suddenly reappear. The people working in such countries need to interact with donors, banks and transport and logistics companies. They need comfort on that. They need to buy fuel. They need to buy mobile phones. They need to make payments to move about the country and to let aid flow. For example, it is not possible to move around Yemen because there are different forces imposing different visa regimes. Moving around the country may involve making payments that fall foul of sanctions.
Stephen Kerr (Stirling) (Con)
Is the hon. Lady in effect agreeing with the Law Society of Scotland’s interpretation of the need in clause 1 for a list of all sanctions, including descriptions of any designated person and types of sanction imposed, and exemptions from such sanctions? Is that the thrust of the point she is making, because I agree with that?
Alison Thewliss
I thank the hon. Gentleman for agreeing with me. It is very rare and very nice, and I thank him for it. Yes, there has to be a good deal more clarity. I welcome the Law Society’s view, because that is not clear in the Bill. If people are working in that environment, they need certainty. For aid to flow and for banking transactions to flow, there has to be clarity.
UK Finance seeks further detail in clause 18 on extra-territorial application. It wants to know exactly what a UK element constitutes and what its reporting obligations might be under that regime, because it is not entirely clear.
Scrutiny and transparency are somewhat lacking. There is a lot of scope in the Bill for Ministers to create significant new criminal offences through secondary legislation, some of which would carry a sentence of 10 years in prison under clause 17(6). It is constitutionally unacceptable for that type of thing to be created by Ministers, and it is not just me saying that. The House of Lords Constitution Committee wants beefed-up parliamentary scrutiny, and the House of Lords Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee states that the provisions
“confer exceptionally wide powers which are capable of being applied to a very wide range of persons, with a very wide discretion being given to Ministers to determine the persons against whom sanctions measures may be applied.”
We should be concerned about that and seek corrections later in the process.
The Secretary of State, who has left his place, may not make decisions in haste, but we have to be concerned about the future. This is not a Bill for just now, but for many years to come, so the powers that we put in it are very important. The European Scrutiny Committee currently looks at EU sanctions that go through. We need to know what scrutiny process in this place will replace that, because it is important to ensure that things are being done properly and are above board.
At clause 21(4)(a) and (b) and clause 25(3)(a) and (b), a review process of three years from the laying of a sanction is mentioned. I would like clarity from the Government about why that is three years, because I understand that in the EU process it is only one. The Secretary of State said that a person who has been subject to a sanction has the ability to request from him that it is reviewed. Given that circumstances change and given the way of the world today, perhaps three years is a little too restrictive. We might want to push that down a bit further, or at least give scope for it to be varied, given the circumstances.
Clause 41—a Henry VIII clause, which has the power to authorise additional sanctions—is very like the other clause that I just mentioned, and again, the Lords Constitution Committee had concerns when it looked at it. The clause allows the amending of the definition of sanctions and puts a lot of powers into the hands of Ministers. What is the mechanism, the clause or the parliamentary check on that? Where is the means for Parliament and Committees of the House to have their say on the scrutiny of that? It is fundamentally important to have checks and balances in the system.
I am a member of the all-party parliamentary group on responsible tax, as is the right hon. Member for Barking (Dame Margaret Hodge), and I am pleased to see her amendment on beneficial ownership. I look forward to hearing her later on in the debate hopefully talking about that a wee bit more. There are a lot of issues about working with overseas territories and Crown dependencies. Much as I do not wish the House to legislate on Scottish matters, I do not want us to legislate for overseas territories or Crown dependencies without consent. That is very important. If we want to get buy-in and compliance, imposing things upon people may not necessarily be the best way to do it.
Sammy Wilson
The hon. Lady has hit on a very important point. If changes are to be made in the Crown dependencies and overseas territories, it must be by persuasion, rather than imposition. Does she agree that so far, by using persuasion, significant changes have been made in transparency in those countries? That should perhaps be the thrust of future Government policy to ensure that these areas do not become places where money can be hidden and laundered.
Alison Thewliss
We have to be very careful. To an extent, we push people and give them a carrot, and in a sense, we have a stick. We have to weigh up in all of this where exactly they are on that continuum and with compliance. Will Ministers tell us what conversations they have had with the likes of Guernsey and Jersey? Do they have confirmation of a permissive extent clause? I am very keen to see open registers. The right hon. Member for Sutton Coldfield laid out some points on that excellently. If the registers are there, they should be publicly available. We want to see transparency everywhere, but we also need to bear in mind that we have a long way to go on ensuring that everything that we do is absolutely correct and proper.
There are clearly issues and disputes among people about their interpretation of the proposals. Having read a submission from Jersey and Guernsey, I know that their account of affairs is quite different from other people’s. Perhaps we will have time in Committee to discuss this a wee bit more, take evidence and see in more detail exactly what needs to be done, how far people can be pushed, cajoled or brought along, or whether or not we need take this action and the extent to which it has a different force.
Dame Margaret Hodge
I am intrigued by the hon. Lady’s contribution. We all want to move forward on the basis of consent, but I slightly disagree with her about how fast the overseas territories are moving. It has been five years since David Cameron first encouraged them to develop public registers of interest. Will she give us some indication of when she thinks that the broader interest of having those public registers and the role that they could play in tackling financial crime would override her absolutely instinctive desire to seek consent in moving forward?
Alison Thewliss
I agree. That is the point I was trying to make, fairly badly I suppose: how long do we leave it? Has it been five years with no sign of anything, or five years with some sign of something? We need more conversations to see exactly where things are, but I am keen to support the right hon. Lady’s amendment.
There is slightly more concern about overseas territories such as the British Virgin Islands and Bermuda. When we look at the extent of the Panama papers and the Paradise papers, we cannot fail to be deeply concerned by the extent of nefarious transactions, out-and-out theft and money laundering, particularly when it involves, as other Members have said, the siphoning—the guzzling —of funds from countries whose populations can least afford it. We should be deeply concerned about that, and there seems to be little indication that they will comply at all. Perhaps there is a different approach from the Crown dependencies and the overseas territories on how willing they are to comply with what has to be done to make things transparent and open.
Moving on to part 2 and clauses 43 and 44, on the progress towards beneficial owners of overseas entities. This is very encouraging, but again the thing with the Bill is that action is required. Action is required to check up on all these companies and registrations. Action is required on enforcement and prosecution, and enforcement action requires agencies, intelligence, people and boots on the ground to make sure that it is done. It is fine to have law, but if we do not have anybody to enforce it, there is absolutely no point at all.
Scottish limited partnerships are a particular example of where things are not being enforced. This was bequeathed to me by Roger Mullin, and I am very grateful. It is estimated by Richard Smith and David Leask, who have been working hard on this issue—hon. Members will have seen some of David’s reports in The Herald—that an estimated 20,000 to 28,000 SLPs are of concern. The Herald recently reported that a former president of Peru has been accused of taking £4 million of bribes that have been funnelled through a shell firm based in Scotland. These things should be checked up on and enforcement action should have been taken, but SLPs have become a cover for all manner of murky and dubious behaviour.
As Transparency International and others have said, the missing link in all this is Companies House, because it does not have the duty to refuse a company’s registration; it has to register the company. It does not check up on whether it is legitimate, or whether the people who are registering it actually exist, and it is less compliant than the agents who use it, so there is no benefit to someone going through an agent if they can go through Companies House and avoid all the scrutiny. We have an opportunity in the Bill to close that loophole, because for me, Companies House is ignoring its money laundering duty.
There are wider concerns about shell companies. I invite the Minister to look at New Zealand, which was in a similar situation. However, its regulations have seen a near eradication of its 5,000 shell companies, which were registered to only about a dozen addresses in New Zealand. Part of the solution was a requirement for a New Zealand-based director, which made a huge difference almost overnight.
Mr Sweeney
Another interesting example from the recent Labour Government in New Zealand is the idea that they could ban the overseas ownership of property. Given the huge inflationary pressure in the UK housing market, usually from the opaque overseas ownership of UK property, perhaps we ought to consider that measure in this country as well.
Alison Thewliss
Yes, that would be a very useful addition. The Secretary of State did not answer the questions on the fifth money laundering directive: how it will be transposed; how it will be scrutinised; if there is a transitional phase; what that transition will look like; how we will prevent any loopholes; and how we will make sure that criminals do not exploit that transition.
Sir Alan Duncan
Perhaps at this stage I can give the hon. Members for Glasgow Central (Alison Thewliss) and for Bishop Auckland (Helen Goodman) the answer they are seeking on the fifth money laundering directive. It will be published in the summer of 2018 and member states will have 18 months to implement it. That will be after we leave the EU, so whether we or Gibraltar are legally required to transpose will depend on the terms of the implementation period, which of course are under negotiation.
Helen Goodman
Perhaps the hon. Lady would like to ask the Minister whether the powers he is taking in chapter 3—temporary powers in relation to EU sanctions lists—will not give him the power to enforce the fifth money laundering directive.
Alison Thewliss
That is a very good question. I do not know whether the Minister wants to take this opportunity to answer it—perhaps not. He has heard the question, so I need not repeat it.
Finally, I want to refer to the Scottish Government, because aspects of the Bill reflect some of the powers that lie within Scotland. The Court of Session is referred to in clause 33(2) and clause 34(2). What consultation has there been with the legal profession in Scotland and with the Scottish Government on that? On clause 47 —“Regulations: general”—the power to change devolved legislation under the negative procedure is really not cool. It is not just I who object to this; the Library briefing states that this will
“enable ministers to make supplemental, incidental, consequential, transitional or saving provisions repealing or otherwise amending existing legislation, including devolved legislation.”
Lord Judge referred to this clause as “monstrous”. Has the Scottish Government been consulted on this provision? What has the Minister got to say about this? This power grab, hidden on page 35 of the Bill, is something that I will seek to amend in Committee.
I support any moves to improve the scope of the Bill, and I look forward to hearing the rest of the debate.
Mr Jonathan Djanogly (Huntingdon) (Con)
The Bill constitutes one piece of a patchwork of laws that are currently going through Parliament to create a post-Brexit framework of legislation, but it is potentially much more than just an enabler for the UK to implement sanctions post Brexit. Thinking about the Bill, it became clear to me how many scenarios it will actually cover, from sanctions used as an alternative to military or technological warfare to sanctions used to express the protection of national sovereignty or to counter financial corruption or human rights abuses, and in each case at state or individual level.
In short, I think that this is a good piece of legislation that will address the mechanical issues that we need to implement. As the Foreign Secretary has said, it recognises that the majority of sanctions implemented by the UK are derived from UN Security Council resolutions or EU multilateral agreements. In practice, our EU and domestically derived powers to implement multilateral sanctions and any domestically generated ones will be limited by redundant or inadequate UK legislation. Therefore, mechanically, the Bill does the job.
I have seen the Lords amendments to the Bill. As is so often the case, the other place has done a thorough job of tightening up these inherently intrusive provisions to provide more focus and to take on board human rights considerations and reporting requirements. There was also a significant narrowing of the Henry VIII powers to create new sanctions, which is generally to be welcomed.
However, there is of course much more to consider than just whether we can practically implement sanctions. There are also the policy questions of what types of sanctions we want to issue; to what extent we wish to continue following the sanctions regimes of various national groupings, or whether we increasingly want to assert our own new policy post Brexit; and how our view ties in with our wider policy objectives on the trade and security fronts going into our Brexit negotiations.
In that context, I recognise and strongly support how the Prime Minister spoke out recently in Munich, and before that in her Mansion House speech and on her visit to Estonia, against Russia meddling in elections and planting false stories in the media to “weaponise information”, and also against its aggression towards eastern Europe, which is threatening the international order. However, I suggest that this admirable and strong rhetoric needs to be backed up with more specific proposals showing how and with whom we intend to use sanctions in the post-Brexit world. I was somewhat surprised that more space was not given to that policy issue in the Foreign Secretary’s speech this evening. Yes, of course trade policy will be vital post Brexit, but so will our ability to protect our trade interests and our wider democratic values.
More to the point, if we do not stand up, engage on this issue and lead in the way that many countries expect us to, our authority and influence could quickly disappear. The UK was a party to the Budapest memorandum, by which Ukraine renounced its nuclear weapons in return for what it thought would be peace with Russia. But when it came to Europe taking ownership following the betrayal by Russia and its occupation of Crimea and east Ukraine, it was France and Germany, rather than the UK, that led on sanctions.
Is that a portent of post-Brexit Europe, with reducing UK influence? If we do not lead, will we simply fade away to relative international insignificance, in the same way that a couple of months ago the UK lost its seat on the International Court of Justice for the first time since its foundation in 1946? I repeat that we need leadership on this issue as to where we want to place ourselves as an international player, if we are no longer the global superpower we once were.
The key emerging issue on our future trade with the EU is that of regulatory alignment—whether we have it at all and, if so, whether it should be implemented by our choice or by tying ourselves to future changes through membership of the European economic area, for instance. The debate over alignment also holds for sanctions, but with a key difference, I believe: barring the extreme positions on the far left and the UKIP-style non-interventionist right, most of us would agree that close co-operation with the EU and the US will remain vital, and perhaps even more so now that we are possibly to lose our seat at the EU table and lose the leading role that the Foreign Secretary referred to in his speech today. That seems to have been confirmed by the Prime Minister in Munich last Friday, when she said that the UK will be leaving the EU’s common foreign and security policy.
Finding a new policy is therefore vital. It is no coincidence that Russia is delighted with the idea of Brexit, not least because of the potential weakening effect on the western alliance. It must be a key objective that we minimise that effect. We can see the importance of blocs in how Russia and China have been attempting to undermine UN sanctions on North Korea. Without a concerted US and EU insistence, what chance would we, the UK, have had of stopping recent Russian and Chinese abuse by acting alone? The answer, I fear, is very little, despite having the fifth biggest economy in the world.
In that regard, the more experts in this area that one listens to, the more one comes away with the understanding that the most effective sanctions regimes are those put in place by multiple countries. UK unilateral sanctions placed on Russia following its murder of Alexander Litvinenko in 2006 may have been right in principle, but they were seen to have little impact in practice. On the other hand, the EU, as the largest trading bloc in the world, can pack a heavy punch when it implements sanctions, as the figures show it is increasingly being prepared to do.
Alignment is therefore in our interests, but we need to ask what form it should take. Should we align like the neutral Swiss or Norway, and not have a seat at the table or determine policy but just join in with the others? Personally, I would see that as a failure of our long-held responsibility to engage and help lead the free international community.
My view is that, for sanctions, we should negotiate a position with the EU whereby we keep a decision-making and voting seat at the table. Whether that is done via some form of membership of the EU’s Political and Security Committee or through a new body is what we should now be considering. In Munich last week Mr Barnier called for an “ambitious partnership” that is “broad... beneficial and balanced”. I think that we should take him up on that invitation.
From a UK business perspective, there could be severe dangers associated with unilateral action. It could result in British companies being much more easily impacted by counter-sanctions imposed by the targeted regime, and it could have the additional regulatory headache involved in multiple export licence systems.
Finally on sanctions, like my right hon. Friend the Member for Sutton Coldfield (Mr Mitchell) and the hon. Member for Bishop Auckland (Helen Goodman), I turn to the financial crooks, drug and people-smuggling barons and human rights abusers who are laundering more than £100 billion through the UK every year. We do not want that money here, and hopefully the asset freezing provisions of the new Criminal Finances Act 2017, including its Magnitsky human rights abuse amendment, will help, although some action from the Government would now be welcome.
However, it is not just about the money. We do not want these people or their families here, enjoying the rule of law and standards that they so blatantly disregard in their own countries. I should like to see a new visa-based regime and a list system. As every Russian opponent of the Putin regime will tell us, it is exposure and publicity that such people fear the most. At a time when the United States has just issued a further list of people whom it is only considering adding to its public Magnitsky list, I would appreciate an explanation of why Ministers continue to keep the banned list private here in the United Kingdom.
On the subject of anti-money laundering, let me say that it would be very helpful if the Government produced their long-awaited anti-corruption strategy. Many anti-corruption themes need to be pulled together and acted on. Let me issue a plea for moderation, common sense and risk assessment to be given more consideration in that context. That plea comes from the thousands of people who are ever more frustrated to hear that £100 billion of black money is being laundered in the UK while they have been banned from or delayed in opening simple bank accounts for some petty, spurious or jobsworth reason.
Dame Margaret Hodge (Barking) (Lab)
The Bill commands general support on both sides of the House, and, like the hon. Member for Huntingdon (Mr Djanogly), who made an excellent speech, I welcome it. As currently drafted, however, it fails to include one vital measure that would at a stroke transform Britain’s contribution to the fight against money laundering, tax avoidance and evasion, corruption and financial crime. That measure has been debated many times in both Houses, and is strongly supported by parliamentarians in all parties and by the all-party parliamentary group on responsible tax.
We simply want to ensure that British overseas territories, many of which constitute the leading tax havens in the world, have registers of beneficial ownership that are public and open for anyone to interrogate: businesses, individuals, the press or civil society. I for one have had enough of the endless rhetoric proclaiming that Britain is leading the global fight against corruption and money laundering. The reality has to start to match that rhetoric, because at present it does not. By failing to insist that our overseas territories have public registers of beneficial ownership, we are complicit in facilitating the very corruption that we claim to want to eradicate.
Our overseas territories play a central role in the scourge that is corruption, tax evasion and money laundering. Of the 200,000 companies exposed in the Panama papers, more than half were registered in the British Virgin Islands, a UK overseas territory. More than half the offices of the law firm Appleby that were exposed in the Paradise papers are located in UK-controlled tax havens, and 90% of the world’s top 200 global companies have a presence in a UK tax haven. A World Bank review of corruption cases over a 30-year period found that our tiny overseas territories came second only to the vast United States of America among jurisdictions that provide anonymous shell entities for those involved in international corruption.
We all know that the effect of this financial crime is immense, and that the impact on the poorest in the world is particularly pernicious. We in the UK lose money that we desperately need for our schools and hospitals, but developing countries are even more adversely affected. The United Nations Conference on Trade and Development has estimated that developing countries lose at least $100 billion a year as a result of tax havens, and the OECD has estimated that they are costing those countries up to three times as much as the total global aid budget. What happens in our tax havens really matters. Persistent collusion by the UK in enabling them to endure, because of the Government’s failure to clamp down on the secrecy that pervades our British tax havens, is inexcusable.
Jo Stevens (Cardiff Central) (Lab)
My right hon. Friend is making an extremely powerful speech. Does she agree that whatever is in the Bill, it will lack any credibility if we point the finger at secrecy in other countries but do nothing about the secrecy in the overseas territories and Crown dependencies?
Dame Margaret Hodge
I strongly concur. Interestingly enough, David Cameron recognised that in 2013 when he told the overseas territories to rip aside the “cloak of secrecy” by establishing public registers of beneficial ownership. He wrote to them in 2014 saying that public registers were
“vital to meeting the urgent challenges of illicit finance and tax evasion.”
In September 2015, he accused them of
“frankly…not moving anywhere near fast enough.”
He said that
“if we want to break the business model of stealing money and hiding it in places where it can’t be seen: transparency is the answer.”
When he launched the UK’s public register, he argued that
“it’s better for us all to have an open system which everyone has access to, because the more eyes that look at this information the more accurate it will be.”
I agree with all those sentiments and arguments. All that we are asking of the present Government is that they stand by the promises made by their colleagues, their right hon. and hon. Friends, in a Conservative-led Government nearly five years ago. I also agree with the current Prime Minister, who said:
“If you’re a tax-dodger, we’re coming after you. If you’re an accountant, a financial adviser or a middleman who helps people to avoid what they owe to society, we’re coming after you”.
However, our tax havens are “middlemen”. It is time that the Prime Minister and her Government turned their rhetoric into practical action, and put an end to the nefarious activities that take place in so many of our jurisdictions.
Lloyd Russell-Moyle
Many of our tax havens, and some of our Crown dependencies, were put on the EU watch list. They had to demonstrate that they were making improvements. I understand that one of the ways in which they could get on to the watch list was for the UK Government to underwrite that progress by indicating that they would support it, which would enable them to avoid being put on the blacklist. Is it not imperative for us to enforce the commitment that we made to the European Union in preventing them from being put on the blacklist by ensuring that they implement what they promised?
Dame Margaret Hodge
I entirely agree. Indeed, if we leave the EU without having implemented reforms that would have an impact on the overseas territories, the EU will blacklist them.
I know that there are many principled Conservative Members—including the right hon. Member for Sutton Coldfield (Mr Mitchell)—who care passionately about transparency, and have championed the cause from both the Back Benches and the Front Bench for many years. I urge them all to make clear to their Front-Bench colleagues that they will support a cross-party amendment setting a clear and reasonable timeframe within which the overseas territories would be required to prepare and launch public registers of beneficial ownership. I hope that the Government will listen to the advice of leading Back Benchers on their own side. Those of us who are involved in campaigning for transparency are not seeking short-term political advantage. What we want is an important, sustainable change that will have a lasting impact on the process of stamping out financial skulduggery, and a considerable impact not just on the United Kingdom’s public finances but on those of the poorest nations in the world.
We can never build a global Britain on dirty money. We will not create a strong economy on the back of being the jurisdiction of choice for every kleptocrat and crook in the world. Our British overseas territories will not prosper over time on the basis of being safe havens for illicit wealth. Transparency is an essential tool in the battle against all financial crimes. Exchanging information behind closed doors, which the Government claim is sufficient, particularly disadvantages the very same countries that suffer the most from financial crime and money laundering, because they have the weakest regulatory agencies in operation.
Relying on regulatory bodies is also very much second best. Even our under-resourced bodies such as Companies House are at best reactive in their work on uncovering financial crimes; there is very little evidence that they are undertaking proactive investigations. Indeed, the constant flow of scandals is strong evidence that the system based on the private automatic exchange of information is not working.
Let us consider the case highlighted recently by Global Witness of the $75 million paid by Glencore to Dan Gertler, a controversial businessman accused of bribing senior officials in the Democratic Republic of the Congo to advance mining interests. The money was originally due to be paid to Congo’s state mining company, but following a secret agreement was paid into one of Dan Gertler’s companies registered in the Cayman Islands. Or let us consider the case revealed in the Paradise papers of Jean-Claude Bastos, who managed Angola’s sovereign wealth fund and was paid more than $41 million from the fund via a secretive British Virgin Islands company. The BVI company was itself owned by a series of secretive offshore companies, but the ultimate beneficial owner was Mr Bastos.
Today’s Guardian contains disturbing revelations that North Korea broke international sanctions aimed at inhibiting the development of weapons by using a network of companies based in our tax havens to acquire millions of dollars-worth of fertiliser, coal and other commodities—our tax havens, undermining our national security and that of other western nations. Secrecy enables wrongdoing.
Ironically, the British Government have accepted that argument, because we are ourselves publishing our national register of beneficial ownership. The standard that we accept for ourselves should be the standard we expect for our overseas territories. To pretend, as the Government do, that the overseas territories are making good progress is nonsense. It was 2013 when David Cameron first demanded public registers; nearly five years later, we are still waiting for a number of the jurisdictions, including Anguilla and the Turks and Caicos Islands, to set up a central register.
Let me take this opportunity to debunk some of the myths that were prayed in aid when this matter was debated in the House of Lords. Raising the spectre of identity theft and personal security risks is wide of the mark. Public registers can have tightly defined case-by-case exemption policies to protect individuals who are genuinely at risk. Ministers claim that no other countries are adopting public registers. Again, that is not true: the EU is currently implementing the fifth anti-money laundering directive requiring all EU members to implement public registers by 2019, including Gibraltar, and we should be implementing that.
Arguing, as Ministers do, that we should not act until others have acted is a wretched excuse. We have been bold in leading the movement to stamp out corruption; we should pursue that course and be proud of it. As the number of tax havens decreases and the noose tightens around the remaining tax havens, our action will make action elsewhere in the world inevitable.
I welcome today’s statement from the Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union that the UK wants to lead a global race to the top in rights and standards. There is no better way of leading that race to the top than by insisting that our overseas territories adopt public registers of beneficial ownership.
Public registers will not undermine legitimate businesses or individuals who want to continue to take advantage of low-tax regimes. They will expose those who seek to hide their money because they have received it corruptly, or who unlawfully evade tax, all too often at the expense of poor people and poor countries.
Anneliese Dodds (Oxford East) (Lab/Co-op)
On public registers, is it not also the case that firms that are more transparent are often more successful than those that are not? We see that in the examples of Santander, SSE and many others.
Dame Margaret Hodge
My hon. Friend on the Front Bench is completely right.
Finally, while we were all horrified by the destruction wrought by the hurricanes last year, those disasters should never, ever be used as an excuse for allowing kleptocrats, villains and tax evaders to prosper. In a White Paper on the overseas territories published in 2012, the Government stated:
“As a matter of constitutional law the UK Parliament has unlimited power to legislate for the Territories.”
I am urging tonight that the Government use their powers to insist that our tax havens—our overseas territories—put in place public registers in a defined timescale. That is a reasonable demand. Stopping it would create a grim stain on Britain’s reputation as we move to establish credibility in a post-Brexit world.
Nick Herbert (Arundel and South Downs) (Con)
I agree with what the right hon. Member for Barking (Dame Margaret Hodge) and my right hon. Friend the Member for Sutton Coldfield (Mr Mitchell) said in welcoming the measures in this Bill. I would go further and welcome the steps that the Government are taking to tackle corruption. However, I also agree with the right hon. Lady and my right hon. Friend that we need to go further now on the issue of transparency in our overseas territories—an issue I spoke about almost exactly a year ago in this House. Specifically, it is necessary in the fight against corruption that a public register of beneficial ownership of companies is established.
Much has been made of the effect of criminal activity, the ability of those engaged in such activities to launder money and the impact of the lack of transparency in supporting crime and corruption. The right hon. Lady pointed out that the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development estimates the cost of tax havens to developing countries to be some $100 billion a year. These are costs that are falling on the poorest developing countries. It should also be pointed out that tax avoidance costs us, too. It costs taxpayers in developed countries. A 2014 United States Senate report pointed out that the US loses some $150 billion in tax revenues a year because of offshore tax schemes.
The Panama papers, and subsequently the Paradise papers, revealed the extent of the problem. However, as President Obama said after publication of the Panama papers, the problem is that most
“of this stuff is legal, not illegal.”
That goes to the heart of the issue. Companies are able to operate perfectly legally in environments where there is not sufficient transparency. The losses are legitimate in the sense that they are not unlawful but they are avoiding taxation; the activities may be legally possible, but they are illegitimate morally. They may also, however, involve criminal activity. All of those are reasons why transparency is so important.
That is why it was such a major step forward when David Cameron announced in 2013 that action would be taken and when, in April 2014, he wrote to the leaders of the overseas territories, following the action taken in global summits, and said that Britain wanted the overseas territories, in partnership with us, to publish public registers. As he argued, these were the gold standard in transparency and would support law enforcement. That was the Government’s position at the time, but does it remain their position? They have never said that they will insist that the overseas territories produce public registers, even though the then Prime Minister urged them to do so in the strongest possible terms. I will explain why that is a necessity.
It is not clear to me whether it remains the Government’s position to urge the overseas territories to introduce public registers as soon as possible. That does not seem to be their position any longer. I think they are now saying that the overseas territories should move towards the creation of public registers once that becomes the gold standard globally. If hon. Members and non-governmental organisations have noticed this change of emphasis, surely the overseas territories will have noticed it, too. What progress can we reasonably expect them to make if they have sensed that the pressure from the UK Government to introduce those registers has eased?
Luke Graham (Ochil and South Perthshire) (Con)
I agree with many of my right hon. Friend’s points about transparency. I also agree with some of the fine points made by the right hon. Member for Barking (Dame Margaret Hodge). My right hon. Friend mentioned a change of emphasis. I am a member of the Public Accounts Committee. I understand from speaking to some of the United States authorities that there has clearly been a change of emphasis. We are getting quite a clear picture from the United States that it is not intending to go all the way with public registers of beneficial ownership, and certainly not as far as we would like to go. Therefore, we need to be clear about where we want to show leadership, but, at the same time, we have a duty to our overseas territories to ensure that, if we limit their economies in some way, we think about other measures that can support them in the short run.
Nick Herbert
I agree with my hon. Friend that it is necessary for us to show leadership, and I will say more about the support that we will need to give to the overseas territories in that respect.
A number of arguments have been advanced as to why it is not a good idea to require the overseas territories to introduce public registers. The first is that others will take advantage, and that criminal activity will simply relocate if we say that it can no longer take place in the overseas territories without visibility.
That argument is completely without moral credibility. It is also an admission that such activity is taking place in those areas. To say that we should not act because there might be an economic effect as a result of a reduction in criminal activity would be to argue that the Government should never take action against crime. We have to look at what steps might be necessary to compensate for and mitigate those effects, and to support the overseas territories, to whom we have an obligation in many ways. Simply to say that we will not insist on these changes because their economies would be damaged by the ensuing reduction in criminal activity would be akin to arguing that there would be no point in the police arresting a major drugs dealer in the UK because another drugs dealer might sell drugs in his place.
That argument cannot be sustained. If we believe that a wrong is being done to developed and developing countries—as it is—by the absence of transparency enabling tax evasion and worse, it is our responsibility to tackle that wrong by any means we can. If we simply stand back and wait for change to happen, we cannot expect it to do so.
The second argument that is put forward is that the measures are unnecessary because allowing law enforcement agencies specific access to information on the beneficial ownership of companies is better. It might be the case that law enforcement agencies require a particular level of information, and they can get it through the introduction of central registers, which is a welcome initiative, but if people are seriously arguing that transparency is unnecessary for law enforcement, why did we introduce transparency in the UK? It is self-evident and intuitively obvious that transparency is an aid to law enforcement, because law enforcement agencies cannot be expected always to go after criminals. Criminal activity has to be exposed, and publication is a way of exposing and preventing it. It is telling that a lot of this activity has surfaced only because of leaks. We cannot rely on the law enforcement agencies alone, even with the assistance of central registers and the exchange of information, to deal with all these issues. Also, they cannot deal with tax evasion issues that might be lawful but morally illegitimate. If it was right for the UK to do this, it is right for others to do it, especially our overseas territories.
That leads me to the third argument, which is an important and difficult one. To what extent should the UK insist that the overseas territories do anything? Would we be behaving in a neo-colonialist manner if we did so? This argument has surfaced more recently in relation to the decision by the legislature in Bermuda to reverse a decision of the Supreme Court relating to same-sex marriage. The UK Government made the difficult decision that it was not proper for them to intervene and that this was a matter for the Bermudian authorities. However, we took action in previous years when we reversed the colonial laws that we had bequeathed to the overseas territories in relation to the criminalisation of homosexuality. The very fact of the relationship between us and the overseas territories—and the very fact that we can change the law there by orders in the Privy Council—reveals a relationship that requires us to hold to certain standards.
I accept that there could be unusual circumstances in which the UK Parliament would seek to intervene, but when it comes to global law enforcement, the harm that is being done is so general that it surely justifies action. There is a danger that, if the Government are seen to be stepping back in relation to human rights issues and to corruption, far from winning praise for allowing the devolution of power and the expression of local democratic decision making in the overseas territories, we will actually be harming ourselves and our international reputation for not upholding our obligations to the highest standards. Therefore, on balance, the argument is made not only that we have the power to intervene but that we have a duty to do so if the harm that is being done is otherwise so great.
Let us be clear that the tide is now turning in the direction of increasing transparency. As we have heard from the official Opposition, the EU is adopting measures to ensure that that takes place, and it is significant that the developing countries—those that are most harmed by the absence of transparency—are often the most supportive of these measures. Countries such as Kenya, Nigeria and Afghanistan are committed to introducing public registers of beneficial ownership. Are we really saying that our own overseas territories will not be required to do so when developing countries such as those are committed to taking that action?
The uncomfortable truth is that some of our overseas territories are the worst culprits when it comes to tax havens. Everyone knows that; the papers that have been published reveal it, and the time has come to deal with it. I agree with the right hon. Member for Barking that the time has come to insist that our overseas territories deal with this issue because frankly we will not make progress unless we press them. That is why, if a sensible amendment is tabled to the Bill to set a reasonable timetable for the overseas territories to produce registers of beneficial ownership—an amendment that has cross-party support, that includes commitments to ensure redress for any economic harm and that is respectful of the great economic damage done by the terrible hurricanes to some of our overseas territories—I will support it. I hope that such an amendment will command support on both sides of the House. This is, after all, the policy set by a Conservative Prime Minister and this Conservative Government, and it is the right policy.
Tax havens harm the world’s poorest most of all. Tax havens harm developing countries, and they harm us. They harm us economically, but they also harm our reputation. We live in an age of accountability and transparency. We must continue to lead this argument and not be behind it, which is why I urge my right hon. and hon. Friends on the Front Bench to take very serious note of what is being said in the House this evening and to act.
Jo Swinson (East Dunbartonshire) (LD)
It is a great pleasure to follow the right hon. Member for Arundel and South Downs (Nick Herbert), who made a powerful speech to which I hope his Front-Bench colleagues were listening. It is hugely encouraging to hear so many Conservative voices speak out in favour of more transparency than is already being implemented. I hope it is a sign that this House has a centre of gravity for encouraging further action, of which the Government need to take note.
This Bill is sadly necessary if we are to leave the European Union. The very existence of this Bill underlines the negative impact of Brexit. Our international influence is diminished by leaving the European Union. Of course, sanctions and action against financial crime and money laundering are much stronger when co-ordinated internationally, and the European Union has been a successful mechanism for doing just that.
The existing sanctions and anti-money laundering rules are important, because fighting corruption is an important part of protecting our democracy. When I was a Business Minister, I was charged with implementing parts of the accounting directive through secondary legislation and with championing extractive industries transparency through the extractive industries transparency initiative. One of the issues I was always keen to explain is the link between financial crime, which can often be seemingly victimless—we are talking about numbers on a spreadsheet or on pieces of paper—and its very real and significant impact on people’s lives. The extractive industries transparency initiative is about fighting the corruption that we know happens in some developing countries, where vast mineral wealth is siphoned off into the pockets of dictators rather than funding essential public services.
It is important that we recognise that our country is not immune to such practices. Given particularly that London is such a major financial centre, we perhaps have a greater responsibility than other countries to ensure that tough laws are properly enforced to crack down on corruption. Of course, UK tax havens are another area to which that responsibility extends. I totally agree with the points made about the effect on our international reputation when we do not make sure that happens.
On the sanctions part of the Bill, I welcome the UK’s appetite to align with the EU’s sanctions policy in future, although I note that we will not enjoy the influence we currently have on what that sanctions policy should be. It is crucial that we do not diverge from that policy, because we do not want to risk being seen as a haven for corrupt individuals and corrupt money.
As the right hon. Member for Sutton Coldfield (Mr Mitchell) said, there are opportunities in the Bill to provide greater clarity for NGOs that are doing vital work in difficult countries where there may be regimes that are subject to sanctions but where, none the less, those NGOs need to purchase fuel, supplies and food in country. Clause 15 makes sure there are more powers in primary legislation to provide exemptions so that there is legal clarity that what those NGOs are doing is proper and in order, which is important. Some NGOs, and others in the sector, have suggested that there could be improvements in the detail, which can no doubt be discussed in Committee and on Report.
More generally on sanctions, despite the amendments made in the other place, the Bill still hands over too many powers to the Government, and those powers are too widely drawn. Clause 12 is a case in point, as it defines sanctions not in terms of named individuals but gives Ministers the power to describe groups of people. The potential for unfairly catching individuals in such descriptions is large, and we still need to consider that point. I urge the Government not to look to overturn amendments made in the other place or to roll back the positive changes that have already been made to this Bill.
Various right hon. and hon. Members, including the hon. Members for Bishop Auckland (Helen Goodman) and for Huntingdon (Mr Djanogly) and the right hon. Member for Sutton Coldfield, have raised the idea of a Magnitsky amendment. It is important that the UK takes a leadership role on human rights issues, and sanctions responding to human rights violations are therefore important. That means a crackdown on money and on visas, and it should also include a public list of those who are banned or for whom a ban is potentially being considered. I will look with great interest at any amendments tabled on that basis, and my party and I are very much minded to lend support to such amendments.
On the anti-money laundering aspects of the Bill, one part of the UK economy where there is real cause for concern is our property market. My hon. Friend the Member for Oxford West and Abingdon (Layla Moran) talked about her experiences when the Public Accounts Committee visited the United States last week. The United States is already ahead of us, with mechanisms to define areas where property transactions and property ownership can be further investigated. The statistics are shocking. As many as three in 10 properties that are investigated have suspicious ownership. The London property market is hugely vulnerable to such intervention. Properties are bought to try to clean dirty money.
Excellent research by Transparency International UK has identified £4.2 billion-worth of property in London that has been bought with suspicious wealth, most of it based in secretive jurisdictions. In praising Transparency International, I should declare a degree of interest. Transparency International has excellent research, and my husband happens to be its director of policy.
The anti-corruption summit in 2016 committed to introducing legislation so that overseas companies that own UK property would have to declare their beneficial owners. We were promised that legislation by April 2018—in two months’ time. That is clearly no longer happening. It has been delayed on more than one occasion, and now it looks like we will not receive even a draft Bill until the summer.
Danielle Rowley (Midlothian) (Lab)
With the UK in a housing crisis, does the hon. Lady agree that the Bill could speed up the property register and help tackle that important issue?
Jo Swinson
I absolutely agree. There is no need for any further procrastination. Officials clearly ought to have been looking at this issue since the promise was made at the anti-corruption summit 2016, and it was expected that something would be ready in time for this year. Even if a draft Bill is being considered for the summer—I recognise that parliamentary time is sometimes a constraint on the Government—there would be real support for the bringing forward of some amendments to this Bill based on what may already be partially drafted legislation, because money laundering is important when it comes to property and understanding who owns it. This situation is just another worrying signal from this Administration about the priority they give to combating corruption, because promises made in 2016 are being downgraded and delayed.
Others have pointed out the missed opportunity in this Bill in respect of the overseas territories and Crown dependencies. Back in 2015 and the latter part of 2014, I was the Minister who brought forward changes to the Small Business, Enterprise and Employment Bill—now Act—to introduce a public register of beneficial ownership of UK companies, and I am proud to have done so. Persons of significant control are now registered at Companies House, and people can now log on and see exactly what is there. I agree that there is a need for additional resources for enforcement to will the means, but that was an important step forward, and I am proud to have been part of a Government who took a leadership role.
I pay tribute to my right hon. Friend the Member for Twickenham (Sir Vince Cable), who was Business Secretary at the time, and to the former Prime Minister, David Cameron, because he was absolutely committed to fighting corruption and to playing a global leadership role through the G7 summit and beyond. He repeatedly made it clear that overseas territories should also publish registers. In fact, between 2013 and 2016, the Government sent letters to the overseas territories on several occasions encouraging action, and it is deeply concerning that the appetite has significantly diminished under the current Administration. It is almost as if the Government are now relaxed about the murkiness of financial transactions of the like that we saw revealed in the Paradise and Panama papers and about our overseas territories being used in the UK’s name to hide complex structures under which corruption can flourish. Progress has ground to a halt. If the Government disagree and think that they are as committed to tackling corruption as ever, what have they been doing since 2016? Where are the letters and notes from meetings where they have been encouraging the overseas territories to publish their beneficial ownership registers? I stand ready to be corrected if the Minister can provide that information, because the House would very much like to see it.
The right hon. Member for Barking (Dame Margaret Hodge) mentioned Gibraltar and the fifth anti-money laundering directive when the Foreign Secretary was still in his place. His answer was somewhat vague, suggesting that maybe we would be implementing it, because the UK is already going beyond what is required, but that was not entirely clear. We then heard a response that was slightly more depressing, if a little clearer, from the Minister for Europe and the Americas later in the debate, suggesting that we perhaps would not need to implement the directive because we may have left the EU by the final deadline for implementation. He knows as well as I that there is no reason to be a last-minute merchant about such things. There is nothing to stop us implementing the directive before the final deadline, so it is absolutely in the gift of the Government to do so. If they are choosing not to, that is a clear decision from this Government to allow Gibraltar not to conform to the provisions of a directive that we deem to be necessary for the UK as a whole.
The hon. Member for Glasgow Central (Alison Thewliss) raised Scottish limited partnerships, and I am glad that she did, because they have been abused in major money-laundering schemes. Indeed, they have potentially been implicated in the alleged bribery of European politicians. Such partnerships have been required to file beneficial ownership information since June, but many have failed to do so or, in some cases, have filed patently false information. Again, there is an issue about enforcement.
Many of these issues need to be explored further during the passage of this Bill, which is sadly necessary. The Bill overreaches in some areas by giving the Government too many powers, but in other areas it misses opportunities that we need to take in order to provide assurances that we are taking the necessary and swift action to fight corruption. The Bill is an all right start, but it clearly needs further improvement. We should maintain the positive changes already inserted by the House of Lords, and I look forward to exploring the detailed issues as the Bill progresses through the House.
Nigel Mills (Amber Valley) (Con)
It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for East Dunbartonshire (Jo Swinson). I also pay credit to her husband’s work at Transparency International. I think he came up with the phrase that, as we leave the European Union, we should be “a beacon, not a buccaneer”. That is the spirit in which I approach the Bill: we should look to set the highest standards for transparency and financial probity, not try to get some short-term advantage by short-changing on those important issues.
I want to focus on three matters. The first is sanctions, which I raised with the Secretary of State earlier. I accept that if we freeze other people’s assets, we should not try to take part of them. However, in rare situations when we freeze the assets of regimes that have caused or committed serious offences in our country that have done real harm to our citizens, it is perhaps right to say, “Those assets are there and there is no realistic prospect of getting compensation to the victims in any other way than by using them.” In those rare situations, rather than letting people continue suffering from the injuries that were done to them, should not we be able to use the assets to try to rectify the wrong, if only slightly? I cannot imagine many instances in which that would apply, but it would clearly apply to the victims of the previous Libyan regime, which supplied Semtex to the IRA. I hope that, when the Government consider licensing the use of assets that have been frozen, we would help those victims of events that took place at least 20 years ago, if we could find a way to do so. How much longer will they be around to benefit from compensation, even if we could agree it with a Libyan Government—if there ever were one that would do so?
I heartily support the arguments for the need for overseas territories to have public registers of beneficial ownership. I do not want to repeat the arguments, but I will add a couple. It is sometimes asked why the overseas territories should have to lead, and argued that they should be able to follow the rest of the world. It is claimed that if they act first, they will be at a disadvantage and lose revenue and business will be driven elsewhere, to even murkier regimes. The problem with that argument is that our overseas territories are such a large part of the market for the activity that we are discussing that, if they do not reform, nobody else will. We cannot follow the market—we are the market here. We have to take a lead. We have to say to our overseas territories, “You have to do this. We don’t want you to be accused of having dirty, corrupt, criminal money. We don’t want you to have it or be accused of having it. The only way that we and you can show that you have clean regimes is to have this transparency.”
I suspect one of the reasons why the overseas territories can attract such large amounts of business is their relationship with the UK, their protection by the UK, the rule of law that we help them have and their access to our financial market. There is a very real link between what they do and what happens here. We therefore have some obligation to act to ensure that they have the same standards as we have. We cannot just wash our hands and say that it is for them and that they are independent and can do what they like. They benefit greatly from their links to us, and the time has come for us to say that we need them to move to the same standards as we have and that they cannot be allowed to weaken our reputation. Everywhere else in the world thinks that they are part of the UK. Developing nations say, “What you’ve done is great, but our assets have been stolen and are being hidden by your territories and we can’t get at them or find out exactly where they are.” Everyone thinks that they are part of us and it damages our reputation if they do not adopt the same high standards.
I agree with my right hon. Friend the Member for Arundel and South Downs (Nick Herbert) who said that we cannot force that on overseas territories overnight. We have to give them a sensible and fair timeframe and we would much prefer them to choose to put the transparent register in place instead of our forcing them. I, too, would support an amendment that provided for a realistic and fair timetable, but we need the Government to tell the overseas territories that they want and expect them to do it and that, if they have not done it by the deadline, the Government will make them do it, so that we get that open, clear and transparent standard.
Let us be honest: the Government’s actions in the UK to increase transparency have been mostly extremely good. We have the open register of beneficial ownership for companies, although we need to sort out some of the Companies House details. A few weeks ago, the new power of unexplained wealth orders came into effect. But if devious people can hide from our regime by using our overseas territories, all those things will be for nothing. We need to extend these powers much more widely.
I am not usually keen on our transposing EU directives where we do not need to do so, but it would be a terrible situation if we were not to implement something consistent with the fifth EU anti-money laundering directive and were lagging behind. If we read what is in there, we see that it contains some things that we should do, such as having a cap where we do not have a register of who has a pre-paid card, so that someone cannot spend laundered money around the world using such a card. That is a perfectly sensible measure to take.
The directive also contains provision for the register of trusts in certain situations. It would be a strange situation if the country in Europe that probably has the most trusts was the only one that did not have any transparency. That would hardly aid our reputation for being a clean financial centre, which is what we should be keen to establish. I am not particularly fussed whether the Government implement the fifth directive before we go or whether we introduce similar, equivalent or, we hope, stronger measures of our own, but let us not fall behind on those sensible ideas that the EU has come up with. I am not aware that we opposed them in the EU. I believe that we agree with the direction of that directive, so let us get those things into force.
The third point I wish to cover is the property register. I have served on a few Bill Committees in my time and I have occasionally tabled amendments in my misspent youth; occasionally I have asked for reviews, as that has been the only way of getting things tabled. In general, the Government’s response is, “There is no point putting into a Bill a requirement for a review, as we review things in any case.” Yet in clause 44, on the property register, what we have managed to get is a requirement for three annual reviews of the progress the Government are making on their own policy. I accept that that was the result of a compromise in the House of Lords, but I, too, would love to see real progress made on this property register, as it is an important missing link in our transparency.
I followed that debate in the House of Lords, and I found Lord Ahmad’s argument convincing: if we are going to have this register, we want it to have real meaning and teeth, and if the reward for a delay is that we can have a mechanism in law that means that if someone does not disclose the beneficial ownership of that property correctly, we can prevent them from selling it in future, that is a price worth paying for a delay. That would be a real consequence: if someone does not register who really owns a property, they cannot sell it until they do. That would be a powerful message to send out to say that we do not want dirty money buying property in this country; that if we think someone has bought a property with dirty money, we will impose an unexplained wealth order and try to work out whether we should get that money back off them; and that if they just do not tell us who owns that property, they are not allowed to sell it until they do. That would be a real step forward, so I am reluctantly prepared to accept that we need to wait a couple of years to get those powers in a place that will be effective. I hope that as this Bill proceeds through this House we can have the same assurances that were given in the Lords that the Government are committed to that register and that we are not just left with three years of reviews, at the end of which we have made no progress on that situation. The Government have committed strongly to that register again, and I look forward to it.
If ever we needed a reminder of how important the measures in this Bill are, we need only look at a story again today of a large bookmaker being fined millions of pounds. One of the reasons for that was that it did not prevent money laundering through its shops for several years. I declare that I went to a charity darts tournament sponsored by that bookmaker, to get a donation for a charity in my constituency—that is on the register and I declare it. This just shows that money laundering is not just about large amounts of very clever things moving around the world, as the “McMafia” credits showed; it is everyday activity, and we need everyday businesses to be on their guard in preventing this from happening. So I support the fact that the Bill retains those important powers going forward.
Dr Rupa Huq (Ealing Central and Acton) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Amber Valley (Nigel Mills), who made a thoughtful contribution on some of the gaps in this Bill. Perhaps it is because I am, with him, the co-chair of the all-party group on anti-corruption, perhaps it is because in the last Parliament I was our Front-Bench spokesperson on the Criminal Finances Bill or perhaps it is because I am in front of the TV too much at the weekend, but I get the sense that money laundering is everywhere of late.
As the hon. Gentleman has just mentioned, we heard this morning of the record £6.2 million fine slapped on William Hill for not being vigilant enough in the prevention of money laundering. We have seen how the proceeds of crime have been funnelled through its channels, and the Gambling Commission has said that it must do better—as if it did not have enough on its plate with responsible gambling.
It has just finished, but for a while Sunday night was “McMafia” night—it is now “Homeland” night again in our house—and as the plot unfolded, we saw how billions of pounds can be transferred internationally very quickly, at the click of a mouse on a laptop. It also showed corrupt politicians, violent police, counterfeit goods hawked around high streets and all sorts of other things. It was fiction, but there was some factual basis.
No one so far has spoken against the idea of having such a Bill. The principle is good. No one is saying that we should turn a blind eye to dirty money. My worry is that, as right hon. and hon. Members from all parties have said, the Bill could do better and go a lot further. It is a good start, but the Paradise papers and Panama papers shone a light on a murky world of international finance and taxation working for the benefit of those with access to vast wealth and an army of lawyers—for the few, not the many—when ordinary citizens just want a fair and transparent financial system. So two cheers for the Bill.
The glaring omission, which has been mentioned many times, is that the Government need to work a lot harder to persuade the UK’s overseas territories—and one day, I hope, the Crown dependencies, too—to adopt the same level of transparency as we have in the UK and introduce public registers of beneficial ownership.
It is not for nothing that London is frequently named as the world’s money laundering capital. In 2016, the Home Affairs Committee concluded that the London property market was the primary avenue for the laundering of £100 billion of illicit money a year. As a London MP, that is particularly galling to me, because my inbox and postbag are full of housing issues, which also come up a lot when people come to my surgeries. We have a housing crisis, with people who want to get a foothold on the ladder and people in substandard accommodation.
It is not enough to think that it is not our problem; otherwise, silence equals complicity in what are becoming industrial levels of tax avoidance and evasion. The Bill will allow us to set our own sanctions and anti-money laundering policy, but our leaving the EU will inevitably damage our ability to influence the policies of the bloc. Britain’s voice will be quieter on the world stage and its global footprint will diminish. We will shrink in our role fighting corruption globally.
Some progress has been made in the adoption of private registers, but not all overseas territories have even adopted one, and if they have, they have not been centrally located or fully populated. Four and a half years on from when the Government tried to persuade the overseas territories to adopt public registers, none has so far done so, and the Government seem to have given up on them. As has been said many times in this debate, only Montserrat has made the commitment.
The ghost of David Cameron seems to have been ever present in this debate. He invited the world to an anti-corruption summit in London in May 2016—how long ago it all seems—and talked about how the public register model should be a “gold standard”. He said that tax avoidance schemes
“are quite frankly morally wrong”.
Again, there is that disjuncture between what is legally possible and what is morally correct.
Fast forward to 2018 and the Foreign Office expects the UK tax havens to adopt the public register model only when it becomes a “global standard”. There is a definite shift there. It is hardly leadership; it is followership, backtracking or a dereliction of duty, if we are being blunt.
Dr Huq
Absolutely; my hon. Friend is so correct, as ever.
We all know what happened to David Cameron next: his ill-judged referendum was his downfall. Ironically, the EU seems to be taking the lead as it prepares to implement the fifth anti-money laundering directive. Our chaotic approach to Brexit and the slippage—we do not know what will or will not apply—is why the Bill is necessary. Last December, the EU agreed that all its 28 member states should establish public registers of the beneficial ownership of companies. We can all get behind the reasons: they allow greater scrutiny of information and contribute to preserving trust and integrity in the financial system. More and more countries are committed to implementing, or have implemented, public registers—I am talking about sovereign countries and not necessarily our overseas territories. There were 35 countries with registers at the last count, and with all EU member states required to have them by 2019, I suggest that this is a golden opportunity to build a new global standard.
When that happens in 2019, the UK Government should seize the opportunity to ensure that our overseas territories follow suit as soon as possible. Regulatory alignment is a popular watchword these days, and we should apply it in this situation. The territories that rely on wealth being stashed away from taxpayers are astute. They do it because they can get away with it, and they use the arguments of competitiveness and security against a centralised register. Our Government continue to drag their feet after so much promise, which is shameful.
The Government’s anti-corruption strategy was hastily rushed out—some Conservative Members did not notice it—because of harrying by people such as my right hon. Friend the Member for Barking (Dame Margaret Hodge), who had several debates on it at the end of last year. We kept saying, “Where is that anti-corruption strategy?” and the strategy was hurriedly rushed out at the end of last year. There is full awareness of the importance of public registers, but the strategy states:
“Our ultimate aim is that public registers become the norm. If this were to happen”—
suddenly it has become conditional—
“we would expect the Overseas Territories to follow suit. The government will continue to work with these Overseas Territories to strengthen their beneficial ownership arrangements”.
The Government also promise a statutory review by December 2018. Why not now? It seems we have had a year of nothing, with the smokescreen of a consultation thrown in. People have consultation fatigue and we know what the issue is.
How can the Government aim for something if they are taking no action? It is not good enough. Only when the UK mandates the overseas territories to create the registers will transparency flow, and only then will the big question be sorted out, with all its constitutional, ethical and international dimensions—people have talked about foreign aid. It is right to hold the Government to account on the promises they have made, as the all-party parliamentary group will continue to do. I hope that the anti-corruption tsar, the hon. Member for Weston-super-Mare (John Penrose), who has gone from his place—I would have liked a tsarina—will continue to hold the Government’s feet to the fire.
I should give a short plug for the APPG. We recently had an event where we had the cast and crew of “McMafia” in the building—my hon. Friend the Member for Oxford East (Anneliese Dodds) was there. It is not just fiction, but is happening in the real world. They launched an app. If people enter their postcode, they can see how many secretive jurisdictions are near them. The programme showed Kensington and these smart central London properties, but it is happening in Ealing. I put in my own postcode: Ealing is the 14th most secret neighbourhood in the country.
We are lucky enough to live in one of the most desirable cities in the world, but it is desirable for the corrupt, too—those with dirty cash to stash and launder. The Government agreed to fix that at least two years ago, but no concrete progress has ultimately been made. There are loads of examples—I will not go into them all now because we could be here forever. There were stories of “from Russia with cash”, Magnitsky was mentioned in the debate, and there is the pop princess from Uzbekistan. My right hon. Friend the Member for Barking had a debate on the Azerbaijan laundromat case, and we have had Bywater Investments and North Korean shell games. The list goes on and on.
This country has a real choice ahead in defining what kind of country we want to be post Brexit. We can put an end to the millions of pounds of stolen money flowing through London’s luxury property market or we can continue turning a blind eye, kicking the can down the road, saying that we are doing a consultation, pushing these things into the long grass and making London an even more appealing playground for the corrupt.
Thankfully, the other place wants significant concessions on the Henry VIII powers that might have come to pass. We have heard mention of statutory instruments, but this House must be vigilant and ensure that the Government do not try to sneak in more secondary powers through the back door, giving Ministers carte blanche.
Leaving the EU will undoubtedly affect our ability to sanction regimes properly. We will be vulnerable to legal challenges because corporations will see us as an easy target outside the EU. They will have an easier task suing a smaller state. Despite the Bill’s title, only one and a half of its 59 pages are dedicated to anti-money laundering. The Bill is a disappointment and a missed opportunity from a Government who promised much but are short on delivering. It is not just me saying that; ask Christian Aid, Global Witness and Transparency International. My verdict is, “Could do better.”
Julia Lopez (Hornchurch and Upminster) (Con)
I welcome the Bill, which will not only see us retain our ability to impose sanctions and some of the powers against crime that currently derive from our EU membership, but will pave the way for new methods of tackling terrorism financing and money laundering.
Concern has been expressed that once we are out of the EU, the UK will—out of economic desperation—somehow turn itself into the global laundry for money of dubious origin or market itself as the premier place to stow ill-gotten gains. Sound arguments for a simpler, more competitive UK tax and regulatory regime must never be undermined by the idea of a financial free-for-all, not least because, in an ever more transparent world, London’s reputation as the world’s top financial centre will increasingly depend on it setting and adhering to global standards on financial probity. Meanwhile, as criminals continually update their methods, we shall need our own law and law enforcers to be ever more adaptable and responsive. It is therefore a timely moment to create an independent UK sanctions and anti-money laundering regime that can respond adequately to the forensic, cutting-edge work being undertaken by the likes of the City of London police and the National Crime Agency.
Going forward, the UK might wish to harmonise its own sanctions regime with existing sanctions regimes in order to maximise the impact of those sanctions and reduce the opportunity for legal uncertainty for UK or UK-based firms operating under our new regime. In time, the UK could play a critical role in bridging the growing gap between the EU and US approaches to sanctions, and in pushing for ever greater clarity from both sides to try to mitigate the risk of non-compliance in the financial sector.
As we look ahead, we must be careful of the law of unintended consequences. We must not make operating in certain countries or particular types of business so risky that we either cut ourselves off from legitimate opportunities or push ever greater volumes of business into newer, less robustly regulated parts of the sector. In that regard, the Government might consider new measures to facilitate information sharing between banks and regulators on suspicious entities or individuals so that we can encourage a proportionate, risk-based approach to whether to take on such business.
I welcome the ability that the Bill gives us to update counter-terrorism financing legislation, as well as clause 44, which commits to a register of beneficial owners of overseas entities. Nobody wants to discourage investment into the UK, particularly if such investment can help to increase housing supply by getting large-scale developments off the ground. None the less, the current approach cannot go on.
For goodness knows how long, I have been writing a book about London in the 21st century, covering the flood of international money into London’s housing market, the use of overseas investment vehicles to pay for that property and the resentment stoked in Londoners when such investment vehicles have been used as mechanisms to shield the proceeds of crime or evade tax, with property left empty. I therefore appreciate the confirmation from my hon. Friend the Member for Weston-super-Mare (John Penrose) that the Government believe that foreign owners of British homes and offices should now be treated in the same way as owners of British companies. As he says:
“More than £122bn of property in England and Wales is owned by offshore firms. If they’re clean and reputable…they’ll have nothing to fear. But if murky shell companies have bought British property with plundered or laundered cash, we don’t want them here.”
The register should underline the UK’s commitment to being a strong, reputable trading nation that welcomes clean investment. Those values must surely shape our nation’s future as we chart our new path outside the EU.
Alex Norris (Nottingham North) (Lab/Co-op)
As I have been sitting here listening to the debate, I have had a growing sense of déjà vu with regard to a similar sedentary vigil just before the recess when we debated the Nuclear Safeguards Bill. That is an important piece of legislation that we need as we leave the EU and seek to quickly and safely reproduce the benefits of our EU membership. It is in the same vein that we consider sanctions and anti-money laundering provisions. We must have arrangements in place not only because sanctions and anti-money laundering provisions are important causes, but because we have international duties to fulfil. This must be done, as is widely accepted across the Chamber.
Nuclear safeguards are of course high-impact, but also relatively easy to define and understand. That makes things a bit easier. We have civil nuclear matter, we need it, we want to move it, and we do not want it to fall into the wrong hands. Our current arrangements work, and we want to continue to have the same level of protection and safeguards. We cannot say the same about this area of murky finance, with money moving across boundaries and individuals profiting from criminal activities and then seeking to legitimise that wealth elsewhere. This is an ever-changing world, so our arrangements must be able to keep up. As we have heard very powerfully from Members throughout the Chamber, our current arrangements leave a lot to be desired. It would therefore be remiss of us just to lift and shift current systems; we should seek to improve them, and I will suggest a couple of ways in which we might do so.
First, I want to address the issue of the EU’s fifth anti-money laundering directive. This has now been agreed in principle between the EU and member states, of which we are still one, but it is scheduled for a phased introduction from next year, presumably falling during a post-Brexit transitional period. We have not had a lot of clarity from those on the Treasury Bench about how we will approach this. I hope that we will not see a request for us to concede a boatload of secondary legislation to Ministers. There was considerable interest about that in the other place, and I think we can do better. Even the hon. Member for Amber Valley (Nigel Mills), who is not currently in his place, said that we ought perhaps to transpose the directive into our law. When we hear the hon. Gentleman talk about transposing EU directives, we really are in a special place.
So what could we do about our sanctions regime? Currently, we lag behind the US and Canada. We need a targeted, flexible approach that promotes human rights and protects innocents from paying the price for the crimes of their leaders. That is why we have heard many voices call for Magnitsky-style amendments to the Bill. I add my voice to that. Such provisions allow us to pick and choose public officials from around the world who have committed human rights abuses or violations, and seize their assets and ban their travel. Such sanctions work because they target the wrongdoer specifically. A broader sanction or embargo at a national level punishes all, and often those who can least afford it bear the burden. Instead, such provisions target the people we need to get to. They would give Ministers flexibility and promote our attempts to meet our human rights goals as a country. We could underpin that—I am very keen on this, and it has not been mentioned yet—with humanitarian impact assessments of any sanctions that the Government impose. When our Government seek to impose sanctions, it is reasonable that we ought to have a clear understanding of their impact on the wider community in the affected area.
With regard to the anti-money laundering provisions, I start with the obvious: it is time for a property register. The initial commitment was made by the Government in 2016; we are now told that it will be operational in 2021. That will not do. This Bill is a good opportunity for us to pick up the cudgels and get on with it. Bricks and mortar is an obvious place to start, where we can disrupt the supply chain and follow the money. That would also have benefits in affected communities through releasing properties for people who actually wish to live in them.
That would help us at home, but we need to take on the broader challenge across the world. We will have failed if we get to the end of the process with a gold-standard piece of legislation—as I very much hope we will—but find that those high standards can be easily circumvented through a British overseas territory or Crown dependency. I know that this is controversial and there are strong feelings on it, but while we have a relationship whereby this Parliament has responsibility for defence, security and foreign relations in those territories, we should continue to take a strong interest in money laundering, because it sits at the very root of all those things. When the British Virgin Islands is at the heart of the Panama papers and Oxfam rates Bermuda as the No. 1 worst corporate tax haven, we should want to act and use all the tools that we can. Notwithstanding the qualifiers heard from the Government Benches, it is not too much to ask that we should see a public register of beneficial ownership of companies in the overseas territories and Crown dependencies.
The final way we could improve is by looking at the role of the banking system in preventing money laundering. We know that banks are under pressure to serve the bottom line and that they can have their heads turned when they encounter potentially profitable customers. We also know that relative to estimated levels of money laundering, regulatory fines have been low. When penalties are low, rewards for looking the other way are high. When there is little personal reputational risk, these things can happen.
The current legal framework is inadequate, and we should seek to change it. Two years ago we had a consultation on creating a specific “failure to prevent economic crime” offence, which would have covered money laundering. That was downgraded to a call for evidence, which closed in March 2017. It has been nearly a year, and we have not seen the fruits of that. I know as well as anybody what 12 months can do in life—it has been a big 12 months for me—but it is time we got around to this.
In conclusion, how we approach the Bill will tell us a lot about Britain’s place in the world post Brexit. Do we still believe that we have an outward-looking leadership role? Do we still seek to set high standards for ourselves and others? Are we keeping up with the pace of the modern world and the changing nature of crime? I believe that we ought to want to do all those things, and that we can use this Bill to do so.
Mr Bob Seely (Isle of Wight) (Con)
It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Nottingham North (Alex Norris), who spoke so eloquently. I welcome the Bill, but like so many other Members who have spoken this evening, I think we should be doing more.
It is not in our interests to have lax standards. It is in our interests to have the highest standards, which I know the Foreign Secretary and others are trying to achieve. The Bill is not just about finance; it is about power. Our finance system—the western finance system—is a source of power. Russian and Chinese oligarchs, and especially the Russians, use our finance system. That gives us influence over them. This is not just about terrorists, dodgy individuals or drug dealers. This is about changing and influencing state behaviour. I very much hope that Ministers will see it in that guise. With new forms of conflict in the world that we inhabit, financial power is a hard bit of soft power. The power to make rich people poor by freezing their assets should not be underestimated because it is a significant source of our influence.
Other Members, such as my right hon. Friend the Member for Sutton Coldfield (Mr Mitchell), have spoken eloquently about the lack of Magnitsky elements in the Bill, which concerns me. There are no visa bans in the Finance Bill amendments, and there is no presumption of action. I remind Members that Magnitsky was a Russian lawyer who worked for Bill Browder. He was tortured for several months and murdered, and his dead body was put on trial. That is remarkable, even by Russian standards. It would be nice if the Government had more ambition when it came to the Magnitsky elements of either the Finance Bill or this Bill.
The idea that weak or lax standards help the UK to compete in international money markets and international economies is deeply misguided. We are in danger of wagging our fingers at people like the Russians while allowing their state officials, people close to their regime and those on sanctions lists a free light to live here and use the western system.
EN+ was floated recently in the City. It has been reported that US security officials were concerned about the float and raised issues about it, as it may have been used to pay off loans to VTB, a Russian state-owned bank that is subject to sanctions. If that is the case, I would love Ministers to explain to me why it is a wise move effectively to turn a blind eye while the Russians play the sanctions process that we have put on them.
I will touch briefly on the offshore problem. I congratulate Private Eye on the work it has done in recent years to highlight the effects and the extent of offshore vehicles in the UK. When even in a place such as the Isle of Wight we have property owned by companies based in the British Virgin Islands, the Cayman Islands, Jersey, Guernsey, Luxembourg or Gibraltar, the system is flawed. Lax standards are corrupting for our country and our financial system and it is short-sighted to see it otherwise; I am sure Ministers will agree. When houses in Belgravia and Hampstead are used as glorified Rolexes for the international kleptocracy, we are getting something wrong.
I very much hope that the Minister will pledge to continue to make aspects of the Bill tighter, consider what can be done about the missing Magnitsky elements and make a commitment to having the highest standards in the Bill, rather than following others.
Bambos Charalambous (Enfield, Southgate) (Lab)
As most hon. Members have stated in this debate, money laundering and corruption are huge issues worldwide. Although I welcome some of the measures in the Bill, I do not believe that it goes far enough.
The Minister for Europe and the Americas has already been made aware—it was mentioned in an intervention—that, as part of the recently agreed fifth EU anti-money laundering directive, all EU member states will be required to have public beneficial ownership registers by 2019. I am sure he will confirm that, whether or not the United Kingdom is part of the EU at the time of the directive’s implementation, the United Kingdom would not want any measures that are weaker than those in the directive.
This raises the question of what should happen in the overseas territories. The UK has made a start on a public beneficial ownership register, but more needs to be done in the overseas territories. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Barking (Dame Margaret Hodge) pointed out, the problem is that many overseas territories are tax havens and as such they are home to many offshore companies willing to offer complete anonymity to their clientele, with very few questions asked.
We should note that, despite overseas territories having small populations, half of all global trade passes through them because they are tax havens, and the vast majority of the transactions are carried out by offshore companies. Let us, for example, take the British Virgin Islands. Despite having a population of only 28,000, it is home to an estimated 500,000 offshore companies, which is 40% of the total number of offshore companies in the world. Many of these offshore companies have complete anonymity and are shell companies working with nominees and powers of attorney to move around vast amounts of money. Most people faced with that information would conclude that there is something dodgy going on.
My right hon. Friend gave examples of corrupt and illegal practices that have occurred in overseas territories tax havens, all of which are because of the opaqueness of the systems that they operate. A fully functioning central, public beneficial ownership register in the overseas territories would be no cause of concern to companies carrying out legitimate business activity. As more and more countries agree to adopt a public beneficial ownership register, it is inevitable that the overseas territories should follow.
We need to make sure that money offshore in these tax havens is not being used for illegal purposes. If there is an issue, it is that overseas territories have built their wealth on secrecy. If that is the case, the Government should support the overseas territories to make sure activity is based on a legitimate and transparent model of business. The Government should give support to the overseas territories as they transition from financial secrecy to openness.
There is no reason why corporate ownership transparency should cause any problems in the provision of legitimate financial services, especially considering that many other countries will be adopting the principles of transparency registers. The people who are losing out the most are those in developing countries. They are in the greatest need and the billions being diverted away from them could literally be costing lives.
I will conclude by saying that a fully operational public beneficial ownership register in the overseas territories will greatly help to curtail money laundering, corruption and criminal activity, but much more needs to be done than is set out in this Bill.
Vicky Ford (Chelmsford) (Con)
Issues relating to sanctions and anti-money laundering have been dealt with under EU law for many decades. It is absolutely right that we in Britain should treat these matters extremely seriously and make sure that the UK has in its toolbox all the tools that it needs to take action.
The UK has taken the lead in the past. Many of my colleagues in the House have reminded us of their experience when David Cameron chaired the G8 and tax transparency was put at the top of the global agenda. I remember being in the European Parliament at that time, working with the UK Conservative-led Government to increase tax transparency across Europe by introducing country-by-country reporting for banks.
The UK must continue to lead because the City of London is the world’s leading financial centre. The financial services sector is the leading contributor to British finances. It is vital to our future economic success, and its success is based on its reputation for trust and transparency. Crime does not stand still, however, and those who want to continue to launder money will continue to try to evolve their behaviour, moving into new dark spaces, taking advantage of digital trade and finding new ways to exploit a virtual world. No country has the tools to act alone and countries must continue to work together. Of course Britain will continue to implement anti-money laundering laws that were set in Brussels: we helped to form those laws. Action is being taken today. In today’s news, we have seen fines against William Hill, HSBC has announced a warning of a potential $1.5 billion fine for its Swiss operation and Latvia’s central bank chief has been suspended.
If we are to continue to take action against money laundering and fraud internationally as well as domestically, we must continue to have exchange of information. Data exchange is key for our security services, our tax authorities and our financial services sector. The vast majority of our financial services companies want to be able to stamp out fraud themselves. I am sure I am not the only Member to receive a phone call from their credit card company warning them that their credit card was being used fraudulently. I was in my kitchen in England while my credit card was being used in a hotel in Turkey. Our companies want to be able to access cross-border personal data because that helps them to fight crime.
Foreign Secretary, you have spoken about building bridges with Europe. You have spoken about building a physical bridge. You have spoken about building a hypothetical bridge. I challenge you to build a digital bridge: a 21st century data exchange bridge, based on the rules of data adequacy. That will ensure we keep the ability to fight crime together across the world.
Lloyd Russell-Moyle (Brighton, Kemptown) (Lab/Co-op)
I agree with many of the comments we have heard today from both sides of the House, which I would summarise as a necessary start but not good enough, not far enough, not strong enough.
One area I am interested in is arms control, which the Bill misses an opportunity to address. The arms export control system we use in the UK goes hand in hand with the sanctions system we use to stop arms getting to certain regimes. The arms export regime we operate in this country is, of course, underpinned by EU consolidated criteria. There is no mention of consolidated criteria or of bringing the arms licensing regulations into a system such as the sanctions regulations. It is, I suggest, a great shame. The Bill does not touch on that area.
All of this is all very good, but enforcement is needed. Without enforcement, there is no point and the Bill is not worth the paper it is written on. Since 2011, there have been no prosecutions by Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs of people who have broken the arms export regime or broken sanctions on arms sales. What is the point of introducing a Bill with a raft of sanctions against arms sales to certain regimes if we are not going to enforce them? It is not as though during this time there have not been significant and very credible reports that arms export controls have been breached and that arms have been sold to some of the most dangerous regimes in the world. We have just failed on enforcement because HMRC is under-resourced and these issues are under-prioritised in that department.
Turning to another area, I have a constituent who is a local business owner with a foreign national. She has reported many times her feeling that the company that she co-owns has been engaged in money laundering. She reported it to Action Fraud, Sussex police and HMRC, but for over a year, nothing was done. It took us hiring forensic accountants for HMRC suddenly to realise that hundreds of thousands of pounds might well have been laundered through the company. This was a director who wanted to blow the whistle, but HMRC and Action Fraud were just not interested. That is another example of how what is written in the Bill is all well and good, but the enforcement is just no good.
When Labour Members talk about wanting to give more money to our nurses, teachers and firefighters, we are often mocked by Government Members, who say that we want a magic money tree. It seems to me that a crop of magic money trees is growing with incredible health in some of our 14 British overseas territories. They are very clean because they are laundered daily, and they clearly like the climes—the balmy 32° that it is right now—in the British Virgin Islands. I note that many of the people in the Virgin Islands never really see these trees because they are lovely brass-plate trees.
Maybe it is not the climate that encourages magic money trees to locate in our overseas territories. Perhaps they thrive as part of a protection racket to shelter the very wealthiest in our society from paying their fair share. As we leave the European Union, it is vital that we have the mechanisms in place to replace the sanctions and money laundering provisions of the EU. I commend the Government for taking the first steps, but the Bill falls very short of creating a public, central and open register of beneficial ownership for our overseas territories.
More than 70% of corruption cases surveyed by the World Bank between 1980 and 2010 rely on anonymously owned companies helping to obscure what they are doing. It is the overseas territories that fly the flag of brand Britain and endanger that flag by not opening up—[Interruption.] I am sure that you will have a moment to reply later on, Mr Foreign Secretary. You do not need to chunter from your seat. These corrupt regimes are under the British flag. We have seen in the Paradise papers how companies such as Appleby—I call them crooked Appleby—advertise themselves as respectable offshore sector companies. However, they are now suing The Guardian for telling the truth that six of their 10 offices are located in overseas territories and are involved in money laundering. What will the Bill do to help people? Not enough.
We might hear from Government Members that we cannot do much on these issues, but a raft of people from overseas territories have written to me, begging us to take action, saying that they see no benefits in the territories for people on the ground from this tax evasion. It does not benefit our overseas territories. It benefits a small, super-elite and if we do not take action on enforcement in our overseas territories, who will? The Bill must go further. If it does not, we must ensure that amendments are forced in Committee and on the Floor of the House because there is cross-party support for ensuring that brand Britain stays clean and that we kick out the dodgy dark money from our country and our overseas territories.
Anneliese Dodds (Oxford East) (Lab/Co-op)
It is a real pleasure to respond to the debate on behalf of the Opposition. The Bill, as many colleagues have indicated, purportedly aims to provide the UK with an appropriate system to stop the corrupt and the criminal from benefiting from our British financial system. I will first consider the sanctions-related matters before looking at the money laundering matters, although they are of course intrinsically linked.
As with much of the Government’s Brexit-related legislation, many concerns have been expressed about the lack of parliamentary oversight of the Bill’s provisions. As my hon. Friend the Member for Bishop Auckland (Helen Goodman) set out, many positive changes were made when the Bill was discussed in the other place, and they must not now be rolled back in this place. Other matters of concern persist, as indicated by the hon. Members for Glasgow Central (Alison Thewliss) and for East Dunbartonshire (Jo Swinson), and echoed in the calls for clarity from the hon. Member for Huntingdon (Mr Djanogly).
We still lack clarity over the extent to which our sanctions regime will be aligned with that of the EU 27. The evidence is clear that sanctions are more effective when imposed collectively—the hon. Members for Glasgow Central and for Huntingdon made that point very well. I was disappointed by the Foreign Secretary’s comments in this regard, which I thought were contradictory; he simultaneously admitted that unilateralism might not be effective while vaunting the possibilities of a totally independent regime. There are no indications in the Bill of how we will concretely ensure the continued co-ordination that is so necessary in this area.
We heard in the debate some persuasive arguments about the need for stronger commitments in the Bill, not just fleeting mentions, on the necessity for sanctions to target those responsible for human rights violations, particularly those responsible for gross human rights violations, as in the so-called Magnitsky regimes. The right hon. Member for Sutton Coldfield (Mr Mitchell) spelled out clearly the reasons for such an explicit approach. I hope that Government Members will have listened to those arguments.
Finally in relation to the sanctions-related provisions, the hon. Members for Glasgow Central and for East Dunbartonshire mentioned the need to ensure that measures are appropriately calibrated so that they target criminal individuals and terrorists, not legitimate aid agencies and financial service providers delivering legitimate services. It is essential that we have accurate and appropriately granular mechanisms in that regard.
Let me move on to money laundering. I was very pleased, as I am sure were many Members, about the informative and courteous style of debate that we have had on money laundering tonight. I am afraid that is in contrast to the comments on money laundering from the Government when introducing the Bill, which I thought were disturbingly brief. It is clear that the problem of money laundering is getting worse, not better. I will not go into all the arguments and evidence on that now, because that has been done very ably by other Opposition Members, not least my hon. Friend the Member for Ealing Central and Acton (Dr Huq). At the centre of the UK’s problems with money laundering lies a lack of transparency and accountability, both of which are essential if we are to ensure that the criminal and the corrupt do not profit from our leaky financial system.
On the issue of public registers of beneficial ownership in our associated territories, may I say what a powerful tour de force we have had from the right hon. Members for Arundel and South Downs (Nick Herbert) and for Sutton Coldfield? I am sure that the right hon. Member for Arundel and South Downs, as a former Home Office Minister, has a huge insight into the damage being done by the lack of transparency in this area, aiding international criminals. The Government must listen to the uncomfortable truth that he has set out so ably tonight.
My right hon. Friend the Member for Barking (Dame Margaret Hodge) set out how long this process has been running, as the Government requested beneficial ownership registers from the overseas territories five years ago. Many Members have indicated that we have had a slippage from the Government’s initial commitments in this regard. The failure to clean up their act by some of our overseas territories is having a severe impact on their reputation. As someone who has had many meetings with representatives of those jurisdictions, and who supports them tremendously, let me say that it is not their foes but their friends who are arguing for more transparency, because we see the reputational damage that the lack of transparency is doing to them. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Barking said, the Government’s failure to act constitutes complicity. I agree with the hon. Member for Amber Valley (Nigel Mills) that the UK must exercise leadership.
There has also been a lack of clarity from the Government over whether they are minded to follow EU-level developments, particularly the anti-money laundering directive known as AMLD 5. I agree with the hon. Member for Chelmsford (Vicky Ford) about many things—we worked together previously in the European Parliament—but I am afraid I cannot agree with her assessment that we know for certain that the Government will continue to cohere with EU-level developments. The hon. Member for East Dunbartonshire (Jo Swinson) and my hon. Friend the Member for Enfield, Southgate (Bambos Charalambous) explained very clearly why we do not have the clarity that we need.
I think it especially important to focus on the regulation of trusts. Under David Cameron, the Government argued against their inclusion in EU registers of beneficial ownership. The Foreign Secretary claimed that the UK was ahead of the rest of the EU with our register of beneficial ownership, but we have been a drag on the EU when it comes to more transparency on trusts.
Anneliese Dodds
At EU level, we have been. David Cameron argued against the inclusion of trusts in EU beneficial ownership registers, but we now have a chance to change. I can see that the Foreign Secretary is appalled by the idea that we might have acted as a drag in that regard, but I am sure that he will be converted to the cause of more transparency.
As the hon. Member for East Dunbartonshire rightly mentioned, it is deeply concerning that the timetable for the foreign-owned property register has slipped so substantially. I take on board what was said by the hon. Member for Amber Valley—we already have a register of sorts, in the guise of Private Eye’s tax haven property map—but that map was created, essentially, by mistake. It was created when the Land Registry released data, by mistake, which was then matched up with Companies House data. The Government should be delivering the register themselves. I appreciate that there should be additional disincentives, but that is not a reason not to act now.
Finally, let me say something about the issue of due diligence in relation to British company ownership. Yes, we do have a public register run by Companies House, but the responses to a series of parliamentary questions that I have tabled have shown that there is little or no oversight of the veracity of the data supplied to it. That is illustrated by the worrying case mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Brighton, Kemptown (Lloyd Russell-Moyle), to whom I pay tribute for all his effort to help his constituent. There are not enough resources in Companies House, and there is a regulatory gap in respect of those registering companies with it directly. There are even problems for those who register through company formation providers, many of which have been shown not to be fulfilling their responsibilities. In that context, it may be necessary to launch a pincer movement requiring all such firms to have UK bank accounts: at least they would then be covered by anti-money laundering legislation through the bank account system.
The Financial Action Task Force is due to report next month on the UK’s approach to money laundering and ensuring the integrity of the international financial system. I am sure Members in all parts of the House agree that it would be a huge international embarrassment if the taskforce concluded that the UK Government had chosen not to adopt measures that would help to clean up our financial system. I am afraid I agree with my right hon. Friend the Member for Barking that there are grim stains on the UK’s reputation in this regard.
Let me issue one last plea. I have been very disturbed by the Government’s decision not to defend publicly the journalists who were singled out by Appleby. It picked on British companies, the BBC and The Guardian, which were taken to court after releasing details that were in the public interest. Sadly, the Treasury team—I see that some of its members are present—has not yet been willing to condemn that behaviour. I appeal to Ministers, including those in charge of foreign policy, to do so now, and to confirm that those disclosures were in the public interest.
The Minister for Europe and the Americas (Sir Alan Duncan)
As my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary said in his opening speech, this Bill is necessary to ensure that we can continue to use sanctions and anti-money laundering regulations to support our foreign policy and national security goals as we leave the European Union. We have had a lively and passionate Second Reading debate, but I sense that the setting up of a UK sanctions regime on our departure from the EU would appear to enjoy the broad support of this House.
It is often invidious in winding up a debate to pick out some speeches but not all, but forgive me, Mr Speaker, if I do that this evening, because I think the two strongest and most remarkable speeches were those of the right hon. Member for Barking (Dame Margaret Hodge) and my right hon. Friend the Member for Sutton Coldfield (Mr Mitchell), with whom I worked very closely as his deputy in DFID. I appreciate the passion of the right hon. Lady; we will no doubt debate these matters at great length in Committee and on Report, and we will take on board the strength of the arguments we have heard tonight, and which, of course, we have heard before. Likewise, my right hon. Friend made an impassioned plea for humanitarian agencies to be fully considered, and I will come to that shortly. He also spoke of Magnitsky, as did many Members; I will go into more detail later, but for now I will say that this Bill has wide-ranging powers to sanction people for human rights abuse. On open registers, we share my right hon. Friend’s view on wanting to bear down on illicit money flows; as he said, the registers are open to instant access by regulatory authorities, but I quite understand his view that such action alone does not suffice.
I have a small point to make to my hon. Friend the Member for Huntingdon (Mr Djanogly), who asked if we could publish the anti-corruption strategy; we did so in December of last year. The hon. Member for Brighton, Kemptown (Lloyd Russell-Moyle) asked why nobody has been prosecuted for export control offences; in fact, there have been 23 not just prosecutions, but convictions, for export control offences in the 10 years from 2006 to 2016, and a number of these prosecutions relate to exports to countries covered by UN and EU sanctions regimes.
This being a Second Reading debate, I want to dwell on a few key principles contained in the legislation, as I have no doubt that we will discuss the closer detail further in Committee. The first such issue is that of delegated powers. They are rightly coming under scrutiny in this place today. However, it is important to recognise that Ministers implement sanctions and anti-money laundering regulations by using delegated powers now, through secondary legislation under the European Communities Act 1972, and this Bill will not change that approach. In fact, in the future Parliament will have greater oversight of sanctions than it currently does, with votes needed in both Houses when the UK acts outside the requirements of the UN, and given the need to respond quickly to global events, the Government believe that regulations remain the best mechanism for implementing and amending sanctions and anti-money laundering regimes.
There is, however, the question of creating criminal offences, as referred to by the hon. Member for Glasgow Central (Alison Thewliss), and I am confident this will be addressed before Report. We have listened to these concerns and we are working on a solution that we hope will be accepted by those who expressed them in another place. Indeed, Lord Judge, whom we have been talking to, and his colleagues did not disagree that breaches of sanctions should be criminal offences, and we will introduce amendments to fix this and address their concerns in due course.
On procedure, we believe we have the right balance of affirmative and negative resolutions. Regulations that implement UN regimes will be made under the negative procedure; regulations that do not implement UN sanctions regimes will be made under the made-affirmative procedure.
The hon. Member for Glasgow Central talked about the ability to amend devolved legislation as being “monstrous”. I think she slightly misunderstands the process here. Sanctions are a matter of foreign policy.
Helen Goodman
On negative and affirmative resolutions, the Minister is choosing to draw a distinction based on the origin of the sanctions—whether they are from the UN or the EU—but would there not be a greater logic in drawing a distinction between individual sanctions on people, which obviously have to be done quickly, and the rules of the game for the regimes, where the House would be reasonable in seeking to be consulted before they are introduced?
Sir Alan Duncan
The reason that we have made this distinction in terms of procedure is that we are obliged in law to implement UN sanctions. Once the sanctions have been agreed at the UN Security Council, the UK has an obligation to implement them under the UN charter. Not to do so would leave the UK in breach of international law—hence the distinction in the procedure that we are using.
Returning to what the hon. Member for Glasgow Central described as “monstrous”, I say again that sanctions are a matter of foreign policy and so are reserved to this Parliament.
Sir Alan Duncan
No. We consulted the devolved Administrations—that answers a question that the hon. Lady asked—and they did not disagree with us. The ability to make changes to devolved legislation that can be used only to make changes required as a result of sanctions does not injure the devolution settlement. Their primary purpose is for a reserved matter.
Let me move on to the issue of Magnitsky. I recognise the concerns expressed about the importance of taking a stand against individuals responsible for committing gross abuses of human rights. We recognise and indeed share those concerns. I would like to make it clear that this Government are committed to promoting and strengthening universal human rights, and this Bill will permit us to do so. We already have a range of powers to take action against those who commit gross human rights abuses, most recently through the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002, as amended by the Criminal Finances Act 2017. The Home Secretary also has the power to exclude individuals whose presence we believe to be contrary to the public good, and we keep track of potentially dangerous individuals to prevent them from entering the UK. To complement this, we also have a range of domestic asset-freezing powers.
We are already committed to using sanctions in this area. This is demonstrated by the number of countries against whom we use human rights-related sanctions. They include the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Iran, Libya, Mali, South Sudan, Venezuela and Zimbabwe. The Bill will rightly continue this, allowing the UK to continue to implement existing sanctions regimes and to impose new sanctions in the future. I reiterate my point that paragraphs (f) and (h) of clause 1(2) will empower the Government to implement sanctions on human rights grounds. These are broad powers that will provide maximum flexibility and allow us to include all sorts of abuses, including but not only gross human rights abuses.
I should like to refer to the comments made by my right hon. Friend the Member for Sutton Coldfield about humanitarian access and freedoms. This is an important point. The Government recognise the concerns expressed in the House about the humanitarian impact of sanctions, and we understand the need for engagement with non-governmental organisations and other humanitarian actors. We fully support the work of NGOs operating in difficult areas, and we recognise that they are important partners in delivering the UK’s objectives in challenging environments. I want to reassure the House that the Government have been actively engaging with NGOs. As part of the consultation for the Bill, we held a roundtable to understand their concerns. Within the past couple of months, we have also met organisations involved in humanitarian, development and peace-building work.
The Bill provides a number of tools that will enable the Government to tailor each regime to help to meet the needs of NGOs. In particular, it will enable the Government to make exemptions for humanitarian reasons and to issue licences for legitimate activity. EU case law currently limits our ability to issue general licences, but the Bill will provide greater flexibility by allowing us to do so in circumstances where Ministers judge it appropriate. It will also help to prevent the exploitation of NGOs by those seeking to circumvent sanctions. We have committed to remain engaged with the humanitarian sector and to provide it with high-quality guidance on the implementation and enforcement of individual regimes. We will continue to work with NGOs and other stakeholders to develop the best possible system.
Beneficial ownership has been at the heart of tonight’s debate. We will no doubt discuss it in Committee and perhaps on Report. It is important to recognise that the UK is the only member of the G20 with a public register of company beneficial ownership. We welcome the fact that the EU is catching up with us, but, when it does, public registers of beneficial ownership will still not be a global standard. The non-EU members of the G20 will still not have them.
We hope to work with the Financial Action Task Force and other partners to establish registers of beneficial ownership as a global standard, the effect of which will be not to allow companies or people simply to shift from one regime to another and hide their assets somewhere else. In the meantime, we should remember that the overseas territories are well ahead of most jurisdictions, including many G20 partners, in developing private registers.
In the exchange of notes in 2016, the overseas territories with significant financial centres each committed to holding central or equivalent registers of company beneficial ownership and to making information held on those registers available to UK law enforcement and tax authorities. Those arrangements are almost complete, with some of the territories understandably slightly delayed by last year’s devastating hurricanes.
Moreover, the overseas territories are separate jurisdictions with their own democratically elected Governments. The UK respects the constitutional relationship with the overseas territories and Crown dependencies. It is entirely right to work consensually with them, rather than to impose legislation. The UK has only legislated directly without the overseas territories’ consent in the most exceptional of circumstances, such as on capital punishment.
We do not generally legislate for the overseas territories, and to do so would have the effect of overruling their own legislatures and could be interpreted as disenfranchising the citizens who voted for them. The overseas territories have taken great steps forward in this area, further indeed than many other jurisdictions, and I urge the House to appreciate the importance of not jeopardising what has been agreed with them.
Until we leave the European Union, the United Kingdom will continue to exercise all the rights and obligations of membership, including with respect to common foreign and security policy, sanctions and anti-money laundering. After we leave, this Government intend to continue working closely with our European neighbours to ensure our collective peace and security. Sanctions and anti-money laundering regulations will continue to be a powerful tool in that effort.
Through this Bill, the Government intend to ensure that these important foreign policy instruments continue to be fully available for the United Kingdom to use wherever it is deemed appropriate so to do. I commend the Bill to the House.
Question put and agreed to.
Bill accordingly read a Second time.
Sanctions and Anti-money Laundering Bill [Lords] (Programme)
Motion made, and Question put forthwith (Standing Order No. 83A(7)),
That the following provisions shall apply to the Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Bill [Lords]:
Committal
1. The Bill shall be committed to a Public Bill Committee.
Proceedings in Public Bill Committee
2. Proceedings in the Public Bill Committee shall (so far as not previously concluded) be brought to a conclusion on Tuesday 6 March.
3. The Public Bill Committee shall have leave to sit twice on the first day on which it meets.
Proceedings on Consideration and up to and including Third Reading
4. Proceedings on Consideration and any proceedings in legislative grand committee shall (so far as not previously concluded) be brought to a conclusion one hour before the moment of interruption on the day on which proceedings on Consideration are commenced.
5. Proceedings on Third Reading shall (so far as not previously concluded) be brought to a conclusion at the moment of interruption on that day.
6. Standing Order No. 83B (Programming committees) shall not apply to proceedings on Consideration and up to and including Third Reading.
Other proceedings
7. Any other proceedings on the Bill may be programmed.—(Chris Heaton-Harris.)
Question agreed to.
Sanctions and Anti-money Laundering Bill [Lords] (Money)
Queen’s recommendation signified.
Motion made, and Question put forthwith (Standing Order No. 52(1)(a)),
That, for the purposes of any Act resulting from the Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Bill [Lords], it is expedient to authorise the payment out of money provided by Parliament of:
(a) any expenditure incurred under or by virtue of the Act by the Secretary of State or the Treasury; and
(b) any increase attributable to the Act in the sums payable under any other Act out of money so provided.—(Chris Heaton-Harris.)
Question agreed to.
SANCTIONS AND ANTI-MONEY LAUNDERING BILL [LORDS] (WAYS AND MEANS)
Motion made, and Question put forthwith (Standing Order No. 52(1)(a)),
That, for the purposes of any Act resulting from the Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Bill [Lords], it is expedient to authorise:
(1) the imposition, by regulations under the Act, of charges by persons exercising functions under the regulations in connection with the detection, investigation or prevention of money laundering or terrorist financing or the combating of threats to the integrity of the international financial system; and
(2) the payment of sums into the Consolidated Fund.—(Chris Heaton-Harris.)
Question agreed to.
Business without Debate
(6 years, 10 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text
Delegated Legislation
(6 years, 10 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text
Mr Speaker
With the leave of the House, I propose to take motions 6 to 17 together.
Motion made, and Question put forthwith (Standing Order No. 118(6)),
Legal Services
That the draft Legal Services Act 2007 (Appeals from Licensing Authority Decisions)(General Council of the Bar) Order 2018, which was laid before this House on 19 December 2017, be approved.
That the draft Legal Services Act 2007 (General Council of the Bar) (Modification of Functions) Order 2018, which was laid before this House on 19 December 2017, be approved.
Representation of the People
That the draft Representation of the People (England and Wales) (Amendment) Regulations 2018, which were laid before this House on 19 December 2017, be approved.
That the draft Representation of the People (Scotland) (Amendment) Regulations 2018, which were laid before this House on 19 December 2017, be approved.
That the draft Representation of the People (Northern Ireland) (Amendment) Regulations 2018, which were laid before this House on 19 December 2017, be approved.
Social Security
That the draft Social Security (Contributions) (Rates, Limits and Thresholds Amendments and National Insurance Funds Payments) Regulations 2018, which were laid before this House on 15 January, be approved.
That the draft Tax Credits and Guardian’s Allowance Up-rating etc. Regulations 2018, which were laid before this House on 15 January, be approved.
Criminal Law
That the draft Policing and Crime Act 2017 (Consequential Amendments) Regulations 2018, which were laid before this House on 11 January, be approved.
Soft Drinks Industry Levy
That the draft Soft Drinks Industry Levy (Enforcement) Regulations 2018, which were laid before this House on 15 January, be approved.
Terms and Conditions of Employment
That the draft Seafarers (Insolvency, Collective Redundancies and Information and Consultation Miscellaneous Amendments) Regulations 2018, which were laid before this House on 15 January, be approved.
Criminal Law
That the draft Andrey Lugovoy and Dmitri Kovtun Freezing Order 2018, which was laid before this House on 19 January, be approved.
Digital Economy
That the draft Proposal for Designation of an Age-Verification Regulator, which was laid before this House on 14 December 2017, be approved.—(Wendy Morton.)
Question agreed to.
Standing Orders Etc. (Departmental Nomenclature)
Motion made, and Question put forthwith (Standing Order No.9(6)),
That the following Orders, changes to Standing Orders and amendments to Resolutions of the House be made:
A: Select Committees Related to Government Departments
(1) That Standing Order No. 152 (Select committees related to government departments) be amended in the appropriate places in the Table in paragraph (2) as follows:
(i) by inserting “Housing,” before “Communities and Local Government” in the first column, and by leaving out “Department for” and inserting “Ministry of Housing,” in the second column, and
(ii) by inserting “and Social Care” after “Health” in each place it occurs.
B. European Committees
(2) That the Table in paragraph (7) of Standing Order No. 119 (European Committees) be amended as follows:
(i) in respect of European Committee A, by inserting “Housing,” before “Communities and Local Government”, and
(ii) in respect of European Committee C, by inserting “and Social Care” after “Health”.
C: Planning: National Policy Statements
(3) That paragraph (7)(a)(i) of Standing Order No. 145 (Liaison Committee) be amended by inserting “Housing,” before “Communities and Local Government”
(4) That paragraph (2)(a) of Standing Order No. 152H (Planning: national policy statements) be amended by inserting by inserting “Housing,” before “Communities and Local Government”
D: Liaison Committee
(5) That the Resolution of the House of 6 November 2017 (Liaison Committee: membership) be amended, by inserting “Housing,” before “Communities and Local Government”, and by inserting “and Social Care” after “Health”.
E: Related Provisions
(6) That all proceedings of the House and of its select committees relating to the Communities and Local Government Committee done before the passage of the Order this day (Standing Orders etc. (Departmental Nomenclature) (Select Committees related to Government Departments)) shall be read and have effect as if they had been done in relation to the Housing, Communities and Local Government Committee.
(7) That all proceedings of the House and of its select committees relating to the Health Committee done before the passage of the Order this day (Standing Orders etc. (Departmental Nomenclature) (Select Committees related to Government Departments)) shall be read and have effect as if they had been done in relation to the Health and Social Care Committee.
(8) That all proceedings of the House and of its select committees relating to the Culture, Media and Sport Committee done before the passage of the Order of 12 September 2017 (Standing Orders etc. (Departmental Nomenclature) (Digital, Culture, Media and Sport) (Select Committees related to Government Departments)) shall be read and have effect as if they had been done in relation to the Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Committee.—(Wendy Morton.)
Question agreed to.
Committees
Mr Speaker
With the leave of the House, we will take motions 19 to 24 together.
Ordered,
Foreign Affairs Committee
That Ms Nusrat Ghani and Nadhim Zahawi be discharged from the Foreign Affairs Committee and Priti Patel and Mr Bob Seely be added.
Health and Social Care Committee
That Dr Caroline Johnson and Maggie Throup be discharged from the Health and Social Care Committee and Derek Thomas and Martin Vickers be added.
Home Affairs Committee
That Will Quince be discharged from the Home Affairs Committee and Kirstene Hair be added.
Committee of Public Accounts
That Heidi Allen and Nigel Mills be discharged from the Committee of Public Accounts and Anne Marie Morris and Lee Rowley be added.
Treasury Committee
That Kit Malthouse be discharged from the Treasury Committee and Mr Simon Clarke be added.
Work and Pensions Committee
That Chris Green be discharged from the Work and Pensions Committee and Nigel Mills be added.—(Bill Wiggin, on behalf of the Selection Committee.)
Mr Speaker
Order. We will come in a moment to the petition to be presented by the hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle (Emma Hardy), so I will repeat the point that I ordinarily make: if, unaccountably, there are Members who do not wish to listen to the presentation of this petition, I hope they will leave the Chamber quickly and quietly, so that the rest of us can enjoy the mellifluous tones of the hon. Lady.
Petitions
(6 years, 10 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text
Emma Hardy (Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle) (Lab)
I rise to present this petition relating to LGBT sex and relationship education. Sadly, for everybody in Hull and elsewhere in the country, the Hull equalities campaigner Colin Livett died over the weekend. He wrote this petition to ensure that no child would be left behind just because they are LGBT or struggling with their sexuality or gender identity, and it is in tribute to him that I present this today.
The petition states:
The petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons urges the Government to ensure that LGBT inclusive SRE is to be granted mandatory status in all schools in order that future generations leave schools informed on such matters of equality and personal safety having been educated correctly about sexual relations.
Following is the full text of the petition:
[The Petition of residents of the UK,
Declares that there are benefits of inclusive teaching of Sex and Relationship Education (SRE) to ensure that no child is left in ignorance; further that the Government should pledge that the updated SRE guidelines for mandatory SRE in all schools will be LGBT inclusive, which it is yet to do; and further that recent agreements made by the Government with a party which is not sympathetic to LGBT inclusive SRE following the general election on June 8th 2017, causes concern that education that is appropriate and LGBT inclusive, could be put at risk.
The petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons urges the Government to ensure that LGBT inclusive SRE is to be granted mandatory status in all schools in order that future generations leave schools informed on such matters of equality and personal safety having been educated correctly about sexual relations.
And the petitioners remain, etc.]
[P002103]
Martyn Day (Linlithgow and East Falkirk) (SNP)
I rise to present a petition relating to the damaging and misguided proposals to close the RBS branch in Linlithgow.
The petition states:
The petition of residents of Linlithgow East Falkirk,
Declares that proposed closure of Linlithgow branch of the publicly-owned Royal Bank of Scotland will have a detrimental effect on local community and the local economy.
The petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons urges Her Majesty’s Treasury, the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy and the Royal Bank of Scotland to take into account the concerns of petitioners and take whatever steps they can to halt the planned closure of this branch.
And the petitioners remain, etc.
[P002111]
Arts Council England Funding: Coalfield Communities
(6 years, 10 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
John Mann (Bassetlaw) (Lab)
Thank you, Mr Speaker, for generously granting this debate. I rise to congratulate Arts Council England on its incredible deftness and artistic creativity in presenting to the world a list of the coalfield communities that it funds that is so expansive as to defy most critical logic. In attempting to demonstrate that the paltry amounts of money it spends in English coalfield communities is slightly larger, the Arts Council has through its vivid imagination incorporated into the English coalfields the centre of Newcastle, the docklands of Salford and the entirety of Huddersfield.
Were this 200 years ago, the latter would have some credibility, but one can see from the detail of where miners are under the miners’ pension scheme, and much more publicly through Hansard due to repeated questions about the number of former miners who have claimed compensation under the huge industrial injury compensation scheme, the precise number of retired miners —for they are what we are talking about when we discuss former coalfield communities—in each constituency in the United Kingdom. It is safe to say that Huddersfield, central Newcastle and the Salford docks are rather low down the pecking order. Indeed, they are virtually invisible.
However, one can see on the public record, which the Arts Council should read to clarify its statistics, where the former coalfield communities are. I have a list of some of them and the amounts of money generously given by the Arts Council in the past year: Nuneaton—zero; North Warwickshire—zero; Washington and Sunderland West—zero; Amber Valley— zero; Erewash— zero; Rother Valley—zero; Wentworth—zero; Blyth Valley—zero; Gedling—zero; Sedgefield—zero; Sheffield South East—zero; Cannock Chase—zero; Makerfield—zero; Easington —zero; Leigh—zero; Doncaster North—zero; Barnsley East—zero; Newcastle North—zero; Blaydon—zero; Sherwood—zero; Staffordshire Moorlands—zero; North West Durham—zero; Stoke-on-Trent North—zero; Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford—zero; Hemsworth —zero; Houghton and Sunderland South—zero; Ashfield —zero; Mansfield—zero; North West Leicestershire—zero; Bolsover—zero; Bassetlaw—zero. The figures were last put in the public domain by my good self in a parliamentary question in 2007, when the situation was slightly better—five had received tiny amounts of money. However, 85% received nothing in 2007, nothing since and nothing today. We are therefore talking about national funding by the Arts Council, in most coalfield communities, of zero.
Let us compare that, at random, with the borough of Islington. There, the Arts Council funded 26 projects in the last year, 14 of them at more than £1 million—up from 2007. In Bermondsey, 13 projects were funded—up from 2007. In Bethnal Green and Bow, the figure is 30 projects—up from 2007. In Cities of London and Westminster, 62 projects were funded in the past year, of which 35 received more than £500,000—up from 2007. In Hackney, North and South, 32 projects were funded, and in Holborn and St Pancras the figure was 26. To demonstrate that this is not entirely a London bias, Manchester Central received funding for 30 projects, Brighton Pavilion had 13 projects funded and the figure for Birmingham, Ladywood was 29. All those areas benefit more than all the coalfield communities in England combined every single year.
This debate is about arts funding, but if we look at sports funding, the picture is not quite as bad. London has merely four times as much as the entirety of the coalfield communities.
All of that prompts the question of whether this is fair or reasonable. Should my constituents not have the same access to the arts as everybody else? If someone takes a bus from my constituency, it is not like taking a city centre bus or the underground in London. It is not possible to get from parts of my constituency to the city of Nottingham and back in a day by public transport. The slightly more generous funding for the city of Nottingham, which was explained to me as benefiting my constituents, has minimal benefit, particularly for young people.
I am particularly concerned about young people. You, Mr Speaker, have always been rightly and appropriately generous in welcoming young people from my constituency to Speaker’s House. For them, it is not just a great honour; it opens their eyes and opens doors to the kind of places they do not tend to go into. You fully recognise that, Mr Speaker, as did your predecessor. Why cannot the Arts Council gets its head around the fact that young people in my area do not have such opportunities?
We are talking about scores of constituencies around the country. One that I have excluded—Bishop Auckland—has one project at the moment, so it is doing very well. However, that is hardly an example of fairness. Indeed, the Bishop Auckland project demonstrates a further problem: when arts funding goes in, it tends to go into the great, historic buildings and museums. So although Bowes in Bishop Auckland is a great place and a great museum, it is not in the coalfields. Technically, it can be put down as a “coalfield contribution”, and it is a very valid contribution, but it is not a coalfield contribution at all. Even the paltry amounts are skewed by the Arts Council—
Helen Goodman
My hon. Friend is making a passionate case. I think the bias is for London and against the regions. Not so long ago, the whole of Lincolnshire was given 25p per person. What can be done with 25p per person? That is absurd. At the same time, London was getting 14 times as much as the average across the rest of the nation.
John Mann
My hon. Friend makes a good point. I merely say that when it comes to the English coalfields, we are talking about zero, zero, zero, zero, year after year. So the young people are reliant on the schools, which do their best, but we all know that schools funding has been tight. Schools funding for the arts has been tight for successive Governments—this goes back to the Labour Government as well. It has always been tight, but it has got tighter. Where someone wants to be creative in music in Bassetlaw, there is no facility available in the community for them. Where someone wants to go into the world of theatre, they find that no youth drama is being funded by the national Arts Council. The amounts of money that are there ought to be spread to some extent, to allow us to do things.
When we bid for money, the way the Arts Council works is that it says, “We’ll give you a consultant. One of our consultants.” That consultant will advise the Arts Council on what should be done. It is a closed shop within the arts world, where they give someone they know the contract to bid for money from themselves and none of it gets into the former coalfield communities. It is a scandal. The Arts Council needs to have the integrity to open up opportunities to give us the chance to demonstrate that where we do not have the arts infrastructure to bid for money, we can do it in a different way, with its assistance, without needing that infrastructure. Where people have the time, wisdom, inclination and skills, coming from the arts world, I do not begrudge them their brilliant ideas, inventiveness and claims in respect of facilities that already exist. If those facilities were in my constituency, I would be proposing the same. But is this fair on the national level? What about not just the education but the health, not least the mental health, of young people and the importance of the arts to them?
Jim Shannon
I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on his contribution. He has just mentioned the very issue that I want to bring to his attention—the health institutions. Almost 50% of the nation’s healthcare institutions provide arts programming for patients, families and staff because of the health benefits of the arts to their patients. Surely if they can do it, we can see clearly the benefits that would be brought to the coalfield communities.
John Mann
It would bring a huge benefit. We are talking about small amounts of money to give us a chance with the few projects we ever put forward, which get knocked back repeatedly, as the evidence demonstrates. That requires a change of mindset in the arts world and in Arts Council England, which must say to communities—not only mine, but the many others from all corners of England—“You have the right to benefit from the arts. You have the right and we are going to help you. We are going to get in there. We are going to provide that little bit of funding that would make such a big difference.” I predict, Mr Speaker, that if the young people in my constituency were given that opportunity—you, Sir, are witness to this—we would see that they are as inventive, creative and brilliant as any other set of young people in the country, but they do not end up in the arts world because their skills remain hidden. It is hardly a surprise that the talent shows uncover so many people from areas like mine.
We once had in the miners’ welfares and institutes many educational, artistic and sporting structures, based on the coalmining industries. That gave an entire set of generations opportunities. Over the past 30 years, those facilities have gently crumbled away in most places. The miners are not there and the employer is not there to provide the time, facilities and, indeed, money that there used to be. The void needs to be filled.
Will the Minister meet representatives from the Arts Council to take them through these incredible figures and challenge them? I am more than happy to go with him. The big-picture issue is not whether it is my constituency or one of the many others that actually benefits. I shall of course fight strongly for my area, but if it was only my area that was not benefiting, one could see that we were doing something wrong. When so many scores of constituencies get no national funding whatsoever from the Arts Council, that shows that the system is wrong.
I say in a non-partisan way—the Minister will note that this affects constituencies represented by Members from different parties—that it is long overdue that this issue is addressed. The Arts Council is currently reviewing its priorities; here is a chance to direct a modicum of resource to the former coalfields to give our kids a proper artistic chance.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (Michael Ellis)
I congratulate the hon. Member for Bassetlaw (John Mann) on securing this interesting and important debate. I believe that he and I are in agreement about the vital role that the arts can and do play in binding local communities together and about the sense of pride—and enthusiasm, for that matter—that engagement with the arts can bring to individuals and to places; we are certainly in agreement about that. The Government truly believe in and recognise the power of the arts to transform places and, indeed, people’s lives. I passionately believe that and know it to be true.
As the hon. Gentleman will know, Arts Council England rightly operates at arm’s length from the Government. In those circumstances, it would be wrong for a Minister of the Crown to intervene in, or comment too specifically on, individual funding cases. I shall therefore begin by discussing the Arts Council’s role and the support that it provides at a broader level.
The Arts Council’s mission is “Great art and culture for everyone”, which it seeks to achieve through advocacy and investment in line with its 10-year plan. It works to make the arts, and the wider culture of museums and libraries, an integral part of everyday public life, accessible to all and understood as essential to the national economy and the health and happiness of society.
On the hon. Gentleman’s specific point, the Arts Council has worked very hard in recent years to ensure that investment outside London has increased as a percentage and in cash terms. He will be pleased to hear that last year some 70% of Arts Council funding was awarded outside London. Between 2018 and 2022, an additional £170 million will be invested outside London. The Arts Council is also on target to spend 75% of national lottery money outside London by April this year—that is expected in the next couple of months.
The Arts Council recognises that more can be done to ensure that more people have access to great art and culture. Its flagship Creative People and Places programme, for example, was set up to focus on the least-engaged parts of England. Current investment in that programme is more than £53 million. The scheme allows local people to have a say in the art that they want locally. It is about taking art and culture to the people. Through that programme alone, the Arts Council has reached 1,450,000 people who would not ordinarily participate in art and culture.
There are some great examples of Creative People and Places schemes working in former coalfield areas, such as St Helens in the north-west, where Heart of Glass was set up in 2015. The evidence shows that that has made a difference. Heart of Glass and St Helens library service will join the Arts Council’s national portfolio of organisations for the first time in 2018 to 2022—congratulations to them for that achievement.
Helen Goodman
The statistics the Minister has given would be reasonable if between a quarter and a third of the British population lived in London, but they do not. Moreover, although the Arts Council is at arm’s length, the Minister has under his own control a significant budget that he could use if he wished to make up for the deficiencies in Arts Council distribution.
Michael Ellis
The fact of the matter is that the Arts Council has made significant progress, as I have outlined, in delineating moneys outside the London area. It is also important that my Department and I access all people throughout England. Arts Council England is focused on that too.
I should like to take this opportunity to congratulate Sue Williamson, who joins the Arts Council as director of libraries from St Helens library service, which I referred to a moment ago. She most recently delivered its award-winning cultural hubs and arts in libraries programme, and oversaw the successful application to the Arts Council’s national portfolio.
Another Arts Council-funded scheme is First Art, which is a collective of four cultural and community organisations working within former coalfields in north-east Derbyshire and north-east Nottinghamshire. It aims to bring inspiring cultural experiences within reach of everyone in Ashfield, Bolsover, Mansfield and north-east Derbyshire over the next two years. It is a very exciting programme.
The hon. Member for Bassetlaw raised the issue of funding for coalfield communities at Prime Minister’s questions a few weeks ago, when he alleged an inequality of funding by comparing funding for coalfield communities with funding in the London Borough of Islington, which he mentioned again this evening. I am happy to correct that assertion on the record. Having read his letter to me following Prime Minister’s questions, I see that his figures are based on the Arts Council’s national portfolio funding only, which led to the conclusion of a discrepancy in funding. In actual fact, although the national portfolio organisation funding is an incredibly important part of the Arts Council’s work—it provides regular funding over a set period to some of England’s most vital cultural institutions—it is by no means the only form of funding it distributes. The Arts Council has established various funding streams to tackle different issues across the nation. Many of those funding streams are heavily focused on supporting areas outside London. Some 80% to 90% of the funding for the Ambition for Excellence scheme, which supports talent, leadership and ambition, will be spent outside London. Recent research showed that 91% of touring activity funded by the Arts Council strategic touring fund was spent outside London. Some £35 million will be invested in the scheme between 2015 and 2018.
John Mann
I fear that the Minister is not quite getting it. Yes, touring people come through the wealthy villages in my constituency—I live in one—and good people like me pay good money to see these productions. But that is not in the former mining communities. In most of the former mining communities, there is zero going on. The Arts Council could not even manage to agree to fund an artistic director in my constituency and others for the 400th anniversary of the Mayflower pilgrims in 2020. We are getting zero into the coalfield areas. Let us not confuse constituency and coalfield area, as I fear the Minister is being hoodwinked into doing by the Arts Council.
Michael Ellis
No, I certainly would not wish to conflate any of those issues. As I have already delineated, the fact is that there are several examples of coalfield areas that have benefited from Arts Council funding.
As I was saying, £35 million will be invested in the strategic touring fund between 2015 and 2018. The Arts Council is continuing to work hard to create a fairer balance to its funding outside of London. It is no part of my suggestion that there is not more that needs to be done; of course there is. This is something to which the Government are fully committed. I consider that the Arts Council is doing a very good job, and Sir Nicholas Serota is doing very well. I understand that there are currently no national portfolio organisations in the hon. Gentleman’s constituency, although I am sure that the Arts Council would be willing to discuss how that could be addressed in future. I know that, as he loves the arts and supports the priority that culture should and does have in our society, he will want to engage and be willing to discuss how the situation can be addressed.
I emphasise that there is investment through the national lottery grants for the arts scheme, most recently awarded to the Harley Gallery and the artist Anthony Cropper. The hon. Gentleman’s constituency has seen an increase in funding of 269% taking into account all Arts Council funding, when comparing data for 2012-13 with the current financial year.
Michael Ellis
May I just make a wider point?
In many cases, the perceived lack of funding in certain areas is due to the limited number of applications for funding that the Arts Council receives. This is the case in the hon. Gentleman’s constituency, where the Arts Council has only received 17 applications through its grants for the arts programme since 2014.
John Mann
That rather sums up the problem across every coalfield community. Of course, there is the Harley Gallery. Prince Charles has been there on several occasions, which is not surprising given that he is directly related to the family who own the estate. It is a great investment. People come to the Harley Gallery from all over the world. If we could get people to go there from my constituency as well, it would be even better. But let us not confuse that kind of high-end art work—as important and valuable as it is to the nation—to working in coalfield communities.
Michael Ellis
I want to do everything I can to support all parts of society to access all forms of art. The Harley Gallery is doing wonderful work, and it is open to all. I know that the hon. Gentleman will join me in encouraging people to visit that gallery and any other galleries nearby that people wish to visit.
The Arts Council recognises the need to increase levels of ambition and interest at the local level. This, of course, cannot be done in isolation. Partnerships are vital. They often extend beyond culture and tourism to include businesses, the local authority in a given area, schools and higher education establishments. In places where that co-operation exists, great things can happen. I know that, as a supporter of the arts, the hon. Gentleman will be a leader in Bassetlaw in working to make these things happen. Clearly, things do not change overnight. It is important that this House devotes time to discussion of the arts, given their importance to so many people in our country.
I again congratulate the hon. Gentleman on enabling this discussion to take place.
Helen Goodman
Before the Minister concludes, we know what the problem is, and we know it is difficult, but we want to know what he is going to do about it.
Michael Ellis
Well, this Minister is deeply supportive of our arts, our culture, our galleries and our museums—our entire sector. This Minister is going to give every ounce of support to ensuring that we support the Arts Council and other arm’s length bodies in the important work that they are doing to make sure that the widest section of society has access to the arts, crucial as we know that to be in broadening the horizons and vistas that the hon. Member for Bassetlaw has spoken of. As I have said, there is work to be done, but it is wrong, in my submission, to characterise the Arts Council in the way that it has been characterised, because it is working very hard on this, and 75% of its funding is now outside of London.
As we all know, arts and culture help to remind us of where we come from. They bring incredible stories to life and help us to step into someone else’s shoes and see the world through their eyes. This country is a world leader in culture and the arts and the Government are committed to supporting that. By continuing to inspire people through the arts, we can continue to create the practitioners of the future. With the leadership—the good leadership—of the Arts Council, the House can see that this Government are paving the way for a bright cultural future right across the nation.
Question put and agreed to.
Draft Mesothelioma Lump Sum Payments (Conditions and Amounts) (Amendment) Regulations 2018
draft Pneumoconiosis etc. (Workers’ Compensation) (Payment of Claims) (Amendment) Regulations 2018
(6 years, 10 months ago)
General CommitteesRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Minister for Disabled People, Health and Work (Sarah Newton)
I beg to move,
That the Committee has considered the draft Mesothelioma Lump Sum Payments (Conditions and Amounts) (Amendment) Regulations 2018.
The Chair
With this it will be convenient to consider the draft Pneumoconiosis etc. (Workers’ Compensation) (Payment of Claims) (Amendment) Regulations 2018.
Sarah Newton
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Ryan. The two draft measures will increase the value of lump sum awards payable under the Pneumoconiosis etc. (Workers’ Compensation) Act 1979 and the diffuse mesothelioma payment scheme, which was set up by the Child Maintenance and Other Payments Act 2008. The new amounts will be paid to those who satisfy all the conditions of entitlement on or after 1 April 2018.
The two schemes stand apart from the main social security benefits uprating procedure, and there is no legislative requirement to review the level of payments each year. None the less, I am happy to increase the amounts payable from April 2018 by the consumer prices index rate of 3%. The same rate is being applied to some other social security disability benefits and the industrial injuries disablement benefit.
The Government recognise the suffering of individuals and their families that is caused by the serious and often fatal diseases resulting from exposure to asbestos and other listed agents. Individuals affected may be unable to bring a successful claim for civil damages, mainly because of the long time lag between exposure and onset of the disease, which can often stretch for decades. Therefore, by providing lump sum compensation payments through these two schemes, we fulfil an important role to those who have these dust-related diseases. As well as compensating people who cannot make civil claims, the schemes aim to ensure that people with such diseases receive compensation in their lifetime, while they can still benefit from it, without having to await the outcome of civil litigation.
I will briefly summarise the specific purpose of these lump sum compensation schemes. The Pneumoconiosis etc. (Workers’ Compensation) Act provides—for simplicity, I shall refer to this as the 1979 Act scheme—a lump sum compensation payment to those who have one of five dust-related respiratory diseases covered by the scheme, who are unable to claim damages from employers because they have gone out of business and who have not brought any action against others for damages. The five diseases covered by the 1979 Act scheme are diffuse mesothelioma, bilateral diffuse pleural thickening, pneumoconiosis, byssinosis and primary carcinoma of the lung if accompanied by asbestosis or bilateral diffuse pleural thickening.
The 2008 mesothelioma lump sum payment scheme widens the criteria for compensation to those who have contracted diffuse mesothelioma but who are unable to claim compensation for that disease under the 1979 Act scheme—for example, the self-employed or people whose exposure to asbestos was not the result of work.
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
This is a complicated area, and I have a particular interest in it because a brother of mine died after working for British Petroleum and using asbestos in the days when it was not seen as a danger. He died in great agony, and he had a terrible fight with British Petroleum for any compensation at all. Will the new regulation detract from the capacity for people to sue their employers for a decent sum?
Sarah Newton
I am very sorry to hear about the hon. Gentleman’s sad loss. It is disappointing to hear of such a large and profitable organisation putting up such a case to resist providing compensation to an employee who was no doubt valued. The regulations were brought in specifically to address that; we know that the onset of these terrible diseases can come after many years, and often after people have left employment. However, once they are diagnosed people can, tragically, die very quickly, and we do not want them to spend their remaining time trying to pursue civil litigation, with a huge fight on their hands. That is why the lump sum payments are available.
Of course, the scheme and the Department will seek to claim back any payments that can be reclaimed through our own civil litigation; but the scheme was set up specifically to address the concern that the hon. Gentleman raised, so that no one else in that situation would have to go through what his brother went through. Today’s regulations are just about increasing the payment by 3%. We are not changing the scheme in any way. I think that Members on both sides of the House welcomed the measures when we introduced them.
Mr Sheerman
When people who suffer from such a disease get involved in the system, they face some of the hardest, sharpest lawyers that can be found. My brother had an apprenticeship at BP and worked there all his life. The lawyers found out that when he was in the Army he smoked, and that was extremely damaging. I have never seen sharper, more unscrupulous people than those employed by reputable companies to make sure that they do not pay their workers their just deserts.
Sarah Newton
I thank the hon. Gentleman for that further intervention. It is clearly disappointing to hear of such practice, but I understand from the independent advisory board, the Industrial Injuries Advisory Council, that since the introduction of redress in the form set out in the schemes there have been improvements in corporations’ behaviour, because they understand that the Government see the conditions in question as absolutely terrible. There is far greater understanding of those conditions and their causes than there was in the past, and it is expected that corporations will settle swiftly. I am glad if I have been of some reassurance about that.
I think it is important that under both schemes, a claim can be made by a dependant if the person with the disease has died before being able to make a claim. That can give some comfort to the remaining relatives. Payments under the 1979 Act scheme are based on the age of the person with the disease and their level of disablement at the time they are diagnosed. The highest amounts are paid to those who are diagnosed at an early age and with the highest level of disablement. All payments for diffuse mesothelioma under the 1979 Act scheme are made at the 100% disablement rate—the highest rate of payment—owing to the seriousness of the disease. Similarly, all payments under the 2008 scheme are made at the 100% disablement rate and based on age, with the highest payments going to the youngest people with the disease. In the last full year—April 2016 to March 2017—3,620 people received payments under both schemes, totalling just over £50 million.
I am aware that the incidence of diffuse mesothelioma is a particular concern of Members, given that the number of deaths from the disease in Great Britain is at historically high levels. The life expectancy of those who are diagnosed with diffuse mesothelioma is poor, with many people dying within 12 months of diagnosis. Diffuse mesothelioma has a strong association with exposure to asbestos, and current evidence suggests that around 85% of all male mesotheliomas are attributable to asbestos exposures that occurred through work.
The number of cases occurring reflects the long latency period of the disease. Our latest available information suggests that there will continue to be about 2,500 diffuse mesothelioma deaths per year for the rest of this decade before annual cases begin to fall, reflecting the reduction in asbestos exposure after its widespread use before 1980.
The draft regulations increase the levels of support through the statutory compensation schemes. I am sure we can all agree that although no amount of money can ever compensate individuals and families for the suffering and loss caused by diffuse mesothelioma and other dust-related diseases covered by the scheme under the 1979 Act, those who have the diseases rightly deserve some form of monetary compensation.
I am also required to confirm to the House that the provisions are compatible with the European convention on human rights. I am happy to do so.
Before I finish, I put on record my appreciation of the excellent work of the outgoing chair of the Industrial Injuries Advisory Council, Professor Keith Palmer. Professor Palmer’s outstanding work on the council over the past 16 years has included six years as a member and chair of the council’s research working group and, latterly, 10 years as the council’s chair, advising the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions and the Department for Communities in Northern Ireland on the industrial injuries benefit scheme.
During that time, under Professor Palmer’s leadership, the council has written more than 80 reports explaining the often complex scientific evidence underlying its recommendations on work-related diseases. Those reports have included recommendations on work-related musculoskeletal diseases that have gone on to benefit farmers, carpet fitters, floor layers and miners, among others. More recently, prescription has been extended for cancers caused by exposure to ionising radiation. On my own behalf and that of my predecessors, I thank Professor Palmer for his contribution and leadership.
Marsha De Cordova (Battersea) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Ryan.
The draft regulations cover compensation payments for sufferers of listed dust-related diseases, or for sufferers’ dependants. As we have heard, the Child Maintenance and Other Payments Act 2008 made provision for lump sum compensation payments to people suffering from diffuse mesothelioma or their dependants. The draft legislation provides for a 3% uprating of the lump sum payments made to sufferers or their dependants. We recognise that under the 2008 Act the Government have no obligation to increase payment rates to keep up with inflation, so we welcome the move.
Mesothelioma is a cancer of the lining of the lungs or abdomen and is predominantly associated with asbestos. The greater exposure, the greater the risk, and those who work directly with asbestos are at the highest risk. However, those with limited exposure—a significant number of people, such as those who wash the clothes of someone who works with asbestos—are also at considerable risk. There is usually a delay between exposure and the onset of the disease of about 40 years on average.
Mesothelioma is a very serious disease. Only 55% of those with the disease live longer than six months following diagnosis, while just over a third live longer than one year. According to Cancer Research UK, incidence rates in the UK have increased by 71% since the early 1990s. In the past 10 years, the number of deaths has risen by nearly a third. More than 2,500 people in the UK die of the disease every year.
As we have heard, the 2008 scheme provides a one-off lump sum payment to sufferers where there is no occupational link to the disease. That includes cases in which a person affected was exposed to asbestos while self-employed, or in which a person lived near a workplace where asbestos was used regularly. People suffering from diseases as a result of exposure to asbestos, or one of a number of other similar agents, may be unable to bring a successful claim for civil damages in relation to their disease, mainly because of the long delay between exposure and the onset of the disease. We recognise that providing lump sum compensation payments through the two schemes covered by the two sets of draft regulations is important for sufferers of those diseases.
Improved health and safety procedures have restricted the use of asbestos and provided a safer environment for its handling, but the legacy of the common use of asbestos is still with us, and it is still a very current issue. Predictions of a peak in cases have proved wrong time and again, and they have been revised time and again in debates in the other place. The Government suggested that they expected mesothelioma claims to peak in 2018—this year—but their previous estimates have proved inaccurate. Will they confirm whether they still expect a peak this year? If not, what is their revised date?
Regardless of whether there is a peak in the number of people affected, it is vital that we continue to raise awareness of the risk of working with asbestos. What measures are the Government taking to ensure that awareness is widespread? Responsibility for asbestos lies primarily with the Health and Safety Executive. Will the Minister provide details about the activities and campaigns that the HSE is undertaking to raise awareness and encourage prevention?
The HSE’s funding is being slashed by almost half as a result of Government cuts. It will receive over £100 million less from central Government in 2019-20 than it did in 2009-10—a reduction of 46%. Between 2010 and 2016, the number of its inspectors was reduced by 25%. Such huge cuts will inevitably have an impact on all its areas of responsibility. Will the Minister secure appropriate public protection by ending the proposed future cuts to HSE funding? Will she confirm whether additional funding has been made available to the HSE in the last year to prevent harm from asbestos? Will she set out the funding plans for the next financial year for the same purpose?
I also ask the Minister about the considerable disparity between payments to sufferers and payments to their dependants. In 2010, a commitment was made by the then Minister Bill McKenzie—now Lord McKenzie—to close that gap. The issue was raised again last year, but the Government failed to provide any commitment and we have seen no further action since then. In every debate on the issue since 2010, Members of both Houses have called on the Government to honour that commitment. Why have the Government not done so? Do they still intend to reduce the differential between lump sum payments for dependants and sufferers? What would be the additional cost of achieving parity between the two?
We welcome the increase, in line with inflation, in payments to those who suffer from pneumoconiosis. Again, we recognise that the Government have no statutory obligation to increase those payments, but I am pleased that the Minister has done so. The draft regulations relate to the Pneumoconiosis etc. (Workers’ Compensation) Act 1979, which provides lump sum compensation payments to sufferers of certain dust-related diseases, including those caused by coal dust and asbestos. As with mesothelioma, provision is made for payments to dependants, as defined by the 1979 Act, where the sufferer did not receive payments under that Act before their death.
The annual death rate from pneumoconiosis in the UK has remained relatively constant over the past 10 years, with an average of approximately 140 deaths per year. According to charities that support sufferers, the number of cases and the number of deaths attributed to the disease are both likely to be underestimates. Identification of the disease is difficult: it does not always present as acute, and its symptoms can be overlooked or misattributed because they are similar to those of several other diseases. Diagnosis could be improved with greater awareness. Will the Minister set out what action the Government are taking to raise awareness of the disease, its range of causes, the circumstances in which it is likely to occur and the support available? We support increasing payment levels to sufferers of the illness and their dependants. As with previous regulations, I want to ask again: are the Government still committed to ensuring that sufferers of pneumoconiosis and their dependants achieve parity of award?
We have no impact assessment for either of the statutory instruments. The Government assert that it was not necessary to produce those, but I am concerned about the reason for that. Why does the Minister believe that was not necessary? Will she tell us how many claims there were in relation to both sets of regulations last year, and how many of those claims were successful?
I look forward to the Minister’s response to the points that have been raised today. If she cannot answer all the questions now, I would be grateful if she put her answers in writing. Despite the points raised, we welcome both the regulations and the uprating of payment levels in line with inflation for those affected by these devastating illnesses.
Chris Stephens (Glasgow South West) (SNP)
Just as I did when we discussed this matter last year in Committee, I want to put on record that today I am remembering my comrade and friend, the fine trade union activist Tom Begley, who passed away from asbestos-related cancer before the 2008 regulations were put in place.
This point is similar to that made by the hon. Member for Huddersfield. People have difficulty raising claims on these issues for no other reason than that employers of the time are no longer trading. Sometimes it is very difficult for individuals to raise cases, so it is important that we get the regulations right and that we compensate at an appropriate level.
With that in mind, may I ask the Minister two questions, one of which will be similar to what I asked last year? First, the Government are increasing the payments in line with the consumer prices index. Many of us believe that that does not represent the real rate of inflation; many of us believe that the real rate of inflation is given by the retail prices index. Why is the consumer prices index chosen over the retail prices index, given that the retail prices index is at 4%?
Secondly, the explanatory notes that accompany this statutory instrument refer to the Government having no statutory obligation to increase payments. Many of us who have seen friends pass away because of these diseases, or those of us who take an interest and have lost family and friends, would like that to change. Perhaps we can agree a formula in the future so that a statutory obligation is placed on the Government to increase the payments for these two awful diseases each year.
Sarah Newton
I thank the hon. Members for Glasgow South West and for Battersea for welcoming and supporting this really important uprating. I am sure that the increase will be welcomed by the people who are affected.
The hon. Gentleman asked why we are uprating using this particular measure. It is commonly regarded as the best measure of inflation. It is the one that the Treasury uses, the Bank of England uses and the Government use for uprating. There is always this debate about which is the most effective measure, but that is the settled view of the Government. At 3%, it is a decent rise that people will experience.
Mr Mark Harper (Forest of Dean) (Con)
On that point about RPI, not only is CPI thought to be better, but the Office for National Statistics—the independent statistics organisation—and the UK Statistics Authority have said that RPI is a flawed measure, and it is not counted as an official UK national statistic because it is so unreliable.
Sarah Newton
I thank my right hon. Friend for such a helpful intervention. He knows this matter well, having been the Minister in this place before. I am sure he has had to respond to that question in similar debates, and I thank him for that additional point.
The hon. Member for Battersea asked me a number of questions, and I will try my best to get through them all. If I have omitted to make a timely note, I will follow up any unanswered questions after reading Hansard. First, she asked why impact assessments have not been prepared for the statutory instruments. I remind hon. Members that the statutory instruments do not change any policy or existing scheme; they just uprate the amount that is paid. If there were new measures or policies, it would be absolutely right and proper to do an impact assessment in relation to businesses, charities and voluntary bodies; but as there would be no impact, because all of those assessments would have been done when the legislation was introduced, there is no need to do that.
Mike Amesbury (Weaver Vale) (Lab)
Surely there is an impact regarding the disparity between payments to sufferers and dependants? It is important to address that.
Sarah Newton
The issue of what the person affected by the condition and their dependants receive was a matter of policy when the initial legislation was introduced.
The hon. Member for Battersea also asked about predictions and whether we still hold to the Health and Safety Executive’s most recent predictions of the annual number of deaths. Predicting life expectancy and death from any condition is an art rather than a science. We must listen to the experts; we very much value the work of the HSE and it stands by that estimate. Let me reassure everyone that as long as people suffer from these conditions and need compensation, the scheme will be there. The estimates are to help us to plan the scheme, but they are in no way a limitation on who is eligible for support.
The hon. Lady made a good point about spouses who might have contracted mesothelioma from washing overalls or clothes, or from being exposed to asbestos other than because they were workers. People who contract mesothelioma through contact with their spouse’s clothing are eligible for an award under the 2008 scheme, and the value of such payments are the same as those made under the 1979 Act.
The hon. Lady also asked about the action that the HSE takes to raise awareness of asbestos. The HSE ran a successful and high-profile campaign from October 2014 to October 2015, and it continues that work by making a lot of information available on its website and in its “Beware Asbestos” app. The matter is regularly highlighted through trade magazines and trade associations; as has been mentioned, people who are self-employed are perhaps not aware of the compensation scheme. Such campaigns are aimed at ensuring that people are aware of the dangers and know about the available support, and that every effort is made to reduce exposure to asbestos. In my conversations with the HSE, which is an arm’s length body, I have been assured that it has the resources it needs to do its work. Its funding does not come solely from the Government, and it assures me that it has the funds that it needs to do the important review. I meet the HSE regularly, and it always has the opportunity to raise the issue of resources with me.
The question of why the Government do not equalise dependants’ payments with those made to people who have the disease has been debated in the past, and it was raised again today. We estimate that the cost of equalisation is about £5 million a year, and it is absolutely right that we prioritise the use of resources where they are needed most: for people who live with the disease. If we were to consider equalisation, in addition to the financial implications, legislative changes would be required. That would be a complex task, because awards to dependants under the 1979 Act include payments made in two parts: a payment for the effects of the illness before death, based on the assessed level of disability and the length of time the person had the illness, and a payment made in cases where the death was caused by the disease. At the moment, we see no legislative opportunity for equalisation, and no priority. We want to ensure that people who would benefit from the compensation in their lifetime come forward now and claim it. There are payments available for dependants.
I thank Members for their contributions, which have helped us all to understand how valuable the regulations are, in that they help some very poorly and very disabled people. We want to ensure that the schemes operate really well, because they can play an important part in people’s lives at a very difficult time. I commend the regulations to the Committee and ask for approval to implement them.
Question put and agreed to.
Resolved,
That the Committee has considered the draft Mesothelioma Lump Sum Payments (Conditions and Amounts) (Amendment) Regulations 2018.
Draft Pneumoconiosis etc. (Workers’ Compensation) (Payment of Claims) (Amendment) Regulations 2018
Resolved,
That the Committee has considered the draft Pneumoconiosis etc. (Workers’ Compensation) (Payment of Claims) (Amendment) Regulations 2018.—(Sarah Newton.)
Ministerial Corrections
(6 years, 10 months ago)
Ministerial CorrectionsRead Full debate Read Hansard Text
Education
(6 years, 10 months ago)
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Melanie Onn
Can the Minister tell us how long it takes between a school identifying that a child has an issue and that child receiving the intervention and support that they require? In too many areas throughout the country, it is taking far too long.
Nadhim Zahawi
I am grateful to the hon. Lady for her question. In my speech, I will go on to address some of the issues—not just the Prime Minister’s review, but the Lenehan review and the Bercow work as well. We are looking very seriously at this matter, and the impetus from the Prime Minister and No.10 is only helping us to focus even more resources on making sure that we get this review right.[Official Report, 6 February 2018, Vol. 635, c. 1471.]
Letter of correction from Nadhim Zahawi:
An error has been identified in the response I gave to the hon. Member for Great Grimsby (Melanie Onn).
The correct response should have been:
Nadhim Zahawi
I am grateful to the hon. Lady for her question. In my speech, I will go on to address some of the issues—not just the Prime Minister’s review, but the Lenehan review and the Bercow work as well. We are looking very seriously at this matter, and the impetus from the Prime Minister and No.10 is only helping us to focus even more on making sure that we get this review right.
Treasury
(6 years, 10 months ago)
Ministerial CorrectionsRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mel Stride
I thank the hon. Member for Oxford East for her contribution and for welcoming the measures, albeit that she did caveat her remarks fairly heavily. She asserted that the Government are not doing enough, but bringing forward the change to the revaluation approach by two years is a £2.3 billion move. [Official Report, 29 January 2018, First Delegated Legislation Committee, c. 6.]
Letter of correction from Mel Stride:
An error has been identified in my response to the debate.
The correct wording should have been:
Mel Stride
I thank the hon. Member for Oxford East for her contribution and for welcoming the measures, albeit that she did caveat her remarks fairly heavily. She asserted that the Government are not doing enough, but bringing forward the change to the indexation approach by two years is a £2.3 billion move.
Petitions
Oundle Library
Health and Social Care
Urgent treatment centre, Westmorland General Hospital
Transport
Sudbury Bypass
Toft Hill Bypass
Treasury
Closure of RBS branches in East Kilbride, Strathaven and Lesmahagow
Westminster Hall
(6 years, 10 months ago)
Westminster HallRead Full debate Read Hansard Text
Westminster Hall is an alternative Chamber for MPs to hold debates, named after the adjoining Westminster Hall.
Each debate is chaired by an MP from the Panel of Chairs, rather than the Speaker or Deputy Speaker. A Government Minister will give the final speech, and no votes may be called on the debate topic.
This information is provided by Parallel Parliament and does not comprise part of the offical record
UK Basketball
(6 years, 10 months ago)
Westminster HallRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Westminster Hall is an alternative Chamber for MPs to hold debates, named after the adjoining Westminster Hall.
Each debate is chaired by an MP from the Panel of Chairs, rather than the Speaker or Deputy Speaker. A Government Minister will give the final speech, and no votes may be called on the debate topic.
This information is provided by Parallel Parliament and does not comprise part of the offical record
Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)
I beg to move,
That this House has considered the future of basketball in the UK.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Bailey. I am delighted that the Backbench Business Committee has given us an opportunity to debate the future of basketball at such an important juncture for the sport. It is five years since this place last had a chance to discuss this hugely popular sport.
There are three main areas of the sport and different organisations leading and governing them, as befits a game played by so many in this country. To put it simply, we have the grassroots sport, which is overseen by Basketball England, Basketball Wales and Basketball Scotland, looking after all the amateur clubs, from juniors right up to the semi-professional national basketball league. We have the professional club game for adults, which is overseen by the British Basketball League and Women’s British Basketball League. In my constituency, we have Leeds Force, who are the newest team in the British Basketball League. I know that many other hon. Members are in attendance because they have WBBL or BBL teams locally; just like all sports fans, we are here to support our teams. Finally, we have the elite, international top of the sport, which is made up of the eight Great Britain teams, both male and female, playing in age groups and at adult level, and overseen by the British Basketball Federation. This is GB Basketball.
I pay particular tribute to the women’s team, who beat both Portugal and Israel last week on the road, to jointly top their EuroBasket qualifying group with Greece, one of the pre-eminent basketball nations, which finished fourth at the last EuroBasket event, in 2017. Some of those top players are here today, as I am sure people will not have failed to notice: Stef Collins, GB women’s captain, Eilidh Simpson and Bev Kettlety, the team manager. Those women’s futures are at stake, as are the futures of their male counterparts, of all the boys and girls playing in the national age groups, and of all the boys and girls in the clubs out there who dream of one day putting on a Team GB jersey—in other words, all those who think that they have a future in basketball and that our great country will sustain their dream of one day playing for their national team. The more immediate future concerns those women present here today and their dreams of finishing the qualifiers and competing at the 2019 EuroBasket championships, where they have a brilliant chance of taking GB to its highest ever placing in the competition.
Minister, let us not be remembered for throwing an air ball; let us do what is right for basketball and slam dunk the ball right into the hoop for our GB players. At the moment, the ball is in the hands of UK Sport, and I am concerned that it is double dribbling with its decision not to fund GB Basketball. I see an opportunity for the Minister to make an offensive turnover, and her assist could provide the opportunity for British basketball to score the winning three-pointer that sees those women through to EuroBasket in Serbia and Latvia in 2019 and all the other GB teams continuing to compete in their competitions, thereby maintaining the dreams of young people to play at the highest level.
Paul Blomfield (Sheffield Central) (Lab)
I thank my hon. Friend for securing this hugely important debate. On the point about dreams, does he recognise the point made to me by Tyler Gayle, who wrote to me on behalf of Sheffield Hatters, our women’s basketball team, and said that the sport of basketball is one of the most effective at reaching out to deprived communities? Is that not a particularly important reason that it should continue to be supported?
Alex Sobel
My hon. Friend’s area has two great basketball teams: Sheffield Hatters and Sheffield Sharks. People in disadvantaged communities in Sheffield, Leeds, London and other urban centres, aspire to play for such teams and, one day, for our national team, so his point is spot on. My constituent Tricia McKinney, knowing that this debate was scheduled to take place, wrote to me on a similar point. Her son represented England and played for Sheffield Sharks, in my hon. Friend’s constituency, and her daughter and four grandchildren are involved with clubs in Leeds. She said:
“I see first hand the physical and social benefits ‘of being involved’. All the facts and figures show that basketball provides opportunities for adults and children from diverse ethnic backgrounds and both genders to participate in sport. It is a particularly important sport for those in deprived communities.”
That echoes my hon. Friend’s point.
Nic Dakin (Scunthorpe) (Lab)
I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this very important debate. Does he agree that local basketball involving colleges, schools and other organisations, such as John Leggott College and Leggott Academy, is so important and, indeed, key to helping to grow the grassroots of this very important game?
Alex Sobel
My hon. Friend makes an absolutely apt point, which leads me to my next point. My constituent Baile Beyai wrote to me:
“I’m currently studying Politics at Leeds University and Basketball was a big, big reason that I had the self-esteem to even attempt to study at university, especially growing up as a problem child”—
those are his words—
“in a ‘disadvantaged’ area of London. So thank you; it’s an inspiration that you’re commandeering these efforts as I doubt even you know how much impact it has on kids, especially ethnic minorities in low income families. We face a much…bigger dropout than other sports and more funding would definitely improve the chances of young children playing the sport. Growing up I was jumping trains to go to England Basketball trials and sessions by myself, and remember at age 16 I was forced to skip the regional competition because I just didn’t have the £120 to pay for hotels. I doubt such constraints are put on children who’ve been selected to a high level of competition in other sports.”
Minister, do we really want our inner-city kids driven to petty criminality in order to follow their dreams, or to abandon their dreams, as they cannot pay for hotels?
UK Sport recently announced £226 million for Olympic eligible sports until 2021. That includes £14.5 million for equestrian sports, £25.5 million for sailing and more than £6 million for modern pentathlon—a sport that requires a horse, a sword and a gun. None of those sports is within reach of the young people we see playing basketball. We are funding elite sports for elites.
Temi Fagbenle, who top scored for GB in last week’s win against Israel, started playing in Haringey. That ultimately led her to a scholarship at Harvard University and a contract in the Women’s National Basketball Association, where she plays for Minnesota.
Last week, Temi said:
“I feel…they are literally trying to rip the GB shirts off my and my team-mates’ backs. Just look at the athletes on the basketball teams—a lot of us are from ethnic minorities and/or grew up in working-class households. The youth from these groups, and young people in general, aren’t inspired by obscure sports that are completely alien to them, they are inspired by athletes they can relate with.”
This is the sad reality of where we are. The next game for Temi and the other women players will be in November, but will they be able to play that game and qualify for EuroBasket, as we have heard they are on course to do?
I think it is important, Mr Bailey, that you know the background to how we got here. In 2006, British Basketball was formed, as required by the International Basketball Federation—FIBA—in conjunction with the British Olympic Association, to guide our teams through to London 2012, where we qualified as hosts. Since then, basketball has continued to grow in popularity, with more and more players giving us our best ever base for the future, but funding has eroded and is almost entirely at risk, although our elite teams have continued to improve, especially the women, who finished a best ever ninth at the 2013 EuroBasket tournament. The two main funding bodies in this country are Sport England and UK Sport, but at present our GB teams do not receive funding from UK Sport because basketball does not meet the current performance policy. Sport England provides £4.7 million for the grassroots game in England and allocates £1.4 million for talent, with £150,000 of Sport England’s talent grant in 2018, plus a further indicative investment of up to £150,000 from that talent grant, to ensure that the men’s and women’s under-16, under-18 and under-20 age group teams can compete this summer, but there is nothing for the senior teams.
This temporary reallocation of funds is subject to final approval by Sport England, and I understand that it will be confirmed shortly. Grateful as I am to Sport England, that is not enough to sustain our GB teams, and if no more funding comes forward, we will have to withdraw all our teams. The sum of £1 million a year is enough to sustain all of elite basketball in the UK. The funding that basketball received was equivalent to just £10,000 per player, while so-called—but not guaranteed—podium team sports received £40,000 per player in the old funding regime.
Julia Lopez (Hornchurch and Upminster) (Con)
I appreciate the hon. Gentleman’s securing this debate, not least because I wake up every day to the NBA highlights on YouTube as my husband is such a fan. One reason for the great appeal of basketball is that it is a game of the street. That is particularly the case in London, where outdoor courts such as Clapham Common, Turnpike Lane and Bethnal Green can act as a social lubricant for people from all backgrounds. Does the hon. Gentleman therefore agree that we need not just to focus on funding costly leagues and indoor basketball courts, but to get local authorities to fund outdoor courts properly and get proper facilities for people?
Alex Sobel
Absolutely. I am very grateful for the hon. Lady’s point, because I am not going into great depth about facilities, but we absolutely do need facilities, and I will come to the outdoor game later in my speech.
I am sure that most hon. Members think of basketball as a five-player game indoors, but they will also remember the classic movie “White Men Can’t Jump”, starring Woody Harrelson and Wesley Snipes, in which Woody and Wesley play outdoors on a half-court, two on two. That will not quite become an Olympic sport, but if we add a player on each side, it will: 3 on 3 basketball will debut at the Tokyo 2020 games, in just two years’ time, as a full Olympic sport—an Olympic sport eligible for UK Sport funding. No one knows who the medal challengers will be or what our Olympic potential is.
The game 3 on 3 is played in every urban constituency, as the hon. Member for Hornchurch and Upminster (Julia Lopez) has pointed out. In fact, 3 on 3 basketball is the largest urban team sport in the world, according to a study commissioned by the International Olympic Committee. The Netherlands base their youth basketball development programme on the 3 on 3 style of play, and as a result the country is ranked second across all genders and ages. Ball Out 3x3 is pioneering 3 on 3 basketball in the UK and is endorsed by FIBA 3x3. It will deliver the nation’s biggest 3 on 3 tournament this summer. We will become one of the leaders of 3 on 3 if this continues.
In the United States, rapper Ice Cube has teamed up with former NBA stars to launch a 3 on 3 league. Cube said:
“It was to bring a style of basketball that I grew up playing, watching, and loving, which is 3-on-3 basketball.”
That is the same urban sport that our young people play outdoors. As this is the first debate I have led in Westminster Hall, I hope you will indulge me, Mr Bailey, and let me quote from the Ice Cube song, “It Was a Good Day”, which is about a day in south-central Los Angeles, a very urban and difficult area. It was a day without any gang violence, air pollution or police harassment. He raps:
“Which park, are y’all playin’ basketball?
Get me on the court and I’m trouble”.
The game 3 on 3 is global, urban and an Olympic sport. It has a bright future, but we are not even considering its potential for our own programme. UK Sport revealed in its annual review that athletes in para taekwondo, para badminton, sport climbing, karate and BMX freestyle will receive national lottery support, as they enter the Olympic and Paralympic programme for the first time, but not 3 on 3.
GB Basketball wrote to UK Sport in June last year seeking a meeting about a 3 on 3 programme, but a meeting did not take place until January this year. GB Basketball has asked for help, as it needs expertise to research the position of the 3 on 3 game and strategic support for 3 on 3. I am sure that UK Sport will say that GB Basketball did not apply, which is true, but it took six months for UK Sport to engage with GB Basketball, and support was not forthcoming to put in a comprehensive application for Olympic funding. GB Basketball is waiting for UK Sport to confirm that it will support it in the process. We are missing an opportunity with 3 on 3. However, if we do fund it, we still need to keep our elite basketball teams on the court.
Stephen Doughty (Cardiff South and Penarth) (Lab/Co-op)
My hon. Friend is making an excellent speech. I wholeheartedly agree with many of his points. I have been contacted by many constituents representing Vale Vipers and Cardiff Met Archers, and by Sheridan Ward, whose son Jed has been selected to play for Wales. They are all passionate about this game. I know how much difference it made to kids in the vale when I was growing up. Some of them went off to play in the United States and at the top levels in the UK sport. Without this funding and support, kids will not have that chance in the future, so I wholeheartedly endorse what my hon. Friend is saying.
Alex Sobel
My hon. Friend hits the nail right on the head. I am grateful for his contribution. Basketball Wales provides valuable support to UK basketball.
On broadcasting, the British Basketball League is not currently able to secure domestic and international broadcast revenues, whereas other European leagues have monetised broadcasting both domestically and internationally. Attendance figures vary throughout Europe, but basketball is clearly a popular spectator sport. BBL’s average stadium capacity is only 2,362—Leeds Force have the smallest arena in the UK—compared with 4,424 in Germany and 6,447 in Spain. The value of France’s domestic broadcasting rights for basketball stands at £8.5 million. The domestic league in Spain is valued at £5.3 million and Germany’s at £0.9 million.
The Perform Media Group—one the world’s largest sports media companies, which holds the BBL media rights—estimates that the level of interest in basketball in the UK stands at 20% of the population. That is one in five people. Similarly, 22% of the population in Germany takes an interest in the game. The figures for France and Spain are 33% and 61% respectively. Much smaller nations, such as Israel, still manage to monetise their league rights to the tune of £1.8 million. The potential audience of 20% in the UK is sizeable. If we can grow the brand appeal of both the national team and the BBL, that will help create a sustainable commercial model for both.
The UK’s domestic fan base is young—we can see that from those present in the Public Gallery—which is extremely important to advertisers. The monetisation of German and Israeli basketball gives us a benchmark for where the UK could realistically be in the future with the right funding and investment. However, due to the rise of internet protocol television there is general commercial uncertainty over the future of TV licensing revenues. As a result, the right to broadcast tier 1 sports, such as the premier league, the National Football League and the champions league, attract an even larger share of broadcasting budgets. Tier 2 sports, such as ruby league, ruby sevens and hockey, are struggling to grow and maintain revenues from broadcasting rights. Currently, the only way to watch the BBL is online, apart from the finals games that are broadcast—but poorly promoted—on the BBC. However, 10 times as many people watch the BBL on the Unilad Facebook page than on the BBC. There are huge opportunities to grow the audience for basketball here, and get more young people playing through clubs and rising to the highest level. These audiences will also attract commercial opportunities, but this takes time—time that the game is currently not being given.
Our GB games are also not being broadcast, with limited live-streaming opportunities to watch GB games, so how can the British fan base watch our national team and how can our national team move on to monetise their potential? In the medium term, if we can get those broadcasting rights for those games, we can monetise it, but in the short term, that just is not possible.
I hope that the Minister will take on board three recommendations, with which she can score a triple double—a basketball term for scoring 10 or more in three different areas. First, I recommend that sports funds provide a short-term solution for the next three seasons so that GB players can stay on the court. Secondly, post-Tokyo, I recommend that the review of elite funding looks at a wider set of criteria than immediate podium potential and a wider range of socioeconomic factors, including the barriers to elite sport faced by our black, Asian and minority ethnic and disadvantaged communities, linking it to the sports they play. Finally, I would like the Minister to intervene and recommend that UK Sport undertakes an urgent review of the potential of 3 on 3 and that funding is made available for a development programme for a 3 on 3 squad for Tokyo.
Mr Adrian Bailey (in the Chair)
I have something like eight Members down to speak. I intend to call the Front-Bench spokespersons at 10.30 am at the latest. That works out at approximately five minutes per speaker. I will not impose a time limit at this point, but I will start to get agitated and interrupt after five minutes. Back Benchers should bear that in mind.
Sir Mike Penning (Hemel Hempstead) (Con)
It is a pleasure to take part in this debate, not least because the national cup champions, Hemel Storm, are in my constituency. I want to talk about two points. I agree completely, looking at aspiration, that there has to be an opportunity for our young boys and girls to start at school, come through the clubs and go on to play for England. If the funding is just about winning at the top all the time, there will never be that transition. While I absolutely agree with the policy of Sport England on elitism, money has to be put to one side to bring the different places through.
I slightly disagree with the hon. Member for Leeds North West (Alex Sobel): it is not all about young people. The average crowd at Hemel Storm—I see here some of the referees that have come to me—is 700. That club started seven years ago. We had a club many years ago; the franchise was bought out, and it went to Milton Keynes. When we restarted the club—I say “we”, because it is completely a community project—we made sure it was set up as a trust, so that it could never be sold off again.
From that moment on, the community came in. We have great-great-grandparents in the audience on a regular basis, and toddlers who cannot even walk. They are mostly not there because of the players. Of course, the families and loved ones of the players are there, but we could not get those sorts of numbers from only families and loved ones, in a town that has baseball, professional rugby league and three football clubs—I could go on. There is an elite gym where Max Whitlock and Jess Stretton, who won Olympic golds, came from. The crowd is there because it is a community thing. It is us coming together.
When we went to east London, to the Docklands, for the final against Manchester Magic, they never realised what happened to them, because we had 500-plus of our people in the crowd and I think Manchester Magic had about half a dozen, or perhaps fewer than that. I am not saying that that is why Manchester Magic lost; they lost because they were not as good as Hemel Storm—it is as simple as that.
The issues I have heard are not new to me. I have players playing for England at junior level. In the past, I have had families come to me and ask, “Can we help fundraise?”, to help these young players come through. Like many colleagues, I have had correspondence from young people with aspirations who want to get up there. They have been selected for the England junior team. Marina Christie and Jack Burnell are both coming through and should be playing for England soon. They have had problems, but the families are brilliant and support them. While I fully support saying that we need to get more help from central funding, if we are really honest with ourselves, basketball needs to come together better across the board, so that we have the structures we need, right from the bottom to the top.
Nicky Morgan (Loughborough) (Con)
Does my right hon. Friend agree with what the Leicester Riders said to me: basketball has a unique case for funding, because it is not just a sport, but a way to engage disengaged young people? He has been a Minister; he knows about young people who might fall the wrong way. Basketball can be a way to get them back on the right track, as sport generally is for young people.
Sir Mike Penning
I completely agree on the latter point: sport is aspirational. It is one of the great ways forward for people like me, born and bred in north London. I got into the armed forces because I could play rugby pretty well. It was pretty obvious that I would not have got in on my academic abilities, but I boxed and I played rugby pretty well. I did try to play basketball, but it was the wrong shaped ball for me, and they were all up here somewhere, even though I was in the Guards.
My right hon. Friend the Member for Loughborough (Nicky Morgan) has touched on a very important point. Look at the people in the crowd watching: they are young and old, and from across our community. I am not going to pick on any particular area; at the end of the day, we come together as a community. Interestingly, Hemel Storm have only one overseas player. That is quite remarkable given the progression that we have made, but we simply did not have the money at the time to bring in players from Spain and America; we have one American player now.
We looked at how this could be funded, and we need to look at that all the way through. Look at the sponsorship of Hemel Storm: Epson, an international company; Vanarama, one of the largest leasing companies in the country and sponsors of the Vanarama football league; McDonald’s, interestingly enough, which is genuinely trying to show what it does with its healthy food; and Arriva, which has donated us a bus completely plastered with “Hemel Storm”, which we use when we are away.
Interestingly and importantly, Mr Bailey, when I was at the cup final, I saw absolutely no advertising. There was no marketing and no sponsorship. To me, that is the missing link. We can ask the lottery and Sport England for more money, but we also have to come together in the basketball community to get the sponsorship that we need.
Alison Thewliss (Glasgow Central) (SNP)
I am delighted to speak in this debate and very glad that the hon. Member for Leeds North West (Alex Sobel) secured it. I should declare two interests: first, the Glasgow Rocks are based in my constituency and play at the Emirates arena, and secondly, one of my caseworkers, Alexander Belic, is a Rocks season ticket holder. The Rocks have gone through a wee bit of history in Scotland. They started as the Edinburgh Rocks in 1998, became the Scottish Rocks, and then in 2008—I was a councillor in Glasgow City Council at the time—we pinched them and lured them over from Renfrewshire to play in Glasgow.
Alison Thewliss
There will be more on that later from my hon. Friend.
The Rocks have been a huge success story in the city and a great thing to celebrate. I thank the new owner, Duncan Smillie, for his time earlier this week, when he gave me a wee bit more information on them for this debate.
In my constituency, the Emirates arena is a key part of the Commonwealth games legacy in Glasgow. It is a huge arena with great benefits for many sports, particularly basketball. It is very impressive and has a big capacity, so it can put on a great show. Basketball has the benefit of being something that people can do in Scotland indoors during the winter. That is of huge benefit to many people, because it is freezing and raining most of the time, so there is a consistency in being able to play indoors.
We have been able to grow lots of our own talent in Scotland. My son’s favourite player, Jonny Bunyan, joined the 1,000-point club at the weekend, having scored 1,000 points in the British Basketball League championship. That is a good achievement from a Scottish-grown player.
In Scotland, we have also had a good degree of success in securing the grassroots elements of basketball, particularly through Scottish Government funding through the CashBack for Communities scheme. For people who do not know, CashBack for Communities puts money from the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 into grassroots sport. The scheme is in its fourth phase in Scotland. The basketball programme has received £2.1 million over the course of CashBack for Communities, and in this phase, basketball programmes got a significant £492,800, which will support 16 schools of basketball right across Scotland over the next three years.
The scheme has surpassed its targets: 95 new teams have been established across Scotland, 61% of Basketball Scotland’s membership are young people, and there are 155 registered members playing wheelchair basketball in Scotland. All the clubs that have youth sections in Scotland are also delivering women’s basketball, which is great. There is also an associated education programme, which sees qualifications achieved in partnership with Glasgow Kelvin College. That means the volunteer coaches who come through the programme get accreditation, which is really important, as they can take that on to other parts of their life.
Outreach work in schools, such as the Jump2it programme and Shell Twilight Basketball, run right across Scotland and are absolutely brilliant. At Glasgow Rocks games, the kids who are involved in those programmes come on at half time, which is absolutely great to see. They get to come in front of a huge crowd and have that experience, which is absolutely brilliant.
Shell Twilight Basketball runs in the highlands, Aberdeen, Fife, Dundee, Sterling, Glasgow, North Ayrshire and Stranraer, so it goes right across Scotland and is a really valued programme. It has the impact of youth diversionary activity, which the hon. Member for Leeds North West mentioned. It keeps the kids busy, occupied and healthy, and has that brilliant impact on those communities. It is very much done in partnership, working with local schools. Schools in my constituency see a huge benefit from it, because they have the team very close by. Credit goes to those Glasgow Rocks players who go into schools across the length and breadth of the country, are very accessible, and make promoting basketball to young people across the country part of their job.
The players’ other partnership work in Glasgow is with Active East, which is the Commonwealth games legacy programme. That has sustained funding, and I hope it will continue to be funded in the years ahead. It has had an impact on local schools. St Mungo’s Academy has a basketball team. At the school’s academic awards, the winner of the basketball MVP—most valuable player—award comes up with everybody else who has won an academic achievement, and is recognised by their peers. It is important that the partnerships between these organisations—Active East, Scottish Sports Futures, the colleges and Basketball Scotland—are in place.
The result of that success is that the Scottish team has qualified for the Commonwealth games for the very first time. That is brilliant, and we are really excited about it. Seven people on that 12-person team are Rocks players. That is an important aspect. The points that the hon. Member for Leeds North West made about losing out on places mean that we might not be able to put that team forward. That would be hugely disappointing, not only for the players, who are desperate to play and represent their country, but for Callan Low, who is only 17 and has been called up. I would be heartbroken if he was not able to take up that place. It is also important for the kids in my constituency to see the players that they have had in their schools, such as 6 foot 10 Kieron Achara, representing Scotland on the Commonwealth stage. I beg the Minister to do something to make sure that the sport is secured for the future.
Maggie Throup (Erewash) (Con)
In the words of the hon. Member for Leeds North West (Alex Sobel), I am here to support the Ilkeston Outlaws and the Derby Wheelblazers.
The Ilkeston Outlaws were set up in 1966, so have just celebrated half a century. They have gone from strength to strength: they lost their first match against Bestwood A by 121 points to 14, but are now winning, which is really good news. They have eight teams, beginning with boys and girls aged 7 and stretching into senior men and women. That covers something like 120 to 130 people across the community, and it is an amazing way to get people active in sports. However, the club do not receive any funding from the sport’s governing body, Basketball England. The regional body, Derbyshire Basketball Association, does help with some small-scale funding to support them at county tournaments and with coaching and official courses, but in the main, the club is self-funded, and that is probably one of their problems. They have managed to get some sponsorship, like the team mentioned by my right hon. Friend the Member for Hemel Hempstead (Sir Mike Penning), from a bus company; but that is just for kit and equipment—they do not have a bus from the bus company.
Maggie Throup
We will try harder, definitely. Having good kit and being branded provides a sense of community for the players. The bus company sponsors the under-12s squad, and it gives them a sense of purpose and of belonging that is so important.
When it comes to funding for the future, there is a lot more that Ilkeston Outlaws want to do. At the moment, girls must leave after reaching age 12, because there is no pathway for them beyond that. The club could set up a pathway for girls over 12, but it would run at a loss, which the club, as a community group, cannot afford. The school where the under-12s practise has made a great push on “This Girl Can”, but sadly, any girl over 12 cannot. On the other hand, boys can continue. If one looks back at the reports, one can see that some of the people involved in the club in 1966 are still involved. It shows what longevity basketball has. If we get it right at the grassroots, not just for boys but for girls, it can go from strength to strength in future.
Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)
I am enjoying my hon. Friend’s speech immensely, and I congratulate her team on its success. I do not quite understand why the girls must stop at age 12, while the boys can carry on. Would she be kind enough to explain?
Maggie Throup
That is a good point; my hon. Friend is right that it sounds odd. It is down to numbers. More boys are attracted to basketball at that age, especially in my local community. It is a matter of having the numbers. Long-term, a team for girls over 12 would be self-funding, but there would be a period after set-up before it would become fully funded and viable. It is about getting over that gap.
To look at it from another angle, children who start the right way—by doing sports, getting out and being active, and developing a good body awareness and image —are less likely to eat the wrong things and become obese, unlike many of their peer group. We need to look at it not just from a sporting point of view but from a health point of view. If we set them on the right pathway, they will have the right habits for life.
Before I finish, it would be remiss of me not to show my support for Derbyshire wheelchair basketball and our team, Derby Wheelblazers. We have a hub in Erewash that meets at Friesland sport centre in Sandiacre. Wheelchair basketball can be played by anyone: amputees, paraplegics and people with no disabilities whatever all play together. It is good to have that rounded approach.
If we get it right at grassroots level and at a young age, habits will be formed for a lifetime. Who knows? Maybe even more stars will make our country proud.
Mrs Sharon Hodgson (Washington and Sunderland West) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Bailey. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds North West (Alex Sobel) for securing this important debate, and for his excellent and entertaining speech; I do not think that we have heard rap quoted in here before. He recently took over from me as co-chair of the all-party parliamentary group on basketball, and he is doing a sterling job; he has already done a lot more in that short time than I hoped to do to raise the profile of basketball in Parliament, and this debate is an excellent opportunity to do so.
I have always loved basketball. I know that I do not look like a basketball player—we have lots of them in the Public Gallery—but I played in high school, and I still love to watch the sport; I know that that is hard to believe. I always hoped that through the work of the all-party group, one day the sport would be as large as others, even football, and that it would be everywhere: on our TVs, on the news channels, in our local communities and in our international sports arenas. However, that cannot be achieved unless basketball receives fair and sustainable funding so the sport can grow from the grassroots up.
Basketball is the second most popular sport behind football for 11 to 15-year-olds. According to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, it is more popular than riding a bike, so why does the funding stay so low? All young people could benefit from basketball as a sport. It gets them active, but as shown in the results of the all-party group’s 2014 inquiry, which I chaired, it can also serve as a great tool for representation and aspiration, especially among children from deprived communities.
Basketball is perceived as very cool, and it is. It has street credibility globally, and due to its strong affinity with music and lifestyle, it is a sport that can resonate with young people. It can be played with very little space, equipment and money, making it truly representative. More than 300,000 young people aged 16 and over play basketball at least twice a week. It appeals to men, women, boys and girls—one in six participants are female—and is popular among players from less wealthy backgrounds. Somewhat uniquely, basketball is the only team sport in which more than half of registered members—58% of adult basketball participants—are from black and minority ethnic backgrounds. That is followed by cricket, which is still some way behind at about 30%.
We have all plugged our local teams. My local team, the Newcastle Eagles, are absolutely amazing. I do not wish to gloat or be biased, but allow me to remind Members that they are the top team in the British Basketball League, having won the BBL championship seven times and the BBL cup six times. I was there for some of those games, cheering them on. Not only are the Newcastle Eagles a fantastic team, they do so much work for the local community and hold partnerships with Northumbria University. Little Dribblers, Mini Eagles, Hoops 4 Health and the School of Excellence are just some examples of what the Eagles Community Foundation, launched in 2006, helps to do for the local community. The primary school programme Hoops 4 Health works with 7,000 young people every year, encouraging them to play and get healthy. It is a great way to introduce children to the sport. They can also play in the Eagles’ central venue league on weekends. The Eagles are a great example of what all BBL clubs do, week in and week out.
Despite all that great work, since 2009, basketball nationally has received just £102 in funding per adult participant. That is less than half as much as the next highest comparable sport, netball, which receives £205. Why is that? I know that netball has its own attributes; I used to play when I was younger, although I preferred and was better at basketball. It is cooler, as well. Why must funding be shared so unfairly? Sport England’s February 2017 funding round awarded £4.73 million to Basketball England, and just £1 million to British Basketball. Wheelchair basketball funding was not announced until October 2017, when it received £300,000.
Based on Sport England’s active lives survey, just under 1% of the population—0.7%, to be exact—participated in basketball at least twice during the 28 days prior to the survey. Although that might seem like a small percentage, basketball placed 10th out of the top 25 sports by participation— only 8% of participation was in team sports—placing it ahead of other sports such as netball, rugby and hockey. [Interruption.] I will wind up, but before I do, I will make one point about funding. Those sports receive far more funding than basketball. Hockey receives more than £9 million in funding although only 0.3% of the population participate, meaning that hockey receives 50% more funding from Sport England than Basketball England, British Basketball and wheelchair basketball.
I had more that I wanted to say, but others want to participate, and I am being told to wind up, so I will leave it to the Minister to do the sums. I hope that she will consider what is being said today and fix the unfair funding, so that basketball becomes a national sport in this country.
Luke Pollard (Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport) (Lab/Co-op)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Bailey. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds North West (Alex Sobel) on securing this debate. It seems that we share more than just a love of environmental and co-operative politics. I can be very proud as well, because Plymouth are two places above Leeds in the league table.
Basketball is a sport worthy of our support. It is growing, with more young people getting stuck in every day, and it has low barriers to entry, because all people need is a ball, a hoop and a flat surface. It can change lives.
As a supporter of the mighty Plymouth Raiders—as we know, the sporting hub of the country is Devon—who play at Plymouth Pavilions in my constituency, I know that basketball is fast-paced, family friendly and a great spectacle that grows every year. It has the opportunity to star as a sport that is embedded in the community by getting young people involved from day one, which is what Plymouth Raiders and Plymouth Storm, the wheelchair basketball side, do with their incredible community work.
Raiders are Plymouth’s only national top-flight sports club and we are very proud of them. They are firmly established in Plymouth’s big three alongside the in-form Plymouth Argyle, who are pushing for the playoffs in league one, and Plymouth Albion, who are fourth in rugby’s national league one.
Home games at the Pavilions are something special. For people who have not been to a basketball game, it is worth going along. It is not like a football game or a rugby game. I have seen Raiders play at the Copper Box at the Olympic park and I was brimming with pride at seeing them play on such a big stage, but there is no place like home. We have Foxy the mascot, the best basketball cheerleaders in the country, indoor fireworks, music, competitions on court and a chance to see hero players—going to a basketball game is fantastic. I last saw Raiders play on 11 February when our friends from Glasgow gave my boys a bit of a beating—the score was 63-86. Glasgow Rocks outplayed us, but it was a fantastic game. The drama and cheerleaders were electric.
Some hon. Members will know that as a massive gay, I am not really into the traditional cheerleader, but I am a big fan of equality, which Plymouth Raiders can boast about. In October 2015, Terrell Lawrence became the British Basketball League’s first male cheerleader and he remains centre-stage as the team’s choreographer and fitness coach. To be honest, I would love to be able to bust a move like he does when Raiders go on. It is on my bucket list, but sadly I fear my busting-a-move days are behind me.
The serious point of this debate is that despite basketball’s growing popularity, its funding is a real concern. As a country, we need to look at how we adopt our funding model. It is great that we put money behind going for gold, but we also need to put money behind sports that are growing in our communities, especially at the grassroots.
The lack of certainty about elite-level funding for basketball from UK Sport and Sport England has already been discussed. It needs to be pushed for. If we cannot compete at the highest level and allow our players to do what they do best—give it a go—we lose the role models our young people need to aspire to keep pushing themselves. We need better and more consistent elite and grassroots funding.
Basketball is a sport that centres on team spirit and attracts children and young people, particularly from working class and ethnic minority backgrounds. The lack of funding largely targets the underprivileged areas of the UK, including in Plymouth. The Minister will know that a lack of funding has consequences. She is a real sports fan and is passionate about participation, so she will take these concerns seriously. We need to compete at the world cup, EuroBasket, the Commonwealth games and the Olympics. We also need to be able to compete in new sports such as the 3 on 3, which my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds North West mentioned.
In a world where we are at risk of turning our back on the global stage, we need to put our best foot forward and compete at international competitions. Basketball teams, like other sports teams, are a source of huge local and regional pride. Sport has a unique power to bring people together. Although basketball was not an English sport originally, it is one that the British people have adopted and hold dear.
This is a debate about not just the sport itself, but what sport can do in our communities. Basketball is a superb example of how elite and grassroots sports teams across the country have a fantastic role to play. Plymouth Raiders have launched two new community clubs for under-16 girls and sessions for walking basketball, which has not been mentioned yet. Similar initiatives are happening across the country and we should give teams the platform to talk up that work. Across the country, whether it is playing, coaching, officiating or volunteering, basketball is a fast-growing sport worthy of support at the highest political level.
Mr Adrian Bailey (in the Chair)
Four hon. Members wish to speak, so I will reduce the time limit for each speech to a hard limit of four minutes.
Mr David Lammy (Tottenham) (Lab)
Given the time limit, I will cut to the chase. This debate comes at a tough and rough time for urban, inner-city communities in our country. Local authorities have had their money slashed by up to 40%. The idea that they could invest in courts and facilities is, I am afraid, pie in the sky. In a constituency such as mine, knife crime and gun crime are soaring. I thank God for groups such as the Haringey Hawks and the Haringey Angels. I thank God for the basketball facilities we have at Ducketts Common and Finsbury Park.
I ask the Minister very seriously why we are looking at the prospect of the decimation of elite basketball in this country. I remind her that this is absolutely an urban sport and a predominantly black, Asian and minority ethnic sport: almost 60% of adults in the sport are from black, Asian or minority ethnic backgrounds. The figure for adult men is 75%. That is staggering. In reality, they are role models—role models I desperately need—but there cannot be role models if there is no prospect of making it to the elite.
When I look at the figures for this urban sport, which attracts black, Asian and minority ethnic communities in the numbers it does, I have to ask why hockey received £28.1 million and the rugby league received £51.6 million. Why is it that canoeing, equestrian, cycling and rowing all do so much better? Where is the equity in that formula? Can the Minister satisfy herself that there is no unintended or unconscious bias in the way that judgments are being made about that funding? Urban communities across the country require young people to have the prospect of reaching their hoop dreams.
This debate is important because this is a critical moment for basketball in this country. There are many people in the Public Gallery and across the country waiting to hear what the Minister will say. On the tube, people have tapped me on the shoulder and said, “Are you going to be in the debate? What can you do about it, Mr Lammy?”
When we look at the problems that urban communities have across the country, we cannot talk about dreams and cut them away in the same breath. We need proper grassroots basketball, of course, but we absolutely need the prospect of being successful in the elite game. Ultimately, this debate is about whether we are going to throw that away after all the effort that has been put in. I cannot wait to hear the Minister’s response.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
I congratulate the hon. Member for Leeds North West (Alex Sobel) on bringing this debate to Westminster Hall for consideration. I am pleased to participate and to see whether we can persuade the Minister to do what everyone wants her to do: put more focus on basketball in this place and across the United Kingdom. In Northern Ireland, basketball is a small but passionate community, in which it is fair to say that love of the game has overtaken any issues of identity. With 22 teams in the Basketball Northern Ireland league, it is safe to say that we are happy to play—and hopefully beat—any and all teams.
My interest in basketball comes from my boys. We live on a farm and we had a basketball net out in the yard among the tractors and the cows. The boys played basketball when they could and it was a fun game for them. In America, where we sometimes go on holiday, the love of basketball is a phenomenon like our love of football or rugby. The players are superstars, the cheerleaders are as ferociously competitive as the players, and the sport has a buzz about it. Although we do not currently have that buzz in the UK, that is not to say that we cannot and will not. When I look back at Ulster Rugby in Northern Ireland 20 years ago, they did not have the passion and the buzz around them that they now have. I am astounded at how far they have come. It is not surprising to see young boys and girls walking down the street with their Ulster tops on, which gives an idea of what dedication and promotion can achieve among young people.
What brought about that change? It was the sport’s and promoters’ dedication to slogging away when we were not winning; it was going to schools and inspiring young people to take up the sport; and it was promoting the schools rugby cup with time, money, passion, drive and determination. All those things have brought about the change that was necessary.
The same can be said about the Northern Ireland football team, who are at a level that was unheard of years ago. We are no longer the joke act. The best teams understand that there is a good chance that they could fall under the weight of the green and white army; many of us have believed that for a long time, and the figures and statistics indicate it as well. For those who have kept paying for season tickets and hoping and believing, the ambition used to be for Northern Ireland to score one goal, but now it is for us to beat the best teams—and we can.
Hon. Members have mentioned cycling. Britain is now the greatest cycling nation in the world. Did that happen by chance, because hundreds more people just decided to take up the sport and were good at it? No, it came through a targeted offensive aimed at young people and showing what could be achieved. Why are we taking the focus off inspiring our young people to get off the sofa, get off their mobiles, interact in a team, build fitness and build relationships? We regularly read figures about childhood obesity. If those figures do not inspire us to act, I do not know what will.
Every year, Wimbledon lights a fire in a child to pick up a tennis racket. My parliamentary aide’s niece and nephew have done just that, and they now play for the Ulster team. We could achieve even more inspiration and attraction, but that takes funding.
For the sake of mental and physical health, combating social isolation, encouraging those who struggle academically and building self-esteem and confidence in children, I ask the Minister and her colleagues for action to help children who play basketball, as well as tennis and other sports. Perhaps we can win gold at the next Olympics—who knows? We can certainly get kids off the sofa and involved in sport if we fund it and make it attractive and accessible. That would be gold enough for me.
John Grogan (Keighley) (Lab)
It is a great pleasure to take part in this debate, which was introduced with such energy, enthusiasm and expertise by my constituency neighbour and good friend, my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds North West (Alex Sobel). In the few minutes available, I would like to address the history of basketball, the implications for its future, and the issue of broadcasting.
As several hon. Members have said, the United States have always provided inspiration. My hon. Friend mentioned “White Men Can’t Jump”; I understand that the basketball film that everyone is looking out for this year is “Uncle Drew”. Basketball first came to the United Kingdom in the 1890s, when a gentleman called C. J. Proctor of the Birkenhead YMCA went to Canada, was inspired by the sport and brought it back to our country. The participation of American soldiers in the first world war reinforced that connection. The London YMCA—the greatest team in our country in the 1920s—went to the 1924 Paris Olympics, at which basketball was a demonstration sport, and did not lose a game.
We have that history with the United States, but even today people go on basketball scholarships there and in Europe, because the only way they can become really expert at the game is by going abroad. In my area, the Bradford Dragons have a number of players who have followed that pattern: Zion Tordoff, Eisley Swaine, Mate Okros and Tamas Okros have all played for England at age-group level and are now looking for opportunities elsewhere. At a lower level, the Keighley Wildcats aim
“to promote healthy living, social interaction and community togetherness through our mutual love of the game of basketball”,
which is all organised by a man who goes by the great name of Andy Romero-Birkbeck.
The link with the United States brings me on to broadcasting. Every year, National Basketball Association teams play a game at the O2 in London and not enough is made of it, whereas when American football is played at the O2 we get live free-to-air coverage. The NBA is the greatest basketball league in the world, and we need more support from it. Why not have a British final at the same venue on the same day as the NBA game? That would create an event that might be attractive to free-to-air TV.
My hon. Friend the Member for Leeds North West is right to say that some of the basketball figures on the BBC Sport website have been disappointing. More needs to be done to promote the sport, perhaps by showing it on a different night; Friday is a very crowded night for sports, so Thursday might be better. We must also make the most of the broadcasting opportunities from the Commonwealth games. These are only the second ever Commonwealth games—Melbourne was the first—to include a basketball tournament. Both England and Scotland will be represented, and it will all be broadcast live on free-to-air TV. I do not think that the sports for the Commonwealth games in Birmingham have been decided yet, so let us lobby to ensure that they are the first Commonwealth games in the United Kingdom to feature basketball. There is an awful lot more to do on broadcasting and general promotion of the game.
I end with an appeal to the Minister. We all have great confidence in her; we know that she loves sport, that she does not take no for an answer and that she knocks heads together. The rules are the rules, but sometimes they have to be interpreted creatively. We have to preserve our national teams, because they are the heroes and heroines who inspire people to take up the game. Whatever else the Minister does in her tenure, please will she save British basketball?
Sarah Jones (Croydon Central) (Lab)
I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds North West (Alex Sobel) for securing this important debate. As so often happens, my right hon. Friend the Member for Tottenham (Mr Lammy) has said what I wanted to say better than I can, so I will be brief.
We have already heard how basketball reaches further into communities than many other sports in this country, how it reaches children from black, Asian and minority ethnic and deprived backgrounds, and what value it provides. The case for funding is clear, but we need to stress the value that basketball can bring to our local communities by tackling the problems that we struggle with in London and across the country, including serious youth violence, and young people getting involved in crime and needing to be helped out.
I will not go through all the statistics, but 2017 was one of the worst years for fatalities, knife crime and youth violence since the ’70s: 39 teenagers were stabbed to death. There have already been 13 fatalities in London this year, and we are only in February. We know that knife crime is a complex issue with many underlying causes that we could debate for hours, but among them are cuts to our youth services. Young people do not have the roots, activities, aspirations, hopes and role models that they once did. Basketball has a real role to play in addressing that.
Mrs Hodgson
Further to my hon. Friend’s point about youth crime, is she aware of a fantastic initiative in Newham, the Carry A Basketball Not A Blade campaign?
Sarah Jones
Absolutely. I have met many young people who have come out of prison, who have carried knives or who have been involved in knife crime or selling drugs. Many of them have responded well to sports, including through organisations such as Gloves Not Gunz. There are many different sporting activities that we can encourage people to get involved with, but basketball is a key one.
After the Croydon riots in 2011, teachers and basketball players in Croydon set up the Croydon Cougars. The club does fantastic work with local people, and it also manages to fit in some extra homework time, so that children can play basketball for free and get tuition and help with homework afterwards—a good combination. Croydon Council and OnSide Youth Zones are funding a very big and impressive new, all-singing, all-dancing, youth centre in Croydon that will cost £6 million and will open next year. It should bring in thousands of young people and give them things to do, and basketball will be a key part of it.
I want young people in Croydon to be able to say, “If I put the effort in, show talent and become good at this, there is a pathway right to the very top,” but unless we fund the very top as well as the grassroots, that pathway will not be there for them. I echo other hon. Members in urging the Minister to consider basketball really carefully and see whether she can find some money for it.
Mr Adrian Bailey (in the Chair)
We come to the Front-Bench spokespersons. You have 10 minutes each. If you could be a little disciplined and show a bit of flexibility, so that Alex Sobel can sum up at the end, that would be helpful. I call Gavin Newlands.
Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP)
Thank you for calling me to speak, Mr Bailey. It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair once again.
It is also a pleasure to take part in this debate, and I congratulate the hon. Member for Leeds North West (Alex Sobel), not only on securing it, but on getting on the parliamentary record what I think is the first reference to Ice Cube. He will be remembered for that, if for nothing else. I also echo the sentiments expressed so powerfully by the right hon. Member for Tottenham (Mr Lammy); I think he spoke for many of us.
Unfortunately, basketball is a slightly touchy subject in my constituency. As we heard, we hosted the Scottish Rocks at the Braehead arena for about six years. In 2008, however, they moved to Kelvin Hall in Glasgow, before moving to their current home at the Emirates arena. Their move to Glasgow coincided with a name change: the team is now called the Glasgow Rocks. We already have Glasgow airport in the Renfrewshire area, so I am sure we could live with the name change if the team chose to come back to Renfrewshire.
Gavin Newlands
We shall see about that. The Rocks attract healthy crowds. Their popularity should not come as a surprise, given that they are second in the British Basketball League championship, sitting just behind what is apparently the best team in the league, the Newcastle Eagles, and given that basketball is so popular in local schools and communities. As we have heard, it is also popular in English schools, where over a million children between the ages of 11 and 15 play the sport.
A survey carried out by Sport England in 2012-13 identified basketball as the third most popular sport for once-a-week participation among over-16s, behind only football and rugby union. That level of engagement is mirrored in other age groups, because basketball was the fourth largest team sport in 2016, with over 160,000 people playing recreationally every single week.
I have witnessed the popularity of this sport in my constituency, through the excellent work of React Basketball. It exists to advance public participation in the sport, regardless of how good someone is at it. Essentially, its work is about keeping children active. The great thing about React is that its work is not limited to encouraging boys and girls to play the sport; it also works to instil a sense of social responsibility and pride in young people. It is firmly rooted in the community, and it extends its efforts to raising funds for other causes, such as cancer research. It is a fantastic example of a sporting charity that uses the power of sport not only to help those whom it engages with directly, but to help improve local communities and wider society.
It would be remiss of me not to mention the achievements of Basketball Paisley. It is considered to be one of Scotland’s biggest and most successful basketball clubs, and since its inception its various teams have managed to bring 95 trophies back to Paisley. In fact, only last Friday night, the senior men’s team were crowned Scottish league champions, 18 years after their last league title.
As with React, Basketball Paisley is successful on and off the court: it does community outreach work, and runs community clubs across Renfrewshire and East Renfrewshire for kids from primary school through to second year at secondary school. These clubs are open to everyone regardless of ability, and are always popular among schoolchildren.
Basketball also leads the way when it comes to disability sport: many disabled people play and become involved in it. The Great Britain wheelchair men’s basketball team won gold in the European championships for the third time in a row in 2015 and were fourth at the London Olympics, and the GB women’s team won their second bronze in a row at the European championships in 2015. Wheelchair basketball is an inclusive sport that allows many individuals who would not normally be able to access sporting opportunities to become involved in sport. According to the all-party group on basketball, wheelchair basketball is the largest disability sport in the world, and it has the world’s largest women’s league in disability sport.
British Basketball is working hard to grow basketball, and its “Transforming Basketball in Britain Together” strategy sets out its intentions to improve the sport in all parts of the UK, from grassroots through to elite level. However, as I will discuss a little later, basketball, like other sports, is held back by UK Sport’s fixation with funding only elite sports that have medal potential. The Scottish Government recognise the popularity of basketball and encourage people across Scotland to play it. The Shell Twilight Basketball project, supported by the Scottish Government’s CashBack for Communities fund, which we have already heard about, provides basketball sessions infused with education and life skills for all those aged between 11 and 21.
The Scottish Government are keen to get more women playing different sports, including basketball, and in 2017 they announced a fund to help that aim become a reality. One of the projects that benefited from that fund was the Scottish Women Warriors wheelchair basketball club. It is a fantastic club that is based on the philosophy that it is
“about what you can do—not about what you can’t do”.
It is a fantastic resource to get people fit and healthy, but perhaps even more importantly, the Scottish Women Warriors club serves as a vital support network for all the women involved. Projects such as this one have helped to grow the sport over the past four years, with research from the Scottish Parliament Information Centre revealing that 82% more women now play in basketball clubs. Groups such as the Scottish Women Warriors not only highlight the inclusivity of wheelchair basketball but help to capture the growth of the sport.
A few months ago, I met Kevin Pringle and David Watt from Basketball Scotland, and they spoke with great passion about the fantastic work that the sport does to encourage individuals from all backgrounds to start playing it. It is important that such work is recognised in the funding of groups.
As I have said, one of the stumbling blocks threatening the growth of basketball is the stringent funding criteria of UK Sport. This issue does not just affect basketball. I have written to UK Sport about the impact that its funding criteria have on other sports, such as badminton. Another stumbling block is the historically low level of direct funding for basketball in relative terms. As we heard from the hon. Member for Washington and Sunderland West (Mrs Hodgson), basketball receives only £102 per adult participant. She referred to netball, but hockey receives £259 a head in funding, and my sport of rugby union receives £276 a head. These are the figures for Sport England funding only; if we include elite funding from UK Sport, the discrepancies become far, far greater.
UK Sport’s funding criteria ignore the high participation rates for basketball, and the sport is also doing great work in recruiting individuals from diverse backgrounds. I agree with British Basketball when it says:
“We believe Basketball has a unique case for funding, as it is not just a sport, but also a way to engage disengaged young people, particularly from BAME communities, and offer wider life opportunities, and reduce the potential for involvement in anti-social and criminal activities”.
Unfortunately, despite the great work that basketball does in our communities by improving health outcomes, reducing antisocial behaviour and encouraging involvement from diverse groups, British Basketball warns that it is reaching a “crisis point in funding”, which puts its progress in real danger.
Winning a medal at the Olympics should not be the only way in which we judge success. UK Sport’s funding criteria should also judge participation rates, engagement from diverse backgrounds and social impact. Assessing sports by these factors would help sports such as basketball to grow and flourish.
Much more importantly, right across the four nations we need to become much fitter and healthier. The obesity and inactivity rates are desperately high, and they not only impact on individuals, particularly later in life, but are a great cost to society and the public purse. It is estimated that obesity and physical inactivity cost NHS services across the UK around £6 billion a year, and the cost to the wider economy would be much higher.
The future of basketball can be bright, but the sport needs to be supported to achieve its full potential. Experience shows that young people from all backgrounds are jumping—literally and figuratively—at the chance to play basketball. However, the success of the sport is under threat due to the funding criteria of UK Sport. We need to use this debate to call on UK Sport to recognise participation rates as much as it recognises medal success or medal potential. We all want to see our teams and athletes winning medals, but the best way to ensure that happens is by supporting grassroots sports and providing a pathway through to the elite level.
I will end by congratulating Scotland on qualifying for the Commonwealth games for the first time. I wish the team all the very best on the Gold Coast.
Dr Rosena Allin-Khan (Tooting) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Bailey.
First, I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds North West (Alex Sobel) for calling this debate. He is a champion of basketball, serving as the chair of the all-party group on basketball, and is also a fierce supporter of his local team, Leeds Force.
I also thank all Members from all parties for their contributions today. As has already been pointed out, basketball is a truly unique sport. I played on my university team for three years and enjoyed it, proving that mixed-race, Pakistani-Polish girls can jump. [Laughter.]
Basketball has an amazing grassroots following and reaches out to demographics that other sports simply cannot. It gathers popular support among black, Asian and minority ethnic communities, and among those who come from traditionally poorer backgrounds.
In the UK, basketball is the second most popular sport played by 11 to 15-year-olds, and that cannot go unnoticed. One in four teenagers played it last month alone. The sport can play a major role in supporting communities and can help to address the issues they traditionally face. My hon. Friend the Member for Croydon Central (Sarah Jones) made that point most eloquently. Those issues include everything from education and health to inclusion, aspiration and employment opportunities. As my hon. Friend the Member for Washington and Sunderland West (Mrs Hodgson) says, it can also do a great deal to deter people from engaging in criminal activities and help them to stay out of gangs. Yet it remains woefully underfunded, under-appreciated and under-acknowledged. Facilities are poor and many local clubs struggle financially. If basketball is to continue to support our communities, we must support basketball—it needs proper funding. We need to plan for the future. We need to create role models. We need to inspire.
Part of the attraction for young aspiring players is being able to see themselves and their values in the players they support, respect and look up to. Some of the most famous basketball players the world has seen started out in the sort of communities we need to inspire. My right hon. Friend the Member for Tottenham (Mr Lammy) spoke eloquently about the need for role models and about how we cannot ignore the communities that basketball speaks to. We have Luol Deng, originally from Sudan, who moved to Brixton, where he played basketball at his local club and went on to become a two-time NBA all-star. Do we have the next Luol Deng, the next LeBron James, the next Michael Jordan, in our ranks? We do not know. But one thing is certain: if we do not fund basketball, we will never know.
Sadly, no Government funding will be available for elite athletes from April. That risks preventing participation in the world cup, EuroBasket, the Commonwealth games and the Olympics. Although success at the Olympics brings wonderful plaudits for those sportsmen and women who work tirelessly for success, our funding formula cannot always be driven by Olympic medal potential. As my hon. Friend the Member for Keighley (John Grogan) and my hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport (Luke Pollard) have said, it is right that as a country we support athletes who are at the top of their game—those who have the ability to achieve their dreams—but when large swathes of young people are galvanised by their love for a sport such as basketball and not by Olympic medal potential, we owe it to them to ensure adequate funding.
It is a terrible shame that our professional basketball teams have been pushed to the brink of financial collapse. A last-minute deal saved our national team from pulling out of the European championships this year. Without additional funding, we risk losing future stars and damaging the positive impact that basketball has on all our communities. The recent U-turn made by Sport England suggests that there is the capacity for bespoke partnerships. Badminton was originally one of five sports set to lose all its funding for the next Olympic and Paralympic games; however, it has now been placed on a medal support plan, following the team’s success at the 2017 world cup championships.
Basketball’s contribution to local communities deserves recognition. Look at who we have here in Westminster Hall, coming and fighting for their sport. Look at the cross-party agreement we have today about the necessity of adequate funding for basketball. Sometimes sports need to be judged more than on just their medal potential. The narrative must change. I hope that the Minister agrees that if we refuse to give basketball the funding it needs, we risk losing an exceptional sport and all the people it reaches out to.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (Tracey Crouch)
As always, it is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Bailey. I thank the hon. Member for Leeds North West (Alex Sobel) for securing this debate. Given the number of contributions from colleagues across the House, I hope that the players who have travelled to watch the debate from the Gallery, and indeed those who are watching outside, recognise how much we value basketball in this place.
Colleagues have made some brilliant speeches, and at this point I particularly mention those of my right hon. Friend the Member for Hemel Hempstead (Sir Mike Penning), the hon. Member for Washington and Sunderland West (Mrs Hodgson), the right hon. Member for Tottenham (Mr Lammy) and the hon. Member for Croydon Central (Sarah Jones). My right hon. Friend the Member for Hemel Hempstead—a genuine champion for sport in his constituency, and a fellow Tottenham fan—made a really important point about getting basketball working better together, and I would welcome his thoughts and comments after the debate on how we can make that happen. Likewise, the hon. Member for Keighley (John Grogan) made some really important points about broadcasting and displayed some creative thinking about how we can bring that together, so I would welcome his thoughts also on how we can promote the game.
John Grogan
Does the Minister agree that the BBC coverage has been valuable? Whereas on YouTube people watch for three or four seconds, I understand that on the BBC it is 15 to 20 minutes. Whatever happens in the future, that has been of some value.
Tracey Crouch
I completely agree. I will refer to the BBC coverage in my speech. It is important to remember that people watch the BBC’s free-to-air broadcasting and that it brings value to sport in this country.
I pay tribute to the comments made by the hon. Member for Washington and Sunderland West, who has been a true champion of basketball for all the time we have been in the House together. It was her passion that had me shooting some hoops in the shadow of Big Ben in the pouring rain—it was hard, however, for me to shake off my netball arm. She mentioned some comparative funding figures. I know she appreciates that funding is complex and is allocated for lots of different factors, and I hope she will not mind if I take her points away, consider them in more detail and get back to her if necessary.
In response to the points made by the right hon. Member for Tottenham and the hon. Member for Croydon Central, I could not agree more about the disruptive and the diversionary power of sport. I sit on all the relevant ministerial groups—something I am sure they appreciate—including that on gangs, in which I regularly try to promote sport and ensure that its power is recognised and funding made available, so that projects can go into communities to help the disruptive and the diversionary aspects that the Members are rightly concerned about in their London constituencies.
As a nation, we should be proud of the investments we make in support of sport, both at the grassroots and on the Olympic and Paralympic stage. After Rio in 2016, many international Sports Ministers came to me to see how they could get a better understanding of how we invest in sport, with our unique mix of Exchequer and lottery funding. We are very different from America, for example, where sport is solely privately funded, and from China, where it is completely state-funded. We have a true mix of funding streams. As colleagues know, Sport England invests lottery and Exchequer funds in its “Towards an Active Nation” strategy. Sport and physical activity have the power to transform people’s wellbeing and create a fitter, healthier and happier nation. UK Sport inspires the nation by investing in Olympic and Paralympic success. The two organisations have an agreed memorandum of understanding on talent, but are largely tasked to invest in sport and physical activity at different levels against criteria specific to their remits.
I am a fan of basketball. I never played, because my sister is about 6 inches taller than me and also three years younger. So I stuck to football and she stuck to basketball and my poor mum’s garden was obliterated as a consequence. However, I recognise the opportunities basketball provides across the country and internationally. At the grassroots, basketball can have great success in engaging young people from disadvantaged communities, which is reflected in Sport England’s investment in the sport at that level. The organisation’s Active Lives figures show that just over 300,000 people in England had played basketball at least twice in the previous 28 days, and between 2013 and 2021 it expects to invest just over £18 million in basketball’s grassroots. That investment runs much wider than in national governing bodies, and includes localised projects such as StreetGames doorstep clubs and providers such as Reach and Teach. Basketball England will receive £2.1 million of Sport England investment to deliver satellite clubs that create regular, informal opportunities for young people who have not made the commitment to regular club basketball or are completely new to the game, particularly young people from groups typically underrepresented in sport. Other organisations such as county sports partnerships also receive funding to invest in satellite club projects locally, including basketball provision. A total of 608 satellite clubs have been established between 2013 and 2018, attracting nearly 45,000 young people.
Basketball is a sport with professional opportunities for those with skill and commitment. The men’s and women’s British basketball leagues represent the top tier of domestic competition. They offer ambitious playing opportunities for some of the most talented individuals and a showcase of regular live games for their fans. As has been mentioned, not only can BBL fans follow the competition in person or streamed online, but they can now enjoy 32 games broadcast on the BBC via the red button, making the domestic league possibly more accessible than ever before. There is always more to be done, but rights are matters for national governing bodies. Earlier this year we welcomed an eighth regular season NBA game to London, and I am keen to encourage more NBA presence and investment in the UK as part of our wider ambitions to bring more US sports over here.
There is much to appreciate about basketball in the UK, but we find ourselves in a difficult financial situation. A great number of conversations have taken place in recent months with British Basketball, Sport England, UK Sport and the hon. Member for Leeds North West and the all-party group about the state of the finances in supporting a financially sustainable GB set-up. It is with great regret that none of that investigation has identified viable solutions. That has led to us discussing the matter here again today.
When I saw British Basketball last year, it was optimistic about a commercial sponsorship that would have helped enormously, but sadly that fell through. British Basketball approached my Department again in January to outline its immediate shortfall, and a great deal of effort on all parts sought a potential solution to support the age group GB teams through Sport England talent funding. As our English sports council, Sport England invests in participation and physical activity, but its priority must be to support its grassroots programmes, which include using sport to reach into communities that other initiatives do not.
The other sports body in which we invest Exchequer and lottery funds is UK Sport. UK Sport funds Olympic and Paralympic success. Its “No compromise” funding philosophy has taken the GB Olympic team from 36th in the medal table in Atlanta 1996 to third in London and now to second at Rio 2016 in both the Olympic and Paralympic Games. It has done that through investing strategically in the right sports, the right athletes and the right support programmes to meet its goals. UK Sport has made its complex funding decisions for this Olympic and Paralympic cycle, as in previous cycles, based on the likelihood of medal-winning performances in Tokyo in 2020. Against those fundamental criteria, basketball is sadly not yet in a position to receive funding.
However, the hon. Member for Leeds North West raised the issue of 3 on 3 funding, and I am happy to look further into that, particularly since the qualification process will not be confirmed until early next year. That will have a huge impact on the shape of the competition. Indeed, that issue was one of the key asks in his speech. I hope that I have reassured him that I will take that away.
We have established an expert body in UK Sport—it is envied around the world—to take on the funding mandate and make difficult decisions on how to deliver within that. I still believe that it is important that it is not a matter of direct ministerial intervention. These long-term investments are measured and monitored against clear criteria, not my personal interests or empathy.
Mr Lammy
On the point the Minister has just made—I am grateful she will look at 3 on 3—we could be in a situation after the next Olympics where elite and Olympic sport are further away from urban communities, but in other communities, where there is hockey, canoeing and rowing, it is all around.
Tracey Crouch
I hear what the right hon. Gentleman is saying. That is why it is important that we continue to invest in the grassroots and community delivery. I completely empathise and sympathise with the points that he and others have made about the talent pathway. That is why we need to continue to have these conversations, particularly around 3 on 3 funding.
As other colleagues have mentioned, basketball is not the only Olympic sport that UK Sport does not fund. While I completely agree about the good opportunities it can deliver in communities—that is why we will continue to do much through grassroots development—many other sports could set out equally credible reasons to receive elite-level support on a variety of different funding criteria. Eleven governing bodies, including British Basketball, did just that most recently under the banner of “Every sport matters”. I have all 11 in mind as we consider the asks made today.
Sir Mike Penning
The Minister is passionate about sport and in particular about basketball, although I know she does not want to be drawn into her personal views and, as a former Minister, I fully understand that. The difference between basketball and the other sports on the list she just referred to—I have looked at it—is that basketball touches areas of the community that are not touched by those other sports. We are reaching out beyond communities such as Tottenham, where I grew up, into areas such as my constituency, where we did not traditionally have that reach. The participation across communities is not touched by those other sports. Every sport says that it is different, but basketball is clearly different.
Tracey Crouch
I hope that so far in my speech I have assured colleagues that I absolutely recognise that point. It is why we look at different funding criteria for different sports across the whole activity perspective in the sports strategy. We also do that in the work we do in all Departments, whether that is to get people healthy or to get them engaged in their communities and so on. I hear what colleagues are saying, but at the same time funding criteria are set by UK Sport for the Olympics.
It is important to say that no funding criteria have been set beyond Tokyo 2020. UK Sport will begin its Paris 2024 funding cycle in due course. Criteria will be reviewed, offering the opportunity to reflect on the existing strategy of investment for the next cycle. UK Sport will then publish a clear set of investment principles against which future awards will be made. I hope that that reassures Members that this is not a closed book.
Tracey Crouch
Sorry, but I cannot, otherwise I will not give the hon. Member for Leeds North West time to respond. For the current cycle, UK Sport has set a clear investment strategy, has made a long-term commitment to invest against that and is delivering against that.
I recognise that elite basketball and top-flight players can have an enormous impact on the grassroots across the country. Many colleagues have made that point. Clubs such as Brixton Topcats and those mentioned this morning can and do reach some of the most diverse young communities in the country and signpost opportunities for the most talented to follow in their footsteps. When my right hon. Friend the Member for Hemel Hempstead writes to me on how we can promote and expand basketball and what more can be done together, we will reflect on that.
I am committed to continuing to work with all the constituent bodies delivering basketball in this country and to support grassroots opportunities where they are needed. We will always consider providing elite team funding should the funding criteria be met, but this debate is not the final discussion. There is still time before the end of March. We all need to work together to ensure that we find a solution. In the meantime, we will continue to support governing bodies, clubs, satellite club providers and other bespoke local projects to support grassroots basketball across the country.
Alex Sobel
Because I have little time, I will concentrate on the Minister’s remarks. I thank her for taking on board two of my recommendations, but I want to refer to the conversations I had yesterday with UK Sport. It admitted that basketball had medal potential, but that it would take 12 years. UK Sport initially funded basketball in 2006, but that ceased in 2014. UK Sport did not see through those 12 years that it identified to me on the phone yesterday. As my hon. Friend the Member for Washington and Sunderland West (Mrs Hodgson) said, funding is £102 per adult participant, which is the lowest of any team sport, even though it has the second highest participation rates. With those participation rates, it surely has Olympic potential, and UK Sport admitted as much.
A number of Members, including the hon. Members for Glasgow Central (Alison Thewliss) and for Paisley and Renfrewshire North (Gavin Newlands) and my hon. Friends the Members for Keighley (John Grogan) and for Tooting (Dr Allin-Khan), mentioned the Commonwealth games. I want to highlight the letter that FIBA sent to the Minister yesterday. I received a copy. It said:
“I revert to the FIBA October letter, sent to British Basketball, that England and Scotland’s Commonwealth Games participation could still be under threat if Great Britain Basketball cannot fulfil its senior fixtures in the next windows.”
Yesterday, UK Sport said to me that GB Basketball should perhaps relook at its strategy and concentrate on the Commonwealth games. FIBA said that is not possible. I am concerned that UK Sport is luxuriating in complacency about UK basketball and does not understand the implications of its actions across the piece. An urgent discussion is needed among the Minister, possibly me, GB Basketball, Sport England, UK Sport and others, and I am glad that the Minister is committed to that. As a matter of urgency, we need to move things on so that we can save UK basketball, which is a unique sport in this country.
Question put and agreed to.
Resolved,
That this House has considered the future of basketball in the UK.
PACE Trial: People with ME
(6 years, 10 months ago)
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Carol Monaghan (Glasgow North West) (SNP)
I beg to move,
That this House has considered the PACE trial and its effect on people with ME.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hollobone.
“The doctor doesn’t see me crawl on the floor. The doctor doesn’t know I don’t shower every day or brush my teeth twice a day like everyone else. He isn’t aware of my frequent sore throats, my poor balance, my difficulties with reading, my muscle twitches, or my sound intolerance, and he certainly wasn’t here to nurse me when once I was too weak to eat.”
Those are the words of a junior doctor living with ME, who alongside nearly 1,000 others has contacted me prior to this debate.
Myalgic encephalomyelitis, or ME, has been described in many ways, but labels such as chronic fatigue syndrome or post-viral fatigue syndrome simply do not come close to the living hell experienced by many ME sufferers—a hell that is made worse by the lack of understanding that is faced when seeking help.
ME is estimated to affect about 250,000 people in the UK and is classified by the World Health Organisation as a disease of the central nervous system. Symptoms can include debilitating muscle pain, severe headaches that are often made worse by light or noise, significant impairment of short-term memory and post-exertion malaise that can last days and even weeks.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
I congratulate the hon. Lady on securing this debate. Does she agree that there is still huge concern among ME patients that the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence says it will not abandon the promotion of physio-social therapies for ME, despite the widespread scientific criticism of the PACE trial methodology, and that we must ensure that that is addressed as a matter of urgency?
Carol Monaghan
I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention. I will come on to the NICE guidelines later in my speech.
Although ME is a pathological, not psychological, condition, much about it remains a mystery. The reasons for that are twofold. First, many sufferers are housebound and therefore easy for society to ignore. Secondly, there is a lack of awareness among medical professionals and as a result a woeful lack of quality research. What we do know is that ME is often triggered by a viral infection such as flu, but, unlike healthy individuals, people living with ME do not recover. Into that research drought entered the PACE trial—pacing, graded activity and cognitive behaviour therapy; a randomised evaluation.
The trial was unique in medical research. It was funded by the Department for Work and Pensions to the tune of £5 million, a point to which I will return. From the very start the PACE trial was flawed. In contravention of the World Health Organisation classification, it assumed that ME was psychological and sufferers could recover if they chose so to do. Thus the PACE trial was framed in psychological terms.
Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)
I thank the hon. Lady for securing this important debate. Does she agree with me that a lot of employers do not really understand how people with ME suffer and that that can affect their employment? It can also affect housewives.
Carol Monaghan
Absolutely. The public perceive it as mere tiredness, but it is so much more than that. The debilitating pain that ME sufferers experience is something that we all should be aware of.
The participants in the PACE trial received a range of different treatments, including cognitive behaviour therapy and graded exercise therapy, where patients were encouraged to become physically active and then increase the activity’s intensity. Unbelievably for a trial this large, none of the groups was given specific medical interventions. The results were published in The Lancet in 2011, with the contentious claim that CBT and GET brought 30% of patients back to normal, while 60% improved. The media reported that all ME sufferers had to do to recover was exercise. However, the report was immediately questioned by the patient community. How could exercise, the very thing that was known to worsen symptoms, actually help?
Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)
My friend Jo from Leeds wrote to me:
“I’ve had CFS/ME for 25 years. I’d had it for 10 years before it was diagnosed. When I was diagnosed in Sheffield I was told there was literally no service they could refer me to and relied largely on a local support group. I was told by a Leeds GP to ‘just get on with life’ despite trying to hold down a professional job and look after a young child.”
That is a typical story of somebody with ME.
Carol Monaghan
I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention. It is typical, because the PACE trial had such publicity and was lauded by many as the answer. One participant in the original trial has contacted me:
“I was determined to be a part of the...trial because I wanted to get better—so if this ‘treatment’ could make me better I wanted to give it the chance to do so. I was assigned Graded Exercise Therapy. It never occurred to me that it would actually make me more ill. Nor did it occur to me that decline would not be documented, and that despite patients not recovering (or in some cases worsening), they would publish that the treatment was successful...It was stressed that I would only get better if I tried harder, and even though the graded exercise was clearly making me worse, my struggle and pain was dismissed.”
Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)
As a former physiotherapist, I recognise that all therapeutic interventions must be patient-led—led by people with the lived experience. Does the hon. Lady agree?
Carol Monaghan
Absolutely. In fact, I will be calling for the patient voice to be heard in any treatments.
Calls to publish the raw data—basic protocol in good research—were ignored. Queen Mary University spent an estimated £200,000 on keeping the data hidden. Finally, after a long battle, patients won a court order to force the PACE authors to release the data. It was discovered that the authors had altered the way in which they measured improvement and recovery, to increase the apparent benefit of the therapies. Re-analysis showed that the improvement rate fell from 60% to 21% and the recovery rate fell from 22% to just 7%.
The method of patient reporting has also been questioned. As one participant says:
“After repeatedly being asked how severe...my symptoms were—in the context of…it’s just me not trying hard enough...I started to feel like I had to put a...positive spin on my...answers. I could not be honest about just how bad it was, as that would...tell the doctors I wasn’t trying and I wasn’t being positive enough. When I was completing questionnaires...I remember second guessing myself and thinking for every answer: ‘Is it really that bad? Am I just not looking at things positively enough?’”
John Howell (Henley) (Con)
I thank the hon. Lady for securing this debate. The PACE trials have been roundly condemned by many scientists as being totally inappropriate. Does she have a feel for what an appropriate trial might have found?
Carol Monaghan
Yes. I will come on to how an appropriate trial could be done. First, I will mention the self-reporting that was a part of the trial. Questionnaires provided the data and measures of success. There were no physiological or scientific measurements. For patients the damage was done. I am a science teacher by profession and I always told my pupils that there are a number of stages to any scientific investigation: “Start with a hypothesis. Decide how you will test this theory, what measurements you will make, how you will record your results and how you will use these results to draw your conclusions. Those conclusions, which might be different from the original hypothesis, must be based on the evidence you have gathered.”
That did not happen in the PACE trial, which relied on patient self-reporting, rather than measurable physiological parameters. Furthermore, when the results were not as expected, rather than revise the original hypothesis, the investigators simply changed the success criteria. Thus patients participating in GET who had deteriorated during the study were considered recovered.
There are, of course, ways of measuring the physiological impact of exercise. The two-day cardiopulmonary exercise test can objectively measure post-exertional malaise. We know that a person with ME can perform adequately—sometimes even well—on the first day, but can have greatly reduced cardiopulmonary function on the second. The test requires the participant to exercise on a static bicycle, and allows data on oxygen consumption, workload and gas exchange to be measured. Two identical tests, separated by 24 hours, must be carried out to properly measure the impact of exercise. Results from a single test could be interpreted as a lack of fitness. Two tests change that to something quite different. A healthy person will perform better the second time; an ME sufferer will most likely be worse.
Of course, the failure of the PACE trial to do that could simply be put down to bad science, but unfortunately I believe that there is far more to it. One wonders why the DWP would fund such a trial, unless it was seen as a way of removing people from long-term benefits and reducing the welfare bill.
John Lamont (Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk) (Con)
The hon. Lady is speaking very well about the challenges that this illness presents to people, but does she share my concern that in Scotland there is only one specialist, nurse-led ME facility and there are no specialist ME consultants? She raises an important point, but in terms of NHS awareness of the condition, we need to do more to ensure that people are getting the treatment that they undoubtedly need.
Carol Monaghan
This is a worldwide issue. The PACE trial results have affected people all over the world. In my folder, I have examples of people from Australia, the United States and Canada. Although there are no specialist centres in Scotland, the ones in England are recommending graded exercise therapy, which is making people worse. We need to deal with the issue.
Carol Monaghan
I will make some progress. The PACE trial was used to inform NICE guidelines, which has meant that symptoms have been disregarded, and sufferers are considered to be attention-seeking hypochondriacs or even, in the case of some female patients, hysterical. Although in some ways the lack of belief has been the most difficult thing for sufferers and their families, the impact of the PACE trial and the resulting NICE guidelines is far further reaching. Many sufferers have reported major difficulties in accessing financial support. Employment and support allowance assessments do not consider the impact of exertion on a person’s ability to function on subsequent days, and personal independence payment assessments, which consider ME to be psychological following the PACE report, mean that sufferers struggle to access that entitlement and simply rely on family members.
Conflicts of interest in the trial are also deeply worrying. The former chief medical adviser to the DWP sat on the trial’s steering committee, and ultimately the results of the trial have been used to penalise those with ME. When we consider the relationship between key PACE investigators and major health insurance companies such as Unum, the trial takes on a far more sinister slant. Sufferers have reported that their health insurance company would pay out only if they undertook a programme of GET—an impossible task, as the insurance giants knew.
It is not only adults who are affected. Children with the disease have been subject to care proceedings because of widespread misunderstanding among health workers. ME has been mistaken for school phobia, neglect or even abuse.
Carol Monaghan
I will in a moment. One mother contacted me, saying:
“Our 12 year old son was seen at specialist ME centre by a consultant who prescribed GET. In one year this ‘programme’ caused our youngster’s body to develop higher and higher levels of inflammation, he began limping, was in continual pain from not only the ME headaches but joint and foot pain. The comments were ‘well he managed to limp into my office’, ‘you were very active, now since the virus you are very inactive, so you will have this pain due to lack of exercise’.
GET caused his body’s immune system to go into overdrive. My son developed Juvenile Idiopathic Arthritis. This was treated by a paediatric Rheumatology Consultant who was shocked it had been left so long and told my son that his toes would be permanently swollen even after treatment as the bones had grown abnormally during the inflammation”.
Layla Moran
I, too, have been contacted by parents in my constituency. In the case of one constituent, her daughter took a year to be diagnosed and missed an entire year of school as a result. The effect on children’s lives at a very young age is palpable.
Carol Monaghan
Many parents who try to home school their children also face local authority intervention, trying to get the children back to school. We must listen to patients.
This disease is very easy to ignore. All too often, those living with ME are housebound, and suffer from what they refer to as “brain fog”, which makes it difficult to mount an organised campaign. That means that much about ME remains unknown. There is some evidence that it could be grouped with auto-immune conditions such as multiple sclerosis and rheumatoid arthritis. Some people have reported that certain anti-viral drugs improve their condition, but without properly conducted scientific research, we do not have the answers. Ultimately, the impact of the PACE trial on those with ME has been devastating.
Alison Thewliss
My hon. Friend makes a good case. My constituent Carol Ann McGregor has had ME since 1996 and has been bedbound for seven years. She says that she has
“lost my life, health, husband, my career and my home”.
Does my hon. Friend agree with my long-term family friend Maureen Bivard that the cover-up, and the way in which the PACE trial was carried out, amounts to a miscarriage of justice for patients?
Carol Monaghan
I think that when the full details of the trial become known, it will be considered one of the biggest medical scandals of the 21st century.
Carol Monaghan
I am just going to finish off. I am pleased that NICE is reviewing its guidelines on ME and has removed the recommendations to embark on harmful exercise, but I was contacted only last week by a lady who had been told recently by her GP to exercise her way to health. That highlights the huge need for education and for raising awareness among both the public and medical practitioners.
I ask the Minister: can the next set of guidelines be drawn up through listening to those living with ME? What plans does she have to introduce compulsory training for medical practitioners on ME care and treatment? Can she assure me that specialist ME treatment centres are not advertising graded exercise therapy as a method of recovery? Will she support proper funding for ME research? Lastly, will she work with DWP colleagues to ensure that new guidelines are drawn up for dealing with people with ME?
Finally, I thank the Countess of Mar and the ME Association for helping me to prepare for today. I also thank those living with ME, whose voices are not being heard.
The Minister for Care (Caroline Dinenage)
It is a great pleasure to serve under your stewardship, Mr Hollobone. I congratulate the hon. Member for Glasgow North West (Carol Monaghan) on securing today’s debate. As she has articulated so beautifully, the situation is clearly very concerning. I know that she has done an enormous amount of work in this area, and has met people, both in her constituency and more widely, affected by the condition, and with expertise on the condition, to hear about its impact on individuals’ lives. As MPs, we all know people in our constituencies who are affected by the condition.
As we have heard, chronic fatigue syndrome, also known as myalgic encephalomyelitis or encephalopathy, is a debilitating and very poorly understood condition, which is estimated to affect more than 200,000 people in England. We do not understand the underlying causes of it, there is no one diagnostic test to identify it, and although patients can improve and recover, there is no cure for it. The condition, which for brevity and to avoid covering you in a thin layer of spittle, Mr Hollobone, I shall refer to in the abbreviated form CFS/ME, can stop a life in its tracks, leaving sufferers unable to carry out the most basic tasks. In the most serious cases, people can be bedbound for weeks at a time. It has a complex range of symptoms, including a very disabling, flu-like fatigue and malaise, and neurological problems. Of course, the impact on friends, families and carers can be significant as well.
It is also true that the difficulties in diagnosis mean that patients with CFS/ME often experience delays in getting the treatment and support that they need. In recognising the need for GPs to be aware of the condition, the Royal College of General Practitioners identified CFS/ME as a key area of technical knowledge that GPs should have as part of their qualifying exams, which answers a question raised by the hon. Lady.
The recommended treatments for CFS/ME, namely cognitive behavioural therapy, or CBT, and graded exercise therapy, or GET, and the evidence for them are the subject of today’s debate. Those treatments were first recommended for patients with mild or moderate CFS/ME in 2007 in the NICE guidance, in line with the best available evidence, which showed that the treatments offered benefits. The guidance sets out that there is no one form of treatment to suit every patient and that the personal needs and preferences of patients should be taken into account. Doctors should explain that no single strategy will be successful for all patients; that in common with all people receiving NHS care, CFS/ME patients have the right to refuse or withdraw from any part of their treatment; and that those with severe symptoms may require access to a wider range of support, managed by a CFS/ME specialist.
The results of the PACE trail, which examined pacing therapy, cognitive behavioural therapy, graded exercise and specialist medical care for chronic fatigue syndrome, were published four years after the NICE guidance. The trial ran from 2005 to 2011 and, contrary to what the hon. Lady said, was primarily funded by the Medical Research Council, not the DWP. Total funding was £5 million and the MRC contributed almost £3 million.
The study was undertaken by the Queen Mary University of London. It was the largest ever trial for CFS/ME, including more than 600 participants in England and Scotland. It sought to assess and compare the effectiveness of the four main treatments for CFS/ME—adaptive pacing therapy, CBT, GET and standardised specialist medical care.
The peer-reviewed trial results published in The Lancet in 2011 found, as the hon. Lady said, that 60% of patients with CFS/ME benefited from CBT and GET when provided alongside specialist medical care. CBT and GET were found to be better than pacing therapy or specialist medical care alone in improving both symptoms and disability, and a follow-up study looking at recovery after one year further supported the benefits of interventions. The trial had ethical approval from the NHS research ethics committee and had ongoing oversight from an independent trial steering committee, which included patient representatives. Trial reports were regularly provided to a data monitoring and ethics committee that had the power to halt the trial if harm was indicated. NICE considered the PACE results in 2011 and concluded that they supported its existing recommendations on both CBT and GET.
The Government are aware that the use of CBT and GET in treating CFS/ME has long been a controversial issue for patient groups, charities and some clinicians. That began with the publication of the NICE guidance 10 years ago and continued with the PACE trial. Since 2011, PACE trial data has been shared with many independent scientists as part of normal research collaboration, including the internationally respected research organisation Cochrane, which independently validated the findings. However, in the last 18 months, the attention on the trial has increased substantially, following a tribunal ruling in August 2016 ordering the release of the trial data to a member of the public, which the hon. Lady referred to. The data has since been examined more widely and critics, including some clinical academics, have suggested that it shows that CBT and GET are not as effective as the trial results suggested.
Nicky Morgan (Loughborough) (Con)
This is clearly a very important debate. I think both the hon. Member for Glasgow North West and the Minister would agree that it is not possible to do justice to the concerns raised by all our constituents, and the 200,000 sufferers that the Minister has identified, in half an hour. Does the Minister agree that this is a subject worthy of wider debate in the House of Commons? Constituents such as Sarah Reed, who have written to me, say that because of the belief in CBT and GET, and because academics believe in the results, many other treatments have not been pursued. Does the Minister feel angry about that?
Caroline Dinenage
I thank my right hon. Friend for her intervention. As has already been said, it is important that we listen to patients. As I will go on to explain, NICE is now looking at reviewing its guidance on this and, in the light of that, it may well be worth discussing the issue more fully.
Luke Pollard (Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport) (Lab/Co-op)
Does the Minister agree that believing patients is also important here? Patients with the condition are often not believed and concerns about the PACE trial have not been believed, and that has just loaded concerns on those individuals.
Caroline Dinenage
As I have already set out, sometimes it can take a really long time for this to be diagnosed. People have to keep going backwards and forwards to GPs and others with their symptoms. Many other potential conditions have to be discounted before it can be fully diagnosed, which often leaves people feeling that their symptoms are not being taken seriously or they are being dismissed. Obviously, that is massively concerning, which is why, as we have already said, it is important that patients are listened to and that clinical professionals are well-equipped to be able to recognise the symptoms and identify them.
As I said, the data has been examined more widely. Critics, including some clinical academics, have suggested that it shows CBT and GET are not as effective as the trial results suggested. In turn, the trial authors have defended their work. They have responded to criticisms in medical journals and the wider medical printed press. I know the hon. Member for Glasgow North West raised one such criticism at the oral evidence session of the Science and Technology Committee in January, concerning possible conflicts of interest of the PACE trial authors. On that point, in line with normal practice, all such conflicts were published with the trial protocol as well as the results. If she has evidence to the contrary, I would be very happy to discuss that with her afterwards.
Carol Monaghan
I thank the Minister for that. However, they were not disclosed to the PACE participants.
Caroline Dinenage
It is very important that the hon. Lady has raised that point, and I am sure it will be taken into consideration.
Helen Whately
ME sufferers in my constituency welcome that the NICE guidelines are being reviewed, but one problem is that when they find that the existing treatments do not work for them, there is a lack of alternatives. Does the Minister recognise that alternative treatments need to be looked into urgently and offered to patients?
Caroline Dinenage
I am sure that will be part of the NICE guidance. Where there is significant evidence that alternatives deserve greater investigation, I am sure NICE will look at that. I will talk about that a little more in a second.
On conflicts of interest, it is obviously important that researchers and scientists with particular expertise in one area will have worked and shared their expertise in related fields and industries, but transparency regarding conflicts of interests is vital to the integrity of the research. The NHS Health Research Authority already issues guidance on conflicting interests and I understand it will consider whether any further clarity is needed.
Clearly, the controversy around the trial is problematic for researchers, but it is most of all distressing for patients with CFS/ME, who deserve the most appropriate treatment from the NHS and to have confidence in the treatment that is being provided. That is why we welcome the NICE decision to undertake a full review of the guidance, which will examine the concerns around the PACE trial and any implications for its current recommendations. NICE develops its guidance independently to support NHS organisations and clinicians to deliver services in line with the best available evidence. It welcomes the input of stakeholders and more than 10 CFS/ME charities and organisations are already registered to support the guideline development process. All other parties who are interested can comment on the draft scope and draft guidelines at the appropriate time during the development process. Final guidance is expected in October 2020.
Paul Blomfield (Sheffield Central) (Lab)
The Minister makes the point that final guidance is expected in October 2020, but given the significant doubt over CBT and GET and their impact now, does she recognise the strong case for NICE to suspend the current guidance, which points people towards those potentially damaging treatments?
Caroline Dinenage
As an independent organisation, that will of course be a matter for NICE, taking into consideration the evidence.
I know it is a priority for the CFS/ME community that more research into identifying the underlying causes of the condition be undertaken. I would like to reassure those affected that both the MRC and the National Institute for Health Research welcome high-quality applications for research into CFS/ME, including studies to investigate its biological causes, and it will come as welcome news that the MRC is currently funding a project to examine the relationship between abnormal brain structures and symptoms of CFS/ME.
I again thank the hon. Member for Glasgow North West for raising this important issue on behalf of those affected by the condition in her own constituency and up and down the country. I hope the debate has been helpful.
Question put and agreed to.
NHS Staff: Oxfordshire
(6 years, 10 months ago)
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Layla Moran (Oxford West and Abingdon) (LD)
I beg to move,
That this House has considered recruitment and retention of NHS staff in Oxfordshire.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hollobone. I am delighted to have secured this important debate on the retention and recruitment of NHS staff in Oxfordshire. It is a pleasure to see fellow Oxfordshire MPs in the Chamber.
Since my election last summer, the state of the NHS in our county has been one of the issues that my constituents have raised with me most frequently. I pay tribute to all those who work in the NHS in Oxfordshire at every level for their outstanding dedication and commitment to delivering first-class care. We owe it to them, and to patients and their families, to ensure we are providing the best possible service across Oxfordshire and, indeed, the country. I am sure all hon. Members will agree that the staff do an incredible job, but they are under increasing pressure. Some have described the situation as a crisis. Although politicians are prone to hyperbole, I fear that that word is increasingly apt.
Last month, our local NHS hit the headlines nationally, as a leaked memo suggested that Oxford University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust is considering rationing rounds of chemotherapy at the Churchill Hospital for terminally ill cancer patients because of a 40% shortfall in the number of specialist nurses needed to deliver care. I spoke with the trust bosses, as I am sure many other hon. Members did, and they assured me that the leaked suggestion is not their policy—it is important to reaffirm that point—but they confirmed that it is one option among many being considered by senior staff in the privacy of internal conversations. It is alarming that they are having such conversations at all. That points to a wider issue that needs to be addressed urgently.
The problem, of course, goes beyond cancer services at the Churchill. I am sure Oxfordshire colleagues have their own experiences. In my advice surgery, junior doctors, who prefer to remain nameless, have told me in confidence that staff shortages at the John Radcliffe Hospital and high workloads are leaving some departments dependent on less experienced doctors. They tell me that that would not have happened in years past, and that they are now anxious about patient safety. They work far more than their allocated hours to catch up with paperwork, and they are especially concerned about the night shift, when the problem is most prevalent.
In recent years, the NHS in our area has been propped up by the good will of staff at all levels—doctors, nurses and ambulance workers alike—who put patients first, but the stress of the job is affecting them and their families, and I am afraid that some are voting with their feet. In nursing, the shortage is most acute. In Oxford, we had 560 unfilled vacancies at the end of last June. The vacancy rate increased from 6% to 10% at OUH trust between October 2016 and October 2017.
Mental health is another area of concern. The child and adolescent mental health services in Abingdon provide outstanding care and support to young people with mental health issues and their families, but I have been contacted by residents who are worried that experienced staff are leaving the profession and the NHS altogether due to the pressure on the service and their workloads. According to the Royal College of Psychiatrists, in the Thames valley area, we have a below average number of consultant psychiatrists per 100,000 people, below average numbers of junior doctor psychiatrists, and below average numbers of psychiatric nurses.
The Department of Health’s pledge to expand the mental health workforce to the tune of 570 extra consultant psychiatrists by 2021 is welcome, but the number of medical students specialising in psychiatry has flatlined. The Government must do more to ensure Oxfordshire has sufficient mental health specialists to make parity of esteem between mental and physical health a reality. I am interested to hear from the Minister what they are doing about that.
On the mental health of NHS workers themselves, there is a huge if perhaps unsurprising problem relating to stress and sick leave. A freedom of information request by the Liberal Democrats found that nurses took 5,869 days off for stress and mental health-related illnesses in Oxfordshire in 2016-17—up 11% on the previous year.
Why are we having all these issues? There are several strands to the problem, some of which are specific to Oxfordshire and some of which are represented more widely in the country. I will take each in turn. My Oxfordshire colleagues on the Conservative Benches, in particular, would be disappointed if I did not take the opportunity to speak about Brexit, so let me do that first. To put it bluntly, the Government need to do more to reassure the EU citizens working in the NHS that they are not just welcome in the UK but valued. They face uncertainty about their future status, whether they will be settled and the cost and bureaucracy of it all, and they do not have faith in the Home Office to manage the gargantuan administrative burden. More than 2,700 EU nurses left the NHS in 2016—a 68% increase since two years ago. Separate figures from the Royal College of Nursing show that the number of EU nationals registering as nurses in England has dropped by 92%. I am told by local EU nurses that one of the main sticking points is uncertainty about whether their time spent in the UK will count towards career progression in their country when they go back home, so people are making the decision not to come to the UK lest they risk being at a disadvantage in their career. Is the Minister aware of that problem? If so, what is the Department doing to tackle it? I would also like to see the introduction of an NHS passport, or an equivalent with a different name, to secure the rights of EU citizens who have made their home here and to encourage others to come now, because we cannot wait to address this crisis.
Coming back to our home-grown population, the Royal College of Nursing suggests that the next generation of British nurses is deterred by pressure, a lack of funding and poor pay. It also says that the cuts to training places are exacerbating the problem. Just a fortnight ago, we learned of a 13% reduction in the number of UCAS applications for nursing, compared with the year before. This is the second year in a row that applications for nursing courses have fallen, and 700 fewer nurses are even starting. NHS Digital figures show that one in 10 nurses is leaving the NHS every year, and that those leaving now outnumber those joining.
I recently visited Abingdon Community Hospital, and the staff there told me that the shortages mean that they are increasingly using agency staff to fill the gap. Although those staff are well trained, there is strain associated with bringing them up to speed while managing everything else. It is not a sustainable situation.
The RCN is clear that the Government’s attempts to increase the number of trainee nurses are not working, and that care failings are becoming more likely. The Government must address this situation urgently so the public can have confidence in safe staffing levels in our NHS. The Department has pledged an extra 5,000 places for student nurses in 2017. Again, that is welcome, but how does it square with the collapse in applications? I would like to hear what the Minister and the Department are doing about that.
I think we can lift the 1% pay cap for NHS staff, who deserve a decent, fair and long overdue pay rise. The Minister must be aware of what the cap is doing to morale across the NHS—especially in areas such as Oxfordshire, where the cost of living is high.
Robert Courts (Witney) (Con)
I congratulate the hon. Lady on securing this important debate. She may be about to address this point—I apologise if I am foreshadowing her speech—but she mentioned the cost of living, and of course the cost of housing is a big issue for all of us in Oxfordshire, no matter where we live. Does she agree that one of the most helpful things we can do is to follow the example of schemes such as the partnership in my constituency between Blenheim Estates and West Oxfordshire District Council, which is looking at providing substantially reduced market-rent housing for all key workers—not just those in the health sector? There is a great deal to be done there. Furthermore, institutions such as hospitals may be able to look at similar practices. The clinical commissioning group might take up the long-standing invitation for it to attend growth board meetings, in which it will be able to have some input into the housing provided for key workers, what it costs and where it is located. I am sorry that there are so many points there, but perhaps the hon. Lady can consider them.
Layla Moran
Not at all; I thank the hon. Gentleman for his helpful intervention. He is right to foreshadow what is coming later. The more times we make the point, the better, because it is the crux of the issue in Oxfordshire. On the pay cap, when will we see the timetable for the pay review? We need to ensure that the basic cost of living at least is covered. I will come on to housing later.
I am glad about the renewed focus on social care in the Department since the reshuffle, but I sincerely hope that it extends beyond just a name change. Staffing levels for the sector are even worse than in nursing in Oxfordshire. One of the more surprising facts I have learned in recent months has been about how many social care staff are leaving the service locally to fill positions in the retail sector created by the opening of the shiny new Westgate centre in Oxford. Pay is at a similar level, but the work is less stressful, so the people doing those vital social care jobs are deciding that they would rather do something else and take the easier path.
It is not just pay that we are talking about; Oxfordshire pays well for such jobs in comparison with other parts of the country. Our area still struggles to recruit and keep people. The recently published Care Quality Commission report for Oxfordshire found that
“The system in Oxfordshire was particularly challenged by the issues of workforce retention and recruitment across all professions and staff grades”,
and that “countless” concerns had been expressed about recruitment and retention, and their impact on developing a skilled and sustainable workforce.
The report goes on to highlight the need to do more to increase professional development. We must ensure that budgets are available for continuous professional development within the NHS, allowing existing staff to train, develop and build their career over time. Without such opportunities, it is little wonder that they move on. That has been raised vociferously by nursing leads as another key factor in the retention crisis. I will be interested to hear what the Minister has to say about CPD and whether the budget for that will be increased.
Then there is overall funding. At the election, all political parties pledged more, but it was not enough. Rather than just talking about how much, I want to talk about how we can be honest with the public about how to pay for more funding, if we are all agreed that that is needed. In the short term, my party would like to see a ring-fenced penny in the pound on income tax, providing a £6 billion cash injection. In the longer term, and as a replacement for national insurance, on the basis of wide consultation, we advocate a dedicated health and social care tax. The advantage of that would be that people could see in their pay packets exactly what we were paying for.
We also want an NHS and care convention to bring together all political parties and stakeholders, so we stop using the NHS and social care as the political football it was during the election. Recently a letter on the issue backed by nearly 100 MPs was sent to the Prime Minister, but I was saddened to see that it was not taken up. I therefore urge the Minister not only to continue to ask the Prime Minister and the Treasury for more money for the NHS but, critically, to back something along the lines of a cross-party NHS and care convention, so that we can take the NHS out of the hands of political pundits and put it back into the hands of patients, where it belongs.
I have talked about what I would like to see from the Government: an open and generous offer to EU citizens; a decent pay rise; better funding, which is not kicked about as much; improved working conditions; and action on bursaries and training for nurses. But, to come to the point made so eloquently earlier, that will not cut the mustard for Oxfordshire, because our biggest issue by far is the prohibitive cost of housing in the county.
I will share an email I received from one of my constituents in Kidlington who works for the NHS. She contacted me to say that she feels as though she will never be able to afford a house of her own:
“I work for the NHS and although it comes with fantastic benefits and, I hope, great security it doesn’t pay like those who would be doing the same job as me as an office manager, in the private sector.
My situation is that I have been working for NHS nearly 9 years now. I want to move out and I live in Kidlington. To have a slight chance I would have to do shared ownership. Although not ideal it is a great stepping stone, and you have to start somewhere. However, if I was to look outside Kidlington, the Bicester area where there is up and coming new builds, the prices are still out of my range. It is disheartening to be rejected, especially when you are literally outside the affordability, yet you have worked, paid taxes and generally contributed to society.”
That is a damning indictment, and the despair is shared by so many public sector workers across Oxfordshire. A 2017 study by Lloyds bank listed Oxford as the most expensive city in which to live in the UK, with the average house price now 11 times average earnings. The recent CQC report on Oxfordshire found that staff at every level cited cost of living and housing as barriers to staff recruitment and retention.
There have been some steps in the right direction. As the Minster will know, in March 2016 the OUH trust launched a scheme in which new nursing recruits were offered a cash incentive equivalent to their first month’s rent and a deposit. I have no doubt that the council, the NHS and other organisations in other parts of the county, as we have heard, are doing everything they can—I am not here to bash them—but the fact is that the new houses to be built will not fix the problem. At best, the models show that house prices may flatline over time, but the definition of affordable as 80% of the value of incredibly expensive houses is still nowhere near enough to tackle the problem for public sector workers.
I can propose a solution. I would like to see some kind of Oxfordshire housing allowance for public sector workers given to local NHS staff to help them meet the extremely high cost of living and to tackle our recruitment crisis. Unison’s Oxfordshire health branch has called for the reintroduction of an Oxford weighting to help staff with living costs in the area, in line with the NHS weighting already paid to staff in London. I prefer not to do that, simply because “more pay” can be seen as “more valued”, which is not what that is meant to be. I would prefer to see the introduction of a specific payment for housing—a specific payment for a specific problem.
I am open to exploring all options, and I am very keen to hear what fellow Oxfordshire MPs and others think. Without an Oxfordshire housing allowance in some form, we will always struggle to recruit the NHS staff we require. Moreover, we need to start doing something now.
To conclude, the Government can and must take a role collaboratively with stakeholders to recognise the unique situations and challenges that we face in Oxfordshire. If we do nothing, we risk the rationing of care and treatments and, rightly, a backlash from our constituents. God forbid that anything should happen to a single patient as a result of any of the issues I have described today. It is our duty to tackle the problems head on and to ensure that we recruit and retain the staff whom patients deserve and our local NHS desperately needs.
Mr Philip Hollobone (in the Chair)
The debate can last until 1 o’clock. I will call the Front-Bench spokespeople at 12.30 pm, so other Members have 10 or so minutes each. I call Victoria Prentis.
Victoria Prentis (Banbury) (Con)
Thank you, Mr Hollobone, and it is a pleasure to take part in the debate. I thank the hon. Member for Oxford West and Abingdon (Layla Moran) for securing it.
It is great to see all my fellow Oxfordshire colleagues present today. If I may say so, they have all been great allies in my fight to save acute services at the Horton General Hospital. Talking about recruitment in some detail is particularly useful, because that is our greatest local challenge with regard to good healthcare.
It is also good to see the Minister in his place. Since he took up his role, he and I have spoken many times about the issues faced at the Horton. We in Banbury are waiting patiently to hear the outcome of the Independent Reconfiguration Panel’s initial assessment of the permanent downgrade of our maternity services. Our hopes are pinned on a full review, and we were due to find out 10 days ago whether that would take place. We have heard nothing yet, but I am watching the post with interest.
The Independent Reconfiguration Panel is familiar with our situation, having looked at similar proposals to downgrade maternity at the Horton back in 2008. Just as recruitment was the contributing factor almost 10 years ago, the failure to fill middle-grade vacancies at the Horton’s obstetric unit was the straw that broke the camel’s back in 2016. However, failures in recruitment are not, as we have heard, unique to maternity services at the Horton. We have spoken briefly about chemotherapy services at the Churchill, and at a meeting in January with local GPs, many expressed concerns about the sustainability of their practices in the current recruitment climate. Last week, the Care Quality Commission observed the following in its full and, if I may say so, quite critical review of the local system, which the hon. Member for Oxford West and Abingdon has quoted and which I will carry on a little:
“The system in Oxfordshire was particularly challenged by the issues of workforce retention and recruitment across all professions and staff grades, especially acute hospital staff…and in the domiciliary…market. This resulted in staff shortages, heavy workloads and impacted upon seamless care delivery and integration of services.”
I am reassured that the Department takes recruitment seriously and has invested significant time and resources in addressing current workforce challenges across the nation. Attracting more people to the profession and training them takes many years. The cost of living in our area is high and London weighting is a significant pull factor out of our area, particularly given our very reliable transport links to the capital. We may be a wealthy county but we must think creatively to overcome the current challenges. The future of our services depends on that.
When I called for help, I was overwhelmed by the generosity of local schools and businesses in my area, which offered discounted school fees, free shirts from Charles Tyrwhitt, and free beer from Hook Norton—that made the headlines—to any prospective obstetricians who wanted to apply for a job at the Horton General. As a leading house building authority, Cherwell District Council has been exemplary in its support for the Horton, exploring the possibility of golden handshakes and providing key worker housing. A local developer came forward to offer one of its new build properties to any obstetrician looking to relocate to our area. Yet all of these offers remain completely unexplored by the local hospital trust, which has refused repeatedly to engage with me on this issue.
Last September, the Secretary of State announced plans to offer salary supplements to GPs in rural and coastal regions, which was a really welcome development. Market towns such as Banbury, Bicester, Abingdon and the many others represented in this Chamber desperately need similar incentives to attract newly trained professionals, whether through an Oxfordshire weighting or a ring-fenced housing allowance. I have no particular view about which would be the more effective incentive—I am happy to explore both. More money is always welcome, but it does not have to be the only answer. Just yesterday, I heard from a Banbury GP who has not been able to recruit a fully qualified international GP who is a resident outside the EU, because of problems with the tier 2 visa requirements. The person is an Australian who trained in Banbury and is very familiar with the local system, and we would really value having her back.
It is important that we consider specialties such as general practice and obstetrics when looking at the shortage occupation list that needs to be filled, because there are gaps in those areas too. We must think outside the box and talk across Departments to find the solutions that we desperately need. We must also have some clarity. When obstetric services at the Horton were suspended in August 2016, we were told that the rota needed six obstetricians to operate safely. But the goalposts were moved; the trust now tells us that nine are needed before the unit can reopen. Those decisions have real consequences. We must know the potential domino effect that shortages can have on other medical rotas. Since maternity services at the Horton were downgraded, the hospital has, in turn, lost one of its anaesthetic rotas. Difficulties attracting professionals to CT1 and CT2 posts pose a very real risk to the future sustainability of the one remaining rota. Until that can be full resolved, the threat to all acute services at the Horton cannot be fully ruled out.
Finally, we must learn, as I say repeatedly, to communicate openly and transparently. Extracting recruitment information from the trust is painfully slow. Rather than offer updates, it leaves us to ask for meetings. We are still waiting for the meeting that my hon. Friend the Member for Witney (Robert Courts) requested for us to discuss recruitment at the Churchill. Yet when I made remarks on local radio about a perceived culture of secrecy, the trust chairman was very quick to summon me to meet her. I was told by the trust that all Oxfordshire MPs would be sent a detailed briefing on recruitment and retention challenges by 1 February. I have not had such a briefing and I do not know whether other hon. Members have.
Time and again I have offered assistance with tackling recruitment. Schools and businesses made generous offers to attract obstetricians, and I am furious that the trust continues to fail to engage. I am hopeful that the CQC report provides a long overdue reality check and that we start to see a real step change in its approach. I have made clear numerous times that we MPs are ready and waiting to help. I am really hopeful that under the new excellent interim head of the clinical commissioning group, we will start to develop a vision for our future healthcare, which we have so desperately lacked for so long.
This year we mark 70 years of the NHS. I am hopeful that many of the hard-working staff in Oxfordshire will be recognised at the upcoming parliamentary awards. I am particularly grateful to the dedicated Horton midwives who now face an almost three-hour round commute to and from the John Radcliffe, following the downgrade of our unit. Experience has taught us that we need to keep up the pressure.
Anneliese Dodds (Oxford East) (Lab/Co-op)
It is a real pleasure to see you in the Chair, Mr Hollobone, and to be among my fellow Oxfordshire MPs. I wish that we could always take the same friendly approach as this county group to different policy issues. It is a pleasure to participate in this debate and to follow the hon. Member for Banbury (Victoria Prentis) and the hon. Member for Oxford West and Abingdon (Layla Moran), to whom I am very grateful for calling it.
In common with my colleagues, I receive a huge amount of case work from patients, members of the public and NHS staff who are concerned about the local NHS. I want to share one very recent example that offers some very telling lessons. A local nurse who came to one of my surgeries had talked to other nurses in her department and put a notice on the staffroom noticeboard asking for people to add their comments about issues that they wanted raised with their local MP. Low pay and understaffing came right at the top of that list. She was absolutely dedicated to helping her patients, but she felt under extreme pressure. She said to me that the recent negligence claim that was brought against a doctor, which many of us will have seen, could have happened anywhere in the NHS, and that she was enormously concerned. I was very impressed by her dedication and concern to make sure that these issues were dealt with at political level. She did not believe that they were being dealt with and I do not believe that they have been either.
The Library briefing rightly indicates that recruitment and retention are largely the responsibility of individual trusts, yet they are undertaken within a framework of national policy. This is a particular problem for the local NHS—colleagues have already mentioned that. The pay cap in particular is a big issue in Oxford—we have no uplift compared with London, which is a competitor in staffing terms—as is the large number of EU staff in the local NHS. I will briefly run through each of those three matters before turning to some of the positive moves that are ameliorating the situation but are being countered by those strong headwinds from national-level factors.
The seven-year pay cap has been a particular problem for NHS staff in Oxford because of the gap between wages and our high living costs. It is the No. 1 issue whenever I talk to NHS staff. Yes, there will be local concerns too, but so many staff say to me that they feel they are being forced either to leave the profession or to work as an agency or bank member of staff, because the pay is not keeping pace with the costs that they face. That is a much more expensive way of staffing the healthcare system, because it is much more expensive to fill those gaps through bank or agency staff than by using the permanent workforce. The hon. Member for Oxford West and Abingdon mentioned that the Government have maintained that they will lift the pay cap, but that is contingent upon an “Agenda for Change” process. A lot of the NHS staff I have talked to have said they are worried that that could be used as an excuse to screw down terms and conditions.
More than one nurse has said to me on the doorstep that they are concerned about the impact of the removal of the nurse training bursary and pointed out that nurses who are in training cannot do other jobs to keep themselves afloat. They are expected, in effect, to live on thin air. That might be possible at times in some low-cost areas, but it is just not possible in Oxford, and it leads to a lot of potential recruits abandoning their dream of entering nursing. That really is a dream for a lot of people, and they are very motivated to do it, but it is becoming very hard to achieve.
Colleagues have already referred to Oxfordshire’s particular problems with mental healthcare. Mental healthcare funding generally is low in Oxfordshire compared with other clinical commissioning group areas, but that is compounded by the issues with recruitment. Again, there have been positive developments, such as the reinvigoration of the child and adolescent mental health service, but we still have many issues with recruitment.
That is of course compounded by the lack of Oxford weighting, which is a particular problem for us because we are so close to London. If we were not, we might be in a different situation, but there is a natural process whereby staff look to London and see what they would be able to afford there, where their housing costs would be the same, if not lower. Colleagues will know that local NHS staff began a petition calling for some kind of Oxford weighting to be introduced. That petition now has more than 7,000 signatures.
Such a weighting must not be used as an excuse to move away from collective bargaining. I am a bit disappointed that some Government Members have said to me, “Yes, this is why we need to abandon collective bargaining.” That is not what NHS staff have told me they want. A weighting introduced specifically to cover housing costs—we could call it a levy, a special payment or whatever—could be part of a system that recognised the abnormally high costs in Oxford, which is the most expensive place in the UK to buy a home and one of the most expensive in which to rent.
We need to ensure that outsourced staff are covered by any uplift. I was appalled to hear that some outsourced staff have been living in a corridor in a shared house because they cannot afford a room. This is not about people being able to afford their own flat or house; it is much worse. I recently came across a couple living with their children in Blackbird Leys, which is a relatively low-cost area of Oxford, who both work in the NHS. They were unable to afford their rent and thought they would have to move out of the city. That is not uncommon.
I do not want to stress the point too much, but I do not think the answer is to stop Oxford’s economy growing. Instead, we must ensure that we pay NHS staff properly. My party set out in our grey book how we would do that by removing the pay cap, which, given the issues with recruitment and retention, may end up saving the NHS money in the long run. NHS staff have told me that they believe it would save the NHS in particular on filling gaps with agency staff that are not filled by permanent staff.
The hon. Member for Oxford West and Abingdon mentioned the reliance of our local NHS on EU staff. Oxfordshire has about double the national average of EU staff. It does not give me any joy to say that—although I expressed concerns just before the referendum and afterwards about the danger that a new immigration system for EU staff similar to that for non-EU staff would end up costing the NHS money and result in it losing staff—all those chickens seem to be coming home to roost. I have experienced the same kinds of issues as the hon. Member for Banbury, who mentioned NHS trusts’ problems with recruiting staff from outside the EU, and particularly with getting them on to their books. It will be an enormous problem if we end up taking the same approach to staff from the EU, because the system is already very costly, bureaucratic and unclear.
Given those circumstances and all the problems, local measures can have only limited impact, but I will mention a few of them, because they demonstrate that solving the current problems with recruitment and retention requires national commitment. First, Members have already mentioned that one of the major problems for our local NHS is social care, which is under enormous pressure in Oxfordshire. Social care is the responsibility of Oxfordshire County Council, which has struggled to deliver adequate services since its budget was cut by about one third due to reductions in central Government grant. However, there are positive developments in Oxfordshire. The home assessment reablement team—HART—has brought together social care and NHS staff and delivered a big acceleration in the provision of the social care that people need when they are able to go home. That ultimately has not been enough, but it has helped.
Secondly, it has been good to see Oxford Brookes University develop its own nursing and midwifery school in an innovative attempt to bring together research, education and training, which does not happen anywhere else in the country, and to persuade local people that nursing and midwifery may be for them. Again, though, that is a big challenge, because people still have to be able to afford to live in Oxford while they undertake that world-class training.
Thirdly, we have spoken quite a bit about housing. Oxford’s housing plans include a commitment from the city council to enable the NHS to meet employee needs by exempting staff housing schemes on land owned by the NHS from social rent requirements. However, it is important that we ensure that any housing that results from that exemption is permanently provided on a favourable basis, for affordable rent, to those who need it. If it is only later going to be sold and returned to the free market, it is not going to deal with the problems. Applying a 50% affordable housing requirement to new developments in Oxford will also help the situation. Constituents I speak to, including people who work in the NHS, say that schemes such as Help to Buy and the stamp duty holiday are not having an impact, because even contemplating buying a house is far too much of a jump. Genuinely affordable housing would help.
The removal of restrictions on land acquisition, new rules on viability and enabling local authorities to borrow to build would help improve the situation further, especially when it comes to the provision of key worker housing. In Oxford, that has to involve co-operation with neighbouring councils. I am pleased that we have had such co-operation on the Oxford to Cambridge corridor, but that needs to come to fruition. Independent assessments indicate that Oxford needs about 30,000 new homes, but there would be space for only about 8,000 within Oxford’s boundaries even if occupancy levels in the city were intensified. The Oxford to Cambridge corridor plan has to focus on delivering housing for key workers and people on low incomes; otherwise it will not deliver the change that we need.
The leader of the city council and I wrote to the Housing Minister last week to detail some of the areas where we desperately need change. Oxford probably has the biggest housing crisis of just about any city. Unfortunately, we see that right in front of us every day from the number of people on the streets, but there is also a hidden problem of people struggling in overcrowded or unsuitable accommodation.
The local NHS trust is working hard on recruitment and retention, and it has done some innovative things. The hon. Member for Oxford West and Abingdon mentioned the golden handshake people get when they start, which is obviously necessary. A lot of work has been done on advertising, recruitment fairs and so on, and there is an attractive on-the-job training offer, although we always need more funding for that. However, all that has been done in the context of the almost perfect storm of factors that affect us in Oxford—particularly the pay cap and uncertainty for EU staff.
There is an enormous amount that we, as Members who represent Oxfordshire constituencies, should be proud of, and I am sure that we all are. We have world-class services and incredible opportunities because of the proximity of Oxford University, Oxford Brookes University and other research centres, and the incredible diversity of innovative companies and others in our area. However, those world-class services are under pressure like never before. If we want to continue providing the kind of excellent care that I am grateful to have received when I gave birth to both my children in the John Radcliffe Hospital, we need to deal with these issues very quickly.
John Howell (Henley) (Con)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hollobone. I congratulate the hon. Member for Oxford West and Abingdon (Layla Moran) on securing this debate, and I echo her praise for NHS staff who do a fantastic job—indeed, only the other day I was approached in the street by a constituent who told me just how fantastic his NHS treatment had been.
The issue under discussion is not a new problem or something that started only in the past year. I have chaired a group of Oxfordshire MPs and the clinical commissioning group for a number of years, and this issue has been there from the beginning. If I can segment the NHS market a bit, perhaps we can consider how different elements of the NHS can play their part. First, however, let me say that the release of information to The Times by Churchill Hospital must be opposed. It created much stress among patients, and it bore no resemblance to the policies of that hospital. We should send a firm message to Churchill Hospital that the way it behaved was unacceptable.
Perhaps my constituency is very fortunate, but on several occasions I have been told by constituents that a surgery is full and can take no more people, and that that is all down to new housing. Each time I rang the GP surgery, however, I was assured that that is not the case and it still had a tremendous amount of room to take more people. Nevertheless, that does not reflect the current problem with the GP practice system which, however we look at it, we must admit is in need of considerable reform. There are at least two reasons for that. First, we have the problem of young doctors who are unable or unwilling to take on the stress burden created by taking out the loans necessary to buy into the surgery. Secondly, there is a limitation on the ability of GP practices to do some of the minor operations that they have done in the past, and which allowed them to carry on the excellent work that they do for their communities. I urge the Minister to look at that, and perhaps to remove some of the restrictions that apply to the ability to operate in GP surgeries.
Of course GPs need to adapt to new ways of working, and they need to use the internet in a much better way. My own results from what is, I hasten to say, a minor health issue are dealt with by the internet. I email the information in on a regular basis, and the results come back on the internet—fortunately they come back clear each time. [Interruption.]
John Howell
I know, and I will leave that issue there.
Social care has been mentioned in terms of its competition with the retail sector in Oxford, which I think is a very real threat. Another issue goes back to one of the more substantial points in the Care Quality Commission report, which is that the joining up and interlinking of different aspects of social care in Oxfordshire leaves a lot to be desired. For example, the amount that was paid by the NHS health trust was different to the sum paid by the county council for the same number of people doing the same amount of work. Evening up that difference must be something to concentrate on, and I wish people success in doing that.
The income of the clinical commissioning group amounts to about £880 million. Staff costs are about 70% of that, at just over £600 million. A 1% pay increase means at least £6 million to £7 million as an unfunded pressure on the health care system, and that is not a very productive way forward. There is no getting away from the fact that the biggest problem with recruitment and retention is living costs in Oxfordshire. There are a number of ways that we can tackle that problem, such as by building more houses—the Oxford-Milton Keynes-Cambridge express way is a good joined-up process for dealing with that, and I hope it comes to fruition.
The second thing we can do, I am afraid to say, is change the housing policies in Oxford city. That goes back to conversations that I had ad nauseam with the predecessor of the hon. Member for Oxford East (Anneliese Dodds). We were known for our fighting over the green belt, and I am glad to infer from what the hon. Lady has said that Oxford is changing the way it deals with issues of planning and housing.
We are talking about a marginal increase across the board, and the uplift that that will bring will not have a big impact on retention and recruitment. It would be much better for us to focus any increase in funds on the issue itself. I ask the Minister, formally, to agree to a weighting for Oxfordshire that gives it some of the strength that London has. As we have already heard, housing costs in Oxfordshire are at least as great as those in London, and that must be tackled. We need a specific weighting, not a marginal increase in pay, and since there will be only a limited pot of resources for increasing pay, it makes a lot of sense to concentrate the impact of that in those places with more intractable problems, such as the housing market and living costs in the city.
Mr Edward Vaizey (Wantage) (Con)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hollobone, and I thank you for saving the best till last. I congratulate my Oxfordshire colleague, the hon. Member for Oxford West and Abingdon (Layla Moran), on securing this important debate and on her extremely eloquent speech. I echo the way that she opened the debate by paying tribute to our colleagues who work in the NHS. When talking about the problems faced by our NHS locally, we should not lose sight of the fact that we are supremely well served by some extraordinary men and women in our hospitals and GP surgeries, who go well beyond what is required of them to provide first-class care. As Oxfordshire MPs we are also lucky to represent a population that, on the whole, is pretty healthy—indeed, the greatest health care challenge we face is the fact that a lot of our constituents, thankfully, live to a serious old age.
I also want to pay tribute to the hon. Member for Oxford East (Anneliese Dodds) and my two hon. Friends the Members for Henley (John Howell) and for Banbury (Victoria Prentis), for their fantastic speeches. It may be frustrating for the Front Bench that, although potentially there were plenty of goals to be scored, the debate was conducted as all Oxfordshire debates have been since I became a Member in 2005, in the spirit of doing the best for the county.
I want to mention particularly the work of my hon. Friend the Member for Banbury on the Horton General Hospital, which relates to the problem I want to focus on. She has worked tirelessly to maintain services there, and has made it clear to me that although the Horton is geographically well away from my constituency the services that it provides mean that my constituents benefit from choices. The pressures on the local NHS are spread further, enabling a better service to be provided for all. My hon. Friend has come up time and again, as she pointed out, against a culture of secrecy. There have even been court proceedings in which she has been involved. The mind boggles at how the local NHS goes about its business.
Perhaps when the Front Benchers speak we shall go back to playing the traditional national blame game. However, I want to play a bit of a blame game myself—but placing the blame squarely on local NHS management. I do not want to put words into my colleagues’ mouths, but whenever I go to meetings with local NHS management—ably convened by my hon. Friend the Member for Henley—I find that they are passive, unimaginative and deeply bureaucratic. I find the local NHS system completely opaque, and mired in jargon, endless consultation—or non-consultation—and a woeful lack of action.
The CQC report well illustrates the inability of silos to come together for conversations for the greater good of healthcare in Oxfordshire. An example of that is provided by the biggest local issue for me and my constituency: the closure, coming up for two years ago, of Wantage Community Hospital. It closed in April 2016, apparently for justifiable reasons. It is a very old building and its pipes are ageing. There were continual outbreaks of Legionnaire’s disease, so it was closed for safety reasons; but one would have expected some rapid developments to solve that problem. We were promised a consultation that was going to happen in October 2016; that never happened. Then we got a consultation in January 2017, but because of the opaque bureaucracy that my local NHS enjoys that was a phase 1 consultation. Apparently the community hospital was going to be in phase 2, which of course—like the gold at the end of the rainbow—has not materialised.
I took it upon myself at the end of last year to convene a meeting—ultra vires, you might say—of local stakeholders, my local GPs and health managers. It was the first time they had all met together, convened by me, the local MP, not by the health authority. Again, there was complete passivity. I shall not bore my colleagues with the complexities of the attempts to untie the Gordian knot, but clearly one of the solutions for local healthcare in Wantage is the expansion of the local GP surgery. It is owned by a private landlord, Assura, but it seems to me a benign landlord that wants to do the best thing; it would be happy to expand the building. Of course it would receive increased rent as a result. We need, potentially, some financing from the Department of Health and Social Care, but at the very least we need some engagement from health management. I am the one who has effectively brought Assura to the table to discuss how we can develop the GP surgery, to put some proposals on the table and to search for a funding solution. That could involve all sorts of imaginative solutions. I think there will be a meeting at the end of the month to take things forward, but I find it deeply frustrating that I am the one having to drive the process, and not my local NHS management—not that I am complaining, as it is the only way we shall get results.
[Mr Nigel Evans in the Chair]
As to the quasi-national issues that have been raised, I echo much of what has been said. As a convinced remainer—although, sadly, the horse has bolted—may I get well behind the hon. Member for Oxford West and Abingdon and point out that we have, proportionately, twice as many EU citizens working in our local NHS as elsewhere? As the hon. Lady said, it is absolutely reasonable to say that the Government must do more to reassure our European colleagues who live and work here, who contribute their taxes and want nothing more than to be good citizens of our communities, that they are welcome here and that we have nothing against them. I am sure that now that we have Mr Nigel Evans in the Chair that sentiment will be echoed by him at the earliest opportunity.
Housing is clearly an issue, and although I am sure that all our postbags are full of letters from people who do not want an increase in the amount of housing, we need to speak up for all the people for whom it is essential. They include the very people charged with keeping us healthy. I had not appreciated the issue of visas—that is why the debate is so important. I am driven mad by the lack of imagination on the part of the people running our local health service. That came up in what my hon. Friend the Member for Banbury said about the imaginative solutions that her community came up with to secure a senior obstetrician. Shift patterns are an example of what I mean. Nurses leaving the John Radcliffe after 9 o’clock in the evening is something that needs to be looked at.
Parking at the JR is appalling. Surely it is possible for representatives of the local council and the JR to sit down and find a parking solution. An imaginative health authority and imaginative health leaders would look holistically, if I may put it in that way, at the entire working environment for nurses and doctors, particularly in hospitals: how do they get there, how much does that cost, how can parking arrangements be improved and how can permits be given to people who need them for their shift working pattern? That could make such a difference, above and beyond pay. It needs everyone to come to the table. It sounds incredibly boring to keep talking about getting people together for discussions; however, in my time as a Minister—and as a Back-Bench MP—I have often discovered, on bringing together people who I thought probably had regular conversations, that they never sit down to discuss the issues.
Victoria Prentis
My right hon. Friend is making the most marvellous speech I have ever heard him make, on a number of issues. I regret interrupting him, but I want to echo what he said and suggest that, as we despair slightly of anyone else taking the action in question, perhaps we as a group—with the Minister if he is willing to be involved—could take the baton and go forward. When I was in charge of fundraising as a volunteer at my local hospital, as I was for many years, I offered charitable funds to look at car parking. That was ridiculous, really, but it was an attempt to break through the bureaucratic impasse that we so often came up against. Let us take matters forward together.
Anneliese Dodds
I agree that it is a marvellous speech, and I thank the right hon. Gentleman for that. On the point he was making, we must be sanguine, of course, and I am sure that colleagues will be. There is a tension that I have discussed many times with the trust, and with others; it wants a green and pleasant environment for patients and staff, but intensifying car parking, as many want, might go against that. There could also be planning implications. To be fair, the trust is actively looking at the issues.
As to innovation, the new district heating system that has just been put in is pretty unique. We should give credit where it is due, sometimes: it will ultimately save the trust hundreds of thousands of pounds.
Mr Vaizey
I thank the hon. Lady for a course correction in my so-called brilliant speech. I have perhaps been too hard on the NHS management locally to make that point. I am sure that there are hundreds of examples of great innovations that they have introduced. I want to re-emphasise what I said at the beginning of my speech about my huge admiration for nurses, doctors, consultants, surgeons and indeed NHS managers, who do a difficult job. However, I hope that there is appreciation of the frustration that I feel as Wantage Community Hospital’s closure comes up to its second anniversary and there appears to have been no movement.
I do not have time to discuss pay but I noted what my hon. Friend the Member for Henley said. He is a bold and brave advocate for pay locally, and if he thinks that an Oxfordshire weighting is a good idea I am happy to support that, because of his venerable experience in the area. I would be delighted for us to get together as all the MPs of Oxfordshire and with key stakeholders. Personally, I would leave the Minister out of it, because the key message for me in this debate is that Oxfordshire has its issues, but a lot of them can be solved locally.
Justin Madders (Ellesmere Port and Neston) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Evans. I congratulate the hon. Member for Oxford West and Abingdon (Layla Moran) on securing the debate and on the powerful arguments she made about the recruitment and retention crisis affecting NHS services in her area and across the country.
As the hon. Lady said, the NHS has been a frequently raised issue in recent times, certainly since her election. I join her and the other right hon. and hon. Members who have spoken today in praise of the dedication and commitment of the staff who work in our health service. She said that we are close to a crisis in the NHS. I believe that only the dedication and commitment of staff prevent a crisis from turning into a complete catastrophe. She was also right to say that the good will of staff is propping up services at the moment. That is something that, I am sad to say, I have to keep repeating every time we have a debate: it is the good will of staff that keeps the show on the road.
I was concerned to hear that some staff had approached the hon. Lady to say that some of the levels of experience in particular wards were raising concerns about patient safety. She highlighted in particular the shortage of mental health specialists. She is right to say that the good intention to try to achieve parity of esteem will be extremely difficult to meet when there are so many shortages.
The hon. Lady diagnosed a number of issues that have contributed to causing the crisis. Uncertainty around Brexit has certainly accelerated some of the staffing challenges already in place. The abolition of the nursing bursary has also created issues, and I will come back to that later on. I agree with her that reliance on agency staff is unsustainable, and we can talk about that in a little more detail later. She mentioned the pay cap, as I think every hon. Member did; that is something else I will come back to later, but I remind her that when her party was in government it enacted that policy for a full five years.
The hon. Lady also mentioned staffing shortages in social care. It is sad to hear that those doing one of the most valuable jobs in society feel that they have a better prospect of earning a decent living in retail. That brings home the challenge we face. The issues she raised about training and professional development are also particularly relevant.
The hon. Lady was right to mention that behind all of that is the funding challenge we currently face. We are in the longest and most sustained financial squeeze in the history of the NHS, and it is inevitable that those kinds of issues will come up until we reach a sustainable funding settlement. She also raised the question of housing and the cost of living in Oxfordshire. I think most hon. Members touched on that point. She said she was concerned that unless the issues are tackled in a comprehensive way, services will be rationed. I am afraid to say that services up and down the country are already being rationed, as we have discussed here on a number of occasions.
It was a pleasure, as always, to hear from the hon. Member for Banbury (Victoria Prentis). She always speaks strongly and passionately about NHS services in her area. She said that staffing issues were a major factor in the proposals to downgrade the maternity unit at Horton. It is a sad fact that half of all maternity units up and down the country have had to turn expectant mothers away at some point in the last year, often due to staffing shortages. We currently have a national shortage of about 3,500 midwives. It was interesting to hear some of the possible initiatives to attract new obstetricians in particular. Certainly, the prospect of free beer is something that works for me, but I do not know whether the hon. Lady can wait quite as long as it will take for me to train in that profession. I think we will have to do without my particular skills in that area.
The hon. Lady raised the issue of transparency and openness. It is disappointing to hear the difficulties she has had with her local trust on that issue, but it is clear from what she has said today that she has a lot to contribute to the wider health economy in her area. She is not alone on that issue. The Government have been pushing through policies on sustainability and transformation plans, accountable care organisations and the capital expenditure processes, which are all done under a veil of secrecy. There are wider issues in play there.
My hon. Friend the Member for Oxford East (Anneliese Dodds) described the current situation as a perfect storm—an apt description. I am impressed at the way in which she has engaged with staff in the health service in her constituency to get to the real meat and bones of the issues. It was sad to hear that staff feel they are forced to leave the profession and go to work for an agency; she was absolutely right to say that forcing staff to go and work for an agency to make ends meet costs us more in the long term. There are ways in which that could be a saving for us if the pay cap was lifted.
The problems with the nursing bursary were again highlighted, particularly how they are exacerbated in the Oxfordshire area by the cost of living. Has the Minister done any analysis of the cost of living in different parts of the country and the income streams available to those undertaking nursing degrees, who, because of the way the degree is structured, do not have the option of supplemental employment?
My hon. Friend explained very well how the proximity to London creates recruitment difficulties. The stark image of staff living in a corridor highlighted to me the impact of eight years of pay restraint. She also highlighted the bureaucratic nature of recruiting overseas staff. I know immigration policy is outside the Minister’s remit, but I hope he is making representations to the Home Office about how we tackle those issues in future. My hon. Friend highlighted how, despite the Government’s various initiatives for getting people on to the housing ladder, it is still too big a leap for many. We need much more genuinely affordable housing to be built.
We also heard from the hon. Member for Henley (John Howell). I agree with him that the problem did not start in the last year. He raised the question of challenges in GP practices, particularly younger GPs not feeling able to make the financial commitments to buy into practices, but also the restrictions on operations. He was right to mention that GPs need to move with the times on technology. A number of interesting initiatives are doing that up and down the country, although we have concerns about some of them and how they may exclude patients.
Finally, we heard from the right hon. Member for Wantage (Mr Vaizey). He painted an impressive picture of how healthy the Oxfordshire area is, but a report by the Oxfordshire clinical commissioning group shows a gap in life expectancy of nine years between different parts of the county—something about which the Opposition feel passionately.
It is fair to say, from the right hon. Gentleman’s comments, that the local NHS leadership are not on his Christmas card list. He gave a pretty damning assessment of their ability to engage, but of course the structures we are currently working under were brought in under the Health and Social Care Act 2012, which led to the removal of the Secretary of State’s responsibility for much of the system and to the fragmentation with which we are all grappling. I applaud the right hon. Gentleman for his efforts to try to bring everyone together, but he should consider whether the legislative framework we currently work under is fit for purpose. The way in which he has brought people in the NHS together is important and we should be doing more of that. In this particular area, that should be not just on the health economy, but on the wider issues, particularly those relating to cost of living and housing.
As we have heard, the potential impact of the recruitment and retention crisis was brought into stark focus by the issue that sparked the debate: the leaked email from the head of chemotherapy at the Oxford University Hospital’s NHS Foundation Trust that found its way on to the front page of The Times. That memo confirmed to staff that the trust was down on nurses at the day treatment unit by approximately 40%, and as a consequence that the hospital was having to delay chemotherapy patients’ starting times to four weeks. It also stated that there was no prospect of an improvement in the situation for 18 months to two years.
More worrying was a proposal to reduce the number of chemotherapy cycles available to dying patients, which is totally contrary to National Institute for Health and Care Excellence guidelines, as well as the national cancer strategy. We were therefore relieved to hear that the trust has now backed down from those suggestions.
Anneliese Dodds
To be clear, as other Members have mentioned, those were not live proposals. The problem was that the trust had to scope out the full range of potential action, given the challenge it was facing. However, the proposals were not something that it wanted to do—quite the opposite. I just wanted to underline that.
Justin Madders
I thank my hon. Friend for that point. I was not trying to imply that the proposals were live, but the fact they were being considered is of huge concern, which Members have rightly raised. It will be helpful if the Minister could look at what caused the proposals to even be discussed, because they are contrary to so many of the principles and guidelines that we want in our NHS. I hope he will be able to assure us that those kinds of dramatic measures are not being considered in other areas.
The impact of recruitment and retention issues at the trust extends far beyond chemotherapy. In January, 2,159 patients waited for longer than four hours to be seen in A&E, falling well below the 95% target—a measure that the Health Secretary described as “critical for patient safety”. Even more worryingly, since December eight cancer operations and 26 heart operations were cancelled either the day before or on the day itself. Although that is at the upper end of operation cancellations, it is sadly a story that we now hear up and down the country. Cancelling an appointment at short notice causes immense frustration. It is sometimes unavoidable, but we know that it can have devastating consequences and put patients at unnecessary risk, not to mention the emotional impact. On the practical side, cover has to be arranged, spouses and family members have to arrange their own time off, and sometimes even national or international travel is required.
Staffing shortages are not behind every cancellation, but they will be a factor in many, and the vacancy rate at the trust tells us that it is an increasing problem. As we heard, vacancies at the trust for nurses, midwives and nursing support workers have almost doubled in the past year, from 5.99% in October 2016 to 10.8% in October last year, leaving about 400 whole-time equivalent vacancies. As we have heard from hon. Members, local factors have undoubtedly contributed to that. A 2017 study by Lloyds bank listed Oxford as the most expensive city in the UK, with average house prices 10.7 times average annual earnings. As we have heard, there is some support for the introduction of an Oxford weighting-type arrangement.
There is also a national context to look at, with housing costs being exacerbated by the pay cap. It is clear that, although that is probably at the sharper end of the pressures, Oxford’s issues are being repeated up and down the country. We now know that, after eight years of this Government, more nurses are leaving the NHS than joining. That position is particularly sharp in the Thames valley area, where there were 39% more leavers than joiners between September 2016 and September 2017.
While almost all trusts up and down the country have been unable to fill vacancies, Oxford’s is probably one of the more acute situations. However, much of it was completely predictable. One of the first decisions the Government took in 2010 was to cut the number of nurse training places by 3,000, which has led to about 8,000 fewer nurses nationally. We then had the Health Secretary’s farcical decision to take on the junior doctors, which has led to a demoralised workforce.
Then, to cap it all, as Members have said, came the decision to scrap nurse bursaries, which is possibly the most ill-conceived decision the Government have made—and there is plenty of competition for that particular award. We warned at the time that, far from providing more nursing places, the move would lead to a drop in the number of applications, with the biggest impact being on mature students, who bring a huge amount of experience from outside the profession.
As we have heard, statistics show that there was not only an 18% drop in applications in 2017, but a 2.6% decline in England in the number of students accepted on to courses. Among mature students, 13% fewer of those aged between 21 and 25 were accepted. That decision is discriminatory and stands in stark contrast to the Government’s aims on social mobility. Those are not just my words—they are in the equality assessment undertaken by the Department for Education. However, instead of learning from that lesson, Ministers have decided to scrap NHS bursaries for postgraduate students as well.
Alongside that disastrous decision, we have had the counterproductive capping of pay, which has led to hard-working NHS staff losing money in real terms at the same time as their workload has increased. We have heard encouraging noises from the Government recently, but we have seen no firm action. Perhaps the Minister can provide some clarity when he responds. The Nursing Times reported this week that the Treasury apparently still needs convincing that a rise in wages should be “meaningful”. Will the Minister send his Treasury colleagues a transcript of the debate, to persuade them that a strong case is being made for an increase?
Across Oxfordshire and the whole of our NHS, a recruitment and retention crisis is exacerbating a situation that has already reached crisis point. The Government need to act, realise their mistakes and urgently give hard-working NHS staff the belief that their work is valued and the confidence that their concerns are being listened to.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health (Steve Brine)
It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair, Mr Evans. I congratulate the hon. Member for Oxford West and Abingdon (Layla Moran) on securing the debate. We have met a number of times and I have responded to a number of her written questions, so I know that she is working hard on this subject.
It is always great to hear Members speak personally about their experiences—maybe none more so that my hon. Friend the Member for Banbury (Victoria Prentis)—and how passionately they speak about the national health service. Members from the county of Oxfordshire have spoken well; I do not know how they play in private, but in public they seem like a very good team. That may not be the case in Hampshire; maybe there are too many of us on the Front Bench. We are only a two-party state in Hampshire; perhaps that is why.
The debate is not only important but timely. I had the pleasure of visiting the Churchill Hospital, which is part of the Oxford University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, last Tuesday during our half-term recess. I saw the superb and innovative cancer care provided by the dedicated staff—I obviously echo all the praise for the staff—and had the opportunity to discuss workforce issues for a little time with the chief executive, Dr Bruno Holthof, who is a very nice man, and his senior team. I therefore hope I can provide some well-informed replies to the hon. Member for Oxford West and Abingdon and Members from across the county. The NHS in Oxford is working hard to ensure it has the doctors and nurses to continue to provide excellent care to Members’ constituents.
We met in Maggie’s Oxford cancer centre. As Members will know, I am the cancer Minister—it is the thing that gets me out of bed in the morning—and I was blown away by Maggie’s cancer centre. I know there are a lot of them across the country, but this was in a beautiful building, was brilliantly designed and had incredible, passionate staff. I met a number of patients who described Maggie’s as a haven for them while they are going through their cancer treatment. It was great, as always, to talk to patients.
My hon. Friend the Member for Banbury spoke about the recent story in The Times—the front-page splash on changes to patient cancer treatment plans at the Churchill—which a number of hon. Members mentioned and which I suppose was the spur for the debate, although it seems to have broadened out into everything, covering about four different Government Departments. I, too, was obviously concerned when I saw the story. I called the chief executive of the trust, and he was very clear that, although it would have been a great story, there was only one small problem: it was not true.
The leaked emails—whoever leaked them can examine their own conscience and motives—set out hypothetical challenges and invited suggestions from clinical staff, ahead of a meeting taking place this month. There has been no change to formal policy on chemotherapy treatment at the trust, and any such decision would be a matter requiring clearance at board level anyway. As we discussed, the chief executive’s first consideration was, rightly, the obvious and needless worry caused to cancer patients across Oxford and the wider area. I am pleased, although obviously disappointed it was necessary, that he quickly put in place plans to communicate to his patients that there were absolutely no changes, as the hon. Member for Oxford East (Anneliese Dodds) said, to chemotherapy treatment.
The trust continues to meet two of the three main cancer waiting time standards and is working hard to meet the third. We discussed that last week, too, and the trust should be very proud of it. I was able to congratulate some of the team personally last week. The trust is considering how best to deliver chemotherapy services going forward, and I am confident that it will do that in the correct way, through the correct channels, and of course in compliance with NICE guidance.
When I was on site at the Churchill, I was able to pop in to the ACE wave 2 pilot. ACE stands for accelerate, co-ordinate and evaluate—I know that my right hon. Friend the Member for Wantage (Mr Vaizey) enjoys these acronyms. I met Fergus Gleeson, Sara Bainbridge, Shelley Hayles, a local GP in Oxford who leads on cancer, and Julie-Ann Phillips, who is the navigator—a great title—and seems to make it all happen there. I, as a cancer Minister, and we as a Government are very excited about ACE. It is about taking patients with suspected cancer from the GP and into the accelerated diagnostic centre and getting them a diagnosis or clearance quickly. I met patients and saw how much it means to them.
I asked patients about stories on the front pages of national newspapers, which of course are trying to sell national newspapers. I noted, in relation to the story, which was gleefully run by the BBC that morning once it had read The Times, that by the end of the day the coverage had slightly changed as it realised that it had been reporting fake news all day. I asked patients what they thought about seeing that sort of thing on the front page of The Times while they were receiving world-class cancer treatment in Oxford, and I will not repeat the exact words that they used, but they were very clear about how disappointed they were to see that, and that they did not feel that it represented the professionalism that constituents of hon. Members across this Chamber see. I think that hon. Members can get a sense of what I thought about that story, and I do not take The Times anyway.
Let me start with the global picture, and then I will localise. The dedicated men and women who work in our NHS are of course its greatest asset. The Government have backed the NHS. We have made significant investments in frontline services and are now taking bold steps to plan for future generations. We do, however, recognise the workforce challenges that the NHS faces in its 70th year. That is why the entire system embarked on a national conversation, with the publication by Health Education England in December of “Facing the Facts, Shaping the Future: A draft health and care workforce strategy for England to 2027”, which is designed to stimulate debates such as the one that we are having today. I know that HEE will read the record of this debate.
The strategy sets out the current workforce supply and retention, and the challenges that we face, but also the significant achievements made from work already under way. It is the first step towards a proper plan that stretches beyond any electoral cycle—we must get away from working in that way—and secures the supply of staff for future generations in our health service. The strategy posed a number of questions that will inform a comprehensive strategy for the workforce over the next decade, to be published in July this year. We need to think innovatively about how we can make the NHS workforce fit for the future, and as always in debates about our NHS, we have heard a number of excellent suggestions today. I encourage hon. Members to engage with the consultation, and from what I have heard today, I do not doubt that they will.
We have heard a lot today about recruitment. Of course, that is not the only way to ensure that the NHS has the workforce that it needs to deliver the safe and high-quality care in which I, the Secretary of State and all hon. Members are so interested. We need to ensure that our excellent doctors and nurses want, and are supported, to stay in the national health service, and we have a clear plan to ensure that the NHS remains a rewarding and attractive place to work.
Let me list a few of the things that the plan covers. It includes arrangements for more flexible working—we know that many health professionals are married to other health professionals, and quality of life matters as much as quality of pay—and a system of staff banks for flexible workers across the NHS, increasing opportunities for staff to work on NHS terms and to reduce agency costs for employers. Something else that we discussed last week is a scheme to offer the right of first refusal to NHS employees on any affordable housing built on NHS land, to increase NHS workers’ access to affordable housing, with an ambition of benefiting up to 3,000 families. When I got lost while trying to find Maggie’s cancer centre on the Churchill site, I noticed that there is a lot of surplus NHS land on that site, and I know that it is looking at that. In addition, since September 2014, more than 2,700 nurses have successfully completed the nursing return to practice programme and are ready for employment.
Let me localise to the recruitment and retention of NHS staff in Oxford, which I also discussed last week. It is important to note from the outset that although there are workforce challenges, Oxford University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust has 388 more hospital doctors and 591 more nurses than it did eight years ago. It is also successfully seeing 11,500 more patients—a 120% increase—with suspected cancers than it was in 2010. One of the key challenges that we discussed is that Oxford, much like London, is a very expensive area to live and work in, as hon. Members have mentioned, and unemployment is very low. Those conditions present a recruitment challenge that other, less affluent areas do not have.
The hon. Member for Oxford West and Abingdon mentioned continuous professional development, and I promised to mention that. It is a matter for employers; any agreements, such as for protected study time, would need to be negotiated between employer and employees. However, it is always in the best interests of employers to encourage and support the learning and development of their employees. HEE provides national funding to support development of the NHS workforce and invests up to £300 million every year in supporting NHS employees to achieve registered qualifications, and that will continue.
We are increasing the number of nurse training places by 25%. That means 5,000 additional nurse training places every year from September 2018. It is one of the biggest increases in NHS history, and I was glad that the hon. Lady welcomed that in her opening remarks. She also mentioned Brexit, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Wantage did. The Secretary of State and the Prime Minister could not have been clearer: the Government hugely value the contribution of EU staff working in our NHS and understand the need to give them certainty. The Secretary of State has made it clear that after Brexit, we will have an immigration system that means that the NHS is able to get the staff that it needs, not just from the EU but from all over the world.
The hon. Lady asked about career progression; I think that she was referring to scale points earned in the NHS and whether they would transfer. I will get back to her on that; I will get a note to her and copy it to other hon Members in the debate, as I know they will be interested.
Pretty much everyone mentioned the idea of pay weighting for Oxford, as with London, given the proximity of the county. There are a number of mechanisms in the NHS funding and pay system to compensate for higher costs in particular areas. It is open to the independent NHS Pay Review Body to make recommendations on the future geographical coverage and value of such supplements. Additionally, there is flexibility for local NHS employers to award recruitment and retention premiums where recruitment is difficult at standard rates of pay, so when they are having their team get-together—
Steve Brine
I will not, because I need to give a minute to the hon. Member for Oxford West and Abingdon, who introduced the debate.
Pretty much everyone asked about the public sector pay cap. I am glad that everyone recognises and welcomes the fact that we have said that that will be lifted. The shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Ellesmere Port and Neston (Justin Madders), and the hon. Lady leading the debate asked about the timetable. I cannot give an exclusive in this Westminster Hall debate today, but I can say that talks between NHS Employers and the trade unions continue, and I know from my hon. Friend the Minister for Health that they are constructive.
So many other points were raised. They included the future of the Horton. I am told that the decision has been considered by the Independent Reconfiguration Panel and the Secretary of State will consider its advice and recommendations in the next few days. I have a funny feeling that when we have a vote tonight, my hon. Friend the Member for Banbury will seek out the Secretary of State.
My hon. Friend the Member for Henley (John Howell) left us hanging as to what he is transmitting via the internet with his GP. [Laughter.] Perhaps that is the wrong expression, but his point about primary care at scale and truly integrated services that can take pressure off the NHS was so well made and is exactly what we mean: sustainability and transformation partnerships are about one NHS and bringing NHS services together.
If I have not covered any of the points, I will write to hon. Members. The pressures on the health system are significant. I have talked about the sheer increase in the number of people coming forward needing cancer treatment in the area of the hon. Member for Oxford West and Abingdon, and that is true across the NHS. The demands are intense, but the workforce are responding brilliantly. We understand that there is a workforce challenge. That is why we launched the workforce consultation, with which I know hon. Members will want to engage. We look forward to the responses to the consultation exercise, so that collectively we can ensure that the NHS remains the best health system in the world, and the envy of the world, as it celebrates its birthday in June.
Layla Moran
I end the debate by thanking all my fellow Oxfordshire MPs for their fantastic contributions. I am pleased to see that we are in violent agreement on most of the issues that we face. We also agree that the staff, above all, must be thanked for the work that they do; we cannot say that enough. I thank the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Ellesmere Port and Neston (Justin Madders), for his remarks, and the Minister. I hope that he can see how passionate we all are about this matter and that we hunt as a pack, so this will not be the last time that he is contacted by us. I look forward to his note and to any answered questions that come back to us on this issue.
Mr Nigel Evans (in the Chair)
I should not have stopped you there, should I?
Motion lapsed (Standing Order No. 10(6)).
Rail Services: Kettering
(6 years, 10 months ago)
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Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)
I beg to move,
That this House has considered rail services to and from Kettering.
It is a delight to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Evans, and I thank Mr Speaker for granting this debate. I welcome the rail Minister to his place. I want to place on record my thanks to the formidable Kettering rail users group and its two main advocates, Christopher Groome and Stuart Porter, who must be among the most able leading amateur rail enthusiasts and timetable experts in the country. Christopher is also chairman of the Leicestershire and Northamptonshire rail action committee. If an organisation could be more formidable than the Kettering rail users group, it would be that organisation. I also praise all the station staff at Kettering railway station. They must be among the nicest, most pleasant and hardest working railway staff anywhere on the system. They are forever courteous and helpful, and go out of their way to ensure the passenger experience is as smooth and trouble free as possible.
I want to make several points to the rail Minister on behalf of my constituents. Railway issues and timetables can get formidably complicated. I do not want to go down that route. I just want to highlight some key issues. The reason for this debate is that the rail franchise through Kettering—the east midlands franchise—is coming up for renewal, and it is important that we get the rail services to and from Kettering right in the next franchise. The first point the Minister needs to understand is that nowhere on the midlands main line is growing faster in housing development than Kettering, Wellingborough and Corby. They are among the fastest growing places in the whole country, and the railway line through those three constituencies is extremely important.
My second point is that about 10 years ago, when the branch line was reopened to Corby, the main line rail service to and from Kettering northwards was effectively downgraded from a half-hourly service to an hourly service. That was done by the last Labour Government and I am looking to this Conservative Government to right that wrong. They should be able to do that, if the Minister and his officials were to revisit the superb representation made in the franchise consultation by Christopher Groome and Stuart Porter. In their submission, they are not just arguing Kettering’s corner. They are standing back, putting themselves in the rail Minister’s shoes and asking, “How can we help the Minister to develop a new franchise arrangement that will facilitate a better service up and down the line?” The proposals that they advance would reintroduce that half-hourly service.
My third point is that rail fares to and from Kettering are relatively expensive, compared to other rail fares around the country. We effectively have inter-city rail fares, but an increasingly commuter-style service. I am frequently surprised, whenever I travel by rail to any other part of the country, by how cheap rail travel is compared to the expensive fares that passengers to and from Kettering have to pay.
Kettering is effectively at the apex of a Y-shape coming out of St Pancras station. The midland main line comes out of St Pancras in London and goes north. The first junction is at Kettering, with the Corby branch line. Because Kettering is that junction, it makes sense to reintroduce the half-hourly services, because effectively Kettering is the hub, and that will help all the commuters from Wellingborough, Corby and Kettering to go north. It is important that the rail Minister bears that Y-shape in mind.
The central demand of the Kettering rail users group is for trains to call at Kettering every half an hour, because that will provide platform connections to Wellingborough, Bedford, Luton and Corby. Ideally one service should be from Sheffield and Derby, and one from Nottingham, and then run non-stop to St Pancras. That might be too ambitious in terms of non-stop to St Pancras—but it is the frequency of the service. Once it is less than every half an hour, passenger numbers start to drop off.
Cross-platform connectivity between trains happened very well at Leicester, which is a far bigger station than Kettering, until 2009. That led to a substantial growth in ridership. Since 2009, passenger growth has been suppressed because of the changes made then, particularly for Kettering journeys to Leicester, Birmingham and beyond. Kettering is the optimum hub for the towns in north Northamptonshire and their connectivity to Leicester and beyond.
Fares have been set at inter-city levels for many years to reflect the level of service and comfort. The rolling stock specification, journey times, comfort and capacity need to be of a high-enough standard to justify those inter-city fares and the premium charge, compared with, for example, Northampton to Euston or Huntingdon to King’s Cross fares. Some passengers from Kettering will drive to Northampton or Huntingdon to take advantage of the cheaper fares.
I firmly believe, as does the Kettering rail users group, that we have an opportunity for strong rail growth by restoring Kettering’s half-hourly off-peak service to Leicester. Before we lost that frequency 10 years ago, travel to both Derby and Nottingham was possible via an easy cross-platform connection at Leicester—effectively a half-hourly link to both, with equivalent connections to Birmingham. But train journeys from Kettering to Birmingham, Manchester and Leeds have become car journeys today, due to the reduced frequency to Leicester and beyond. Any delay to a connecting southbound service now leads to an hour’s wait. The risk of that is too high for too many passengers. Corby passengers also suffer an hour’s wait heading north, due to poor connections. When the Corby shuttle comes into Kettering, it is not timed to meet the hourly service going north from Kettering.
A mix of connections and through-services, as suggested by the Kettering rail users group in their submission to the Minister, from Leicester to Kettering, Corby, Wellingborough, Bedford and Luton, is needed to avoid future rail growth from Leicestershire, Nottingham and beyond being replaced by car journeys. It would be a tragedy if the new franchise on the midland main line ended up seeing an increase in car journeys in the east midlands, when we want to see the opposite.
I mentioned at the start that Kettering, Wellingborough and Corby are very fast-growing parts of the world, and that is exemplified by the crowding and overcrowding figures on East Midlands Trains. In May 2017, the East Midlands Trains website showed the following trains as forecast to have over 90% of seats taken when leaving St Pancras: the 3.29 to Nottingham, the 4.01 to Corby, the 4.26 to Sheffield, the 4.29 to Nottingham, the 4.57 to Sheffield, the 5.01 to Corby, the 5.30 to Nottingham, the 5.57 to Sheffield, the 6 o’clock to Melton Mowbray, the 6.30 to Lincoln, the 7.15 to Nottingham, the 7.28 to Derby, the 8 o’clock to Corby and the 8.30 to Nottingham. Those are all at 90% of passenger capacity when they leave London. On other trains, 75% to 90% of seats are taken: the 2.58 to Sheffield, the 3.26 to Sheffield, the 3.58 to Sheffield, the 7 o’clock to Corby, the 7.32 to Leeds and the 8.15 to Nottingham. The system is already groaning at the seams, and that is why we need more seats and more services.
The Kettering rail users group has complained often about overcrowding and poor connectivity since the changes that were made about 10 years ago. The franchise is the chance to correct that mistake, to improve journey opportunities from Kettering to Birmingham, Manchester and Leeds and to provide a timetable that varies at peak times to avoid creating overcrowded services. The group’s aims for 2020 and 2023 are better connectivity north and, if possible, quarter-hourly commuting frequency and two fast services to London each hour throughout the day.
Chapter 4 of the Department’s consultation document on the new franchise claims that the line is full, but our experience is that many hourly freight paths are underused on the line. Freight paths should be allocated only at less of a speed differential to passenger paths. The Kettering rail users group believes that three minute or four minute scheduled headways should be more widely specified and that freight passing loops between Kettering and Wigston should be sought and funded to allow more, faster trains on that key section. An engineering solution could help to fit more passenger trains on the midland main line.
The Kettering rail users group has frequently pressed East Midlands Trains to restore the two trains an hour service between Leicester and Kettering, though with no success so far, and other stations have taken prior advantage of the line speed improvements that have been made. Recently the situation has got even worse than it was 10 years ago. The Sunday pattern was the old pattern until very recently, when East Midlands Trains switched Sunday afternoons over to the inconvenient weekday system in May last year. With growing demand, the hourly Nottingham service is now frequently full with passengers standing when it leaves Kettering going north, especially on Saturday mornings, in school holidays and at key times. Ironically, line speed improvements between Kettering and Corby mean that the hourly Corby southbound service arrives in Kettering just after the northbound hourly Nottingham service on the main line leaves, making a connection impossible if both trains are on time. The Corby passengers then have to wait an hour at Kettering before they go north. That situation cannot be right.
Kettering Borough Council, of which I am proud to be a member and therefore declare my interest, has a great opportunity to develop Kettering station. The redevelopment of Kettering’s station quarter has been in the pipeline for several years. Additional investment could lead to increased car parking, enhanced passenger facilities and an improved station gateway. Land west of the station could be developed as a business innovation centre. There would also be the opportunity to create access from the west, so that local passengers do not need to drive round the one-way system to the other side of the station before accessing trains. If the franchise is got right—if the train pattern in the new franchise encourages passenger growth—Kettering Borough Council is well placed to ensure that the infrastructure at Kettering station is upgraded to help.
Our other problem is that because of the Thameslink timetable changes, passengers from Kettering, Corby and Wellingborough who would take a peak service to Bedford or Luton will now have to do so by bus. That will lead to a dramatic decline in the number of passengers using this rail/bus service, and I urge the Minister to think of a physical rail infrastructure solution. Network Rail could extend the platform or platforms at Bedford to take a shuttle service from Kettering, Corby and Wellingborough while the Thameslink timetable settles down.
Mohammad Yasin (Bedford) (Lab)
Does the hon. Gentleman agree that passengers from Kettering, Wellingborough, Luton and Bedford will be badly affected by those journeys and that the franchise should compensate them for their losses, because thousands of people moved to those areas so that they could easily commute to work?
Mr Hollobone
In effect, Thameslink is a very narrow tunnel that goes underneath London, and therefore all the trains that go in and out of it have to be timed exactly to fit on to the other train routes, including the midland main line. That is clearly leading to a bottleneck in our part of the world. I understand that problem, but I believe that there is an engineering solution. There is no doubt that East Midlands Trains will take a huge revenue hit with the loss of passengers using its service. I think East Midlands Trains is doing its best given the constraints placed on it, but the Minister needs to work with Network Rail to see if an engineering solution is possible at Bedford: the extension of a platform and the purchase of a shuttle train that can run backwards and forwards, so that passengers have at least a train service to Bedford instead of having to go on the bus.
It is welcome that electrification is coming to Kettering and Corby. I urge the Minister to consider extending electrification to Braybrooke, and then to Harborough or Wigston, because of the feeds from the national grid. An engineering solution would mean that that could be done at very low cost. Early procurement of bi-modes for the new franchise is needed, because part of the line will be electrified and part will be diesel. There are also easy stretches for upgrading and electrification further north. It would be a shame to break up the engineering teams installing electrification up to Kettering and Corby when, with a little bit of forward planning, they could be sensibly deployed to deal with stretches of the line that can be electrified fairly simply and at low cost. That would not be 100% electrification of the whole line, but other bits north of Kettering could be done at very low cost.
It has been a pleasure to have this debate under your benign guidance and chairmanship, Mr Evans, and I look forward to the Minister’s response.
The Minister of State, Department for Transport (Joseph Johnson)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Evans. I would like to start by thanking my hon. Friend the Member for Kettering (Mr Hollobone) for securing this debate. I congratulate him on that, and thank the hon. Member for Bedford (Mohammad Yasin) for contributing. It has been a helpful, if somewhat short, debate. I am keen to respond to the questions that my hon. Friend has put to me, which cover much of the ground that we covered in our very useful meeting with members of the Kettering rail users group and those from the hon. Gentleman’s constituency in Bedford just a few days ago, on 7 February.
I am grateful for the considerable work undertaken by the Kettering rail users group on the complex areas that my hon. Friend mentioned. I hope he will be reassured by the fact that the Department has shared the group’s proposals with Network Rail. Department for Transport officials are in discussions with Network Rail and the train operating companies that were present at the meeting that he and the hon. Gentleman attended—East Midlands Trains and Govia Thameslink Railway—to see whether it is possible to bring life to the proposed engineering solutions: the introduction of a shuttle service involving the extension of a platform at Bedford. A shuttle service between Kettering and Bedford would enable us to remove the bus service mentioned by the hon. Member for Bedford.
I also acknowledge the wider aspirations for rail services in Kettering, as mentioned by my hon. Friend. On the specific aspiration to reintroduce the half-hourly northbound service and occasional faster peak services, Department for Transport officials are giving careful consideration to what will be specified in the next franchise. However, ultimately, it will be a matter for consideration by the bidders for the new franchise. I encourage the Kettering rail users group to engage directly with the bidders to see whether its aspirations can be secured through those bids.
That said, I have listened carefully to the remarks made by my hon. Friend the Member for Kettering and the hon. Member for Bedford about their constituents’ recent experiences and their concerns about the immediate plans for rail services through Kettering and affecting Bedford. It is clear that, to a great extent, their constituents have lost patience and confidence in the process, partly due to the lack of consultation—that theme came up in the meeting a couple of weeks ago—on the plans to introduce service changes. I will say more about that.
I apologise to hon. Members, their constituents, passengers and local businesses inconvenienced by the planned service alterations in May. The Department recognises the short-term pain that the changes will cause, and we regret it. I assure them that the Government, Network Rail and the train companies are doing everything possible to mitigate the impact of the changes, particularly on rush hour passengers. The hon. Member for Bedford asked about compensation. I bring to his attention an announcement by the Department offering a dedicated fare for season ticket holders who have to use the coach service; it will be 50% lower than the equivalent rail fare. In addition, there will be a 25% reduction on anytime fares affected by the change.
On a more positive note, I would like to be clear about two things. The enhancements that we will ultimately deliver to Thameslink and the midland main line are essential to sustaining the long-term prosperity of Kettering and the east midlands in general. The passengers, businesses and communities that will have to cope with some service reductions in the shorter term are the very people who will benefit in the medium and long term from newer, faster trains, more services, more seats and more destinations.
[Mr Albert Owen in the Chair]
We are also dealing with challenges associated with success, not failure. I recognise that such statements will be of little comfort to hard-pressed commuters in Bedford and Kettering facing the short-term prospect of fewer trains, even if they will be more certain of a seat on those trains for their journey. However, that is the reality. Demand for rail travel quite simply exceeds supply. The Thameslink programme and the upgrade of the midland main line represent only two examples of the major investments that this Government are making across the country to give passengers the rail services that they demand. Last year, we announced our intention to commit some £48 billion to improving the reliability of the rail network between 2019 and 2024. However, the clear and unavoidable cost to passengers of delivering all those improvements is often, unfortunately, a short-term impact on current services.
Mr Hollobone
I appreciate that the Minister has a complicated job; he is playing with a huge train set across the country. The key thing for the midland main line and Kettering services in the long term is to have an eighth train pathway. The present ambition is to have six trains an hour from London; can he confirm that the long-term ambition is to have an eighth train pathway? It would make a lot of the problems go away.
Joseph Johnson
I understand that that is the aspiration. It is right that my hon. Friend is a powerful champion for rail users in his constituency. We are giving careful consideration to all the trade-offs involved in the development of the franchise, and we will be setting out specifications in due course.
I said that I would return to the question of consultation. May 2018 represents one of the largest timetable changes in recent rail history, affecting services across the south-east of England and beyond. The scale, complexity and late emergence of the impact of the planned changes were such that it was not possible for train operators to consult on the changes as they would have done in normal circumstances. I acknowledge that lack of consultation.
Mohammad Yasin
Surely the changes must have been planned months or years before coming into effect, but why was there no consultation? I am sure that the franchises and the Government knew months and years before.
Joseph Johnson
The hon. Gentleman is entirely right: there was a regrettable lack of consultation, which the Government acknowledge and apologise for. It runs counter to the open and transparent approach to service planning and franchise design generally adopted in recent years, and the Government have no hesitation in offering their apologies to my hon. Friend and the hon. Gentleman for the inconvenience suffered by their constituents as a result and the frustration that they must feel at the lack of consultation on the development of the timetable changes.
In the case of Kettering, once the electrification of the midland main line is complete in 2020, passengers at Corby, Kettering, Wellingborough, Bedford, Luton and Luton Airport Parkway will benefit from a new, dedicated fast commuter service into London St Pancras. The electric trains will be longer, with more seats. In total, a 50% increase is planned in the number of seats into St Pancras during the peak by 2020, with further increases as new rolling stock is introduced on the inter-city services. With the introduction of the new timetable in December 2020, Kettering will become a key interchange between the inter-city services and the dedicated fast commuter service from Corby into London.
In the meantime, let us not forget that the £7 billion Thameslink programme was designed to transform the rail services that are so important to my hon. Friend’s constituents, as is the planned upgrade of the midland main line. From May 2018 to 2020, while the upgrade is being delivered, Bedford and Luton will, as discussed, lose the direct connection from Kettering during the peak. However, the Department has agreed to fund East Midlands Trains to lease three additional high-speed trains to mitigate other adverse impacts.
In addition, as part of the timetable development work, East Midlands Trains has found a way to maintain its existing calls at Luton Airport Parkway in the peak, enabling airport passengers from north of Bedford to continue to enjoy a direct service. When completed, the Thameslink programme, along with the timetable enhancement in 2020, will also open up new connections for passengers with other GTR services from Bedford to Farringdon, as well as to London Bridge and further south. It is not all bad news. We will continue to work closely with my hon. Friend, the hon. Gentleman and their user groups to ensure that their views are taken carefully into account as we specify the work for the new franchise.
Mohammad Yasin
I appreciate what the Minister is saying about the new franchise from 2020, but between May 2018 and 2020, the changes will affect many people who moved to Bedford because they could easily commute from there to work in London and the north. Now, during those two years, they might lose their jobs or be unable to commute to work, so they might already be moving out of Bedford. The damage will be done by 2020. What does the Minister say about that?
Joseph Johnson
I would say that we are working hard to ensure that they get the train services that they need for the future, which will sustain the local economy and give them a viable basis for getting to work and going about their business.
Question put and agreed to.
Social Housing and Regeneration: Earl’s Court and West Kensington
(6 years, 10 months ago)
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Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith) (Lab)
I beg to move,
That this House has considered social housing and regeneration in Earl’s Court and West Kensington.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Owen. Last Thursday, Property Week carried the story that Capital & Counties Properties plc, the promoter of the Earl’s Court development, is about to sell the Empress State building to the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime for around £240 million. Capco confirmed the leak. Indeed, using the “cui bono?” test, Capco was responsible for the leak, which gave a glimmer of good news to its shareholders, who have only had bad news in recent years, ahead of its full-year figures for 2017 being published later this week.
At over 30 storeys, Empress State was the tallest commercial building in London when it was built in the early 1960s. When it was vacated and sold by the Ministry of Defence, the Metropolitan police rented it from its new commercial owners. When Capco acquired the freehold in 2014, it gave notice to the Met and got consent from a complicit Conservative administration—with only weeks to spare before they lost control of Hammersmith and Fulham Council—to approve Empress State’s redevelopment as 440 mainly luxury flats.
Why give up now on luxury residential development, which was previously seen as not just another licence to print money, but a way of integrating the key Empress State site into Capco’s master plan for Earl’s Court and West Kensington? The answer is that throwing in the towel on Empress State is the clearest sign yet that not just the master plan, but Capco itself is in serious trouble and is seeking to cut and run to save its own skin.
This is a story about arrogance and greed; about politicians who thought they could treat people as commodities, units of production and pieces on an electoral chessboard; about developers who could not believe their luck and then fell prey to changing political and market forces; about a vibrant part of London full of industry, commerce and entertainment that was ordered to be razed and replaced with monotonous high-rise blocks as safe deposit flats for the investment market; and about a proud community of 2,000 people who have stood firm for 10 years against the threat of their homes and community being demolished and dispersed.
Ten years ago, Capco conceived a master plan for 77 acres of land straddling the borders of Hammersmith and Fulham and Kensington and Chelsea. It was dubbed Earl’s Court, although the majority of the land lay in the marginal North End ward of Hammersmith and Fulham. It was billed as the biggest urban development outside China, with an estimated built-out value of £12 billion.
The plan was audacious, because although designated as an opportunity area, this was no derelict, brownfield land. One third of the site comprised the Earl’s Court exhibition centre, including its iconic 1930s entrance, which is now sadly demolished despite the UK having only a third of France’s exhibition space and a quarter of Germany’s. One third comprised the maintenance, manufacture and stabling of a significant part of London Underground in the Lillie Bridge depot, which was a major employer of skilled labour. One third comprised two estates of predominantly council housing: Gibbs Green and West Kensington. Around 2,000 of my constituents live there in 760 good quality, spacious, affordable 1950s, 1970s and 1990s low or medium-rise homes.
In place of all that, Capco promised 7,500 high-rise flats, of which only 11% would be additional affordable homes that stretched that definition to its limits by, for the most part, offering nugatory discounts on extortionate market prices. Interestingly, now Capco is aching for a deal—any deal—to get out of the scheme, it does not say, as most developers do, “Look at our viability assessment. It is all that we could afford.” It says, “We did what Conservative politicians asked, and they wanted precious little affordable housing and not one new social rented home.”
At the start of the process in 2008, Capco told me with similar candour that it did not want to include the estates in the master plan. Developing the exhibition centre and depot meant negotiating with a single partner, Transport for London. Bringing in the estates meant not only a political minefield, but buying up the land interests of the hundreds of freeholders and leaseholders who had bought the desirable homes, flats and maisonettes on Gibbs Green and West Ken.
Why did Capco succumb? Because the ideologically driven council in Hammersmith and Fulham decided to attract the attention of its political masters in the Department for Communities and Local Government by showing that whole areas of social housing could be wiped and reconceived as luxury developments—they called it “sweating the asset”. For Capco, demolishing the estates was the price of the Tories’ co-operation with the scheme.
Capco drove a hard bargain. The inequality of arms between developers and local authorities is not unique to Hammersmith. The deal done with TfL on the exhibition sites was hugely preferential to Capco, despite TfL owning the freehold—perhaps the right hon. Member for Uxbridge and South Ruislip (Boris Johnson) was also not trying too hard—but that looks like a master stroke compared with the deal that the Hammersmith Tories did for the estate land.
In 2013, Hammersmith and Fulham Council made a deal to receive £90 million for the estates, plus space in the new development to replace the homes lost. Uniquely in the experience of most planners and developers, however, that sum was not index-linked—as if property prices never rise in central London.
Moreover, the council needed to deliver vacant possession of the land. That meant buying out 171 leasehold and freehold homes, which is normally the developer’s task. The maximum needed to acquire the homes was budgeted as £60 million, although valuation experts assessed the true figure as between £150 million and £174 million. The council has already purchased 26 homes at an average price of £552,000, excluding compensation, which is well in excess of the estimated £350,000.
The true value of the land is not recorded, but reading across from the valuation of the exhibition centre site, which is, suggests that a more accurate figure is around £1 billion. By accepting no more than 10% of the land’s value and by underestimating the costs of acquiring vacant possession, the council could now be left with a zero receipt and a maximum of 672 replacement homes for residents of the estates, having sold 88 homes to cover its shortfall. That will also not guarantee a home for all residents in the new scheme.
For reasons of time, I must return another day to what I regard as one of local government’s great financial scandals: how not just prime land, but whole communities were sold for a song to serve an extreme political agenda of gerrymandering and social engineering. Most of the guilty men of the previous Conservative administration—and they were all men—have taken their poisonous philosophy elsewhere, but Capco still squats on Earl’s Court and West Ken like a toad.
Capco is represented by its chairman, Ian Hawksworth, who is now most famous for being on the guest list for the President’s Club dinner, and Gary Yardley, its managing director, who is quick to pick up lavish bonuses for the granting of planning consents with negligible community benefit and huge community loss. Its development partners are even less savoury. They include Hong Kong-based mega-developers Kwok Family Interests. One of the family, Thomas Kwok, is currently serving a five-year sentence for bribery.
Although I have referred, and will continue to refer, to Capco as the developer, in fact the estates were purchased through an obscure entity called EC Properties LP. The sole partner capital contributed to EC Properties LP is £2 paid in cash by Jersey-registered EC Properties LP Ltd. These and further labyrinthine arrangements appear designed to put Capco in control while shielding it from liability and allowing it to take advantage of offshore tax arrangements.
Before being tempted by the prospect of rich pickings in Earl’s Court, Capco’s business was commercial and retail estate management, specifically through its ownership of Covent Garden. It has no experience as a major land developer, and it shows. It does not have control of the master plan site; it has no option on Lillie Bridge depot, which is owned by TfL; the estate residents, through their lawyers, dispute that the conditional land sale agreement for the estates is enforceable; and now the deliverability of its scheme has been further undermined by the sale of the Empress State building.
Capco’s scheme, the value of which fell by 20% in 2016, includes £1.8 billion of enabling infrastructure costs. At £148 per square foot, that is more than three times the cost of larger development schemes in London. Other residential developers have commented on Capco’s extreme construction costs, which are thought to be 30% to 45% above the market rate.
Capco’s assumptions for residential value, which are significantly higher than the local market and schemes elsewhere in London, have not been realised. Sales are slower than expected: flats have been selling at a rate of less than one a week. At one point it was selling one flat a fortnight, at which rate it would take more than 150 years to sell the entire scheme, yet the business plan relies on a high sales rate of 480 private homes a year. Unsurprisingly, Capco has tried in recent months to sell some or all of the site to overseas investors in America, South Africa, Japan, China and Saudi Arabia, but it has had no takers. Frankly, any developer, however much of a gambler, would be beyond reckless to take any of the Earl’s Court site off Capco’s hands.
With no money in the scheme and none from outside, Capco’s only other option is to return to planning and come up with a new master plan with increased heights and density. Sadly for Capco, that option also looks like a dead end. With Eric Pickles at the Department for Communities and Local Government, the right hon. Member for Uxbridge and South Ruislip as Mayor in City Hall, and Stephen Greenhalgh in Hammersmith Town Hall, anything was possible, but the political weather has changed. Now Sadiq Khan is Mayor and has very different ideas about what constitutes affordable and sustainable development. He has also made a strong commitment to tenants’ ballots and said that he wants
“to make sure people living on social housing estates…are at the heart of any decisions”
involving demolition. Stephen Cowan, the Labour leader of Hammersmith and Fulham Council, has described the Earl’s Court scheme as “unviable” and “undeliverable” and called on Capco to return the estates to the council. He has the full support of the North End ward Labour candidates, Councillor Larry Culhane, Councillor Daryl Brown and Zarar Qayyum. It appears that he also has the support of the deputy leader of Kensington and Chelsea, Councillor Kim Taylor-Smith, who spoke about the scheme at a meeting of the full council on 24 January.
On Monday, I wrote to the chief executive of EC Properties, whose parent company is Capco, to seek a meeting to consider the site’s future. I told him that on 14 June the facts on the ground in Kensington had changed. I wrote:
“I want to make it very clear that I do not believe the continuation of this development under the current terms is right. And, as a minimum, if this is to continue I want to see more social and more truly affordable housing included in this scheme.”
I am pleased to see my hon. Friend the Member for Kensington (Emma Dent Coad) present, because part of the site is in her constituency. As she knows, my reference to 14 June was to the Grenfell Tower fire.
So what happens now? It is too late for the exhibition centres that were demolished in an act of vandalism, but it is not too late to build an acceptable replacement on the site. It is far from too late for the Lillie Bridge depot, which is still owned by TfL, to undergo sympathetic redevelopment to preserve necessary infrastructure for the tube and new affordable homes. If hon. Members will forgive me, however, I will turn my focus to the estates, or rather to the people who live there.
I first got to know West Ken and Gibbs Green in 1985 as the newly selected council candidate for Gibbs Green ward. The first campaign that I had to fight was to stop the then Tory council putting a relief road through the West Ken estate. It has been a pleasure to represent the area as a councillor and MP for 28 of the past 32 years. Although on aggregate it is a low-income community, it includes people from every walk of life, ethnicity, nationality and profession.
Residents reacted with horror to the prospect of demolition of their homes. At first, there was no guarantee of rehousing in the area—only the statutory requirement to rehouse secure tenants in suitable alternative accommodation. Even when residents were told that homes would be available on the site, there were strings attached. Homeowners, private tenants and households who moved into the estates after the land sale agreement was signed in 2013 have no guarantee of finding a replacement home in the area on eviction. Secure council tenants who move into the first phase of replacement homes could see their service charges triple to between £2,500 and £3,500 a year on top of rent. Having been initially promised like-for-like replacement homes, residents who currently have spacious flats and houses built in the 1960s and 1970s, some of which have gardens and off-street parking, have now been told simply that replacement homes will meet the legal minimum size standard. Even if the developer had the finances and political support to begin evicting residents tomorrow, redevelopment of the estates would still take at least 20 years to complete.
Residents have done everything they can to make it very clear what they do not want: demolition. In December 2009, a year after learning of the possible demolition of their homes, residents from 83% of households on the West Kensington and Gibbs Green estates signed a petition to oppose it. In March 2012, 80% of residents who responded to the council’s consultation on the scheme said no to demolition.
Residents have also been very clear about what they want instead: community ownership. In March 2011, they formed West Ken Gibbs Green Community Homes, a community-controlled not-for-profit organisation with membership from more than two thirds of households on the estates. It was set up with the intention of exercising council tenants’ right to transfer.
Ms Karen Buck (Westminster North) (Lab)
I congratulate my hon. Friend on his powerful speech. Does he agree that residents could do a lot worse than learn from the community ownership experience in a neighbouring estate? Walterton and Elgin Community Homes was set up in the face of a threat from Westminster City Council in the late 1980s. It has proved to be one of the most successful and popular models for social housing in the country. Does he agree that that experience shows exactly the approach we should take when estates are threatened?
Andy Slaughter
It is a pleasure to see my hon. Friend in the Chamber. I am not surprised to hear her champion one of the most successful community-held developments in the country. I will say a little more about that development before I conclude my speech.
The right to transfer allows council tenants to choose a different landlord for their area. The objective of West Ken Gibbs Green Community Homes is to become the community-controlled landlord for its members’ homes. For four years, it lobbied the Government to implement the necessary legislation to enable it to use the right to transfer under the Housing Act 1985, as amended by the Housing and Regeneration Act 2008. The necessary regulations came into force in December 2013, and in March 2015 members voted 100:1 to serve a right-to-transfer proposal notice. That is a comfort to those whose priority is simply to remain in their homes. Some residents have lived on the estates with friends and neighbours for 30, 40 or even 50 years and dread the disruption of redevelopment and forced transfer.
Estates are home to people who are the lifeblood of our towns and cities. Many residents are people on minimum wage or zero-hours contracts, who feel the rising costs of living the most. Demolishing and marginalising social housing will not work; more importantly, it dehumanises an entire category of people. Certain councils and developers generalise about social housing tenants. They assume they know better than the tenants what is good for them, and they tell them to be grateful when their homes are under threat. That is what the Conservatives did before agreeing the sale to Capco, describing estates as “not decent neighbourhoods”, “barracks for the poor” and “ghettoes of multiple deprivation”. Is it any wonder that communities such as West Kensington and Gibbs Green are bidding to take control and ownership for themselves?
So residents came up with the people’s plan, which shows the professionals how new development ought to be done. At the outset, Community Homes brought more than 100 residents into workshops and site visits with architects. Residents and architects together identified space for up to 327 new homes and devised plans for improvements to their homes, streets and community spaces. The plans were costed and valued, and residents were able to show that they could help to pay for improvements and subsidise the building of new homes at social rent levels through sales. Residents from 65% of households provided written feedback on these proposals, and 90% of respondents said that the plans were “excellent” or “good”, and “better” or “far better” than the Capco scheme. Here is some of their feedback:
“Everybody is trying to save our homes from these rich people. What do you want to destroy people’s lives for? For money?”
“I like that there is a plan to build new homes but I can keep my home. I don’t understand why they are going to demolish decent homes.”
“The most important thing is that we get to stay. I love it here. We know each other and look out for each other.”
I have two final things to say. First, I thank everybody in the community at West Kensington and Gibbs Green, and their supporters and advisers, for the struggle of the last 10 years. It has been gruelling, and 2,000 people have had their lives on hold, unable to move on with everything from modernising their home to planning their family’s future. However, it has created a fantastic community spirit and inspired people to create their own vision for the future.
Even before the political climate began to thaw, I knew that we would win, because I have known people such as Sally Taylor and Diana Belshaw, the chairs of the West Ken and Gibbs Green residents’ associations, and Keith Drew, the chair of West Ken Gibbs Green Community Homes Limited, for 20 years and more. They are strong Fulham people who are standing up for their communities, and they are not daunted by the dirty tricks of the developer and its political cipher.
I am delighted that so many residents have been able to attend this debate. I apologise if I cannot name them all, but they stand for the hundreds and thousands of people on the estates who have fought for their homes and their livelihoods over many, many years. That battle is not over, but there is at least some light at the end of the tunnel.
As I say, there are too many people for me to name, but I cannot leave out Jonathan Rosenberg, the community organiser for these 10 years, who brought not only his absolute focus and determination to an often exhausting David and Goliath battle, but 30 years of experience of community housing. As my hon. Friend the Member for Westminster North (Ms Buck) knows, Jonathan is the chair of Walterton and Elgin Community Homes, which is in her constituency. He is a slayer of Shirley Porter and a champion of tenants’ rights. Jonathan has been ably assisted by a number of professional advisers—accountants, architects and planners—and by community activists across both boroughs, and indeed by residents who have turned up, often when everything looked hopeless and bleak, time and again to assert the identity of their community.
I must also mention Dave Hill, the former Guardian journalist who now runs—I will give it a blatant plug—the “On London” website, which he is crowdfunding for. Dave has written dozens and dozens of articles to expose what has gone on in West Ken and Gibbs Green over the last 10 years. I do not always agree with everything that he says—he is a good, independent journalist—but he has chronicled what I am afraid to say lazier and more partisan journalists would have otherwise missed. It is good that we have it all on the record.
In conclusion, I have only a couple of simple requests to put to the Minister. I know that, new as he is to his post, he will have listened attentively. From my time holding the justice brief, I know that he is serious and has intellectual weight, and I hope that he will give me good news today. First, will he please determine the Community Homes application for the right to transfer, which his Department has been waiting to determine for more than two years? When he does so, can he please heed the residents’ call for him to uphold their legal right to take back control—a phrase I am sure he is keen to hear in this Chamber—of their community, so that they can deliver the homes that we need?
Secondly and more broadly, I ask the Minister to get the Government, including his Department, to work with the residents, the boroughs and the Greater London Authority—they are all now of one mind, a very different mind from the one of 10 years ago—to provide decent, genuinely affordable homes across the Earl’s Court site for families? That perhaps includes families from Grenfell, and thousands of others who are in overcrowded, unfit and unaffordable accommodation in two of London’s most expensive boroughs.
This situation should not be seen as a tragedy but as an opportunity. If there is going to be redevelopment, it should be sympathetic and sustainable, and in the interests of the people who need it most. They are the people who need social and affordable housing in Hammersmith and Fulham, and in Kensington and Chelsea.
Emma Dent Coad (Kensington) (Lab)
Like many Kensingtonians, I have a long history with Earl’s Court exhibition centre. As a child, I visited the Bertram Mills circus, when they had performing animals; it was the “olden days”. I also attended the Royal Tournament, countless Ideal Home exhibitions, and—of course—some of those amazing concerts. However, the site is not just part of my story. It was, and could be again, a thriving and well-used commercial centre, comprising a third of our country’s exhibition space, and providing jobs and customers all year round for our local hotels, restaurants, shops and pubs—remember pubs?
According to the Greater London Authority, Earl’s Court exhibition centre generated £1 billion of business a year. Now, however, it has been flattened and all that business has gone elsewhere. I remember those crazy days eight years ago when Hammersmith and Fulham Council was under a different administration, and the then director of housing and homelessness was exposed for vile racist views, including, in the context of the estates, expressing a wish to “bulldoze the ghettos”.
Enter Capco, the social cleanser’s friend. Its plans, promoted as being “sensitive” to local context and character, put on the Kensington side a forest of lumpen, bland, blocky chunks of real estate with brick cladding, where no one would ever live; shopping streets where no one would ever shop; and a “river park” without a river or, indeed, anything like a park, and where, despite the optimistic visuals, small blonde children would not play with red balloons.
Facing Warwick Road, in place of our beautiful and now demolished art deco facade, would be a bizarre pair of supposedly landmark buildings that I am sorry to say are reminiscent of Italian fascist architecture. Put simply, world-renowned architect Terry Farrell, whose work I have known for many years, had apparently transported a piece of one of his Chinese cities into our beloved borough. It was a cut and paste job, and was very disappointing.
In May 2015, I had the pleasure of speaking at a seminar at South Bank University, called—enticingly—“Politics with Planning”, which is my favourite combination. I was up against the chief executive of Capco, Gary Yardley. I expressed my misgivings about the proposals for Earl’s Court. How he sneered, because he was reimagining a chunk of our heritage. Who was I to question him? After all, the 14% social housing on offer, or 10% based on floor space, was all that the poor thing could offer, because he had consultants. And this is what Section 106 Consultants says to its developer clients,
“if a Section 106 viability report cannot entirely extinguish your liability to provide Section 106 affordable housing”,
then all is not lost. It says that much may yet be achieved, either
“through delivering…affordable housing of a type…that is more valuable to you”—
that is, to the developer—
“or identifying and prioritising those types of contribution that are most important to the Local Planning Department.”
Let us hope that the days of cosy relationships between developers and planning departments are well and truly over.
How the world has changed. Three years on, Capco is on the ropes, its share value plummeting due to the local luxury housing over-provision, and the heat has been taken out of the market, by, among other factors, fears over Brexit. Capco’s recent half-hearted attempt to intensify the provision of units at Earl’s Court—to provide more small housing units that it thought it could sell, rather than the huge and unwanted super-prime units of its dreams—seems to have hit a brick-clad wall.
Politically, culturally and in terms of local need, the scene has changed dramatically. The international appetite for buying flats to park money—sometimes dodgy money—has waned, and it seems that even Capco has accepted that. It had hoped its desire to intensify Earl’s Court could be agreed within the current planning permission, but that is not happening.
Let us not compound the litany of errors and developer greed with yet another round of international online poker, using our neighbourhoods as chips, to sell the site abroad. Local house prices are plummeting—or what the estate agents call “softening”—and there is no longer any taste for these super-luxury developments that have turned parts of London into ghost towns. The current plan is undeliverable; we need to start again. We need to curtail the developers’ rampage through our neighbourhoods and look to a future at Earl’s Court that does not offer empty units for international investors but instead satisfies local needs and provides homes for existing residents.
After the atrocity of the fire at Grenfell Tower, we have seen a dramatic change of heart at Kensington and Chelsea Council, which we need to consolidate and compound with a completely new approach to the development at Earl’s Court. We need to listen to our constituents, who are the experts on what is needed, now, at Earl’s Court. The Save Earl’s Court campaigners are relentless, intelligent and forward-thinking and have good and achievable ideas.
The UK is desperate for exhibition space and London lags dangerously behind in its offer to those who need large exhibition centres. Earl’s Court is struggling, with local shops and restaurants closing and hotels clinging on by their fingernails, ironically propped up by the council using them as temporary accommodation. The heart has been ripped out of Earl’s Court and we need to put it back.
The deputy leader of Kensington and Chelsea Council has stated that communities must take the lead in future developments. Let us trust them, and listen to the knowledgeable and conscientious Save Earl’s Court campaigners, all our local residents and Councillor Wade. They have been working on proposals for an environmentally sustainable and very green exhibition centre with social rented housing on site, offering a green lung in an area of terrible air quality and with jobs on the doorstep. Demolishing estates of social housing is not the answer to deprivation; working with communities is the way forward. We must set the current undeliverable plans aside and start again.
The world has changed since the repellent comments were made by the former Hammersmith and Fulham director of homelessness; we are better than that now. The world has also changed since 14 June 2017, when the result of poor maintenance, lack of care and absence of social conscience was exposed to the world with the Grenfell Tower fire. Let us show that change now by finding ways to realise our constituents’ ambitions. Let us leave the 2,000 residents of my hon. Friend the Member for Hammersmith (Andy Slaughter) in peace to enjoy and manage the homes built with conscience and care over the past 50 years. On my side, at Earl’s Court, let us support a struggling area that has been decimated by developer greed, by working closely with the London Mayor and the Government to repeal the current planning permission where possible and work with the people of Earl’s Court to provide socially rented and truly affordable housing for those who need it, cleaner air, and a fantastic modern exhibition centre that will provide jobs and return vital business. Let us get them out of those hotels.
Albert Owen (in the Chair)
If there are no other Back-Bench speeches, I call the Front-Bench spokespeople. Tony Lloyd, usually you would have five minutes. I am sure that you will use your discretion and allow the Minister enough time to respond to the matters.
Tony Lloyd (Rochdale) (Lab)
Thank you, Mr Owen. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Hammersmith (Andy Slaughter). He made a powerful speech that was clearly embedded in the needs of the people he represents, some of whom have come here today to hear the debate and others of whom will want to know the outcome. I say kindly to the Minister that there is a real expectation that today we begin to move the long-running saga of Capco’s plan forward in a way that is acceptable to the local residents.
If I may, I will set the debate in a wider context, going back to before the Grenfell fire. It has been recognised that the policy of owner occupation being the only viable form of tenancy, which was driven during the bulk of the Conservative-Lib Dem coalition and in the early days of the present Government, had to change, in the face of the reality of what modern Britain is all about. It is worth putting on record some of the national statistics that are part of the process faced by people in this part of London. Since 2010, there has been a 50% increase in the number of people who are unintentionally homeless and are deemed to be a priority, people who desperately need rehousing and regarding whom our local authorities have a duty to respond. The local authorities find that extremely difficult of course, because of the lack of available properties.
Those who present themselves to local authorities as unintentionally homeless are only part of the picture. Many families and individuals are in inadequate, overcrowded housing, perhaps living with parents or other relatives. We know that the need for affordable social homes is massively greater than that illustrated by the unintentionally homeless figures. It is a scandal that some 120,000 children nationwide are in temporary accommodation—and the number is growing. In London in particular, in recent years there has been a tripling in the number of people described as rough sleepers, people who have been abandoned by our society in many ways.
That is all part of the background. So why is this? It is because policies dictated to take out social housing—affordable housing for people who need it—have been massively detrimental. That is what the ideologues my hon. Friend the Member for Hammersmith talked about earlier wanted to achieve. Since 2010, we have seen a 174,000 reduction in the number of council properties nationwide. According to the Chartered Institute of Housing, 150,000 social housing units have been lost, and it is predicted that a further 80,000 will go between now and 2020. At the same time, in 2010 there were 40,000 social housing starts and in the most recent year the figure was down to 1,000. Frankly, this is a crisis that has been made at political policy level, because of incompetence and the unacceptability of developers taking control of our planning process.
Something has gone drastically wrong, and the situation in Earl’s Court and West Kensington fits into that national pattern. My hon. Friend the Member for Hammersmith made the point forcefully that there is something fundamentally wrong when developers can sweat assets that are people’s homes, land on which perfectly adequate estates and communities make their lives. That is not sweating assets; it is prostituting national resources in the interests of developer profit and it cannot be acceptable. Nor can it be acceptable that simply because the market is turning and Capco no longer sees the development as viable we now have the possibility of a change of policy. The policy should never have been allowed in the first place, putting, as it does, people’s lives and homes at risk.
Everything I know of the situation my hon. Friend the Member for Hammersmith has talked about says that this is a collection of viable estates of popular homes. I understand there are very few voids, empty properties—I think my hon. Friend the Member for Hammersmith confirms that—and that they are properties that are not so old and not really in enormous need of repair. With that background, the idea of destroying those homes simply to allow the sweating of assets—in fact, to allow people to make enormous amounts of money—does not fit in with the social values we ought to espouse. Even the Government have now begun to espouse those values, as they talk in a slightly more nuanced language about the need to develop more affordable social housing.
My hon. Friend the Member for Hammersmith made some important points about the situation that would be unacceptable anywhere. “Like for like” should be the minimum requirement of any transfer for individuals. It is not like for like when we know that people who have substantial properties will be offered properties with minimum space standards—whatever that means. In fact, it increasingly means much reduced standards and therefore a lower quality of life. My hon. Friend talked about people possibly seeing a tripling of service charges to £3,500 a year, and that is not a small amount of money. It would have a significant impact on people’s incomes, and it simply is not sustainable. Given that background, there is something fundamentally wrong with the model. Residents are rightly looking not only to the local authority—it now has a different political complexion and a different view of the situation—but to central Government to see what they can do to alter the situation.
My hon. Friend asked for specific things from the Minister. The Minister should look at the capacity of the right to transfer. If that issue has been on his predecessor’s desk for two years, it needs to be brought to a conclusion. I hope today he can begin to move that process on. My hon. Friend also talked about the need for the provision of affordable housing. There is something fundamentally wrong in the design of a new area that is supposed to have some 7,500 properties when the number of affordable homes would be less than the number being taken out. In the world in which we now live, the proportion of affordable homes should be significantly in excess of replacement. It should make some real impact on the dire need for social homes—affordable social homes at that—in London in particular. I hope the Minister will comment on what that means for future developments such as this and what the Government can do to begin to bring pressure to bear on Capco.
In conclusion, my hon. Friend has brought a shocking story to the House. The support that my hon. Friends the Members for Kensington (Emma Dent Coad) and for Westminster North (Ms Buck) have brought is important. I congratulate the residents of the area. Their 10-year fight is not yet over, but had they not been prepared to stand up to Capco and the developers, the issue most certainly would have been finished long ago with them in massively inferior conditions to what they now have. I hope that where we are today promises something better for the future.
We look to the Minister for a credible response. The saga is complicated because a lot of the control rests with the developer, but the developer is now on the ropes. I hope he accepts that it should not depend on changing market conditions for us to have a more rational housing policy that says that the rights of existing viable communities should not be wiped out simply to sweat those assets to make more money. The Government’s changing attitude says that that is the wrong situation for us to be in, and I hope the Minister will confirm that.
Albert Owen (in the Chair)
I know that in responding to the debate the Minister will allow a couple of minutes for Mr Slaughter to wind up.
The Minister for Housing (Dominic Raab)
It is a privilege to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Owen. As is the custom, I congratulate the hon. Member for Hammersmith (Andy Slaughter) on securing this debate. We have sparred many times on justice matters, and I look forward to an equally rigorous friendship on housing issues. He takes a close interest in those issues and I know how tenaciously he makes his case for his constituents and on matters of principle. I pay tribute to the residents who have come to listen to him and to hear the different views on this important matter.
I take note of all the hon. Gentleman’s points regarding the merits or otherwise of the development of the Earl’s Court and West Kensington area. He will know that the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government has been asked to make a decision on two specific matters submitted for his determination. The determination requests are currently being considered in the Department. The hon. Gentleman made some specific requests that I want to address clearly. As a lawyer and an assiduous local MP, he will know that that process precludes me, for legal and propriety reasons, from commenting specifically on the regeneration proposals for the Earl’s Court and Kensington area. As he knows, to do so would prejudice the very decision making he is calling for. Notwithstanding those limits, in his usual deft way he has highlighted his concerns over the Earl’s Court project while also raising—the shadow Minister did this, too—wider issues relating to social housing and the place for regeneration within that. I will say as much as I conceivably can.
Members will know that social housing is a priority for this Government. Last year we announced a review to examine the issues affecting social housing. To help inform the Green Paper we have spoken directly with 1,000 people who live in social housing, as well as with more than 7,000 people through online surveys. Notwithstanding the fact I have only been in this post for a short time, I have been to two workshops this year in Basingstoke and for Lancaster West residents in north Kensington. I hope that reassures the hon. Member for Kensington (Emma Dent Coad). Those workshops and the wider feedback have made a profound impression on me. We have an important opportunity to look afresh at the sector. A lot of the wider points that Members have made will feed into, touch on and resonate with some of the issues we will be grappling with. We will publish the Green Paper this year for consultation, and I look forward to engaging with all Members at that point on those wider policy issues as we strive to get the best out of the social housing sector.
More broadly, the Government are increasing the supply of homes and implementing policies that help people to access housing, whether they are renting or looking to buy in whichever sector, private or social. In 2016-17, which is the last year for which we have full figures, nearly 220,000 net additional homes were delivered. There were more than 41,000 affordable housing completions, which was up 27% on the previous year. We saw nearly 145,000 completions on the Help to Buy equity loan scheme by the end of September 2017.
Building affordable homes is a top priority for this Government. Since 2010, we have delivered more than 357,000 new affordable homes. In relation to the specific issues raised by the hon. Member for Hammersmith, about one quarter of those homes have been delivered in London. The Prime Minister recently announced an additional £2 billion of funding for affordable housing. That will increase the affordable homes programme budget to more than £9 billion. The new funding will support councils and housing associations to build more affordable homes where they are needed most: where families are struggling with rental costs and some may be at risk of homelessness.
The shadow Minister raised the issue of affordable housing in the wider context, and the hon. Member for Hammersmith made a number of political points. I hope both will forgive me for pointing out a few basic undeniable facts about affordable homes in Hammersmith and Fulham. Affordable home delivery in Hammersmith and Fulham in 2016-17 was 28% of the level of the last year of the previous Conservative administration. In the same year, Hammersmith and Fulham delivered 15% of the affordable housing that Wandsworth delivered. I note that as a matter of balance with the account of the borough given today by Members. It is worth putting it in some perspective. Nevertheless, across the political aisles and across the country—the issue is most acute in relation to London, where there is a serious housing shortage and high demand—I think we all are clear about our ambition and restlessness to go much further.
At the autumn statement in 2016, we agreed a record-breaking £3.15 billion package of funding for affordable housing in London to deliver at least 90,000 new affordable homes by March 2021. In addition, London will also get a share of the extra £3.4 billion investment in the affordable homes programme announced recently. Since 2010, we have delivered more than 357,000 new affordable homes, and about one quarter of them have been in the capital.
As London struggles to build enough homes to keep pace with demand, attention is naturally turning to the broader options regarding the regeneration of housing estates. Estate regeneration done the right way can create new improved homes and communities for the people who live there. It can increase the supply and quality of homes through densification and design. Those two can be viewed as a win-win, rather than a zero-sum game. Savills has estimated that in London there is capacity to provide more than 54,000 additional homes using a street-based model. The Government published a new estate regeneration national strategy in December 2016, which supports local partners to improve how they do estate regeneration in partnership with residents to drive better quality housing, local growth and wider opportunities for the residents of local communities.
To give some examples of good practice, in the north Solihull area of Birmingham, a focus on education with the local community infrastructure amenities has led to an increase in educational standards. The regeneration set out to change the lives of 40,000 people by building new homes of mixed tenure, developing new state-of-the-art schools and creating new village centres with improved health and enterprise facilities. The best estate regeneration schemes make the community central to the project.
The Spirit Quarters redevelopment in Coventry is a resident-led scheme. They have set up three social enterprises: a community café, a neighbourhood centre and a business centre. In addition to the physical transformation, there have been improvements in many social and economic outcomes. Overall, reported crime in the area is down by almost 20% and the number of residents claiming jobseeker’s allowance has reduced by 44%. The percentage of students leaving school with five or more GCSEs at grades A* to C has increased from 5% to 33%. Those are all incredibly positive outcomes.
The issue of tenant participation has been raised by hon. Members. Residents are clearly key partners in any regeneration scheme. They should have opportunities to participate from the start, developing the vision, design, partner procurement and delivery. Working with residents can help to build trust and consensus on regeneration. I have said this numerous times since taking on this portfolio: we need to build more homes, but we also need to build up stronger communities, too,
It is particularly important that residents have the opportunity to express their views on the final options for regeneration, whether as individuals or through the democratic process more generally. The way that is done should be agreed locally. That is the template for the national policy that we put out. The regeneration should have the support of a majority of the residents whose lives will be directly affected. At the Wornington Green estate in north Kensington, support for the regeneration was helped by early and ongoing conversations with residents. It included a resident steering group, regular outreach, independent advice and advocacy, regular public meetings, and training for residents.
It is important to set out a clear set of commitments about how the regeneration process will work and what housing options are available. Providing security and confidence through a charter early on is one option for helping to establish trust and foster positive discussions about the scheme. All existing council and housing association tenants, whether on a lifetime or fixed-term tenancy, should have the option to return to the estate. It is a legal requirement for leaseholders to be compensated if their home is demolished. However, we expect that schemes will go further and offer leaseholders a package that enables them to stay on the estate or at least close by.
It is important that home purchase options are made available. Residents should be given the opportunity to change tenure if they so wish. Regeneration can help first-time buyers get a foot on the housing ladder and provide opportunities for tenants to own their homes. Shared ownership has an important role to play in helping those who aspire to home ownership but cannot afford to buy. For example, residents of the Rayners Lane estate in Harrow have been guaranteed the right to remain in affordable housing on the estate, with the extra 260-plus homes creating a vibrant mixed-tenure community through the introduction of outright sale and shared ownership. All of that requires strong leadership from local authorities.
Our strategy highlights the importance of devolution and the leadership role of local authorities working with their communities to support estate regeneration. We have seen good examples of that type of strategic leadership and co-operation. Notwithstanding the criticisms that have been made, I hope we will not throw the baby out with the bathwater and lose sight of the good examples and the positives.
Dominic Raab
I will make a little more progress and the hon. Gentleman can comment at the end.
Combined authorities in the Tees valley, the west midlands and Greater Manchester are now tackling housing and regeneration alongside transport, infrastructure and skills as they take a more holistic approach. Strategic regeneration plans can act as the catalyst for delivering place-based services and infrastructure through, for example, new community hubs and schools that service the areas being regenerated.
Opposition Members have sometimes accused me of focusing too much on London and the capital. However, the regeneration of Anfield in north Liverpool has focused not only on housing, but on the place as a whole, including the commercial offer and the wider infrastructure. Your Housing association, Liverpool football club and Liverpool City Council created a partnership that enabled them to consider the needs of the community across the whole Anfield area. That was important and is a good example of the strong joint partnership and long-term community engagement that has transformed Anfield into a place where people want to live.
Andy Slaughter
I appreciate the tone of the Minister’s speech and what he said about not giving a view on the regeneration scheme. However, may I press him a little on two points? First, if he cannot say what his position is, can he indicate—this is not unreasonable after two years—when there is likely to be a decision on the right to transfer? Secondly, there are many regeneration schemes, but so many of them involve a reduction in the number of social rented homes. When we have a new deal for Earl’s Court and West Kensington, will he agree to work with the other players there to ensure that we preserve and enhance the existing community?
Dominic Raab
The hon. Gentleman has made his point in a constructive and reasonable way. I appreciate his frustration on the time issue. After the length of time and all the issues that have been churned over, no one will say this has been done in a rushed way, but we need to take the time required to get the decision right. I cannot give him a specific timeframe, but we will move as expeditiously as we can. I certainly will take back to the Department the point that he has made.
On the wider question, we have an opportunity through the social housing Green Paper. We will collate the extraordinarily wide range of feedback we have had. We will put that into the proposals through a Green Paper for consultation. I look forward to working with the hon. Gentleman and hearing from him at that stage.
In conclusion, I want to make sure this debate does not lose sight of the fact that local regeneration can offer enormous scope to build more homes and at the same time build up our local communities, which, whatever side of the political argument we sit on, is the shared objective. It requires ambition from local authorities, which many are providing. It also requires that residents have a strong voice in the process to shape the local plan, and support from central Government, which London and many other communities are receiving, not least with the recent homes infrastructure funding that has been made available. It also requires strong leadership to carry local communities with us.
Andy Slaughter
I am glad we had a civilised debate, but that does not detract from the fact that what has happened, particularly to the tenants and residents of the West Kensington and Gibbs Green estates over the past 10 years, has been an outrage. It would not have been tolerated were this not an area of social housing. Threatening to demolish 750 private homes in the same way simply would not happen. All we ask is that similar standards are adopted. That is why I am delighted with the Mayor’s new guidelines and his wish to use his own power and economic clout to ensure that tenants are fully consulted in future.
I want to make two or three quick points. I accept that local authorities can always do more and that it is very difficult to build genuinely affordable housing in London, where land values are high, but it is not impossible. I do not want to dwell on the political past, but I will give one statistic: in the past three years of Conservative control in Hammersmith and Fulham, the number of social rented homes actually fell. It is the only borough in London where that happened. I would be willing to draw a line under the past and to accept at face value what the Government say and what some Conservative councils now say about a new commitment to social rented homes. I suspect the new settlement will not be until after the local elections because Capco, like all desperate gamblers, will want one more throw of the dice to see if it can get a more sympathetic administration. I suspect it will be unlucky on this occasion, not only in Hammersmith but in Kensington. I invite the Minister to work with all players after that time to ensure that we begin to build the homes that Londoners need and can afford.
I end where I began by thanking everybody who has taken part in the debate, particularly my hon. Friends the Members for Rochdale (Tony Lloyd), for Kensington (Emma Dent Coad), and for Westminster North (Ms Buck), who are passionate about these issues, as I am. Most of all I thank the tenants and residents not only for giving up their day and being here—they have given up so many days—but for everything they have done for their community. By resisting the demolition that was due in the area, they have prevented it from happening to other communities in Hammersmith and elsewhere. For that we all owe them an undying debt of gratitude.
Question put and agreed to.
Resolved,
That this House has considered social housing and regeneration in Earl’s Court and West Kensington.
Written Statements
(6 years, 10 months ago)
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ECOFIN
(6 years, 10 months ago)
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The Chancellor of the Exchequer (Mr Philip Hammond)
A meeting of The Economic and Financial Affairs Council (ECOFIN) will be held in Brussels on 20 February 2018. The UK will be represented by Mark Bowman (Director General, International and EU, HM Treasury). European Union Finance Ministers will discuss the following:
Early Morning Session
The Eurogroup President will brief Ministers on the outcomes of the 19 February meeting of the Eurogroup, and the European Commission will provide an update on the current economic situation in the EU.
Financial services legislation
The Bulgarian presidency will present information on current financial services legislative proposals, followed by an exchange of views.
Sustainable finance
The Council will hold an exchange of views on the recommendations of the High-Level Expert Group on sustainable finance.
Discharge of the 2016 EU Budget
Ministers will be asked to approve a Council recommendation to discharge to the European Commission in respect of the 2016 EU Budget.
EU Budget guidelines for 2019
Ministers will be asked to approve Council conclusions on the EU Budget guidelines for 2019.
Public procurement and strategic investment
The European Commission will present information on the public procurement strategy it adopted on 3 October 2017.
[HCWS468]
EVEL Analysis
(6 years, 10 months ago)
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The Financial Secretary to the Treasury (Mel Stride)
I have today published a written submission outlining the Government’s analysis of how the English votes for English laws principle relates to all Government amendments tabled for Report stage of the Finance (No.2) Bill.
The Department’s assessment is that the amendments do not change the territorial application of the Bill. The analysis holds if all the Government amendments be accepted.
I have deposited a copy of the submission in the Library of the House.
[HCWS470]
Bovine TB
(6 years, 10 months ago)
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The Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Michael Gove)
Five years into the current bTB strategy, drafted in 2013 and published a year later, the time is right to review progress on the various elements of the strategy. I envisage further reviews will take place at five-yearly intervals in the future.
The purpose of the review is to consider progress made to date and what further actions might need to be prioritised now in order to ensure we maintain progress towards our target of becoming officially TB free after 25 years.
Bovine TB is a slow-moving insidious disease which presents major challenges. It can be difficult to detect; it can be harboured in the wildlife population; no vaccine is fully effective and none of our diagnostic tests are perfect. The review will be forward looking. Its aim is to identify what actions we could take now to ensure that other elements of the strategy, such as cattle vaccination or improved genetic resistance, are ready to deploy at later phases of the strategy.
We now have over 20 cull zones that are operational and we envisage additional ones for 2018. Although it is too early to make definitive conclusions, early analysis suggests that the first two cull zones are seeing the anticipated impact in terms of reduced incidence of the disease. However, we do need to consider what further steps or actions should follow the conclusion of each four-year cull. After all, none of us wants to be culling badgers forever. The review will therefore also consider such issues.
The review will be led and overseen by an external chair and I am delighted that Professor Sir Charles Godfray has agreed to take on this role. Professor Godfray is a population biologist with interests including ecology and epidemiology, currently based at the University of Oxford where he is director of the Oxford Martin School. He is also a fellow of the Royal Society. He chaired the independent scientific review of the randomised badger control trial, and is chair of DEFRA’s Science Advisory Council.
The chair will be supported by a small working group, membership of which will be confirmed in due course. The chief veterinary officer and the director of animal and plant health will provide oversight within the Department.
The review is expected to commence in March and to be completed by the end of September 2018. The findings will be submitted to DEFRA Ministers for consideration with a final report published in due course.
As well as this work, DEFRA has launched a consultation on the principle of allowing badger control in the low-risk area to enable rapid action to tackle outbreaks at the local level where there is evidence of infection in badgers linked with infection in cattle, and to help preserve the area’s low disease incidence. Any decision on whether or not to implement badger control in the low-risk area will be taken by the Secretary of State following the consultation, once all the responses have been considered alongside relevant scientific evidence and veterinary advice.
The terms of reference for the review and the consultation have been published on the gov.uk website and placed in the Libraries of both Houses.
[HCWS466]
Fixed Recoverable Costs in Lower-value Clinical Negligence Claims
(6 years, 10 months ago)
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The Minister for Health (Stephen Barclay)
My hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State for Health (Lord O’Shaughnessy) has made the following statement:
Today I am publishing a document summarising the responses we received to our consultation ‘Introducing fixed recoverable costs in lower value clinical negligence claims’.
Following the end of the consultation in May 2017, the right hon. Lord Justice Jackson published a report “Review of Civil Litigation Costs: Supplemental Report Fixed Recoverable Costs”, which included a recommendation that The Civil Justice Council should, in conjunction with the Department of Health and Social Care, set up a working party with both claimant and defendant representatives to develop a bespoke process for clinical negligence claims initially up to £25,000 together with a grid of fixed recoverable costs for such cases.
Ministers at the Department of Health and Social Care and the Ministry of Justice have accepted this recommendation and I would like to inform Parliament that work has commenced in setting up the working party with both claimant and defendant representatives.
The document I am publishing today sets out a summary of what we heard in our consultation, and points to The Civil Justice Council working group as the next step in developing the fixed recoverable costs policy and the report into fixed cost proposals by Professor Paul Fenn.
It is also available online at: http://www.parliament.uk/writtenstatements.
[HCWS472]
Rights of EU Citizens Resident in the UK
(6 years, 10 months ago)
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The Minister for Immigration (Caroline Nokes)
The Government have been clear since the start of negotiations with the EU that protecting the rights of EU citizens in the UK, together with the rights of UK nationals living in EU countries, was their first priority.
Since the opposition day debate on 29 November 2017 secured by the hon. Member for North East Fife (Stephen Gethins) on the vital issue of safeguarding citizens’ rights, we have delivered on that commitment and reached an agreement with our EU partners on citizens’ rights. The agreement was set out as part of a joint report issued on 8 December 2017, and provides more than three million EU citizens living in the UK with certainty about their future rights and, most importantly, allows them and their families to stay in the UK.
The agreement will protect EU citizens who have been exercising free movement rights in the UK at the time of the UK’s withdrawal from the EU. Family members, including those from outside the EU, living lawfully in the UK with a qualifying EU citizen at this point are also protected.
As part of our citizens’ rights agreement, we have agreed with the EU that we will introduce a new settled status scheme under UK law for EU citizens and their family members who are covered by the agreement. Those who have already had five years of continuous residence in the UK will be eligible to apply for settled status. Others will be able to remain in the UK to build up their five years’ residence.
We have agreed with the EU that the eligibility criteria for UK settled status will be the same as, or more favourable than, those set out in the EU Directive 2004/38/EC for acquiring permanent residence. In line with this, we have already committed to setting the evidence requirements to suit the demands of this unique situation and have taken a unilateral decision to introduce more favourable provisions to ensure that everyone lawfully in the UK on exit day will be able to stay. For example, we will not require evidence that economically inactive EU citizens have previously held comprehensive sickness insurance or apply a “genuine and effective” work test. We are engaging closely with representative bodies for EU citizens in the UK to understand all the different circumstances under which they have built their lives in the UK so as to tailor evidential requirements appropriately.
Those who obtain settled status under the agreement on citizens’ rights will be granted indefinite leave to remain in UK law. This status will provide the holder with the same access to benefits, education and healthcare as those who have obtained permanent residence under EU law.
In addition, those granted indefinite leave to remain in line with this agreement will also benefit from certain more favourable entitlements than those with permanent residence under EU law. For example, their status will not lapse unless they have been continuously absent from the UK for over five years, as opposed to two years.
Importantly, our agreement on citizens’ rights has also opened the door for us to finalise work on the development and delivery of the new system for settled status applications.
The scheme, which will open for applications by the end of 2018, will be streamlined, user-friendly and will draw on existing Government data to minimise the burden on applicants to provide evidence.
The Home Office will work with applicants to ensure that their application is not refused on minor technicalities, and caseworkers considering applications will exercise discretion in favour of the applicant where appropriate. As a result, we expect the vast majority of cases to be granted.
To ensure all EU citizens and their families have enough time to apply for UK status, the scheme will remain open for applications for at least two years after the UK leaves the EU. During this period, they will enjoy the rights conferred by the agreement. The application fee will not exceed the cost charged to British citizens for a UK passport, and for those who already have a valid permanent residence document there will be a simple process to exchange this for a new settled status document which will be free of charge.
The agreement reached in December will now be converted into the legal text of the Withdrawal agreement. The withdrawal agreement and implementation Bill will incorporate the contents of the withdrawal agreement, including the agreement on citizens’ rights, into UK law by primary legislation. This will mean that the agreement on citizens’ rights will have direct effect in UK law and EU citizens can rely directly on it.
We are pleased with the progress we have made on citizens’ rights. Reaching an agreement with the EU on this and other separation issues is an important step on our journey towards a new relationship with our European partners.
The Government hugely value the contributions that EU citizens and their families make to the economic, social and cultural fabric of this country, and we have been clear from the start that we want them to stay. The agreement we have reached with the EU will allow EU citizens to do this and continue living their lives as they do now.
[HCWS471]
Housing Market
(6 years, 10 months ago)
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The Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government (Sajid Javid)
The Government believe that consumers should have swift, effective routes to complain and to access resolution when things go wrong with their home—whether they are a tenant, or a homeowner.
We are concerned that the current redress landscape is confusing and does not always support this. There are multiple redress providers, each operating different practices. Even this array of schemes does not provide for every eventuality. Some people have no option but to take a grievance through the courts.
On Sunday 18 February the Government launched a public consultation on strengthening redress in housing. The consultation is open to consumers, providers of housing services, and existing redress schemes, and asks how we can make the system simpler and more effective for consumers.
It asks about consumers’ experiences of redress, and how to improve “in-house” complaint processes to ensure that issues get resolved as quickly as possible.
It considers the practices that redress schemes should adopt in terms of timeliness, accessibility and transparency; and it considers the powers that schemes require to operate effectively.
It also considers gaps in redress, and how these could be filled. This includes consideration of how to implement our commitment to require that all private landlords join a redress scheme, as well as improving access to redress for buyers of new-build homes.
Finally, the consultation also seeks views on whether redress should be consolidated into a single housing ombudsman service and, if so, what form this might take.
The policy proposals primarily relate to England. The UK Government will be discussing these issues with devolved Administrations where existing legislation also has scope outside England.
The consultation will run for eight weeks and ends on 16 April 2018.
Copies of the consultation document will be placed in the House Library and are available on the Government’s website here: https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/strenathening-consumer-redress-in-housing.
[HCWS467]
UN Convention Against Torture
(6 years, 10 months ago)
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The Secretary of State for Justice and Lord Chancellor (Mr David Gauke)
The OPCAT, which the UK ratified in December 2003, requires states parties to establish a “National Preventive Mechanism” (NPM) to carry out visits to places of detention to prevent torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.
The Government established the independent UK NPM in March 2009, and extended its membership in December 2013, and in January 2017. The UK NPM is currently composed of 21 scrutiny bodies covering the whole of the UK, and prepares annual reports on its activities. It also has an independent website at: www.nationalpreventivemechanism.org.uk.
Following previous practice, I have presented to Parliament the eight NPM annual report (Command Paper 9563). This report covers the period from 1 April 2016 to 31 March 2017. I commend the important work that the NPM has carried out over this period and the NPM’s independent role in safeguarding the human rights of detainees across the UK. I also note the NPM’s observations around prisons, children in detention, police and court custody, immigration detention, and health and social care detentions.
[HCWS469]
House of Lords
(6 years, 10 months ago)
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Black Rod
(6 years, 10 months ago)
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The Lord Privy Seal (Baroness Evans of Bowes Park) (Con)
My Lords, I have to inform the House that Her Majesty has appointed Sarah Clarke to be Lady Usher of the Black Rod, in succession to Lieutenant General David Leakey, CMG, CVO, CBE, and that she is at the Door, ready to receive your Lordships’ commands.
Baroness Evans of Bowes Park
My Lords, it is the custom of the House to pay tribute to the outgoing Black Rod on the day that their successor assumes the office. I would like to take this opportunity to thank David for his tireless service to the House during the seven years that he served as Gentleman Usher of the Black Rod.
Noble Lords will be aware that, since David’s retirement in December, the Yeoman Usher, Brigadier Neil Baverstock, has stepped in to serve as acting Black Rod. I am sure I speak for us all when I say that we are extremely grateful to Neil for taking on these essential duties with his typical calmness, good humour and effectiveness, and preparing a smooth handover to Sarah.
With the leave of the House, I would like to pay tribute to David’s distinguished career. He assumed the office of Black Rod in February 2011, following the sadly curtailed tenure of Sir Freddie Viggers, after a distinguished career in the Army spanning four decades. He commanded forces and operations in a number of areas, including West Germany, Northern Ireland and Bosnia. He used his service experience in the latter country to play a critical role as the UK’s military representative during the talks which led to the Dayton agreement in 1995, ending three and a half years of devastating conflict. David also held other senior defence, security and international appointments in the Ministry of Defence and in Brussels, most recently as the director-general of the EU military staff from 2007 to 2010.
As noble Lords know, behind the scenes during his time as Black Rod, David was responsible for arranging six State Openings—a huge operation, which he and his team, including the doorkeepers, always managed with skill and sensitivity. David supervised nine state visits and six addresses by a number of notable Heads of Government and States. As I am sure your Lordships well remember, the successful visits of President Obama and the King and Queen of Spain, as well as the celebrations to mark Her Majesty the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee, were all significant operations, conducted with enormous care. The novel arrangements in the Chapel of St Mary Undercroft, which allowed parliamentarians and the public to pay their respects to Lady Thatcher, Tony Benn and last year to PC Palmer in advance of their funerals, were also conducted with his characteristic thoughtfulness.
Throughout his time as Black Rod, David enjoyed close working relationships with three Serjeants at Arms in the Commons, and oversaw a good deal of change. His open-minded approach to changes in security governance, in particular, was essential in ensuring that the new arrangements under the parliamentary security director have worked well. The fact that those arrangements are now taken for granted by his successor will be one of David’s lasting legacies to this House.
During his tenure David also played a significant role in improving Parliament’s relocation contingency arrangements, overseeing, as one of his final acts as Black Rod, a successful relocation exercise which helped to provide reassurance about the robustness of these arrangements. He leaves Parliament as a whole better equipped to handle the considerable challenges to be faced in the coming years, for which we are grateful.
It would also be remiss of me not to acknowledge the degree of fame that David achieved last year, or rather his legs as adorned by Ede & Ravenscroft’s finest 60 denier tights, when they appeared in the BBC’s “Meet the Lords” documentary.
Beyond David’s professional achievements, many noble Lords will also be aware of his extracurricular musical activities and achievements. He was an active supporter of the National Children’s Orchestra, serving as the chairman until 2014, and within Parliament was a stalwart of the Parliament Choir, overseeing a successful joint concert with the Bundestag choir in Westminster Hall in July 2014. I trust that his retirement will provide ample time for the continued pursuit of these interests.
It simply remains for me to warmly welcome Sarah Clarke to the House. I look forward to working with her. I end by reiterating our thanks to David Leakey for the service he has given to this House, its Members and Parliament as a whole. I wish him, and his wife Shelagh, many happy years of retirement.
Baroness Smith of Basildon (Lab)
My Lords, the noble Baroness has provided a very rounded picture of our outgoing Black Rod, Lieutenant General David Leakey. Like his predecessors, he brought his considerable military experience to Parliament and, as we have heard, he has used his logistical, management and diplomatic experience and skills to great effect, both in good times, for national celebratory events, and in very difficult times, when his diligent and considerate nature was greatly appreciated.
The role of Black Rod has changed over the years, and David’s time in office was one of significant change, particularly in relation to how Parliament manages the security of the estate and of those who work here. The noble Baroness the Leader was right to highlight his flexibility and professionalism in managing such change.
On a personal note, I was very grateful when David supported my campaign for a commemorative brass plaque to recognise the Westminster Hall lying-in-state of those killed in the R101 airship disaster of 1930. After two years’ of Questions and lobbying, finally, with David’s strong support, we were able to welcome the descendants of those who had died and lain in state to an unveiling service in Westminster Hall, where the new plaque is proudly on display—a missing piece of parliamentary history now recognised. Thank you, David.
One of my favourite stories about David was told to me by my noble friend Lord Collins. When he asked Black Rod whether it was compulsory for Peers’ spouses to wear tiaras at State Openings, he was told very firmly and succinctly, “Yes, of course”. “That’s good”, replied my noble friend Lord Collins, “my husband has just bought one”. David’s response is not recorded—it may have been a rare speechless moment—but no tiara was worn.
From men in tiaras to men in tights: the Leader mentioned that the collective memory of your Lordships’ House has been deeply affected by the sight of David on national television in just his long white shirt, quickly and I have to say rather expertly managing to pull on his ceremonial black tights. One day, feeling quite courageous, I summoned up the nerve to ask him why. How did the crew manage to get him to dress in front of the camera? Somewhat embarrassed, he replied that he had got so used to them following him around that, “I just forgot they were there”.
One of the highlights of the parliamentary calendar has to be the State Opening of Parliament, when TVs around the world show that slow parade from your Lordships’ House to the other end of the building, so that Black Rod can summon Members of the elected House to hear the Queen’s Speech. As 2017 brought an unexpected election, the Queen’s Speech unfortunately clashed with a previous commitment in the royal calendar—Ascot. In a full House of Commons, with such formal ceremony, it was a delight to watch David struggle to keep a straight face as Dennis Skinner quipped, “Get your skates on. First race is half past two”.
The Leader paid tribute to and thanked the Yeoman Usher, Brigadier Neil Baverstock, for stepping up as the acting Black Rod following David’s departure. On behalf of these Benches, I add our appreciation and thanks. Neil has served as Yeoman Usher in good and in difficult times, and his calmness under pressure alongside an easy, yet highly efficient manner has been greatly and warmly appreciated.
And now we move into a new era with our new Lady Usher of the Black Rod, Sarah Clarke. When Sarah first saw the newspaper advert, she knew that that she would have to demonstrate that her experience would enable her to fulfil the responsibilities of this position. Following her interviews, we were absolutely confident that she has the skills, the understanding and the personality to take on this role. Who knows, her Wimbledon experience could be very useful during any parliamentary ping-pong—although some things take more time. We warmly welcome her and look forward to working with her, although she may not appreciate the ping-pong joke.
The last word has to be for David Leakey. We wish him and Shelagh a long and enjoyable retirement.
Lord Newby (LD)
My Lords, on behalf of these Benches I too welcome Sarah Clarke very warmly to the House. I and my colleagues look forward very much to working with her. I also express our thanks to Neil Baverstock for serving as acting Black Rod in the intervening weeks since David Leakey’s retirement. We are extremely grateful to him for filling this role with his customary professionalism.
David Leakey had an extremely distinguished career in the Army before he became Black Rod. One of his military roles was particularly useful preparation: from 2004 to 2007 he was commander of the European Union’s peacekeeping force in Bosnia and Herzegovina. His civilian opposite number was my colleague and noble friend Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon, then the EU’s high representative. I doubt whether they saw their regular dealings in Bosnia as training for their eventual roles here, but in any event it clearly stood Black Rod, at least, in good stead. Being a professional peacekeeper would, I am sure, have proved extremely useful training because, in addition to the ceremonial roles played by Black Rod, sorting out disputes between Members of your Lordships’ House has traditionally been an important element in his work. I know from my own period as Chief Whip on these Benches that there were times when Black Rod had to deal with disputes between Peers, sometimes of an essentially trivial nature but of great importance to the Peers concerned. He did it with calm authority and due seriousness.
It takes much meticulous planning to ensure that the great ceremonial and state occasions referred to by the Leader of the House run smoothly and without a hitch. David approached all of these with great skill and care and ensured that they were all flawlessly executed time after time. We are all deeply grateful to David for his dedication to public service and this House. We on these Benches wish him and his wife extremely well in his retirement.
Lord Hope of Craighead (CB)
My Lords, on behalf of these Benches, I join the Leader of the House in welcoming Sarah Clarke most warmly to the House and in expressing our thanks to Neil Baverstock for the exemplary way in which he has served as acting Black Rod since David Leakey’s retirement. We are very fortunate indeed in our Yeoman Usher—and to have such a worthy successor to fill the place that David left behind him.
I am sure I am not alone in being glad that David Leakey was in his usual place in the Chamber on 21 December last year to hear the loud chorus of “Hear, hear” when the Lord Speaker told us that he wished to place on record his thanks and the thanks of the whole House, and to wish him well for the future. The warmth of that response was as good a tribute as one could have wished for, to show the affection in which he was held on all sides in this Chamber.
I think our best memory of him will be of a slim, dapper figure in his Black Rod’s uniform. As we have heard, he made no secret of the fact that he liked dressing up. Perhaps this was because of the bulky clothes, designed for outside duties in a cold climate, which a photograph on a website shows him wearing when, as a brigadier, he was in command of operations in Kosovo. He certainly was not slim and dapper then. He put all of that behind him when he came here. As for the disciplines which guided him during his long and distinguished career in the Army, happily they were not so easily discarded. I recall his attempts to instil some sort of discipline into the very unmilitary combination of the Lord Speaker, the three party leaders and myself as Convenor—I hope my colleagues will forgive me—as we rehearsed for our appearance as commissioners in the Prorogation ceremony at the end of the previous Parliament. We did our best, several times, but I am sure our drill was not really up to his high standards. But if he was disappointed, he was far too polite to show it.
For most of us, much of what David did was unseen. There were the grand occasions that had to be planned for, of course. No state visit is complete without our welcoming the visitor to Parliament. But these things do not just happen. Like all the other ceremonial occasions in which he was involved, they have to be planned for. Nothing must be allowed to go wrong. If anything did go wrong during his time, the mishaps were so small that no one ever noticed. Security issues occupied his time, too. They, too, had to be planned for, and one of his legacies is the improvement of the oversight of the parking of cars in Black Rod’s Garden. But there were occasions when he had to cope with the unexpected, as happened during that dreadful terrorist incident last March, and others when a swift and sympathetic response was called for to attend to the needs of someone who had fallen ill. Unseen to most of us this part of his duties may have been, but the fact that he was here to be called upon as needed and to respond so quickly was a reassurance in itself. For that, as much as for as his ceremonial duties, we are most grateful.
David is not one who is likely to be short of things to do during his retirement. On behalf of these Benches, I join all the others who have spoken in wishing him and his wife well in whatever he may wish to do to occupy his time in the future.
The Lord Bishop of Winchester
My Lords, from these Benches I emphasise our gratitude to Sir David, particularly for the steadfast and dependable way he supported this House during quite a challenging term of office, with threats to the building from without and within. He will be remembered by the Lords spiritual especially for the time he took to welcome each one of us when we first arrived, and of course for his self-deprecating sense of humour.
On a personal note, there has been a long connection between my diocese and holders of the office of Black Rod, and we both serve as officers of the Most Noble Order of the Garter. I am personally grateful to him for the support he gave me when I took up my role as Prelate to the Order. I shall miss our conversations about Kenya, and I hope his retirement from this House will afford him more time to spend on his smallholding. We wish Sarah all the very best in her new role as Black Rod.
The Lord Speaker (Lord Fowler)
My Lords, lastly and briefly, I once again pay my own tribute to David Leakey for his dedicated service to this House and I wish him a long and well-earned retirement. I also thank very sincerely the Yeoman Usher, Neil Baverstock, and his team for stepping into the role for the past two months so very ably. I, too, extend a warm welcome to the new Black Rod, Sarah Clarke, and on behalf of the House I wish her all the best in her new post. In this centenary year of the first enfranchisement of women, I am so pleased that this most historic of roles has finally been taken up by a woman. I hope that her appointment will demonstrate to women everywhere that no job or position is beyond their reach. I very much look forward to working with Black Rod in the years ahead.
Charities, Social Enterprises and Voluntary Organisations
(6 years, 10 months ago)
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Baroness Barker
To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether they have plans to improve the regulation of charities, social enterprises, and voluntary organisations.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (Lord Ashton of Hyde) (Con)
My Lords, the Charity Commission was recognised by the National Audit Office in November last year for making significant progress in improving its regulatory effectiveness. Additional funding of £5 million per year for the Charity Commission was announced in January, as was the preferred candidate for its chair, my noble friend Lady Stowell. The Charity Commission has been clear that safeguarding is a key governance priority. In response to recent safeguarding revelations, the commission has announced a number of measures to ensure that charities learn the wider lessons and that trustees strengthen their own safeguarding arrangements.
Baroness Barker (LD)
I thank the Minister for that Answer. Perhaps more than ever, we need a Charity Commission that is strong, effective and respected by all charities, big and small. Yet for the second time, the Government have nominated as its chair someone who has no noted experience of charities and no noted experience of regulation. Does the Minister agree that to safeguard the independence and authority of the commission, there now needs to be a depoliticisation of the appointment process?
Lord Ashton of Hyde
My Lords, the appointment process is a fair and open recruitment process, in line with the Government’s code for public appointments and regulated by the Commissioner for Public Appointments, so there are no plans to change the process. My noble friend Lady Stowell has already said that if she is appointed as the chair, she will renounce her party membership and move to the Cross Benches. She is well aware of what it takes to be impartial and I am sure she will do a good job, as has been said by many people in the charity sector.
Baroness Nicholson of Winterbourne (Con)
My Lords, while I am sure the Minister will wish to pay tribute to the retiring head of the Charity Commission, William Shawcross, he might be minded to take note of his final comment that some of the huge NGOs now hire extremely expensive lawyers to combat the good advice that they receive from the Charity Commission. Perhaps he might consider fining or getting some reimbursement from those enormous NGOs to heighten the Charity Commissioners’ rather slender budget, as William Shawcross recommended.
Lord Ashton of Hyde
My Lords, the subject of charging for the Charity Commission to enable it to be sustainable is an open question and it will consult on that. I realise that there is an issue of principle here but my noble friend is right that some of these very large charities have considerable means. The suggestion on which the Charity Commission will consult is that only those charities with incomes of over £5 million will be involved. I think that would be about 2,000 charities out of about 168,000 registered charities.
Lord Hylton (CB)
My Lords, we all know that charities have to be regulated in accordance with charity law, but will the Government resist proposals for including social enterprises and voluntary organisations in any enhanced regulation? Surely the variety within civil society, and its constantly branching out into new and creative directions, is a national asset and should be left alone.
Lord Ashton of Hyde
My Lords, I agree with the noble Lord. I do not think there is any suggestion of further regulation of civil society, as such, but we expect all organisations which deal with the public to obey the law. That includes charities but also all civil society. It is one thing that can be considered in the new consultation on the civil society strategy that we are going to launch soon.
Lord Griffiths of Burry Port (Lab)
My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord for bringing to our attention the connection between the activities of the Charity Commission and bodies like it and recent incidents of which we are all too well aware. I have long and profound experience of Haiti and could make my question centre on that, but that is not where the Question laid before us is. Granted, in times of heightened anxiety, such as this, we are all tempted to put regulatory strangleholds on those at the top, whether an NGO, the Charity Commission or even the Government. However, is not the best way of ensuring improvement—so that these things do not happen again—to have adequate procedures as near to the place where these incidents happen as possible, and proper ways of monitoring those activities? Is that not better than finding other rules and regulations simply at the top?
Lord Ashton of Hyde
My Lords, there is lot of sense in what the noble Lord said. One of the things we want to do is to strike a balance. We should remember that all these organisations do good work; that is what they are in business for. We have to be careful about things such as safeguarding. I take the noble Lord’s point about making it near the action, as it were. One thing we are doing is convening two summits, one to focus on international aid charities, which will be jointly chaired by the Secretary of State for International Development, and another, chaired by the Minister for Sport and Civil Society, to concentrate on domestic charities, to look at what we can do to strengthen the safeguarding capability and capacity of charities working across that area. The fact remains that charities and organisations like them do good work on the ground.
Baroness Walmsley (LD)
My Lords, charities are affected not just by regulation but by policy developments. Will the Minister say whether there is a protocol across government to investigate how new policy developments impact on charities and their ability to do their work?
Lord Ashton of Hyde
I do not know whether there is a protocol but the Minister for Sport and Civil Society is the focus for work in policy areas that go across government. We are currently working closely with, for example, the Department for Education and the Department for International Development to make sure that policy development is joined up. The Office for Civil Society, which is based at DCMS, is the focus for that.
Lord Laming (CB)
My Lords, does the Minister agree that the Charity Commission should have powers to require charities to have clear lines of accountability and to be transparent, not only in how they spend their money but in how they handle their staffing issues?
Lord Ashton of Hyde
Yes, one of the issues is the Charity Commission having sufficient resources, not only for regulatory functions but for advice functions. Increasingly, the charitable sector is asking for advice from the Charity Commission and we have to find a sustainable way for it to do that.
Commonwealth Summit
(6 years, 10 months ago)
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Baroness Berridge
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what steps they have taken to promote the forthcoming Commonwealth Summit with schools, universities, non-governmental organisations, and businesses.
The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon) (Con)
My Lords, we have undertaken an extensive public engagement programme across the United Kingdom and the wider Commonwealth to complement and promote the formal summit programme. The Department for Education recently launched a Commonwealth schools pack, which is available to all schools in the UK, to further pupils’ understanding of the Commonwealth and its values. We are engaging schools, universities, non-governmental organisations and businesses and encouraging them to celebrate the Commonwealth and raise the summit profile.
Baroness Berridge (Con)
My Lords, I thank my noble friend for his Answer. It is often stated in this Chamber that the Commonwealth is an underutilised intergovernmental network and has little profile among these institutions and the general public. After the Heads of Government meeting, the UK will be the chair of the Commonwealth for two years until the next Heads of Government meeting. So what plans do Her Majesty’s Government have to promote this with those institutions? Could my noble friend outline the Government’s priorities for this period in office?
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon
My Lords, I agree with my noble friend. The Commonwealth is desperately underleveraged in terms of what it brings together in common languages, common history, common cultures and common opportunities for the future. I am delighted, as all noble Lords will be, that we now have an additional Commonwealth state; the Gambia has joined the Commonwealth family. On my noble friend’s specific questions, the priorities of the Government will reflect what will be decided during the course of the Heads of Government meeting itself, but already we are seeing some real focus on the important areas of empowerment, girls’ education and 12 years of quality education; on areas of cybersecurity; on trade; on tackling issues around climate change; and on the broader agenda of human rights. All these will be reflected during the two years of the UK’s chairing during this period in office.
Lord Morgan (Lab)
My Lords, is not one of the important aspects of the Commonwealth relationship that of higher education? I have taken part in two conferences on that in two citadels of learning, New Delhi and Aberystwyth, both of which are very successful. Can the Minister tell us anything about the degree of prominence that this might have at the Commonwealth summit?
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon
The noble Lord is correct in his statement that the university sector is an important part of the Commonwealth. In this regard, the Commonwealth summit unit within the Cabinet Office is working very closely with the Association of Commonwealth Universities, which has over 500 members, and the Commonwealth Scholarship Commission, which has 900 scholars and thousands of alumni. As for our own commitment, we are giving over £25 million in the current year on the issue of Commonwealth scholarships. These are all part and parcel of the engagement. I am sure all noble Lords will be pleased to know that there is a specific youth forum during the Commonwealth summit week, which is being organised by those 60% of people under 30 across the Commonwealth family.
Lord Collins of Highbury (Lab)
My Lords, one of the aspects of the CHOGM event is that it is an opportunity for Heads of Government to meet civil society. The Minister has mentioned the several different forums that will be taking place. It is also an opportunity to welcome the new South African President to this country. As chair of the constitution committee, he created a first with the constitutional protections for gay rights in the constitution. Will the Minister take the opportunity to ensure that Cyril Ramaphosa is able to meet civil society and the Commonwealth Equality Network so that we can have a voice from Africa standing up for LGBT rights?
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon
My Lords, the noble Lord has put forward a very practical and helpful suggestion and I will follow it up with the Commonwealth unit and the South African high commission. On the broader point about LGBT rights, which I have talked about previously in this Chamber, I have just returned from the Gambia. I assure all noble Lords that during the various meetings that I had with senior members of its Government the issue of LGBT rights, among other human rights, was raised directly.
Baroness Northover (LD)
My Lords, the UK will indeed chair the Commonwealth for the next two years. Will the Cabinet Office unit that is currently planning for CHOGM stay in place for those two years? Will there be a focus on increasing trade with the Commonwealth, given that at the moment only 9% of UK trade goes to the Commonwealth even though it has one-third of the world’s population?
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon
To begin with the final point that the noble Baroness raised—the important element of opportunity within the Commonwealth—she is quite right. I myself mentioned from the Dispatch Box a few moments ago the underleverage and the opportunities of the Commonwealth. Trade will be mentioned specifically in the communiqué, and we are hoping for agreements across the piece on that issue. On the specific issue about the organisation, she is quite right: the current unit sits within the Cabinet Office. It is the intention during our period in office to move the running back to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, but all parts of government will be represented within that team.
Baroness Hayman (CB)
My Lords, does the Minister agree that the global malaria summit, which will be held during the week of CHOGM, gives a great opportunity for all the groups mentioned by the noble Baroness, Lady Berridge, to give their common commitment to a programme to reduce the death toll of malaria in the Commonwealth and beyond?
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon
I totally agree with the noble Baroness and pay tribute to her work on the important issue of fighting and eradicating malaria—we had a very constructive and helpful meeting in that respect. Yes, we are working closely with the organisations Malaria No More and Global Citizen to ensure that eradicating malaria across the Commonwealth 53 and beyond is prioritised. There are 85 NGOs accredited by the Commonwealth, and we are working closely with them as well.
Lord Howell of Guildford (Con)
I am sure my noble friend agrees that this will be a summit with a difference in that it will involve to an unprecedented degree not only businesses and universities but schools, cities and regions right across the United Kingdom. That is very welcome and the preparation has been very thorough and encouraging. Does he agree that the task now is to ensure strong outcomes and results, so that the benefits and opportunities of the modern Commonwealth network, which is quite different to anything in the past, can be spread to business and to the nation as a whole, and so that we support the Commonwealth more strongly than we may have in the recent past?
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon
I totally agree with my noble friend. Of course we will ensure that all the opportunities are appropriately leveraged. He makes an important point on education. I was delighted to be with him only this weekend to celebrate the contribution of British Bangladeshi youth, among the other diasporas, to making our country what it is, also demonstrating the strength and benefits of the Commonwealth not just to the United Kingdom but across the world.
Disabled People: Social Care
(6 years, 10 months ago)
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Baroness Campbell of Surbiton
To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether they have plans to improve social care for disabled people below retirement age in the light of the change in title of the Department of Health.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Health and Social Care (Lord O'Shaughnessy) (Con)
My Lords, the Government are committed to making sure that everyone who is assessed as having a care need can access high-quality support to maintain their independence. While the social care Green Paper will focus primarily on care for older people, it will also address questions relevant to adults of all ages with care needs. In addition, the Government are taking forward a parallel programme of work so that issues specific to working-age adults are considered in their own right.
Baroness Campbell of Surbiton (CB)
I thank the Minister for his reply—but, as he will know, the Government have transferred responsibility for the social care Green Paper for older people from the Cabinet Office to the Department of Health. Will he confirm that the Government will use this opportunity to review the scope of the Green Paper to include younger disabled people, because the proposed parallel process, which is not a Green Paper, is simply not acceptable when half of social care spending now goes on working-age disabled people? Please will the Minister confirm that both older and younger disabled people will receive parity of status and attention from the Government?
Lord O'Shaughnessy
I thank the noble Baroness for her question. She is quite right to highlight the importance of reform for this group of people. We are talking about 250,000 people now, but that is projected to rise to 400,000 working-age adults in the next 15 years. I want to reassure her that, while the Green Paper itself is focused on care reform for older people, a parallel programme of work is going on. There is an important round table coming up which is being chaired by both the new Minister of State for Care, Caroline Dinenage, and the Parliamentary Under-Secretary for Communities and Local Government, with Mencap, Scope and others. We are giving the issue equal seriousness, as it deserves.
Baroness Brinton (LD)
My Lords, the charity Together for Short Lives last year put in a Freedom of Information Act request and found that one in five local authorities and one in six CCGs have absolutely no provision for respite care short breaks for the most seriously ill and disabled children. Since then we have received reports from across the country of more and more centres under threat or actually closing, such as Nascot Lawn, which I have raised in your Lordships’ House before, which is in court again tomorrow to try to save it. What is happening about this social care and nursing care provision for children? Normally, for adults, there is a negotiation between the NHS and the local authority about what is nursing and what is social care. But for these children there seems to be no such relationship; both local authorities and the NHS just point fingers at each other, and the result is children and their families not getting breaks.
Lord O'Shaughnessy
I am very aware of this issue. Indeed, we have had the opportunity to speak about it in specific cases. Local authorities of course are obliged to provide respite care. The noble Baroness highlights an important point about care, which seems in a way to slip between the boundaries of the two. I shall write to her about the general policy work that is going on, but I know that we need to solve this because we have children who are now living longer who before might not have lived so long and who require care, as do their families. It is essential that they get the care that they deserve.
Baroness Thornton (Lab)
My Lords, I know that the Minister will tell me and the House again about the extra billions that the Government are putting into social care. However, when everyone else says that there is clearly a social care crisis, we have some dissonance here. The evidence of this crisis is the regression of opportunity and care for young disabled people, which is there to see in personal cases where people are not receiving the sort of support that they need. I am not convinced about the Green Paper looking at social care for older people. The noble Baroness, Lady Campbell, is right—that makes me more concerned, and I join her in that concern. Will the Minister explain how the Government will achieve their target of 1 million more disabled people being in work by 2027 if they cannot get out of bed and travel to work without help because of this combination of cuts and the stalling of a coherent support policy to make that possible?
Lord O'Shaughnessy
I do not want to disappoint the noble Baroness, but she is aware that more money is going in. To address the specific issue that she talks about—and I obviously can talk about it only from the point of view of the Department of Health—we want and are seeing more disabled people going into work. I would point to one big investment that the Department of Health is making, which is the disabled facilities grant. That is about making sure that disabled people can live at home and have their independence, which of course is critical to maintaining their physical health and confidence to make them, in a way, ready to go into work. I know that there are other programmes being put through job centres and the Department for Work and Pensions to make sure that they are supported, too.
Lord Patel (CB)
My Lords, I take this opportunity to thank the Minister for laying before Parliament today the government response, 11 months after the report was produced, to the House of Lords Select Committee report on the long-term sustainability of the NHS. We will now get an opportunity to debate the report and the Government’s response in due course. One recommendation that was accepted was the renaming of the Department of Health as the Department of Health and Social Care. Attached to that was the recommendation that the budgets should be amalgamated so that we can provide social care to all those who need it—both care for the disabled and adult social care. Would he like to comment on that?
Lord O'Shaughnessy
I am glad to be able to publish the response at last, and apologise again for how long it has taken. I am pleased to report that we have not just changed the name of the department but given the strategic direction for social care policy back to it. That also includes strategic direction of funding—but the actual funding settlement happens through the local government funding settlement. I have to disappoint the noble Lord on that because there are no current plans to change it.
Lord Cormack (Con)
My Lords, in his Answer to the noble Baroness, Lady Campbell of Surbiton, my noble friend referred to a forthcoming round table that will address some of the issues that provoked the Question. Can my noble friend assure me that the noble Baroness will be invited to participate in that round table?
Lord O'Shaughnessy
My noble friend makes an excellent suggestion. It is not my round table, so the invitation is not mine to extend, but I shall certainly be seeing my colleague the Minister of State this evening and shall do everything that I can to encourage that invitation to come.
Apprenticeships
(6 years, 10 months ago)
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The Lord Bishop of Winchester
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what steps they are taking to ensure that young people from disadvantaged backgrounds are not put off taking up apprenticeship scheme places.
The Lord Bishop of Winchester
My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question standing in my name on the Order Paper. In doing so, I declare an interest as patron of YMCA Fairthorne, Hampshire.
Viscount Younger of Leckie (Con)
My Lords, ensuring that apprenticeships are accessible to people from all backgrounds is a priority for this Government. Our funding policy recognises where additional support is necessary through extra funding. We have launched a new partnership with five major cities in England to drive up apprenticeships among under-represented groups. In addition, our careers strategy will mean that young people will have a better understanding of the world of work, including apprenticeships, to help to decide their future careers.
The Lord Bishop of Winchester
I thank the Minister for his Answer. However, a major concern is that disadvantaged students who rely on benefits lose that entitlement when they take up apprenticeships. My colleagues at the national YMCA tell me that 50% of young people say that their apprenticeship salary does not enable them to afford basic living costs. What action are the Government taking to address issues in the benefits framework which adversely affect the ability of young people from disadvantaged backgrounds to successfully complete their apprenticeships?
Viscount Younger of Leckie
My Lords, one of the core principles of an apprenticeship is that it is a genuine job, and it is treated accordingly in the benefits system. Therefore, a young person on an apprenticeship will receive at least the national minimum wage, which will increase to £3.70 per hour for apprenticeships from this April. The Low Pay Commission estimates that up to 34,000 apprenticeships will benefit from that. However, for apprentices claiming benefits in their own right, financial support is available for those on low incomes and young people may be able to claim universal credit or tax credits to help with living costs. As the House will know, universal credit is an in-work benefit, so those young claimants in work on low wages, including apprentices under contract, can continue to claim support for housing.
Lord Aberdare (CB)
My Lords, I know from experience that young people from disadvantaged backgrounds may need extra help and support to enable them to take up, and make a success of, apprenticeships: for example, in areas such as travel, dress, punctuality and behaviour at work. What are the Government doing to support employers, particularly smaller employers, to enable them to provide that kind of support?
Viscount Younger of Leckie
There are a number of initiatives. For example, the DfE and the Department for Transport are looking at ways to ease young apprentices’ travel from home to work. That could take the form of providing extra money or practical ways of getting them to work. It is important that young apprentices are not put off taking up this great opportunity to get a good start in life.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)
My Lords, are the Government aware of the scepticism I have encountered when talking to people in Yorkshire involved in this area over whether the new apprenticeship scheme really will be used to encourage 18 year-old school leavers to take up new apprenticeships as their first job rather than companies using it to upskill those they already employ? Can the noble Viscount assure us that the Government will make every effort to develop links with schools to ensure that children are helped to make the transition to work, particularly in areas such as the construction industry where skills are in desperately short supply?
Viscount Younger of Leckie
The noble Lord is correct: in Britain we desperately need to grow certain skills ourselves. Encouraging employers to go into schools is very much work in progress. The Careers & Enterprise Company has pushed for employers to go into schools to talk to young people about opportunities. Linked to that, the traineeships, which the noble Lord will know about, provide quality training for thousands of young people who need to develop initial skills to help them into the pipeline of getting into apprenticeships and on into a meaningful career.
Lord Howarth of Newport (Lab)
My Lords, does the Minister accept that if we are no longer in the single market and under the European Union requirement for the free movement of labour, there will be much greater incentive for employers to increase the number, and improve the quality, of the apprenticeships they offer to our disadvantaged young people?
Viscount Younger of Leckie
The noble Lord is absolutely right: that is why we are putting so much effort into developing our own apprenticeships. The Institute for Apprenticeships is looking particularly at setting high standards to ensure that employers have the right people on board and that this country has the necessary skills to ensure that we can stand on our own two feet after Brexit.
Lord Trefgarne (Con)
My Lords, is my noble friend aware of the shortage of apprentices in the engineering sector, due, sadly, to a lack of encouragement on the part of their secondary schools? I speak as a former chairman of the Engineering Training Authority.
Viscount Younger of Leckie
That may well be the case, but, as I said already, there are several initiatives with employers going into schools, to ensure that schools can push further to encourage apprentices. It is important to create parity of esteem between apprentices and those going along the academic path. A lot of work needs to be done. There are advertisements on the radio at the moment—I heard one on my way in last night—and a full marketing or promotional campaign is going on.
Lord Watson of Invergowrie (Lab)
My Lords, when the Prime Minister announced her review yesterday, she called for parity of esteem between academic and technical routes, to create what she called,
“a system of tertiary education that works for all our young people”.
That is certainly a worthwhile objective. Yet, bizarrely, the Department for Work and Pensions does not class apprenticeships as approved education or training, which leads to the sort of problems outlined by the right reverend Prelate in his Question. Can the Minister envisage a situation in which a 16 year-old goes to his or her parents and says, “I’m considering an apprenticeship or going to further or higher education, and in one of those cases you will lose my child benefit and your tax credits”? It is not difficult to see what road the parents will usher him or her down. To deal with this structural barrier, will the Minister speak to his colleagues from the Department for Work and Pensions to get them to understand that there will have to be some change if a level playing field is to be created for apprenticeships?
Viscount Younger of Leckie
The Government are doing an enormous amount to encourage apprenticeships for all, and in particular for those from disadvantaged backgrounds. The noble Lord mentioned parental input, but it is a joined-up effort of parental input plus schools, led by our own careers strategy. As the noble Lord will know, schools have a mandatory obligation to give proper careers guidance to young people. It is very important indeed that we raise the level of advice that is given to young people on careers.
Automated and Electric Vehicles Bill
Tuesday 20th February 2018
(6 years, 10 months ago)
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The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Transport (Baroness Sugg) (Con)
My Lords, as announced in the Industrial Strategy last year, automated and electric vehicle technology forms an important part of the “future of mobility” grand challenge. This grand challenge sets out the ambition to create a long-term, strategic dialogue and partnership between government and industry, and to support sectors that can drive growth in the future. The Bill creates a framework to support automated and electric vehicle technology as it continues to develop and becomes more commonplace in our lives. It will lay the insurance framework as we prepare for fully automated vehicles on our roads, and provides for infrastructure that is easy to use for electric vehicle owners. Along with electrification, automation will make profound changes to our future vehicles and mobility.
First, on automated vehicles, it is over 85 years since the UK first introduced compulsory motor insurance for drivers on British roads to protect victims of collisions involving motor vehicles. The advent of a motor insurance framework in the Road Traffic Act 1930 revolutionised the car industry, enabling the mainstream sale of vehicles and changing the way people travelled throughout the country. Today, we face another revolutionary change in how we travel by road, thanks to innovative advances in computing and sensor technology. Vehicle manufacturers are already delivering advanced driver-assistance systems, and in the near future we will see the arrival of vehicles capable of safely driving themselves, at least in some circumstances or situations.
Noble Lords may recall our debate in December on last year’s report Connected and Autonomous Vehicles: The Future? from the Lords Science and Technology Committee, which highlighted how automated vehicles could present an enormous opportunity for the UK, flagged some of the challenges and made recommendations to government. I thank the committee, led by my noble friend Lord Selborne, for the helpful and insightful contributions to this exciting field of automotive technology, and I look forward to this discussion continuing through the passage of the Bill.
The benefits of this new technology, for both mobility and wider society, have huge potential. The public could have their lives transformed for the better by the introduction of new and innovative mobility solutions. This could be particularly transformative for those who cannot currently drive: for instance, the elderly and people with disabilities that impair them from easily accessing different transport modes. Automated vehicles also have the potential to improve road safety by reducing the influence of human error. In 2016, human error was involved in over 85% of all reported UK road incidents. By automating the driving task, human lives could be saved on our roads.
Along with opportunities, there are many challenges in the area of automated vehicles, not least ethical questions and public acceptance of this technology. The Government are taking a number of steps to address these wider issues, including carrying out a three-year project with the Law Commission to set out proposals for a long-term regulatory framework for self-driving vehicles and investing in public demonstrations of these vehicles. The Bill that we are discussing today focuses on just a few elements of the Government’s work in this area.
To ensure the safe arrival of automated vehicles, we will need a compulsory motor insurance framework that is fit for purpose to support consumers and businesses involved in accidents. The Bill provides that framework. Currently, as the driver’s use of the vehicle, rather than the vehicle itself, is insured, collisions involving automated vehicles that occur when the driver is legitimately disengaged from the driving task may not be covered. Having consulted widely and worked closely with parliamentary colleagues, the automotive industry and the insurance industry, the Government are creating a new compulsory insurance framework within the Bill that covers motorists both when they are driving and when the driver has legitimately handed control to the vehicle. This framework will place a first-instance liability on insurers so that they can pay out to victims and, where they can, recover costs from the liable party.
We will ensure that victims continue to have quick and fair access to compensation by taking steps to align the way that consumers can buy insurance to the way they do now. As the Bill has progressed, we have been reassured of this approach by the support offered by both the insurance and the vehicle manufacturing industries. James Dalton, director of general insurance policy at the Association of British Insurers, has said:
“We support the approach the Government has taken in the Bill, as this will give the industry time to prepare for the commercial rollout of fully automated driving technology”.
As I said, these measures are part of a broader programme to ensure that automated technology is developed here and that, once ready, we are prepared to see it deployed on our roads.
While we prepare for the advent of fully automated vehicle technology, the Bill also seeks to encourage the use of electric vehicles by expanding and improving the network of charge points and hydrogen refuelling stations for plug-in and fuel cell electric vehicles. It is this Government’s ambition that by 2050 almost every car and van will be zero-emission. This commitment to zero-emission vehicles is technology neutral and should be industry-led but the Government have an important role to play. We are acting now to ensure that the right infrastructure is available right across the UK to meet the needs of current and future electric vehicle drivers. More electric vehicles on our roads will reduce pollution and improve local air quality, as well as deliver economic benefits. One in five battery electric cars sold in Europe in 2016 was made in the UK.
As numbers on our roads increase, owners need to be able to drive their vehicles and have confidence that they will be able to easily locate and conveniently access public charging infrastructure if they need to. We are investing nearly £1.5 billion between April 2015 and March 2021 to boost the number of electric vehicles on UK roads, and the Bill is a key enabler in delivering the infrastructure to support this.
The measures in the Bill will give the Government powers to make it easier for electric vehicle owners to charge their vehicles. To improve the consumer experience of using public charge points, the Bill includes the power to mandate a common method of payment and ensure that they are equipped with certain types of physical connector. This will give consumers confidence that, when they arrive at a public charge point, they will be able to plug in and pay conveniently.
The Bill also includes powers to mandate the provision of open data on the location and availability of charge points to a common standard. This will help drivers find charge points quickly and easily when they need to. To ensure the provision of sufficient infrastructure at strategic sites and overcome fears of range anxiety for anyone undertaking longer journeys, the Bill provides powers to require motorway service areas and large fuel retailers to provide charge points and hydrogen refuelling facilities.
The Bill also provides powers to require charge points in the future to be “smart”—that is, they will be able to receive, understand and respond to signals sent by third parties, such as National Grid. The Bill also provides a power to ensure that data transmitted from charge points to specified bodies such as National Grid is not stopped or disrupted so that energy demand can be accurately mapped and addressed. These requirements will enable the flexible management of electricity supply and demand and the ability for electricity networks to balance themselves at times of peak demand. This will also make sure that consumers can take advantage of managing their own charging patterns—for example, charging up when electricity is cheapest and potentially even selling electricity back to the grid at times of peak demand.
I fully acknowledge that with both automated and electric vehicles, there are many areas that the Government need to focus on, take action on and invest in. The Bill addresses just some of these issues but, taken together, the measures in it demonstrate the readiness of the UK to be part of this latest transport revolution to deliver easier, cleaner and safer journeys for everyone. The Bill is designed to put the UK on the front foot, ready to take advantage of the social and economic benefits these technologies will bring. I beg to move.
Lord Campbell-Savours (Lab)
My Lords, I apologise to the House because my voice is a little frail today, after a rather difficult week.
I regret to say that I have mixed feelings over the introduction of the Bill, although I particularly welcome provisions dealing with battery technology. I believe that the moment the industry can claim 450 or 500-mile ranges for vehicles, particularly motor cars—with adequate charging points at home, on the roadside and in commercial areas—the market will take off.
However, I see two impediments. First, the price of home-charging units will inevitably go up because the Exchequer will have to compensate for the revenue loss on hydrocarbons, particularly taking into account the fact that some people will use their electric vehicles far more regularly than others. We need a little more information about how hydrocarbon revenues will be made up. Also, if home-charging rates are put up, we might get tax evasion—as we have with pink diesel, which has been a major area of tax evasion over the years. Secondly, the introduction of electric vehicles has consequences for west African and Middle Eastern politics: oil-producing countries that are dependent on hydrocarbon production will be in a rather difficult position. I am not opposing it at all, but I am not sure that we have altogether thought through the political consequences for those parts of the world.
Although I welcome the provisions on battery usage, I take a very different view on driverless vehicles. From the 2017 Budget report, I understand that the Government want to see some of them on the road by 2021. That worries me. I regard the development of driverless car technology as premature and, in the main, probably unnecessary—a huge black hole down which millions, perhaps billions, of pounds will be lost as promoters increasingly experience regulatory problems, software failure problems, contested legal liability—despite the first-instance arrangements that the Minister referred to—roadside vehicle control technology problems, road pricing arguments, public expenditure or infrastructure constraints, traffic delays leading to congestion and, most of all, driver frustration, which does not appear to have been considered to date. I foresee huge driver frustration with the technology. I am not suggesting that driverless vehicles will never happen; they will come one day, but only after the increasing problem of congestion has been resolved—particularly as every year there are more and more vehicles on our roads— public transport has been hugely improved, and there have been developments in as yet unexploited overhead transport systems in inner-city areas. The high-speed agenda currently being pursued is premature.
I will take two areas where the Bill seeks to reassure us. On insurance, we had a report from the Science and Technology Committee in February 2017. Paragraphs 54 to 59 of that excellent report are on liability and insurance and describe occasions,
“when an accident occurs and the car is in fully autonomous mode. In this case the ‘driver’ is not necessarily liable and liability could lie with the manufacturer of the vehicle”.
The report goes on to state that there were,
“some remaining issues, particularly around product liability”.
That is the understatement of 2017. The whole approach to vehicle liability will turn into a legal nightmare in the end despite the assurances given by the Minister. It is a lawyer’s dream, with different legal jurisdictions internationally drawing up different protocols, law, appeal arrangements and perhaps even immunities.
If noble Lords want more evidence of that, we need do no more than examine the provisions in the Bill. Clause 3(2) states:
“The insurer or owner of an automated vehicle is not liable under section 2 to the person in charge of the vehicle where the accident that it caused was wholly due to the person’s negligence in allowing the vehicle to begin driving itself when it was not appropriate to do so”.
“Inappropriate to do so” will be very expensive words, because the lawyers will make a mint out of it. They will love that one. How about this one?
“An insurance policy in respect of an automated vehicle may exclude or limit the insurer’s liability … for damage suffered by an insured person arising from an accident occurring as a direct result of …a failure to install safety-critical software updates that the insured person”—
once again we are into an area that the lawyers will love—
“knows, or ought reasonably to know, are safety critical”.
That is also worth a few bob.
We will end up in trench warfare between the likes of Microsoft, Tesla, Dyson, Ford, Mitsubishi and the big insurance companies and poor old Joe Bloggs, the innocent man caught in the middle, with 100 cars barping and beeping behind him as he sits at a congested roundabout with two software systems in two separate cars screaming and arguing with each other over who should go first. If the wrong one proceeds and clouts the other, there will be some very angry queueing drivers behind. It will be like a road traffic accident in Italy in the 1950s and 1960s—some noble Lords may recall them. Whenever there was an accident there would be a huge crowd of people surrounding the cars. The reason was of course because there was only third-party insurance and someone was going to pay. That is the kind of argument that I see us getting into.
I have another example on software conflict. Clause 2(2)(d) states that:
“Where … an accident is caused by an automated vehicle when driving itself”,
and,
“a person suffers damage as a result of the accident”,
the insurer is liable for the damage. But which car’s insurer? I heard insurance companies referred to, but will they stand up at the end of the day? People pay premiums to insurance companies and there comes a point where someone has to take a decision on conditions of software conflict.
I ask myself a simple question. Should a vehicle owner who is not driving, an attendant driver, a passenger or any other person be held responsible in law in any way for a software malfunction beyond their knowledge or control that leads to damage to another vehicle or injury to others? By others I mean people in the car allegedly at fault, persons in another vehicle, pedestrians in the street or persons on private property. What about a multiple accident on a motorway? That will be an interesting one for the lawyers.
That brings me to the equally important issue of offences under the road traffic Acts. Again, I ask a simple question: who is liable when the software leads the vehicle to drive down a cycle lane, which is punishable in law? Who is liable if the vehicle turns right at a “No right-hand turn” sign, which is punishable; or exceeds the speed limit, which is punishable; passes through a red light, which is punishable; or enters a one-way street the wrong way—punishable? I have no reason to believe that these issues have been sorted out.
Finally, I have been referred to case law which is based on a House of Lords decision of 1925: Donoghue v Stevenson, known as the “snail in the bottle” case. It established the civil tort of negligence and obliged manufacturers to observe a duty of care towards customers. I should make it clear that I am not a lawyer; I am simply referring to the comments of others. In that decision, it was established that a manufacturer owes a duty to the consumers who it intends to use its products. This arose out of the need for negligence to be dependent on contract. It enforced the concept of a duty between the parties concerned. The lawyers will argue that in the case of the driverless car the software manufacturer, or even the vehicle manufacturer, stands in the front line of responsibility in both accidental damage and injury, and perhaps even in the unimaginable circumstance of road traffic Acts penalty fine payments. As I say, I am most unhappy about this latter part of the Bill. I know that the noble Baroness has given us assurances on first-instance responsibility, but I do not believe that it is going to work, or at least not yet.
Lord Borwick (Con)
My Lords, I must first declare my interests in the register as the chairman of the advisory board for the GATEway Project, the Greenwich automated vehicle test project which is running automated pods around the Greenwich peninsula. It is particularly concentrating on the human reactions to automated vehicles. Historically, I was the executive chairman and founder of an engineeringly fascinating but financially disastrous business called Modec, which manufactured and sold 400 pure electric delivery vehicles. We sold them around the world to brave pioneers like UPS, FedEx and Tesco. This was a zero-emission, battery-powered truck where the only emissions of carbon dioxide came from the driver. Alas, the idea came around too early, by at least 15 years, and I had to shut it down, but it did teach me a few things about electric vehicle manufacture—notably, that pioneering is expensive.
I first welcomed this Bill as a good step forward, but when I looked at it in detail, I did not think that it had been fully thought through. It seems to be a Bill that says, “Something must be done!”, but it does not really say what is to be done. Take, for instance, the definitions set out in Clause 8 in Part 2 of the Bill. There is a definition for a “hydrogen refuelling point”, but those points are not mentioned anywhere else other than in the definition, nor does the Bill aim to legislate for them, so why are we attempting to define hydrogen refuelling points in this Bill? In fact, one might argue that Part 2 provides powers only to regulate and does not produce new legislation at all.
I am sure that my noble friend the Minister will agree that it is important to get more electric vehicles into the market, not least because of the enormous improvements to air quality that can be delivered as a result. She will no doubt agree that leadership is better than legislation to achieve this. Would she therefore agree to add what pressure she can to the authorities in this noble House to ensure that electrical charging points are installed in our noble car park at the front of the Palace? Should we not install the very same sort of points that we are contemplating requiring large petrol stations to have?
Yesterday, I had the privilege of taking a test drive in a new Nissan Leaf, a car that will be made in Sunderland very soon. It can be recharged quickly, in about 40 minutes, so you can imagine that during a long journey that will be a chance for the driver to have a welcome cup of tea while the Nissan Leaf is recharging. But in a motorway service station, the restaurant is always some way away from the pumps, for health and safety reasons. Will the regulations contemplated in Part 2 deal with installing the charge points somewhere more convenient to the driver?
My noble friend the Minister has mentioned that the Bill is important to achieve the ambition of making the UK a centre of excellence for electric and autonomous vehicles. I share that ambition, but I am not sure that the Bill as presently drafted and without the regulations helps to achieve it.
I have quite a few comments about Part 1, specifically about the insurance of automated vehicles. I noticed the word “must” in the first line of Clause 1(1). I do not understand the implications of it. Does it make the Secretary of State liable if he fails to do this task? Why do we have “must” when the more usual “may” would do? The words in Clause 1(1)(a) and (b) are different, in that paragraph (a) defines that the vehicle travels on the roads but paragraph (b) does not. I can imagine an agricultural tractor driving on the roads manually, but autonomously only in a field. This would fall into both categories, but would not be an autonomous vehicle in most people’s opinion. Similarly, the self-parking function of a vehicle such as a Nissan Leaf might make it fall into both paragraphs (a) and (b), were it not for the qualification in Clause 7.
What is the meaning of Clause 7(1)(a),
“does not need to be monitored”?
In the Bill, it is a phrase used to define autonomous vehicles and whether they are to be included in the list, but in my opinion its meaning is uncertain. Does this mean level 5 in the worldwide accepted standard for autonomous vehicles, those of the SAE, the Society of Automotive Engineers? “Monitored” means different things to different people and is not defined in the Bill. If the Government are unwilling to accept other organisations’ standards, does it mean actually monitored by a driver with a suitable licence, or that it actually needs someone sitting in the driver seat?
What does “monitored” mean? Does it include operating the vehicle from a connected iPad, as might be done by a disabled driver in their wheelchair? When I take the tube, there is a lever to pull in cases of emergency. Does this not mean that the carriage is monitored by the passenger? Similarly, with an autonomous vehicle, if there is a button to press that stops or overrides vehicles in cases of emergency—I hope that it does have that—does that not therefore mean that the vehicle is constantly monitored for emergencies? If that is the case, surely the interpretations outlined in Clause 7 mean that there will be no vehicles on the list at all until level 5 vehicles are sold.
What does the word “safely” in,
“capable … of safely driving themselves”,
mean? As this will be used only when there is an accident, will someone argue that the vehicle cannot drive safely if it cannot avoid an accident? I have received an email from the Bill team that explains the need by saying, “A requirement for a vehicle to be capable of driving itself safely is not a requirement for it to be incapable of driving itself unsafely”. Could we have a meeting in which the Minister can explain to me slowly—very slowly—the meaning of, “a requirement for it to be incapable of driving itself unsafely”?
There is another “must” in Clause 1(3):
“The Secretary … must publish the list … each time it is revised”.
Is this practical when the Tesla, for example, may have the ability to safely drive itself turned on or off by remote software? When Tesla remotely downloads software, must a new edition of the Secretary’s list be issued? Is my noble friend sure that this is practicable?
One of the biggest costs in the insurance industry comes from ignorance, either of the driver or other road users. One of the advantages of autonomous vehicles is in the number of television or LIDAR cameras that they will carry. This trend is already starting with dash cams, but I would like to ensure that the guilty party in a crash does not feel tempted to delete the evidence from their car cameras. More cameras ought to reduce the cost of insurance.
Finally, I suggest that the regulation-making clauses should be amended. I have discussed this Bill with lawyers who have suggested that these powers are limited to Part 2 and therefore are relevant only to charging points. Similar powers are needed for the autonomous vehicle industry as they are likely to change faster than the electrical charge points. The focus should be on putting in place legislation which is as agile as it can be. This will enable it to develop, adapt and evolve with the technology that it tries to regulate. It could also help to remove obstacles, clarify grey areas and provide short, medium and long-term solutions which help demonstrate that the UK is a centre of excellence for the future development, testing and commercialisation of CAVs.
To summarise, I share the Government’s aim to put the UK at the front of the pack in developing and using these new technologies. The Bill as drafted does not yet help us achieve that ambition, because it merely enables future regulations. I hope that the regulations will help us achieve that ambition. Can my noble friend the Minister give us an indication of when these regulations will be published?
Lord Craig of Radley (CB)
My Lords, it is a great pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Borwick, with his incisive critique of many aspects of the Bill. I understand that the Government are keen to be seen to be helpful and supportive of this new technology. The content and thrust of the Bill before the House today amply demonstrate that enthusiasm. It smacks of a “just do it” approach to this topic. I have no wish to be a spoil-sport but I am astonished that almost nothing is said, let alone covered, about safety: that is, road safety.
Not one element of the Bill has any realism unless the listed driverless vehicles are known to be safe for use on motorways, on all other major or minor roads up and down the country, on streets and avenues and in other urban settings wherever they may be cleared and allowed to roam. The safety not only of the occupants of the driverless car but of all other road users must be fully considered and regulated.
There must be negligible probability that they will behave like bumper cars, banging into each other or other vehicles or road users, or striking and damaging property. However, the Bill’s total coverage of this critical issue is limited to,
“in the Secretary of State’s opinion”—
in Clause 1(1)(b)—and a number of references to “safety-critical software”. It may be that the Secretary of State’s opinion will be that a particular type of vehicle can be used driverlessly only on motorways or dual-carriage highways, or he may have other ways of bracketing or classifying different makes or models of driverless vehicles and where, or where not, they may go.
While manufacturers’ undertakings will be an important guide, they surely cannot be the last word. One has but to recall the problems over diesel exhaust emissions to know how to answer that question. How is the Secretary of State to be satisfied that some enthusiastic DIY driverless car maker’s pet construction passes muster for safety—the safety, that is, not only of the occupants of the driverless car but of all other road users? It and all driverless-capable vehicles must be well described and regulated in ways that address the fundamental point of “safe to use”. Surely some MOT coverage of the automatics and its software will be necessary, too, as the vehicle ages.
Whatever methods the Secretary of State might use to arrive at their opinion, there must be some clear, publicly transparent criteria that underpin the opinion and manufacturers’ claims. In her letter of 8 February the Minister stated that the,
“approval process, which ensures that all”,
automated,
“vehicles on our roads are safe, is still in its infancy”.
She also mentioned discussions with the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe on this topic. But surely we must have our own national standards set out if we wish to be in the vanguard of using this new technology.
The repeated use of the phrase “safety-critical software” worries me, too. It is presumably meant to sound reassuring—until we ask how “safety-critical” is defined and who decides. Does it not imply that the vehicle was unsafe before the software update? There are also the so-called ethical and moral issues touched on in debates in the other place. I shall not dwell on them, but of course they will need resolution.
Without in any way trying to detract from the purpose of the Bill, I invite the noble Baroness to give some indication or explanation as to how the Government view and will deal with the road safety and ethical aspects of these vehicles and give insurers confidence in the safety performance of the new vehicles that they will be asked to insure. On a perhaps slightly lighter note, I hope that a more user-friendly word or expression than the phrases “driverless vehicle” or the even more legalistic and laborious “automated vehicle when driving itself” might be adopted. Once these vehicles become more than a pipe dream, the public will surely have coined a word. Look how the word “mobile” has been coined for such telephones. Might the now archaic word “autocar”, unhyphenated, first in use in the 1880s, and “autovan”, et cetera, be adopted? Perhaps the Minister might consider this use, with a definition in the Bill that resurrects this 19th-century word—or suggest another more user-friendly descriptor should the magazine Autocar decide to claim prior rights to the word.
While I might have no difficulty sitting back and reading the paper or answering my mobile as my automated vehicle—my autocar—takes me safely along a motorway or major dual carriageway, I doubt that I could feel safe on the many narrow and winding roads I frequently use when at home in Norfolk. Often, when another car approaches and the road is too narrow for both to pass, one courteously backs to a spot where the verge has been sufficiently flattened to allow enough space for the other to squeeze by. Will driverless cars display such courtesy or be able to decide which should reverse? How about roadworks that require vehicles to queue and pass in turn? Will the autocar approaching a stationary queue of cars ahead, waiting for the controlling traffic lights to go from red to green, too far ahead to be visible from the back of the queue, be able to distinguish that back of the queue from a couple or more vehicles parked by the side of the road, or will it erroneously decide to overtake?
Getting such autocar decisions wrong would have obvious safety risks. Even if such roadworks are hazard-signed and preregistered on GPS, there are also so-called mobile roadworks, with traffic control being maintained by two individuals with stop and go boards. Could an automatic vehicle cope with that as well, or would such roadworks have to be banned? These are but a couple of examples of my actual road traffic experiences in the past couple of weeks. Until such issues are resolved, the hype about the benefits that autocars will bring to those unable to drive themselves seems wildly premature.
To conclude, will the noble Baroness explain the Government’s thinking on their approach to safety in the regulation, approval and use of autocars? I am of course confident that her department will have been giving safety much thought—so, if the noble Baroness prefers, I am happy for her to write to me. With that, I have no other points to raise.
Viscount Goschen (Con)
My Lords, I say at the outset that I very much welcome the Bill. The Government are indeed to be commended for making a start—it is really only a start—on the creation of a regulatory framework for the operation of autonomous vehicles and for enhancing the infrastructure to support electric vehicles. I add my usual, somewhat tangential, declaration of interest in that I work for an executive search firm which serves the high-technology and manufacturing sectors, among others.
Perhaps the first thing to say is that this is a field which is developing incredibly rapidly and is therefore unbelievably difficult to legislate for with any degree of certainty. We should all understand that while we are not quite ready for the operation of fully autonomous vehicles, what we are discussing is not a pipe dream or science fiction: although it must be considerably refined, the core technology exists now. The challenges are much less about the physical operation of the vehicle and more about the interaction with other parties and the regulatory and safety framework that the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Craig, referred to a moment ago.
Commercial aircraft have been utilising auto-land and fully automatic control systems for many years, with extremely high levels of reliability and integrity. Of course, they are operating in a highly controlled environment, but in terms of the physical operation of very complex machines in three dimensions, in all weathers and at high speeds, there are no concerns. In the military sphere UAVs are rapidly displacing manned airborne systems. At the other end of the spectrum, even consumer drone technology is quite extraordinarily capable in this regard. I have seen demonstrated one machine costing a few hundred pounds which can fly many kilometres and return to its launch site, avoiding collision with fixed and moving objects, and which is even capable of following a moving vehicle autonomously. These are the guides to the future.
We know that on the road real progress has been made in the development of autonomous vehicles, particularly their computing power and sensing capabilities. In some jurisdictions prototypes are even now operating on the roads; that is not without incident, but we should be in no doubt that the industry is moving ahead at great pace. As we have heard, already many cars are supplied with automatic—as opposed to autonomous—systems such as lane assist, park assist and various systems to apply the brakes to prevent collisions on motorways. But these do require oversight from the driver—at least, legally. I suspect that there will be a degree of confusion over what is required of the driver when he or she is operating a vehicle fitted with this type of system. There is an important role for the Government in making drivers aware of their continued responsibility for collision avoidance, no matter how clever their vehicles are, until those vehicles are specified by the Secretary of State in the manner envisaged by the Bill, which is many years off.
What is missing now is a regulatory regime to allow the operation of this type of vehicle. As we have heard, it is exceptionally difficult to legislate in this fast-moving technological arena. We can be sure that whatever we envisage in your Lordships’ House this afternoon will be outdated and superseded within just a few years. None the less, that is not an excuse for doing nothing. There is not an option to wait and see what develops. These initiatives are being pursued around the world, so we need to move forward and take the first steps towards creating that framework. Of course, technology does not recognise national boundaries, and if ever there was an area of the law which demanded co-operation with other countries, surely this is it. Whatever happens in our settlement with our European partners over the coming months and years, clearly it is absolutely vital that we pursue a transparent regime that is fully aligned in terms of standards, approaches and interoperability.
As I said earlier, we have to start somewhere, and the Government have chosen to prioritise dealing with insurance issues as the best place to start. I can understand the pressure from manufacturers and insurance companies to set the ground rules, and we should recognise that the Bill is a creditable and important first step. However, it is only that, and on its own it will achieve very little until we see the other areas of important regulation which will actually facilitate the operation of these vehicles. None the less, it is a start and the Government are to be congratulated on it.
The structure for how we approach the broader regulation of AVs is both highly complex and evolving. I think that the boundaries between the regulation of road vehicles and of other forms of automated transport, such as aerial drones, will become increasingly blurred; whether a vehicle travels along the road and whether it leaves it for certain sections remains to be seen. The regulatory, moral and ethical questions are legion, particularly as we are considering not just how machines interact with each other but how they interact with humans as fellow road users and pedestrians, and even with animals. For example, what happens with policemen trying to deal with a fast-moving situation on a motorway—how can they communicate in the way that they do with vehicles that are operated by human drivers?
Along with other noble Lords who have spoken this afternoon, I ask my noble friend the Minister to give at least an indication—not in any detail—of the Government’s thinking on how they would approach the broader regulatory environment. Particularly contentious areas will include the certification of the autonomous systems themselves, as we have unique regulations. Our Highway Code in the UK is not the same as that of other countries, so the Government will have to have the capability to evaluate the assumptions and algorithms that lie behind the computing for these highly complex systems. Another area is that of training for human drivers in how they interact with autonomous vehicles. There is that critical lack of eye contact, through which one can gain an understanding of the other driver’s intentions—the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Craig, gave a great example of a driver reversing courteously to prevent a traffic jam. We also need to consider integrity and the protection against hijack, for want of a better term, of these vehicles.
The noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, presented a very pessimistic view, if he will allow me. He almost seemed to say that we should not really do anything right now because it is very complicated; indeed it is, but we need to make a good start now. He should be reassured that machines really are very much better at performing many mechanical and computational functions than humans. I suspect that if we were moving from an autonomous environment to allow the manual operation of vehicles, there would be a bigger outcry and the risk might well be higher. The prize is there in terms of road safety and particularly, I suggest, of environmental reduction.
On the subject of electric propulsion and that section of the Bill, briefly, it is indisputable that such propulsion has many significant benefits, particularly in environmental factors but also in terms of performance. We are seeing an unstoppable wave of investment and new product development from almost all established automotive manufacturers and from some exciting new entrants. We know the limiting technological factors—battery capacity and the length of time it takes to charge the battery—and they are being addressed rapidly. But the Government have their part to play in seeking to address the current charging infrastructure. I suspect that once the electrical vehicle movement gains critical mass, as it almost has now, then commercial imperatives, innovation and the operation of the free market will solve many of the problems that we seek to solve through the rather clunky method of primary legislation. I also suspect that areas of the Bill will become otiose quite quickly. None the less, the Government have a clear role in helping to co-ordinate and align interoperability, nationally and internationally, and to facilitate the provision of greater infrastructure.
Finally, I want to say a word about power and the degree to which we take electricity for granted. I direct your Lordships’ attention to a video clip on YouTube that shows the German Olympic cyclist Robert Forstemann, an immensely powerful sprinter, nearly killing himself at maximum effort on a static bicycle connected to a generator. He struggled to maintain 700 watts of output for a number of minutes—the equivalent of climbing a 40-degree incline. His challenge was to produce enough electricity to toast a single slice of bread; he just about manages that but afterwards was completely shattered and collapsed in agony on the floor. It is a great illustration of how we take for granted the flick of a switch, whereas to move these vehicles around takes enormous reserves of power, which is itself a scarce resource.
Lord Berkeley (Lab)
My Lords, like many noble Lords, I also welcome the Bill as an heroic attempt to deal with the challenges. It certainly has not dealt with them all but it is a good start.
The complexity is well illustrated in the schedule, which to me demonstrates the need for a comprehensive review of all road traffic legislation. I know we will not get that at the moment; it would be a lawyer’s paradise. But the Minister mentioned some work by the Law Commission, which I found interesting. Its work seems a bit delayed. Five years ago, the Law Commission produced an excellent report on making level crossings safer not only for trains but for cars, lorries and so on, and we still have not seen any legislation about that. If there is to be legislation, I hope this Bill does not jump the queue.
The term “automated vehicles” also applies to railways and shipping, where they are happening. We have not yet heard how you would rescue a ship in the middle of the Atlantic if the whole thing fails, but no doubt we will. I think drones are excluded, but the noble Viscount, Lord Goschen, talked about air. It all comes back to public acceptance. There is already a trucking experiment—probably more than that—going on in Germany. What are called “platoons”—of three trucks, I think—are driving down what I think is a private motorway. I am told that they have even found a way of having two platoons driving together in adjacent lanes and automatically hitching and unhitching the second or third truck with no driver in it between one and the other. I shall not explain where they could have come from, but they would all be going along at the same pace. How you deal with other people who want to overtake in a car, goodness knows. That is happening, and one of the failures of the Bill is that it does not take into account the road freight sector, where the challenges are probably different. The results may be different, but it is definitely happening. On the whole, a greater number of professional drivers are driving or controlling them than there possibly are in the private car sector.
Clause 1 refers to the listing of automated vehicles and their data. I think many noble Lords will have received a briefing from the Association of British Insurers which sums up the problems of insurance very nicely. For me, the most important thing is for the Government to ensure that users of automated vehicles are able to demonstrate that their vehicle was in a fully automated mode to exercise their rights under the legislation. What commitment can the Minister give us that the data confirming the status of the vehicle at the time of a crash will be made available to insurers and the public? I hope the answer is that it will be, because it is fundamental.
What happens to pedestrians and cyclists on a road where some of the vehicles may be in automatic mode and some may be being driven by one’s stepmother who cannot drive, has never had a licence and has forgotten how to turn a corner? Then there are many examples that we know of, involving people on scooters and things like that.
I worry about the definition of a vehicle driving itself, which the noble Lord, Lord Borwick, mentioned. It may be going along by itself, but it is under the control of somebody. It may be a computer or a human being playing some kind of game of Matchbox cars or something, but somebody is in control. This whole idea of the vehicle driving itself will be a bit of a get-out somehow.
The other issue is that if a vehicle is in an automatic mode, I do not believe it can possibly break the law. If it did, like a lot of motorists and truck drivers do today, it is not just about the weight of the vehicle, its speed and whether it has turned right in the wrong place, because that is all recorded, or it should be. We have to accept that everybody will be watched by Big Brother all time and will not disobey the law; otherwise they will presumably have their password removed and will not be able to control the thing any more.
There is another question related to that. You get power failures and breakdowns of computers. At some stage, these vehicles will break down, for whatever reason, and one has to find a way of rescuing them and making them go again. As many noble Lords will know, if your computer breaks down, someone—whether it is you, the retailer or someone else—has to try to start it again, and that sometimes takes a long time. That is a question that we need to look at.
On charging points, I do not think the needs of the trucking industry have been looked at. There need to be many more such points. In the future, I think most of them will be smart, for the reasons that the Minister and other noble Lords have given. There will be a need to get a quick charge and for your vehicle’s battery to feed back into the grid, if that is thought to be a good idea and it makes money, to get rid of the peaks and troughs.
It is essential that we have one common socket. That may seem a very small point, but many people drive to the continent—we will still go there after Brexit, I am sure—and many continental cars and vehicles will come here. Let us learn from the horrible divergence of power sockets in Europe at the moment. The Swiss have one, most of the rest of the continent has another and we have a different one again. There are very good reasons for that, but let us try to have one common socket everywhere so that they are completely interchangeable. I think we shall need one socket outside everyone’s property, if they still own a car. I am not convinced that everyone will own cars by then; I think they will hire them when they want to travel, which is another challenge. We must have many more smart charging points, taking into account not just heavy goods vehicles and so on but taxis—Uber, black cabs or whatever we like—because otherwise how will they work when the vehicle works 24 hours a day and they want a very quick charge?
I am sure a lot of interesting amendments will come up in Committee and thereafter, but I wish the Bill well. Let us hope we all try to improve it.
Lord Lucas (Con)
My Lords, I too welcome the Bill. I hope we will be able to persuade this House and the Government to strengthen it a bit because we need a Bill that is capable of dealing with standards, as many noble Lords have said, and we need to respond to emerging standards fast rather than having to wait for other Bills to come through, because we hope to be at the forefront of development in this area. We hope this is going to be one of our emerging industries. If we have to spend two years putting through primary legislation every time there is a new standard, we are very quickly going to fall off the wave front.
As many noble Lords have said, standards will be needed for how vehicles detect each other, how they react, how they resolve conflicts, how they communicate with each other and with the overall structure of what is going on, and indeed how they behave in particular circumstances—when they are not allowed to turn right, how fast they are allowed to go in built-up areas and how they deal with pedestrians and cyclists. This will all have to be covered by standards. Those standards will evolve over time, and we must be in a position to react fast to them. So I really hope the Government will allow us to add to the Bill some powers for them to make regulation in this area. I cannot see how a process of primary legislation is possibly going to allow us to succeed in this area.
As the Minister knows, I am a proponent of transforming our extensive slow rail network into a set of dedicated highways for autonomous vehicles, thinking of autonomous vehicles as standard passenger road vehicles. That, to my mind, has enormous advantages. First, it allows us to begin this transformation immediately because we are dealing with dedicated highways. There is no problem with pedestrians. There may be the odd cow—there certainly is round our part of the world—but generally, there are no manually driven vehicles, no pedestrians and nothing to obstruct the dedicated highway. We can use current vehicles, such as the Nissan Leaf, and current technology, or certainly that available by the time we get around to making the transformation.
It is a low-cost transformation, because essentially the roadbed is there and just requires some relatively inexpensive adaptation. The charging structure is there—it certainly is around us—the third rail is there and you can just use that, because no people are using these highways. Using current technology, you would get a service which was more reliable, because there would be lots of vehicles rather than the occasional train that breaks down, and much more convenient. It would be much easier to deal with things going wrong, because it is easy for a car to steer around a car which has stopped and there is plenty of extra space on a two line railway.
We as a nation would quickly get a very large population of autonomous vehicles—much larger than anything happening anywhere else in the world. We could upgrade their facilities as the technology became available, perhaps to allow them to be driven out of the stations and become manual vehicles, perhaps to allow them to trundle back very slowly to the station. You get a system that can evolve because it is big enough to afford to change, not a series of small experiments. We have tens of thousands of such vehicles, so it is much easier for us to make a big industry out of it and to have a voice in evolving it. It gets around all the problems mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours: you do not have to deal with them until you have the technology to do so. It would allow us, rather than to be trotting along behind the French, Japanese and, doubtless, the Chinese, to be at the forefront because we would provide the place where such vehicles could be used on a large scale.
One feature of that system, and possibly of automated vehicles generally, is that the vehicles would not be owned by individuals but by a much larger organisation—perhaps the railway. That has great advantages, because the whole business of ensuring that a vehicle is up to spec, has the latest software installed and all its parts are working would become the responsibility of a large-scale supplier, which could be made the person liable under the insurance policies if such things were not done. My computer keeps itself up to date with software, but most people let their software get out of date. The idea that all sorts of different versions of software would be trundling around the roads is a nightmare. I do not think that is possible. To make automated vehicles possible, we will need some form of common ownership. We ought to reflect that in the insurance clauses in the Bill. A problem that does not seem to be dealt with is the transfer of control from autonomous to manual. How does the autonomous vehicle, owned by some large corporation, know that the person who wishes to drive it manually is entitled to do so? I want to ensure that the data flows necessary to achieve that will be allowed under the Bill.
This is a Bill with great possibilities. I shall certainly propose amendments to widen the Government’s powers, so that they can take on board the sort of developments that I would like and have the powers that I think they will need to govern how vehicles are owned and how they operate on our roads. I suspect that the Government, and particularly the Department for Transport, have got used to seeing Southern Rail as an insoluble problem and a complete pain in the fundament—and certainly that is the way in which its passengers view it—but it is not. It is an enormous and wonderful opportunity, which we should seize, and I really hope that I can persuade the Government of that.
Lord Birt (CB)
My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, who exhibited his normal entrepreneurial and visionary flair.
I have no doubt whatever that, one day, all vehicles will be electrically powered and autonomous and that, as a result, travel by road will be safer, faster and carbon-free. However, this Bill is but a modest, incremental step towards that very distant goal.
Electric vehicles are not new. In 1899, a Belgian electric vehicle, “La Jamais Contente”, which looked like a torpedo with a man perched uneasily on the top, was the very first vehicle of any kind, anywhere in the world, to break the 100 kilometres per hour speed barrier. All new cars in the UK will have to be electric by 2040—earlier in some countries. Anyone purchasing a car in or around 2030 will be wary of buying anything other than an EV, because the resale value of a carbon emitter will become so low. So, in a little over 10 years, the rush to buy EVs may well have begun.
Currently there are 37 million vehicles in the UK, of which only 140,000 are plug-in electric—and these EVs have access to only 15,000 charge points at the moment. Think how much energy is required to move nearly 40 million heavy metal objects across long distances—the noble Viscount, Lord Goschen, gave us a very vivid illustration of that. Full electric mobility will exactly double our current demand for electricity. Moreover, at the very same time, to meet our carbon targets to which we have all agreed, gas and oil heating will itself be replaced by electric heating and overall demand for electricity will be triple what it is now. EVs will be by far the most power-hungry devices connected to the low-voltage grid, so a massive investment in the local grid will be needed to cope with the huge increase in domestic demand.
My first question is: when will the Government produce a plan for the transformation of the electricity generation and distribution system to accommodate this tripling of demand—a demand that must be served by non-carbon means? Furthermore, the Government’s thinking on a charging infrastructure for tens of millions of EVs appears to be in its infancy, as the Bill demonstrates. My second question is: when will the Government produce a strategy for charging to match the scale of the demand that will surely occur?
I turn to CAVs, connected and autonomous vehicles—a far less mature technology than EVs. The Secretary of State has said that we shall have,
“fully self-driving cars, without a human operator”,
on UK roads by 2021. This Bill provides a framework for authorising such vehicles. I have been heavily involved with organisations at the forefront of digital technology for 25 years, including leading global players. I have the most direct experience of the awesome power of these technologies and of their transformative impact. However, in every single organisation in which I have worked, digital technology has also often gone wrong. This is an embryonic, still nascent technology. For instance, we cannot get wi-fi to work reliably in the Palace of Westminster. On almost all technology platforms, one piece of software exposes bugs in another. Malign elements at home and abroad penetrate deep into our systems. The notion that we can reach level 5 autonomy by 2021—what the Secretary of State described—is a fantasy.
Toyota was the most innovative car maker in the second half of the 20th century. It invented lean manufacturing and produced reliable vehicles, thus ending the era—an unwelcome part of my youth—of push-starting cars in second gear on cold winter mornings. When the careful, measured CEO of Toyota’s research arm recently said that,
“we are not even close”,
to level 5, I found it all too easy to believe him. As the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Craig, illustrated brilliantly, how can technology reliably master 100% of the extraordinary complexity of the driving experience, in all circumstances, overnight? In a Renault test, the sensors fogged up and the system tanked. I invite noble Lords to look at the BBC website to see the driverless Nissan in east London. It stops impressively at zebra crossings and traffic lights but it is completely thrown by the—admittedly unusual—sight of a broken-down emergency vehicle with fluorescent flashes being ferried on the back of a trailer with a big blue turn-right sign on the rear. It would have flummoxed me and it certainly flummoxed the driverless car.
There have been many crashes of autonomous vehicles in California, not least because the way CAVs currently move confuses human drivers and thus triggers human error. We must be extremely cautious about allowing CAVs on to our roads. It will certainly be a very long time indeed before I will be trying out a CAV on a crowded M6 on a stormy winter evening and risking meeting one of the double platoons of heavy goods vehicles described by the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley. So my third question to the Minister is: how will the licensing system for CAVs work? I simply do not understand it and I suspect other noble Lords do not, either. What criteria will be applied before these vehicles are allowed on our roads?
Finally, bold, unevidenced statements appear to be a growing feature of our modern politics on all sides. In recent times Ministers and officials have loudly proclaimed, “We will keep Britain at the forefront of CAV technology”, or, “We are at the front rank of electric vehicle technology”. There are many more such examples. My fourth question to the Minister is: what evidence is there to support these confident claims? I can find none. If you look at the sector analysis, the global leaders of these technologies are, unsurprisingly: GM; Ford, which acquired Argo AI, a collaboration between former Google and Uber executives; Honda, working with Alphabet’s Waymo; and Renault and its partners, including Microsoft. No British names appear in the global tech analysis.
I will offer some hard numbers. In the past few days I have looked at patent applications for CAV-related technologies to the end of 2016. US companies had 10 times, German five times and Japanese 4 times the number of patents applied for by UK-based companies. What evidence does the Minister have to persuade us that the Government’s rhetoric is justified and that we are leaders and not laggards in this important new technology? We must prepare for electric vehicles and we should be alert to the potential of autonomous vehicles, but we need a far bolder vision and plan for both than we have yet seen from the Government in this Bill.
The Earl of Selborne (Con)
My Lords, there is general agreement that this Bill, while modest, is nevertheless an encouraging start. I think it is a start to something far wider than transport and driverless vehicles; I refer particularly to the employment implications of robotics, and of course autonomous vehicles are part of that story. Over the next decade, or probably much longer, the Government will have to deal with a whole succession of issues about how to bring legislation in line with transformative, often disruptive, technologies. We agree that the Bill is a modest start to that. It is easy to look at insurance as a discrete issue and the industry has done some work on that, which I welcome, but I particularly welcome the Government’s recognition that a start has to be made. We should not disguise from ourselves the fact that, if we are to attract inward investment in these essential new technologies to deliver the industrial strategy which was published last year, we need to have legislation, in successive stages, in place to assist the overall policy.
We can all speculate about the speed with which these transformative technologies will be introduced. However, as has been pointed out, we have developed autonomous vehicles for shipping, rail and air transport, and discrete vehicles in isolated tracks. The noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, mentioned platooning in Germany. I can see that it would not be very difficult to fence off or bollard off a lane of a motorway and reduce it from four lanes to three or three lanes to two and simply have platooning going down that track. My noble kinsman Lord Lucas has a more adventurous proposal with regard to railway tracks. I am not sure whether I go the full way with him on that, but I would at least like to see some of Dr Beeching’s tracks restored in that way, even though cyclists might object.
We can say with absolute certainty that, with the advent of robotics, existing jobs in many sectors will disappear—in the transport sector, drivers will, of course, disappear—as they always do when transformative technologies are introduced. The secret is to try to ensure that we get the required inward investment. It does not have to be UK companies that are developed, although it would be good if that were the case, but we have to make ourselves fit for purpose in terms of inward investment.
What will make companies from around the world choose the United Kingdom as the preferred place for investment? I suggest that, first and foremost, it is our science and engineering base and skilled workforce. It is certainly helpful to companies to have a research infrastructure which will advance their cause. Many of the companies involved in this area are not necessarily existing car manufacturers but new entrants—for example, computer companies. They will certainly wish to work closely with university groups leading the field in this highly fast-moving area. Therefore, we must make sure that we promote our national research base. Above all, we need to deal with an issue that we have discussed many times in this House—namely, the skills gap and the shortage of qualified engineers in this extremely fast-moving area. Again, I refer not just to autonomous vehicles but to robotics as a whole.
We also have to ensure, as several noble Lords said, that we are around the table setting the international standards. It would be disastrous if we found that our initial enthusiasm proved to be redundant because the international standards were different from those we had pioneered. It is not just about having one common socket, which the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, referred to, although that would certainly be a start; there are many other common standards which we will have to favour. We therefore need to think about how we look at the whole sweep of new technologies, of which autonomous and electric vehicles is one.
That brings me back to the Bill. Modest though its scope may be, with most of the provisions concerning driverless cars, which address the insurance issues, the Bill represents a start on the legislative programme which will be of critical importance to the successful implementation of a much wider industrial strategy. If we look at some of the detail, which has already been referred to by several speakers, in particular my noble friend Lord Borwick, there is a complete mystery as to what in fact a driverless vehicle is. It cannot just be level 5, which is some years off. If you look at the table from the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders, which was reproduced in the Science and Technology Committee’s report, which the Minister and the noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, referred to, you can see that there are quite a lot of situations, and that levels 3, 4 and 5 might meet the definition of a car which in certain situations is capable of safely driving itself. Therefore, in Committee, unless we are to give a bonanza to lawyers, we must chisel down and decide exactly what we mean by an autonomous vehicle. I rather agree with the noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, that the lack of adequate definitions in the Bill seems to be a hostage to fortune so far as legal fees are concerned.
Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe (Lab)
My Lords, I welcome the Bill generally. As the Minister stated when she moved the Second Reading, the Government have said that, by 2050, nearly all cars and vans should be zero-emission vehicles. As other noble Lords have said, that is not a particularly stretching target compared to the ambitions that are being laid down by many other countries, but to reach even this goal we will need major improvements in both the availability and reliability of electric charging points. I will concentrate on Part 2 and will essentially try to be practical in looking at what is happening around us and fairly close to us.
While the Bill starts to address the key risks and issues in rolling out electric charging points, it falls short on two fronts. First, it does not give the Secretary of State the power to require electric charging points to be installed at workplace car parks or residential developments, or in other large public locations. Secondly, it does not give the Secretary of State the power to require a minimum standard of reliability. This has not been picked up greatly in the debate so far; at the moment we have a system which is in many respects quite unreliable. People who use these cars often find that the connections do not function. It is quite disastrous if you are out on the road and get to a charge point but then find that it does not work. We need to address this point much more closely to ensure that effective infrastructure is rolled out.
It might seem a good idea for the Bill to give the Secretary of State the power to require petrol forecourts to install charging points, but the average person will not want to leave their car charging at a forecourt for long periods; they will want to charge it at home. The Bill should go much further than just forecourts and allow the Government to require charge points to be installed at public places such as shopping centres, leisure centres, stadiums and airports. There are massive parking areas at airports with very few facilities, despite all the pollution that we get there. When my noble friend Lord Adonis was in power, we were suggesting bringing that to a halt if there is a problem with pollution at airports. However, very little charging is planned for those areas and little encouragement is being given to people to install it. We should extend charge points to train stations, local golf clubs and National Trust centres, where, in some cases, hundreds of cars are parked. There are no such facilities in those places and, from reading the Bill, there is no indication that this has even crossed the Government’s mind.
Then we come to where 98% of people are located—domestic residences, with many people living in flats. What is in the Bill to assist people to charge their cars at blocks of flats and residential developments, as well as at large office car parks, where vehicles are parked for a lot of time? Electric charging points are needed there. Before making it a mandatory requirement, the Bill should lay the groundwork for incentives to be introduced in many of these areas so that people can look positively at effecting changes. For example, there could be lower council tax rates for premises that provide electric charging infrastructure. Have the Government looked at any new incentives that they might offer to people who change their infrastructure? I would like a response from the Minister on the possibility of council tax being one area that could be reviewed.
Speaking personally, I have been trying for two years to persuade the management board of the private estate where I live to introduce electric charging points. We are still talking about it but are no further forward. I live in a flat but I also have a garage, which is situated well away from the flat. We have a whole battery of garages with no electricity in them. Cars are parked all over the place and nobody uses the garages. If only the garages had electricity, people would put their cars in them to charge them and we would have a better life all round because the cars would not block the roads. It would be a double-win situation, but trying to get people to move on that is extraordinarily difficult.
The Bill needs to be strengthened to a degree to encourage local authorities, groups of individuals and landlords to look for ways in which they can start working together and make early changes. Achieving win-win situations is possible if we approach this matter with an open mind. As I said, it is essential to install charging points where people live and work, and a start needs to be made on that. We need to go way beyond just the forecourts mentioned in the Bill.
If we look at the size and scale of the electric charging infrastructure being rolled out in countries such as China, we see that our economy is at great risk of falling way behind. If we are to be at all competitive, we need to scale up much faster and require many more charging points and much more infrastructure than we are currently planning.
Earlier, I mentioned reliability. The Bill makes reference to the 11,500 charging points around the UK, but nobody has referred to how many of them actually work. What data do we keep on which of them do or do not work? Although it is good to see that, through the Bill, the Secretary of State would be given powers to require data on charging points in the future, it appears that it does not enable the Secretary of State to require a minimum standard of performance from them. Why not? If we look at similar utilities—such as water and electricity—for households and businesses, we find regulations on minimum levels of reliability. It is the same for telephones: obligations are placed on utility providers to ensure that they provide a reliable service to the public.
Running out of power in an electric vehicle is not only a major inconvenience; it could damage a business and its prospects, particularly if it relies on only electric vehicles for deliveries. What a problem it is to find a charging point for your delivery van, but find that it does not work because minimum standards have not been required and are not being met in any way. The charging point can be left unrepaired for considerable periods of time—as is the case with many of them, which are not immediately righted when they break down. We need to have a look at this and see whether we can find ways to avoid the frustrations that people currently encounter when they find so much unreliability in the existing network.
I ask the Minister whether the Government have been thinking about this and what ideas they have in mind for regulation. Is there any possibility of bringing something on standards into the Bill when we come to debate it in Committee? I look forward to the answers to the questions I have posed.
Baroness Deech (CB)
My Lords, I am the happy owner of a new all-electric car, so I have a strong personal interest in this. Although I am proud to be a green driver, and delighted with the quiet ride and freedom from queuing at petrol stations, at the same time I have two considerable problems, one of which is addressed by this valuable Bill.
The unaddressed one is being a pioneer. Every year, the battery life of electric cars is increased by technology, and new cars are selling with longer mile ranges than mine. So the 2017 model I have will not only suffer the usual depreciation, but will frankly be valueless: not in a year or so—I gather the selling price is quite good for about a year—but quite soon, because no one will want a short-range car when they can have a longer-range battery. We pioneers deserve all the subsidies we can get as we lead the way in persuading all, or many, drivers to go electric.
The second problem, which the Bill begins to address, is the range. My car’s is 120 miles maximum. The distance from my home to Westminster and back is a 126-mile round trip. Therefore, I dare not make it without being assured of being able to recharge, let alone allowing for any unexpected diversions on the way. I am like a goat tethered to a stake, going 50 miles this way, 50 miles that way, or round in circles—as tethered goats tend to go—but always going back to the centre and the comfort of the electric socket in my garage.
I echo the noble Lord, Lord Borwick: the Palace of Westminster should be leading the way. However, there are no charging sockets in the House of Lords car park. I have been agitating over this for nearly a year. I was told that it was impossible because this is a heritage site, not to be despoiled. However, all it takes is an ordinary three-prong socket, perhaps in the lamp posts dotted around our parking area, to allow charging during debates; indeed, they provide the most convenient length for this exercise. Those spaces, if we can get them set up, would have to be reserved for electric car owners. Nothing is more off-putting than to arrive at a charging point in a car park, only to find a petrol car parked there so that there is no hope of charging.
I support as urgent Clauses 8 to 16, which give the Government power to support the charging point infrastructure. Indeed, it needs to go further. Right now, the Government should mandate operators to provide uniform charging points and one method only of information about them and about payment and access. We have multiple confusing memberships, information packages and payment options now, which only add to concerns on a long trip. We need public charge points right now at every large garage, car park, motorway service area, supermarket, station car park, park and ride, in new buildings, offices and in residential areas, not to mention the House of Lords. It is not good enough to wait until this place is refurbished. There are lots of reasons to refurbish it but we should not have to wait to get simple, three-point plugs installed in our car park. The information about charging needs to be consistent and transparent right now. It is not good enough to wait for the market to do this itself.
I say that because it is no surprise that, as I have read, the Petrol Retailers Association does not agree with pushing ahead, and there is a risk that progress will be delayed indefinitely. The Government must send a positive message. Potential buyers will not buy until they are assured of charging convenience, and charging points will not come about in sufficient quantities until the purchases take off. The same was true as we moved from horse-drawn transport. The horses were always ready to go, despite the heavy maintenance, the mess and the smell, but we moved to petrol even though there were so few petrol stations at the start. Let us embrace this new progress.
Northern Ireland Update
(6 years, 10 months ago)
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The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Northern Ireland Office and Scotland Office (Lord Duncan of Springbank) (Con)
My Lords, with the leave of the House, I will now repeat a Statement made by my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland in the other place. The Statement is as follows:
“With permission I should like to make a Statement about the current political situation in Northern Ireland. Over recent weeks, there have been talks involving the main political parties in Northern Ireland, particularly the two largest parties, the Democratic Unionists and Sinn Féin, to see if there is a basis for re-establishing the Executive. The UK Government have facilitated and supported these intensive negotiations. We have been in close touch with all the parties, and responded to requests for advice and support.
The Irish Government have also been involved in accordance with the well-established three-stranded approach. I would like to place on record my appreciation of the contribution made by the Irish Foreign Minister, Simon Coveney, and his team. In addition, my right honourable friend the Prime Minister has been consistently and closely involved, speaking to party leaders and visiting Belfast last Monday. I have continued to give her up-to-date reports as the talks have progressed.
The aim of those talks has been very clear: to bring about the re-establishment of inclusive, devolved government at Stormont, which Northern Ireland has effectively been without for over 13 months. In so doing, we have been able to build on the progress made by my predecessor, my right honourable friend the Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup, who I warmly welcome back to this House today”.
I share that welcome. The Statement continues:
“In the Government’s view both the DUP and Sinn Féin participated in discussions seriously and in good faith, and we believe that progress towards reaching agreement on all the key substantive issues has been made. It became possible in the light of this progress to identify a basis for a possible agreement to allow an Executive to be formed, embracing how the parties ensured the Executive was sustainable and how they reached a balanced and fair accommodation on the difficult issues of language and culture and how this was reflected in a package of legislation. Many other issues were addressed too, if not always resolved. Unfortunately, however, by last Wednesday it had become clear that the current phase of talks had reached a conclusion, without such an agreement being finalised and endorsed by both parties. As I said then, it is important for everyone to reflect on the circumstances which have led to this and their positions, both now and in the future.
What is important today is for me to give some direction as to next steps. First, as our manifesto at the last election set out, this Government believe in devolution under the terms of the 1998 Belfast agreement. We want to see local politicians taking decisions over local matters accountable to a local Assembly. We need devolved government to help deliver a stronger economy, to build a stronger society and to ensure that Northern Ireland’s voice is properly heard as we leave the European Union. In addition we want to see all of the other institutions of the agreement operating in the way that was intended.
I cannot reiterate too strongly that devolved government is in the best interests of all the people of Northern Ireland because it ensures that their interests and concerns are fairly and equitably represented. It is also in the best interests of maintaining and strengthening the union, to which this Government remain fully committed, consistent with the principle of consent. So we will continue to explore with the parties whether the basis for a political agreement still exists, and, as my right honourable friend the Prime Minister has reaffirmed, we stand ready to bring forward the necessary legislation that would enable an Executive to be formed at the earliest opportunity. That is this Government’s clear hope and desire, and something that I believe is shared widely across the House.
Secondly, however, things in Northern Ireland cannot simply remain in a state of limbo. A number of challenging decisions will have to be taken. Ultimately, the Government have a responsibility to ensure good governance and the continued delivery of public services. In particular, as the head of the Northern Ireland Civil Service has made clear, there needs to be certainty and clarity about a budget for Northern Ireland for the next year as soon as possible. I intend to take steps to provide clarity on the budget and I will update the House as soon as I am in a position to do so. This is clearly not where I want to be, but in the absence of an Executive in Northern Ireland, I will have no other choice.
Over the longer term, the Government will not shirk our responsibilities to take whatever steps are necessary to provide certainty and stability for the people of Northern Ireland while maintaining our commitment to govern with rigorous impartiality in the interests of all the people of Northern Ireland. But we will do that only once we are sure that all other viable options designed to restore devolved government have been properly considered, including my current statutory obligation to call an Assembly election.
In the absence of devolution it is also right that we consider the issue of salaries for Assembly Members. At the end of last year, my right honourable friend the Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup received recommendations on this from Mr Trevor Reaney, a former Clerk to the Assembly. The Government will need to decide shortly on the next steps. I acknowledge the public concern that while a number of Assembly Members continue to carry out constituency and representative functions, current salaries are being maintained while the Assembly is not meeting.
On the issue of addressing the legacy of Northern Ireland’s past, the Government have manifesto commitments to consult on the implementation of the bodies set out in the 2014 Stormont House agreement and to support the reform of inquests. I would much prefer to do this in the context of an agreement that sees the restoration of a devolved Executive, but I am conscious of the Government’s responsibilities to make progress in this area to provide better outcomes for victims and survivors, the people who suffered most during the Troubles. We will continue to proceed toward a full consultation as soon as possible so that everyone can have their say.
As the House will recognise, this April marks the 20th anniversary of the historic Belfast agreement. That agreement, along with its successors, has been fundamental in helping Northern Ireland to move forward from its violent past to a brighter, more secure future, and this Government’s support for the agreements remains steadfast. There is no doubt that Northern Ireland has taken huge strides forward in the past 20 years. In my short time as Northern Ireland Secretary, I have seen a place full of wonderful talent and huge potential, yet any commemorations this year will look decidedly hollow if Northern Ireland still has no functioning Government of its own. So everyone needs to continue striving to see devolved government restored and to build a Northern Ireland fit for the future. That remains the clear focus and determination of this Government”.
My Lords, that concludes the Statement.
Baroness Smith of Basildon (Lab)
My Lords, I thank the Minister for repeating today’s Statement, and I say at the outset that we understand and appreciate all the effort required to seek the agreement needed to re-establish the political institutions. The UK Government, the Irish Government and all the political parties have worked hard to try to rebuild trust and deliver a deal. Although this round of talks has ended in failure, I commend all of them for their efforts. But on listening to the Statement, I have a sense of déjà vu and it is hard to understand where, despite all this effort, progress has been made.
I took the opportunity to reread a Statement made last July by the former Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, James Brokenshire; I am pleased to see that he is back in Parliament today. Both Statements, from July and from today, say that progress has been made. Both say that gaps still exist on key issues, but before we were told that they were few in number. We had more information in the last Statement back in July on where progress had been made. Both Statements say that the Government remain optimistic and that a deal is achievable.
Is the Minister to say anything more about where progress has been made this time? When the Prime Minister visited Belfast she said that there was a deal on the table. That was corroborated by the Irish Government and Sinn Féin, but it was then disputed by the DUP. To provide reassurance that progress has been made in the last 13 months, the details of where there was agreement and where gaps remain should be published. Can the Minister assure your Lordships’ House that he will encourage the Secretary of State to commit to providing that detail for the people of Northern Ireland and for Parliament? Only then can there be a real understanding of why the talks have failed so far. Such transparency may offer greater support for those who really want to see the institutions re-established.
I will give the noble Lord a personal example. At the end of last month, on 31 January, the report of the inquiry into deaths related to hyponatraemia was published, 14 years after I set it up as a direct rule Minister, following the deaths of young children. That report makes difficult reading into why those children died. It also makes a number of significant and very important recommendations for action. Some of those recommendations may have been taken forward already and others can be put in place by the relevant authorities, but others need the involvement of locally elected politicians in both the Assembly and ministerial roles, which Northern Ireland has been without for the last 13 months. I use that example because I have a personal connection to it, but it is not the only issue on which Northern Ireland needs its locally elected representatives to step up to the plate. They have a duty to those who elect them. Surely local people have a right to know what the areas of agreement are and the areas of disagreement that remain. They can then raise these issues with the decision-makers and negotiators.
Disappointingly, in the other place the Secretary of State said that this was a matter not for the Government but for the political parties. I put it to the Government that this is a matter which they should discuss with the political parties and, if they refuse to agree to publication, the reasons should be made public. Transparency is now essential.
Some in Northern Ireland are looking to the Government to make difficult decisions and have even encouraged direct rule. Direct rule is far harder to remove than it is to set up. I was told in 2002 by my noble friend Lord Reid that I was going to be a direct rule Minister for around three months. I was then in post for two and a half years and direct rule lasted for three and a half.
Many of us have been alarmed by those who have used this situation to oppose power-sharing and the Belfast agreement. That is a dangerous and reckless approach. The efforts of those from all political parties, here and in Northern Ireland, over time ended a conflict that claimed 3,500 lives. As a former Victims Minister in Northern Ireland, I met with many more who had had their lives changed for ever through injuries and loss. I trust that when a former Conservative Secretary of State for Northern Ireland makes such comments, he is not in any way at all acting with the agreement or even the acquiescence of the Government. I welcome the comments in the Statement about the Good Friday agreement. Can the Minister confirm from the Dispatch Box that the Government fully support the Good Friday agreement as the only viable long-term option for peaceful governance for Northern Ireland, and that the Government believe that its unique form of power-sharing is indispensable?
We have heard the Secretary of State say that she intends to introduce legislation here at Westminster to directly set a budget for Northern Ireland. The Minister confirmed that. They have our support in doing so, though it is deeply unsatisfactory to have unaccountable civil servants taking decisions about schools and hospitals, and the example I gave of the inquiry. However, we acknowledge that resources must be allocated for services to be delivered. Obviously full-scale direct rule for Northern Ireland would regressive.
Political problems are nothing new to Northern Ireland, but the current impasse that has left the people of Northern Ireland without a Government for almost 400 days is a profound crisis. The Government have a clear duty to resolve it, and to preserve the Good Friday agreement and the principle of power-sharing.
Many in your Lordships’ House, and many here today, have been involved in Northern Ireland and retained an affection and an interest. I am sure that we all want the Government to continue to seek resolution and we will support them on legislation where necessary. However, we will hold them to account to preserve the letter and the spirit of the Good Friday agreement.
Baroness Suttie (LD)
My Lords, I, too, thank the Minister for repeating the Statement. On these Benches, we add our voice to those who feel a sense of deep disappointment, and indeed some bewilderment, at this latest failure to reach a workable agreement.
Just over one week ago, when the Taoiseach and the Prime Minister went to Stormont, we were led to believe that a deal was possible. That a positive outcome has once again proved elusive inevitably leads us to ask questions about the structure, participants and transparency of the negotiation process. As Naomi Long, the leader of the Alliance Party in Northern Ireland, has said, there was a degree of inevitability that,
“without a more structured approach, we would not see a successful outcome”.
This latest failure is a missed opportunity and yet again leaves the majority of ordinary people in Northern Ireland feeling deeply frustrated and without a democratically elected voice at this critical time.
Much-needed decisions have to be taken about how to ensure effective public services for the people of Northern Ireland—decisions about long-term provision for education, health and infrastructure development—and how to build the shared society that we all want. As the noble Baroness, Lady Smith, has just said, civil servants have played an excellent and vital role in the past 13 months during this political vacuum—and we should pay tribute to their professionalism—but without an Executive in place there remain inevitable questions about democratic legitimacy.
Three weeks ago, on a visit to Northern Ireland with the EU Select Committee, I was struck by the excellent and imaginative work being carried out by so many people in the business community, as well as in local government and civil society, to strengthen the Northern Irish economy, most particularly at this time with the additional and complex challenges of Brexit. However, their deep frustration that many of their plans were on hold because of the absence of an Executive in Stormont was palpable.
On these Benches, we continue to believe firmly that power-sharing devolution is vital to local democracy and representative decision-making. It must be possible to find creative solutions to the current impasse. In that regard, can the Minister say whether thought is now being given to bringing in an external mediator to chair the negotiations? I appreciate the difficulties in identifying such a person given the sensitivities, personalities and challenges involved, but the events of last week show that such a person is now needed more than ever. In the light of last week’s failure, will Government consider making the talks all-party rather than just two-party as they are at present?
In the new circumstances, I repeat an earlier question that I put to the Minister: in the continued absence of an Executive, will the Government now give serious thought to the creative proposals put forward by the noble Lords, Lord Alderdice and Lord Trimble, among others, for allowing the Assembly to play a role in ensuring that the views of the Northern Irish people can be heard during the next few months, most especially during the Brexit negotiations?
Given what the Minister has said on inquests in the Statement, will the Government release funds for inquests into historical deaths, as was promised by David Cameron when he was Prime Minister?
It is vital that the hard-won gains of recent decades are not discarded without exploring all the options and alternatives. Northern Ireland and its political leaders have in the past overcome seemingly insurmountable problems, but this situation requires a degree of leadership and flexibility and a spirit of compromise that, sadly, seem all too absent at present. Short-term party-political gain must not be allowed to jeopardise two decades of progress.
Lord Duncan of Springbank
I thank the noble Baronesses for their insightful questions. I welcome the support—I think from all sides of this House—for trying to move this matter forward. It is true that the sense of déjà-vu is to some degree palpable. We have been speaking of the closeness between the parties involved. Indeed, that closeness brought about such proximity that it was anticipated that we would be making a very different Statement today, but we are not. We are instead making a statement, I suspect, of regret that we have not been able to bridge those gaps. The important thing to stress here is that the UK Government have acted in good faith to try to bring together the two key parties that will be instrumental in forming a functioning, sustainable Executive. We have done all we can to facilitate that dialogue.
I shall answer the specific questions raised. The noble Baroness, Lady Smith, put her finger on it when she reflected on the inquiry she set up all those years ago and recognised that it is important that we are able to deliver, but it is, in truth, the people of Northern Ireland who must deliver, and it is an Executive who must deliver. There is no substitute—we are not a substitute and nor is the other place—for that functioning Executive and it is right that the civic society of Northern Ireland must feel a degree of frustration that this has been going on for so long. My right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland has been clear that nothing will now be taken off the table: all aspects of the negotiations will be moved forward as best we can to try to bring about some sense of movement.
Again, let me move on. I recall the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Empey, who spoke about direct rule being like walking down the steps of Stormont: it is easy to tumble down but very hard to claw your way back up. Direct rule, indeed, cannot be taken off the table but nor should it be a priority or a single focus. There are too many other avenues that we must explore. I am conscious, again, that we must recognise that the Belfast agreement and the successor agreements are all part of and core to what we will use to go forward. I welcome the remarks of the noble Baroness: the Opposition need to hold us to account and make sure that we do not slip in any way from our clear commitment to deliver, on an impartial basis, a functioning Executive in Northern Ireland. Progress has been made; the problem, of course, is that an agreement has not been reached. The bilateral discussions have taken place; the question is whether that information should be made public. At the moment, the parties themselves would prefer that information not to be made public and we would prefer to allow that to continue on that basis.
Turning to external mediation, nothing is off the table from this point onward. Again, my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland will consider every possible way of taking this matter forward. Indeed, the issues raised by the noble Lord, Lord Alderdice, and my noble friend Lord Trimble will be part of all consideration to make sure that every possible means we have to bring about a rekindling of this spark, to allow these talks to deliver an Executive, will be used. Nothing is off the table; indeed we have high hopes that there will be an opportunity for the parties to reconvene and to once again seek to bridge the ever-diminishing divide between the sides. This is what I believe all in this House, the other House and all the people of Northern Ireland so clearly and needfully desire at this moment.
Lord Reid of Cardowan (Lab)
My Lords, the Minister is working, through no fault of his own, in some very dangerous circumstances. I think they are even more dangerous than some of the experiences my noble friend Lady Smith outlined. Let me put it this way: will he now take the opportunity to respond to the question contained in my noble friend’s opening remarks and distance himself, unequivocally, from any sympathy or support—even any understanding—for those who have called in the past few days for the unravelling of the Good Friday agreement, or the Belfast agreement? I say this because, without casting any aspersions, if one of the parties causing the deadlock is also now, apparently, calling for direct rule by the British Government and is the same party that is propping up the British Government, and has now gone further with some of its members calling the Belfast agreement “unsustainable”, there cannot but be suspicions that this had an effect on the conduct of these negotiations. Will he therefore make it absolutely plain that the Good Friday agreement, which has now been in place for two decades and resolved problems of tragic conflict in the island of Ireland that lasted for several centuries, will be maintained, in the spirit and the letter, by this Government?
Lord Duncan of Springbank
I thank the noble Lord, Lord Reid, for his question. He is right to raise it once again. I will be unequivocal and as plain as I can be: this Government do not support any of the remarks made by those who believe that the Belfast agreement is in some way dispensable, erodible or dismissible. It is not. It is the cornerstone of our approach and of bringing about a restored Executive. I am happy that the noble Lord has given me an opportunity to make that point very plain.
Lord Rogan (UUP)
My Lords, I also welcome the Statement but I am slightly disappointed by some of the content. We all want a devolved Administration in Northern Ireland. I will be pessimistic: I cannot see it happening in the near future. In the absence of devolved government in Northern Ireland, we urgently need ministerial decisions in many, many departments, none more so than on a budget for Northern Ireland. For some 400 days now, senior civil servants have been coping without ministerial direction. When will the Minister begin to take day-to-day decisions on the affairs of Northern Ireland and, especially, when will a budget be set? Civil servants wanted it to be by 8 February. Today is 20 February.
Lord Duncan of Springbank
I thank the noble Lord for his question. My right honourable friend the Secretary of State has made it plain that she will now begin serious discussions on a budget and she will return to the other place by the end of March to deliver on that commitment. We cannot continue to kick the can down the road. That is why these deliberations will need to be much more far-reaching than the discussions we had what seems only a few months ago, when we brought the previous Northern Ireland budget through this place. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Rogan, for his comments.
Lord Cormack (Con)
My Lords, as one who was present at many meetings with the late Ian Paisley—Lord Bannside—when he was breathing new life into the Good Friday agreement, Mrs Foster’s statement last week brought a chill to my heart. Will my noble friend pursue with vigour the suggestion contained in the comments and questions of the noble Baroness, Lady Suttie, and look with real, earnest and urgent seriousness at the Trimble-Alderdice suggestions? The people of Northern Ireland deserve no less than that their Assembly, which they elected, should meet, even without an Executive, much as we would like to see that established at the earliest possible date.
Lord Duncan of Springbank
I thank the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, for his comments. As I said, nothing now can be off the table. The Trimble-Alderdice suggestions will be given due consideration. We owe it to the people of Northern Ireland to deliver better government than we have thus far managed to achieve.
Baroness O’Loan (CB)
My Lords, I ask the Minister whether the issues that actually matter to the people of Northern Ireland—the economy, Brexit, dealing with the past, health, education—have been discussed at all between the parties in the 400 days since we ceased to have a representative Government, or is it that for these past 400 days there has been discussion of same-sex marriage, the Irish language Act and the Ulster-Scots language Act? If it is, we are going nowhere. He has just said that there are too many avenues to explore to move to direct rule. I am not advocating moving to direct rule but the people of Northern Ireland think that ultimately there are two outcomes to this: one is devolved government, which we need, and the other is direct rule. Are there other options? Northern Ireland has become more and more divided over the past 12 months. This sectarian division has got worse and worse. I do not think re-establishing the Assembly but with non-executive powers—no powers to make decisions—would improve that situation; I think it would make it worse.
Lord Duncan of Springbank
I thank the noble Baroness, Lady O’Loan, for her comments. The discussions inside the room remain inside that room. I suspect that we are quite familiar with the points at issue; they stem from the questions of sustainability, culture, language and respect. But when you talk to the people of Northern Ireland, I suspect that other issues dominate their concerns, not the least of which are health, education, wider economic growth and the questions of Brexit. This is a time when the voice of an Executive is required—in fact, it is overdue—in those discussions and, again, the people of Northern Ireland are the ones who are losing out because of that situation. There is no doubt that all options are to be considered—but, at heart, we must recognise now that the people of Northern Ireland deserve a functioning Executive and that it is beholden on all the parties to deliver it. The United Kingdom Government remain committed to facilitating that dialogue in any way that they can, but we need to get off the spot and make progress.
Baroness Randerson (LD)
My Lords, with the background of Brexit, does the Minister recognise that the potential long-term damage to the peace of Northern Ireland is particularly acute at this time? I want to state my concern at the suggestion of a return to direct rule. I share the concern expressed around the Chamber. Does the Minister agree that it is imperative in the short term that the Prime Minister takes a more positive and visible lead in these events, as John Major, Tony Blair and David Cameron each did in their time? Does he share my concern at the comment of Arlene Foster that the Prime Minister’s involvement last week was a distraction?
Lord Duncan of Springbank
I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, for her remarks. Direct rule is not a panacea or a solution—and, as she has already said, once the toothpaste is out of the tube it is very hard to get it back in. I can assure the House that the Prime Minister has been intimately involved in these ongoing discussions. Her commitment is without question and her actions of late have always been mindful of trying to deliver a sustainable Executive who will deliver for the individuals who live in Northern Ireland. Going forward from here, I do not doubt my right honourable friend the Prime Minister’s continued commitment and that she will continue to act in the best interests of the people of Northern Ireland to try to bring about a dialogue that delivers an outcome that works for them. I believe that is in the interests of all the parties there.
Lord Hay of Ballyore (DUP)
My Lords, I too welcome the Statement this afternoon. I also welcome the fact that Her Majesty’s Government are now to set a budget for Northern Ireland—especially to help our public services, which are going through a very difficult time. I heard the comment about an independent chair. However, knowing the politics of Northern Ireland and having been Speaker of an Assembly that lasted almost 10 years, I think that they would probably spend some time arguing over who that person might be—so I do not think we should add fuel to a very difficult situation.
At this moment in time, Northern Ireland is not in a good place. It gives me no pleasure to say that, so we all have to be careful with our words and actions while we see whether we can resolve the last remaining issue of the project. Does the Minister agree that political progress can be built only on an accommodation that can be supported by the whole community, and which is shared, fair and balanced? Despite the setbacks over the last few days, we as a party are determined to secure devolution for Northern Ireland. I say clearly in this House today that we will leave no stone unturned to try to resolve this issue. Can the Minister assure the House—and settle unionist nerves as well—that Dublin will not be involved in the internal affairs of Northern Ireland? The Minister needs to clarify that important point if we are to settle everybody down and get back to trying to resolve what I believe is the last remaining issue.
Lord Duncan of Springbank
I thank the noble Lord, Lord Hay, for his intervention. It is in the interests of all the people of Northern Ireland that we achieve good government. Now more than ever, good government will be delivered by devolution—by a functioning Executive—but at heart it will have to be delivered for Northern Ireland no matter what happens, because we cannot keep kicking the can down the road. The three-stranded approach will be at the heart of our ongoing discussions with all parties, but I am happy to confirm to the noble Lord that no joint approach to the administration of government between the United Kingdom and Ireland is on the cards.
Lord Empey (UUP)
My Lords, the noble Baroness, Lady Smith, talked about transparency. We have a “she said/she said” argument at home over what was and was not on the table, which I believe will be settled only when those documents are in the public domain. I seem to recall the late Lord Bannside talking many times about secret documents; well, now there is a chance to make secret documents public. Let us see what was on the table.
The Minister said in his Statement:
“First, as our manifesto at the last election set out, this Government believe in devolution under the terms of the 1998 Belfast Agreement”.
No, they do not, because the terms of the 1998 Belfast agreement are not what we have today. It was butchered in 2006 when the guts were taken out of it, after years of negotiation. The partnership at the centre of that Government, with each community having its hand on the steering wheel and the First and Deputy First Minister being identified jointly in the Assembly by a vote of the elected Members, was torn out to suit two parties, neither of which negotiated their part of the agreement in the first place. If the Minister is thinking outside the box and nothing is off the table, may I put back on to the table the 1998 Belfast agreement, as it was voted on by 71.2% in the north and over 90% in the Republic? If we are leaving the European Union on the basis of 52%, in all fairness we are entitled to have the vote that we made honoured and implemented as it was voted on in 1998.
Lord Duncan of Springbank
The noble Lord, Lord Empey, makes a very forceful intervention. The details of the discussions that took place between the two principal interlocutors will not be made public. At present the parties agree that, were they to be made public, they might continue to prolong the challenges that they face in trying to secure ongoing agreement. We will honour that approach.
On the broader question of the Belfast agreement and its successor agreements, at their heart is, I hope, a recognition of respect from all the participants—not just the two principal parties but the other parties in Northern Ireland as well. That is why my right honourable friend the Prime Minister, in her ongoing dialogue with the two principal parties, recognises very clearly that there are others to be taken into account when we make these positions clear. I hope—I desperately hope—that we can make progress going forward and work on a basis of respect. With the good will that I know exists across Northern Ireland, the urgency brought about by Brexit and the reality of the challenges faced by the various communities in Northern Ireland—whether that be on the economy, education or health—this is the time to deliver an Executive, now more than ever.
Lord Bew (CB)
My Lords, I thank the Minister for the Statement and the rather elegant balance he has achieved between a ringing defence of the Belfast agreement and some wise and sensible words about the immediate future. Does he agree that it is even more important to defend the Good Friday agreement of 1998 at this point, because of the deal that we reached with Europe on 8 December? If paragraphs 49 and 50 of it mean anything, they require a viable working of the institutions and the agreements reached in 1998. It has therefore become the fate of the institutions in Belfast to be caught up with the wider question of the transitional agreement that was reached with the European Union at the beginning of December, so that is an even further reason for the ringing defence that the Minister has offered for the institutions of 1998. I say this knowing that the policy department of the European Parliament has just published an excellent report by Lars Karlsson, the Swedish customs expert, saying that it is possible to avoid a hard border on the island of Ireland as there are technical means which will allow that to happen, even without any political settlement. Even so, and despite that important intervention from Europe on this sometimes exaggerated issue, it is vital at this point, because of what our Government said on 8 and 9 December, that the agreement works.
Lord Duncan of Springbank
The noble Lord, Lord Bew, puts his finger upon it. The Good Friday agreement has to work. We are in challenging times right now; there is no question about that. It is right that during this time the voices of Northern Ireland are heard loud and clear and are allowed to speak for themselves. The last thing the people of Northern Ireland need is me speaking for them. They need to be able to articulate the concerns and issues that they live with on a daily basis. The transition agreement is going to be negotiated in coming months. It is right and proper that their voices are heard. Whether they are heard through an Executive, which we hope and pray will be reformed, or whether through individual councillors and MLAs, with all the communities represented, we cannot ignore the voices of those who will stand on the border between ourselves and the European Union. We would be short-sighted and foolish if we did. As I emphasised earlier, I hope that it will be through a reformed Executive, chastened by the 13 months in which they were absent but recognising right now that the clock is ticking and that the voices of Northern Ireland must be part of the ongoing Brexit negotiations.
Baroness Blood (Lab)
My Lords, I have listened carefully to what the Minister has said and I cannot understand it. He tells us in one part that it is about the people, and in another part that the people really have nothing to do with all these secret talks and that they cannot be told what is going on. I do not understand that. I do not understand why some form of what happened cannot be put to the people of Northern Ireland to let them decide. People in the street will tell you that they want to know what happened. There is no point in having another election as the same thing would happen. We have to put it to the people. I am very surprised at the Conservatives: they had no problem putting the Brexit referendum to the people when they wanted it. The Good Friday agreement came about through a referendum and I fail to understand why this cannot be put to the people in a form that is easily understood. Let us take it from there. I have to tell the Minister that we are never going to get any real agreement with what is going on at the moment.
Lord Duncan of Springbank
I thank the noble Baroness for her contribution. I would draw a distinction between democracy and representative democracy. The demos—the people—have chosen particular political parties. The Belfast agreement recognises those parties and their role in delivering what I hope will be a fully functioning Executive. The people will hold their representatives to account, and they must do so in whatever way they feel to be appropriate, given the situation that Northern Ireland finds itself in. The key thing that I hope I leave with noble Lords today is that this Government remain fully committed to facilitating the ongoing dialogue. We were tantalisingly close, and we owe it to the people of Northern Ireland to continue to reach across that divide. If we do not, Northern Ireland will be the poorer spiritually, economically and in its contribution to the ongoing and important Brexit discussions. Please be assured that this Government will do all they can to bring about a fully functioning Executive. I thank all noble Lords who have made clear today that there is a commitment across this House to deliver a fully functioning Executive.
Automated and Electric Vehicles Bill
Tuesday 20th February 2018
(6 years, 10 months ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Automated and Electric Vehicles Act 2018 View all Automated and Electric Vehicles Act 2018 Debates Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts Amendment Paper: Report Stage Proceedings as at 29 January 2018 - (30 Jan 2018)
Earl Attlee (Con)
My Lords, I am grateful to the Minister for the skilful way in which she introduced the Bill this afternoon. I am pleased that the Government will not be Luddite and will welcome this new technology. In doing so, they will need to be careful and interfere and legislate only when it is necessary. The omens are favourable. It may appear that the Bill does not cover all the issues, but we must not forget that the Secretary of State can do a lot with the construction and use regulations made under Section 42 of the Road Traffic Act 1988. Those regulations are extensive.
When I refer to a self-driving taxi, I mean a vehicle that is available for the user to call up when required but which the user does not keep, own or operate. The point is that the vehicle operator would not necessarily be a conventional taxi operator. When I use the term “self-driving vehicle”, I recognise that there are various levels of autonomy. No doubt we will discuss that in Committee.
The noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, talked about taxation issues relating to electric vehicles. He is right to raise them. It is clear to me that at some point we will have to move to a system of universal road user charging rather than relying on taxing hydrocarbons, but overall I am rather more optimistic than the noble Lord.
I think autonomous and electric vehicles will be very disruptive but equally beneficial. Recently there has been much concern about the advent of the Uber taxi service, but that will be nothing compared to the effect of self-driving taxis. It is obvious that a major component of a taxi fare is the need to pay for a driver to be available for the next fare, but by definition a self-driving taxi will not need a driver, so that cost will be eliminated. It will also have the unfortunate effect of eliminating the possibility of migrants earning their living as taxi-drivers, which is very common, while their children study to be professionals later in life. When the self-driving taxi has dropped off its passenger, it can be programmed to go to where it is most likely to pick up its next fare. Alternatively, it might go to where it can most economically recharge itself.
I welcome the insurance provisions in the Bill, which no doubt we will look at closely in Committee. I do not share the pessimism of many noble Lords. It is interesting that we can expect a self-driving vehicle never to commit a traffic violation; in other words, it will be programmed not to commit a traffic violation. That would include never going so fast that it cannot stop within the distance it knows to be clear. Furthermore, we can expect a self-driving vehicle to record all its sensor inputs for the few minutes prior to any incident. This was touched on by my noble friend Lord Borwick. Thus, if there is an accident, and there will of course be some, it will be easy to work out why it occurred and the data must be made available to all those with a legitimate interest.
There is, however, a worry about software causing an accident. Of course, how to avoid that problem is a technical issue, not one for us, even though we can be confident that there will sometimes be a problem. However, I suggest that it will be nothing compared to the risk presented by a young novice driver or someone whose driving is impaired through drink, drugs or tiredness.
Another disruptive effect of self-driving taxis and vehicles is that households may move from having two conventional cars to having one conventional car and one electric car, or to not having a second car and calling up a self-driving taxi when required. These self-driving taxis will be used far more intensively than our contemporary vehicles and there will be less to wear out. They will have no internal combustion engine or complex transmission. The useful life of a contemporary private car is about 250,000 miles with a 15 to 20-year life expectancy. It is therefore currently essential that the cost of production of a modern conventional car is kept very low, thus we have large and very efficient motor manufacturers. With self-driving taxis, the amortisation of the cost will be much better since they will be much more intensively used. This could mean that the cost of manufacturing these vehicles is less important and could allow smaller manufacturers back into the market. However, in answer to the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Craig of Radley, and the noble Lord, Lord Birt, there are already type approval regulations in place, maintained by the Department for Transport and internationally, and these can be amended to deal with electric and autonomous vehicles. So I do not think there is a problem of a lack of legislation; the Secretary of State has all the powers he needs.
I have always resisted the suggestion that a person should be licensed to maintain a motor vehicle, because I am a Conservative and do not want to regulate unless it is essential. However, there are two reasons why it may be essential with this new technology. The first is the software problems that have already been touched on. Even now, we are seeing unscrupulous HGV operators using Defeat software to avoid the use of AdBlue supplements or altering the engine mapping to achieve increased power and lower fuel consumption. The cost, of course, must be increased emissions, so playing around with the software of the vehicle is extremely undesirable. Clause 4 goes some way towards addressing this issue. The second reason for needing qualified technicians is that I understand that electric vehicles can use much higher voltages than current vehicles. This presents a real risk to the operator of the vehicle and any unqualified technician attempting to maintain it. My noble friend Lord Selborne talked about the need to train engineers and technicians. Wherever I look, the engineers and technicians are always a problem.
Some noble Lords have raised the issue of electricity supply, and I hope we will hear something on that from the noble Baroness, Lady Worthington, who will be following me. The population of electric vehicles is low at the moment but I expect it will grow rapidly. For instance, my neighbour already has one and when I replace my current vehicle I expect it will be electric-only. The problem is that if everyone comes home in the evening and connects their electric car to the electrical system, with each drawing 16 amps at the same time, there will be problems, a point made by the noble Lord, Lord Birt. The supply system simply could not tolerate that much concentrated demand. I expect the noble Baroness will talk about smart metering, and we should listen carefully.
However, there may be a silver lining. Wind power is still generated throughout the night when overall electrical demand is lower. It is obvious to charge up an electrical vehicle in the middle of the night rather than on arrival in the early evening. What is not so obvious, although it has been touched on by the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, is to use the battery capacity of electric cars to feed back into the electrical distribution system in the early evening when the power is needed. The car could then charge up in the middle of the night, and it would be a simple matter to programme it so that it would not compromise the minimum range desired and set by the owner. The beauty of this is that the problem of the capital cost of battery storage and wind power would be reduced. It is true that batteries will always have only a finite amount of cycles in their life, but that could be accounted for in the commercial arrangements.
While we need some understanding of the technology, we do not need to worry too much about steering it. That will happen automatically. The question that we will have to address is how much regulation of the utilities to put in place. Nevertheless, the electrical supply for electric vehicles could be a win/win situation where the capital cost of the batteries is amortised over both the operation of the car and the wider electrical supply system. I think our discussions on this in Committee will be very interesting.
One of the advantages of a fully autonomous vehicle is that a person who is medically unable to drive will in future be able to be taken somewhere by a vehicle that they do not actually have to be able to drive. I have no problem with that; it is an obvious advantage. However, what if someone is impaired through drink and drugs, therapeutic or recreational? We currently have an offence of being drunk in charge of a motor vehicle, which is very sensible, but may have to review it at some point in the future because otherwise we could have a situation where a blind person could use a self-driving taxi but a person who had been drinking a little could not. The noble Lord, Lord Brooke, and I are very concerned about drink-driving. Surely in future self-driving taxis will mean that there is no need for anyone to drive to a pub or restaurant and consume any alcohol.
In conclusion, I welcome the Bill and look forward to supporting the Minister in Committee.
Baroness Worthington (Non-Afl)
My Lords, I am pleased to be taking part in today’s debate. I will begin by declaring my interests. I have taken a role in the international NGO Environmental Defense Fund, heading up its European affiliate. One of our aims is to help to speed the transition to a net zero greenhouse gas emissions economy. My other interest is that I drive a plug-in electric vehicle and know first-hand the joys and frustrations of this mode of transport. Unlike the noble Baroness, Lady Deech, I lease my vehicle, which is one way around the problem of fearing that the next generation will always be better than the one you have. In my comments today I shall focus on two main issues relating to the part of the Bill dealing with electric vehicles: the need to make smart-charging infrastructure mandatory now, and the need for firmer policy to drive investment throughout the charging and EV supply chain in Great Britain.
In my limited experience in the House I have often judged the importance of a Bill by the size of its impact assessment, and unfortunately this Bill gives itself away by the size and brevity of its impact assessment. Clearly more could be done using this parliamentary opportunity. As it stands, the Bill is something of a missed opportunity, and I hope that during our scrutiny we can work with the Government to turn it into a piece of legislation to truly put the UK at the forefront of the revolution in mobility that we are witnessing on a global scale.
The UK is both a large consumer and manufacturer of vehicles. In 2016, 3.3 million new cars were registered here, bringing the total number of registered vehicles in the UK to 37.3 million. The latest manufacturing figures in the UK show that 1.7 million cars rolled off the production line and 2.7 million engines were manufactured here. The vast majority of all cars made and sold are conventional cars powered by internal combustion engines. A recent study estimates that the total number of electric vehicles on the road today across the entire globe is a mere 3 million—fewer than all the new vehicles registered here in one year. As the noble Lord, Lord Birt, mentioned, the total number of EVs on the road today in the UK is around 130,000—just 0.3% of the total number of licensed vehicles.
It is clear that the demand for cleaner vehicles is increasing, thanks to heightened awareness about the impact of transport on the quality of our air and on climate change; the reducing costs of alternative designs; the increasing ranges; and the wider availability of charging infrastructure. However, there are still a number of frustrations that early adopters have to endure, and new legislation to address them is most welcome. Most users will find charging at home the most convenient option. However, the availability of public charging infrastructure is a key factor in allowing extended journeys and helping those in households without off-street parking to enjoy the benefits of electric vehicles.
There are just under 4,000 public charging points in the UK, but the network is poorly co-ordinated and access is very patchy. There is an urgent need for a standardisation of charging regimes. Vehicles are designed for mobility, yet in my experience it is common to travel to new parts of the country only to find that access to the charging infrastructure requires membership of a regional subscription-based club. There is currently no single national database of all publicly accessible charging points, and to access the widest range of points requires the installation of a number of different applications and the cross-checking of a variety of different data sources—a frustrating and time-consuming occupation. I hope that the Bill will address this.
Another aspect of EVs that must be addressed to facilitate their widespread uptake is the need for charging to be done in a smart way, as the noble Earl, Lord Attlee, mentioned. This means providing the right technology and incentives to enable vehicles to be charged at times of day when power is abundant, which usually correspond with when it is cleanest and cheapest. It must be made mandatory for all the charging infrastructure installed to be connected to the internet and capable of receiving and using a data signal about the state of the grid, both in real time and projected forward.
I am delighted that the Environmental Defense Fund has collaborated with the national grid and WWF and catalysed the publication of a live data feed that already provides this data for the UK via an open source API. I am even more delighted that information about the carbon intensity of power is increasingly available on a European and international scale, thanks to the incredible talent behind electricitymap.org. These data feeds clearly illustrate that all power is not created equally: there are times of the day and year when it is much cleaner, thanks to the mix of generating sources on the system. In order for electricity to be used sustainably for transport, it is imperative that we look at the issue holistically, ensuring that the extra load on the electricity grid is timed to take advantage of cleaner sources of power. That will help us avoid the need for costly and dirty back-up sources of power when demand is high. The technology to do all this already exists; the Bill does not need to rely on secondary legislation to make it the norm. We can and should do it now in the Bill.
There are many other issues which we will surely touch on in Committee, including enabling consumers to add the cost of charging their car to their utility bills regardless of where they consume the power, and the need to ensure that planning regulations and building codes properly integrate electricity charging infrastructure into all new developments of all types and scales—something to which the noble Lord, Lord Brooke, alluded.
I turn to my second point about zero-emission vehicles: the need for firmer policy to guide investment in the necessary infrastructure and supply chains. In the industrial strategy, the Secretary of State, Greg Clarke, stated:
“Britain is extraordinarily well-placed to benefit from”,
a,
“new industrial revolution. We are an open, enterprising economy, built on invention, innovation and competition. Our universities and research institutions are among the best in the world. We have a deserved reputation for being a dependable and confident place to do business, with high standards, respected institutions, and the reliable rule of law”.
All that is true, in particular the last point about our use of the rule of law in driving change.
However, we are the home of the Industrial Revolution, and we still get about 70% to 80% of our primary energy from fossil fuels. We are making progress towards decarbonisation but there is still a long way to go. The Government’s clean growth strategy still projects that we are not on track to meet our fourth and fifth carbon budgets in the next decade, and the chief culprit for that is transport emissions. On air quality, too, we are failing to meet WHO and EU standards. Our cities are making us sick and we are failing to move sufficiently quickly to bring down emissions of pollutants. Clearly, more needs to be done and can be done. Today we start debating a potentially very important Bill, using scarce public resources and parliamentary time—but we are merely discussing enabling legislation. Nothing in the Bill gives the much-needed policy certainty that investors look to before committing their capital.
If we had tried to build a renewable power sector on the basis of providing some enabling powers about grid infrastructure standards, we would not now be home to a world-leading offshore wind industry and would certainly not be building new nuclear power stations. We do not have a CCS industry in the UK yet, precisely because of the absence of a policy framework. For too long we have relied on increases in renewable energy across electricity, heat and transport. This has failed, particularly in the transport sector, where emissions remain stubbornly high and rising.
Other countries and states have already learned this lesson and taken action. China most recently took action to boost the market for zero-emission vehicles by introducing a mandate that 10% of all vehicles sold in China must be electric or equivalent by 2019, rising to 12% in 2020. This mandate is based on a similar policy introduced many years ago in California and since adopted in nine other US states. More recently, Quebec has followed suit. In Europe, there were moves to introduce a similar policy as the reality of China’s enormous policy shift started to set in and the industry tried quickly to adapt, but the Commission’s proposals were watered down. In the UK we can take up the baton and move to match or even exceed the international leaders in policy-making. That is, after all, one of the things we are good at.
A market-based mandate for zero-emission vehicles would harness the efficiency of the private sector, ensure that support for electric vehicles and their equivalents did not rely on the public purse and kick-start investment that shows some signs of having stalled. The SMMT reports that last year UK car production volumes took a dip, and cited policy uncertainty as one of the reasons. Brexit surely plays a part in this, but so too must the announcement by the Secretary of State, Michael Gove, that we plan to ban the internal combustion engine in 2040. That is too far away to affect investment decisions in a positive way but is certainly close enough to be disconcerting to all those invested in the internal combustion engine supply chain today.
As we found in designing the Climate Change Act, long-term targets are useful only if they are coupled with clear, unambiguous policy frameworks in the near term. I look forward to the Government publishing the Road to Zero strategy, but I must ask the Minister whether she thinks it is credible or proper that we should be debating legislation ahead of its publication. Surely we should make a strategy and then legislate with a bold vision—the kind of bold vision that the noble Lords, Lord Lucas and Lord Birt, referred to our needing.
The Committee on Climate Change has made it clear that the Government need to do more to plug the gap in our carbon budgets. We have failed to adequately address air quality, which is a blight on our urban life. We have all the necessary reasons to act with more conviction than the Bill sets out. I very much look forward to hearing more from the Minister, who I am sure is, like the Government, committed to putting the UK at the forefront of the race towards the modern mobility that we all deserve. I hope that as the Bill passes through our Chamber we will succeed in making the case that it can and must be strengthened.
Baroness Randerson (LD)
My Lords, I start by declaring an interest as the owner of an electric car. I welcome the Bill because of the huge potential of such vehicles to reduce congestion on our roads and improve air quality. However, along with others, I must add that I regret that the Bill is so narrowly focused. As always, the Government claim that it is designed to place us as a world leader. In practice, we are of course already lagging behind and nothing in the Bill will help us leapfrog our already more successful rivals.
Let us start with the Title, which is overly specific. In 2011, the UK was a trailblazer when it announced that every new car and van should be ultra-low emission by 2040, but we have already been overtaken. The Government last year committed to phasing out diesel by 2040—in itself, that was a reduced ambition from the 2011 one—but already Norway, Austria, India, Ireland and Scotland are committed to either 2030 or an earlier date. China’s zero-emission vehicle mandate has already demonstrated the surge of electric vehicle manufacturing which follows such a commitment. The UK will not get the investment in EVs, batteries or charging infrastructure unless the Government up their game.
There are already many jobs riding on this. There are 7,000 people in Sunderland working on the Nissan Leaf, which includes 300 people working on battery development. There are 1,000 or more jobs in the London Electric Vehicle Company, which is manufacturing the new electric taxi. It is time that the Government took a wider view, and with that we need a wider Title for the Bill. The Title refers specifically to electric vehicles, but Clause 8 also refers to hydrogen, which is not mentioned in the sub-headings, let alone the overall Title. I should be interested to know from the Minister why that is.
As far as it goes, the Bill is welcome, but it does not go far enough. For instance, it does not mention the issue of training. There is no recent precedent for the scale of change on which the industry is embarking at this moment, and the new technologies referred to in the Bill simply cannot be assimilated by engineers and car mechanics—or enthusiastic amateurs—who trained for standard diesel or petrol engines.
To illustrate the need for qualifications, I point out that households operate on 200 volt electricity but cars operate on 600 volts. That illustrates the additional danger that we are talking about for those working in the field. It is an issue of safety—and there are parallels here with the CORGI scheme for gas engineers, which has proved very resilient, effective and important in raising safety standards. The qualification already exists, and is quick and easy to access, but it needs to be made compulsory, and this Bill would be an opportunity to do that.
Clause 1 refers to a definition of automation but, like other noble Lords, I am rather confused about this, because we have cars that park themselves already, cars with cruise control and cars with automated emergency braking. In my view, they could all be judged to be driving themselves when that automatic process takes over. They are certainly not at level 5 in the standard definition of automation. Does the Secretary of State’s compulsory list, which he has to provide, include all those vehicles that are already on our roads? What about the insurance in relation to foreign cars that are automated? Where will they come into the scheme of things on this?
In respect of automated vehicles, the Bill essentially deals only with insurance, but other key issues will need to be addressed. Clause 4 touches on one of them—the issue of software, and its integrity. It is not just about ensuring that you have updated your software; it is also about the issue of cybersecurity, about data and their use. These cars produce vast amounts of very valuable data. To whom does that data belong? Does it belong to the manufacturer of the car, the manufacturer of the software, or to me? Do I have a right to privacy of my data? Is there a right for me to keep quiet about whether I shop in Sainsbury’s or in Tesco? I am not trivialising this issue; it is a really important one, which I believe needs to be addressed.
Alongside the issue of insurance, those who work in the field have also suggested to me that the current model of car ownership will change, and we are likely to move to fleets of cars that we will not own but will summon up when we need them. That is much more efficient because, currently, the cars we own are parked for 95% of the time and cause a great deal of congestion in that process. Is the model of insurance that this Bill suggests going to be suitable for the ownership of fleets that we simply rent for particular times?
Automation is not going to be an overnight change. It will happen gradually but swiftly—but it will, of course, reduce the number of accidents, because the overwhelming majority of car accidents are due to driver error. The other aspect that the Bill does not deal with is the process of modernising road layout and smart signage and the issue of road safety. What are the Government proposing to do to prepare us for automated cars in that respect?
In Part 2 of the Bill there is a more engaged approach to creating the right infrastructure for electric vehicles. This is a field that is developing very rapidly indeed. It always costs less to run an electric vehicle but it is estimated that, by 2020, it will cost a comparable amount to an ordinary, conventional vehicle to purchase one up front. Range anxiety is still something that is with all of us who own them, and every long journey still needs careful planning. That is ironic, as everyone has electricity, but it does not seem to be available to all of us. The Bill contains some sensible ideas on developing a market, and I welcome in particular Clause 13 and the attempt at standardisation.
As usual, many organisations have been in touch with us, and it has been very informative, but I received one email complaining about Clause 10 and the requirement for large fuel retailers to provide charge points. I wondered whether the organisation sending us that email had considered to whom fuel retailers will be selling fuel in 10 years’ time if not to electric vehicle owners. That is called preparing for the future.
I have a couple of questions. First, on the use of data, it is reasonable applied to public charge points, but are the Government planning to make requirements on the use of my data if I have a charge point on my house, as indeed I do—and what do the Government mean by a charge point? Will the regulations distinguish between the different speeds? You can have standard and fast or you can have rapid, and fast is not as fast as rapid. I am sure that there are other sorts in future in a process of development. Are the Government sensitive to those technicalities, and will the regulations take that into account?
We need a wider approach to the development of charging points. It is not acceptable for electric vehicles to be owned only by people who happen to have drives. We need a very much wider strategy—this Bill does not provide it—to provide additional charge points. The Government should be looking at a planning process to ensure that all new developments provide such charge points. If not, when we look to the future, this Bill will already be out of date. We need to work together to improve it and make it future proof and still useful in 10 years’ time.
Lord Tunnicliffe (Lab)
My Lords, we on the Labour Benches are broadly supportive of this Bill. Our colleagues in the other place supported it the first time round, when it was part of the Vehicle Technology and Aviation Bill. The Government have said that this Bill is about getting ready for the changes that we will see in motoring over the next decades. We are told that 85% of car accidents are in some way due to human error, and automated vehicles have a huge potential to radically improve road safety, reduce human error in incidents, improve traffic flow and combat our air quality and pollution crisis. They could also broaden access to mobility for elderly, disabled and vulnerable people. This is all to be encouraged.
The key provisions in the Bill are welcome, but they seem to be just part of the story when it comes to preparing ourselves for transportation of the future. I wonder if the Government have thought ahead to the impact that automated vehicles might have on our already stretched infrastructure. If the cost, dangers and environmental impact of driving are brought down, how many people might drive their own vehicles, or be driven in their own vehicles, in 20 or 30 years’ time, rather than taking public or other modes of transport? That is something we should think about.
The Bill updates the regulatory regime around motor insurance, removing uncertainty for insurers and manufacturers for claims relating to automated vehicles. It also seeks to address the inhibitors to widespread take-up of electric vehicles. In doing so, it gives the Secretary of State a large number of secondary legislative powers in relation to standards for design of charging points and transmission of data, which I will return to in a minute.
While we broadly support its aims, there are areas of the Bill on which we intend to pose questions and suggest amendments. Clause 1 requires the Secretary of State to keep a list of automated vehicles. The definition is therefore in the hands of the Secretary of State, an issue which remains unaddressed as the Bill reaches your Lordships’ House. The Bill assumes that there is a clear distinction between a vehicle that is automated and one that is not, when the distinction may be more complex. The Government should make sure that they draw on all available expertise and consult before drawing up such a definition. We should not underestimate the size of the task of creating an appropriate regulatory environment for these vehicles. The history of creating a safe regulatory environment in transport is extremely grim. In virtually every mode of transport—aviation, railways or motoring—regulation has caught up with the need to secure safety only after multiple crashes. It is important that a well-resourced and thought-through approach is applied to developing these regulations. We have to recognise that high reliance on digital technology platforms is a very new area. My personal view is that the technology is pubescent: it is full of promise and deeply unreliable.
We welcome the Government’s action to facilitate automated vehicle insurance policies in the future but we need to ensure that changes to insurance processes in the Bill do not result in policyholders being left with additional costs and that there are clear lines of responsibility between manufacturers and insurers. With the introduction of new technology, we must ensure that we have in place cybersecurity measures against hacking. We do not want automated vehicles or charging points to become vulnerable or dangerous. As with other forms of software, automated vehicles will need to be updated and remain so to prevent safety risks. The Government should require automated vehicles to be up to date for the automated function to be used. They should also make clear how the large amounts of data stored in automated vehicles and their charging points will be shared and regulated.
There are currently 11,840 charging points for electric vehicles across the UK and only seven hydrogen filling stations. There are multiple charging point operators, each with their own plugs, software, customer charges and payment methods. If we are to increase the take-up of electric cars, we must make sure that charging points are universally standardised across the country. The Government should ensure that they assess the costs, benefits and feasibility of charging points so that we end up with a national network for both commercial and public use. We are glad that the Government have agreed to publish an updated strategy for promoting the uptake of electric vehicles by the end of March this year and look forward to seeing it in due course.
In making way for the number of electric vehicles on our roads to grow, we need to consider the effect this will have on the current workforce and the potential for a skills gap. Electric and hybrid vehicles need fully trained technicians and a recent study on behalf of the Institute of the Motor Industry showed that 81% of independent garages found it difficult to recruit technicians with the skills to work on such vehicles. Provisions must be put in place for mechanics and small businesses to upskill, so that we may prepare the workforce as we develop this new technology.
As I mentioned, Part 2 of the Bill is full of regulation-making powers for the Secretary of State. Regulations may impose requirements and prohibitions in relation to payments at public charging points, services and facilities available and the transmission of charge point data, to name but a few. We are concerned about the Government’s liberal use of wide-ranging secondary legislation and will examine the Bill more closely to see whether they are using such powers inappropriately. We look forward to hearing the view of the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee on this.
We support the Bill but we are disappointed that it is not accompanied by a broader strategy to combat poor air quality and climate change. This is an important opportunity missed. The proportion of renewable transport fuels in the UK fell from 4.93% to 4.23% in 2015 and the Government are in danger of missing their legally binding renewable fuels target of 10% of transport fuel coming from renewable sources by 2020. Electric vehicles are one way for the Government to confront the air quality crisis that they are presiding over, but the Bill could have been a much more ambitious vehicle for tackling pollution and improving public health. We look forward to discussing these and other issues further with the Minister as the Bill progresses through your Lordships’ House. I am particularly looking forward to the many amendments promised by the debate this afternoon.
Baroness Sugg
My Lords, this Bill is an important piece of the Government’s broad programme of work to ensure that the UK continues researching, developing, manufacturing and deploying innovation in order to harness improvements in vehicle technology. I thank all noble Lords for their contributions. I think it is fair to say that there is more concern from noble Lords on the measures related to automated vehicles than electric ones, so I will begin by addressing those.
The noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, and my noble friend Lord Lucas raised the question of legitimate handover. Transferring control of an automated vehicle from a human driver to the automated system will, of course, require a handover process which ensures that the vehicle is always under the control of either the driver or the automated system. We envisage that vehicle manufacturers will design that system so that it provides prompts to the driver, making them aware when it is legitimate for them to hand over control. We will need to ensure that a driver does not undertake a non-legitimate handover and tries to force the vehicle to take control when it is inappropriate or operate the automated system when it is not designed to be operated. If they do so, they may ultimately be liable for the consequences of those actions.
The noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, my noble friend Lord Lucas, the noble Lord, Lord Tunnicliffe, and many other noble Lords raised the complex issue of software. It is not the policy intent or function of the Bill to provide the regulatory framework for safety and security standards of the software. That is being developed with international standards at the level of the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe and, domestically, as part of our ongoing regulatory programme. We are playing a key part in the United Nations Economic Commission and chair a number of its committees. Based on discussions with manufacturers, we expect that they will inform the owners of cars when a safety update to the vehicle software is needed. However, the overwhelming majority of these updates will be made automatically. The wording in the Bill places the onus on the manufacturer to communicate effectively about the need to install updates, but it is a complicated issue. As and when software updates are developed further, we will need to ensure that there is clear guidance on this for both manufacturers and vehicle owners so that it is clear where the responsibilities lie.
There are several factors which could influence the reason why a collision occurred. At this stage, we are keeping the process of determining liability as it is now, with the courts ultimately making judgments based on the facts. Under our proposals, the insurers will compensate the victim and be able to recover from the liable party, which could include the manufacturer or any other party. The three issues of legitimate handover, software and liability are examples of how complicated and complex this area is. I look forward to getting into the detail of it in Committee.
My noble friend Lord Goschen, the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, and other noble Lords raised the issue of ethics. There are many important questions to be asked about ethics when driving. One of these is how drivers respond when a collision appears unavoidable. Right now, we expect drivers to do the best they can. Given that, as many noble Lords have highlighted, the majority of road collisions involve some form of human error, the advent of automation promises to reduce the number of unavoidable collisions. However, it raises additional question about ethics. As my noble friend Lord Attlee highlighted, with automation we can avoid the risks of novice drivers or someone driving impaired through drink, drugs or tiredness, but reduction is not elimination and at some point automated vehicles will be involved in unavoidable collisions.
We expect the automated vehicle will be able to identify where there is a pedestrian present but may well not be able to identify any more details around the pedestrian’s age or gender. We do not yet know about these details. When faced with such a collision, we imagine that the automated vehicle will be programmed to maximise safety, but, again, this is still being developed. We must address these issues publicly and transparently. Ethical issues were an important focus of the Lords Science and Technology Committee’s report, which calls for further government-commissioned social research. We are taking forward several actions from that report to help in that discussion.
My noble friend Lord Goschen also asked about the wider regulatory framework. I spoke about the Law Commission in my opening remarks. The noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, also mentioned that. I will give a bit more detail on that which may address some of the concerns of the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, and the noble Lord, Lord Tunnicliffe. The Law Commission is undertaking a three-year programme to review the regulatory framework for road-based automated vehicles with a view to enable their safe deployment. Its task is to provide recommendations for a legal framework which can remain effective in the face of vehicles that may no longer require a human driver, and its work will be part of a national conversation on this important future technology. The commission is likely to consider how automated vehicles could fit within the existing regulation of public transport frameworks and look at on-demand passenger transport provision, a point raised by my noble friend Lord Attlee. Again, where ethical considerations are relevant, the Law Commission will highlight the choices which need to be made regulation-wise. It will avoid judging what may or may not be desirable ethical outcomes but will set out possible approaches to promote consistency and transparency. The review is being undertaken to explore the law relating to the deployment of automated vehicles in the United Kingdom and will consider changes necessary to provide a robust and future-proof legal framework to support the deployment of the vehicles. It will also look at areas such as civil and criminal liability frameworks as they apply in the context of automated vehicles, product liability, sellers’ liability, the law of negligence and criminal sanctions et cetera.
The noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, asked what data will be available from automated vehicles. My noble friend Lord Attlee highlighted the importance of ensuring that this data is available to all those who need it. The noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, and the noble Lord, Lord Tunnicliffe, rightly raised concerns about the safety of sharing this data from automated vehicles. These vehicles will generate a huge amount of data during their day-to-day operation. How this data is shared, and with whom, will have an impact on an individual’s privacy. This, of course, is an issue which the Government take very seriously. It is expected that the data recorders, like most new vehicle technologies, will be regulated at an international level. The international debate on what data needs to be collected beyond who or what was in control of the automated vehicle still needs to take place. As I said, we are actively engaged in the relevant discussions on that at the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe. We have also begun speaking to relevant parts of the industry to build our understanding of who will need to access the data, how it should be shared and how to manage concerns over privacy. We will continue this engagement as the technology develops. As the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, pointed out, who actually owns that technology is an important question too.
Many noble Lords raised the issue of standards. I take this opportunity to reassure the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Craig, and indeed all noble Lords, that the Government take very seriously the approval process which ensures that all vehicles on our roads are safe for use. As my noble friend Lord Attlee pointed out, the Government already have the power to make regulations under the Road Traffic Act 1988, which could be used for automated and electric vehicles, but we certainly anticipate the need to legislate further to safely facilitate the deployment of automated vehicles. It is too early to legislate for standards at this time. As many noble Lords have pointed out, the development of automated vehicles is in its infancy and legislating too early or unilaterally may hinder our development of the technology and constrain our ability to steer consensus on international standards.
On additional regulation-making powers to cover automated vehicles as suggested by my noble friends Lord Borwick and Lord Lucas, that would indeed allow more flexibility in the future and potentially future-proof this legislation. I am used to being much more defensive when I am asking for Secretary of State powers, so I am very happy to take that suggestion away and consider it further ahead of Committee.
The definitions of “monitoring” and “safely” were raised by the noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, and my noble friends Lord Selborne and Lord Borwick. It is, of course, imperative that we get these words right and that we do our best to avoid complex legal arguments in the future. I will take that issue away for consideration. I am very happy to meet noble Lords to discuss this further ahead of Committee, but look forward to discussing it further then.
My noble friend Lord Lucas makes another convincing case for automated vehicles on rail lines. I was very interested to discuss this issue with him recently and look forward to discussing it further as plans develop.
I turn to electric vehicles and the electricity system. The noble Lord, Lord Birt, and several other noble Lords mentioned managing loads on the system. Of course, more electric vehicles on our roads means that we will need more electricity to power them. Unmanaged, this could add to the pressure on power generation in the grid. However, the measures in the Bill are designed to allow us to manage future demand and control the cost to customers. The national grid predicts only a 10% increase in demand by 2040 from electric vehicles, which is around 6 gigawatts, and is confident that it can cope. In July 2017, the Government launched their smart plan which set out how the system, including new sources of demand from electric vehicles, can be managed more efficiently. The measures in the Bill are designed to relieve the pressure on the grid from electric vehicles charging during peak time. When drivers arrive home in the evening, they will most likely need their car to be charged only for when they leave in the morning. It is not necessary for this charging to take place during the evening peak time. Ideally, it will be shifted to the early hour off-peak times.
As my noble friend Lord Attlee highlighted, smart charging will encourage electric vehicle users to charge their cars at a time when it is most beneficial for both them and the energy system. This should be cheaper for consumers as well as reducing peak loads on the energy system. This is an important area, and I look forward to finding the YouTube clip illustrating this mentioned by my noble friend Lord Goschen. The noble Baroness, Lady Worthington, made a compelling case for smart charging. Clause 3 contains powers to make new charge points capable of monitoring energy consumption and transmitting that data. Clause 12 contains the power to require this data to be sent and made available to relevant third parties, so there is a lot in the Bill on smart charging, but again I look forward to discussing that further.
The noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, asked about freight. We want all road vehicles, not just cars, to be zero-emission vehicles. Personal use cars are perhaps more developed than haulage vehicles in this regard, but this is a key area which we want to support. We have funded £20 million-worth of innovation trials that have put around 500 low-emission vehicles into UK fleets of companies such as Waitrose, DHL and UPS. That funding has included supporting infrastructure. The measures in the Bill cover electric batteries and hydrogen fuel cell trucks as well as cars, but it will be interesting to see whether we can do more on that.
The noble Lord, Lord Brooke, spoke about the importance of extending the availability of charge points, as did many other noble Lords. The Bill provides powers to require the installation of public charging points only at motorway service areas and large fuel retailers. The idea behind that is that these strategic locations are particularly important to address anxiety about range for drivers on longer journeys. However, it is clear that we will need many more charging points across the UK in the future. The recent Budget committed us to place greater emphasis on locating charge points at rail stations. We have enhanced capital allowances to offer tax relief for companies to install recharging equipment. Noble Lords also mentioned golf clubs, which is a very good idea. We are looking at charge points being installed at supermarkets, hotels and retail centres. We shall consider adding the wider provision of charge points to the Bill but, as I said, currently the focus is just on the large fuel retailers.
As the noble Baroness, Lady Worthington, and other noble Lords pointed out, planning policy is an important tool in encouraging both residential and non-residential developments to bring charge point infrastructure into their thinking. Local planning policies are guided by the National Planning Policy Framework, which stipulates that developments should, where practical, incorporate charging facilities. In the Budget we announced additional initiatives. After the Grenfell review, the Government will update the building regulations to mandate that all new residential developments must contain the enabling cabling for charge points. The Government will also update road works guidance for local authorities so that infrastructure is installed when these works are happening anyway. Officials in my department are working on the details of these measures with our colleagues in the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government; the suggestion made by the noble Lord, Lord Brooke, of working together with communities to deliver these charge points is good, and we will take that forward.
Lord Campbell-Savours
My Lords, have the Government ruled out at this stage a differential in the unit price for electricity used by someone to charge their car as against the unit price for electricity consumed in the home for, say, white goods, lighting and heating?
Baroness Sugg
I do not believe that that has been ruled out. I will come on to our strategy, which we will publish shortly; it will look at those kinds of issues.
The noble Baroness, Lady Worthington, made a number of wider and compelling points about transport emissions and how we can better influence investment decisions. I am afraid that I do not have time to go into those now or to begin to address them, but I hope that the noble Baroness will meet me so that we can discuss that further.
The noble Lord, Lord Birt, asked when we will publish our updated strategy, which will look at managing electricity and increasing charging points. We last set out our strategy on electric vehicles in 2013, so it is due an update. While our ambition that nearly all cars and vans should be zero-emissions vehicles by 2050 remains unchanged, obviously the market and technology have developed hugely since then, as the noble Lord, Lord Birt, pointed out. It is therefore right that we review the steps we need to deliver our ambition on this. We plan to publish the strategy by the end of March, and I hope that it will address many of the wider points raised today by the noble Baronesses, Lady Randerson and Lady Worthington, the noble Lord, Lord Tunnicliffe, and other noble Lords.
The noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, made the sensible suggestion that we should have one universal charging point. The shift to electric vehicles is being driven by the global automotive industry. The Bill does not set out precisely which charging connector could be used as the common standard in any regulation. However, it will allow technical specifications to be set so that drivers can be confident that they will be able to plug in and charge when they arrive at public charge points. I am afraid that I do not have the information about how many of these charge points are operational, but I will go back to see whether we can find that out. The noble Lord, Lord Brooke, is quite right that we must ensure that these all function as well.
My noble friend Lord Selborne and the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, highlighted the importance of skills, and I agree that we must ensure that the UK has a suitably skilled workforce. Motorists with electric vehicles will clearly expect the same level of knowledge and customer service that they have come to expect in connection with conventional vehicles, and, as the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, points out, it is important that we make sure that those trained in these vehicles are trained safely.
As a professional body for the automotive industry, the Institute of the Motor Industry is well placed to help government understand the challenge of ensuring that maintenance and repair is carried out in a professional and safe manner. There are already some level 1 to 3 qualifications in electric vehicle maintenance and repair, and between 30 and 50 UK colleges and training providers offer these courses. However, we can of course do more, and I will look closely at the suggestion made by the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, on this. We recognise that this is a potential barrier for the uptake of electric vehicles and we are already taking steps to address this.
On the Parliamentary Estate—I wondered whether this would come up—there are currently only two charging points in the underground car park. A major project is under way to refurbish the car park, and around 80 car charging sockets are planned—10% of the planned car parking spaces—with the capacity to add more in the future. The car park refurbishment project started in the summer of last year and is due to finish in summer 2019.
Baroness Randerson
I add, as a piece of useful information, that in the underground car park there are also a lot of three-pin plug sockets, and you are entitled to park your car overnight and recharge it there using an ordinary plug. So the facility is there, but of course there is nothing in the House of Lords car park.
Baroness Sugg
Absolutely. I hope that the noble Baroness, Lady Deech, will be able to benefit from that and from the new charge points; as a pioneer of the new technology she certainly deserves to. However, I take the point that those are only for the underground car park and I will certainly follow up on whether we can do anything for the House of Lords car park.
The noble Baronesses, Lady Deech and Lady Randerson, and other electric vehicle users all highlighted the need for interoperability and access to these charge points. We recognise this, and the Bill has powers to address the inconvenience to drivers of carrying around lots of different means of access to the services, whether that is multiple memberships, regional memberships, access cards or unique applications. Obligations that the UK agreed to in the European Union alternative fuels infrastructure directive 2014 were implemented nationally in October and go a little way towards rectifying the current problems. That means that memberships or an advanced notice period can no longer be required before charge point access is granted, which should, we hope, assist in removing the necessity for multiple memberships. However, it does not remove the problem of a lack of consistency in the way consumers are expected to access different public charge points. Each operator remains able to determine whether access is by smartphone app, SMS text, phone number or any other method. As there are currently no statutory duties on operators, our only option is to take powers to legislate to ensure that drivers are offered a common method of access, and the Bill gives this power.
My noble friend Lord Borwick and the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, raised the issue of hydrogen. The use of “public charging points” throughout the Bill includes hydrogen refuelling as per the definition in Clause 8—although, I acknowledge, not particularly clearly. These words are very much designed to cover hydrogen refuelling, but we will consider whether we can do something more on that in the Bill.
On the question of level 3 vehicles, raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, the Bill does not cover cars which are currently on the road; it is designed to cover only fully automated vehicles, or so-called level 5 vehicles.
My noble friend Lord Borwick and the noble Lord, Lord Tunnicliffe, raised the use of delegated powers. That is of course important. We aim to be as transparent as possible in the Bill as to what will follow in regulations. The Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee is considering our memorandum and is due to publish before Committee. Policy scoping notes are being prepared, which outline the policy intent, the proposed content, the approach to preparing the regulations and the indicative timings for each power, and we will make sure that these are available to Peers prior to Committee so that they can be properly scrutinised.
Time is running out: if I have not been able to answer all the questions raised today, I will follow up in writing. Noble Lords have highlighted the narrow scope of the Bill, which indeed addresses only specific issues in this area. However, as my noble friend Lord Goschen said, this is a first step but an important one. The Bill will help ensure that the UK is ready for the change coming in vehicles and mobility. I hope that the advent of automated vehicles will not lead to the type of world that the noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, described. To use a term that is popular today, it sounded like a “Mad Max” dystopia.
The powers in the Bill will help us deliver one of the world’s best recharging networks to support the Government’s ambition for almost every car and van to be a zero-emissions vehicle by 2050. Looking to the future, the Bill brings forward an important step by providing an insurance framework for autonomous vehicles which will put the UK at the forefront of automated vehicle ownership and use when this technology becomes available.
As I said, I am grateful for the contributions from all noble Lords this afternoon, and for the knowledge and experience that will help to improve the Bill as it passes through your Lordships’ House. Many interesting points have been raised, and I will consider these carefully before the Bill reaches Committee.
Andrey Lugovoy and Dmitri Kovtun Freezing Order 2018
(6 years, 10 months ago)
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Lord Young of Cookham
That the Order laid before the House on 19 January be approved.
Lord Young of Cookham (Con)
My Lords, the 2018 order was laid before both Houses on 19 January of this year and came into force on 22 January. This was to ensure that there was no gap in the freezing measures enforced against Andrey Lugovoy and Dmitri Kovtun the day after the publication of the Litvinenko inquiry report on 21 January 2016. The order was debated and approved in the other place on 8 February.
Noble Lords will not need to be reminded that the independent inquiry, chaired by Sir Robert Owen, concluded that Alexander Litvinenko was deliberately poisoned in 2006 by Lugovoy and Kovtun through the use of polonium-210, a radioactive isotope. The inquiry also concluded that there was a “strong probability” that Litvinenko, an ex-KGB and ex-FSB officer and a critic of the Russian Government, was murdered on the order of the FSB, the Russian domestic security service. Furthermore, the killing was “probably approved” by the then head of the FSB, Nikolai Patrushev, and the Russian President, Vladimir Putin.
In response to the seriousness of the report’s conclusions, the Treasury imposed an asset freeze on Lugovoy and Kovtun on 22 January 2016 by making a freezing order under the Anti-terrorism, Crime and Security Act 2001. The 2016 freezing order had the effect of freezing any funds or assets that these two individuals held in the UK or with any UK-incorporated entities, denying them access to the UK financial system and prohibiting UK persons from making funds available to them. The Treasury routinely monitors information provided on financial sanctions on all designated persons. During the two-year period, no relevant information was received in respect of Lugovoy and Kovtun.
Under Section 8 of the Act, the duration of a freezing order is limited to two years. During that two years, the Treasury is required, by Section 7 of the Act, to keep the order under review. In order to maintain the asset freeze, the Treasury was required to review the case and to decide whether to make a new order. The Treasury has conducted such a review and has decided to make a new freezing order.
The Treasury believes that making a new order remains an appropriate and proportionate measure to take. It will ensure that any assets discovered in the UK that belong to the two individuals are immediately frozen, and it will prevent the men trying to access the UK financial sector. The relevant conditions required to be met, in accordance with Section 4 of the Act, are still being met today—the Treasury reasonably believes that action constituting a threat to the life or property of one or more nationals of the UK or residents of the UK has been or is likely to be taken by a person or persons resident in a country or territory outside the UK.
The freezing order is one of a limited number of measures available to the UK authorities as a means of acting directly against Lugovoy and Kovtun. The other actions include Interpol red notices and European arrest warrants, which also remain in place. The Russian authorities’ refusal to accede to extradition requests following the murder of Mr Litvinenko and their lack of co-operation with the inquiry have blocked progress being made by the Metropolitan Police investigation into Lugovoy and Kovtun. There is therefore little prospect of bringing them to trial in a British court.
However, we continue to believe that the freezing order acts as a deterrent and as a clear signal that this Government will not tolerate such acts on British soil and will take firm steps to defend our national security and rule of law. Failure to renew the asset freezes against Lugovoy and Kovtun would, I believe, risk reinforcing a damaging signal that the consequences of murder carried out in the UK are few and time-limited, and that it is possible to evade the UK justice system by fleeing overseas.
Noble Lords will be aware that the UK’s relationship with the Russian Government remains strictly limited as a result of the Litvinenko assassination and the illegal annexation of Crimea by Russia. We continue to engage with Russia on a guarded basis, defending UK national security where necessary. We will continue to pressure the Russian Government to do more to co-operate with the investigation into Mr Litvinenko’s death. This includes the extradition of the main suspects, the provision of satisfactory answers, and an accounting of the role and activities of its security services.
This new freezing order maintains the asset freeze originally imposed by a similar order passed in 2016. It acts as a deterrent and a signal that the UK will not tolerate such acts on British soil and that we will defend our national security and the rule of law. I beg to move.
Viscount Waverley (CB)
My Lords, following the protocol to declare such interests, I do so, informing the House that I am a vice-chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Russia.
It is the nature of the challenge—the noble Lord, Lord Young, touched on this—that UK/Russia relations can charitably be defined as fraught. However, for ever wishing to see justice adhered to, and given that Russia is highly unlikely to agree to the extradition to the United Kingdom, not least because under the Russian constitution no Russian can be extradited if it undermines their citizens’ rights—in addition to the concern that in the UK the proceedings were, I understand, held in camera, thus suggesting to the Russians that this process is all being conducted in secrecy—I understand that there is a willingness by Russia to make these two men available for interview or for a process through a mechanism such as Skype or some other such means.
I want to make one point about something that troubles me. The Foreign Secretary travelled for a bilateral meeting in Moscow with his opposite number, Foreign Minister Lavrov, on 22 December, but I understand that the Foreign Secretary failed to discuss this case with Minister Lavrov. Since the case of Mr Litvinenko is a plank of UK foreign policy towards Russia, this is surprising to me, to say the least, as it sends conflicting messages to the Russians.
Given that background, would it not be more practical to consider encouraging other jurisdictions to assist—for example, by calling on the International Court of Justice to play a role and, in effect, lend good offices to allow for a fair hearing to be conducted? That would in no way suggest that the individuals in question would not receive a fair hearing here in the UK.
Lord Robathan (Con)
My Lords, I commend the Government for taking this action. I also commend my right honourable friend the Security Minister in the other place for his comments about the assets of many people that have been brought here. They are probably illegally obtained moneys and are now held by oligarchs in this country who are laundering them through the banks here and buying up a great deal of London real estate.
I have been put on a stop list and cannot go to Russia. I would rather like to go to St Petersburg, never having been. I have probably been put on the stop list because I said something slightly disobliging about President Putin a few years ago. I urge the Government not just to pursue this matter but to be really fierce with the Russian Government, as I believe our Foreign Secretary has been. If the Russian Government get away with it, they will continue to get away with it and life will get worse, not better.
Baroness Kramer (LD)
My Lords, I support the continuation of the freeze on the assets of Andrey Lugovoy and Dmitri Kovtun, but they had years in which to reorder their finances before the first asset freeze came about in 2016. I point out that there is a lesson there: in the future the Government need to act quickly. The delay in the public inquiry and in acting to freeze the assets was, frankly, shamefully long. Beyond this just being a heinous crime, the murder was also, as my colleague in the other place, Tom Brake MP, said at the time of the public inquiry, an assault on our sovereignty. Those are two fundamental issues that should have urged us to rapid action.
I have a couple of questions for the Minister. Having reread the order, I am unclear about whether it applies to cryptocurrencies. If it does, I wonder whether the Minister can guide me to the relevant article or paragraph in the order and explain to me how on earth action against cryptocurrencies will be enforced. Because those currencies are beginning to play a major role in many areas of asset purchases and payments, it is important that we make sure that the issue is covered, and I would appreciate the Minister’s comments on that.
I also want to ask the Minister about the situation in the British Overseas Territories. The Government have firmly refused to require the overseas territories to make their registers of beneficial ownership open to public scrutiny. They have argued that the facility for UK authorities to inquire whether beneficial ownership is associated with individuals such as these two is sufficient for them to be able to enforce. How often have the relevant British enforcement authorities investigated this and are either of these men using the overseas territories and shell companies to continue to access financial services and markets? If the Minister does not have an answer now, could he write to me on that issue?
Lord Judd (Lab)
My Lords, I am very glad indeed to hear the resolute terms in which the order has been brought forward.
It is very important to remember just how brutal and horrible the murder was and how it was deliberately arranged in a way that would send a message to dissenters and others in Russia itself. From that standpoint, I think that this issue, quite apart from its legal rectitude, has important political significance in terms of our relationship with Russia. I could not agree more with the noble Baroness about the widow, who is an absolutely delightful woman and has come through this remarkably well. It must have been sheer, undiluted hell to see her husband dying in that way. The only way that the present regime in Russia gets messages is by being tough. Any tendency to rationalise or prevaricate on the issue would be disastrous; that is wrong.
I want to make one other point, quite apart from the victim himself. Two weeks before this happened, I heard him speak at a meeting in London, in which he was outspoken in his criticism of the cold-blooded brutality of the regime. He was a very courageous man, standing by the very principles we like to claim as central to our society. My point is this: do we really let agents of a regime like that travel around London trailing radioactivity with impunity? Where are they going? At the time, I found it astounding that they were just wandering round London and leaving trails of radioactivity. This is a very serious case indeed, with the most important issues behind it. I therefore do nothing but commend the Government on the resolute terms in which they have brought the statutory instrument forward.
Lord Hylton (CB)
My Lords, I welcome this order but I think it would be helpful to the House if the Minister could tell us how many persons are subject to orders similar to this one and what the approximate total of the now-frozen assets is. I apologise to him for not warning him of these two points but I hope he can deal with them.
Lord Tunnicliffe (Lab)
My Lords, we on these Benches accept and believe that the order is an appropriate, commensurate and proportionate response in relation to the specified persons. In coming to that conclusion, we have of course looked at the order with care. I also looked up the time when the first order was initiated—two years ago—only to discover that I was in fact the Opposition spokesman then. Time has not changed much.
The noble Lord, Lord Ashton of Hyde, answered all my questions at that time, except one. I quote him:
“As the noble Lord may know, Mrs Litvinenko’s lawyers provided a list of people who she felt should have further action taken against them. Some are members of the Russian authorities who are already under sanctions relating to Crimea and activities in Ukraine. The rest of the list is being considered by the Home Secretary, but so far no action has been decided upon”.—[Official Report, 10/2/16; col. GC 228.]
Has any further action been decided upon for individuals on that list?
Lord Young of Cookham
My Lords, I am grateful to all noble Lords who have taken part in this debate for their broad support for the order. I will try to deal with the points that have been raised, but I may have to write in respect of some of them.
To the noble Viscount, Lord Waverley, I say that the Russian authorities should be in no doubt about the position the Government have taken in relation to Litvinenko. We have reinforced our message several times: we have made very clear our profound concerns to the Russian Government in Moscow, we have summoned the Russian ambassador to the Foreign Office in London and we continue to demand that the Russian Government do more to co-operate with the investigation into Mr Litvinenko’s death, including extraditing the main suspects, providing satisfactory answers and accounting for the role of their security service. The noble Viscount raised the issue of the ICJ. I think that is probably a matter for the ICJ but I will make further inquiries.
Lord West of Spithead (Lab)
I speak from an intelligence background. Does the Minister agree that when one looks at patterns of operation, the way in which this whole affair has been dealt with by Russia is exactly the same way as it dealt with similar things when it was the Soviet Union—particularly its normal, KGB-type way of reacting and acting when these sorts of things happen?
Lord Young of Cookham
I agree with the noble Lord. It is very disappointing that these practices have reappeared in the Soviet Union and have damaged our relationship with that country.
My noble friend Lord Robathan asked what we were doing to stop Russian criminals from exploiting the UK financial system. He may know that we passed the Criminal Finances Act 2017, which introduced criminal offences relating to companies that failed to prevent tax evasion. We made a commitment at the 2016 Anti-Corruption Summit to publish an anti-corruption strategy, setting out a work plan through to 2022. We have created a new National Economic Crime Centre within the National Crime Agency to bring together all our capabilities to fight economic crime, including the specific instances mentioned by my noble friend.
My noble friend may also know that we recently introduced unexplained wealth orders, so in addition to the action we have taken to deal with money laundering—such as the register of beneficial owners—we have taken powers to require people who own property that would ordinarily be beyond their obvious means to prove how they lawfully acquired it. On 31 January this year, the regulations that introduced UWOs came into force. A UWO requires a person who is reasonably suspected of involvement in—or connection to someone involved in—serious crime to explain the nature and extent of their interests in a particular property and to explain how the property was obtained where there are reasonable grounds to suspect that the respondent’s known, lawfully obtained income would be insufficient to allow the respondent to obtain the property.
The noble Baroness, Lady Kramer, asked whether cryptocurrency was included. In Schedule 2 of the order, “funds” is fairly embracing, meaning,
“including (but not limited to) … gold, cash, cheques, claims on money”,
et cetera, and Schedule 4, which deals with freezing prohibitions, refers to,
“making available the proceeds of realisation of property belonging to a specified person, and … making a payment to or for the benefit of a specified person”.
So my advice is that the order includes cryptocurrency. I agree with the noble Baroness that it is unlikely that these individuals will come to the UK or indeed that they have any assets in the UK.
The freezing order applies to overseas banks. The noble Baroness asked a more specific question about shell companies. I would like to write to her about that, but if the money from a shell company went through a bank, it would be caught by the order. She also asked about the delay in introducing the freezing order. She will know that there was a sequence of events—the inquiry that culminated, eventually, in the Sir Robert Owen inquiry. It was some time before we knew who to go for after the tragic death of Litvinenko. I agree with what she and other noble Lords said about the widow, Mrs Litvinenko.
I am sorry that the noble Lord, Lord Tunnicliffe, has had to wait two years for an answer to the question that he asked last time. The Government decided not to implement asset-freezing orders against those individuals mentioned in the letter under this legislation with the exception of Lugovoy and Kovtun but, as was indicated in 2016, a number of individuals on the list provided by Mrs Litvinenko’s lawyers have been designated for other reasons under sanctions relating to Crimea and activities in Ukraine. There is an ongoing police investigation into the two individuals that we discuss this evening.
I will have to write to the noble Lord, Lord Hylton, in answer to his questions about the total volume of assets frozen under freezing orders. I think he went just beyond the order that we debate this evening and his question applied to all freezing orders, so I will write to him. I am sorry if I have not answered all the questions raised by noble Lords. I will write in respect of those that I have not been able to answer.
Review of Post-18 Education and Funding
(6 years, 10 months ago)
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Viscount Younger of Leckie (Con)
My Lords, with the leave of the House I will now repeat a Statement made in the other place by my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Education. The Statement is as follows:
“With permission, Mr Speaker, I will now make a Statement on the review of post-18 education and funding. While I am not announcing new policy today, I welcome the opportunity to confirm to the House details of a major review across post-18 education and funding, as announced by the Prime Minister yesterday.
Before I discuss the specifics of the review, I should highlight some of the strengths and successes of our existing post-18 education system. We have a world-class higher education system. Sixteen British universities are in the world’s top 100, and four are in the top 10. We have record numbers of young people entering university, including from disadvantaged backgrounds. Our student finance system removes up-front financial barriers and provides protections for borrowers so that they have to contribute only when they can afford to do so. A university degree provides significant financial returns for individuals—graduates on average benefit from their university education by over £100,000 over their lifetime.
The Higher Education and Research Act sets the foundation for further improvements, with the Office for Students to be a strong voice for students and ensure minimum standards; the Director for Fair Access and Participation to drive social mobility; the Teaching Outcomes and Excellence Framework—TEF—measures; and the facilitation of further diversity with new providers and shorter degrees delivered at a lower cost to students.
The Technical and Further Education Act 2017 extends the responsibilities of the Institute for Apprenticeships to include technical education, as well as introducing degree-level apprenticeships. New institutes of technology will be established which will focus on higher-level technical skills and will be eligible for access to loans and grants for their students. T-levels are in development—a true equal-standing alternative to A-levels.
It is these important reforms that we will build on in this review, and we will also look at parts of the system that are not working as well as they could be. While we have seen further growth in three-year degrees for 18 year-olds, the post-18 system does not always offer a comprehensive range of high-quality alternative routes for the many young people who pursue a technical or vocational path at this age. In universities, we have not seen the extent of increase in choice that we would have wanted. The great majority of courses are priced at the same level, and three-year courses are the norm. Meanwhile, although the funding system is a progressive one, with in-built protections, these elements are not always well understood.
It is for these reasons that the Government are committed to conducting this major review across post-18 education, to look further at how we can ensure that our post-18 education system is joined up and supported by a funding system that works for students and taxpayers. The review will look at four key strands: choice and competition across post-18 education and training; value for money for graduates and taxpayers; accessibility of the system to all; and delivering the skills that our country needs. This means identifying ways to help people make more effective choices between the different options available at and after 18, so they can make more informed decisions about their futures, and making sure there is a more diverse range of options to choose from beyond classic three- or four-year undergraduate degrees.
We will look at how students and graduates contribute to the cost of their studies to ensure that funding arrangements across post-18 education in the future are transparent and do not stop people accessing higher education or training. We will examine how we can best ensure that people from all backgrounds have equal opportunities to progress and succeed in post-18 education, including considering how disadvantaged students receive maintenance support, both from the Government and from universities and colleges. We will look at how we can best support education outcomes that deliver our industrial strategy ambitions, by contributing to a strong economy and delivering the skills that our country needs. We are clear that we must maintain and protect key elements of our current post-18 education system that work well already. We will maintain the principle that students should contribute to the cost of their studies, and we will place no cap on the number of students who can benefit from post-18 education. We will not regress to a system like in Scotland, where controls on student numbers continue to restrict the aspirations of young people.
The review will be informed by independent advice from an expert panel from across post-18 education, business and academia, chaired by Philip Augar, a financial author and former non-executive director of the Department for Education. To inform its advice, the panel will carry out extensive consultation and engagement with the sector and, among others, people currently or recently participating in post-18 education. The panel will publish its report at an interim stage before the Government conclude the overall review in early 2019.
The UK is truly a world-leading destination for study and research. Record numbers of young people, including from disadvantaged backgrounds, are entering university. But we recognise concerns and that we must look at how we can go further to provide choice, open up access, and deliver value for money for students and taxpayers to ensure that the system as a whole is delivering the best possible outcomes for young people and the economy, supported by a fair and sustainable funding system. That is why we are carrying out this review. I commend this Statement to the House”.
That concludes the Statement.
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Lab)
My Lords, I thank the Minister for repeating the Statement and I remind the House of my wife’s role as a consultant to the Education and Training Foundation. I should like first to ask the Minister about the status of the advisory panel. Can he assure me that it is going to be allowed to work without ministerial interference and direction? I would not ask him this except for the statements made by the Secretary of State at the weekend which seemed to set out most of the conclusions he expects the advisory panel to reach. On that, I should raise one particular issue that has struck me, which is that of charging lower fees for degree subjects with lower salary outcomes and the suggestion that it would mean that the fees for, say, arts courses would be lower than those for science and engineering courses. I cannot think of a more stupid outcome than that. In particular for poorer students, it would act as a huge disincentive to take up the very subjects that this country excels at. I hope that the Minister will tell me that that was just a whim of the Secretary of State and that the advisory panel will be given a clear indication that it is to come to its own conclusions on the issues it has been set.
I turn to the terms of reference. The Statement rather glosses over the important point in the terms of reference that the review cannot make recommendations on tax and must follow the Government’s fiscal policies. Does that mean that the review cannot address anything that would increase spending—and, if that is the case, does it mean that it cannot consider recommending the restoration of maintenance grants, reducing the current interest rates or increasing the teaching grant?
The Minister has made much of the T qualifications and the extension of education, but I remind him that his party’s manifesto promised a review of tertiary education across the board. Despite that, hundreds of thousands of 16 to 18 year-olds studying in FE colleges do not form part of the review. Perhaps he could say why that is.
In closing, the noble Lord set out the core principles under which the advisory panel and Ministers will work and said in particular that the review would look at value for money for graduates and taxpayers. On that, will the review look at the current rate of interest being charged? It is three percentage points above RPI, which all observers believe is unjustified and based on a discredited level of inflation. I remind the noble Lord of the Treasury Select Committee report published this month which states:
“The Committee sees no justification for using RPI to calculate student loan interest rates. RPI is no longer a National Statistic and has been widely discredited. In its Autumn Budget the Government acknowledged that the use of RPI was unfair for business rates, and the Committee is unconvinced by the case put forward for its use”,
by the then Minister. The committee goes on:
“The Government should abandon the use of RPI in favour of CPI to calculate student loan interest rates”.
I notice that the review is not looking at value for money for students. I would say to the noble Lord that what I find difficult about the RPI rate is that it is applied to students’ loans from the moment they reach university. That really needs to be looked at.
On the question of student loans in particular, will the noble Lord remind the House what percentage of graduates are expected to repay their loans in full and what percentage of the loan is likely to be repaid? Will he also say what the Department for Education wrote off in respect of student loans in the last financial year, and for how much below its value has the loan book been sold so far? Will he also say what sum it is now estimated will have to be finally written off at the end of the 30-year term? Will he also confirm that, due to the quirks of accountancy rules, the annual write-offs are missing from the deficit figures, but that while the value of the loan book is not netted off against the national debt, any cash for which it is sold is netted off? In fact, does he agree with the Treasury Select Committee, which described student loan accounting as being a “fiscal illusion”? Up to £7 billion of annual debt write-offs has simply gone missing, allowing the Government to artificially reduce the deficit by saddling young people with the debt. I very much hope that the advisory panel will be able to look at that.
Oh so wearyingly we hear more about a market in higher education—despite the fact that the Government have said that we have the most outstanding higher education system in the world. I shall make one further comment in relation to the report of the Treasury Select Committee. It notes:
“Without adequate information, an efficiently functioning market will struggle to develop. Prospective students face the unenviable task of determining whether to participate in higher education based on increasing quantities of university marketing material coupled with a lack of proven, reliable metrics for judging the quality of courses”.
If the Government are determined to go down the market route, they will have to ensure, first, that prospective students have information that they can use effectively. Secondly, they must ensure that the education sector does not repeat the problem of the health sector, which is to introduce a quasi market and then attempt to micromanage it through the regulator. My great fear about the Office for Students is that, while ostensibly it is there to encourage a market, in reality it is there to micromanage the sector. The outcome of that will be an unholy muddle and a higher education sector that is less than it ought to be.
Lord Storey (LD)
My Lords, we on these Benches welcome this review. Without seeking to prejudge its outcome and indeed the Government’s response, we need a post-18 education system with a guarantee that it is accessible to all. I am particularly delighted that the noble Baroness, Lady Wolf of Dulwich, is to be a member of the panel. She will bring a tremendous amount of wisdom and understanding to the question of vocational education.
As the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, said, one term that is not mentioned in the Statement is “interest”—but I am sure that every single young person racking up a huge debt on their student loan will wonder why they are paying way above the market rate. The word “maintenance” appears only once, as does the word “grants”—and unfortunately they do not appear consecutively. Maintenance grants must be an essential recommendation of the panel. I wonder if the Minister could comment on that.
The review does not seem to do anything to improve opportunities and financial support for people who enter higher education at a later stage in life. Will equalising funding support for older students be part of the review? I go back to the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, on the subject of variable degree course costs dependent on the subject being studied. What will that do to help boost application rates for courses that are more expensive to deliver and which universities might expect to charge more for, such as medicine and engineering, in which it is incredibly important that we continue to train enough people? Will this not exacerbate skills shortages in those areas and mean that people from disadvantaged backgrounds in particular are deterred from studying these subjects?
Finally, we have talked about universities going down the market route. I fear that they have already gone down it with a vengeance. UK higher education allows publicly funded universities to both validate and franchise degrees, and they can subcontract the teaching of their students to private providers. Students are registered with the university and subcontracted colleges provide the teaching. We see tiny companies with no track record getting subcontracted teaching. They can be part of a larger group of firms that are owned by equity companies which are registered in places like Jersey and Luxembourg. I hope that the review might be permitted to look at some of the excesses in current practices. However, overall I welcome the review.
Viscount Younger of Leckie
My Lords, I thank the noble Lords, Lord Hunt and Lord Storey, for their input and their questions, which I will attempt to answer. The first point raised by the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, was about the panel. First, I echo what was said by the noble Lord, Lord Storey, about the appointment of the noble Baroness, Lady Wolf. I am sure that she will be a valuable addition to the panel. I can reassure the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, that it is absolutely clear that Philip Augar and his panel will be independent. It is vitally important that it can carry out its work without interference—perhaps that was the word that he used—by the Government. Again, it must be fully independent.
Both noble Lords referred to the issue of differential pricing between courses. The noble Lord, Lord Hunt, raised the issue that has been much in the press in recent days about the difference between arts courses and engineering courses, and perhaps some comments that might have come from Ministers. I must admit that I have not read any of those comments. Those issues are in scope. I have no doubt that the independent review panel will look at the different courses between, say, humanities and engineering or science subjects as part of the review. I am not willing to be drawn on any other comments about that. I am sure that it will come up with some conclusions on that.
Equally, both noble Lords raised maintenance loans. It is the case that some students are finding it quite tough to live in expensive areas, including London. I know that maintenance loans are within scope. It will be up to the panel to decide whether they wish to look at that, but I clarify that it is within scope.
On the review of tertiary education, I reassure noble Lords that we are looking at a complete review of post 18 education. That includes those who are post-18 in further, higher and technical education; it is catch-all post-18. Again, it is one of the issues that the panel will look at.
The noble Lord, Lord Hunt, asked about interest rates. Again, interest rates have been much in the press and have been much discussed. They will indeed be in scope. I am not willing to comment on the difference between RPI and CPI. I note what the noble Lord said, but that is again something for the panel to look at.
Both noble Lords are correct that we are still looking to be sure that students have value for money. They must be sure that, for their choice of course, they go in with a transparent view as to what they will be paying, the course that they are doing and the outcomes that will come from it. Obviously, the advice to them is very important.
There were a number of questions from noble Lord, Lord Hunt, on loan repayments. I will need to write to him with the detail on that, but he will know that the RAB charge, as we might call it, has gone up to 45%. That is the write-off rate. There is always a subsidy, which has gone up to 45% because the thresholds were raised recently, as he knows—up to £25,000 and at the higher level up to £45,000. Along with a number of questions that he has raised, I will write to him with those specific details.
Finally, on the comments made about the market, one thing that is certain is that we absolutely believe that the basics behind the tuition fee system should remain in place. It is right that there should be a marketplace, that students should be in the lead and that they should be able to choose the right universities and courses. What we are leading on to, which is linked to the TEF, is to have assessments of courses, not just universities. That was always the intention behind the base laid during the passage of the Higher Education and Research Act. I hope that I have answered the questions from the two noble Lords.
Lord Beecham (Lab)
My Lords, why is there no mention of the anomalous position of what used to be student nurses, who now have to take out loans, as do other students, in particular having regard to the pressure on the health service and the difficulties that it has in recruiting nurses?
Viscount Younger of Leckie
Again, they will be in scope in terms of making sure that the support we give to nurses, who are so important in our society, is there. That is within scope and it is noted.
Lord Addington (LD)
My Lords, the review had some very interesting things in it. I must give the Government some credit for the best back-down I have ever read in any document:
“Many elements of our current post-18 education system work well”—
if ever there was a way of saying some do not. I have never heard of anything like it before. The section on “A system that is accessible to all” talks about those with a disadvantaged background. I draw the House’s attention to my declared interests with the British Dyslexia Association and as a chairman of Microlink. We have a situation where disabled students have different provisions made at different universities doing the same courses. Are the Government going to make sure in the review that there is some way of allowing a student to know what is effectively happening to those disabled students, particularly those who do not qualify for the disabled students’ allowance, as there is currently a very confused system? The Government have refused to put in any outside quality control on them, saying that they will all make their own way forward. Will there be something in the review that dictates that you will know the type of support you will get?
Also, as the old provisions of the old system mean that the level 1 and level 2 provision of the four-band system are now provided by the institution, how well do they function with the DSA? Will this be made available? Will all those colleges undertaking any degree tuition be brought into this system so that people can find out what they are going to get? If you want anything that is market-driven to be effective you have to have knowledge of that market for those who access it. At the moment it is confused and almost like a quagmire. Unless the Government can tell us that they are addressing that in some way, they will still continue not to achieve.
Viscount Younger of Leckie
The noble Lord again raises the issue of the DSA. I know that he has done a huge amount of work over many years for the disabled and disadvantaged sectors. I reiterate that the Government are very much committed to ensuring that all students with disabilities receive the very best possible support to enable them to study alongside their fellow students on an equal basis. Disabled students have access to a package of support to cover additional costs that they may face to participate in higher education. I reassure the noble Lord that this is in scope, but I do not want to prejudge the outcome of the review. I am certain the panel will want to look at it. Beyond that, I cannot really comment because the panel is independent.
Lord Adonis (Lab)
My Lords, this is a review of the burdens being placed on students and young graduates, so can the Minister tell us what is the age of the youngest person on the review? Looking down the list of the six members, it does not look to me as if any of them are under the age of 50. Does he think it a good idea that there are no students on the review? Will he explain why there is no current student experiencing higher education and paying these fees on the review? Could he undertake that the Secretary of State will meet members of the Youth Parliament with me to discuss their views on student fees and loans and how the system should be reformed, given that they have no membership of this review?
Viscount Younger of Leckie
On the noble Lord’s first question, I will not be drawn on the ages of the members of the panel. I think that was the gist of his question. Even if I knew the ages, I would not wish to be drawn on that.
Lord Adonis
Will the Minister write and tell me the ages? It is a material factor given that this is a review of student finance.
Viscount Younger of Leckie
I am certainly not going to commit to that. I do not feel terribly comfortable giving out the ages of the panel. It may well be in the press, but I am not prepared to do that. We have a very strong panel.
On his second question, which was to do with the representation of students, he is absolutely right, but the point is that this panel will deliberately be kept small to make it more manageable. They will be engaging with a complete range of stakeholders, including students and student representatives, business and many other areas. I hope I can reassure the noble Lord that this is a wide-ranging stakeholder engagement process with a small and neat panel.
Lord Adonis
Will the Secretary of State meet members of the Youth Parliament with me to discuss their views on these matters?
Viscount Younger of Leckie
On that third question, I am very happy to pass that on, but I do not want to give any guarantees that he will agree to do so.
Baroness Morris of Yardley (Lab)
My Lords, I accept that the Minister will not want to prejudge the work of the panel, but he set out in the Statement one or two principles that are set down to guide the work. I do not think that this is a question that he answered in response to the Front-Bench questions about the introduction of variable fees. Will he give the House an assurance that one of the principles he will set out for the panel is that the price of the course should not be a determinant in a student’s choice of degree course or eventual career?
Viscount Younger of Leckie
I take note of the question from the noble Baroness but, as she predicted, I will not be drawn on giving a commitment on that. I have no doubt that the panel will want to look at it, as I indicated earlier.
Lord Young of Norwood Green (Lab)
My Lords, I welcome the review. I have a couple of questions. The Minister said that there would be an interim report. When is that likely to be? He gave us the final date.
The Statement refers to participation to drive social mobility, the teaching outcomes and excellence framework and,
“the facilitation of further diversity with new providers and shorter degrees delivered at a lower cost to students”.
That is something for which I have been arguing for quite a while. However, alongside that greater flexibility and, I hope, the use of new technology, we need to ensure that we get the quality as well. There have been some worrying developments in apprenticeships recently where we have warned about focusing not on the quantity but on ensuring the quality.
The Statement also talks about,
“identifying ways to help people make more effective choices between the different options available at and after 18”.
I still think that the current drive in secondary schools is to push most young people towards university and not look at the alternative vocational route. Given that schools rely on ensuring that their sixth-form colleges are full, what steps are the Government taking to ensure that they really are made aware of alternative routes?
Viscount Younger of Leckie
The noble Lord asked a number of questions. First, I am not able to give an interim date for the review. I made it quite clear that the full results of the review will come out early in 2019. Obviously, I would want to keep the House updated as to when that would be—that would of course come from the review panel.
The noble Lord also made an important point about shorter degrees. I would like to add to that part-time courses. As we know, there has been a fall-off in part-time courses, which is a concern and one of the issues that the panel will definitely want to address. We want to be sure that the courses are right, that they are at the right price and that take-up is much better than it has been. That is within scope. Again, beyond that, I do not want to prejudge what the panel will come up with.
Lord Young of Norwood Green
I stressed the importance of quality; it is not just about the price.
Viscount Younger of Leckie
I was about to come to quality. Of course, the noble Lord is right that it is extremely important that the quality of the courses in higher education is outstanding. He mentioned apprenticeships. He will know that the Institute for Apprenticeships is focused solely on making sure that the quality of apprenticeships is as high as it can be. We want to replicate that in university courses as well. One of the main remits of the Office for Students is to monitor the quality of courses.
On choices for students, I know that the noble Lord has quite a lot of experience in this field. I think I am right in saying that he was instrumental in introducing the concept of employers going into schools and giving careers advice. That is important and valuable. On students being informed, it is a mix of parents being better informed and being able to talk to their children—who probably become less child-like as they move into the higher education system. Schools and employers certainly have a role. One of the things we most want to do—I hope it will extend into the review—is to look at the vocational and technical routes as opposed to the academic route. It is important that they are marketed and sold appropriately. I said earlier in the Chamber today that I was driving into town last night and heard on the radio an advertisement for apprenticeships. We want to hear more of that and more promotion for these areas.
Lord Lexden (Con)
My Lords, there will be a wide welcome for the emphasis on technical education. The Minister has just referred to it, and it looms large in the Statement. Can my noble friend tell us when T-levels are likely to become available to students? At the conclusion of the review early next year, will there be a government document that indicates not only what conclusions have been arrived at but the action that will be taken thereafter?
Viscount Younger of Leckie
Yes, indeed. On the second question, my noble friend will know that the review will conclude in 2019. The Government have pledged to give a speedy response to it. I cannot give any timescales, but “speedy” means that they will want to move quickly to look carefully at what the panel has come up with and to respond accordingly. I feel sure that they will do that.
On T-levels and the timings for them, I will have to write to my noble friend to be sure that I am accurate.
Safeguarding in the Aid Sector
(6 years, 10 months ago)
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The Minister of State, Department for International Development (Lord Bates) (Con)
My Lords, with the leave of the House, I shall now repeat a Statement made earlier in the House of Commons by my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for International Development. The Statement is as follows:
“With permission, I would like to update the House on my department’s response to the sexual abuse and exploitation perpetrated by charity workers in Haiti in 2011 and the measures that we are taking to improve safeguarding across the aid sector. I would like to start by paying tribute to Sean O’Neill of the Times and the two sets of whistleblowers, those in 2011 and later, for bringing this case to light.
On 9 February, the Times reported that certain Oxfam staff, when in Haiti in 2011, had abused their positions of trust and paid for sex with local women. These incidents happened in the aftermath of the devastating earthquake in 2010, which killed hundreds of thousands of people and left millions more homeless and reliant on aid for basic needs such as food and shelter. This is shocking, but it is not by itself what has caused such concern about Oxfam’s safeguarding. It was what Oxfam did next.
In chaotic and desperate situations, the very best safeguarding procedures and practices must be put in place to prevent harm, but when organisations fail to report and follow up incidents of wrongdoing that occur, it undermines trust and sends a message that sexual exploitation and abuse is tolerated. We cannot prevent sexual exploitation and abuse if we do not demonstrate zero tolerance. In such circumstances, we must be able to trust organisations not only to do all they can to prevent harm but to report and follow up incidents of wrongdoing when they occur.
In this duty, Oxfam failed under the watch of Barbara Stocking and Penny Lawrence. They did not provide a full report to the Charity Commission; they did not provide a full report to their donors; they did not provide any report to prosecuting authorities. In my view, they misled, quite possibly deliberately, even as their report concluded that their investigation could not rule out the allegation that some of the women involved were actually children. They did not think that it was necessary to report to the police in either Haiti or the country of origin of those accountable. I believe that their motivation appears to be just the protection of the organisation’s reputation. They put that before those they were there to help and protect—a complete betrayal of trust. It was a betrayal, too, of those who sent them—the British people—and a betrayal of all those Oxfam staff and volunteers who put the people they serve first.
Last week, I met Mark Goldring, chief executive of Oxfam, and Caroline Thomson, Oxfam’s chair of trustees. I made three demands of them: that they fully co-operate with the Haitian authorities, handing over all evidence they hold; that they report staff members involved in this incident to their respective national Governments; and that they make clear how they will handle any forthcoming allegations around safeguarding, historic or live. I stressed that, for me, holding to account those who made the decision not to report but to let those potentially guilty of criminal activity slip away was a necessity in winning back confidence in Oxfam. As a result of those discussions, Oxfam has agreed to withdraw from bidding for any new UK government funding until DfID is satisfied that it can meet the high safeguarding standards we expect of our partners. I will take a decision on current programming after 26 February, as I will then have further information which will help me decide if I need to adjust how that is being delivered.
Given the concerns about the wider sector that this case has raised, I have also written to every UK charity working overseas that receives UK aid—192 organisations—insisting that they spell out the steps they are taking to ensure that their safeguarding policies are fully in place and confirm that they have referred all concerns they have about specific cases and individuals to the relevant authorities, including prosecuting authorities. I have set a deadline of 26 February for all UK charities working overseas to give us the assurances that we have asked for and to raise any concerns with relevant authorities. We are also undertaking, in parallel, a similar exercise with all non-UK charity partners, 393 organisations in total, and with all our suppliers, including those in the private sector—more than 500 organisations—to make our standards clear and remind them of their obligations. We are going to do the same with our multilateral partners too.
The UK Government reserve the right to take whatever decisions about future funding to Oxfam, and any other organisation, that we deem necessary. We have been very clear that we will not work with any organisation that does not live up to the high standards on safeguarding and protection that we require. I will also be sharing details of this approach with other government departments responsible for overseas development assistance spending. Although this work is not yet complete, it is clear from the Charity Commission reporting data, and the lack of it from some organisations, that a cultural change is needed to ensure that all that can be done to stop sexual exploitation in the aid sector is being done. We need to take some practical steps now. We should not wait for the UN to take action. We must set up our own systems now.
My department and the Charity Commission will hold a safeguarding summit on 5 March, where we will meet UK international development charities, regulators and experts to confront safeguarding failures and agree practical measures, such as an aid worker accreditation scheme that we in the UK can use. Later in the year, we will take this programme of work to a wide-ranging global safeguarding conference to drive action across the whole international aid sector. I am pleased to say that the US, Canada, the Netherlands and others have already agreed to support our goal of improved safeguarding standards across the sector. The UK is not waiting for others to act; we are taking a lead on this. I will also be speaking to colleagues across government and beyond about what more we can do to stop exploitation and abuse in the UN and the broader multilateral system. Our message to all parts of the UN is clear: you can either get your house in order or you can prepare to carry on your good work without our money.
I welcome the UN’s announcement on 14 February that the UN does not and will not claim immunity for sexual abuse cases. This sends a clear signal that the UN is not a soft target, but we must hold the UN to account for this. Further actions we have taken in the last week include the creation of a new safeguarding unit. We have also promoted our whistleblowing and reporting phone line, to encourage anyone with information on safeguarding issues to contact us. We have appointed Sheila Drew Smith, a recent member of the Committee on Standards in Public Life, who has agreed to bring her expertise and her challenge to support my department’s ambition on safeguarding. She will report directly to me.
I have asked to meet leaders of the audit profession to discuss what more can be done to provide independent assurance over safeguarding to the organisations that DfID partners with globally. I have held my own department to the same scrutiny that I am demanding of others. I have asked the department to go through our centrally held HR systems and our fraud and whistleblowing records as far back as they exist. I am assured that there are no centrally recorded cases that were dealt with incorrectly. Separately, we are reviewing any locally reported allegations of sexual misconduct involving DfID staff. To date, our review of staff cases has looked at 75% of our teams across DfID. It will complete within a fortnight. Our investigations are still ongoing and if, during this process, we discover any further historic or current cases, I will report on our handling of these to Parliament.
DfID, other government departments and the National Crime Agency work closely together when serious allegations of potentially criminal activity in partner organisations are brought to our attention, and we are strengthening this. The new strategy director at the National Crime Agency will take on a lead role for the aid sector. I am calling on anyone who has any concerns about abuse or exploitation in the aid sector to come forward and report these to our counterfraud and whistleblowing team. Details are on the DfID website and all communications will be treated in complete confidence. Later today I will have further meetings, including with the Defence Secretary regarding peacekeeping troops and with the Secretary of State at DCMS regarding the charity sector.
My absolute priority is to keep the world’s poorest and most vulnerable people safe from harm. It is utterly despicable that sexual exploitation and abuse continue to exist in the aid sector. The recent reports should be a wake-up call to all of us. Now is the time for us to act, but as we do so we should note the good people working across the world in this sector, saving lives, often by endangering their own, and all those, from fundraisers to trustees, who make that work possible across the entire aid sector. In the last week alone, UK aid and aid workers have helped vaccinate around 850,000 children against polio. We should also recognise that that work can be done only with the support of the British people. I commend this Statement to the House”.
Lord Collins of Highbury (Lab)
My Lords, I thank the noble Lord for repeating that Statement and of course I welcome him back to the Dispatch Box. I am very pleased to see him there. I very much welcome the Secretary of State’s Statement and her swift and robust action in dealing with this appalling situation of vulnerable women and girls being exploited by men with power acting with impunity in an appalling culture of silence. We must not, however, allow the actions of a few to undermine the efforts of the vast majority of people who carry out their work with integrity and commitment in often dangerous and difficult circumstances. Nor must we let this damage the commitment of the British people, who daily support charities such as Oxfam to save lives in crises and tackle the root causes of injustice. Of course, most importantly, we must not let this stop us helping those who need our help most.
I welcome the fact that the Secretary of State has written to taxpayer-funded charities to ask for written assurances that they have safeguarding in place. While I note that she will be sharing this approach with other government departments, can the Minister give us a categorical assurance that all departments with ODA spend will adopt the same processes and that they too will report to Parliament on the outcome of those efforts? I also welcome her swift commitment to a safeguarding summit on 5 March. Out of that summit must now come real commitment to reform: tightening international criminal regulation, establishing a global passport or register for humanitarian workers, and setting up an independent regulator or centre of excellence. I was pleased to note in the Statement that our global partners have been invited to that summit in preparation for a perhaps even bigger one later in the year.
However, reform must not be just about policies and procedures. It must also be about a change in practice and culture. This appalling situation, as the Secretary of State pointed out, came to light only because of whistleblowers. Trade unions play a critical role in supporting workers in such circumstances. Will the Minister commit to ensuring that trade unions representing workers in this sector are also fully represented at the summit? In the evidence given this morning to the International Development Committee, the point was made that short-term contracts often prevent people speaking out. I welcome the commitment by Oxfam’s chair of trustees that employment procedures will also be reviewed and reported to Oxfam’s governing council in March. But can we be assured that that sort of review looking at those sorts of issues will also be undertaken by other NGOs and charities so that we look across the board and not just at Oxfam?
I note that Oxfam has agreed to withdraw from bidding for any new UK government funding,
“until DfID is satisfied that they can meet the high standards we expect from our partners”,
but can the Minister clarify what the criteria for restoring funding will be? What exactly does the Secretary of State mean by “high standards”? I hope that, apart from all the policies and procedures, these will include a clear commitment to ensure proper consultation with workers’ representatives.
Baroness Sheehan (LD)
My Lords, we are all shocked that aid workers from a respected organisation such as Oxfam could abuse the trust of vulnerable people in Haiti, whose lives had been shattered by the earthquake in 2010. Action must be taken to ensure that such abuse at high levels of a world-renowned charity cannot be repeated, so I welcome the Secretary of State’s Statement.
However, having read the Statement in full, I am disappointed that it talks only about strengthening safeguards going forward. What we really need is a wide and far-reaching inquiry into the scale of historic abuse and that which exists in the sector today. All the indications are that this is but the tip of the iceberg and, to deal comprehensively with the situation, we must have all the facts. In 1999 the national crime agency said that the charity sector was susceptible to being targeted by paedophile rings. We must know if that is the case. Reports that men in positions of power have acted with impunity in exercising control over young women are rife in the sector. There are allegations of abuse in the awarding of short-term contracts by those in permanent senior positions. What we really need is an independent inquiry into the global aid sector—failing that, at least into the UK aid sector—that will leave no stone unturned. Unless we know what has gone on in the past and hold people accountable, we cannot hope to go forward with confidence.
This is also an issue about governance. Oxfam has been found wanting on many levels, and the whole sorry saga has highlighted the failure of good governance by those to whom it answers—the Charity Commission and DfID. Both accepted without question the charity’s version of events and did not probe further into what “sexual misconduct” meant. Both failed to ask the obvious question of whether minors, of either sex, were involved. Both have questions to answer and improvements to make if they are to avoid future failures. Any inquiry must encompass their role in the Haiti cover-up.
I welcome that the UK intends to work closely with the UN. This is a global issue which the global aid community must address collectively, so the proposal for a sort of passport for workers in the UK aid sector is welcome. Will there be government support for a global aid worker accreditation scheme? Inevitably, unless answers to these questions are forthcoming, attacks against the 0.7% of GNI that is devoted to overseas aid will increase. But this would not only be a kick in the face of the vast majority of aid workers, who work tirelessly to alleviate extreme poverty, but jeopardise some of the really worthwhile programmes bringing health, education and sanitation solutions to those in desperate need. We must not throw the baby out with the bathwater, so I ask the Minister about the Secretary of State’s decision to bar Oxfam from receiving new government funding. Last year it received £31.7 million from DfID. What assessment have the Government made of the impact on programmes serving the poor and destitute if support is withheld this year? What are they planning do to mitigate the extra hardship this will inflict on aid recipients?
I will mention just one other thing, which has disturbed me throughout the media coverage over the past few weeks, and that is the use of the term “beneficiaries”. Will DfID consider using a term other than beneficiaries, which sounds as though people are in receipt of an inheritance rather than baby milk? Perhaps “aid recipients” would better describe their vulnerable state. It is no more of a mouthful than beneficiaries: both have five syllables.
Lord Bates
I am very grateful for the comments and the general support of the noble Baroness, Lady Sheehan, and the noble Lord, Lord Collins, for the Statement and the action proposed. The noble Lord, Lord Collins, is absolutely right that we have to call for a significant culture change. It is about an abuse of power by men often in positions of authority, the likes of which we have seen in other settings around the world, and it needs to be addressed in robust and forceful ways.
The noble Lord, Lord Collins, asked about other government departments. This is very important. That is why the Secretary of State met the Secretary of State for Defence today and will be meeting the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport. She will also be meeting the Minister for Civil Society in the course of this because there has to be a cross-government approach to ensure that we are entirely consistent in seeking the changes that we wish to see.
Lord Collins of Highbury
I am concerned specifically about the FCO, which has an increasing proportion of ODA spend: it has risen from 13% to nearly 18%. It is funding organisations that we need to look at very carefully.
Lord Bates
That is correct. The Foreign Secretary and the Secretary of State will be meeting tomorrow morning to discuss these matters, among others. But the noble Lord is absolutely right. I totally accept his urging in that area. We have received his advice on that point and it will be responded to.
The noble Lord raised a very good point about trade unions. As to whether the invitation would more probably be to the 5 March event, which is aimed particularly at UK charities and regulators, or whether it is more about how we engage them perhaps in the international conference later in the year, I will come back to him. But he is absolutely right to say that trade unions have a very important role to play in ensuring that people in employment, particularly on short-term contracts, understand what their rights are and can have representation. I will certainly take that back.
The noble Lord asked what requirements would be made of Oxfam before it would be considered for government funding. It is clear that it will have to fully co-operate with the Haitian authorities by handing over all the evidence it holds, that it reports staff members involved in this incident to their respective national Governments, and that it makes clear how it will handle forthcoming allegations around safeguarding, historic or live. That is the basis on which decisions will be made and the Secretary of State said that she will take those decisions next week, when she has received responses to those points.
I reassure the noble Baroness, Lady Sheehan, who said the Statement was about going forward, that we have taken steps. I point out that, in terms of DfID, we have gone through our centrally held HR systems and our fraud and whistleblowing records as far back as they exist, to check that no cases have escaped the scrutiny that they should have.
Baroness Sheehan
I was really asking for an independent inquiry. This will have a huge impact on the public mood about giving to charities and we have to show to the public that it is not just us investigating ourselves but that an independent eye has been cast over everything.
Lord Bates
Yes, that point is well worth making. It is one reason why we have brought in independent expertise from outside to strengthen our ability to review. I would also point out for the record that Oxfam itself has voluntarily agreed to withdraw, as opposed to being barred, from the position. As regards other government departments, the Permanent Secretary has written to all those that administer ODA, including the Foreign Office, to drive the cross-Whitehall message that there will be zero tolerance in this area, and asking them to mirror the actions we are taking at the Department for International Development.
Lord Hayward (Con)
In recognising the comments made by the noble Lord, Lord Collins, and the noble Baroness, Lady Sheehan, in relation to work that is undertaken in particularly dangerous and difficult circumstances, I was in Iraq last week, as my noble friend knows, where I met DfID, charity and voluntary workers. They are working in incredibly dangerous and difficult circumstances. It would be a disaster for the communities if the work being undertaken was deferred by even a few days or weeks. Will my noble friend therefore exhort all contributors, whether large or small, to continue to make donations to the charities to which they contribute, so that those charities can continue to make their crucial contribution to societies, whether in Iraq or around the rest of the world?
Lord Bates
I am very happy to give that undertaking. My noble friend is absolutely right that British people are generous to people around the world. In many ways, the great tragedy of what has happened is that the failure to act in a transparent and timely way has genuinely put lives at risk, because people might stop giving in the way that he talked about. Oxfam alone has around 10,000 people in 90 countries; it is working with DfID at present in places such as Yemen and South Sudan, delivering life-saving materials. In everything we do, we are going to ensure that our prime concern is for the people whom we are trying to help. We will not deal with contracts in a pre-emptive way until we are absolutely confident that those people who need our help, whether they are called beneficiaries or aid recipients, are our number one concern. They must be protected at all times. That is what the charities themselves should have been thinking all the way through.
Lord McConnell of Glenscorrodale (Lab)
My Lords, there are several references in the Lords register to my voluntary positions with charities in this sector, so I should reference that before asking my question. I will say, though, that I would like the Minister to convey to the Secretary of State that the way in which she has handled this issue in the last 10 days has been impressive. To take a constant position through these days that has put the interests of the children first and not used the issue as a political football or been defensive in any way about the role of the department or other agencies, has been the right approach. I hope that she will continue to do that.
The Statement today has been comprehensive and impressive on where we are right now. However, it contains one omission: what did DfID know in 2011? There is a reference in the early part of the Statement to the lack of reporting in full to the Charity Commission and to the authorities, but there is no reference to any reporting to DfID. What, if anything, was done by Ministers or officials with any such report? It is important that we have some clarity on that.
Secondly, it is important to be clear that when traffickers, and in some cases the Mafia, move into emergency zones in the absence of effective government—as with the earthquakes in Haiti or Nepal, or the typhoon in the Philippines, when hundreds of young children were targeted by traffickers to be taken immediately to brothels and slave labour elsewhere in the world—it is the large NGOs that are usually first on the spot to protect those children. In some cases, as on the Nepalese-Chinese border after the earthquake there, they have saved hundreds of children from moving into some form of slavery or perhaps worse. So it is important to register that, while this is essential work to expose the problems that have been going on, which demands a zero-tolerance approach, we should also reinforce our commitment to ensure that children will be protected by some of these NGOs, in the absence of effective government, in some of the world’s worst disaster zones.
Lord Bates
I am very grateful to the noble Lord and will certainly convey to the Secretary of State his remarks about her handling of the crisis thus far. I also recognise his deep experience of leadership in this field. He asked a very specific question about what we knew when. I should say that the chairman of the IDC in the other place has confirmed that the committee is commencing an inquiry into this, and we will be co-operating fully.
The Charity Commission is also going to undertake an inquiry into this. The elements of who knew what and when are very important issues, but they will be addressed at that time. At the moment, all we would say is that, although DfID was informed that the investigation had concluded on 5 September 2011 and that all members who had been found not to have followed Oxfam’s code of conduct had left the organisation, its letter states that no allegations involved beneficiaries or the misuse of DfID funds. That was the reason for the very strong line that the Secretary of State used in her Statement in the other place about how DfID was potentially misled in this respect. Again, that will be something on which there will be full disclosure and transparency so we understand what happened and when. We will be co-operating with the Charity Commission and the IDC on those inquiries.
Lord Patten (Con)
My Lords, I have a family interest to declare inasmuch as my daughter has worked for the Catholic Agency for Overseas Development for the past 10 years. That is not a material interest, but it is one I should properly declare. Does my noble friend share my view that there may be very inadequate ethical training in many of our charities? Ethical training is not a central part of their DNA, particularly in the larger and more bureaucratic charities. I entirely agree with the noble Lord, Lord Collins of Highbury, that cultural change is desperately needed, particularly in some of our larger charities. Bringing about cultural change takes a very long time. It takes years and it needs ethical training of the highest level. That is something which many charities need to turn their attention to urgently.
Lord Bates
My noble friend is absolutely right on this. There is a core problem which we have seen across different organisations. We have had to wrestle with these issues in recent years: the fear of asking the difficult probing questions when they are needed or the failure to be transparent about what has happened. Organisations are doing that—one does not like to say “for understandable reasons”—because they want to protect the reputation of the organisation. If anyone wants to know whether that works, ask Oxfam today when its reputation has been so tarnished and damaged by the failure to take that kind of prompt action and to ask the most difficult and searching questions in these areas at the right time.
The Earl of Sandwich (CB)
My Lords, this is a very painful affair for all of us who have been concerned with aid over many years. I have not worked directly with Oxfam, but I have worked alongside it and on this occasion I want to pay tribute to what the noble Lord, Lord Judd, achieved over many years in bringing standards up over that period. We must not forget what has already been done. The Secretary of State is new and it is quite right that she should send a powerful message to the aid agencies, especially those in receipt of public funds. It is obviously a shocking affair. However, the Minister has considerable experience and knows that there are limits on outrage that can be expressed. Does he not think that collectively the Government and the statutory agencies have gone over the top on this? It is not happening on the scale suggested by the noble Baroness, Lady Sheehan. As other noble Lords have said, the danger is that it is affecting the work that is going on all the time all over the world. The noble Lord, Lord Collins, made this point, and Andrew Mitchell said it, as did Anna Soubry. The Secretary of State seems to understand this, but only in the last sentence of the Statement.
Lord Bates
We need to communicate that, but the noble Earl will recognise that we have had many debates on these things and we are almost always on exactly the same page. The message needs to go out that there is zero tolerance on this. We need to come down very hard to change the culture within the aid sector. That was one of the reasons why the previous Secretary of State took such a strong approach on the allegations against UN peacekeepers and was at the forefront of driving that up the agenda, to the extent that it was at the UN General Assembly and the Secretary-General has taken action on it because it goes to the heart of the problem. People who are there have a duty to protect, not to exploit. As in every type of organisation and institution that faces allegations of this type, the very few people who are doing this are having a devastating effect on the 99% of people who are carrying out that work selflessly and, as my noble friend said earlier, putting their lives at risk to help others, which is in the great tradition. It is in their interests and for them that we ought to be so ruthless in rooting it out.
Lord Judd (Lab)
My Lords, I must declare an interest as from 1985 to 1991 I was director of Oxfam. I was a long-standing supporter of Oxfam before that and I remain a firm supporter of Oxfam. Last weekend, I was in my local shop in Cockermouth talking with the volunteers, who have obviously been affected by this story. For all of us involved in that work over the years—right back to 1942 in the middle of the war, when Oxfam was founded to try to get relief to the Greeks under German occupation—this has been a terrible nightmare. What happened in Haiti was wrong and despicable. It was a complete contradiction of the purpose of Oxfam in its exploitation of individuals, who will remain harmed. I am very glad that the organisation has not just issued an email but been to see the Government to talk to them about how genuinely sorry it is.
We must remember certain points. First, the Government have a responsibility for public funds, and that must be recognised by everyone. Secondly, it is terribly important to recognise that charities, not only Oxfam but right across the field, must be accountable, and, as the Minister has said, being accountable involves transparency, complete integrity and openness. Anyway, it is stupid to do anything else because, as we have seen, almost inevitably it will become known in one way or another and do even more damage than it would have done at the time.
I shall conclude by making a couple of observations. The current leadership, including Mark Goldring and the new chairman who took office only last year, were nowhere near the situation when it occurred; they have been dealing with a situation that they inherited. A lot of very hard work has been going on in seeing how proper standards, regulation and accountability can be put in place. If that is not sufficient, it is quite right that the Government should challenge it, and I am sure that if they work together it can be tackled. However, it is interesting to note that the highly esteemed Tufts University in the United States, which has done an inquiry into this problem, has said that during its inquiry it became convinced that the best regulations now in place were those of Oxfam. There is therefore a certain paradox in the situation.
I thank the Minister for the understanding way in which he has handled this Statement. It is quite right that the organisation has to look to its governance and its transparency. It also has to face up to its responsibility to those countless volunteers; the saddest part of the whole story is what these wicked people in Haiti did to their very own colleagues and the work that they were trying to do. I would like a reassurance from the Minister that in all that the Government are doing, and I totally understand that the Government have to be very firm in the public interest, their objective is to enable Oxfam to be in a convincing position to continue the work that started in 1942—it has been in the front line of so many situations, such as in Kampuchea, South Africa in the bad years, Latin America and the Middle East—and to face the public and speak with authority and morality again.
Baroness Stedman-Scott (Con)
I thank the noble Lord for his significant contribution. If he has a question, may we please have it? There are other people who still wish to ask questions.
Lord Bates
I thank the noble Lord. I realise that what is happening to the organisation to which he has given so much of his life must be breaking his heart, and that he feels passionately about it. I think his words, which he has said in forthright terms on the record, will speak more to the organisation that he cares for than anything that I can add, and I thank him for that.
Lord Sheikh (Con)
My Lords, I note that letters have been sent to charities which have received UK aid. I am a patron and supporter of a charity which is undertaking work in 12 countries. I had a long meeting with the trustees yesterday, and we decided to tighten and toughen our safeguards. My point is: could charities which have not received such aid be written to to ask them to tighten up? I am deeply concerned about what can go on, and if they are not UK-aided there are possible concerns and problems.
Lord Bates
That is a really good idea and I am happy to take it away and think about it. It may be something for the Charity Commission to take leadership on, but if there is anything we can do to support and strengthen safeguarding, particularly for charities working overseas, we will want to consider it.
Lord Bates
As I said, I am happy to take back that suggestion about what more could be done, but the very fact that my noble friend as a trustee is now asking those searching questions of his organisation, although it is not in receipt of government funding, bodes well for the approach which is being taken more generally to improve safeguarding across the sector.
Viscount Waverley (CB)
My Lords, the Minister said that difficult, probing questions need to be addressed. Is he aware that that there are not shy of 80 Metropolitan Police officers serving with overseas responsibilities? That does not include those seconded to the International Court of Justice investigating purported international crimes. Would he consider their being marshalled to make further in-depth investigation of the horrors that are before him and reporting back to the Government, who can then address them with host nations?
Lord Bates
I am very happy, as I set out, that we are in contact through the National Crime Agency, which has a dedicated director looking into the aid sector more generally. One of our arguments all the way through has been that the law enforcement authorities for those alleged to be guilty of wrongdoing should be informed, whether they are in Haiti or other countries. It is absolutely right that the authorities should be informed and involved as soon as matters come to light.
Lord Leigh of Hurley (Con)
I remind the House that this is not the first time that large charities have brought the sector into disrepute. It was only a short time ago, your Lordships will recall, that Olive Cooke threw herself off a bridge in Bristol because she was being pursued by large charities. At the time, the then Prime Minister asked me, the noble Baroness, Lady Pitkeathley, and the noble Lord, Lord Wallace of Saltaire, to form a short, sharp committee to investigate what had happened and produce our results, which led to the formation of the Fundraising Regulator chaired by the noble Lord, Lord Grade of Yarmouth. We managed to do that in three months, unlike a long investigation. Does my noble friend agree that it is the trustees’ responsibility? The trustees need to know what is going on and the trustees need to be held accountable for the actions taking place in their charities.
Lord Bates
The trustees’ responsibilities are onerous, detailed and should be taken very seriously. I would expand further on that, but I am conscious that the time limit has been reached and will therefore save my further comments in writing to my noble friend.
Nuclear Weapons
(6 years, 10 months ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text
Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what is their assessment of the outcome of the United Nations Conference to Negotiate a Legally Binding Instrument to Prohibit Nuclear Weapons, Leading to Their Total Elimination.
Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer (LD)
My Lords, I declare an interest as a co-president of Parliamentarians for Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament. I thank all noble Lords who will contribute their considerable expertise this evening. Many noble Lords taking part in this debate will have spoken in the debate in 2013 that the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, introduced, which was really the last substantial debate that we had on the issue generally.
What has changed since 2013? Certainly not my views. I still see nuclear weapons as an immense danger to the future of the planet. But the nuclear landscape has changed significantly, and there is a growing consensus that luck is running out—because we have been lucky that there has been no catastrophic accident, and no accidental launch. In the words of former US energy secretary Ernest Moniz, who is now the CEO of the Nuclear Threat Initiative, the,
“margin for error in avoiding disaster is getting thinner because of the introduction of new, smaller weapons, the broadening of circumstances in which their use is being contemplated, and a lack of high-level communications between major nuclear weapons powers”.
He said that the chance of nuclear use was,
“higher than it’s been since the Cuban missile crisis”.
His words are, rightly, chilling.
That increased threat was one of the factors that led to the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, which is about to become international law. It was voted for by 122 countries, with one against, and some abstentions—of course, all nuclear weapon states abstained. The treaty, widely known as the ban treaty, will become international law when 50 states have signed and ratified it. The ban treaty prohibits states parties from developing, testing, producing, manufacturing, otherwise acquiring, possessing, stockpiling, transferring, using or threatening to use nuclear weapons, so it is pretty comprehensive. The International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons, known as ICAN, won the Nobel Peace Prize last year for its work on the ban treaty.
The treaty results from the frustration of the vast majority of countries of the world with the few nuclear weapon states, which have completely failed to honour Article 6 of the nuclear non-proliferation treaty. Noble Lords will know that Article 6 requires that nuclear weapons states make meaningful steps towards nuclear disarmament. In return, other countries agreed not to develop nuclear weapons. It is 50 years since that agreement was signed and, although there have been steps to limit the number of nuclear weapons, there has not been the disarmament envisaged by Article 6.
In this very House, 50 years ago, Lord Chalfont, the then Minister, said that,
“we regard the Non-Proliferation Treaty as an essential first step in achieving the ending of the nuclear arms race and making progress towards general and complete disarmament”.—[Official Report, 18/6/1968; col. 514.]
So, 50 years on, my first question to the Minister is whether multilateral nuclear disarmament is still a UK Government aspiration. It seems to me that our Governments always say that it is an aspiration, but then always say that “now is not the time”.
An example of this would be when the UN convened the open-ended working group to try and kick-start the process, stuck ever since 1996, of the UN Conference on Disarmament. The UK boycotted that opportunity—but why? I asked that question in March 2016, and this is the reply:
“The UK is not attending the Open Ended Working Group … on nuclear disarmament in Geneva …The Government believes that productive results can only be ensured through a consensus-based approach that takes into account the wider global security environment”.
But how can consensus ever be reached when those with nuclear weapons will not even attend meetings to debate the issues?
The UK boycotted the first two international conferences on the humanitarian consequences of nuclear war. Why? Does closing our eyes to the reality of a nuclear war really change those realities? Of course it does not. The president of the International Red Cross said at the conclusion of those conferences that,
“if a nuclear conflict happened today, there is no humanitarian assistance capacity that could adequately respond to such a catastrophe”.
Of course, beside the appalling immediate deaths, the world would face the much wider threat of a prolonged nuclear winter.
Nuclear weapons are now the only weapons of mass destruction that are not subject to a categorical ban. Chemical and biological weapons are rightly banned, but nuclear weapons, the most apocalyptic WMDs, remain legally acceptable. Now the ban treaty fills a major gap in international law and will change that.
The treaty was adopted, in July last year, before the increased dangers posed by President Trump’s new nuclear posture, which Senator Ed Markey says,
“isn’t deterrence—it’s an invitation for America’s adversaries to expand and diversify their nuclear arsenals too”.
The accuracy of his quote is echoed in the Chinese PLA Daily, which responded to the new American posture by saying that China needs more nuclear warheads to deter the US threat. Just this month the news is bad. Russia is reported to be deploying nuclear weapons on the borders of Poland and Lithuania. The US Director of National Intelligence, Dan Coats, said that Pakistan is developing new types of nuclear weapons, including short-range tactical ones, which will bring more risks to the region. All of this has led atomic scientists to move the Doomsday Clock forward to two minutes to midnight. The situation is extremely urgent.
In the light of that, the UK must become a much more positive influence for progress, just as it did on climate change when we were the first country to introduce a climate change Act with mandatory targets. This example was crucial to getting the final Paris accords. I am asking the UK Government to stop boycotting global efforts to even discuss this massive issue and take an active part. I am sure that other noble Lords will mention some of the positive moves that can be built on: the Iran deal—held to be a success despite President Trump’s attempts to sabotage it—and the resumption of the NPT review cycle, with a preparatory committee this May hopefully leading to a reinvigorated NPT.
I ask that the UK should play a constructive part in the forthcoming UN high-level conference on nuclear disarmament. This conference could make all the difference. It could set the scene for immediate steps in changing policy, such as no first use and de-alerting, before moving the agenda on to longer-term issues of a phased programme to reduce nuclear stockpiles. Will the Minister confirm that the UK will take part in the conference, to be held in New York in May? We have plenty to offer. The UK has done some valuable work on verification; Aldermaston could be a global centre of excellence in nuclear disarmament. We also owe participation to our NATO partners. Having asked them to oppose the ban treaty process, it is now time for nuclear weapon states to provide something in return: a commitment that we are willing to engage with serious nuclear disarmament initiatives.
There is a clear choice. Although this serious subject is not really the time for a joke, this one does illustrate the stupidity of the situation we have got ourselves into. There are two aliens, and the first one says, “The dominant life forms on planet Earth have developed satellite-based nuclear weapons”. The second alien asks, “Are they an emerging intelligence”? The first alien says, “I don’t think so; they have them aimed at themselves”. We have the nuclear weapons aimed at ourselves as mankind. It is time that we made a choice to start on the road to disarmament. It will be a long and difficult road, but we have to start talking. We have to attend the UN high-level conference in New York and I hope that the Minister will have a positive message about that for this House this evening.
Lord Patten (Con)
My Lords, the disinvention of knowledge is just as difficult as the abolition of sin or crime, as the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Chelmsford and the noble Lord, Lord Thomas of Gresford—who are, happily, both speaking in this debate—would attest. Nuclear knowledge cannot be just wished away. Indeed, it gives much benefit to men and women in invaluable nuclear medical applications and in its use for the nuclear generation of clean power. By comparison, the dangers presented by nuclear weaponry need little elaboration, save to note a fundamental point. It is manifest that, since World War II, their possession by some stops their use by others.
I say this with a little background. We in this place rightly are enjoined not to clutter up our speeches with otiose or redundant declarations. However, in the interests of transparency, I think it would be wrong not at least to note that in the 16 years up to 2015 I served as an adviser and then non-executive director of Lockheed Martin. In parallel, I declare my current holding of some of the common stock of that company in the United States.
As further background, it has always been good to learn from our service men and women as well as from those civilians in the western nuclear defence industry whom I have met who think deeply about the morality and practicality of what they do. They have families to lose, after all. While they may not keep the thoughts of St Thomas Aquinas exactly by their bed every night, they do without exception, at least in my experience, seem to have the concept of just war principles front of mind—that any war must be, like any weapon, properly considered and undertaken for a good purpose, just as this brave country took exactly that sort of decision back in 1939, but also that the outcome to be aimed for is peace. That is the underlying strength of our present position and our attitude towards regrettably having to have nuclear weapons.
In saying that, it is no virtue-signalling on behalf of Christianity in mentioning St Thomas Aquinas, as the Hindu epic Mahabharata of the pre-Christian era, with its description of five brother rulers thrashing out exactly what was a just war, so clearly demonstrates. Trying to work out what is right and the balance between protection, defence and attack is an eternal and vital concern, and no more strongly than in the matter of nuclear deterrence and multilateral disarmament. I am hopeful that one day we will get going on this much more rapidly around the world, but between now and then there are all sorts of difficulties to be dealt with.
As neither knowledge nor stocks of nuclear weaponry can be wished away, the first task is to stabilise and then to stop proliferation. Declarations of hope and interest at the United Nations will not achieve this by itself or by themselves. I have noticed rather few calls to eliminate nuclear weapons from Russia, China, India, Pakistan or indeed from Israel, let alone from what can understandably and reasonably be called the rogue state of North Korea, and we have certainly not heard much cheeping about this from terrorist groups such as IS or Daesh or al-Qaeda.
Proliferation risk is at a dangerously high level and other state players such as Iran and Saudi Arabia have nuclear status high on their agenda and wish list. They are on their way, I believe. While one authority with very deep background in this area told me recently, “Look towards any Sunni state and you look at states mulling nuclear weaponry as a desirable possession in the longer term”, I think that, if they start, they will go shopping in Pakistan to get the necessary material. Yet, more cheerily, de-escalation happily has worked, with the UK, the US and France leading NATO-wide efforts post the Cold War, none the less leaving present day Russia with a superiority in numbers, if not in efficiency and effectiveness, of nuclear warheads.
To continue this process of measured nuclear disarmament is, as I know the noble Baroness recognises, grinding, difficult and long-term work. It can be achieved only by the current possession, however, of the very weaponry that we wish to abolish in the end. That is a practical paradox but a real one, which is why I support the replacement of our current fleet of deterrent-carrying Vanguard boats by their Dreadnought successors in close co-operation with the US, and admire the efforts of France. These three countries have together declared that they will never sign or ratify this undoubtedly well-meaning but hopelessly unrealistic treaty. The UN division list, as it were, on 7 July last year when a division was called shows countries, with some dubious virtue-signalling, for sure seeking to ban nuclear weapons but via a treaty that does not enjoy the support of, or engage, any state actually possessing the weapon. So this will not by itself reduce nuclear arsenals.
The UN treaty is extremely well-meaning naivety on extremely high stilts, and it will not contribute to international safety nor to the development of practical international law, let alone persuade any rogue state or terrorist organisation to come to the negotiating table tomorrow afternoon. Only realism will do that—the realism that was demonstrated to me clearly in an open and unchaperoned conversation with a chief petty officer in one of our Vanguard-class Trident-carrying boats during a visit on board. Mercifully for this poor sailor, the particular boomer I was on board was moored at the dockside of Faslane rather than being “out and under” on patrol. This chief petty officer of many years’ experience demonstrated the process to be followed, with multiple verifications that might lead to him using the trigger in his hand if ordered so to do. He has used it on a number of occasions during demonstration and shake-down operations to launch unarmed Trident test missiles on test. We talked—no one was listening; the commanding officer was not there—about the reality of war, and he talked a bit about his feelings. He was a human being like us and, like us, he had a family to hold in front of his eyes as he discussed his duty. I asked him what he felt, and very bluntly—he had a straightforward and appealing personality—he said, “Well, they know we have got the weapon, and if we have to, we will use it. It stops them”. Just so.
Lord Browne of Ladyton (Lab)
My Lords, I draw attention to my entry in the register of interests, particularly my work with the Nuclear Threat Initiative. I warmly congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Miller, on securing this valuable debate.
Whether we like it or not, there is a growing consensus about the increased risk of nuclear weapons use, including by accident or miscalculation. In January, when the hands of the Doomsday Clock moved to two minutes to midnight, the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists said:
“In 2017, world leaders failed to respond effectively to the … threats of nuclear war … making the world security situation … as dangerous as it has been since World War II”.
Across the globe, nuclear weapons are poised to become more, not less, usable because of nations’ plans for their nuclear arsenals. Earlier this month, the US released a new Nuclear Posture Review, which reflects several worrying trends: new, smaller yield nukes for “more optionality” for deterrence purposes, of which a New York Times editorial said “this logic is insane”; an expanded role for nuclear weapons in national security strategy; and expanded circumstances when nuclear weapons might be used. Unlike his predecessor’s review, this President’s review does not mention a role for diplomacy, arms control or means to address the threats it generates. It does not consider the effect of proposed policies on strategic stability, proliferation or the impact if other nuclear armed states adopt similar policies—and they are doing so. The US is not alone in going down this path. But they are our closest ally and, unlike Germany, we have been silent. Previously, we were encouraging.
In June 2015, on the “The Andrew Marr Show”, Philip Hammond, then Secretary of State for Defence, was asked whether he would back plans to station such weapons here in the UK. He said, “We would look at the case” for doing so. For those of us who live in the Euro-Atlantic space, where over 90% of the world’s nuclear arms are deployed some minutes from use, these risks are compounded by heightened tensions between NATO and Russia, dangerous rhetoric and brinkmanship from nuclear-armed states, and the growing risk of cyber threats to nuclear command and control systems, which we grossly underestimate.
Across Europe, there is an ongoing collapse of the suite of arms control treaties that for decades have provided stability. There are no ideas on how to arrest that collapse and no intent to pursue alternatives. With allegations of cheating on both sides, no one has any idea how to defend the INF treaty, secure the extension of New START, or repair the collapse of the CFE regime. Now we are heading to another crisis in the NPT review cycle. Last year, frustration over the lack of advancement in the disarmament pillar of the NPT caused the agreement of the first international treaty banning nuclear weapons. Some 122 countries negotiated a treaty that will prohibit nuclear weapons, just as the international community prohibited biological and chemical weapons. Who thinks that the world is less safe because these weapons are banned?
However, before the treaty was even negotiated, our Government made it clear that they would have nothing to do with it. Consistently over the years, the Government have declared opposition to this idea. Every ministerial statement says the same—so much so that I could paraphrase the Minister’s speaking notes. The component elements of the justification for opposition are that the treaty does not deliver any progress on disarmament, does not take account of the international security environment, which apparently compels the retention of nuclear weapons, or address the threats to international peace and security posed by nuclear proliferation, and will cause divisions in the international community over its opposition to the DPRK’s behaviour.
Positively, sometimes the Government repeat that they are committed to progress on global nuclear disarmament and tirelessly work with partners to press for key steps, including the entry into force of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test-Ban Treaty and the successful negotiation of a fissile material cut-off treaty. So it is no surprise that, in response to the treaty, the UK, France and the US issued a joint statement in the usual terms. The treaty, it said,
“does not address the security concerns that continue to make nuclear deterrence necessary”,
and,
“cannot result in the elimination of a single nuclear weapon and will not enhance ... international peace and security”,
and, in particular, it is a threat to the unity of purpose essential in the face of growing threats from the DPRK’s proliferation efforts.
Let us look at the elements of this position. What exactly are the “security concerns” that make it necessary for us to rely on nuclear deterrence? This is all set out in the SDSR 2015, a document that in January in the other place the Defence Secretary, Gavin Williamson, said “remains sound”. The relevant paragraph states that we need nuclear deterrence because there is,
“a risk that states might use their nuclear capability to threaten us, try to constrain our decision making in a crisis or sponsor nuclear terrorism”.
So it is clear that the reason we have nuclear weapons is to prevent the eight other nuclear armed states, two of which are our allies, threatening or using their nukes against us—not for some vague security concerns or to deter proliferation, as all statements to date imply. We do not have nuclear weapons to deter proliferation. In fact, we have a positive approach to non-proliferation, with an unqualified negative security assurance that the UK,
“will not use, or threaten to use, nuclear weapons against any Non-Nuclear Weapons State party to the … NPT”.
Within months of the agreement of the ban treaty and the ludicrous statement in response, the North Korea fears were dispelled. Three United Nations Security Council resolutions imposing the toughest sanctions yet on North Korea were passed, with no division, and in January in Vancouver the Foreign Secretary claimed that,
“the world is not being intimidated or divided by the threat from North Korea ... actually … there was an unprecedented measure of global consensus about what to do”.
So, at least the Minister can spare us that DPRK nonsense when she responds.
Ironically, today the biggest threat to international peace and security through proliferation comes not from the ban treaty but from the extant threat by President Trump to the Iran deal. That is the Government’s position too, as both Boris Johnson and the Prime Minister have made clear—Boris Johnson most recently in Brussels in January.
I am suggesting not that the UK signs up to the ban treaty or that the treaty does not have flaws—I accept that it does—but that the reasons given for not engaging the international community do not stand up to any level of scrutiny, and nor do our repeated statements in support of our alleged commitment to global disarmament. In truth, we are not even doing the minimum that we claim we are.
As far as the entry into force of the CTBT is concerned, only eight states matter. Theresa May has met with the Heads of State or Government of five of them. Can the Minister confirm that when the Prime Minister met Donald Trump, Benjamin Netanyahu, Narendra Modi, Xi Jinping and Abdul Fattah al-Sisi, she raised the issue of entry into force of the CTBT? I am happy to await a written response, as I do not expect it to be available immediately. Regarding our ambition for a fissile material cut-off treaty, only Pakistan matters. Did David Cameron ever raise this issue when he met Prime Minister Muhammad Nawaz Sharif? Likewise, I will wait for a letter.
In this environment, the challenges that we face need to be addressed by nuclear-armed states working together in a responsible way, yet when there are meetings among the P5, there are no meaningful discussions about disarmament or even risk reduction. In fact, the only issues on which the P5 seem to be in agreement is their disdain for the ban treaty and calls for further disarmament, and the alleged but bogus risks that they—the treaty and disarmament—pose to global security.
First, we need to reduce polarisation and live up to our existing commitments and responsibility by engaging in—and encouraging other nuclear weapon states to engage in—UN discussions on disarmament in good faith. We need to focus on the NPT review conference, because if there is further failure on this issue in 2020 due to a lack of progress in disarmament, we may damage the future of that treaty irreparably. With 2020 only two years away, the UK needs to do more and push others to do more to demonstrate progress in meeting its NPT disarmament responsibilities and pledges—including, for a start, those in the 2010 NPT action plan.
Baroness Walmsley (LD)
My Lords, I congratulate my noble friend Lady Miller on asking this very important question.
I speak in a personal capacity about the greatest threat to mankind and the planet: nuclear war. I believe that there are no safe hands for these weapons of mass destruction—not even ours. Global warming is a very major threat, but the threat of any detonation of nuclear weapons is even greater. Yet, despite the lead the UK has shown on the issue of global warming, we are not showing the same leadership on getting rid of nuclear weapons. Of all weapons of mass destruction, only nuclear weapons will kill not just one generation, but kill and maim future generations, resulting in the starvation of 2 billion people, even when used on a small, regional basis, as my noble friend said. It has also been made clear by the Red Cross and the Red Crescent that no medical response to a nuclear detonation would be anywhere near adequate.
It should hardly be necessary to restate that it is illegal to possess such weapons, let alone use them, but that is what the new UN ban treaty seeks to do. In my contribution, therefore, I urge the UK Government to demonstrate by their actions their commitment to a world free of nuclear weapons, which they frequently express to Parliament and at the United Nations. Although the UK is a signatory to the 1968 nuclear non-proliferation treaty, very little progress has been made for five decades on the incremental reduction of nuclear weapons to which the treaty commits us. It is time we did something about that. Indeed, it seems that weapons are proliferating rather than reducing. It saddens me, therefore, that the UK Government refused to sign the new Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons—negotiated by the UN last July—and still seem not to have made up their mind as to whether they will attend the UN high-level conference on nuclear disarmament in May. If not this way, which way?
The new ban treaty lays out a process leading to multilateral disarmament. The conference to discuss urgent next steps will be held in a climate of increasing possibility of a nuclear exchange between North Korea and the United States, or India and Pakistan, or Russia and NATO. There is no better time for world leaders to come together to take nuclear war off the table. The principal aim of the conference is to make progress on effective measures for nuclear risk reduction and disarmament. Membership of the NPT already commits us to that, so we really must take part. If we do not, we will increasingly be seen as out of step with the international community and rejecting the opportunity for global leadership that it presents.
The UK should not wait for other states to take action: surely we should make our own decisions about something as important as this. The non-nuclear countries have shown the way by agreeing the resolution last summer, and many have now signed and ratified it. But without the participation of the nine nuclear countries, the threat—not just of intentional detonation, but of accidental detonation too—remains acute. The presence of nuclear convoys on our roads brings the latter very close to home.
The treaty calls for progress to be made on a global agreement, which would include the nuclear-armed states and provide a phased and verified process for prohibiting and eliminating nuclear weapons. Verification is an area where the UK has considerable expertise to offer, so we should take part in discussions about how this can be done. Such processes have been very successful in reducing the use of chemical and biological weapons, and it is essential that the global community learns from that success in relation to nuclear weapons too. Chemical and biological weapons were banned first and then eliminated, so making them illegal was the essential first step.
Parliamentarians and civil society organisations have called on world leaders to commit to attending the conference at the highest possible level. The Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe Parliamentary Assembly, which includes the Parliaments of France, Russia, the UK, the USA and 52 other members, adopted declarations in 2016 and 2017 calling on member Governments to reduce nuclear threats, adopt no-first-use policies and support UN negotiations, including on the nuclear ban treaty and at the 2018 UN high-level conference. Even though we might be leaving the European Union, we are being told that we will still be in Europe, so there is no reason why we cannot continue to play an active role in this organisation and to support its demands.
Jonathan Granoff, president of the Global Security Institute and UN representative for the World Summit of Nobel Peace Laureates, said recently:
“Nine nations continue to hold the world at risk of nuclear annihilation. Although 120 non-nuclear weapons states have negotiated a treaty to ban the weapons, the states with the weapons remain deadlocked in inertia. It is time for leaders to come together … to discuss measures to reduce nuclear threats”.
So will our Prime Minister attend? Frankly, I would not trust the Foreign Secretary to make a positive contribution, but the Prime Minister might. If not now, when?
While millions starve, over $100 billion per year is spent globally on nuclear weapons, including many millions of pounds by the UK. Personally, I believe that this is a terrible waste because I do not believe that the deterrence principle makes us any safer. On the contrary, possession of these weapons makes us a potential target, as it clearly does for the United States. Certainly the people of Scotland think so, which is why they are overwhelmingly against the location of these weapons on their soil. The money could be better spent to create jobs, support renewable energy, protect the climate and clean air, maintain our conventional defence forces and implement the sustainable development goals.
The ban treaty also has something important to say about the ongoing humanitarian legacy of past nuclear weapons use and testing, and obliges states to provide medical rehabilitation and socioeconomic assistance to those affected by nuclear weapons and to make affected environments clean and safe again. The UK has nuclear test veterans, so I ask the Minister: what are the UK Government doing for them and what contribution are they making to assist victims in other parts of the world? Taking the first steps to engage with the ban treaty by attending the conference is not only compatible with our membership of NATO, the NPT and the Comprehensive Nuclear Test-Ban Treaty, it is a vital step towards fulfilling our legal obligations in relation to nuclear disarmament.
Given the aggressive stance of the current holder of the office of US President, it is time for us, one of the United States’s oldest friends, to show that jaw-jaw is better than war-war by participating in the high-level conference, even as an observer. Even if the other nuclear states refuse to take part, the presence of the UK would prove what the Government have recently been claiming—that even after Brexit, the UK will remain an outward-facing country, engaged with the rest of the world and taking a leading role in efforts for peace. I challenge the Government to prove their claim by attending the conference.
The Lord Bishop of Chelmsford
My Lords, I too thank the noble Baroness, Lady Miller, for bringing this timely and important debate. One of my predecessors, H A Wilson, Bishop of Chelmsford from 1929 to 1950, only ever made one speech in the House of Lords. Prelates nowadays tend to have more to say. This may or may not be a good development.
Shortly after the Second World War a Motion was before this House on the subject of nuclear weapons. Drawing on Christian just war theory, he rose and spoke about how the use of nuclear weapons broke one of the few conventions that civilisation had succeeded in setting up to mitigate the brutalities of war. In his memoirs he recalls how the speech was received:
“Nobody took the slightest notice. I sat down in dead silence and I was conscious that all the noble Lords considered that I had made an ass of myself. Well, probably I had, but the ass’s burden no longer included an uneasy conscience”.
I speak with a similar conviction and perhaps a similar dread. I want to say simply that nuclear weapons are immoral, that they are a lethal extravagance, and that we must find another way. The noble Lord, Lord Patten, spoke about sin and that we cannot go back to Eden. He is quite right—but, my dear brother, there is also repentance. What he said about nuclear weapons could also be said of chemical weapons, yet we have succeeded in ridding the world of those to a certain extent. I am sure that rogue people will always do rogue things, but we have made progress, and similar progress can be made with nuclear weapons.
The truth is that these weapons of mass destruction are also weapons of mass deception. They provide the illusion of security while actually making the world less secure than ever. North Korea now joins the nuclear club. Who will be next, and do we really feel safe with Donald Trump’s finger upon the button? Will we ever be told the truth about their cost, their unusability, their increasing detectability, their vulnerability to cyberattack, and the near misses and accidents that have happened over the years? The fact is that there are military people today who acknowledge their redundancy in the face of the security threats and military needs of a much changed world—or simply that, if we do have all these billions to spend on something we claim we will never use, how about a few more hospitals instead?
The world needs to find another way and to do this the world needs to work together. Obviously, nuclear disarmament cannot be left just to nuclear states, but we do not join in the conversation. The impact of nuclear weapons—their threat, their cost and, God forbid, their use—affects everyone. The most hopeful sign of this happening is the United Nations Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. It confirms that the long-standing obligation to negotiate disarmament is an obligation under international law, and it is because of the failure of nuclear armed states to make multilateral progress that the United Nations is now rightly taking on a more substantive role.
The very first UN General Assembly took place in 1946 just across the green from here in Central Hall, Westminster. Its first resolution focused on,
“the elimination from national armaments of atomic weapons and all other major weapons adaptable to mass destruction”.
As I have said, since then some progress has been made. The UK has signed the nuclear non-proliferation treaty. Chemical and biological weapons have been banned, and so have cluster bombs. A few years ago we all patted ourselves on the back when we banned them. The moral arguments about nuclear weapons are just as compelling, if not more so, for to use a nuclear weapon is suicide as well as genocide.
In the coming years, this conversation is going to take place on a wider stage, but our Government, along with other nuclear states, have met the call for wider involvement with the United Nations in disarmament with obstruction, veto and boycott. As supporters of international law, how can this be right? Even if the noble Lord, Lord Patten, is correct and people like me are well intentioned and naive, that does not stop us sitting down to talk with people about it. Yet we do not do that.
The question before us is simple: when a majority of the world’s countries are working within the UN framework to achieve non-proliferation and the ultimate goal of multilateral disarmament, why will we not even engage with the process? If we are so convinced that nuclear weapons are so helpful to keeping peace in the world, what have we to fear from discussion with those who think differently? Why cannot we even, as the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, said, send an observer? Or is it the case, as I suspect, that in our hearts we know that we can never use these bombs and therefore to own them and to perpetuate the myth of deterrence is a moral failure?
If it is right to say that cluster bombs should not be manufactured or used and that they are immoral, but nuclear weapons could, in certain circumstances, be used, then, in my predecessor’s words, we are breaking the conventions which have, through our understanding of just war that teaches that any force must be proportionate, discriminate, able to achieve its aims of peace and a last resort, mitigated the terrible brutalities of war, then he is also right that we put ourselves in a very weak position to lecture others. But our presence at the table is requested. There is to be a United Nations high-level conference on disarmament in May. My simple question to the Minister is: will we be there and, if not, why not?
Mark Twain famously said that it was not the bits of the Bible that he did not understand that caused him a problem but the bits that he did. Here is a saying of Jesus that is easy to understand: “Peace I give you, but not as the world gives peace”. I speak for many churches and many people of faith in this nation when I ask our Government simply to take part in the process.
Lord West of Spithead (Lab)
My Lords, I first declare that I have been closely involved with the UK deterrent for some decades. Indeed, for four years I was directly responsible to the Prime Minister for the safety and operational effectiveness of the UK deterrent. I also thank the noble Baroness, Lady Miller, for raising this topic, because it is important.
First, I make clear my view that this UN nuclear ban treaty was a mistake and will if anything make us less safe because it will take our eyes off the areas where we should be concentrating to try to control and to restrict nuclear weapon ownership, types of devices and numbers. As has been mentioned already, it is virtue-signalling on a grand scale—something that seems to have caught on in this snowflake and social media age. While it makes the people virtue-signalling feel rather good, generally I am afraid it achieves nothing.
Shortly after the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the strategist Bernard Brodie stated:
“Thus far the chief purpose of our military establishment has been to win wars. From now on its chief purpose must be to avert them”.
I agree with that. We spend extraordinary resources on weapons that we hope will never be used, but one of the ironies of nuclear deterrence is that its effectiveness depends upon actual willingness to use nuclear weapons. I do not intend to go into that deep justification, but I will make it absolutely clear that if any nation thinks that in the final analysis of the destruction of, for example, our capital cities, we would not use nuclear weapons, they are deluding themselves. One should make that clear.
Although I disapprove of the UN treaty, I am strongly of the view that the leaders and nuclear strategists of the nuclear powers need to start focusing on what is without a doubt the greatest existential threat facing all our nations and indeed the globe. They have taken their eyes off the ball. Even if the US nuclear posture review has pushed deterrence up the agenda—although, as my noble friend stated, there are some very worrying proposals within it—I believe that there is a real risk of an inadvertent nuclear exchange. There are multiple ways of misreading or misjudging the other side’s behaviour, or miscalculating during a crisis, especially in “hybrid” scenarios of the type beloved by President Putin. Such a possibility of a nuclear exchange with Russia, starting by accident, no matter how remote it might be at present, would have such a catastrophic result that we should work hard now to ensure that it can never happen.
Part of my concern is because of Putin’s so-called “escalate to de-escalate” strategy, which is bonkers. In that, he would use a nuclear weapon at a sub-strategic level, based on his calculation that NATO could not credibly respond with strategic-level nuclear weapons. Nuclear weapons are not war-fighting weapons—I find the whole prospect of that horrifying. That is a very dangerous assumption and the prospects of controlling escalation and terminating a conflict according to any pre-planned scenario which he or NATO might think they have are disturbingly small. All sides would have great difficulty in limiting, managing or ending a conflict on their preferred terms.
All our leaders in the nuclear weapons states must understand the value of dialogue and signalling for conflict avoidance and management. Diplomacy and investment in coherent signalling are cheap compared to the costs of conflict. Russia and NATO should make sustained efforts to communicate their positions to each other and be able to use well-established communication channels to manage any emerging crisis. It is no good trying to cut those links; we need more and better links.
I had hoped that Presidents Trump and Putin, the great “deal makers”, might reach some accord. There was, I thought, a golden opportunity to lessen tension by establishing lines of communication and to avoid misunderstandings. Indeed, reinvigorating the web of agreements and understandings between their two nations and NATO about nuclear weapons could help defuse potential escalation in time of crisis. Additionally, the START negotiations could move forward again, because, despite the achievements of SALT I and II and START I and II, we are still in a world where Russia and the US each have about 7,000 nuclear warheads in their arsenals. The Russians also have 4,000 short-range nuclear weapons, and the US fields about 200 in Europe. These are particularly destabilising, not least in their vulnerability to terrorist attack and capture, since many of the Russian weapons are held in remote storage areas. A major reduction in warhead holdings and systems would make the world safer.
We in the UK can be proud of having taken a lead in reducing our warheads to about 200 and only one system—the bare minimum to establish a credible deterrent. If the two Presidents could reach some agreement on ways of reducing tension, it would enhance global security. It would be a great coup, for example, if the US and Russian strategic nuclear forces went from a condition of instant notice to fire, which I find quite extraordinary in the world that we are in at the moment, down to a reduced readiness to fire, as we have done in the UK. The issue of alert state and readiness to fire is particularly important in the case of land-based ICBMs and bombers, as they are vulnerable to first strike. This means there is only a limited time to react to a suspected attack before they are destroyed—in the US and Russian case, it is about 15 minutes. In times of severely strained relations between the US and what was then the Soviet Union in the past, on a number of occasions missile launches were almost made on incorrect information—that is a chilling thought. Such calming measures, combined with success in a new START III, would be a substantial achievement by these two “Marmite” leaders. We would inhabit a safer world and feel bound to acknowledge, at least in this one area of endeavour, that perhaps they have some statesmanship.
Reduction in number of warheads, removal of whole types of systems and better links and understanding of the need for more dialogue will all make us safer and put no country’s interest at risk. The risks, should things accidently go wrong and we do not make some progress, are too dreadful to contemplate. Bearing in mind the worrying proposals in the US nuclear posture review, has our Prime Minister discussed in any depth with the US President ways forward on this nuclear issue?
Lord Thomas of Gresford (LD)
My Lords, opening the Munich security conference this weekend its chairman, Wolfgang Ischinger, formerly ambassador to the US and later the UK, said that he was worried. He said:
“I think the global security situation is more unstable today than it has been at any time since the demise of the Soviet Union”.
The report prepared for the conference was entitled To the Brink—and Back? Note the question mark. Having listened to the noble Lord, Lord West, and his contribution I feel even more unstable than I did before. He talked about the instability of the current situation and the risks that Putin was prepared to take in the belief that the West would not retaliate, and he painted a picture that underlines everything that Wolfgang Ischinger was worried about at the conference.
The noble Lord, Lord West, also referred to Hiroshima and Nagasaki. My mind goes back to the black and white Pathé news reports I saw in my local Odeon when I was a boy. The burgeoning mushroom clouds from those two cities brought us initially a sense of relief that the war would finally be over. Then the full horror emerged as we saw in later newsreels the death, devastation and destruction on the ground. Later, in 1949, after the Iron Curtain had divided Europe, we learned that our former glorious ally, Russia, had succeeded in testing its own atom bomb in Kazakhstan. At meetings of the Parliamentarians for Nuclear Non-proliferation and Disarmament, we have a brave but deformed survivor of those tests, Karipbek Kuyukov, who carries his disabilities with great grace.
Britain was not far behind. Operation Grapple, between 1957 and 1959, saw the development of the British atom and hydrogen bombs at Christmas Island and elsewhere in Australia, and some of my contemporaries as national servicemen—21,000 of them, some dressed in no more than khaki desert fatigues—were there to turn their backs to the explosions as they occurred. A study undertaken by Sue Rabbitt Roff, a social scientist at the University of Dundee, in 1999 found that of 2,261 children born to veterans of those tests 39% were born with serious medical conditions.
In October 1962 we saw more newsreels, of Russian merchant vessels heading towards Cuba with canisters containing nuclear missiles on their decks. Air reconnaissance showed that launch sites were being constructed on the island of Cuba itself. President Kennedy said in an address to the nation on television that they had identified missiles capable of striking Washington and indeed any other city in the south-east of the United States, the Caribbean or Mexico. He declared:
“It shall be the policy of this nation to regard any nuclear missile launched from Cuba against any nation in the western hemisphere as an attack by the Soviet Union on the United States, requiring a full retaliatory response upon the Soviet Union”.
For 13 days we held our breath. The noble Lord, Lord Patten, referred to concerns for family. I had been married for just over a year, I was starting out on my career as a lawyer; indeed, I had even stood as a Liberal candidate in the local elections. The whole world that I was hoping to build seemed to be in the gravest danger. Then Khrushchev ordered the merchant fleet to turn back and commanded his submarines, which carried nuclear-tipped torpedoes, to return to base. So did the doctrine of deterrence prevent war? Yes, on this occasion, I think it probably did, but it required stable and rational leaders on both sides who weighed the risks, considered the consequences and took realistic decisions. Contrast that with the world today.
Noble Lords have talked about Iran. At Munich on Saturday, President Netanyahu warned Iran not to test Israel’s resolve. His country—a nuclear power, of course—would not allow Iran,
“to put a noose of terror around our neck ... we will act if necessary, not just against Iran’s proxies … but against Iran itself”.
He compared the Iranian nuclear deal with the US with the Munich attempt to appease Hitler: sanctions relief, he said, had,
“unleashed a dangerous Iranian tiger”.
While in Munich at the weekend, the US National Security Advisor, General McMaster, warned of Moscow’s campaign to divide the West through subterfuge. What did the leader of the West, President Trump, have to say about it? He tweeted a rebuke to General McMaster:
“General McMaster forgot to say that the results of the 2016 election were not impacted or changed by the Russians and that the only Collusion was between Russia and Crooked H, the DNC and the Dems. Remember the Dirty Dossier, Uranium, Speeches, Emails and the Podesta Company!”.
That is the so-called leader of the western world. Mr President, you are no Jack Kennedy. Meanwhile, in North Korea, President Kim Jong-un declares:
“The entire United States is within range of our nuclear weapons, a nuclear button is always on my desk. This is reality, not a threat … This year, we should focus on mass-producing nuclear warheads and ballistic missiles for operational deployment. These weapons will be used only if our society is threatened”.
Trump’s response was to claim that his nuclear button,
“is a much bigger & more powerful one than his”.
This is the context in which we are discussing the ban treaty. In an uncertain and unstable world, we have uncertain and unstable leaders. The risks of an accidental or deliberate detonation of a nuclear weapon have increased. The noble Lord, Lord West, referred to the accidental detonation of these weapons. The possession and deployment of nuclear weapons can result in misjudgments and the escalation of crises, as the Cuba crisis demonstrated.
It is deplorable that this Government refused even to attend the discussions which proceeded the ban treaty. Britain has been prepared to join treaties to ban chemical and biological weapons, as many noble Lords have said. We agree that the possession of such weapons, and cluster bombs, is a war crime punishable by the International Criminal Court. Each of those treaties formulated a sequence for the destruction of the weapons concerned: first, the negotiation of a prohibition treaty; then accession to the treaty; the removal of such weapons from operational positions; and a commitment verifiably to destroy stockpiles within a limited period. Perhaps the Minister will claim that the United Kingdom is committed to multilateral disarmament. But it has to start somewhere so let us make a start and commit to joining the treaty as soon as possible. The first step is for this country to be present at the table at the high-level conference in May. Why should the UK not be present, at least with observer status?
To the brink—and back? Mr Ischinger said at the conclusion of this weekend’s conference that after all the rancorous debate he had heard, the question mark remains.
Lord Judd (Lab)
My Lords, I join others in thanking the noble Baroness, Lady Miller, for introducing this debate. She has a formidable reputation for consistency over many years, and not just in this country. I can say from direct experience how highly she is regarded internationally, particularly in Europe.
We are a permanent member of the UN Security Council. That is an immense privilege and we need to make sure that we are playing a lead role in fulfilling the spirit of the purposes of the UN Security Council. At the time of the negotiation of the non-proliferation treaty, as a nuclear power we were under considerable scrutiny. I am convinced that that treaty was only achieved partly because of the undertaking by the nuclear powers that they would work seriously and deliberately to tackle the issue of the existence of their own nuclear arsenals, and to reduce and eventually eliminate them. That was a solemn undertaking; the world is looking to us again to act in the spirit of that undertaking.
In the 1970s I moved from being Minister for the Navy, where of course I had responsibility for nuclear submarines, to become the Minister for Overseas Development. Friends used to ask me how I put the two things together. I said that I found no inconsistency whatever, because it seemed to me that in any logical and sane defence and security policy, disarmament was a critical element. They were not separate issues but went together. Of course, now we understand even better that there is another issue: the battle for hearts and minds. The world is desperately unstable. My noble friend Lord West reminded us firmly of this. It is unstable, but we shall ultimately build stability and security only when rationality prevails in the international community and we are winning sufficient numbers of hearts and minds. We are therefore being watched in everything we do as to what we are really about, particularly in areas where we have more significance, such as nuclear issues.
I have worked most of my life in the international context but I cannot share with colleagues too closely the dismay I see that we have moved from being seen as a country to be respected to being seen, too often, as part of the problem. We have to do something about this. We also have to recognise that the relationship between the nuclear powers and the non-nuclear states is not good at the moment. There is a lot of mistrust, which is of course related to the issue I just mentioned. How does security come through hearts and minds if we have distrust, uncertainty and misgivings across a wide section of the world? That will not help to create security and stability.
We need to work at improving relationships between the nuclear powers and the non-nuclear powers. The Government may not like a situation in which the NPT and the high-level conference are happening. Perhaps they would far prefer this to be discussed under the NPT processes—but the NPT itself will unravel unless common ground can be built using processes such as the high-level conference. We must recognise that non-nuclear states are setting up these additional processes only because of the failure of the UK and other P5 states to honour their Article 6 commitments.
Looking at the bigger picture, the UK needs to understand that for the “Global Britain” mantra to be meaningful, and for the UK to continue to have global influence post Brexit, Britain must be mindful of its global reputation. This kind of high-handed and insular approach to disarmament does significant damage to that reputation and reduces the UK in the eyes of non-nuclear states. Most of the world’s population and their Governments are fed up and tired of a situation in which certain arrogant powers assume that it is their job to manage the world. They want to be treated as meaningful partners, and that demands our presence at occasions such as this conference.
What should we specifically be doing? I would like to suggest several things. We should take unmistakable action to improve diplomatic relations between nuclear weapon and non-nuclear weapon states by participating in negotiations and stimulating dialogue. We should work energetically to restore the health of the NPT regime, including initiating inclusive processes to work on the 2010 64-point action plan and publishing an annual report on the UK’s contribution to its implementation. We should breathe life into the P5 process talks between nuclear weapon states, including strengthening their agenda and increasing their transparency. We should review the prominence given to nuclear weapons in the UK’s security doctrines, in close consultation with Parliament and civil society. We should use the opportunity of this 2018 UN high-level conference on nuclear disarmament to build bridges with non-nuclear weapon states, and we should do it by having senior members of the Government present at the conference.
None of us would like to be where we are. I have always been a multilateralist because the issue is how we get from where we are to where we want to be, and that will necessarily involve international collaboration and agreements. I thank the noble Baroness for having introduced this debate. The nightmare that is there if we ignore it is too awful to contemplate.
Lord Collins of Highbury (Lab)
My Lords, I too thank the noble Baroness, Lady Miller, for initiating this debate. She reminded us that, on 7 July last year, 122 countries at the UN headquarters in New York endorsed the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons—the ban treaty, as noble Lords have called it. The eight officially recognised nuclear weapons states, plus the unofficially recognised Israel, boycotted the process. I reiterate what my noble friends Lord Browne and Lord Judd said: the ban treaty is born out of perceived frustration by many states at the lack of progress in recent years on nuclear disarmament through the non-proliferation treaty, which was the only multilateral treaty that contained a binding commitment to nuclear disarmament through a gradual process based on good faith.
As my noble friend Lord Judd reminded us, it was a Labour Government who signed the non-proliferation treaty in 1968. In its 2017 manifesto, Labour committed to support the renewal of the Trident nuclear deterrent while advocating greater UK leadership in creating stronger multilateral efforts with the global community and the United Nations in order to achieve a nuclear weapons-free world. Only four countries are not a party to the NPT treaty—North Korea left the NPT, and India, Israel and Pakistan never joined it—but it commits 185 states never to develop nuclear weapons. The UK, the USA, China, Russia and France already had nuclear weapons by 1968. Since 1970, there have been review conferences every five years to pursue an incremental approach to nuclear disarmament, which noble Lords pointed out, through Article VI of the treaty. The NPT has of course come under stress in recent years, most notably at the last quinquennial NPT review in 2015. That ended without a consensus on what actions should be taken over the next five years to pursue the goal of nuclear disarmament, the first time that this has happened since 1970.
As the noble Baroness, Lady Miller, stated, the ban treaty’s main provisions are that member states are banned from developing, testing, producing, manufacturing, transferring, possessing, stockpiling, using or threatening to use nuclear weapons. As the noble Lord, Lord Patten, reminded us, though, the first major inadequacy of the ban treaty is that even though two-thirds of UN member states endorsed it, there was no involvement of the major players in nuclear deterrence. The legal provision banning the stationing, installation or deployment of nuclear weapons on the territory of a member state has implications for NATO countries such as Germany, Italy and Turkey, which have US nuclear weapons on their soil. As we have heard in this debate, polarisation between nuclear weapons states and non-nuclear weapons states could be magnified by the ban treaty. As noble Lords have made clear, we should see this as a wake-up call for the countries that possess nuclear weapons to act.
The United Kingdom has been seen as one of the more progressive nuclear states, leading the way in advocating diplomatic, technological and financial policies to pursue nuclear disarmament, and it has led the way in multilateral approaches to pursue that agenda. Labour has historically been more progressive in finding solutions to nuclear disarmament and continues to be so today. Under Gordon Brown’s premiership, Labour offered a “grand global bargain” that would reduce nuclear weapons stockpiles among nuclear weapons states and vowed to cut the number of Trident submarines from four to three. The Brown Government maintained the UK’s position as the most progressive nuclear weapons state in 2008 by setting up the P5 process, the first forum between the P5 set up specifically to discuss matters surrounding nuclear disarmament, and we also had the UK-Norway initiative. Unfortunately, that process has been reduced in importance by the current Government.
This is the crux of the debate. All noble Lords have asked: where are the initiatives by this Government to maintain the commitments and pathways set out in the NPT? There do not seem to be any. As my noble friend Lord West said, the key to this process has to be a much stronger level of communication and dialogue. That is the way forward. I want to hear from the Minister tonight exactly how the Government are going to engage, particularly with the US President’s reviews that have been announced. How are we going to engage and communicate across the P5? How do we reinvigorate the process so that we avoid the threats that we have heard identified in this debate? How do we reduce tensions and the threat that nuclear weapons pose?
Baroness Goldie (Con)
My Lords, first, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Miller, for tabling this debate and all noble Lords for their thoughtful contributions.
Let me state at the outset that the Government are committed to a world free from nuclear weapons. It is the Government’s view that the nuclear non-proliferation treaty remains central to achieving this. It has been at the heart of global non-proliferation and disarmament efforts for nearly 50 years and it remains the only legally binding treaty on nuclear non-proliferation and disarmament to receive global acceptance.
Perhaps most crucially, the nuclear non-proliferation treaty has worked. By offering reciprocal guarantees to all its signatories, it has succeeded in significantly limiting the global proliferation of nuclear weapons. As many of your Lordships will be aware, it has underpinned the massive reduction in nuclear weapons since the end of the Cold War, and it has allowed all countries to benefit from the peaceful use of nuclear technology. It has been successful because it is built on foundations of consensus, and because it delivers tangible benefits to all its signatories. As security threats evolve and test our resolve and our values, we should cherish the far-sightedness that the treaty embodies.
I listened with care and respect to the views expressed by the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Chelmsford. I perhaps cannot share his analysis, but we both seek the ultimate objective of a world where nuclear weapons are redundant. Where we differ is on the journey to that destination.
I submit that the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, or the “ban treaty” as it is shorthanded into, stands in stark contrast to the proven effectiveness of the nuclear non-proliferation Treaty. First, rather than building the necessary trust and consensus between states, it is seeking quick fixes. Secondly, the ban treaty offers no solutions to the complex security environment that we all face, nor to the technical challenges of verifying nuclear disarmament. Thirdly, its attempt to create a rival legal framework for disarmament is flawed. Its safeguard standards are inadequate and its restrictions on nuclear test explosions lack the rigour of those imposed by the Comprehensive Nuclear Test-Ban Treaty.
My noble friend Lord Patten made the important distinction between a laudable aspiration—no one would dispute that that is what the ban treaty embodies—and a system which actively contributes to a multilateral disarmament objective. That is the problem: the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons fails to offer a realistic path to disarmament and risks undermining the effective non-proliferation and disarmament architecture that we already have in place. The noble Lord, Lord West, identified those flaws with authority.
As a result, the United Kingdom Government do not intend to become party to this treaty and we do not recognise that its prohibitions represent an emerging rule of customary law. I say to the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, that, as we speak, the ban treaty has received, from the original 122 countries involved, 56 signatories and only five ratifications.
The noble Baroness, Lady Miller, asked about the UK’s commitment to disarmament. Your Lordships should be in no doubt that this Government remain committed to full multilateral nuclear disarmament under strict and effective international control. It is our firm belief that the best way to achieve this is through verified, step-by-step, gradual multilateral disarmament. I detected from the contributions that several of your Lordships do not disagree with those objectives.
It is important to note some essential steps along this path. The Government believe that they include: first, the entry into force of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty; secondly, starting and successfully concluding negotiation of a fissile material cut-off treaty in the conference on disarmament; and, thirdly, the global adoption of the nuclear non-proliferation treaty.
There is no doubt that disarmament is more difficult in the current security environment. The noble Lord, Lord Browne of Ladyton, spoke with authority about that. Alongside our allies, we face challenges that are growing in number, scale and complexity. The noble Lord, Lord Thomas, acknowledged that challenge, as did the noble Lord, Lord Judd. These challenges include a more aggressive Russia and a more capable North Korea. That is why this Government will retain our independent and credible minimum nuclear deterrent for as long as the global security situation makes it necessary. This is not just essential for our own security; it is also essential for NATO’s security.
Yet even in this challenging context, progress on disarmament is still possible. I thought that the noble Lord, Lord West, made a number of interesting points in this respect. Allow me to give an example of one strand of the Government’s work that is moving us closer to the realising the goals of the non-proliferation treaty. Establishing an effective nuclear disarmament verification regime will be essential if we are to realise that long-term goal of multilateral nuclear disarmament. States need to be confident that a nuclear armed state will have its warheads dismantled in a way that makes us safer, rather than in a way the spreads nuclear know-how and inadvertently increases the risk of nuclear proliferation. Establishing effective disarmament verification has been a priority for successive British Governments.
I reassure the noble Lord, Lord Thomas of Gresford, by reminding him and other noble Lords that the United Kingdom started working with Norway on disarmament verification over 10 years ago. I pay tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Browne of Ladyton, who was the Secretary of State for Defence that time. The United Kingdom-Norway initiative was the first ever technical project between a nuclear and non-nuclear weapons state in this field. This Government have built on that work. In 2015, we established the quad initiative with the United States, Norway and Sweden, which undertook the first ever multilateral disarmament verification exercise, at RAF Honington in October last year. Since 2015, we have played a leading role in the International Partnership for Nuclear Disarmament Verification, including co-chairing its working groups on verification objectives and verifying nuclear weapon declarations. We have co-sponsored the founding of a United Nations group of government experts on verification, and recently hosted a conference to prepare the first formal meeting of the group in May this year. So this Government are, indeed, talking.
These examples of practical and effective co-operation improve trust between nuclear and non-nuclear weapons states, and take us closer to the goal of a world free from nuclear weapons. To be fair, I thought that the noble Lord, Lord Collins, acknowledged that there had been progress over the piece on these issues.
I turn to some specific contributions raised by noble Lords. The noble Lord, Lord Browne of Ladyton, asked about matters raised by the Prime Minister in recent meetings with different powers. He also raised the issue of cyber threats in relation to nuclear weaponry. I shall make inquiries, and shall write to the noble Lord with any relevant information that I receive.
The noble Baronesses, Lady Miller and Lady Walmsley, and the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Chelmsford and the noble Lord, Lord Judd, all asked about the UK’s view of the proposed high-level conference on nuclear disarmament in May this year. The conference is sponsored by the Non-Aligned Movement, which seems divided among itself about what the conference should focus on. We believe that it is unlikely to lead to effective progress towards global nuclear disarmament. If the conference is held, which is still unclear, we shall consider our approach closer to the time.
The noble Lord, Lord West, raised the issue of the United States nuclear posture review, and the United Kingdom’s attitude to it. The United Kingdom welcomes that nuclear posture review and the continued US commitment to European security and to a world without nuclear weapons.
Nuclear disarmament requires leadership from all nuclear states so, finally, allow me to recall our own strong track record. In January 2015, we announced that we had fulfilled commitments we made in the 2010 strategic defence and security review to reduce the number of deployed warheads on each of our Vanguard class submarines from 48 to 40, and the number of operational warheads to no more than 120. We remain committed to reducing our total stockpile of nuclear warheads to no more than 180 by the mid-2020s. I suggest to noble Lords that that shows leadership by example, and I think it very important, as a number of noble Lords rightly indicated, that the nuclear powers globally are prepared to give such leadership.
This Government assess that the treaty on the prohibition of nuclear weapons represents a significant backward step. It threatens the consensus and progress achieved by the non-proliferation treaty. It undermines the necessary safeguards established by that treaty. For these reasons, it would take us further from multilateral nuclear disarmament, rather than closer to it. That is why this Government will never recognise that its prohibitions represent an emerging rule of customary law. This Government remain committed to the nuclear non-proliferation treaty and its goal of multilateral nuclear disarmament. We shall continue to work with all international partners to build trust and confidence between states, to prevent proliferation, and to take tangible steps toward a safer and more stable world, in which countries with nuclear weapons ultimately feel able to relinquish them. That is the objective to which this country and this Government are committed. As I suggested, this Government are prepared to lead by example.
This has been a useful debate and I thank the noble Baroness for tabling the Motion. It enabled us to make a useful exploration of where we are and what the issues are. We can draw comfort from what I said in response to the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Chelmsford: we may disagree with one another on the analysis of where we are at the moment and what we do or do not do, but we seem to be united in the ultimate objective that we want to achieve.