House of Commons

Tuesday 22nd January 2019 Commons Chamber

Tuesday 22 January 2019

The House met at half-past Eleven o’clock

Prayers

Tuesday 22nd January 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker in the Chair]

Oral Answers to Questions

Tuesday 22nd January 2019 Commons Chamber

The Secretary of State was asked—

[Stephen Timms (East Ham) (Lab)]

1. What recent assessment he has made of the safety and security of human rights defenders throughout the world.

[Lilian Greenwood (Nottingham South) (Lab)]

21. What steps his Department is taking to promote and support human rights internationally.

[The Minister for Asia and the Pacific (Mark Field)]

The UK is committed to the promotion and protection of human rights worldwide and supports the work of the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva, the High Commission for Human Rights and the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights. The UK is one of the longest-standing members of the Human Rights Council, as the right hon. Gentleman will be aware. Regrettably, human rights defenders face unprecedented attack in many parts of the world. In 2018 alone, more than 300 such defenders were killed, and thousands more were imprisoned, attacked or tortured around the world.

[Stephen Timms]

I am grateful to the Minister for that answer. There has been a surge of attacks against and repression of human rights defenders around the world. In Saudi Arabia, for example, women’s rights activists, including Samar Badawi, have been detained since last May, and there have been reports that some have been tortured. I welcome Lord Ahmad’s announcement last month that the Department will publish the guidelines for embassies about support for human rights defenders, to aid clarity and consistency. When does the Minister envisage that publication taking place?

[Mark Field]

I do not want to put my ministerial colleague under undue pressure, but this is clearly something that we consider a major priority. Obviously, as Ministers we raise human rights issues with all our overseas counterparts, in both public and private forums. In December, as part of the UK’s commitment to freedom of religious belief, my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary, who is sitting to my right, announced an independent global review of the persecution of Christians, which will contain recommendations on practical steps in respect of that persecution. Of course, that applies to religious beliefs of all sorts.

[Lilian Greenwood]

An estimated 1 million Uighur Muslims are being held in detention camps in Xinjiang by the Chinese Government. In the very week that we commit to relearning the lessons of the holocaust, does the Minister share my concern that such human rights abuses and persecution cannot go unchallenged? It is quite disgraceful conduct from a permanent member of the Security Council. What is the Minister doing to protest to the Chinese Government about these issues?

[Mark Field]

May I address this issue up front? I suspect that many Members from all parties have grave concerns about it. We are concerned about what is happening in Xinjiang province, including the detention of, as the hon. Lady says, more than 1 million people without trial in political re-education camps. Not only did British diplomats on the ground visit Xinjiang in December 2018 but we are raising and will continue to raise this issue bilaterally with the Chinese. My right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary did so most recently in Beijing in the autumn.

[Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)]

Human rights defenders face particular challenges in the Gaza strip, which is controlled by Hamas. Journalists are oppressed, demonstrations are violently put down and public executions take place. What are we doing to support human rights defenders in the Gaza strip?

[Mark Field]

I reassure my hon. Friend that Ministers, particularly my right hon. Friend the Minister for the Middle East, do make clear our concerns about the rights of human rights defenders and the importance of their work in every part of the world.

[Nick Herbert (Arundel and South Downs) (Con)]

Brave human rights defenders are alerting us to a terrible new wave of persecution of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex people in Chechnya. What steps will the Government take to remind the Russian authorities of their responsibilities, including publishing an independent inquiry into this issue? They are signatories to the European convention on human rights and these abuses cannot be allowed to continue.

[Mark Field]

My right hon. Friend is absolutely right. We are and remain deeply concerned by the recent reports of the renewed wave of persecution of LGBT folk in Chechnya. Both the Foreign Secretary and my right hon. Friend the Minister for Europe and the Americas have in the past week made it clear to their Russian counterparts that we must stop such persecution and hold those responsible to account.

[Patrick Grady (Glasgow North) (SNP)]

What discussions about the human rights situation have Ministers had with the Government of Colombia, either directly or through the embassies, following the bombing of the police academy in that country?

[Mark Field]

There are obviously great concerns. As the hon. Gentleman is aware, a number of cadets were killed taking important action as human rights defenders. My right hon. Friend the Minister for Europe and the Americas has raised this issue at a bilateral level, and we will monitor the situation carefully.

[Sir Desmond Swayne (New Forest West) (Con)]

Will the report to which my right hon. Friend has referred focus on the plight of Christian Churches in China?

[Mark Field]

It will indeed. I know that my hon. Friend the Member for Congleton (Fiona Bruce) speaks avidly, repeatedly, and, if I may say, persistently on this matter—and indeed extremely effectively. My right hon. Friend can be assured that we will address that along with other issues about Christian persecution across the world.

[Liz McInnes (Heywood and Middleton) (Lab)]

One of the most chilling aspects of the violence in Zimbabwe in recent days was the statement of the President’s spokesman that this was

“just a foretaste of things to come”.

In the light of that, does the Minister agree that it is time for the UN to revive the Security Council resolution on Zimbabwe that it failed to pass in 2008, and will the UK seek to initiate that discussion?

[Mark Field]

I thank the hon. Lady for her question. This is deeply disappointing to all of us in this House. We all celebrated the demise of the Mugabe regime, feeling and hoping that a new chapter of Zimbabwe history was commencing. We are very concerned about the disproportionate response of the security forces to the recent protests. May I reassure the House that my hon. Friend the Minister for Africa summoned Zimbabwe’s ambassador on 17 January to urge the Government there to show restraint and fully investigate any cases of alleged human rights abuses? Obviously, we will take this up in multilateral forums such as the UN. I do not want to make a firm commitment to what the hon. Lady has said, but she will know that, in this fluid situation, we will keep all our options open.

[Martin Docherty-Hughes (West Dunbartonshire) (SNP)]

2. What recent discussions he has had with his Iraqi counterpart.

[The Minister for the Middle East (Alistair Burt)]

I spoke to Foreign Minister Alhakim on the telephone on 14 November. I saw him in Rome with President Barham Salih at the end of November, and the noble Lord Ahmad spoke to him in December.

[Martin Docherty-Hughes]

I thank the Minister for his response. Ben Taub reminded us recently in The New Yorker that the murder and rape of women and the brutalisation of children in Iraqi detention camps do not bode well for peace and security. Does the Minister agree that when he next meets his counterparts he should remind the Iraqi state that it should be building peace and reconciliation rather than creating breeding grounds for a new Daesh insurgency?

[Alistair Burt]

That is absolutely right. The future of Iraq, which has real possibilities now following the elections some months ago, has to be built not only on the understanding that all communities in Iraq need a share in government and in the development of the country but on human rights, which can be exploited if they are abused. That forms a fundamental part of the future of Iraq. These issues are indeed raised.

[Alex Chalk (Cheltenham) (Con)]

A successful economy is vital to secure Iraq’s long-term future and the wellbeing of its people, who have suffered so much. What steps are being taken to ensure that British companies can participate in building that better future?

[Alistair Burt]

We have an active and thriving Iraq-UK business council. Baroness Nicholson has been involved for many years in efforts in this area, particularly in the south of the country in Basra. The contracts and opportunities for the rebuilding and the reconstruction of Iraq will be much helped by the international community’s determination to support Iraq and Iraq’s own use of its oil revenues. British companies should be well placed because of their history and expertise.

[Catherine West (Hornsey and Wood Green) (Lab)]

What dialogue has the Minister had with the Government of Iraq on the rights of Kurdish Iraqis and Kurds across the region?

[Alistair Burt]

The Kurdish community is represented through the Kurdish Regional Government, and we keep in regular contact with them. Relationships between Baghdad and Irbil are vital for ensuring that the Kurdish community feels a full part of a united Iraq. Those relations, I think, have been strengthened since the election of President Barham Salih, but the Kurdish people’s future in a united Iraq is fundamental to the future and progress of a united Iraq.

[Mr Khalid Mahmood (Birmingham, Perry Barr) (Lab)]

The Government are supposed to provide the House with an update on the campaign against Daesh every quarter. The last I checked, the duration of a quarter is 92 days, but the most recent Daesh statement was more than 200 days ago, so when will we get the next update, or has the policy changed?

[Alistair Burt]

No, the policy has not changed. The short answer is soon, of course.

[Marsha De Cordova (Battersea) (Lab)]

Soon?

[Alistair Burt]

Yes, soon. It seems the best possible word to use. The definition of quarter has obviously stretched a little bit too far, but it is important both to keep up the relationship with the House on this and to confirm progress in relation to Daesh across Syria and Iraq, which continues to be vital.

[Drew Hendry (Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey) (SNP)]

3. What assessment his Department has made of the effect on diplomatic co-operation between the UK and the EU of the UK leaving the EU on 29 March 2019.

[The Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mr Jeremy Hunt)]

Diplomatic co-operation with our partners in the EU over a wide range of areas is excellent, and will continue to be so post Brexit.

[Drew Hendry]

The Secretary of State says that, but the effects of a lack of co-operation are being felt directly in my constituency. A major European car manufacturer was due to invite 40 international journalists per day to a new Inverness hotel. Now the owner, Tony Storey, tells me that that has been cancelled, costing him £400,000 and priceless exposure for the highlands. What does the Secretary of State say to business owners like Tony and others who are being affected by this Brexit shambles?

[Mr Hunt]

If SNP Members want to resolve the uncertainty, it is very simple—vote for the deal that the Prime Minister has negotiated.

[Greg Hands (Chelsea and Fulham) (Con)]

It is possible to welcome yesterday’s announcement of the waiving of the settled status fee, which has gone down very well with EU nationals across the UK, including in Chelsea and Fulham, where I have 11,000 EU nationals. Could my right hon. Friend say something about improving and boosting our efforts in Germany? We currently have only three diplomatic missions in Germany. France has seven; Italy has 11. Our future relationship with Germany will be crucial. We have no representation. We have a very good honorary consul in Frankfurt, but it seems that for the European Central Bank, we need more representation in Frankfurt and Hamburg in particular.

[Mr Hunt]

I defer to my right hon. Friend’s knowledge of Germany, which is second to none. I would like to reassure him that over the past three years we have had, on average, about one Government Minister visiting Germany every single week, so we do give it the highest priority in our foreign relations, and will continue to do so post Brexit. However, I will look into the issue of consulates that my right hon. Friend raises.

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

Surely the Foreign Secretary has picked up the fact that morale in the diplomatic corps across Europe is at rock bottom. What will he do to lift the spirits of a corps of professional diplomats who are so disturbed by the lack of leadership from this Government on Europe?

[Mr Hunt]

Of course I recognise that we would all like to resolve the uncertainty around Brexit as soon as possible, but we have significantly expanded the diplomatic corps in Europe. Our representation in Brussels—the UKRep office—has gone up from 120 to 150 and will go up to 180 people; we have upgraded our representation across every EU state to senior ambassadorial level; and we are investing, because it matters.

[Bim Afolami (Hitchin and Harpenden) (Con)]

Recently, the former US Secretary of State, John Kerry, remarked on the fact that the British Government are working closely with other European Governments on the Iran nuclear deal. Could the Foreign Secretary give the House further detail on how that will continue after we leave the European Union on 29 March?

[Mr Hunt]

Absolutely. We have an independent foreign policy now and we will continue, obviously, to have that post Brexit. The Iran nuclear deal was negotiated with the United States and European countries, and has been successful in preventing Iran developing a nuclear programme. It is not perfect, but it has worked, and that is why we continue to support it and work closely with our partners to do so.

[Stephen Gethins (North East Fife) (SNP)]

I am sure all Members will want to join me in congratulating the Dáil in Ireland, which yesterday marked the centenary of its first international address and its message to free nations. Ireland, like every other EU member state, sees the EU as a way of strengthening its independence and sovereignty and increasing its diplomatic clout. Shinzo Abe has called on us to take no deal off the table. The Secretary of State knows the deal will not go through. Can he at least take no deal off the table? No deal would undermine our diplomatic clout.

[Mr Hunt]

The best way to avoid no deal is to find a deal that can pass through this House. If you take no deal off the table, you remove any incentive for the EU to help us do that, which is why it would be a big mistake and actually make no deal more likely.

[Stephen Gethins]

The Foreign Secretary is wrong. If we take no deal off the table, we can talk in a meaningful way with each other and with our European partners.

On 17 January I received a written answer from the Minister for Europe and the Americas, saying that we have 550 officials working on Brexit—hundreds of officials, working on a worse deal for the UK. At a time when the FCO and the public services are struggling for resources, is that not a waste of time, a waste of finances and a waste of the good will that we desperately need at this time in terms of our diplomacy?

[Mr Hunt]

What makes no deal more likely is if parties like the hon. Gentleman’s continue to vote against sensible proposals that this Government bring to the House of Commons. Any Government have to be responsible and prepare for all eventualities, but the best way to make sure that we do not have that eventuality is to do the preparation.

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

May I take the Foreign Secretary back to our last debate on Brexit? He gave me an answer that was not exactly convincing, so I thought I would give him another chance. [Interruption.] I am nothing but kindness—it is my new year’s resolution. Four days after the referendum, he said that

“we need to negotiate a deal and put it to the British people, either in a referendum or through the Conservative manifesto at a fresh general election…we will trust the British people to decide on whether or not it is a good deal”.

So can I ask him again why he no longer believes in trusting the British people to decide whether they want the Prime Minister’s deal?

[Mr Hunt]

I do. We have had a general election and over 80% of voters supported parties that wanted to leave the EU and end free movement. I will happily take criticisms of our Brexit policy on the chin the moment Labour actually has the courage to have its own Brexit policy in the first place. This morning, the shadow Business Secretary, on the “Today” programme, could not even say whether Labour supported a second referendum or not. That is not policy—it is politics. I simply say to the right hon. Lady that to play politics with Brexit in a hung Parliament is a total betrayal of ordinary voters.

[Emily Thornberry]

Well, that is not a very convincing answer, is it? It is the same sort of unconvincing answer that we got last time. We always know when Government Ministers are getting a bit desperate when they decide that they need to ask the Opposition what their policy is instead.

The Foreign Secretary said in the very first paragraph of the article that I am quoting that

“we did not vote on the terms of our departure.”

So his entire argument was that we should trust the people to decide the terms on which we would leave. But let me also remind him that in the same article he warned of the danger that

“we could be thrown out with no deal at all.”

So even if he no longer believes that the public should have a say on the final terms of a deal, does he still at least believe that they should have a say if we are risking leaving with no deal at all?

[Mr Hunt]

If the right hon. Lady is worried about no deal, there is a very easy way to stop it, and that is to talk to the Prime Minister. The Leader of the Opposition talks without preconditions to Hamas, Hezbollah and the IRA, but not to the British Prime Minister. The reason is that Labour’s objective is not to have a deal but to have a crisis—and what a betrayal of ordinary families that is.

[Ronnie Cowan (Inverclyde) (SNP)]

4. What recent assessment he has made of the political situation in Catalonia.

[The Minister for Europe and the Americas (Sir Alan Duncan)]

As I have made clear to the House previously, the situation in Catalonia is a matter for Spain. The UK strongly supports the rule of law and is of the view that questions related to the issue of Catalan independence should be resolved within the proper constitutional and legal channels of Spain.

[Ronnie Cowan]

Carme Forcadell was the presiding officer in the Catalan Parliament—a position we would call “the Speaker”. Carme has been in prison without trial for over nine months because she facilitated a debate in a debating chamber. When she is tried, she faces over 16 years in prison. When will the UK Government condemn this outrage and stand up for the process of democracy?

[Sir Alan Duncan]

This is a matter for the Spanish courts. Every democracy has its own rules, laws and procedures. We fully support the proper implementation of the rule of law in Spain, and it is not for us to interfere in the way that the hon. Gentleman suggests.

[Mr Gregory Campbell (East Londonderry) (DUP)]

In any discussions that the Government might have with the Spanish Government, and indeed Governments across the EU, would the Minister be assured that each of those Governments are respectful of the national economic and political integrity of sovereign states across Europe?

[Sir Alan Duncan]

I share the hon. Gentleman’s view and am very grateful to him for expressing it so clearly, so cogently and so sensibly.

[Mr Speaker]

I just very gently say to the hon. Member for Inverclyde (Ronnie Cowan): do not give the Government any ideas.

[Mr Adrian Bailey (West Bromwich West) (Lab/Co-op)]

5. What diplomatic steps the Government are taking to help ensure the safety of the Hazara community in Afghanistan.

[Jessica Morden (Newport East) (Lab)]

18. What recent assessment he has made of the political and security situation in Afghanistan.

[The Minister for Asia and the Pacific (Mark Field)]

The UK remains committed to ensuring that the Afghan national defence and security forces improve their capability to protect all ethnic and religious groups in Afghanistan. British embassy officials regularly meet Hazara representatives to hear their specific concerns at first hand. As the hon. Gentleman will be aware, there have been positive recent developments in Afghanistan’s political and security situation, but the ongoing conflict means that significant challenges remain.

[Mr Bailey]

I thank the Minister for his reply. The Hazara community in Afghanistan is increasingly being targeted by not only the Taliban in Afghanistan, but Daesh infiltrating from Pakistan. What steps are the Government taking to talk to the Governments of both Pakistan and Afghanistan about stopping at source the violent approach from ISIS and other military groups?

[Mark Field]

I very much accept what the hon. Gentleman says. We work closely with our counterparts in both Afghanistan and Pakistan. Peace efforts must focus on supporting attempts to start a credible process. To that end, we will work closely with partners—in particular, US Special Representative Khalilzad—to ensure that international forces that are a factor in the conflict properly address the issue.

[Jessica Morden]

In view of the ongoing security situation, will Ministers do more with Defence and Home Office Ministers to ensure that Afghan interpreters who came here alone under the redundancy scheme can be reunited here with their wives and families, as they clearly face great danger in Afghanistan?

[Mark Field]

I thank the hon. Lady for her question. She is right; local staff, including interpreters, continue to play a vital role in supporting the objectives of the UK and our partners in Afghanistan. As well as paying generous redundancy packages in recognition of service, we will do our level best for those who have made such sacrifices on our behalf, and I will write to my counterparts in the Home Office and the Ministry of Defence to ensure that we do so.

[Tom Tugendhat (Tonbridge and Malling) (Con)]

I pay tribute to the work of the Foreign Office in Pakistan and particularly our high commissioner, Tom Drew. Will the Foreign Secretary lend all his support to the work that Tom is doing alongside Khalilzad on peace negotiations in Afghanistan, particularly to protect the Hazara population but also to stop foreign actors playing silly and dangerous games in Afghanistan, which we have seen for far too long?

[Mark Field]

I thank my hon. Friend for his wise words. He knows this issue well. We are lucky to have such a high-calibre high commissioner in Pakistan in Tom Drew, who is coming to the end of his time there, and in Sir Nicholas Kay and Giles Lever, the chargé d’affaires in Kabul. We have the highest calibre of trusted diplomats, who make a tremendous contribution not only to UK interests but to the interests of civilians in both countries.

[Dan Jarvis (Barnsley Central) (Lab)]

What discussions has the Minister had with his American counterpart about US plans to reduce by half the number of troops in Afghanistan? Does he share my concern that that announcement might encourage the Taliban to play for time, rather than engage in meaningful peace talks with the Afghan Government?

[Mark Field]

That is always an issue. After the White House statement on 28 December that the President had not decided to draw down the US military presence in Afghanistan, we want to try to nail this issue down. Our collective long-term commitment to the objective remains unchanged. We have a long-term intention that NATO and its partners should not reduce their military presence unless conditions on the ground change.

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

6. What recent discussions he has had with his US counterpart on lifting US trade restrictions on Cuba.

[The Minister for Europe and the Americas (Sir Alan Duncan)]

As we have said on many occasions, we consider the US embargo to be counterproductive, and we oppose any possible tightening of it in the future. US sanctions and other unilateral Administrative and judicial measures do the opposite of encouraging potential reforms and economic progress, and officials in London and the British embassy in Havana regularly raise our objections to trade restrictions on Cuba with our US counterparts.

[David T. C. Davies]

Free markets and free trade always encourage political freedoms, and therefore I urge the Minister to continue doing everything possible to remind the United States of its commitment to free trade around the world and the importance of that in encouraging freedom and democracy.

[Sir Alan Duncan]

I totally agree with my hon. Friend. We consistently vote in support of UN resolutions to end the US-imposed embargo, but we do more than that because, under the UK Protection of Trading Interests Act 1980, it is illegal for UK companies to comply with extraterritorial legislation such as the US embargo. We continue to work together with our EU partners to provide UK companies with the support they need to be able to trade with Cuba.

[Jeff Smith (Manchester, Withington) (Lab)]

7. What recent diplomatic steps he has taken to secure a resolution to the conflict in Syria.

[The Minister for the Middle East (Alistair Burt)]

The Government support and keep in close contact with the UN-led political process to end the Syrian conflict. We have used our relationships and convening power to encourage progress, including by hosting the then UN special envoy Staffan de Mistura and the Syria small group of like-minded countries. We are also engaging with the new UN envoy, Geir Pedersen, who has our full support.

[Jeff Smith]

Given the sensitivity at the Syria-Turkey border, what specific steps can we take to keep the US engaged in diplomatic solutions, if it is going to withdraw troops, and, crucially, to keep Turkey engaged in finding a diplomatic solution that does not involve attacking the Kurdish forces?

[Alistair Burt]

I think both states are extremely conscious of the impact of any of their decisions on Syria. We have engaged regularly with the United States as it works through its process of withdrawal to make sure it is manageable and to make sure that everyone remains focused on the importance of continuing the global coalition against Daesh. That contact is constant with Turkey and with the United States.

[Theresa Villiers (Chipping Barnet) (Con)]

Will my right hon. Friend condemn the role in Syria of Iran, a regime that is terrorising its people at home and many across the region, including in Syria?

[Alistair Burt]

The actions of Iran in supporting the Assad regime and the way in which it has conducted a civil war against its own people have caused deep concern. Iran can improve its position only if it does not support such a regime and if it encourages a full part in the political process to see a reformed Syria.

[Brendan O'Hara (Argyll and Bute) (SNP)]

19. A stable Lebanon is vital to securing a resolution to the conflict in Syria. I have just returned from Lebanon with Aid to the Church in Need, and we saw there that Lebanon is a country barely able to cope with the pressure it is under, having been without a Government for the past eight months. What has been done to ensure, while a Government are being found, that Lebanon remains stable and secure?

[Alistair Burt]

I met the Prime Minister of Lebanon, as did my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary, on his visit to the United Kingdom.[Official Report, 23 January 2019, Vol. 653, c. 4MC.] We work very closely with all parties in Lebanon to encourage the process of Government formation. We are acutely conscious of the pressure of 1.3 million refugees in Lebanon. We would encourage the return of refugees from Lebanon to Syria, but only when it is safe to do so. Support for Lebanon and its economy is a fundamental part of the United Kingdom’s engagement in the region.

[Priti Patel (Witham) (Con)]

The Minister will be aware that countries across the Arab Gulf are now reopening their embassies in Damascus. What work is the Minister doing with some of our Arab allies and partners to do more to get back to rebuilding and to getting peace and consensus across Syria?

[Alistair Burt]

There seems to be a mixed view among Arab states about normalising relations with Syria, and that is certainly not the view of all states. Arab states are understandably worried about the influence of others in Syria, but there is a recognition—certainly by the United Kingdom, the EU and others—that there can be no normalisation of relationships and no return to embassies unless there is clear evidence that the regime in Syria has learned from the terrible costs it has inflicted on the Syrian people and there is a political settlement to demonstrate that.

[Fabian Hamilton (Leeds North East) (Lab)]

Given the huge shifts in policy on Syria emerging from the United States Administration, will the Minister provide some clarity on three related issues: when US troops will be withdrawn, what the preconditions are for that to happen and how America’s Kurdish allies will be protected after that withdrawal?

[Mr Speaker]

Cheeky—three questions, but there is not time for three answers.

[Alistair Burt]

With respect, Mr Speaker, they were good questions all. It is clear that the United States has made a serious appraisal of the impact of its troop withdrawal so as not to affect the global coalition against Daesh, and it is in close contact with its neighbours. We do not know the precise details. It is important that this does not disturb the work against Daesh, but the United States has also made it clear, as have others, that the Kurdish community must not be affected by any untoward incursion by Turkey or any others. It is important that the stability of north-east Syria is not affected by American decisions.

[Nigel Mills (Amber Valley) (Con)]

8. What recent discussions the Government have had with authorities in the (a) overseas territories and (b) Crown dependencies on establishing public registers of the beneficial ownership of companies.

[The Minister for Europe and the Americas (Sir Alan Duncan)]

My noble Friend Lord Ahmad, the Minister responsible for the overseas territories, along with the Prime Minister’s anti-corruption champion, my hon. Friend the Member for Weston-super-Mare (John Penrose), discussed the Government’s approach to the Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Act 2018 with overseas territories leaders on 5 December. Government Ministers and officials routinely discuss with the Crown dependencies a range of matters relevant to them, including company registers of beneficial ownership.

[Nigel Mills]

Can my right hon. Friend confirm what date the Government will set in the Order in Council if the overseas territories do not move voluntarily on this issue, and will he confirm that the end of 2023 will be far too late, given that it would be five years after the House voted on it?

[Sir Alan Duncan]

As required by the 2018 Act, we will prepare draft legislation by the end of 2020. All the overseas territories are expected to have fully functioning public registers in place by the end of 2023, as my hon. Friend says, as part of the Government’s call for all countries to make such registers the global norm by that date. The plan is to make 2023 consistent for both.

[Sir Vince Cable (Twickenham) (LD)]

From the vantage point of having introduced the original public register, may I ask the Minister whether he agrees that it is utterly intolerable that British territories and dependencies should be used as a covert conduit for British tax dodgers, and that if they will not reform we should resort to the sanction of direct rule?

[Sir Alan Duncan]

We will stick by the timing, but I think that a lot of work has already been done so that they could perhaps be in place before that date. I am confident that progress is being made as we would wish.

[Helen Goodman (Bishop Auckland) (Lab)]

Over and over again the Government have let the overseas territories off the hook. Now the Government are saying that the territories do not need to have public registers of beneficial ownership until 2023—at a cost, incidentally, of £50 billion to the British taxpayer. The law we passed last May required the Government to act in 2020. Does that not take the Government’s contempt for Parliament to a new low?

[Sir Alan Duncan]

No. I share the hon. Lady’s view that overseas territories with financial centres should meet international standards on tax transparency and anti-money laundering, but most overseas territories are either being evaluated or due to be evaluated by the financial action taskforce and are working to deliver their commitments made to the European Commission to prevent them from being included on the EU’s list of non-co-operative tax jurisdictions.

[Nigel Huddleston (Mid Worcestershire) (Con)]

9. What recent assessment he has made of the effect of renewed rocket fire from Gaza into Israel on the political and security situation in that region.

[Julie Elliott (Sunderland Central) (Lab)]

16. What recent steps he has taken to help secure a lasting peace between Israel and Palestine.

[The Minister for the Middle East (Alistair Burt)]

Rocket fire and attacks on Israel from Gaza remain unacceptable and damaging to any prospect of eventual peace. We continue to urge Israel and the Palestinian Authority to resume direct negotiations towards a two-state solution, and we remain in regular contact with many parties on this important issue.

[Nigel Huddleston]

Last year more than 800 rockets and mortars were fired from Gaza into communities in Israel. Does the Minister agree that we must not forget that Gaza is run by Hamas, who are not our friends but an internationally proscribed terrorist organisation? Will he update the House on what help we are providing to Israel in its fight against terrorism?

[Alistair Burt]

We never forget that Gaza is under the control of Hamas, and that other military groups operate there. As long as there are terrorist attacks on Israel from Gaza, the situation will remain impossible to resolve. We will continue to support very strongly the right of Israel to defend itself.

[Julie Elliott]

What is the Government’s assessment of the report by the UN Office for the Co-ordination of Humanitarian Affairs about the rise in Israeli attempts to delegitimise human rights organisations operating in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, particularly humanitarian non-governmental organisations, and the negative impact that that has on their ability to represent Palestinian rights and organisations?

[Alistair Burt]

Israel, as a democracy in the middle east, has always prided itself on ensuring that those groups have the freedom to operate there, even if they challenge the Israeli Government. It is very important to the United Kingdom that that tradition is maintained, particularly at a time of crisis. The west bank needs those who are able to interpret the situation and speak honestly, both to the Palestinian Authority and to the state of Israel, and the more political space there is to do that, the better it will be all round for the prospects of peace.

[Andrea Jenkyns (Morley and Outwood) (Con)]

What assessment has the Minister made of the effect of the tunnel construction into Israel by Hamas?

[Alistair Burt]

The recent discovery of tunnels from Lebanon into Israel has caused much concern. It is important that they are dealt with on both sides of the border. There is no reason for that work to continue, either by Hamas in the south in Gaza or by Hezbollah in the north in Lebanon.

[Joan Ryan (Enfield North) (Lab)]

Does the Minister agree that Malaysia’s decision to ban Israeli athletes from participating in Malaysian sporting events is shameful and that such attempts to single out the world’s only Jewish state come from a place of deep prejudice does nothing to advance the cause of peace?

[Alistair Burt]

The United Kingdom does not agree with this decision of the Malaysian Government. It does nothing to assist the worldwide recognition of Paralympians. I know that my right hon. Friend the Minister for Asia and the Pacific will take that up directly.

[Bob Blackman (Harrow East) (Con)]

Further to the question of my hon. Friend the Member for Morley and Outwood (Andrea Jenkyns) on materials that are sent to Gaza for building homes, but are being diverted to build terror tunnels, what action is my right hon. Friend taking to ensure that our aid is used to build homes for people in Gaza rather than terror tunnels?

[Alistair Burt]

The principal control of materials flowing into Gaza is of course exercised by the Israelis, with their concerns about dual-use material. We are in regular contact with the United Nations Relief and Works Agency to make every attempt to ensure that such materials are not diverted. Ultimately, there is no future for Hamas and for Gaza unless they stop the terror tactics and the diversion of materials, and respond to the Quartet principles and make peace.

[Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith) (Lab)]

In the past year, 186 Palestinian civilians have been killed on the Gaza border and no Israelis. More than 23,000 Palestinian civilians and 16 Israelis have been injured. Should not the focus be on ending the blockade of Gaza and, indeed, the occupation that has gone on since 1987?

[Alistair Burt]

Virtually every statistic from the area cries out for the need to resolve this issue. We have spoken about it in this House for decades. There are arguments and counter-arguments, but in the main, the misery continues, either for those who feel under attack from terrorist sources or for those who feel the humanitarian impact of political decisions made elsewhere. That is why the United Kingdom is so wedded to—and determined to see—a middle east peace process for all.

[Liz Twist (Blaydon) (Lab)]

10. What recent diplomatic steps he has taken to help secure a resolution to the conflict in Yemen.

[Ruth George (High Peak) (Lab)]

24. What recent diplomatic steps he has taken to help secure a resolution to the conflict in Yemen.

[The Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mr Jeremy Hunt)]

Last Wednesday, the UN Security Council passed resolution 2452, which establishes a six-month, 75-strong UN mission to monitor the ceasefire in Hodeidah. We obviously wish it every success.

[Liz Twist]

One of the fears about the Swedish agreement and the accompanying UN resolution was that they were too limited in scope and too loose in enforcing compliance. Does the Secretary of State accept that those fears are being realised? Is it not time to consider a broader and more robust UN resolution?

[Mr Hunt]

I understand the hon. Lady’s concerns. I simply say that we wanted to establish a ceasefire—this is the first time that has happened in four years of conflict—and then move on to the next stage, which is a second set of peace talks where we can agree a political settlement. There have been some worrying signs—there have been attacks on both sides—but I was in touch with Martin Griffiths, the UN special envoy yesterday, and broadly the ceasefire is holding. The key thing is to open the road from Sana’a to Hodeidah so that World Food Programme food can be released to the population.

[Ruth George]

In the coming weeks, both Houses of Congress are due to vote on whether the US should continue its support for the Saudi coalition in Yemen. Both are expected to vote that it should not. Will the Government give this House the same opportunity to vote on whether the UK should maintain our support for the war if it continues?

[Mr Hunt]

This House has shown recently its high ability to have votes on anything and everything it wishes to, so I am sure that there are plenty of opportunities to have votes on that. However, to answer directly in response to the point that the hon. Lady is making, breaking off support for the Saudi-Emirati coalition would reduce our influence with those two countries. At the moment, the ceasefire is broadly holding because those two countries are playing ball, and we would not want to change that.

[Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)]

I thank the Foreign Secretary for what he said before Christmas about my constituent Jackie Morgan’s daughter, Safia, who was kidnapped from Cardiff and taken to Yemen in the ’80s. I am glad to report to the House that she, her family and her husband, who are now in Cairo, have been granted the visas to travel to the UK, I hope tomorrow. Will the Foreign Secretary pass on my thanks to the Minister for the Middle East for the efforts that he has made to help in this case?

[Mr Hunt]

I am happy to do that. I thank my right hon. Friend the Minister and all the Foreign Office staff involved in that work.

[Marsha De Cordova (Battersea) (Lab)]

11. What steps he is taking to help ensure the long-term sustainability of UN aid to Palestinian refugees.

[The Minister for the Middle East (Alistair Burt)]

The UN Relief and Works Agency, UNRWA, is a necessary humanitarian and stabilising presence in the region, providing vital services to millions of Palestinian refugees every day. We have increased our funding to UNRWA, providing £65.5 million in 2018.

[Marsha De Cordova]

On 9 January, the Minister said:

“Work is going on to ensure that, in the long term, UNRWA is sustainable.”—[Official Report, 9 January 2019; Vol. 652, c. 349.]

However, UNRWA is already closing health centres, and doubling and trebling shifts at schools to cut costs. If it closes down, what will happen to the 526,000 children in UNRWA schools and the 3.1 million patients of UNRWA health services? Can the Minister set out exactly what is going on?

[Alistair Burt]

We sought to increase our funding, as I mentioned to the hon. Lady, but we also talk to other donors. It is impossible for the United Kingdom to fill the gap created, but the point she makes is extremely pertinent: if the education of those in Gaza and children of Palestinian refugees stops, I wonder what organisation in the region would like to take over the education of impressionable youngsters.

[Stephen Crabb (Preseli Pembrokeshire) (Con)]

Ongoing humanitarian support for Palestinians is vital but, given the track record of Hamas in seeking to abuse and exploit UNRWA, what assurances will the Minister give about protecting the independence and integrity of UNRWA and ensuring that taxpayers’ money is used to good effect?

[Alistair Burt]

I hear my right hon. Friend, but it is really important for the House to be clear that UNRWA is an independent organisation run by the UN. Of course practical pressures are caused in Gaza, because Gaza is run by Hamas, but it is wrong to suggest that UNRWA is in hock to anyone else but those who contribute as donors. It does vital work—health, education and services—and it is essential that that continues, because if UNRWA does not do it—I ask the House—who would step in to provide support, where would the finances come from and what would be done with them?

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

Does the Minister agree that the announcement by the Israeli authorities that they plan to close UNRWA schools in East Jerusalem is a direct attack on the welfare of Palestinian refugees in two refugee camps there, including 3,000 students? I welcome the Minister’s increased funding for UNRWA, but will he commit to support the renewal of UNRWA’s mandate later this year?

[Alistair Burt]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his question; he knows the area very well. Of course we will continue to support UNRWA, and look hard at the mandate renewal. It is important that it continues its work there because, as I have said, there is concern about what the impact will be if that work is not done. As I said earlier, all this tells us that such disputes and concerns will not change unless there is overall agreement on a settlement between Israel and the Palestinians. Unless that is done, these problems will continue to occur, much to the misery of all involved.

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

12. What steps he is taking to co-ordinate the use of soft power in British foreign policy.

[The Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mr Jeremy Hunt)]

According to the Portland Soft Power 30 index, the UK is the world’s leading international soft power country. Post Brexit, this will be a vital asset for us to continue to exploit.

[Sir Nicholas Soames]

I thank my right hon. Friend for that important answer, but does he agree that, like so many things that we do well in this country, we tend to take that for granted? Will he therefore assure this House that he will pay greater attention to the co-ordination of soft power across all Departments?

[Mr Hunt]

I thank my right hon. Friend for making that very important point. I can reassure him that I have presented to Cabinet on the subject of soft power and written to every head of mission across the world to underline its importance and to ask what they are doing about it. I am also in charge of a cross-Government taskforce aimed at making sure we do everything we can in this area.

[Alex Norris (Nottingham North) (Lab/Co-op)]

Soft power can be very effective in places where we have a traditional connection, such as Cameroon. Constituents have recently visited me concerned about the ongoing human rights crisis there. Will a Minister meet me and my campaigners to see what more we can do?

[Mr Hunt]

The Minister for Africa is not here, but I am delighted to say in her absence that she would be delighted to meet the hon. Gentleman.

[Derek Thomas (St Ives) (Con)]

20. Soft power in the form of trade can lift billions of people out of poverty. Does the Foreign Secretary agree that the opportunity of new trade deals with the Commonwealth, which would give those countries an opportunity to prosper, is one that we should pursue?

[Mr Hunt]

I absolutely agree. Just as vital is the UK’s support for the international trading system and our belief in free trade, which we continue to champion.

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

African visitor visas are refused at over twice the average rate, and this has a negative impact on all aspects of soft power, including trade, business, culture, education and academia. This afternoon, the all-party parliamentary group on Africa, which I chair, is holding an open meeting on African visa refusals. Can I tell the meeting that the Foreign Secretary is speaking to his Home Office colleagues about the negative impact that this broken system is having?

[Mr Hunt]

I understand the hon. Lady’s concerns. If she writes to me following this afternoon’s meeting, I will happily pass them on to the Home Secretary.

[David Hanson (Delyn) (Lab)]

13. What recent assessment he has made on the progress of international co-operation on climate change.

[The Minister for Asia and the Pacific (Mark Field)]

Lucky 13 for the right hon. Gentleman! The agreement of the rulebook for the Paris agreement at the 24th conference of the parties in Katowice in Poland last month, which I attended, was a crucial step forward, but all our assessments conclude that the current level of global ambition is not enough to meet the Paris goals of just over three years ago. We need unprecedented and rapid action to reduce emissions and build resilience.

[David Hanson]

I concur with the Minister. For all those reasons, will he ensure that, if the President of the United States visits this country in July, climate change will be central so that we can put it on the agenda of America, which is the power best able to influence world opinion on this issue?

[Mark Field]

I very much hope so. I was at the climate change summit in San Francisco in September, and interestingly it is not just the state of California but other US states that take this very seriously. There is, then, a lot of pressure from within the US, but obviously we will keep up that pressure in every way we can, both bilaterally and in multilateral forums.

[Jo Swinson (East Dunbartonshire) (LD)]

rose—

[Mr Speaker]

We are over time, but we cannot proceed without hearing from the hon. Lady.

[Jo Swinson]

Thank you, Mr Speaker. Does the Minister agree that climate change is a strategic threat to our prosperity and security? If so, why is it no longer mentioned in the 28 objectives in his departmental plan?

[Mark Field]

It is very much an important part of my own plan. As the hon. Lady will appreciate, I attended last year’s meeting of the Pacific Islands Forum in Nauru and will attend the next one in Tuvalu—these issues are existential for many of those Pacific islands. I am sorry she feels that we are not giving this enough attention. I am proud of the work the Foreign and Commonwealth Office is doing with the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, which lead on this issue; we work very closely together in a range of different forums and will continue to do so.

[Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (SNP)]

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

[The Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mr Jeremy Hunt)]

My colleague the Minister for Africa is not with us today, as she is meeting partners from the African Union. At that meeting, she will be underlining our concern about the issues in Zimbabwe, where we have seen widespread unrest and a heavy security force response over the last week. Yesterday, I called on President Mnangagwa not to turn back the clock. People must have the right to peaceful protest without fear of violence.

[Alan Brown]

Gaza has been described as the biggest open-air prison in the world. Israel continues to plan settlement expansion and demolitions with impunity, and clearly US foreign policy is making things worse. When will the UK set a realistic timeframe to step up and recognise the state of Palestine?

[Mr Hunt]

We have always said that we will recognise the state of Palestine when the time is right—we support a two-state solution—but we want to do it at the moment it will have the most impact on the peace process.

[Tom Pursglove (Corby) (Con)]

T2. Further to the question from the right hon. Member for Enfield North (Joan Ryan), at a time when relations are improving greatly between Israel and many countries around the world, particularly its Gulf neighbours, will my right hon. Friend stress that not allowing Israeli swimmers to participate in the Paralympic qualifiers would be a retrograde step?

[The Minister for Asia and the Pacific (Mark Field)]

We also have strong relations with the Malaysian Government, and I am very disappointed that they have made what I feel is a fundamentally wrong decision. As my hon. Friend has rightly pointed out, those Israeli Paralympic athletes should not be banned from competing. I shall be seeing the Malaysian Education Minister this afternoon—with, I think, a senior representative of the high commission—and I promise to ask for an assurance that this will be dealt with properly, as a matter of urgency.

[Keith Vaz (Leicester East) (Lab)]

T4. I thank the Foreign Secretary for travelling to Stockholm for the peace talks, and for resolution 2452. Yesterday, however, five aid workers were killed in Yemen as they tried to de-mine parts of the country. Will the Foreign Secretary ensure that the safety of aid workers is a priority during the talks? [R]

[Mr Hunt]

Absolutely. In fact, I had an exchange with Martin Griffiths, the Yemen special envoy, yesterday. De-mining the road between the port of Hodeidah and Sana’a so that food supplies can come from the port into the rest of the country is essential, and I think that the whole House will wish to express our admiration for the bravery of the aid workers who are in Yemen right now.

[Damien Moore (Southport) (Con)]

T3. Recently, six underground tunnels built by the Iran-funded Hezbollah terror group were discovered leading into Israel from Lebanon. The deepest tunnel had electricity and a rail system. Does my right hon. Friend share my fear that Hezbollah was building those highly advanced tunnels in order to launch a large-scale invasion of northern Israel, on the watch of the United Nations and the peace- keeping United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon? [R]

[The Minister for the Middle East (Alistair Burt)]

My hon. Friend is right. The discovery of those tunnels has highlighted concerns about a re-armed Hezbollah in Lebanon, and it is essential for them to be dealt with by both UNIFIL and the Lebanese armed forces. They constitute a clear breach of UN Security Council regulation 1701.

[Sarah Jones (Croydon Central) (Lab)]

T7. My constituent Mr Niranjan Rasalingam is currently shackled in a prison in Myanmar, serving a 13-year sentence after being forced to sign a confession in Burmese, a language that he does not understand. Regardless of his guilt or innocence, he is a British citizen being mistreated. I have raised his case in this place before, but I understand that the Foreign Secretary did not make representations on his behalf during a recent trip to the country. May I ask him again please to give more support, and to advocate on behalf of my constituent?

[Mark Field]

I shall be happy to deal with this matter in my role as Minister of State. I hope to go to Burma, or Myanmar, within the next few months, but I will obviously try to deal with it from London at an earlier stage.

[Mr Philip Dunne (Ludlow) (Con)]

T5. What assessment did my right hon. Friend make of the future economic, trade and diplomatic relations with Singapore and Malaysia?

[Mr Hunt]

I had a very good trip in the new year. We have excellent relations with both countries. What I find impressive is the fact that their prosperity has come about through openness to trade. In that regard, our post-Brexit foreign policy, embracing free trade, will be central.

[Helen Jones (Warrington North) (Lab)]

T9. Of the almost 7,000 Yazidi women enslaved by ISIS, there are still very few who have received treatment for their physical and psychological injuries, and many have been unable to return to their homes. What more can the Government do to support those women, and to urge the Iraqi Government and the Administration in Kurdistan to work together to bring about their resettlement?

[Alistair Burt]

That is another good question. When I was last in Iraq I met agencies involved with Yazidi women, and I hope to go there again in the not too distant future to make the same representations. The difficulty of going back to such areas is related to the overall security situation in Iraq. It is essential for the Iraqi authorities to be able to protect everyone, and that work is ongoing in very difficult circumstances.

[Bim Afolami (Hitchin and Harpenden) (Con)]

T10. Will the Foreign Secretary update the House on his assessment of our relationship with China, particularly in respect of financial services in the City of London?

[Mark Field]

The City of London’s connections with China form an essential part of our overall bilateral relationship, and we look forward to proceeding with an ambitious commercial agenda during 2019. As my hon. Friend will know, the City is already the world’s leading offshore trading centre for the renminbi. It engages in more than 40% of global trading, even more than Hong Kong.

[Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)]

Yanto Awerkion, Sem Asso and Edo Dogopia were among six members of the West Papua National Committee who were arrested in December, when the police and the military took over the group’s secretariat in Timika. The three men were detained on 5 January and later charged with treason, which carries a maximum sentence of life imprisonment in Indonesia. Amnesty International has called for the unconditional release of the activists, because they have only expressed their political views. Will the Minister press his counterpart in Indonesia to release them?

[Mr Speaker]

Order. May I very gently advise Members that, in future, if they have a substantive question that is not reached, they must ask a truncated version of it during topical questions? That is the way it is.

[Mark Field]

Sadly, Mr Speaker, the hon. Gentleman has asked a rather different question, so I cannot just refer to the briefing I have here. May I, however, reassure the hon. Gentleman that the officials at our embassy in Jakarta, including the ambassador, visit Papua and West Papua regularly? We will do our very best in future visits to bring up the specific cases to which the hon. Gentleman refers.

[Peter Aldous (Waveney) (Con)]

With India entering the Open Doors world watch list top 10 and now designated as a country where Christians experience extreme prosecution, what steps is the Foreign Secretary taking to promote the importance of religious freedom in India?

[Mr Hunt]

As my hon. Friend knows, I have just asked Bishop Philip Mounstephen, Bishop of Truro, to do an independent report on what more we can do to support the quarter of a billion Christians across the world facing persecution, but in India the British high commission regularly meets minority communities, including Christian groups, and we have recently enabled training for 900 minority students on faith issues in six universities.

[Ann Clwyd (Cynon Valley) (Lab)]

May I ask about human rights defenders in Bahrain, as we have close links with Bahrain? There is not time to name them now, but they are prominent people and I would like to give their names to the Minister afterwards, and they include Nabeel Rajab and political opposition leaders such as Sheikh Ali Salman, imprisoned for exercising their fundamental rights. What are we doing to get them out of jail?

[Alistair Burt]

As the right hon. Lady knows, all the prominent cases of human rights activists are carefully monitored by the UK representatives in Bahrain. There are independent processes in order to oversee the activities of the courts in Manama, and we urge that there is a consultation and dealings with them. We keep a constant eye on this; it is a matter for progress in Bahrain, and the United Kingdom is very involved in seeing greater progress there.

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

Will Ministers use the United Nations as a forum where the United States can expose the Russian violation of the intermediate-range nuclear forces treaty so that if America does withdraw, responsibility will lie where it should?

[Mr Hunt]

We are absolutely sure that Russia has been violating the terms of the INF treaty and that the way forward in this is to get back to compliance because it is vital for Europe’s security, but that starts with Russia recognising what it has done wrong.

[Thangam Debbonaire (Bristol West) (Lab)]

What representations are the Government making to the Government of Nepal in relation to the recent case of the death of a woman and her two children who were suffocated while being confined in a poorly ventilated so-called period hut?

[Mark Field]

I thank the hon. Lady for her question. I must confess that I do not have direct knowledge of this case, but I will get in touch with Kathmandu to make sure we make representations on her behalf.

[Stephen Kerr (Stirling) (Con)]

When can we expect the report the Foreign Secretary has commissioned on UK support for persecuted Christians to be published, and will he make a statement at that time?

[Mr Hunt]

Subject to other parliamentary business I will welcome the opportunity to do that, because it is a very important issue. The timetable we are provisionally working to is that the interim report will be published before Easter, which will outline the issues faced by Christians all over the world, with the final report later in the year.

[John Cryer (Leyton and Wanstead) (Lab)]

We were told earlier that the Foreign Secretary has raised the brutal treatment of Muslims in China. I am interested to know what possible excuse his Chinese counterpart came up with for their medieval behaviour.

[Mr Speaker]

Let’s hear it.

[Mr Hunt]

It is fair to say that the responses we got in no way assuaged our concerns about what is happening. We do raise these issues: we raise them in private but we raise them persistently, and it is very important for the Chinese to know about the concern in this House and indeed across the country.

[Mark Menzies (Fylde) (Con)]

Following a further week of violence in Venezuela and a refugee crisis that is overwhelming its neighbours, what conversations have the Government had with the United States and Lima group countries to resolve this crisis?

[The Minister for Europe and the Americas (Sir Alan Duncan)]

We are working very closely with the Lima group. I made a very firm statement in the last few days and indeed only yesterday 25 members of the National Guard revolted against President Maduro’s leadership. We are taking a very robust stand on this and we recognise the legitimacy of the constituent Assembly, as indeed should all countries.

[John Woodcock (Barrow and Furness) (Ind)]

The Minister for the Middle East knows that we normally agree, but what on earth did he mean when he implied that we might normalise relations with the murderous tyrant Assad if he learned his lesson?

[Alistair Burt]

We do agree; there is no normalisation of the relationship with Syria. The point I was seeking to make was that before there can be any recognition of Syria, there has to be an understanding of what has happened there. We are looking for the regime, in its political settlement, to understand that it cannot continue to rule as it did in the past. There are no plans whatsoever for the United Kingdom to normalise any relationship with Syria. Looking at the numbers of deaths, of people killed and of murders committed by the regime, it is very difficult to see what arm of justice could possibly result in normalisation.

[Mark Pritchard (The Wrekin) (Con)]

On the Bishop of Truro’s review of the Foreign Secretary’s review of persecution of the Christian Church, will the Foreign Secretary tell me what human and financial resources the bishop and his team will get to ensure that the report is done thoroughly?

[Mr Hunt]

Before I address that question, I need to correct the record. When the Minister for Europe and the Americas, my right hon. Friend the Member for Rutland and Melton (Sir Alan Duncan), talked about the constitutional assembly, he actually meant the National Assembly in Venezuela. We will extend all the necessary resources to the Bishop of Truro and his team. We have had good discussions about the resources that they need. This is an important review, and we want to ensure that it is done properly.

[Kate Hoey (Vauxhall) (Lab)]

I thank the Secretary of State for his remarks on Zimbabwe. Has he—or the Minister for Africa—spoken directly to the South African Government? If not, he should do.

[Mr Hunt]

I agree with the hon. Lady, who is very wise on these matters. The answer, truthfully, is that I have tried to speak to the South African Foreign Minister and so far I have not been able to find a time that suits.

[Bob Blackman (Harrow East) (Con)]

There is widespread concern among the Muslim, Hindu, Tamil and Christian communities in Sri Lanka about the appointment of alleged war criminals to very senior positions. What representations has my right hon. Friend made to the Sri Lankan Government to prevent this from happening?

[Mark Field]

We welcome the progress that has been made towards a peaceful resolution of the destabilising situation in Sri Lanka that took place from late October onwards. Just last week, I welcomed the Speaker of the Sri Lankan Parliament to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and commended him for his central role in bringing that about. Clearly the situation in Sri Lanka is very fluid, and I would be happy to take specific representations from my hon. Friend about the particular concern that he has just raised.

[Jamie Stone (Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross) (LD)]

On Friday, the skirl of the bagpipes will be heard and haggis, neeps and tatties will be consumed in large quantities all over the world. Have the Government instructed their network of high commissions, embassies and consulates to facilitate the celebration of our Scottish national bard’s work and life all over the world?

[Mr Speaker]

Particularly in Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross.

[Mr Hunt]

If we have not, we should.

[James Cleverly (Braintree) (Con)]

I am pleased that the United Kingdom has regained its No. 1 spot in the Portland soft power top 30, particularly because we overtook France in order to do so. Although not every element of our soft power is under my right hon. Friend’s Department’s control, will he ensure that organisations such as the British Council and the BBC World Service are well funded and able to project our soft power globally as we leave the European Union?

[Mr Hunt]

My hon. Friend is right to mention those organisations; they do a very important job. I actually think that the role of the BBC in providing impartial news across the world is very underestimated; that is an area in which we could do much better.

[Chris Stephens (Glasgow South West) (SNP)]

Will Ministers tell us what representations they are making to the Turkish authorities in relation to hunger strikes by Kurdish politicians and activists, and what representations have been made to end the persecution of Kurdish people?

[Sir Alan Duncan]

We are in regular dialogue with the Turkish Government, as is the Minister for the Middle East, specifically in respect of Syria and the Kurds.

[Fiona Bruce (Congleton) (Con)]

Are Ministers aware of reports this week from China Aid that Christian persecution is escalating in China, and that it is now at its worst for 40 years? Thousands of churches have been desecrated and destroyed, and pastors have been imprisoned and are facing trial. Whole sections of society, including children under 18 and students, have been banned from going to church, and those who do attend church are now being filmed and fingerprinted. What can be done to raise this issue internationally?

[Mr Hunt]

I share my hon. Friend’s concern. I read a moving report about a pastor in Chengdu who has suffered greatly. We raised these concerns during the universal periodic review that we did with China in November 2018, and I regularly raise concerns about human rights issues with my Chinese counterpart. One of the reasons for doing the review is to ensure that I am properly informed on matters of religious freedom.

[Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)]

Given the Minister for the Middle East’s earlier expression of support for UNRWA and the concern about the alternative education that Palestinian children might receive if UNRWA pulls out, will the UK Government consider filling the vacuum resulting from the withdrawal of US leadership in this important service?

[Alistair Burt]

In reference to the question from the hon. Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross (Jamie Stone), I am appropriately wearing my tartan tie to celebrate this week.

As I indicated earlier, we support UNRWA’s work and work hard with the organisation in case reform is needed. In the long term, UNRWA’s future will be about the future of refugees and their final settlement status. In the meantime, we cannot completely plug the financial gap left by the United States, which is why we are working with others, but leadership is vital, as is trying to get it across to the world that UNRWA is doing important work, and the UK will remain a champion.

[Several hon. Members rose—]

[Mr Speaker]

Order. Demand always exceeds supply, but I thank the Foreign Secretary and his team, who have been addressing the House, the nation and, very importantly, the world—the planet!

Petition

Tuesday 22nd January 2019 Commons Chamber

[Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP)]

Tower Blocks: Dangerous Cladding

Tuesday 22nd January 2019 Commons Chamber

12:40

[John Healey (Wentworth and Dearne) (Lab)]

(Urgent Question): To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government if he will update the House on the action taken and planned by the Government with respect to high-rise residential blocks with dangerous cladding.

[The Minister for Housing (Kit Malthouse)]

There is nothing more important than ensuring that people are safe in their homes, and we remain determined to ensure that no community suffers again as the community did so tragically and appallingly at Grenfell Tower. Within days of that tragedy, a comprehensive building safety programme was put in place to ensure that residents of high-rise blocks of flats are safe and feel safe now and in the future. Our Department has worked with fire and rescue services, local authorities and landlords to identify high-rise buildings with unsafe cladding and to ensure that interim safety measures are in place until issues are permanently remediated. Measures have included waking watch, which has been put in place in all high-rise buildings with ACM cladding, with the oversight of the National Fire Chiefs Council. As of 31 December last year, interim measures have been in place on all 176 high-rise private residential buildings with unsafe ACM cladding.

Permanent remediation must rightly now be our key focus. On 18 December, we published our plan to implement the recommendations of Dame Judith Hackitt’s independent review of building regulations and fire safety, which will create a stronger regulatory framework and fix the issues for the long term. We have repeatedly called on private building owners not to pass costs on to leaseholders who find themselves in this position through no fault of their own. We have also warned private building owners that, unless they remove and replace unsafe ACM cladding from their high-rise residential buildings now, local authorities have the power to complete the works and recover the costs from the owner. As a result of our interventions, we have secured commitments from owners of 268 privately owned buildings, 212 of whom have either started works, completed them or have commitments in place to remediate. There remain 42 private residential buildings for which the owner’s plans are unclear, so we are maintaining pressure and rule out no solutions.

This is obviously a matter of great importance to many colleagues and, indeed, to many constituents, and that is reflected in the huge amount of activity that is taking place both within the Department, externally within the industry and, critically, in this House. There is an Adjournment debate tomorrow, and I will appear at oral questions and before the Housing, Communities and Local Government Committee on Monday.

[John Healey]

It should be a cause for national shame that, over 19 months after the Grenfell Tower fire, I am having to drag Ministers to the House because there are still buildings in this country cloaked in Grenfell-style cladding and residents who do not know whether their homes are safe, as the Daily Mirror has revealed today. It is shocking that the Government’s own figures show that there were 437 high-rise blocks with the same Grenfell-style cladding and that 370 are yet to have it removed and replaced. It is shocking that the Minister knows every one of those blocks but will not name the landlords or tell the residents. Whatever he says he is doing, it is not working. For over 19 months, any progress made has simply been too slow, too weak and always following pressure from this House and from Labour. If the Government cannot fix problems this serious and urgent, what on earth are they in office for?

Here is a six-point plan to sort out the problems, and this is what we have been arguing for months. First, widen the Government testing programme to cover all suspect cladding, not just ACM cladding. Secondly, set a deadline for all blocks to be made safe. Thirdly, make clear the legal duty for block owners to get this work done, and to pay for it without passing on the bill to hard-pressed leaseholders. Fourthly, set up a loan fund for private blocks. Fifthly, name the landlords and tell the residents so that the public know the safety status of all high-rise blocks. Finally, toughen the sanctions, up to and including taking over blocks to get this vital fire safety work done.

For more than nine months, as the Minister has repeated today, the Secretary of State has said that he is not ruling anything out. It is time to rule things in, and it is time to reverse the refusal to act on all these fronts.

In the days after the Grenfell tragedy, the Prime Minister promised the nation:

“My Government will do whatever it takes to…keep our people safe.”

When will the Minister finally be able to come to this House to tell us and the public that the Government have honoured that pledge?

[Kit Malthouse]

I am sorry that the right hon. Gentleman has sought to make this such an antagonistic exchange in what is a difficult and complicated situation that requires significant amounts of engineering and construction work, which will necessarily take time. He will know that the response from both the Department and the Government in the aftermath of the Grenfell tragedy was immediate and wide-ranging. The commissioning of Dame Judith Hackitt to conduct her inquiry was an important step forward in tackling this issue.

Since then, significant resource and effort have been injected into the need to remove this cladding, but the vital first step was to make sure that people living in high-rise blocks with ACM cladding were safe immediately, and those steps were put in place immediately. We now know, and can tell everyone in tower blocks with this cladding, that they are safe tonight. The Government’s primary focus was to make sure there were enough interim measures in place and that local fire and rescue services were satisfied that the buildings were immediately safe, while at the same time providing the resources, assistance and support—and, yes, cajoling some in the private sector to do their duty and replace this cladding.

That is what we continue to do, and we are making significant progress. However, the right hon. Gentleman is correct that we will get to a point where, for a small number—we are now down to a small number—of owners or contractors who put this cladding on buildings, we will need to consider more assertive measures, and those measures are under active consideration at the moment. All the while, in all of this—he may present himself as an expert, but I am certainly not an expert—we are guided by expert opinion, which includes Dame Judith Hackitt’s review and the independent expert advisory panel that was constituted in the immediate aftermath of Grenfell. We follow their advice in making sure that we can guarantee people’s safety tonight.

[Sir Peter Bottomley (Worthing West) (Con)]

I agree with my hon. Friend that it is not a very bright idea to be partisan about this, given that the majority of the non-private blocks are probably in Labour-controlled councils.

Has the advice on fire and evacuation changed, and is the policy of staying put still right for these blocks? How will my hon. Friend take advice from the representatives of leaseholders? They are the ones who are made to carry the can, but they are regarded as only tenants for most legal purposes.

[Kit Malthouse]

The advice on evacuation procedures is for the local fire and rescue service to determine. Depending on the formulation of the building, advice is given on whether it should be evacuated simultaneously or sequentially, and that advice varies from building to building. In the end, it is for the local fire and rescue service to satisfy itself that there are appropriate evacuation procedures in each building.

My hon. Friend is a well-known and long-standing champion for leaseholders in a number of circumstances, and he will know that we are putting significant pressure on building owners and, indeed, contractors to ensure that leaseholders do not bear the cost of this situation in any circumstance. The Secretary of State has not ruled out any particular measure in making sure that that pertains.

[Alison Thewliss (Glasgow Central) (SNP)]

It is all very well for Ministers to come here and say “never again” after Grenfell, but it is extremely disturbing to hear the news from the X1 Eastbank block in Manchester. Not only did the construction firm apparently neglect to pass on the findings of a failed test, but it appears to have threatened to withhold payment for the test unless the testing company signed a non-disclosure agreement concerning the results. Will the Minister confirm whether the Secretary of State can request that information from the construction firm’s administrators and make sure that it is all handed over?

In the more than 18 months since the Grenfell tragedy, there seems to have been a continued lack of progress and reform. The Royal Institute of British Architects has stated that England lags behind Wales and Scotland, which have in place, or are introducing, regulations to require sprinklers and provide a second means of escape. The Scottish Government-led review of the Scottish fire safety regime by the building and fire safety ministerial working group produced its conclusions and recommendations in December last year. What discussions has the Minister had about that with housing Minister Kevin Stewart in Scotland, and are there recommendations from the group that he could easily implement in England?

Finally, I ask again whether the Government will consider zero rating materials for replacement cladding. That would help to reduce the costs for firms that want to take such remediation measures, and make it easier for them to do so.

[Kit Malthouse]

As I said in my earlier answer to the right hon. Member for Wentworth and Dearne (John Healey), I believe we are making progress on remediation. That is particularly true in the social sector, but we are now seeing signs that significant progress is being made in the private sector with the number of buildings that have been completed, the commitments that have been made and the work that is ongoing.

Regarding the Manchester situation that is on the front page of the paper today, I understand that the local fire and rescue service is satisfied that everybody will be safe in that building tonight, and that temporary measures are in place while the work is being done. There seems to be some complication about getting that work done, but it is being done.

Sadly, I have not met the Minister whom the hon. Lady mentioned, but as she will know, we are reviewing approved document B—the fire safety building regulations —and we would welcome any contribution towards that consultation to help us to get this right.

[Robert Neill (Bromley and Chislehurst) (Con)]

Assertive measures are urgent for my constituents at Northpoint in Bromley, one of the 42 buildings where the owner—in this case Citistead, an offshoot of the Tchenguiz family trust—refuses to meet its obligations and insists that it will use a term in the lease to pass on the costs to the flat owners regardless. The Government need to introduce a legally foolproof mechanism to override those provisions and prevent my constituents and others from being forced to pick up the tab. Words are not enough.

[Kit Malthouse]

My hon. Friend is a fierce advocate for his constituency, and we share his concern about the position of the Northpoint residents. We have been very clear that leaseholders should not bear the cost, and he will be pleased to learn that the Secretary of State has written to the building owner and other parties concerned to make it clear that he expects them to fund the work.

[Mr Clive Betts (Sheffield South East) (Lab)]

The Secretary of State has just written to the Select Committee about the role of local authorities, and local authorities clearly have powers under the Housing Act 2004. When building owners will not act and the local authority acts instead, it may incur costs that it can try to recover from building owners. Can we have an absolute guarantee from the Minister that when local authorities find it impossible to do so, the Government will find that money so that it will not have to be found from hard-pressed local authority budgets?

[Kit Malthouse]

The Chair of the Select Committee raises an important point. We have offered financial assistance to local authorities, and we will work in partnership with them to attempt to recover the money. Where that proves to be impossible, we will try to reach as convenient and financially efficacious an arrangement as possible.

[Greg Hands (Chelsea and Fulham) (Con)]

May I ask my hon. Friend about Hartopp Point and Lannoy Point, two 14-storey blocks in Fulham that are rumoured to face demolition? Residents—including leaseholders who are worried about getting proper compensation —are extremely concerned, and opposition Conservative councillors are calling for an emergency council meeting tomorrow night. Will he join me in urging Hammersmith and Fulham Council to lift the secrecy from its proposals and communicate properly with concerned tenants and leaseholders?

[Kit Malthouse]

My right hon. Friend raises what sounds like an alarming situation. Where people’s homes are concerned—whether it is about safety, the future of their homes or, indeed, demolition—I urge all those in authority to be as transparent as possible. It can be extremely debilitating, concerning and worrying for any resident to have the future of their home mired in uncertainty. I hope that he gets the clarity that his residents need.

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

If the Minister was one of my constituents in the X1 block in Manchester, I am sure that, like them, he would have woken up this morning feeling not only worried and scared, but furious—furious at the way in which the matter has come to light, and furious that there is still, after all this time, no accountability, no transparency and no recourse for the people affected. We urgently need legislation, which must also cover leaseholders who, like those in many of the blocks in my constituency, cannot sell their homes because of the fear that they will have to pay the cost of recladding. This has got to stop.

[Kit Malthouse]

The hon. Lady is quite right; given the story on the front of the paper, anyone who lived in that block would be worried. We have reassured ourselves that the Greater Manchester fire and rescue service is satisfied that everybody resident in that block is safe tonight, and that there has been sufficient engagement by the owners and managing agents to make sure that the temporary measures that are in place are adequate to keep residents safe.

We understand that there is work under way. I believe that that work has been contracted, but it is yet to be made clear who will pay. We will put pressure on the owners and managers of that building, as we are doing with all owners and managers, to make sure that it is not the leaseholders who pay. At this stage, we are not ruling out any particular measure for making sure that that is the case.

[Kevin Hollinrake (Thirsk and Malton) (Con)]

The Housing Minister is doing excellent work on the matter, both behind the scenes and out in front. I have spoken to him about it on a number of occasions. Particularly with private sector buildings where there is no obvious freeholder responsible for replacing the cladding, does he consider that central Government should step in and fund the cost of replacement until it can be established who is responsible for it, after which they should reclaim that money?

[Kit Malthouse]

My hon. Friend is quite right, and he points to something that will become an increasingly difficult issue. In a number of cases, the freeholder of a building—essentially, the owner of the building—may well be obscure, overseas, difficult to contact or, indeed, a dormant company. In those circumstances, as the Chair of the Select Committee pointed out, local authorities have the power to enter the premises and do the work. We have offered financial support to make sure that it gets done.

[Emma Dent Coad (Kensington) (Lab)]

I am very concerned to see the Minister treating this like some kind of theoretical exercise. People are genuinely afraid in their beds and it is not really enough for the Minister to say that he is satisfied. Seventy-two of my neighbours—including those who had warned people about their fears—died in the worst possible circumstances, in front of their neighbours. Hundreds were made homeless, and 19 months later many are still homeless. Nearly 700 children have been diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder, as have nearly 1,500 adults.

This was all preventable. Look at the cases over the years in which people have died in fires spread by external cladding, including at Summerland leisure centre, Knowsley Heights, Garnock Court and Lakanal House, where the coroner advised specifically how the Government should change building regulations to keep people safe. Nothing has yet changed. The Government are ignoring warnings, and our constituents are going to bed afraid. Current measures are not working. One of the Grenfell survivors said:

“Grenfell 2 is in the post.”

How many more must die before the Government take positive action to keep people safe in their beds?

[Kit Malthouse]

I am sorry that the hon. Lady has not acknowledged the significant amount of work that has since taken place, not least the work of Dame Judith Hackitt, which has been seminal and foundational in our changing of the building regulations for the future. The hon. Lady should be under no illusion about the seriousness with which I take the matter. It has occupied very significant amounts of my time since I was appointed in the summer, including chairing the ministerial taskforce, having regular meetings with the team internally to make sure that we are driving performance and numbers and, critically, engaging with the Grenfell community, as I have done on many occasions, both individually and collectively. That included, movingly, attending the silent walk that took place just before Christmas. We believe this a significant part of our responsibility to make sure that everybody is safe.

As I said earlier in response to the right hon. Member for Wentworth and Dearne (John Healey), our primary concern is to make sure that every resident is safe tonight. Whatever measures are required—whether a waking watch, the retrofitting of heat sensors or smoke alarms, new doors, or whatever else it might be—our primary concern is that every local fire and rescue service can guarantee to the Department that everybody who is in a residential building of more than 18 metres is safe tonight.

The secondary concern of importance is getting the remediation done. We are making significant progress on that and will be accelerating that progress in the next few months.

[Bob Blackman (Harrow East) (Con)]

In evidence to the Select Committee, Rockwool has claimed that there are more than 1,600 high-rise buildings with unsafe cladding, rather than the 397—I think—that the Department claims. That is a clear, massive disparity. Will my hon. Friend make sure before he comes before the Select Committee next Monday that we are given a clear explanation of why there is this wide disparity and that he will take action to make sure that all 1,600 buildings are made safe?

[Kit Malthouse]

My hon. Friend makes an important point of which we should not lose sight: there are types of cladding other than ACM cladding. He will know that the Department issued advice to building owners in December 2017 on how to investigate non-ACM cladding systems on their buildings and remediate them. At the Secretary of State’s request, the expert panel reviewed and updated that guidance in December last year, and it reiterates that the clearest way to ensure safety is to remove any unsafe materials. We have commissioned the Building Research Establishment to conduct a programme of testing on non-ACM materials, and we expect that testing to start shortly.

[Ms Karen Buck (Westminster North) (Lab)]

Will the Minister confirm that however strongly worded the letters that he writes to property owners are, they have no legal status whatsoever, so those owners can legally ignore them? Given that, will he tell us what the timescale is for the decision on when he will proceed to legislation; exactly what factors he will bear in mind when he makes that decision; and at what point property owners will know that if they refuse to act, legal action will be taken to force them to do so?

[Kit Malthouse]

Whatever the status of the work that has been done by the Department and of the letters from the Secretary of State, it is bearing some fruit. A large number of companies have taken their responsibilities seriously and are now funding remediation, some of which is quite elderly, and they are doing it for all the right reasons. We are working on the group who have yet to acknowledge their responsibilities and are hopeful of more success on that. As far as legislation is concerned, the hon. Lady will know that just before Christmas we published the Hackitt implementation plan for consultation, along with several other calls for evidence and consultations. Once they are all in and completed, we will produce the legislative programme.

[Dr Matthew Offord (Hendon) (Con)]

The Minister has mentioned a number of small private developers and, indeed, individual freeholders, but will he write to me about Premier House in Edgware, to ensure that my local leaseholders and constituents do not have to foot the bill for the removal and replacement of materials that are considered dangerous? My constituents have already paid out thousands of pounds to their freeholder, a small independent developer. Although they are grateful for the Minister’s support, the leaseholders want legal clarity and certainty that they will not be forced to pay any additional moneys.

[Kit Malthouse]

My hon. Friend is quite right to raise the interests of his constituents. I am not aware of the particular situation, but I am more than happy to investigate and write to him, as he requests.

[Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith) (Lab)]

It is quite extraordinary that the Minister has just said that testing on non-ACM-clad buildings is about to start. There are around 340 high-rise buildings clad with non-ACM combustible materials, and more than 1,000 high-risk buildings. Will he guarantee, now, that those buildings—like Lakanal House, where six people died 10 years ago—will all be tested and treated in the same way as ACM-clad buildings?

[Kit Malthouse]

In considering what we should do about non-ACM cladding, we have been guided by the expert panel, which includes Dame Judith Hackitt, on how we should proceed, and we are proceeding on the panel’s best advice. As I said, we expect testing on non-ACM cladding to begin shortly, and the conclusions of that work will obviously colour what action is taken next.

[Kevin Foster (Torbay) (Con)]

The Minister and I share a local government background, particularly in relation to the fire service, so he will be aware of the importance of not only how regulations are set up but how they are enforced, and I am sure that he shares my concerns about the changes that were made a decade ago. As part of his review of building regulations, what consideration is he giving to ensuring that they are actually complied with?

[Kit Malthouse]

With his usual acuity, my hon. Friend puts his finger on an important point. As part of her review, Dame Judith Hackitt considered whether there is an inherent conflict of interest for those who are implementing buildings and paying for building regulation and therefore being inspected. That is one of the issues that we will explore with the industry. It is about how we can ensure professional standards and professional independence in safety-critical situations.

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

I have previously raised in the Chamber the situation of my constituents in Heysmoor Heights in Liverpool. They live in a high-rise property owned by the offshore company Abacus Land 4. My constituents have already paid for replacement cladding. The situation in relation to insurance cover is completely confused: constituents were told that it was covered, but are now told that it is not. In view of the Minister’s commitment that private owners should not pass on the cost of replacement cladding to leaseholders, will he intervene in the case of Heysmoor Heights?

[Kit Malthouse]

I am more than happy to look into the specific situation and write to the hon. Lady once I have had a review from the Department.

[Mark Pawsey (Rugby) (Con)]

For a variety of reasons, local authorities with high-rise social housing are in the process of taking it down. That includes Rugby Borough Council, which is about to demolish two blocks at Biart Place, where there are structural concerns, and replace them with a larger number of conventional housing units. Does the Minister agree that this process should be accelerated?

[Kit Malthouse]

It is typical of my hon. Friend to fight for improvements for his constituents. I agree that for buildings built in the 1960s and ’70s—I do not know what period the buildings he refers to are—refurbishment often presents more challenges than demolishing and replacing them. In doing so, the consideration of a different formulation—including streets, squares, low rise and high density—may well be preferable to high rise.

[Jamie Stone (Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross) (LD)]

Of course, grave fire risk is no respecter of boundaries within the UK. We heard a wee snippet from the hon. Member for Glasgow Central (Alison Thewliss) on what the Scottish Government are doing about this issue; dare I assume that Her Majesty’s Government and the devolved Administrations are communicating and co-ordinating to establish the safest possible regime throughout the United Kingdom?

[Kit Malthouse]

These are obviously devolved matters, but the hon. Gentleman should be reassured that, certainly in respect of my responsibilities in this country, we will leave no stone unturned and turn away advice from no one if they are getting it right. As I have said, we are currently going through a series of consultations to get this right. If the Scottish or, indeed, Welsh experience can inform our consultation on approved document B —the building regulations—I would be more than happy to consider it.

[Rushanara Ali (Bethnal Green and Bow) (Lab)]

The Minister tries to assure our constituents that they can sleep at night, but I remind him that when he was a London deputy Mayor making fire service cuts and shutting down fire stations, he also assured us that people could sleep at night. Subsequently, we had the Grenfell disaster. I respectfully ask him to take this matter very seriously, or he will not be able to sleep at night because of the prospect of people continuing to live in danger. There are 41 blocks in my constituency that need urgent action; he needs to legislate now.

[Kit Malthouse]

The hon. Lady is quite right to point out that I have spent a significant period in the frontline of public safety policy delivery. I like to think that my record in doing so, particularly on crime, speaks for itself. She will know that during my time at City hall as deputy Mayor for policing, we drove crimes, including teenage murder, down to 20-year lows. We did that by application, dedication and commitment, and I am giving exactly the same to this subject.

[Jack Dromey (Birmingham, Erdington) (Lab)]

Nineteen months on from the Grenfell tragedy and despite all the warm words, not one penny has been forthcoming from the Government to help Birmingham City Council make safe 213 tower blocks in which 10,000 households live. Now the Department has at last written to the council asking whether it has any other “sizeable building safety issues”. That is scandalous. When will the Government accept their responsibility and contribute towards the very significant cost being undertaken by the city council to ensure that our city’s tenants are safe?

[Kit Malthouse]

We have already made a very significant contribution towards supporting remediation in the social sector, and we have already allocated £248 million to remediate 135 buildings out of a fund of £400 million. We are still receiving bids from local authorities, and if Birmingham City Council can make the case, then, of course, we will support it.

[Mrs Madeleine Moon (Bridgend) (Lab)]

Rockwool is in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Ogmore (Chris Elmore), but a number of its workforce live in Bridgend. They have come to see me to reiterate the concerns expressed by the hon. Member for Harrow East (Bob Blackman) that Rockwool’s product, which is fire resistant and has thermal and acoustic properties, is not being promoted in relation to the work that is ongoing. It is non-ACM. Why are we not looking at other products that could also enhance the retrofitting of buildings throughout the UK?

[Kit Malthouse]

I recognise the hon. Lady’s concern, but I am sure that she will agree that it is not for the Government to promote any particular product. The Government’s job is to set the framework in which those who are fundamentally responsible for building safety—that is those who build them and those who own them—are able to make the proper assessment of the safety of the products that they are using. It is quite obvious to everybody that the Grenfell Tower tragedy lifted a big flat rock on the building regulation system and showed that it has not functioned for some time across a number of Governments. We are trying to rectify that and to provide a framework in which developers, building owners and, critically, residents can be sure that the materials used to construct their homes are safe.

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

One of the 42 blocks that was mentioned by the Minister is New Providence Wharf, which is owned by Ballymore in my constituency. He repeatedly says that there are measures under active consideration to get these owners to comply. When will we actually see what these measures are?

[Kit Malthouse]

The hon. Gentleman is quite right that the New Providence Wharf situation is one of those that is currently unresolved. We are engaged with Ballymore, which is the owner at the moment, and it is making the case that leaseholders should carry the cost. We have made it clear to it that that is not the case, and we will keep up the pressure and hope for a resolution soon.

[Diana Johnson (Kingston upon Hull North) (Lab)]

The Local Government Association says that it continues strongly to urge the Government to ban the use of any combustible materials on high-rise and high-risk buildings. Rockwool has been in touch with me about two buildings in Hull North: the Bransholme Health Centre and the Allam Medical Building. I am concerned to hear that these buildings have materials that are combustible and could be dangerous. Is the Minister concerned, as I am, about these type of buildings not being part of his proposed plan?

[Kit Malthouse]

I am, of course, concerned to hear that, and the hon. Lady will know that we introduced a complete ban on combustible materials on buildings over 18 metres just before Christmas. That ban is not retrospective. However, all building owners have a duty to ensure that their buildings are safe, and if they believe, after assessing their buildings, that they are not safe, they also have a duty to remediate. It is almost impossible for us, I guess, to tour the country and review every single circumstance, which is why we are stressing that the primary responsibility for this lies with the building owner. If she knows of buildings that she believes are not safe, and the building owner is not taking the action that is required, she should, in the first instance, speak to her local authority colleagues who have the power to intervene. If that fails then, by all means, write to me.

[Chris Elmore (Ogmore) (Lab)]

As has been mentioned, I represent Rockwool, which has its base in my constituency—the only base in the UK. The Minister says in answer to my hon. Friend the Member for Bridgend (Mrs Moon) that it is not Government’s job to legislate on the use of whichever materials a house builder may need and that is down to the house builder. I am sorry, but I do not agree with him. Ministers legislate all the time on health and safety matters. The reality is that we should not have combustible insulation inside tower blocks, hospitals or schools. The Government could legislate on that today for public safety.

[Kit Malthouse]

Perhaps I was not as clear as I should have been. The hon. Gentleman is quite right. We have banned combustible cladding, which includes insulation, from all high-rise buildings. Anything that forms the skin of the wall and is combustible is now banned for new buildings. The point that I was making to the hon. Member for Bridgend (Mrs Moon) is that it is not for us to legislate that a particular company’s product should be used. What we are in the process of doing is a review of approved document B. I urge both him and his constituents to contribute to the consultation on approved document B to make sure that we are getting the standards to which products must adhere right so that people within the industry can make a selection among products that they know have been tested correctly and are at the right standard to show that they are not combustible and can be used safely on high-rise buildings. That is exactly what we are trying to establish at the moment through the review and I urge him and all colleagues who have questioned me today to participate in that consultation.

Proxy Voting

Tuesday 22nd January 2019 Commons Chamber

13:16

[Jo Swinson (East Dunbartonshire) (LD) (Urgent Question)]

To ask the Leader of the House of Commons if she will make a statement on the obstacles to introducing proxy voting in Parliament.

[The Leader of the House of Commons (Andrea Leadsom)]

I am grateful for the opportunity to respond to this urgent question. I thank the hon. Member for East Dunbartonshire (Jo Swinson) for her question. I have great respect for her, particularly for her invaluable work on the steering group to establish the Independent Complaints and Grievance Policy. She has also been a strong voice on the issue of proxy voting and I know that many of us enjoyed seeing her in her place during the previous debate on this matter with baby Gabriel.

I am also delighted that the hon. Member for Hampstead and Kilburn (Tulip Siddiq) welcomed a new baby boy, Raphael, on Thursday. I am sure that the whole House will want to join me in sending our very best wishes. There are a number of Members right across the House who are expecting babies in the coming months and so I know that this matter is, quite rightly, of huge importance to many.

I profoundly believe that all new parents should be able to spend uninterrupted time with their new baby. That is vital both for the physical and mental wellbeing of parents and their babies. Working to give every baby the best start in life has been a passion of mine for many years, and during this time I have had the pleasure of working closely with many hon. and right hon. Members across the House.

I was delighted that the Prime Minister asked me to chair a cross-Government ministerial group in June to explore what more the Government can do to improve the cradle-to-grave effects that result from better support in this critical period of our lives. The group that I chair will make recommendations to relevant Secretaries of State on how the Government can improve the co-ordination and cost-effectiveness of early years family support, and identify gaps in available provision. I am delighted to be visiting Home Start and Sure Start in Manchester this Friday with the hon. Member for Manchester Central (Lucy Powell) to hear directly from parents about their experiences.

I assure the House that I am absolutely committed to making progress on the issue of proxy voting, and I am truly delighted to be able to confirm to the House today that a substantive motion on proxy leave in the case of maternity, paternity and adoption has been tabled today for the House’s agreement on Monday 28 January.

The motion I have tabled will largely follow the helpful recommendations set out in the Procedure Committee’s fifth report of the Session. It will facilitate baby leave for Members of Parliament and implement the House’s decision to agree to proxy voting in instances of baby leave.

The motion and Standing Order changes that I will table deviate in two minor ways from the drafting in the Procedure Committee report. First, the motion will provide for a pilot scheme of one year, with a formal review at the end of that by the Procedure Committee to ensure that it is working well. Secondly, for that reason, the Standing Order is temporary, and in agreement with the Clerks, the ability to make provision for proxy voting in so far as not provided for by the Standing Order was deemed unnecessary for the scheme to be fully workable. Those are the two minor changes.

This is a perfect example of how Parliament can work collaboratively to bring about important change, demonstrating the work of many colleagues from all parties, who have been determined to see this happen. This is a really positive moment for many colleagues across the House. There have been a number of constructive debates about this issue, and ultimately it is clear to me that the balance of opinion is that baby leave is a unique period of time and is crucial for new parents. This is a step forward, removing the choice between parliamentary and parental responsibilities and helping to make Parliament a more modern workplace.

I do hope that the House will be of the same opinion, and that it will fully support the motion next week to bring forward a pilot scheme for proxy voting.

[Mr Speaker]

Splendid.

[Jo Swinson]

First, I absolutely share in the congratulations that the Leader of the House is sending—I am sure from the whole House—to the hon. Member for Hampstead and Kilburn (Tulip Siddiq) on the birth of her gorgeous baby boy, Raphael.

I thought that things were pretty bad when, back in June in the heat wave, I was 10 days past my due date, but the Government’s response to the House’s instruction to introduce proxy voting gives a whole new meaning to the word overdue. In all seriousness, I congratulate the Leader of the House on her work and on getting to this stage; she is a genuine advocate. Those of us who have worked hard on this issue—the right hon. and learned Member for Camberwell and Peckham (Ms Harman), the right hon. Member for Basingstoke (Mrs Miller) and those of us who have recently been pregnant or are currently pregnant—know from our meetings with the Leader of the House that she has been seriously helping to drive this initiative within Government, I am sure to her frustration at times, because she is committed to this issue. However, it is shameful that last week the hon. Member for Hampstead and Kilburn was put in the invidious position of having to make a choice—weighing up the potential health risks to her baby against whether her constituents could have their voice heard on the biggest issue of our time. Nobody should be put in such a position.

I would also say, for the record, that I think that it is disgusting that some have suggested that the hon. Lady was just trying to make a point. She was put in an impossible position and she made a choice. The judgment that comes from all corners of parents making choices like that, and all sorts of others, is out of order. We should respect the choice that she made.

Yes, the hon. Lady was offered a pair—that is what some people have said: “She was offered a pair.” but it is the Government’s fault that pairing is entirely discredited as a mechanism to enable pregnant MPs and new parents to discharge their responsibilities. I was nursing my two-week-old baby in July when I found out that the person I was paired with had voted anyway. He had not voted all day; he had voted in just the two Divisions that happened to be very close—one that the Government lost and one that they won. So forgive me if I am a bit sceptical about the assurances that we were given that that was a genuine mistake, because the result of the Chief Whip’s behaviour—as it then turned out, others had been asked to break their pairs too—was to cheat my constituents out of their voice on one of the biggest issues of our time: Brexit. So some Members of the Government—not the Leader of the House—have been dragged kicking and screaming to this position.

I also think we should put on record thanks to Esther Webber of The Times, whose article suggesting that it was the Chief Whip who was blocking this issue is, I suspect, not entirely unrelated to the date at which this announcement has been brought forward today, in response to this urgent question.

However, I ask the Leader of the House, why the delay? It has been nearly a year—five babies born; three more on the way. Does she appreciate the appalling message that that sends out about maternity rights? Fifty-four thousand women a year lose their jobs because of pregnancy and maternity discrimination, and the Government’s response has been completely inadequate. The charade that we have seen in this House just underlines that message.

The baby son of the hon. Member for Hampstead and Kilburn is five days old. We in law do not allow new mothers to work for two weeks after their baby is born, which is why I am delighted that the Leader of the House says that the House will discuss this issue on Monday. May I ask her some practical questions? Will the motion have time allocated to it, so that it is not possible for a single voice to shout “Object!” and stop the debate happening? What discussions has she had with the Speaker’s Office to make sure that all the preparatory work is done, and that a scheme is in place, so that if the House approves the motion on Monday, the scheme can be in place on Tuesday?

Of course, that does not get round the issue of the voice of the hon. Member for Hampstead and Kilburn being heard on Monday for that vote. Perhaps the Leader of the House might like to suggest a pair for the hon. Lady on Monday evening—I do not know what the hon. Member for Shipley (Philip Davies) is doing then, but somebody like him may well appreciate having the night off.

We have waited long enough for this change. Modernising the House of Commons is a slow and laborious process—frankly, it is often quite like childbirth—so let us get on with it. I hope that on Monday night I will walk through the Lobby with the Mother of the House, the Leader of the House and many modernising MPs from all parties to get this done.

[Andrea Leadsom]

I say again that I consider the hon. Lady to be a friend and I entirely understand her frustration. I will respond to her questions in turn.

First, the hon. Lady talks about the hon. Member for Hampstead and Kilburn (Tulip Siddiq). As I said in business questions last Thursday, the hon. Member for Hampstead and Kilburn was offered a pair. She has also received an invitation to be nodded through should she wish her vote to be recorded. That would obviously require her to come to this place at some point during the day before the vote, when her name would be recorded; but in the meantime, she is invited to have a pair. I understand that she had a pair yesterday.

As the hon. Member for East Dunbartonshire (Jo Swinson) knows, until proxy voting is in place, that remains the way in which those with illnesses and those having parental leave are accommodated. She will also be aware, as was said at the time, that the breaking of the pair in her case on, I believe, 17 July was done entirely in error. My right hon. Friend the Member for Great Yarmouth (Brandon Lewis) apologised directly to her, as did my right hon. Friend the Chief Whip on behalf of the Whips Office. I apologise to the House again, but I can assure all Members that it is intended that a pair be provided for the hon. Member for Hampstead and Kilburn should she wish it, as was the case yesterday.

The hon. Member for East Dunbartonshire asks about the delay. She will appreciate that this is a fundamental break with the past in this House. She will also appreciate that I wrote to the Procedure Committee in November 2017, asking it to look into this matter, because it was a significant change for the House, and the Committee raised a number of issues that needed resolution. For example, when should a proxy be used? Could it be just for Government business? Should it be for private business? Should it be for a closure motion? Should it be for life-or-death decisions only? Those were very important questions. Also, who should offer the proxy? Who should be the proxy? Who should provide that role, and what sort of consequences does that offer for the individual who may be voting against their conscience on behalf of another Member? Finally, there is the question of whether proxy should be used only for those on baby leave rather than for those who are ill or who have other priorities.

Those were significant questions and I understand the hon. Lady’s frustration at the time it is taking, but we have had a number of very constructive debates, and I believe that we have concluded that the issue of baby leave is unique, and therefore should have priority. That is why I am able to bring this forward today.

Finally, with the breaking of pairs, I totally understand that in the hon. Lady’s case that was extremely regrettable, but she will appreciate that, as an informal system, there are a number of problems with the administration of pairs. I would very gently point out to her that five Liberal Democrat MPs—almost half of the party’s MPs—have broken their pairs in this Parliament alone. It is not unique to the Government side; a number of pairs have been broken through genuine errors. All hon. Members need to consider the fact that there is a strong commitment to making the informal pairing arrangement work as well as it possibly can.

[Mr Speaker]

I thank the Leader of the House for what she has said. The hon. Member for East Dunbartonshire (Jo Swinson) also asked what discussions the Leader of the House had had with my office, to which the answer is that the Leader of the House and I have discussed this matter from time to time. I have made extremely clear privately, as I have made extremely clear publicly, my desire for progressive change and my impatience with its absence. More particularly, what I would like to say to the hon. Lady and for the benefit of the House is this: I can assure colleagues that if and when the House agrees to the necessary resolution and Standing Order, I will ensure that I have a scheme ready to be activated, so that Members can rapidly—indeed, I think instantly—apply for a proxy vote, and their nominated proxy can then cast that vote the next day. I think colleagues will agree that that is crystal clear.

[Mrs Maria Miller (Basingstoke) (Con)]

I thank my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House not only for her statement but for her personal commitment to supporting, in particular, pregnant and new mothers—and new fathers—in Parliament. I fully support what she has outlined today. She talked about modernising the workplace. Proxy voting is only one aspect of modernising this, frankly, prehistoric workplace in Parliament. So many aspects of Parliament need modernisation, and change, as this issue has shown, is far too slow and fragmented. Where does responsibility for driving forward that change lie? I know that it does not lie with the Government.

[Andrea Leadsom]

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for her comment and question. I completely agree with her. Many of us—if not all of us—across this House want Parliament to be a more family-friendly place. There have been a huge number of efforts, including by you, Mr Speaker, and by right hon. and hon. Members across the House to change the sitting hours to make them more family-friendly, for example. There are now better childcare facilities on the estate. There is a greater use of technology to make it easier to go about our jobs. We have done a huge amount of work, with cross-party collaboration, to bring in a new behaviour code and a new complaints procedure to make people feel that they can be treated with the dignity and respect that everybody deserves in this place. There is a huge amount more to do. I am committed to working with colleagues to make more progress. My right hon. Friend and I met only yesterday to talk about what more we can do, cross-party, to try to ensure that we have a more family-friendly Parliament that encourages people from all walks of life to want to come here and take up a role representing their constituents.

[Mr Speaker]

The responsibility is shared, but on a point of fact, as I suspect the right hon. Member for Basingstoke (Mrs Miller) knows, responsibility on this matter was manifestly and incontrovertibly that of the Government, as the Procedure Committee recognised. That responsibility has been discharged today by the Leader of the House, and I thank her for it. It is very important that we proceed on the basis of factual knowledge and not of misguided perception.

[Valerie Vaz (Walsall South) (Lab)]

I thank the Leader of the House for her response and congratulate the hon. Member for East Dunbartonshire (Jo Swinson) on securing this urgent question. I think Andrew is the only one of her family not to be in the Chamber. Thank you for granting the urgent question, Mr Speaker, because it has allowed us to get some further information.

It seems that it is not only the Prime Minister who returns frequently to this House and tells us that nothing has changed. It must be catching, as we have been promised yet a further debate. This is the second urgent question on proxy voting for baby leave in the space of six months, the last being on 18 July 2018 in the wake of the shameful events when a pair was deliberately broken by a Government Minister. The Leader of the House honoured her promise of a debate on 13 September. We have had two debates, and yet no further progress, despite there being broad agreement, and the will of the House being known, on the principle of proxy voting for baby leave. This House is debating and voting on one of the most significant issues that this country has faced, and yet last week a Member who was heavily pregnant, but who wanted her vote counted and recorded to fulfil her duties to her constituents, had no other option but to come to the House. It is time that we ensured that this is a modern workplace with modern employment practices for those with baby leave.

I know that the Leader of the House wants urgently to find a way forward and is not the block in the Government to these reforms. Today we hear about the Prime Minister of New Zealand—she knows that there is a work-life balance, even in that position. Everyone can find a way. Both Australia and New Zealand have a system, so there is absolutely no reason why we cannot look at those precedents and come up with our own solution.

I welcome the fact that the Leader of the House has announced not just a motion but a debate. Will it be on a voteable motion? Will there be time for amendments? For how long will the debate take place? Why, given the paucity of the Government’s parliamentary agenda, can the Leader of the House not secure sufficient Government time? She has not actually said how long the debate will be and whether it is on a voteable motion. Will she say, in response to the question by the hon. Member for East Dunbartonshire and to mine, whether we can vote and whether this principle will be secured by a vote on Monday?



As I set out from the Dispatch Box on 18 July and 13 September, Her Majesty’s Opposition—the Labour party—support the principle of proxy voting for baby leave. As I have repeatedly set out, there is a way that baby leave can be introduced today, without the need for a debate, through public agreement by all the parties to nod through those on baby leave for every Division. As I mentioned in a previous debate, there is a way that we could ensure that those voting by this means are denoted with a star. I even offered the idea of a baby emoji—I am sure that someone will come up with that. That will give full transparency to the public as to how Members have voted.

On 13 September, I asked about the evidence that the Leader of the House was going to take. She said that she wanted to take evidence on unintended consequences and various other issues. Has she taken this evidence? When will she report back to the House on it? Could she share that evidence with the House, and at least with the Chair of the Procedure Committee, who is in his place? As I offered on 18 July, will she agree to meet me today to discuss this?

It is vital that we are a modern workplace—that those on baby leave can have their vote recorded and take part in our proceedings as they are elected to do. I appreciate that the Government are putting forward the motion, but it does not guarantee any time for us to debate or give Members a vote to decide on this matter once and for all. Will the Leader of the House please be clear on that? We need to make this Parliament the modern, progressive and equal Parliament that we all want to achieve.

[Andrea Leadsom]

Well, I do not quite know where to start, because the hon. Lady will be aware that, as I have just made quite clear, Members can be nodded through if they request that. If they come to this place, their name can be recorded. They can, equally, request a pair. So she is pointing out something that is self-evident. On her other point, proxy voting does require a motion of this House, so she is actually not correct to say that people can just be offered a proxy vote as of today. That would be to undermine the right of this House to take decisions on its own procedures.

The hon. Lady asks if there will be a debate and a vote. I thought I had made it clear, but perhaps not, that, as I mentioned in my remarks, the motion that I have tabled today will enable the House to take a decision on Monday on whether it wishes to accept the Procedure Committee’s report, as amended, or not. So it will not be a further debate, as she says. We have had a number of debates.

As I also thought I had made clear, the evidence I took was on issues such as what sorts of motions should be eligible for proxy voting, who the proxy vote should be made by, and what sorts of circumstances should merit a proxy vote.

Finally, the hon. Lady asks if I will meet her today. If she looks in her diary, she will see that we are supposed to be meeting this afternoon.

[Andrea Jenkyns (Morley and Outwood) (Con)]

I welcome the Leader of the House’s statement to the House today. I fully support proxy voting. In my experience of having a baby while being an MP, the guilt that you feel, as a mum to a newborn, about having to drag a three-week-old baby across the country is immense. I lost count of the number of times I was called at the last minute to come and vote. I recall one occasion when I jumped on a train, baby in tow, voted, and got back to Yorkshire at 11 o’clock at night, only to receive a call saying that I needed to be back the next day. So I know that feeling of guilt and I am pleased that the Leader of the House mentioned the emotional impact on a new mum as well. We already have a fantastic nursery in Parliament that my little son, Clifford, attends. I understand that that was a pet project of Mr Speaker, so I welcome his bringing that to the House. Does my right hon. Friend agree that proxy voting will safeguard this precious mummy and baby bonding time?

[Andrea Leadsom]

I certainly love looking at my hon. Friend’s Facebook photos of little Clifford. It is great to feel that we get to see him a bit even though he is not often in the Chamber. Yes, I completely agree with her. What proxy voting will do for this place is to enable parents to have that precious bonding time with their new babies.

[Pete Wishart (Perth and North Perthshire) (SNP)]

I thank the hon. Member for East Dunbartonshire (Jo Swinson) for securing what has turned out to be a fruitful urgent question. I very much welcome the Leader of the House’s commitment to ensure that we have the motion on Monday. It has been a long time coming, but I think we are going to get there at last. This episode has been profoundly embarrassing for the Government; I do not know whether the Leader of the House shares that embarrassment. I do not know whether it was the Whips Office trying to block this, but I will take the Government at their word. I welcome you saying, Mr Speaker, that if the motion is passed, proxy voting will be available the day after to Members of the House of Commons. Perhaps the Leader of the House can ensure that that is the case.

What happened to the hon. Member for Hampstead and Kilburn (Tulip Siddiq) shocked the country. Our constituents could not believe that in the place where we design the legislation that deals with safety at work, we were prepared to put one of our colleagues at such risk. Our 19th-century method of voting has totally and utterly failed. The discredited “nod and wink” pairing system is in tatters and lies in disrepute. It has relied on trust, and clearly that trust has been thoroughly and fundamentally broken by what happened to the hon. Member for East Dunbartonshire.

The Scottish National party never believed in that system or trusted it. I am glad that we have been totally vindicated for never participating in pairing. As the right hon. Member for Basingstoke (Mrs Miller), who chairs the Women and Equalities Committee, said, we have to do more to modernise this place. This is a good start, but it is only a start. We have to start to ensure that we look after people in this House who are ill, indisposed or cannot make it to this place of work. We have to start looking at the practice of putting people in cramped Division Lobbies, at risk to their own health. Many of us heard my hon. Friend the Member for Motherwell and Wishaw (Marion Fellows) talking about her claustrophobia in the packed Lobby last Tuesday. We have to get beyond that. We have to start making sure that this place looks like a modern, 21st-century Parliament.

This is good news, and I welcome it. I look forward to discussing this later with the Leader of the House, when we will hopefully get a clear indication about how this will be done. This is good work, but there is more to be done. Let us get a move on and make sure that this place is safe for the people who come to work here.

[Andrea Leadsom]

I am sure that the hon. Gentleman is taking this matter up with the Scottish Parliament, which also has informal pairing arrangements. I am interested to know what steps he is taking to ensure that it comes into the 21st century at the same rate as the Westminster Parliament.

The hon. Gentleman asked about the situation for the hon. Member for Hampstead and Kilburn (Tulip Siddiq). I can confirm that a pair is available for her, or, if she is on site during the day at any point before the vote, she will be nodded through, which means her vote will be recorded. That is the existing arrangement for those who cannot be here due to illness or other reasons. As I said last Thursday, I genuinely do not believe that any of her constituents would honestly require her to turn up here in a wheelchair when it was perfectly possible to receive the normal arrangements for people in this place with conditions. Members with long-term health issues were paired on that day.

I am genuinely delighted that we are making progress on this issue, but I urge all Members to recognise that we had 13 years of a Labour Government, with three female Leaders of the House, and we have had two Liberal Democrat Deputy Leaders of the House, and I do not believe that any of them brought in proxy voting. The Scottish Parliament has not brought in proxy voting.

Let us pause and have a moment of celebration. We are achieving something truly fantastic—[Interruption.] The hon. Member for Walsall South (Valerie Vaz) shouts that this is not my idea. I am certainly not claiming credit for it. I am asking Members to celebrate the House’s achievement and what we can do when we get together and collaborate.

[Mr Charles Walker (Broxbourne) (Con)]

Mr Speaker, I am certainly celebrating the House’s achievement, just as I am celebrating seeing you break into a smile at the same time as the Leader of the House—it was like a parting of the clouds. You should try to do it more often; you work quite well together.

I thank the Leader of the House and the shadow Leader of the House for closely involving the Procedure Committee in their work. This is good news. As Chairman of the Procedure Committee, I would particularly like to thank the Committee’s members for bringing forward a really good report that seems to have the House’s support.

[Mr Speaker]

I want to say—I do not think this is a divisible proposition—that the hon. Gentleman is an all-round wonderful human being.

[Andrea Leadsom]

I find myself entirely agreeing with you on that point, Mr Speaker. I thank my hon. Friend for the excellent and timely work of the Procedure Committee, which has provided a way forward on which I sincerely hope the House will agree on Monday.

[Mr Speaker]

Colleagues, there is a piquancy about the fact that, as we have been debating this important matter, a large number of children and young people have been observing our proceedings. Until a matter of moments ago, to boot, there was a young man up in the Gallery clutching a little baby—[Interruption.] Apparently, it was the baby of the hon. Member for Lancaster and Fleetwood (Cat Smith)—[Interruption.] Ah, on cue! We are grateful to him.

Those watching our proceedings will be pleased to know that the next Member to be called is the person who has done more to champion women and equality in this House than anyone any of us can recall: the right hon. and learned Member for Camberwell and Peckham (Ms Harman), the Mother of the House, elected on 28 October 1982 and still in service here.

[Ms Harriet Harman (Camberwell and Peckham) (Lab)]

Thank you for your kind words, Mr Speaker, but this has been a collective endeavour. First, I would like to pay tribute to the hon. Member for East Dunbartonshire (Jo Swinson), who has been a champion of this for pressing reasons and reasons of principle. I thank her for securing this urgent question, and thank you for granting it, Mr Speaker. You have always been on the side of progress in respect of parents. As the hon. Member for Morley and Outwood (Andrea Jenkyns) said, you were a champion of the crèche here, and she explained why this measure is so necessary.

We must also thank the Procedure Committee and its Chair. As soon as the House passed the motion, the Committee cracked on with it and did a thorough and excellent job. Who knew how exciting the Procedure Committee was? I also pay tribute to the right hon. Member for Basingstoke (Mrs Miller). This is me railing ineffectively, but she had the idea that we should go to the Backbench Business Committee, to enable the Chamber to debate it. I thank the Committee for its role.

It is 31 years too late for me, but I am delighted about this, because it is really important. There are many babies of Members on both sides of the House in the offing. They are blissfully unaware of the Brexit debate, but these Brexit babies cannot wait, so I am delighted that we are getting on with it.

Finally, I pay tribute to the Leader of the House, who I am in no doubt has always been on the right side of the argument. I point out that I, too, was Leader of the House, and I failed to get this through. Whoever succeeds in these long decades of progress and these baby steps into the 21st century, all power to your elbow.

[Andrea Leadsom]

Of course, the right hon. and learned Lady’s baby steps in her day would now be teenage. She demonstrates what a wonderful Mother of the House she is by being so collegiate. I share her delight that this has been a cross-House effort and that we have got to the point where we can take this forward, which will be great news for all those babies. The Parliamentary Secretary, Cabinet Office, my hon. Friend the Member for Norwich North (Chloe Smith), is sitting beside me with her youngster kicking away, obviously signalling some approval.

[Vicky Ford (Chelmsford) (Con)]

As chair of the all-party parliamentary group on women in Parliament, I want to say a great big thank you for this step forward. I would like to see more women in this Parliament, and it is the women who are, biologically speaking, more likely to need to take maternity leave.

As someone who served in a Parliament for eight years that did not have any proxy voting or pairing and who saw women have to fly all across Europe to vote, I urge colleagues not to throw away the pairing system. Pairing offers flexibility, especially if somebody is unwell or has an urgent family matter. It is a really useful system. It needs to be more robust. Let us respect it and keep that option on the table.

[Andrea Leadsom]

My hon. Friend is exactly right; pairing has its uses. It is important that any parent on baby leave can choose to have either a proxy vote or be paired, if, for reasons of ill health or reasons associated with being a new parent, they do not feel in a position to make that decision. It is very important that they have the choice.

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

I join others in very much welcoming this important motion and the important step that is being taken. In the interests of keeping up momentum on the issue of reform, does the Leader of the House agree that, although this is a first step, what we really need in order to bring Parliament into the 21st century is electronic voting for all? I wonder whether she might explore that option.

May I ask the Leader of the House one question about the motion? I am sorry, but I have not had a chance to look at it yet. I know the Procedure Committee has suggested that there may be some exceptions where proxy voting would not be suitable in its view—for example, a decision on military conflict. I do not think I agree with it about that, but I am interested to know whether that is attached to the pilot that she is proposing.

[Andrea Leadsom]

I can say to the hon. Lady that this is a temporary Standing Order, and it follows the Procedure Committee’s view. I do not want to get this wrong: I know it will not apply to a closure motion, but it will apply to Government and private Members’ business. I suggest that the hon. Lady looks carefully at the Procedure Committee’s report for the finer details of exactly what is included and excluded.

The hon. Lady will obviously appreciate that the reason for making it a temporary Standing Order is so that the Procedure Committee can look at it after a year and decide, in hindsight, whether it is appropriate in scope, who gets to use it and who provides the proxy. In having such a pilot scheme, we will be able to address any residual concerns about its operation.

[Dr Caroline Johnson (Sleaford and North Hykeham) (Con)]

As many hon. Friends have said, people may wish to have a pair for other reasons, such as ill health or bereavement. The pairing system and its robustness seem to be in doubt, with an hon. Member coming in because they could not trust the pairing system, which is something none of us wishes to see. Will my right hon. Friend look at making this more robust, perhaps by ensuring that pairs are lodged in writing in advance—with you, Mr Speaker, the Leader of the House or whoever is thought to be appropriate—such that if someone votes in error, their vote can be discounted, thus restoring faith in the pairing system?

[Andrea Leadsom]

I think my hon. Friend makes a very constructive suggestion, and I will of course discuss it with other business managers. However, she will appreciate that the pairing arrangements are informal arrangements to accommodate people with a sudden need to be absent and so on. Therefore, as I said in answer to a previous question, there are occasions where the administration of them can break down. This is an extremely difficult thing to be absolutely 100% robust, but I know that the business managers are absolutely committed to making it as robust and reliable as they possibly can.

[Cat Smith (Lancaster and Fleetwood) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to be back in the House and to be speaking because, as is quite topical in this discussion, I have just returned from six months away from this place to spend time with my new baby, Eli, who is up in the Public Gallery with my husband, Eli’s dad, Ben. I just want to thank the Government for honouring the pairing arrangements that they gave me during my six months’ leave. I feel I need to say that because that was not always honoured for all my fellow MPs who were also having babies around the same time.

Much has been said about pairing, and I want to put on the record that, while I thank the Government for honouring my pair, I would much rather have had the opportunity to vote—to vote by proxy—perhaps giving my vote to the MP for a neighbouring or nearby constituency who could cast my vote on my behalf, because I was at home and I was following what was going on on BBC Parliament. I remember watching the debate in September, sitting, with baby Eli on my lap, just as my hon. Friend the Member for Hampstead and Kilburn (Tulip Siddiq) is doing right now. Today, she is watching this on BBC Parliament, with baby Raphael, and she knows what is going on, so if there were to be a Division, she could cast her vote.

I stress to the Leader of the House how important it is that proxy voting goes ahead, because I do not think that pairing alone really brings Parliament into what, let us be honest, is the mid-20th century in terms of workplace rights. If we want to get into the 21st century, we have much further to go as a House.

[Andrea Leadsom]

May I welcome Eli and welcome the hon. Lady back to the House? It is great to see her in her place. I completely understand and empathise with what she is saying, and I am delighted that we are bringing forward this motion.

[Rachel Maclean (Redditch) (Con)]

It is absolutely fantastic news that the House has come together to look at these much-needed changes. I pay tribute to my colleagues all across the House who have spoken about their experiences. My children are too old for this to be an issue for me. In my former life, before coming here, I was a human resources director, and I was the person responsible for writing policies. I say to the Leader of the House that I know how difficult it is to be in the position of writing such a policy—we all have the right intentions, but sometimes there are unintended consequences and all sorts of things that we have never thought about. Please will she pay great attention to the pilot study, with the input of the Procedure Committee and everybody from across the House, so that we get a sustainable, long-term solution?

[Andrea Leadsom]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right to raise the importance of making sure that this is correct. That is why it is a pilot scheme for one year. I am confident that the Procedure Committee will do its job in making sure that we review all the positives and negatives during that period.

[Emma Reynolds (Wolverhampton North East) (Lab)]

I would like to put on the record my thanks to you, Mr Speaker, for your personal commitment to the introduction of proxy voting, as well as to the cross-party effort and, of course, to the Mother of the House for pushing this with the passion with which she always pushes quality issues. Thanks so much to the Leader of the House for laying this motion on Monday.

To reiterate what we have already heard in this debate, I want to say from personal experience that pairing may be an option that people want to choose, but for me it was not enough, because my reputation was questioned in a newspaper in relation to why was I not here and why I had the second worst voting record in this Parliament. I want to say to the Leader of the House that the reason why what she is going to do on Monday by laying the motion is so important—I hope we can get on with using this on Tuesday—is that Members should be able to have babies and have their vote registered. That is why proxy voting is such a massive step in the right direction.

[Andrea Leadsom]

I totally agree with the hon. Lady. I know that, in response to her raising this same issue during the debate we had a couple of months ago, the theyworkforyou.com website agreed to change what it was putting on its website about MPs who are on pairing arrangements because of maternity leave, so that it did not indicate that they were incredibly lazy. All of us expressed our disgust at the way she was treated in the press over that. It was a clear misunderstanding, and I hope that the new arrangements will ensure that will not happen in the future.

[Sir David Evennett (Bexleyheath and Crayford) (Con)]

I am pleased to support the comments of the right hon. and learned Member for Camberwell and Peckham (Ms Harman) and my hon. Friend the Member for Broxbourne (Mr Walker), the Chairman of the Procedure Committee, on which I am privileged to serve. I welcome the Leader of the House’s response today, and I thank her for all the work she has done on this important issue. Today is good news indeed. Does she agree that this place has to keep pace with the modern world and that proxy voting will certainly help with this, although there is much more to be done?

[Andrea Leadsom]

My right hon. Friend is absolutely right. I know he did a job share with one of our hon. Friends who was on maternity leave, and it was very good of him to do that. I think all hon. Members are committed to dragging us into the 21st century, and it is quite right that we do that.

[Ellie Reeves (Lewisham West and Penge) (Lab)]

Last year saw a whole range of events in Parliament to mark the centenary of some women getting the right to vote, and this year marks 100 years since the first woman took her seat in Parliament. I was really proud to take part in a lot of those events last year, and I know a lot of progress has been made. Other Members have mentioned the House of Commons nursery, which enabled me to put myself forward for Parliament. I have placed on record my thanks to those who made that happen, particularly you, Mr Speaker. However, when we talk about wanting to have a more diverse Parliament and we have things such as the nursery, is it not a contradiction that we have not yet introduced proxy voting? Does the Leader of the House agree that it is long overdue, and that if we want to break down barriers to women entering Parliament, we do need to take this very swift action?

[Andrea Leadsom]

I completely agree with the hon. Lady, and that is why we are doing so on Monday.

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

May I perhaps surprise you, Mr Speaker, by suggesting that I think this does not go far enough? I think that if this pilot scheme succeeds, as I hope and believe it will, it will probably pretty soon be extended to people who are unwell, because there are very strong arguments that people who are ill should be able to have a proxy for the same sort of reasoning that correctly underlies this one. However, does the Leader of the House agree that any move to something like electronic voting would be a retrograde step? The reason why we vote in person—there are many reasons why, but one of the principal ones—is that we can get hold of a lot of colleagues, principally Ministers or shadow Ministers, at the same time in the same place every day. That is the reason why we would be cutting our own throats as Back Benchers if we were simply prepared to press a button and leave it at that. Let us do this for the categories that need it, but preserve the rights of Back Benchers to be able to nobble Ministers in the Lobbies, because that is what they need.

[Andrea Leadsom]

My right hon. Friend demonstrates perfectly why some debate was needed before we decided to limit the proposal to baby leave and have a one-year pilot. Some Members argue that proxy voting should have a broader reach and include those who are ill or otherwise incapacitated. Clearly there are different views on how we vote, but those are for another day.

[Several hon. Members rose—]

[Mr Speaker]

I do not wish to promote sibling rivalry, so I call Rachel Reeves.

[Rachel Reeves (Leeds West) (Lab)]

I am the older sister, yet I have been called second today—we will be having words later, Mr Speaker.

I too thank the hon. Member for East Dunbartonshire (Jo Swinson) for asking this urgent question, and the Leader of the House for answering it. May I just check the procedure for Monday? Is the intention to table a motion that we can vote on, or will it be introduced at the end of the day, in which case there is a risk that one Member will shout “Object” and stop the proposal going through? I know that the Leader of the House is trying to do the right thing, but we are all keen to ensure that we have proxy voting in place by the end of Monday.

[Andrea Leadsom]

Having had three kids, I have discovered a very useful piece of information, which I wish now to share with the hon. Lady: the oldest child makes the rules, the second child is the reason the rules are needed, and to the third child the rules do not apply. She is absolutely right to raise this issue. We have debated proxy voting a number of times and want to get on with it, so the plan is to bring it forward for the House to nod through. She is therefore quite right that if somebody objects, I will need to look at further measures, which I will do in very short order. This is the quickest way to get it through. Following that, as you have said, Mr Speaker, you will ensure that the detailed procedures are ready immediately thereafter. That will then need to be signed off by you, the Prime Minister, the Leader of the Opposition and the leader of the Scottish National party’s Westminster team. Once those signatures have been received, it will be possible for proxy voting to take place on the next sitting day.

[Mr Speaker]

I thank the Leader of the House for that useful clarification. For the avoidance of doubt, if it is necessary for me to trog around the offices of the individual party leaders in order to secure those signatures, I shall be happy to do so.

[Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)]

Trog?

[Mr Speaker]

Well, toddle then.

[Douglas Ross (Moray) (Con)]

I wish you well in your toddling endeavours, Mr Speaker, although I hope that is not necessary. I associate myself with everything the hon. Member for East Dunbartonshire (Jo Swinson) said and welcome the excellent announcement by the Leader of the House. I declare an interest, as my wife and I are expecting our first child in just over six weeks’ time, so I might be making an early application. With regard to the one-year trial, how will that work ahead of a birth? I am keen to take advantage of proxy voting post birth, but for those of us who represent constituencies far from London—if I am in the Chamber after 5 pm, I cannot physically get back to Moray until about noon the following day—will there be an opportunity not only to share the first few days of their child’s life, but to be there for the birth?

[Andrea Leadsom]

I am happy to discuss this with my hon. Friend in more detail, but the idea is that the normal rule will apply so that the two weeks of parental leave for fathers under proxy voting would be available from the birth. However, there is equally an expectation that it might be necessary to take that at another time, so that can also be facilitated, under the terms of the Procedure Committee’s report, which I encourage him to look at in detail. He and I can then discuss the matter further.

[Jess Phillips (Birmingham, Yardley) (Lab)]

I am thrilled and associate myself with all the thanks to all the people who have already been thanked many times, including the Leader of the House. I am certain that someone will try to object on Monday, so I am going to drop what has been quite a pleasant and collegiate discussion so far. Would she like to join me in warning that I will personally make a misery of the lives of anyone who comes in here on Monday and objects, based on their patriarchal, paternalistic, draconian and old-fashioned sensibilities? What does she think is the likelihood of this getting through on Monday? I would also like to say that it will not just be me making their lives a misery; it will be me and my feminist army.

[Andrea Leadsom]

What I can say to the hon. Lady is that I absolutely believe her—I do not think anyone would doubt her for a moment. Anyone who is even considering objecting should beware.

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

I welcome this statement. Does the Leader of the House agree that it is right that the absent Member should choose the name of their proxy, rather than the Whips, and that they should have an absolute right to change that name upon giving written notice that they wish to do so?

[Andrea Leadsom]

My right hon. Friend makes a very good point, and that is indeed the intention.

[Alison Thewliss (Glasgow Central) (SNP)]

I am pleased to subscribe to the feminist army of the hon. Member for Birmingham, Yardley (Jess Phillips); I will be a proud member and glad to serve. Will the Leader of the House confirm that if somebody does shout “Object” on Monday, the motion will fall? It is unacceptable that one male Member of this House can override the overwhelming will of everybody else in this place just to get their own way, and on an issue that will not even affect them. Will she give that serious consideration? What will she do to ensure that such Members do not play silly games on Monday night, given that babies are expected sooner rather than later in this place? What else will she do to implement the findings of Professor Sarah Childs’s report “The Good Parliament”, which has been far too long in the implementing?

[Andrea Leadsom]

As the hon. Lady will know, it is for individual Members to examine their consciences and act accordingly. I sincerely hope that all hon. Members will support the motion. It is clear that there is huge support for it across the House. As I have said, in the event that somebody does object, I will look in very short order at what I need to do to bring it back again for the House to reconsider. With regard to Sarah Childs’s report, the hon. Lady will be aware that these matters are not entirely for the Leader of the House: they are matters for the House, and the Commons reference group is a cross-party group. I am always keen to hear from right hon. and hon. Members and would be delighted to discuss it further with her.

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

I hope that I can be counted as a member of the feminist army of my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Yardley (Jess Phillips). When I entered the House in 1979, it was a horrible place to have a family. We had about 19 women MPs and it was totally family-unfriendly. It was miserable. I have a large family. As the House will know, I have three daughters and a son—we had four daughters but lost one—and now many grandchildren, four of whom are granddaughters. When I was a young MP, this place was chauvinist and the atmosphere was both undemocratic and unsupportive of those with families. I am just thankful that an army of women came into this place. I remember the dramatic change in 1997, when more women came in than ever before, and they transformed this miserable place into something democratic and warming, and made it a lovely place to come to work. People forget how the arrival of those women not only transformed our democracy but made our politics more pleasant, and I want to put that on the record. I also want to say that I saw a lot of Speakers who could not have cared less about families, women or equality, but you have championed this, Mr Speaker, and I salute you.

[Andrea Leadsom]

I think that the whole House enjoyed and concurred with the hon. Gentleman’s remarks. He does a very good job of showing himself to be a feminist, and those of us who join that brand of feminist determined to make the House a more modern place welcome his views with open arms.

[Diana Johnson (Kingston upon Hull North) (Lab)]

Today is a good day at the office. Although we are taking a small step forward, it is important. I want to push the Leader of the House a little further on the point that the right hon. Member for New Forest East (Dr Lewis) made about whether, after the pilot of a year, other groups may be considered suitable for proxy voting. I think particularly of people who are seriously ill, perhaps with cancer, and undergoing treatment but who want to register their vote in the House. During the pilot year, could work be done on that, ready for the end of the pilot, to see whether proxy voting needs to be extended further?

[Andrea Leadsom]

The hon. Lady raises an important point. As we have discussed in the two debates and several urgent questions on this in recent months, some people believe that proxy voting should be extended, but nevertheless, there is cross-House agreement that the pilot should be restricted to baby leave, which covers a critical and unique period of life. However, I agree that, once the Procedure Committee’s review is under way, we should consider whether other matters should be included.

[Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington) (LD)]

I welcome the Leader of the House’s statement. It starts to reduce the perception that the mother of Parliaments is frozen in time, although of course, if a Member shouts “Object” on Monday, that perception will be reinforced. Will she join me and others in all parties who campaign for other reforms, such as ensuring that there is adequate seating in the Chamber for all Members, electronic voting and, indeed, job sharing for Members of Parliament?

[Andrea Leadsom]

I am always interested to hear hon. Members’ views. I would be happy to discuss that with the right hon. Gentleman, but he will realise that such change would require the whole House to concur with his ideas for reform.

[Chris Elmore (Ogmore) (Lab)]

I know that the Leader of the House wants proxy voting to happen. I am a member of the Procedure Committee and I say to all Members that procedure is fun—never more so than in recent months.

[Chris Bryant]

You’re sad!

[Chris Elmore]

Indeed, I am sad.

I ask the Leader of the House, in all sincerity, if, as I fear and perhaps she fears, the proposal does not go through on the nod on Monday, how soon will she bring back a substantive motion with a vote? The following day, we are expecting votes on Brexit legislation, which means that my hon. Friend the Member for Hampstead and Kilburn (Tulip Siddiq), who has a new-born baby, could lose out again. I am sure that the right hon. Lady agrees that that is simply not acceptable.

[Andrea Leadsom]

I have certainly made it clear that the hon. Member for Hampstead and Kilburn (Tulip Siddiq) should be able to spend critical time with her baby, and I sincerely hope that she will avail herself either of nodding through, or a pair in the event that proxy voting is not available. However, as I have said, in the event that somebody regrettably decides to object on Monday, I will table a substantive motion as soon as possible.

[Chris Bryant]

As it happens, I do not have children, although I was told categorically by an eight-year-old in Ton Pentre school last week that I have two sons, aged two and six, which goes to show that the internet is not always accurate. Perhaps it was another Chris Bryant.

All my friends in the House who have children say that the most useful thing for them is certainty about when votes will be held and when the end of the day will come. Of late, we have had a lot of Tuesdays and Wednesdays that have gone later than 7 o’clock and votes at strange times, and we do not have any certainty about whether the proposal will be accepted next Monday. I urge the Leader of the House to think again about whether it is possible to have a 45-minute or hour-long debate on Monday, with a vote at the end so that we have a guaranteed chance of getting this through. While we are talking about certainty, many parents are uncertain because there are rumours that there will no longer be a February recess during half-term. Will the right hon. Lady make it clear whether that will happen?

[Andrea Leadsom]

The hon. Gentleman will know that the House has agreed its recess arrangements in February. It is a matter for the House, but I have no plans to change that. I have tabled the motion for Monday and I sincerely hope that it will be successful.

[Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)]

May I be another to congratulate the Leader of the House, my hon. Friend the Member for East Dunbartonshire (Jo Swinson) and all others who have finally succeeded in overcoming the forces of reaction? However, in all candour, doing this on a nod or nothing basis on Monday night simply risks affording the dinosaurs the opportunity to bring the Chamber into disrepute one more time. A 90-minute debate is all it would take and surely there must be availability in Government time for that.

This obviously comes too late for my children. My sons were four years and 10 weeks old when I was first elected, and the modern working environment would have made a big difference to us. However, the guilt and the conflicts do not end when we come back from maternity or paternity leave. There is another good 20 years at least to look forward to in that respect. While we have the wind at our back for once on such issues, can we start looking at other ways in which we can make this somewhere that parents can find their place in the nation’s affairs? That should apply not just to parents who choose to raise their family in London, where the question of whether a vote is at 7 or 8 o’clock will make a big difference, but those who choose to raise our families in other parts of the country, especially in relation to sittings in school holidays.

[Andrea Leadsom]

The right hon. Gentleman makes some serious and well-received points. I agree that it is extraordinarily difficult to be a parent in this place. I reiterate that we need to see what more we can do and that I am always delighted to hear from any hon. Member who wants to discuss specific, constructive suggestions that might carry the will of the House to make us a more family-friendly Parliament. It is vital that we enable more people from more diverse backgrounds, particularly with families, who want to express their views and make the world a better place, to be Members of this Chamber.

[John Woodcock (Barrow and Furness) (Ind)]

The Mother of the House also deserves great credit for the way in which she put forward, as the equality Minister in a former Labour Government, a raft of measures to level the playing field between men and women in the workplace, some of which eventually had the support of my former boss, Lord Hutton. Can the Leader of the House suggest ways in which the House could encourage more fathers of new-borns to take up shared parental leave to level the playing field between male and female MPs?

[Andrea Leadsom]

I would like to think that, when the motion is passed, new fathers in this place will want to be role models for other men throughout the country by taking parental leave and demonstrating the importance of fathers in the lives of their new-borns and in supporting new families. I sincerely hope that all male MPs who have new-borns will take advantage of that opportunity.

[Neil Gray (Airdrie and Shotts) (SNP)]

I commend your efforts, Mr Speaker, and those of the right hon. and learned Member for Camberwell and Peckham (Ms Harman), the hon. Member for East Dunbartonshire (Jo Swinson) and my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow Central (Alison Thewliss) for getting us to this point. I also commend the Leader of the House, who I know has met great resistance from some of her crustier colleagues. We cannot allow those crusty colleagues—we know who they are; the Leader of the House knows who they are—to shout “No” on Monday, so I encourage the Leader of the House to go to them and ensure that much pressure is put on them so that the proposal gets through. I say that as someone who is fortunate in that my son, Finlay, was born in the summer recess, so this would not necessarily have applied to me. Will the Leader of the House explicitly highlight how new fathers will be affected so that we too can take on our responsibilities at home properly?

[Andrea Leadsom]

The hon. Gentleman may know that one of my hon. Friends spoke in one of our earlier debates on proxy voting about timing the birth of her baby in the summer recess. The baby was conceived to be born in the summer recess—fine-tuning the event specifically so that she would not have the problems we have discussed. I absolutely understand the challenges that new families in this place face. The hon. Gentleman asked what will be available to new fathers. It will be proxy voting for the two-week parental leave available to fathers—that is what is proposed for the pilot scheme. For mothers, it will be six months of proxy voting, again in line with the Procedure Committee’s proposals.

[Mr Speaker]

I thank all colleagues and reiterate my thanks to the Leader of the House for her work and commitment, which are apparent to everyone. We are not quite there yet, but we are closer than we were, and we hope that the matter will be resolved on Monday. Let me be the first to say thank you to her from this Chair for what she has done.

Green Deal (Conduct of Home Energy and Lifestyle Management Ltd)

Programme motion: House of Commons & 1st reading: House of Commons
Tuesday 22nd January 2019 Commons Chamber

Motion for leave to bring in a Bill (Standing Order No. 23)

14:20

[Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (SNP)]

I beg to move,

That leave be given to bring in a Bill to require the Secretary of State to review the conduct of Home Energy and Lifestyle Management Ltd in relation to the Green Deal; to require the Secretary of State to report on the merits of a scheme guaranteed by Her Majesty’s Government to compensate persons mis-sold loans under the Green Deal; and for connected purposes.

This private Member’s Bill should not be required. First, it is a consequence of a Government-backed scheme failing. Equally, since the mis-selling scandal became apparent, had the Government accepted the responsibility to investigate and to compensate victims, this Bill would be redundant. To date, however, the UK Government have turned a deaf ear to such calls, so now I stand here having to reiterate the call for a UK Government review. I pay tribute to the work of others who are pressing for such action, both here and at the Scottish Parliament; additionally, to my constituents such as Isobel McNicol, who started an awareness and campaign group on Home Energy and Lifestyle Management Systems—HELMS for short—and campaigner Irene Harris; and to Citizens Advice, particularly Linda Corbett from the Kilmarnock bureau.

As the title of my Bill suggests, one company in particular has been at the centre of the mis-selling activity: Home Energy and Lifestyle Management Ltd, or HELMS. One individual from HELMS, Robert Skillen, brazenly struts about telling everyone that it was nothing to do with him and all the fault of the UK Government. I know that Robert Skillen will be watching or reviewing this debate, and I have one thing to say to him: do not bother looking through Hansard and coming back to me—I am not interested.

Robert Skillen has already appeared on STV’s “Scotland Tonight” programme, with my hon. Friend the Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire North (Gavin Newlands) and my constituent Irene Harris. That night, Skillen convinced no one, and I have now discovered that the very next morning after that TV appearance, he emailed my constituent Irene, looking for her written permission to contact her insurance company on her behalf. Apart from the sheer gall of that, it shows that he has held on to personal details and is surely in breach of data protection laws. Even more alarming is his attempt to masquerade as an expert claims company to help people get compensation for the deals he originally mis-sold them. How many people is he targeting using the personal data that he has held on to?

I will contact the relevant authorities, but that again shows how, had the UK Government taken a lead in investigating the HELMS mis-selling, such antics might have been stopped by now. Considering HELMS was previously fined £200,000 by the Information Commissioner’s Office, that latest activity reconfirms Skillen’s brazenness. I support the ICO call for it to have the power to fine such company directors up to £500,000.

A proper review would flush out Skillen’s claims that he warned the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy of the flaws in the system. That is an audacious claim, because he is either telling the truth, in which case he did not care about the flaws and continued to make money, or it is just further bluster.

I remind the House of the number of those affected, which in turn underlines the need for wider Government action: 4,262 households in the UK have HELMS solar PV green deals, with 3,054 in Scotland and 142 in my constituency; 93% of the green deal loans are in Scotland, with 97% of my affected constituents having loans in the 20 to 25-year range. With such numbers of households possibly affected, further Government action is obviously required.

I will now cover the main failings and use them to set the terms for a Government review aimed at making recommendations with regard to compensation. First, the length of the loans needs to be considered. I can only conclude that such loans were a cynical manoeuvre by HELMS to reduce the annual repayment figure below the predicted first year savings, as per the golden rule.

We are told that the PV panels should last for 25 years. As a civil engineer, however, I have undertaken whole-life costing exercises, and it was normal to allow for mechanical and electrical equipment to be replaced at a maximum interval of 15 years. It therefore beggars belief that HELMS cowboy installations will last those 25 years. Also, long-term maintenance costs need to be considered. Was any of that factored into the golden rule? I have previously stated that the actual savings need to be assessed against the theoretical savings, now that we have the installations to measure that against. That needs to be done on a year-on-year, whole-life basis, not just on that first year. On the expected savings, sadly, enough HELMS examples show that electricity bills have increased, not decreased, so again why are the Government sitting back on such matters?

As well as the adequacy of long-duration loans—the high volume of which should have been a governance red flag—the review should consider the age profile of those taking loans and their ability to pay back in the long term. Spend-to-save projects should have a payback period of a few years, not a quarter of a century.

We need a proper root-and-branch review into the HELMS installations. How many households do not have the building warrants that HELMS was supposed to procure? Those without warrants should be compensated against the retrospective charges that are set in law. How many installations are wrongly wired to the meter or connected to the wrong meters? Remedial action should be taken, also at no cost to the householders. How many people have insulation cladding with no building warrant? Where necessary, intrusive testing should be undertaken to prove it is suitable and, again, any remedial works should be compensated. Given that this was a Government-backed scheme, it is not surprising that so many people were trusting.

That takes us to the hard sales tactics. Again, the Government need to review that and to take proper evidence. Given the use of the Government logo and no money required up front, it is easy to see how unscrupulous salespeople could easily conflate matters to the extent that the installations seemed to be completely free. Some customers might already have had free insulation through the energy company obligation, which of itself could have added credibility to the free concept. Even for the ECO, however, we actually all pay for it via our energy bills, so that shows the risks of the Government pretending that measures are free—just like the free smart meters, which we all actually pay for.

The review should also check aftercare and assess how many installations are correctly insured. My constituent Irene Harris says that her insurance is no longer valid. How many others are there like that, and what are the associated risks? There has been a blasé attitude about the fact that those loans are against the property and are not personal loans as though somehow that means the length of the loan does not matter. Well, it does matter. The Government should see that 20-plus years of outstanding loans, no insurance and no building warrants mean that those houses cannot be sold. People are trapped in houses that might not suit their long-term housing need. The review must identify the scale of that problem.

We need to know how many people have been defrauded of their feed-in tariff. In answer to a parliamentary question from me, the Government confirmed that they do not have that information on whose tariffs have been transferred to a third party. It is vital to find that out and to find ways to prevent Skillen from continuing to profit from such fraudulent transfers. It is undisputable that people did not realise that they were assigning their tariffs over to his other company. Worse, many people claim that their signatures were forged. The UK Government need to get a handle on that and to ensure that victims get ownership of the tariffs.

The Government might argue that an appeal process is in place, but that is inadequate. People need to know that they have been ripped off. They then need to set that out to the Green Deal Finance Company, which might make an offer which is associated with a non-disclosure agreement, which smacks of divide and conquer. Worse, many of those people will not be in a position to assess the merits of an offer made to them, and they will feel further stressed by the whole situation.

Sure, if people are not satisfied, they can appeal to the BEIS Secretary, but that process is so tortuous. The last data I had stated that the Department had only made decisions on two out of 79 appeals and well over half of those had been in the system for nine months or more. That shows the limbo that people are left in. It has taken 15 months for my constituent Irene Harris to receive an offer, one fewer than for the original made by the Green Deal Finance Company. Where does that leave her? It is further proof that greater transparency is needed.

If the Government do not step up to the plate on those matters, we will never know the real extent of the problem. People will continue to discover at a later stage that they cannot sell their homes; many will not get the feed-in tariffs that they should be getting; others will overpay on their electricity bills, possibly for the rest of their lives; and incorrect installations will remain in place. Some of the Government architects of the flawed scheme have been rewarded with peerages and knighthoods. Are those matters what we want the legacy of the green deal to be, or will the Government step up to the plate, support my ten-minute rule Bill, conduct a review and properly compensate the victims?

Question put and agreed to.

Ordered,

That Alan Brown, Gavin Newlands, Patricia Gibson, Dr Philippa Whitford, Drew Hendry, Stuart C. McDonald, Chris Stephens, David Linden, Alison Thewliss, Ben Lake and Ged Killen present the Bill.

Alan Brown accordingly presented the Bill.

Bill read the First time; to be read a Second time on Friday 8 March, and to be printed (Bill 322).

Counter-Terrorism and Border Security Bill (Programme) (No.3)

Motion made, and Question put forthwith (Standing Order No. 83A(7)),

That the following provisions shall apply to the Counter-Terrorism and Border Security Bill for the purpose of supplementing the Orders of 11 June 2018 (Counter-Terrorism and Border Security Bill (Programme)) and 11 September 2018 (Counter-Terrorism and Border Security Bill (Programme) (No.2)):

Consideration of Lords Amendments

(1) Proceedings on consideration of Lords Amendments shall (so far as not previously concluded) be brought to a conclusion at 7.00 pm at today’s sitting.

(2) The proceedings shall be taken in the following order: Lords Amendments Nos. 1 to 11, 13 and 16; Lords Amendments Nos. 12, 14, 15 and 17 to 42.

Subsequent stages

(3) Any further Message from the Lords may be considered forthwith without any Question being put.

(4) The proceedings on any further Message from the Lords shall (so far as not previously concluded) be brought to a conclusion one hour after their commencement.—(Michelle Donelan.)

Question agreed to.

Counter-Terrorism and Border Security Bill

Ping Pong: House of Commons
Tuesday 22nd January 2019 Commons Chamber

Consideration of Lords amendments

Clause 3

Obtaining or viewing material over the internet

14:31

[The Minister for Security and Economic Crime (Mr Ben Wallace)]

I beg to move, That this House agrees with Lords amendment 1.

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Sir Lindsay Hoyle)]

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:

Lords amendment 2.

Lords amendment 3, and amendment (a) thereto.

Lords amendments 4 to 11.

Lords amendment 13.

Lords amendment 16.

I inform the House that the Speaker has selected amendment (a) to Lords amendment 3 tabled in the name of Stephen Twigg.

[Mr Wallace]

After that jovial urgent question on proxy voting, I feel like some purveyor of doom, as the Security Minister, having to break the positive note, for we are dealing here with some of the most serious issues facing our society. At the outset, however, I would like to thank Members across the House for their work to improve the Bill and for their cross-party approach to nearly all parts of it. If our security and counter-terrorism policies are to be successful, they must bring with them as many people as possible.

Many of the Lords amendments follow up on earlier debates on the Bill in this House and accordingly I trust that they will command the support of all Members on both sides of the House. I will focus my remarks on the substantive amendments. Clause 3 updates section 58 of the Terrorism Act 2000 to make it clear that it is an offence for a person to view or otherwise access via the internet information likely to be useful to a terrorist. Although section 58 as currently drafted includes a reasonable excuse defence, the hon. Member for Torfaen (Nick Thomas-Symonds) argued in Committee for greater certainty for those who might have a legitimate reason for accessing terrorist material. The Government had previously offered assurances that those legitimately engaged in journalism or academic research would be covered by the reasonable excuse defence, but to provide further reassurance, Lords amendment 1 makes this explicit in section 58.

Although the designated area offence received widespread support when it was inserted into the Bill on Report in this House, the shadow Security Minister said at the time that it would need further scrutiny in the House of Lords. Their lordships lived up to their role as a revising Chamber and proposed amendments to clause 4. Initially, the Government could not support all of them, but on reflection we agree that they do improve the operation of the new offence. The designated area offence is designed to establish a clear ban on travel to a tightly defined area or areas outside the UK, where such a ban is necessary for the purpose of protecting the public from a risk of terrorism, with a criminal sanction for breaching that ban.

[John Woodcock (Barrow and Furness) (Ind)]

I am pleased that the designated area offence, for which I and others have long been pushing, has survived in some form, but does the Minister not share my concern that some of the get-outs now listed in the Bill could be very easily exploited? For example, how can it be proven that somebody was not going to a designated area to attend a funeral, if that is what they say?

[Mr Wallace]

The hon. Gentleman makes a fair point, but if someone goes to a designated area, their reasonable excuse will have to cover all their activities. If they say they are going as a doctor but also commit a terrorist offence or crime, that reasonable excuse will effectively fall away. Everything they do will have to be covered by the reasonable excuse; they are not de facto lifted out of having committed an offence. It is important to understand that going to a designated area with a legitimate reason, such as aid work, and then engaging in some other activity will not prevent them from being in breach of statute and therefore guilty of an offence.

[Sir Edward Davey (Kingston and Surbiton) (LD)]

I seek clarification. In previous debates, I understood the designated area approach to mean that just being there would create an offence, but in his response to the hon. Member for Barrow and Furness (John Woodcock), the Minister seems to be suggesting that the prosecuting authorities would have to find evidence not just that the individual was there but that they were doing something other than what they said they were doing.

[Mr Wallace]

The original offence always required a reasonable excuse. The right hon. Gentleman will be a supporter of the European convention on human rights. Of course, people have certain rights to travel—to visit family or carry out certain other important activities, for example—and the House would consider the restriction of such activities to be a very serious matter. We have to bear it in mind that people travel legitimately. We are not in the business of drawing a circle around somewhere and saying no one is allowed in. That said, someone would have to have a reasonable excuse and present it so that it can be tested and investigated.

Their lordships have said—and I agree—that there are legitimate reasons for entering war zones. Among others, I am thinking of aid workers and Crown servants working for the UK Government or the United Nations. They would have legitimate reasons for being there, and we do not want to shut those off to people, but we do want to make sure they have a reasonable excuse. As is often the case in legislation, however, there was some concern about whether to have an exhaustive list, and risk missing something, or an indicative list, and we have opted for an indicative list.

Some people are concerned about the delivery of humanitarian aid—an amendment on that has been selected today—but I have made sure that the reasonable excuse of delivering humanitarian aid is tempered by the provision in proposed new subsection (3E) in Lords amendment 3 that

“the reference to the provision of aid of a humanitarian nature does not include the provision of aid in contravention of internationally recognised principles and standards applicable to the provision of humanitarian aid”.

That provision is there because, as we have seen before I am afraid, terrorist groups sometimes use humanitarian aid as cover to go somewhere. Ignoring recognised principles, they pick those to whom they deliver the aid and carry out other offences while doing so. By taking that approach, we preserve the freedoms we believe in while sending a clear message that there are areas we do not want people to go to and that going there could in itself become an offence.

We are all struggling in the west to deal with the emerging threat of foreign fighters as failed state safe areas are becoming the routine. Members on both sides of the House rightly get angry when foreign fighters come back and we cannot prosecute them because gathering evidence of deeper and more complex offences is very challenging. We have looked at the Australian and Danish models and found the designated area offence along with a sunset clause and review—it is not indefinite—to be one of the best ways to send a strong message to our constituents that going off to fight in these places is either a terrorist offence or not to be encouraged.

I do not want young people in my constituency going to fight whether for glory or in the commission of terrorist offences, or for anything else; I want them to realise that, however seductive the grooming on the internet, it would turn into a horror story if they went. Also, we do not want young people going out, being trained in terrorist techniques, coming back and posing a threat. In response to the hon. Member for Barrow and Furness (John Woodcock), I simply say, however, that the offence must reflect the freedoms we hold dear. We instinctively find it a challenge to restrict movement in this country—we do not like it, and why should we? It is a freedom we enjoy.

[Gavin Robinson (Belfast East) (DUP)]

As the Minister will recall, some of the concerns that I expressed during the Bill’s earlier stages turned on the issue of free movement within this country, particularly for UK citizens moving from one port to another. In some cases there had been a casual appropriation of former anti-terrorism provisions whereby no suspicion was required, yet people were challenged and checked as to whether they should be travelling. The Minister honourably indicated that he would engage with me on the issue, and he has done so on two occasions. May I ask him whether he has now formed a conclusion on how we can best protect ordinary UK citizens travelling internally from one port to another, and ensure that they are not being checked under counter-terrorism provisions?

[Mr Wallace]

The hon. Gentleman has made some very valid points. Provisions in schedules 3 and 7 to the 2000 Act relating to intra-UK travel allow people to be stopped and checked without suspicion. I think that one of the best ways in which we can prevent abuse of that tool is to publish figures. I told the hon. Gentleman at a recent meeting that in September I would publish figures showing how many people had been subject to such checks while travelling within the United Kingdom, and I think we can start that process of opening up.

I also think that if any of our constituents are subject to such checks, we must always ensure that the police do their work in a manner which is timely and considerate, and which secures the best results for them and the individual who has been stopped. That is not a matter of legislation, but a matter of handling things sensitively. Perhaps we should also be more efficient when it comes to obtaining information, so that there is time to check people before they leave the country.

One reassuring fact is that the vast majority of checks carried out under schedules 3 and 7 involve people who are returning rather than leaving, so there is less disruption than there is when someone is going off for a holiday, for instance. However, I give the hon. Gentleman an undertaking to ensure that the figures are published in September, and I shall then be happy to discuss the issue with him further.

[Kevin Foster (Torbay) (Con)]

May I briefly return the Minister to the list of reasonable excuses? Will he confirm that it would not be up to the prosecution to prove beyond reasonable doubt that they did not apply, but that a person defending a charge would be required to produce some basic evidence that they did apply?

[Mr Wallace]

Yes. That is important. Someone who claims to be an aid worker or a doctor will be expected to prove that. It is not possible simply to pick one of the excuses and use it as a defence. We should expect it to be necessary for the police to investigate any case in which a person returns from a designated area, to establish either whether that person may pose a risk to the public, or whether they fall outside the offence by virtue of travelling for one of the specified purposes or can otherwise rely on a “reasonable excuse” defence.

[Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)]

If a person from this country were to go to one of the prohibited areas and then come back, would it be automatic for that person to be picked up if he or she had not been given permission to do something there? Is it possible that the security services—which, I presume, fully support this measure—would say, “Let him or her run, because it is more in our interests to watch what they do”?

[Mr Wallace]

As I think my hon. Friend will know, when it comes to intelligence and investigations, such decisions are operational. Should our police or intelligence services suspect that someone has committed an offence but there is nevertheless more to discover, that is a risk that they will have to take. They will take it into consideration and make a decision. Of course, any prosecution under the Crown Prosecution Service must meet a number of thresholds. It must be established, for example, whether the prosecution is in the public interest, or whether there is a likelihood of success. However, if someone does not provide a reasonable excuse, that person is potentially open to prosecution and to being sentenced to up to 10 years in prison.

It is regrettable but a fact of life, given the challenges posed by end-to-end encryption, secure communications, and the ability to obtain evidence from people who we may know from intelligence—but not in evidential space—have been up to no good, that we must seek a way around the current issue. When I attended the G7 in Canada last year, it was clear that every state represented at the table, from Japan to France, faced the same challenges. We must reduce the number of offences of this type, and we hope that the Bill will make a difference. We want it to deliver a strong deterrent to ensure that people are where they are for the right reasons, and to make clear there are other ways to better people’s lives in their communities than going to a designated area for reasons that may turn out to be spurious.

To ensure that the power to designate an area is used proportionately, Lords amendment 5 provides that regulations designating an area will automatically cease to have effect after three years. That will not, however, prevent further regulations from being made to designate the same area should such a designation still be required to keep the public safe from the threat of terrorism.

14:29

In its original form, the Bill extended extraterritorial jurisdiction to four further terrorism offences in order to ensure that individuals could be prosecuted in the UK for crimes committed overseas. During its passage, the Government identified two further terrorism offences to which extraterritorial jurisdiction should be extended, namely the offence of inviting support for a proscribed organisation and the new offence of recklessly encouraging support for a proscribed organisation, provided for in section 12(1) and (1A) of the 2000 Act. Lords amendments 9 and 10 amend clause 6 to that end, while Lords amendment 11 limits the extraterritorial jurisdiction in respect of those offences, and the offence in section 13 of the 2000 Act, to UK nationals and residents. That limitation addresses the concern expressed in the Lords that it would be unjust for a non-UK national or resident to be prosecuted in this country for activity overseas in support of an organisation that was not proscribed in the country where they lived, or where the activity took place.

Lords amendment 13 would require the Home Secretary to establish an independent review of the Government’s strategy for supporting people who are vulnerable to being drawn into terrorism, namely the Prevent programme. The hon. Member for Torfaen has acknowledged the excellent work undertaken under the programme. He and his colleagues in the Lords have argued that it is simply a question of good governance to review regularly whether policies and programmes such as this are working as intended, and are as effective as they can be. Essentially, that is the purpose of the post-legislative reviews that have now been in place for some years.

The review of part 5 of the Counter-Terrorism and Security Act 2015, which provides the legislative foundation for the Prevent programme, is in any event due to take place early in 2020, just 12 months away. Given that, I have decided that the time is now right to initiate a review of Prevent. Communities across the country are behind the policy and are contributing to it because, like us, they want to protect their young people from being groomed and exploited by extremists.

[Stephen Doughty (Cardiff South and Penarth) (Lab/Co-op)]

I am pleased to hear what the Minister is saying, and I commend the work of my Front-Bench colleagues—and those in the other place—who have pushed for it. Does he agree that this is also the perfect time to look at, in particular, the issue of far-right and extreme-right groups? Obviously Prevent already addresses it, and does some excellent work—I have regular contact with my local police force about that—but does the Minister agree that we need to do much more to tackle organisations such as System Resistance Network and Radio Aryan, of which he is well aware, and which spew out hate and bile?

[Mr Wallace]

The hon. Gentleman has been a good campaigner on that issue, which he has brought to the attention of the Home Office on a number of occasions. One of the reasons why I think this is the perfect time to review Prevent is that I truly believe that if the public knew how much it does in respect of the far right, there would be more support for it, not less. It is having significant success. Half the Channel cases involve the far right. The work that has been done over the last two years clearly shows that Prevent is not about a particular group or ideology, but is similar to other forms of safeguarding that are carried out every day by our social workers, teachers and police.

[Stewart Malcolm McDonald (Glasgow South) (SNP)]

As far as I can see, those far-right organisations are winning the hybrid war against society. Will the Minister talk a wee bit about what his Department is doing to curb the extremely dark channels of money that are coming in from around the world and funding far-right extremism here in the United Kingdom?

[Mr Wallace]

Terrorist financing, including of the far-right group that was proscribed 18 months ago, is worrying because actually it is not as high as people imagine. In the day of the internet, people can be groomed and inspired for very small amounts of money. Indeed, the five main terrorist attacks of 2017 cost £5,000 in total. That is the reality of a modern-day terrorist attack and the financing behind it. I do not see much evidence of huge swathes of money funding it; what I do see is growing evidence of the impact of the internet in allowing people to join up who in the past had nowhere to go. They may have been the oddball or odd one out in their village, but they now have the ability to live in a fantasy world, indulge their bigoted beliefs, learn how to make bombs and damage and hurt people, and find kindred spirits across the internet. That is what has given one of the big boosts to terrorism, including far-right terrorism.

[Mr Alister Jack (Dumfries and Galloway) (Con)]

What conversations has the Minister had with social media companies to try to get terrorist material removed from the internet?

[Mr Wallace]

The UK was the first country in the world to set up a counter-terrorism referral unit. It is in the Met police and has taken down over a quarter of a million pieces of material from the internet. It has been around for some years now and has been a great success, very quickly getting on to the internet and content service providers. We have also done extensive work alongside them to get them to improve their response, and we are going to go further: the online harms White Paper, a joint Home Office and Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport document, will be out imminently and in it we have said that we will look at everything from voluntary measures all the way through to regulation. It is incredibly frustrating as the Security Minister to proscribe a far-right organisation only to find that its hateful website or its allies are spouting rubbish and bigotry from, for example, the United States, protected under one jurisdiction. That is incredibly difficult to have to deal with.

[Sir Edward Davey]

I thank the Minister for the fact that the Government are not opposing amendment 13 made by the Opposition parties in the other place; that is very welcome. He was talking about the review he will undertake as a result of that amendment. Can he tell us a little more about the remit and timescale of the review? Perhaps he was about to do that anyway, but it would be helpful to have that on the record.

[Mr Wallace]

We have not formed the terms of reference. The timescale is six months; within that period we will appoint an independent reviewer. I am incredibly happy to take suggestions on that from all parts of the House, from both the Back Benches and Front Benches, and I will be happy to meet the right hon. Gentleman to discuss his ideas. I am pleased that this will give the critics of Prevent the opportunity to produce evidence, because time and again we have to spend time knocking down allegations without any evidence behind them. I will look forward to them producing that evidence as part of the process.

[Imran Hussain (Bradford East) (Lab)]

The Minister is making some very thoughtful comments. Will he accept that any strategy must not further isolate or alienate any minority communities that continue to face an increase in discrimination and hate crimes? It is therefore particularly welcome that the Government have conceded and we are to have this independent review. Will its findings be brought back to this House for scrutiny, as the Minister pointed out?

[Mr Wallace]

The hon. Gentleman is right: this will be a public review and we will be able to debate its results in the House and ask for contributions from colleagues and members of the public and groups alike.

Prevent was started by the hon. Gentleman’s Government and I believe it is on a successful flight path. It has diverted hundreds of people, both on the right and Islamist extremists, from the Channel programme back into the mainstream. It is not perfect; not everyone responds to the work that is done and they have to volunteer into the Channel programme. It is high risk, and Labour will inevitably be sitting on the Government side one day and they will carry that risk as well. It is not perfect, and it is better received in some communities than others. I do not mean that in terms of religious communities; I represent a seat that covers north Preston, in Lancashire and this programme is having very good success in some parts of the country. It is not always delivered as well as it should be, but colleagues from around the House from all parties come to me asking for Prevent co-ordinators, suppliers and community groups, and other colleagues who come with concerns.

It is the right time to do this. I started publishing statistics as Minister as I was keen to ensure they were out. We have done two years of statistics and they show clearly that it is not a mass spying operation; there have been 7,000 referrals compared with 621,000 for safeguarding, child abuse and domestic abuse. Also, the proportion of people diverted out of the programme are the same as in other safeguarding areas and in the last few years over 300 people have received help on Channel and stopped being a concern in the future. That is 300 people who could have posed a very real risk to our constituents, so I am proud of where we have got to, but am also very open to improving it and moving it forward.

[Stephen Doughty]

Programmes like Prevent and Channel are needed because of the grooming the Minister was talking about a few moments ago. I was pleased to hear what he said about the joint work between his Department and DCMS, particularly with regard to online content, because he will be aware that I am very concerned about online broadcasting and online radio stations, particularly Radio Aryan, which has been exposed by BBC Wales, The Mail on Sunday and the excellent work by Hope not Hate. Will the Minister undertake to look specifically at that issue, because it is producing some vile content that will undoubtedly draw people into far-right and extreme right-wing activity?

[Mr Wallace]

The hon. Gentleman makes a good point. In protecting people from being groomed and exploited, we all have concern about three main areas. In communities, we need to make sure that people are not groomed by radicalisers and not seduced once they have latched on to what they have seen on the internet from online preachers or elsewhere. That is why the Prevent programme is there. There is also the question of the cause of what drives people to feel that they are lesser or outside the support of the state, which is why we need to do a lot more around Islamophobia; we must challenge Islamophobia. It is happening; it happens in Lancashire and around the country, and if we do not tackle it as a Parliament and a Government it will give some cause and grievance that will be used to recruit people. We probably all dealt in the past in our inboxes with ridiculous BNP-sponsored emails about veterans getting less than an immigrant, with photographs of soldiers and comments like “This veteran gets nothing, but the immigrant gets more,” which turned out to be complete fiction. We must work on that, and where there is a genuine grievance we must make sure it is not hijacked by those who want to exploit that into terrorism or violent extremism.

There is also the question of the method of delivery of grievance and grooming, which is the internet. We need to make sure that Ofcom works alongside the Government, but it is of course independent and can make its own judgments. Organisations like Ofcom are there to regulate what is being broadcast to us. The last stage is what part of this legislation does—recognise that where legislation is written for broadcasters and the internet, it moves with the times. Often when Ofcom has banned people they have flipped on to Facebook and launched a broadcast channel, without any controls. So we must be much more agile to do that.

[Sir Mike Penning (Hemel Hempstead) (Con)]

I apologise for not being present for the start of the Minister’s speech. I listened carefully to what the Minister said about how little money there is, but it is plainly obvious that money is being moved around. Some of this terrorism is coming back from organised crime, particularly in the Province of Northern Ireland. While we look at the technical stuff and the nitty-gritty of what goes on to prevent terrorism like that in Londonderry the other night—the bravery of our police and armed forces and security services is there to be seen—the explosion did take place and we need to do more to prevent such explosions.

[Mr Wallace]

My right hon. Friend knows about these challenges from his own experience. In some parts of Northern Ireland terrorism is entirely ingrained in organised crime, with the money and control of the community organised crime seeks to exert. The Criminal Finances Act 2017, which I took through the House about two years ago, brought in measures that will be very useful for combating illicit finance, whether it is being used to finance terrorism or organised crime. That legislation is being extended to cover Northern Ireland, which will allow us to get to grips with some of the godfathers who have helped to fund that terrorism in the first place.

14:59

I look forward to working with the hon. Member for Torfaen and with the rest of the House to get the review of Prevent right. I also look forward to ensuring that the offences in this part of the Bill help to empower our law enforcement and security services to deal with the growing threat of safe spaces abroad. We must send a strong message to those who wish to travel to become foreign fighters that they should not do so and that there are alternatives, such as Prevent, that can help to divert them away from committing those offences, but that if they do commit them, they will be caught and sent to prison.

[Nick Thomas-Symonds (Torfaen) (Lab)]

I am grateful to the Security Minister for his opening remarks, and for his tone and the consensual approach he has taken. We most definitely do not agree on everything, and we have robust exchanges across the Dispatch Box, but we try to work together constructively on these serious matters whenever we can. I am grateful to him for accepting Lords amendment 1 to clause 3, which has caused controversy in the past. The clause deals with a situation in which it was previously illegal to download these terrible recruiting videos but not illegal to stream them. We have to have a situation in which both are illegal. We cannot have a situation in which watching something later on is illegal but watching it at the time is not. This has been difficult to deal with, and there is no perfect way to capture it in legislation.

As the Minister knows, I was also concerned about the three clicks approach, and I am pleased that the Government have dropped it. Dropping it has not, as some suggested, led to a situation in which one click could lead to an offence being committed. The Bill sets out clearly that anyone inadvertently clicking in that way would not be covered by the offence. I was concerned that the reasonable excuse defence mechanism went put on to the face of the Bill, particularly in relation to journalists and academics, and I am pleased that the Government have now accepted those concessions. It is clear that in the years ahead we will have to look at precisely how the clause works in practice, but it is important to send a clear message that streaming these terrible videos is equally as awful as downloading them and watching them later on.

On designated areas, the Security Minister quoted what I said in the Commons because this measure was introduced at a very late stage and I was unable to have that discussion with him in Committee. We do not oppose the overall aim of dealing with so-called foreign fighters, but the clause needed significant work. Again, I am pleased with the work that has been done and I pay tribute to my Labour colleagues in the Lords and those of other parties there who have put in the work and time to improve the clause. I am also grateful to the Minister for accepting the changes.

There was originally a non-exhaustive list of reasonable excuse defences on the face of the Bill. This has essentially been taken and carved into the law itself, so that people do not commit the offence in the first place if they have a particular purpose for travelling. That was important for two reasons. First, someone with a perfectly legitimate reason for doing something would inevitably have been stopped, and would have been able to raise the reasonable excuse defence only further down the line. It is therefore much better in principle that they do not commit the offence in the first place. Secondly, the last thing anyone in this House wants is to deter people with a perfectly reasonable motive from going to areas of conflict. Aid workers are an example, and I know that the Chair of the International Development Committee, my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, West Derby (Stephen Twigg) has tabled an amendment on that.

For completeness, Lords amendment 3 states that the offence is not committed if one or more of the purposes of the visit is to provide

“aid of a humanitarian nature…carrying out work for the government of a country other than the United Kingdom…carrying out work for the United Nations or an agency of the United Nations…carrying out work as a journalist…attending the funeral of a relative or visiting a relative who is terminally ill…providing care for a relative who is unable to care for themselves”.

That is not meant to be an exhaustive list.

In addition, the reasonable excuse defence is maintained. This relates to the amendment tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, West Derby. The reason is that if no exception is already carved into the law and the purpose of the visit is not included in the list, it could none the less appear as a reasonable excuse defence. In an intervention on the Minister, the hon. Member for Torbay (Kevin Foster) talked about a burden in these cases. With the reasonable excuse defence, there is of course a burden on the defendant to raise it, but the burden to disprove it lies with the prosecution. In the carve-outs in the law that I have suggested, however, these people would not be committing the offence in the first place.

I want to press the Security Minister on how exactly this is going to work in practice. As he knows, there are two models around the world: the Australian model, which I think the sunset clause has been taken from, and the Danish model. The way the Danish model works in terms of not committing the offence in the first place involves an extensive system in which people obtain licences before they go. That is not without its problems, because journalists sometimes like to travel to certain areas without advertising the fact that they are doing so, so I am not suggesting that this would be a silver bullet or a magic solution. However, there will presumably have to be a system whereby we can show clearly that someone has not committed the offence in the first place, as against those situations in which there might be a reasonable suspicion that an offence had been committed and in which the reasonable excuse defence was raised later. Any details from the Minister on how this will work would be appreciated.

The other Lords amendments on these issues are also important. They include the introduction of a sunset clause for the statutory instruments to designate particular areas so that they cease to apply and have to be replaced. This will ensure that the Government regularly make the case to Parliament if they wish to continue with a designation in the long term. Lords amendments 7 and 8 relate to two additional concessions. Lords amendment 7 provides that the Government have to make a statement outlining why they believe an area needs to be designated at the same time as they lay the relevant statutory instrument. Similarly, Lords amendment 8 states that when the Government revoke a designation, the change must be subject to the negative resolution procedure in Parliament in case anyone wishes to object to it. Taken together, the amendments produce a much better clause in relation to the designated areas. It will allow the Government to tackle the problem of so-called foreign fighters, of which we are all conscious, but it now does so in a more balanced, fair way, without deterring those who wish to travel to areas of conflict for perfectly honourable and legitimate reasons. No one in the House would wish to prevent them from doing that.

There are three other broad themes to the amendments in this group. The first relates to extraterritorial jurisdiction, which the Minister will be aware I have raised before in a slightly different context. The Government added extraterritorial jurisdiction to the offence of inviting or recklessly expressing support for a proscribed organisation, and concern was expressed about that by the Joint Committee on Human Rights. The Committee was concerned that the extension of extraterritorial jurisdiction to certain offences was problematic when there was no equivalent offence in the country involved. The safeguard will now ensure that extraterritorial jurisdiction applies only if the offence was committed by a UK national or UK resident. That is in line with what the Joint Committee recommended, and I welcome that change.

Turning to the independent review of the Prevent strategy, I genuinely welcome the Security Minister’s acceptance that a review is required, and I give credit to the shadow Home Secretary, my right hon. Friend the Member for Hackney North and Stoke Newington (Ms Abbott), who has argued for one for some considerable time. As the Security Minister knows, I have visited Prevent programmes across the country, including in south Wales. My hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff South and Penarth (Stephen Doughty) also raised the issue of far-right terrorism, which this House must be conscious of and take action on.

My argument about the independent review of Prevent is that there is a concern that its aims may end up in conflict with or become slightly confused between intelligence gathering, what I would call the more welfarist or safeguarding aspect of Prevent, and community cohesion. There has been an issue around community cohesion, because the facilities that are available to local authorities, for example, are an important part of that. I have had conversations in which it was clear that the pressures on local authority services are really affecting Prevent’s ability to deliver.

There are also aspects or parts of our society—in fairness to the Security Minister, he pointed this out himself—that have lost faith in the programme, and it is time to look at that. We need a programme in which everyone can have faith. None of us wants to see people living a life of violence and hatred that is driven by these kinds of ideologies. We all want to prevent people from doing that, but let us do so in the most effective way. From our conversations, I am hopeful that the Security Minister will be keen to have a wide-ranging review that can deal with such issues.

While I am on the subject of Prevent, I know that the competition to become the new independent reviewer of terrorism legislation has now closed to applications, and I hope that someone new will be appointed soon. I hope, too, that the Minister will be receptive to suggestions about how exactly to construct this independent review, so that we can have the most robust and reliable conclusions possible and, if necessary, make appropriate changes.

Lords amendment 16 is another sensible amendment, relating to bank accounts or terrorist’s bank accounts. There was an issue in the law as originally drafted in that the account would have to be in the name of a particular person. Of course, that did not take into account the fact that people can have control of other people’s bank accounts by their behaviour, and it is important that that was covered in the legislation as well.

Taken together, all the Lords amendments make this legislation far better, and it is pleasing that we end the passage of this Bill on a note of significant consensus.

[Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP)]

I echo the comments of the hon. Member for Torfaen (Nick Thomas-Symonds) about the consensual approach taken by the Government during the passage of this Bill and about the concessions already made during earlier stages, including on the likes of the three-clicks provision. As the Scottish National party has said since this process started last June, we welcome the Government amending this important legislation and appreciate the need to combat the constantly evolving threat from international terrorism in the modern age. However, we must be extremely careful how that is executed, and any new powers must be subject to stringent checks and safeguards if we are to maintain a healthy balance of security and civil liberties.

I will deal with the amendments in fairly short order lest I repeat many of the points already made by the Labour spokesman today or points that either of us made during earlier stages. The SNP welcomes the amendments—the improvements—made to the Bill in the other place and, as an SNP Member, I say that through gritted teeth. However, most of the amendments made in the other place were argued for in one way or another by the hon. Member for Torfaen and myself throughout the passage of the Bill in this place. None the less, I am pleased that the Government have dropped their opposition to many of the additional safeguards, and I hope the Minister is as generous in his treatment of the Crime (Overseas Production Orders) Bill on Report and Third Reading next week.

15:14

As we have heard, clause 3 extends section 58 of the Terrorism Act 2000 to make it an offence to view or access material online of the kind likely to be useful to a person committing or preparing a terrorist offence. Such offences are subject to a reasonable excuse defence which, as has been outlined, includes situations in which a person did not know and had no reason to believe that the material that they had accessed was of such a nature. However, Lords amendment 1 is in line with the amendments tabled previously and would provide that a person who views or possesses such material for the purposes of carrying out work as a journalist or for academic research would have a reasonable excuse defence. We may still be criminalising the innocent curious, and there are potential issues with social media and online algorithms that may push content an individual’s way, but we welcome the further protections afforded by the amendment.

Clause 4 provides for a new offence of entering or remaining in a designated area overseas. Again, the offence is subject to a reasonable excuse defence. Lords amendments 2 to 8 seek to introduce several safeguards to the operation of the new offence. In particular, Lords amendment 3 provides that a person does not commit an offence if they enter such an area involuntarily or for providing humanitarian aid, satisfying an obligation to appear before a court, carrying out work for the Government of another country or the UN, working as a journalist, and attending a funeral of a relative, visiting a relative who is terminally ill, or providing care for a relative, all of which are reasons that the SNP can support.

However, at Third Reading on 15 January, the Government were sympathetic to exempting peacebuilding, saying that they consider peacebuilding to constitute a reasonable excuse and suggesting that it could be added in the future if needed. For the record, the SNP supports the amendment tabled by the hon. Member for Liverpool, West Derby (Stephen Twigg), but if the Minister will not accept it, will he confirm for the record that the Government consider peacebuilding activities to be a reasonable excuse for travel to designated areas and that they are therefore exempt from this clause despite not being on the list? Will he commit to confirming that in the policy guidance accompanying the Bill?

Few policies are so watertight as to be beyond review, and that particularly applies to legislation that is as far reaching in its implications as this Bill. The Prevent strategy has proved controversial—far more so south of the border than in Scotland—but the Scottish Cabinet Secretary for Justice, Humza Yousaf, has said that there is much better community engagement in Scotland, citing the police relationship with mosques as a positive element. I am not saying that everything is perfect in Scotland when it comes to the implementation of the Prevent strategy—far from it—but there are lessons to be learned. The delivery of Prevent in Scotland benefits from the positive relationships fostered with our communities that have been built through years of regular engagement. We recognise that communities are our greatest ally in ensuring that our people are safe. Of course, none of this is perfect, but the review should seek to look at what best practice exists across the UK, and I welcome the fact that the review extends to Scotland.

The Minister and others may recall from an earlier stage of this Bill that I spoke of meeting a deeply impressive young detainee at Medway Secure Training Centre. She turned out to be Safaa Boular, now 18 years old, who has been convicted of terrorism offences and given a life conviction after a chaotic home life and online radicalisation. We all accept that no prevention scheme can stop all potential radicalisation, but we must ensure that we do a lot better in that effort than we have up to now, and we owe it to the vulnerable and the young, who are more susceptible to radicalisation, to do just that. It is vital that the review is not watered down by the Government.

[Mr Wallace]

rose—

[Gavin Newlands]

I am not saying that the review will be watered down in any way, but I will give way to the Minister on that point.

[Mr Wallace]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman. I would not like him to think that we ordered the review because we do not think that the strategy is safeguarding people. He refers to the fact that we must do much better based on his meeting with Safaa Boular, who by the way was convicted of planning a proper terrorist plot, no matter how nice she may have been in the detention centre. The reality is that the strategy has safeguarded hundreds of people away from violence and has been proving a success, so I would not want him to leave an impression that it has not. Of course, I agree that, like all schemes, it does not work for every single person, but it has had considerable success in all our constituencies.

[Gavin Newlands]

I do not dispute anything that the Minister has just said, but there is a huge clamour for review because of the inadequacies of the Prevent strategy, as seen by many in the community. His points about the terrorist plot, and so on, are well made, and I do not dispute them for one second. I am not arguing that Safaa Boular should not have been punished or put in prison; my point is about the fact that she was radicalised in the first place.

Yes, we need legislation that gives the police everything they need to fight serious crime and terrorism, but the Government should bear in mind that this Bill is, in many respects, deeply controversial. They must get it absolutely right, and that will be impossible without a full, independent review—that review has been hamstrung by the Government before it starts. I ask that the Opposition be consulted on the terms of reference, to which the right hon. Member for Kingston and Surbiton (Sir Edward Davey) alluded earlier, and on the timescale for that consultation.

[Stephen Twigg (Liverpool, West Derby) (Lab/Co-op)]

I rise to speak to amendment (a), in my name, to Lords amendment 3. Two years ago, in the space of just six months, we saw five terrorist attacks here in the United Kingdom: the Westminster attack, Manchester Arena, London bridge, Finsbury Park and Parsons Green. Those attacks killed 36 people and remind us all of the very real and continuing threat of terrorism here in the UK. Indeed, we were reminded of it again just last weekend by the latest terror bombing in Northern Ireland.

We know there are people living in fragile states across the world who face this threat daily. Last week, we saw the appalling attack in Nairobi, which killed 21 people, and in western and central Africa, we have seen the appalling terrorist activities of Boko Haram, notably in Nigeria. Earlier this month, more than 9,000 people had to flee Nigeria for Cameroon after such an attack.

The whole House is united in our condemnation of terror, in extending our condolences to all those who have lost loved ones to terror and in our debt of gratitude to the emergency and security services. These appalling acts, both here and in other parts of the world, underline the need to update existing powers to respond better to the threat of terrorism in the modern age, which is why I support the Bill.

I am grateful for the changes that have been secured, and I pay tribute to the Labour Front-Bench team, particularly my hon. Friend the Member for Torfaen (Nick Thomas-Symonds), to the shadow Home Affairs team and to others on both sides of this House and in the House of Lords. The Bill’s consideration has served to make significant changes that have improved the Bill. I particularly welcome Lords amendment 3, tabled by my noble Friend Lord Rosser and agreed by the Lords, and my amendment (a) relates to that amendment.

As has already been explained, the Government’s original approach was to introduce a “designated area” offence to give the Home Secretary the power to designate all or part of a country as forbidden to UK nationals and residents. If an individual is charged with the offence and they are not able to prove that they have a reasonable excuse for entering or remaining in the designated area, they could receive a sentence of up to 10 years in prison. The only original exemption was for Crown agents, and there was wide concern that that could have unintended consequences for a number of categories of people, including United Kingdom citizens who work as aid workers.

Lords amendment 3 was made to reverse the burden of proof by introducing a number of specified purposes that are excluded from the scope of the new offences. I absolutely accept the urgent need to tackle the real issue of so-called foreign fighters, but in doing so, it would be wrong to have the unintended effect of deterring people with perfectly legitimate purposes from travelling. The amendment refers to those working in the humanitarian field and to journalists, which is a truly significant improvement in protecting UK nationals who have legitimate reasons for travelling abroad. I am particularly concerned that, without this amendment, there might not be sufficient protection for aid workers and for the organisations that employ them, which could have a devastating effect on the provision of vital humanitarian aid.

Non-governmental organisations, led by BOND—British Overseas NGOs for Development—have been urging this House to accept Lords amendment 3 because it exempts individuals involved in the provision of aid of a humanitarian nature. In December 2018, the chief executives of 22 organisations signed a statement calling on the Government to introduce an exemption for aid workers and others with a legitimate reason to travel to a designated area.

I am delighted that the Government, on reflection, are content with Lords amendment 3, but the purpose of amendment (a) is to urge the Minister to go a little further and add a number of additional specified purposes. Lords amendment 3 refers to those working to deliver

“aid of a humanitarian nature”.

I am concerned that, defined narrowly, this could unnecessarily limit the activities that are considered legitimate, which is why my amendment would extend that list. First, it would cover work on a development project or programme. That could be a long-term programme to deliver health or education, or one that promotes women’s economic empowerment. Secondly, and importantly, it would cover work on a peace-building project or programme. Peace building is defined by the United Nations as:

“A range of measures targeted to reduce the risk of lapsing or relapsing into conflict by strengthening national capacities at all levels for conflict management, and to lay the foundation for sustainable peace and development.”

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

My hon. Friend raises an important point. Churches often go on aid missions and peace missions, so it is important that we get the legislation right because otherwise, as he says, it could have unintended consequences. Those are two important points.

15:30

[Stephen Twigg]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Church and other faith-based organisations are often involved in peace-building activities.

I will give some examples of the sorts of things that could be covered by peace building. It could include mediation and dialogue activities to negotiate local ceasefires or broker peace talks, support for local communities to strengthen early warning schemes or civilian protection efforts and initiatives to deal with the legacy of violence and promote social cohesion so that peace is built. DFID’s single departmental plan has as one of its five objectives strengthening global peace, security and governance, and DFID seeks to spend about half its investment in fragile states. In November last year, the Department doubled the UK’s commitment to the United Nations Peacebuilding Fund as part of a long-term strategy to build global peace and prosperity by tackling the underlying causes of instability.

[Bob Stewart]

In my experience, a Department such as DFID will sometimes send in a project team to do peace building or peace making, or to build a hospital. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that we might also have to consider bodyguards, because a private military company might be involved in protecting DFID’s people when they go into a war zone? Has he considered that as part of his amendment?

[Stephen Twigg]

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. Aid workers—whether directly employed by DFID or other donor countries, or employed by other non-governmental organisations or private contractors—require security arrangements in precisely the sorts of countries that we are discussing. That is an important part of the aid effort, and therefore it is, as he suggests, covered by my amendment.

My concern is that the term “aid of a humanitarian nature” does not explicitly include such peace-building programmes. I fear that without a clear exemption, there is a risk that peace building could be at the mercy of interpretation on what constitutes a reasonable excuse. This is a relatively low-profile area of international activity, so I think there is a risk that it may not be widely understood. I note that, as the SNP spokesman rightly said, on Third Reading in the other place Earl Howe for the Government said:

“In the absence of such an exemption the Government are clear that entering and remaining in a designated area for the purpose of engaging in peacebuilding would constitute a reasonable excuse.”—[Official Report, House of Lords, 15 January 2019; Vol. 795, c. 141.]

That commitment is welcome, but I think the risk remains that were such a case to come to court, juries might not have a full understanding of peace building and might not understand it to be covered by the concept of humanitarian activity. I do not think anybody in this House would want the Bill to have the unintended consequence of deterring NGOs from going into conflict areas or post-conflict areas. I urge the Minister, if he gets the chance to do so in responding to the debate, to give a commitment to the importance of peace building. Ideally, he will do so, as per my amendment, by adding this activity to the list of specified purposes. Alternatively, he could make it explicitly clear today that peace keeping is covered by the term “aid of a humanitarian nature”, and he could reflect that in the policy guidance.

Finally, let me refer to human rights monitoring. Rightly, the Bill now refers to

“carrying out work as a journalist”

but my amendment seeks to extend the provision to cover those who are undertaking human rights monitoring or advocacy. The United Nations defines human rights monitoring as seeking

“to gather information about the human rights situation in a country or region over time through readily available methods, with the goal of engaging in advocacy to address human rights violations.”

That is dangerous and incredibly important work. Without human rights defenders on the ground, injustices too often go unchallenged, and the most marginalised and vulnerable people have little protection from abuses of power. Those who work in the field of human rights monitoring and advocacy often put themselves in grave danger to shine a light on the abuse of power. I believe they have a right to know that when they are conducting that important work, they have protection in UK law that recognises their legitimate reasons for travelling to such designated areas.

I finish by saying that although it is fundamental that we strengthen our legislation to tackle terrorism, it is important to ensure that when we do so, we do not inadvertently undermine the very values that terrorists seek to attack. We have a proud record as an open, outward-looking country that does not turn away when it witnesses injustice. It would be sad if the Bill had the unintended consequence of limiting the contribution of our own citizens to development programmes, peace building and human rights monitoring in some of the world’s most fragile states. Although I will not press my amendment to a Division, I hope that the Minister will consider the points that I and others have made about this and will, even at this late stage, consider accepting my amendment.

[Sir Edward Davey]

It is a real privilege to follow the hon. Member for Liverpool, West Derby (Stephen Twigg). Had he pressed his amendment, I would have voted for it. I agree with everything he said in his general remarks and with what he said about the real challenge being to balance security and the need to tackle people who threaten our way of life with the protection of the values that make our way of life. He made that point specifically by building on the progress that we saw made in the other place with Lords amendment 3, which is very welcome, and I hope the Minister will cover that point in his response to the debate.

This House should thank Members in the other place because, as we heard the Minister say, they strengthened the legislation in several areas. They particularly strengthened it in respect of concerns that I and others had about civil liberties and freedoms, to make sure that innocent people were not inadvertently caught by some of the new offences that will be created. Lords amendment 1 in particular makes it absolutely clear—to be fair to him, I think the Minister had this in mind—that journalists and people doing academic research will have extra special protections.

We have talked about Lords amendment 3, but Lords amendment 13 on the review of the Prevent strategy—I intervened to ask the Minister about it—is really welcome and will support the Prevent strategy in its objectives. Both today and when we have discussed the matter before, the Minister has rightly said that there are a lot of good things about Prevent, and I agree with him. One of my concerns, which was why I supported the case for a review, was that some of the people who criticised Prevent gave valid criticisms, which I hope will be taken on board during the review, and others made the point that whether or not Prevent was doing the right work and whether or not it was successful, it had lost the trust of some communities. I hope the review will support the work that the Government rightly want to do by rebuilding trust. The review can play a positive role in the meeting of the objectives that I think we all share in this House.

One issue that did not find favour in the other place relates to something the Minister said about proscribed organisations. My colleagues in the other place wanted to see whether there could be a relatively regular review of the list of proscribed organisations. Indeed, Lord Anderson, who is well known and has huge experience in this policy area, said he believed that at least six of the organisations on the proscribed list really should not be there. I hope I can tempt the Minister to say, if he feels able to, whether a process of review of proscribed organisations already goes on somewhere and, if not, whether he would favour one, either specified in the Bill or dealt with outside it. I hope he will look into that, because it would be helpful and welcome.

In closing my brief remarks, let me just say that it is good that the Government have either agreed to accept the amendments made in the other place or to come forward with concessions.

[John Woodcock]

Far be it from me to be a discordant voice in this House, but I have real concerns that the House of Lords have not strengthened the Bill and may have fundamentally weakened parts of it, particularly in respect of the terror travel ban, which, as I said earlier, I have been campaigning for the Minister to adopt for well over a year.

I do not know whether you have had a chance to see the British satirical film “Four Lions”, Madam Deputy Speaker, but it recounts the exploits of four hapless British wannabe jihadis from my home city of Sheffield who are determined to wage jihad. The film opens with one of them getting an invitation to attend a wedding in Pakistan. He knows full well that there is no such wedding, and in fact he and his friend are going over there to be part of a jihadi training camp in the Pakistani mountains.

Although that film is fiction and satire, that excuse is commonly used by people who are overwhelmingly suspected of going over to areas with high levels of jihadi activity to train as foreign fighters, with the potential to then bring that training, knowledge and extremism back to British shores. The whole point of the designated area offence was to make that more difficult. I fully endorse the push of my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, West Derby (Stephen Twigg) to get official recognition for aid workers and journalists. I recognise that there would be a total outcry if someone who verified themselves as a legitimate journalist or aid worker were captured by this legislation. I find it almost impossible to concede that that would happen if they were in fact genuine, but if the measure does give reassurance to development agencies and to members of the fourth estate, I can understand it and agree that it is a good thing.

However, I have real concerns about the list of family excuses, which will surely prove incredibly difficult to disprove once they have been stated. Now that they are up in lights in the Bill, it will become that much harder to bring any prosecutions, and that much harder to deter people from travelling to become foreign fighters, which is, of course, what the legislation is intended to do. It is supposed not to catch people once they are there, but to deter them from travelling in the first place. Clearly, I am in an unusually small minority in this House in expressing that view, but I fear that we will come to rue agreeing such wide-ranging and easy-to-fake excuses in the Bill, and we may need to return to it in future months and years.

Finally, let me just say a word on the review of Prevent. It is of course right that any Government should seek periodically to review flagship parts of any policy. Certainly, in the critical area of preventing extremism and preventing terrorism gaining a grip in our own communities, I very much hope that this review is carried out and is understood in the spirit of remaining robustly in favour of the overall goal of Government, which is to be able to find ways to intervene to stop extremism taking hold. We need a dispassionate analysis of how, in its working, Prevent is able to recognise and potentially to call out the attempts to undermine the programme, which go beyond legitimate concerns, but are, in fact, tools of the very extremist organisations that would fill many young people and British citizens with the hate and terror that can lead to them going abroad to fight jihad, or, in the worst case, bringing terror on to British streets.

[Mr Wallace]

With the leave of the House, I will respond to the points of hon. and right hon. Members. First, let me address the amendment. The hon. Member for Liverpool, West Derby (Stephen Twigg) made a passionate and well-articulated case for adding peace building to the list of reasonable excuses. His example is at the heart of the challenge—peace building is most needed in fragile states, but it is in fragile states that foreign fighters emerge and safe spaces are constructed for that very reason. Effectively, the two sides of this challenge are summarised by peace building. It is therefore important to say that, first, the list is indicative. As long as I have been in this House, there has been debate about whether we have judicial discretion and about not doing too much in primary legislation. Lawyers in this House will be well used to that. The more comprehensive the list, the less room there is for judicial discretion. With no list, there is judicial discretion; holes are found, and we become subject to a different interpretation by judges every time. The word “indicative” is key. This is an indicative list. The major reasons listed are the headline reasons why the vast majority of people go to these places. They are clear, but still broad enough to cover most of the areas that concern us.

15:45

Top of the list of subsection (3B) is obviously paragraph (a)—

“providing aid of a humanitarian nature”.

There are numerous definitions, both at the UN, and no doubt within our own Department for International Development, where humanitarian aid is defined in law, whereas peace building has a broader interpretation. I know that my hon. Friend the Member for Beckenham (Bob Stewart) has been a soldier on a peace building mission. I have been a soldier on operations, where you peacebuild with a gun in your hand. So it is a broad definition. I believe that the indicative list plus “reasonable excuse” should give the hon. Member for Liverpool, West Derby the comfort that peace building—as Earl Howe said in the other place—would be recognised as a reasonable excuse. Peace building would be viewed as a reasonable excuse. But of course, like all the issues listed here, the “reasonable excuse” would have to be proffered and then proved—proved by the prosecution, who would have to prove that someone was not a doctor, or that someone’s idea of peace building was not peace building.

Interestingly, the hon. Member for Barrow and Furness (John Woodcock) used the example of the “Four Lions” film, which is actually tragic rather than a comedy. The tragedy is in the waste of life and so on. When the characters go out for the wedding, they do not go to a wedding. It would not be a hard excuse to disprove; I do not think they actually attended a wedding. It is qualified within the list. The “reasonable excuse” would have to be tested by the prosecution.

[Bob Stewart]

So, if a person wishes to go to a designated area, that person should, perhaps on Foreign Office advice, be told, “That is a designated area; you need to declare it.” If that person declares it prior to his or her going, that is good. If they do not declare it, and they go there and are picked up on the way back—it might be a mistake, but it might not—is that what the Minister anticipates might happen?

[Mr Wallace]

The decision that we took around this offence is that it is not a permission—something that you obtain in advance. As the hon. Member for Torfaen (Nick Thomas-Symonds) pointed out, in the Danish system one effectively gets a licence. The problem with that is that people just get a legitimate licence, and then go and carry out their other mission. It is also administratively burdensome. It also becomes a barrier to travelling for those who are doing so for a genuine reason, because they would have to check in with the state beforehand. We are proposing that people can go, but that if we have a suspicion that they have been doing something, we will test their “reasonable excuse”, and if the “reasonable excuse” fails, they will be guilty of the offence. We believe that to be the best way.

The hon. Member for Torfaen said that journalists would not be able to advertise where they were going. Many are based in theatre and do not know where they are about to go. They might be based in Lebanon and choose to visit—as some have—foreign fighters in detention in Syria. We shall not set up a permissions system; it is simply that you will have to declare it.

To clarify, the list of specified purposes is an exhaustive, not an indicative list, but there is power to add to the list by regulation. To give some reassurance to the hon. Member for Liverpool, West Derby, let me say that we will review the operation of this in conjunction with the Department for International Development and the Foreign Office, to see how it works, and we will of course be open to adding to the list if there were such issues as he represents. I am confident, however, that genuine peace builders would have a reasonable excuse and would not, therefore, be subject to the committing of an offence.

To give the hon. Member for Barrow and Furness some reassurance let me say that these excuses do not exempt a person from committing the offence if all their reasons for being out there are not covered by the “reasonable excuse.” You cannot say, “On Monday I am a peace builder; on Tuesday I am a terrorist.” That will not exempt you from that offence. You have to be there specifically and entirely for a reasonable excuse.

[Stephen Twigg]

I thank the Minister for his response, particularly for what he has said about the potential for review and the ability perhaps to make additions at a later stage. I also thank him for speaking into the record what he has just said about genuine peace builders, which is immensely helpful. I understand that some sort of policy guidance will be issued once this Bill is enacted. May I encourage his Department to look at the reference to peacebuilding in that policy guidance?

[Mr Wallace]

I would be delighted to look at that. I also remind the hon. Gentleman that the Crown Prosecution Service has a role in this. It will test not only the validity but the interest of prosecuting in this area. We do not risk people being wrongly prosecuted by organisations not being on the list as it is, by the time the process has been gone through. While the individuals may not be totally au fait, the prosecutor will be, as will the judge who will test the proposition of the prosecution. I do believe that we should be confident about that. However, I give the hon. Gentleman the undertaking that I will keep it under review.

The hon. Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire North (Gavin Newlands) made a good point about best practice. My experience of visiting Prevent around the whole of the United Kingdom is that it is better received in some areas and better delivered in others. It is absolutely the case that Prevent works very well in some areas, depending on the different communities and who the Prevent champions and community leaders are. He made very good points about community cohesion in Scotland. We are, absolutely, happy to look at that to see what lessons are to be learned. At the heart of his point, he is absolutely right—best practice is going on. I do not want us to throw out Prevent because of a few failing examples, or examples that do not actually exist when tested. We need to build on it and show where it is a success, and we must not be frightened to say, “Look, it is working”, if that is what the reviewer decides. But of course it can be improved. We improve Contest every few years. We do not hold that the Contest strategy overall is absolutely stuck, and therefore we make sure that we move it on.

The right hon. Member for Kingston and Surbiton (Sir Edward Davey) talked about proscription. He will know that Lord Anderson made this suggestion. I met former Lord Chief Justices and a number of Members of the House of Lords on the issues. The Lords, including those on the Labour Front Bench, rejected the amendment. It is quite easy to request that an organisation is looked at and de-proscribed. It only takes a letter from someone to say, “Will you consider de-proscribing this organisation?” In doing so, they are effectively immune from being prosecuted. If they say, for example, “I do not think this organisation should be proscribed because I support it”, and send the letter in, the process starts. That is already open to people.

However, the legislation around proscription is not as straightforward as some people think. We often proscribe groups overseas. In fact, since I have been Security Minister, we have de-proscribed groups that I had frankly never heard of until we did so. They were way overseas somewhere. For example, we de-proscribed one of them so as to assist peace building in a country that was a fragile state so as to allow that process to progress. It is not as straightforward as I think some in the House of Lords had thought it was going to be. A lot of the proscription legislation came around the time of the Northern Ireland Good Friday agreement. We should be mindful about what automatic de-proscription, or automatic reviews, may unlock not so far away.

It is important that we reflected on the issues. We rejected the proposal as there is a solid mechanism already in place whereby people can ask to de-proscribe and call for a review. That is why the House of Lords rejected it, and we are not going to seek to replace it here.

Lords amendment 1 agreed to.

Lords amendments 2 to 11, 13 and 16 agreed to.

After Clause 16

Persons detained under port and border control powers

[Mr Wallace]

I beg to move, That this House agrees with Lords amendment 12.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)]

With this it will be convenient to consider Lords amendments 14, 15 and 17 to 42.

[Mr Wallace]

This group of amendments relates to the new port and border powers in schedule 3 to the Bill to tackle hostile state activity, as well as to the existing counter-terrorism ports powers in schedule 7 to the Terrorism Act 2000. I will focus my remarks on the substantive amendments.

During the passage of the Bill through this House, the hon. Member for Torfaen (Nick Thomas-Symonds) has pressed the Government on whether there is an alternative to the power exercisable in exceptional circumstances for a police officer to be in the sight and hearing of a consultation between an individual detained under schedule 3 and their solicitor. While the Government were clear that safeguards were needed to prevent the right to consult a solicitor from being abused, thereby potentially putting lives at risk, the hon. Gentleman argued that such a provision would undermine the principle of confidentiality of consultations between lawyer and client.

On Report in September, I undertook to consider the issue further. Where there are concerns about a detainee’s chosen solicitor, Lords amendments 35 to 37, 39 and 40 would allow a senior police officer to direct that the individual consult a different solicitor. In practice, that is likely to be the duty solicitor. This provision is modelled on the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984—PACE—code H and reflects the suggestion made by the Law Society in its evidence to the Public Bill Committee in June last year. The change will apply to persons detained under both schedule 3 to the Bill and schedule 7 to the 2000 Act. I hope that the hon. Gentleman will agree that this change adequately addresses the concerns that he raised.

Lords amendment 25 provides for a procedure to enable the urgent examination of a detainee’s property, including confidential journalistic or legally privileged material, in cases where there is an imminent threat to life or significant injury, or where there is an imminent threat of a hostile act being carried out. In such cases, the police must be able to act with immediate effect and, consequently, the usual process whereby any such examination must be approved in advance by the Investigatory Powers Commissioner cannot apply.

These Lords amendments to schedule 3 would instead allow an examining officer, with the approval of a senior officer, to examine a detainee’s property before a decision has been made by the commissioner. Under this exceptional procedure, authorisation would be required to be given or withheld by the commissioner or a judicial commissioner after the event. Where the commissioner withholds authorisation, he would have the power to direct that the property be returned and that information taken from it, including copies, is not used and destroyed.

As with the existing process provided for in the Bill, the commissioner’s decision will be taken after consideration of any representations made by affected parties, and there will also be an opportunity to appeal that decision where it has been delegated to a judicial commissioner. That approach is consistent with the Court of Appeal’s judgment in the case of Miranda, where the Court recognised that there might be a need for

“post factum oversight in urgent cases”.

Further details of the process for examining retained property, including where it contains confidential material, will be set out in the schedule 3 code of practice, which must be debated and approved by both Houses before the provisions in schedule 3 can come into force. These Lords amendments improve the provisions in the Bill, and I commend them to the House.

At present, the schedule 7 code of practice requires that an individual examined under schedule 7 is informed of their rights on first being detained. There is analogous provision in the draft schedule 3 code of practice. The Joint Committee on Human Rights suggested that this protection for detainees is sufficiently important that it should be provided for on the face of the Bill and not left to a code of practice. The Government were content to accept the Joint Committee’s recommendation, and Lords amendments 33, 34 and 38 provide for that.

Lords amendments 41 and 42 respond to a recommendation from the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee. The Committee argued that the regulation-making power in paragraph 53 of schedule 3 is too widely drawn. Under that power, the Home Secretary must specify additional categories of persons with whom information acquired by an examining officer may be shared. The Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee pointed out that this regulation-making power places no limitation on the categories of persons who could be specified for those purposes, including an organisation in the private sector. Lords amendment 41 narrows the schedule 3 regulation-making power so that it can be used only to specify persons carrying out public functions, and Lords amendment 42 makes a similar change to the Terrorism Act 2000. I commend these amendments to the House.

15:59

[Nick Thomas-Symonds]

I again welcome the approach that the Security Minister has taken in reaching consensus on these matters.

First, and this is a very important principle, in this Bill we have maintained and preserved the right to receive legal advice in private. It is a very important principle and, as the Security Minister knows, I pressed him on it at a very early stage of and throughout the proceedings on the Bill. There was a concern either that someone who had been stopped and detained would use the ability to contact a lawyer to communicate the fact that they had been stopped—in other words, to contact someone who was not a lawyer—or, alternatively, that a genuine lawyer was contacted but that the lawyer would then somehow, inadvertently or otherwise, pass on information about the stop. I pressed the Minister on the solution that is now in the Bill at quite an early stage about a kind of duty solicitor scheme that could deal with both of those concerns, but also ensure that we preserved the very important right of legal advice in private. I am pleased that we have reached this stage on the Bill and that the Government have made that concession.

I now turn to a set of Lords amendments, starting with Lords amendment 14, on the urgent procedure for retaining and copying property at the border. I have looked at the Court of Appeal judgment in the David Miranda case. As the Minister says, the judgment, at paragraph 96, identified that there is

“no provision for authorisation by a court or other independent and impartial decision-making body in a case involving journalistic material prior to the use of the Schedule 7 power or, in an urgent case, immediately after the obtaining of the material pursuant to the exercise of the power.”

I fully accept that there are going to be very urgent situations, and this is expressed in terms of an imminent threat of loss of life or of injury. I am pleased to hear what the Minister has said about the code of practice, which we can look at in due course. I previously suggested that there could be situations where a decision maker was available at the end of a telephone line, but I appreciate that there will be truly exceptional cases. The key to this is that, while I fully accept the law needs to be brought into line with what has been suggested in the Miranda case, we have to understand that these must be truly exceptional cases. That is something we can set when we come to debate the code of practice, being very clear that in these particular circumstances there will have to be a genuine, imminent threat that needs to be dealt with. Again, however, bringing the law into line with what the Court of Appeal has suggested is, on the whole, to be welcomed.

I want to speak to two other sets of Lords amendments. I will start with Lords amendments 17, 19, 26, 28 and 29 on the definition of hostile activity. The difficulty is that if this is defined purely in terms of criminal activity, that does not capture other types of hostile espionage activity, which may not necessarily bring into play parts of the criminal law. I did think that there was a danger of this being drawn too broadly, and I am pleased that these amendments narrow the definition, so that when we talk about threatening the economic wellbeing of the UK, we have now added

“in a way relevant to the interests of national security”.

The key is to ensure that we have the powers we need while also being precise about what we consider “hostile activity” to be. It is a welcome amendment that improves the Bill.

Finally, Lords amendments 41 and 42 relate to information sharing. Schedule 3 provides that an officer questioning someone at the border can hand over information to appropriate bodies, as decided by the Secretary of State. I think that narrowing the provision to bodies exercising public functions is to be welcomed, but I have regularly made the point to the Minister during the passage of the Bill that bodies such as local authorities will need the appropriate resources, expertise and support to handle the information, particularly when it is likely to be highly sensitive.

Taken together, I think that the Lords amendments that I have spoken to, covering the four themes I have referenced, make the Bill a better and more effective piece of legislation, although I am keen to engage with the Minister when the codes of practice to which he referred come before both Houses.

[Gavin Newlands]

The House will be relieved to hear that I intend to be even more succinct in my comments on the provisions pertaining to port and border control powers. We have again seen positive movement in this area.

Despite the best efforts of the hon. Member for Torfaen (Nick Thomas-Symonds) and myself, when the Bill reached the other place it restricted access to a lawyer for those detained under schedule 7. Specifically, it restricted an individual’s right to consult their legal representative in private, away from a relevant officer. As I and other Members have said at every stage of the Bill’s consideration, the ability to speak to a legal representative in private is a fundamental right that should not be infringed. Indeed, as the Minister outlined in oral evidence to the Public Bill Committee, both the Law Society of Scotland and Law Society of England and Wales have reinforced that point. Richard Atkinson stated in evidence that the UK’s criminal justice systems have an excellent reputation but that their very

“cornerstone is legal professional privilege…not access to a lawyer”.––[Official Report, Counter-Terrorism and Border Security Public Bill Committee, 26 June 2018; c. 30.]

We therefore very much welcome Lords amendments 12, 15, 35 to 37, 39 and 40, which ensure that that right is protected. Our preference would be for anyone detained under these powers to be able to consult legal representatives of their choosing, but I have heard the Government’s case for the power to require a detainee to consult a different solicitor and, although I would prefer not to have that provision, I completely understand the rationale behind it. I only hope that the power is not abused to ensure lesser representation.

On that note, we also very much welcome amendments 33, 34 and 38, which confirm a detainee’s right to be informed of their rights, which will now be in the Bill rather than simply in the draft code of conduct.

We also welcome Lords amendments 17, 19, 26, 28 and 29—I am not used to having so many Lords amendments, Madam Deputy Speaker. As the hon. Member for Torfaen said, the narrow definition of “hostile act”, so that it is an act that threatens the UK’s economic wellbeing, qualifies only if it

“is relevant to the interests of national security”.

We on the Scottish National party Benches are well known for standing up for civil liberties and human rights, but we do understand that keeping people safe and secure is the primary function of government and fully support our services having the appropriate powers to keep us safe. We therefore support an expedited process for retaining and examining property and confidential material where there is an immediate risk of death or serious injury, or of a hostile act being carried out. That relates to Lords amendments 18, 25, 27 and 30 to 32.

I am sorry to have to mention Brexit so close to the end of our considerations, but it will potentially have a huge impact on the effectiveness of much of this legislation. One of the greatest threats to our national security and counter-terrorism capacity is Brexit and the risk of losing seamless access to multilateral information-sharing tools. Terrorism and organised crime will continue to operate after 29 March without care towards the UK’s membership of the EU—I see that the Minister is delighted by the mention of Brexit. Yet without Europol, Police Scotland will no longer have access to information systems, support and expertise that help make Scotland, the rest of the UK and Europe a safer place. We cannot risk having arrangements that dilute the access that we currently have, and any new arrangements must consider Scotland’s distinctive criminal justice system in order to provide a continuing basis for the direct co-operation that currently exists between law enforcement agencies in Scotland and their counterparts. If we have not made provision to keep our policing effective outside the EU, how can we expect Prevent and everything that has been discussed today to work even after a review?

I thank the hon. Member for Torfaen and the Minister for the manner in which the Bill has been debated throughout its passage and I look forward with joy unconfined to dealing with them again next week on the Crime (Overseas Production Orders) Bill.

[Sir Edward Davey]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire North (Gavin Newlands). He tempts me to talk about Brexit—[Hon. Members: “Go on!”] In relation to security and counter-terrorism, of course, Madam Deputy Speaker. I share his concerns that that has not been dealt with adequately. The political declaration is far too weak on the subject and that concerns me. If we got that right, it would go much further than the Bill can.

On border security, which the amendments cover, I was slightly amused that some of the points I made on Report, about which the Minister was not happy, had been dealt with in the other place. I pay tribute to my noble Friend Lord Paddick, who, in discussions with the Minister in the other place, clarified a point in the legislation in a very helpful way. I am grateful to the Government for conceding that point. I was concerned about the Bill’s definition of hostile activity to include anything that threatened the United Kingdom’s economic wellbeing. Although I clearly do not want anyone to threaten the United Kingdom’s wellbeing, it seemed a broad and unspecific definition. Some people would say that Brexiteers threatened the United Kingdom’s wellbeing, but I do not want to take that too far because that would be controversial. However, I was pleased that the Government have now qualified the provision with,

“in a way relevant to the interests of national security”.

That may well have been the original intention, but the Bill did not say that. That is why we raised the matter and I am pleased that the Government have seen fit to move on that.

I say gently to the Minister that if we are serious about border security, law is important, but we must have enough Border Force guards. I am worried that we do not have enough people to ensure that our borders are as safe and secure as the House wants. That resource point should not be missed as we legislate.

[Mr Wallace]

With the leave of the House, Madam Deputy Speaker, I will respond.

I am pleased that the hon. Member for Torfaen and I have managed to find a way that accepts his points about ensuring that people have legitimate legal representation, but finds an alternative when the state has concerns that there could be abuse. There will be a code of practice and until it is approved by both Houses, law enforcement officials will not be able to use schedule 3. There will be a public consultation and I am happy to discuss matters with him so that we can ensure that we clarify any further areas about which people may be concerned.

The hon. Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire North (Gavin Newlands) made several points. One reason for discussing hostile state activity is what happened in Salisbury last year. There are hundreds of declared and undeclared foreign intelligence officers in the UK who seek to harm this country. They seek to undermine our values, corrupt our people and our news, carry out espionage and do us serious harm. None could be more serious than what happened in the Salisbury attack, where Novichok, a nerve agent banned by law, was used on our streets. That ended in a tragic death—the murder of a British citizen. That is outrageous and something that we did not really see even in the cold war. We should recognise that while the traditional barriers of the cold war and the 1980s are long gone, even more states are committing hostile acts every day, and we need the powers to deal with that.

16:15

[James Cleverly (Braintree) (Con)]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that it is important that as a society—not just as a Government and a House—we make it clear that the norms of international behaviour that we impose on ourselves are not universally accepted? The willingness to deploy both poisons such as Novichok and fake news, lies and so on might seem beyond reality to us, but is the norm for other regimes in the world. We have to be prepared to deal with such regimes and to push back against them.

[Mr Wallace]

My hon. Friend makes a strong observation about the rest of the world. Now is not the time for us to abandon our belief in the rule of law and, indeed, in the maintenance of our freedoms. In fact, we defeat others by leading by example. As he rightly points out, however, when we are faced by such adversaries, the challenge for any Government is to navigate their way through, to keep people safe while upholding their belief in the values and freedoms that we enjoy in the United Kingdom and maintaining the rule of law.

The stops—the powers under schedules 3 and 7—have been around in the terrorism space since 2000. They are strong powers, and they are limited by being used only at the border. Their use is not open to normal police officers going about their normal business. We do that to ensure that we maintain the freedoms in our society, while at our vulnerabilities, such as at borders, we have that extra layer in order to deal with—

[Sir Mike Penning]

Will the Minister give way?

[Mr Wallace]

No, I will press on to the end. I do not think that my right hon. Friend has been in the debate.

It is important to deal with issues as we look at the legislation. The right hon. Member for Kingston and Surbiton (Sir Edward Davey) used the B word, although I had hoped to get through the whole debate without using it. One of the delights of being the Security Minister is that in the world of intelligence sharing and of law and order, Brexit has often been kept at bay. However, the right hon. Gentleman has raised the issue, and we have taken steps to deal with it through private conversations with Ministers from around Europe and the European Commission and through the withdrawal agreement in the deal, which got us access to nearly all the things that we have now. That is why I was, and am, in favour of the deal—security is incredibly important.

We have recruited hundreds more people in order to strengthen the border and to deal with anticipated changes as we get there. The Government are taking that seriously, and we will plan to deal with it. However, it is at our borders that we will be most vulnerable, which is why this new power will help the police and intelligence services at least to keep our borders safer than they are now. That will not change, whatever our relationship with Europe. The hostile-state power will be for our domestic intelligence services and police, and whether we are in or out of Europe, half in or half out, or whatever we are, this power will be a welcome one that they are willing and wanting to use.

[Julian Knight (Solihull) (Con)]

Obviously, the B word is my favourite word at the moment. On information sharing, does the Minister agree that although we are leaving the EU, we are not leaving Europe? We will be a good neighbour as far as security and information sharing are concerned as we move forward into the future.

[Mr Wallace]

Within the remit of the Bill, we should remember that intelligence is the preserve of the nation state and will continue to be so. That has not changed and will not change. Contrary to what Sir Richard Dearlove, the head of MI6 at the time of the Iraq war, said in a letter that he put out last week, we managed to be full members of the Five Eyes and NATO at the same as we were full members of the European Union, so I do not believe that that will be lessened, whatever our status. We will still be members of the Five Eyes and NATO, whatever our relationship with the EU post 29 March. That is why the Bill is pitched correctly. It deals with the threats we have faced, the lessons we have learned from terrorist attack and from the hostile-state attack by Russia last year, and we are only as good as the lessons we learn. That is why the Bill is important in giving us the powers that we need.

In closing, I thank the Bill team, who have put up with their Minister wanting far too many changes, for helping me to deliver the sort of collaborative working that I used not to see, I am afraid, when I was in opposition a long time ago and for producing a Bill that I think most of the House regard as a good place to be. I am also grateful to their lordships for improving the Bill and to Her Majesty’s Opposition, the Liberal Democrats and the Scottish National party for their changes to the Bill. Thanks to those changes, we have a Bill that truly will help to bring people together and deliver better security.

I also thank the hon. Member for Torfaen for putting up with my struggling pronunciation of his constituency—I hope I got it right, but my Welsh is very poor—the right hon. Member for Kingston and Surbiton and the hon. Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire North (Gavin Newlands). I thank, too, the hon. Member for Barrow and Furness (John Woodcock) for his helpful suggestions and his campaign on the designated areas. He was part of their inspiration, so he can carry some of the blame if it turns out in a few years that they do not work. [Laughter.] I will take some of the blame; so can he.

Finally, I also thank my hon. Friend the Member for Redditch (Rachel Maclean), who performed gallantly as my Parliamentary Private Secretary through Committee, and our usual channel, the Lord Commissioner of Her Majesty’s Treasury, my hon. Friend the Member for Blackpool North and Cleveleys (Paul Maynard). I also thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker, the Speaker and the other Deputy Speakers for steering the Bill through the House.

Lords amendment 12 agreed to.

Lords amendments 14, 15 and 17 to 42 agreed to.

Business without Debate

Tuesday 22nd January 2019 Commons Chamber

Delegated Legislation

Motion made, and Question put forthwith (Standing Order No. 118(6)),

Exiting the European Union (Customs) (Guernsey)

That the draft Crown Dependencies Customs Union (Guernsey) (EU Exit) Order 2018, which was laid before this House on 26 November, be approved.—(Jeremy Quin.)

16:22

Division 299

Ayes: 302

---

Conservative: 290
Democratic Unionist Party: 10
Independent: 1

Noes: 263

---

Labour: 217
Scottish National Party: 29
Liberal Democrat: 10
Plaid Cymru: 3
Independent: 2
Green Party: 1

Motion made, and Question put forthwith (Standing Order No. 118(6)),

Exiting the European Union (Customs) (Isle of Man)

That the draft Crown Dependencies Customs Union (Isle of Man) (EU Exit) Order 2018, which was laid before this House on 26 November, be approved.—(Jeremy Quin.)

16:38

Division 300

Ayes: 304

---

Conservative: 292
Democratic Unionist Party: 10
Independent: 1

Noes: 263

---

Labour: 216
Scottish National Party: 29
Liberal Democrat: 10
Plaid Cymru: 3
Independent: 2
Green Party: 1

Motion made, and Question put forthwith (Standing Order No. 118(6)),

Exiting the European Union (Customs) (Jersey)

That the draft Crown Dependencies Customs Union (Jersey) (EU Exit) Order 2018, which was laid before this House on 26 November, be approved.—(Jeremy Quin.)

16:53

Division 301

Ayes: 304

---

Conservative: 293
Democratic Unionist Party: 10
Independent: 1

Noes: 262

---

Labour: 215
Scottish National Party: 30
Liberal Democrat: 10
Plaid Cymru: 3
Independent: 2
Green Party: 1

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

I remind the House that this vote is subject to double majority voting, first of the whole House, then of constituencies in England.

Motion made, and Question put forthwith (Standing Order No. 118(6)),

Education

That the draft Higher Education (Fee Limits For Accelerated Courses) (England) Regulations 2018, which were laid before this House on 29 November 2018, be approved.—(Jeremy Quin.)

17:06

Division 302

Ayes: 301

---

Conservative: 289
Democratic Unionist Party: 10
Independent: 1

Noes: 223

---

Labour: 217
Liberal Democrat: 2
Independent: 2
Green Party: 1

Motion made, and Question put forthwith (Standing Order No. 118(6)),

Exiting the European Union (Intellectual Property)

That the draft Intellectual Property (Exhaustion of Rights) (EU Exit) Regulations 2018, which were laid before this House on 27 November 2018, be approved.—(Jeremy Quin.)

17:23

Division 303

Ayes: 303

---

Conservative: 292
Democratic Unionist Party: 10
Independent: 1

Noes: 266

---

Labour: 218
Scottish National Party: 29
Liberal Democrat: 11
Independent: 3
Plaid Cymru: 3
Green Party: 1

Motion made, and Question put forthwith (Standing Order No. 118(6)),

Capital Gains Tax

That the draft Double Taxation Relief and International Tax Enforcement (Austria) Order 2018, which was laid before this House on 3 December 2018, be approved.—(Jeremy Quin.)

Question agreed to.

[Mr Charles Walker (Broxbourne) (Con)]

On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. During the urgent question on proxy voting and baby leave, I saw you standing behind the Speaker’s Chair, taking a keen interest in the announcement that the House was moving forward in the matter. Was that out of personal interest, or the wider interests of the House and its Members?

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

That is the most interesting point of order I have ever been asked in my life, and I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for asking it. First of all, he is absolutely right in having noticed my presence in the Chamber—of course I cannot sit on the Benches when Mr Speaker is in the Chair, but a very important matter was being discussed.

I should make it absolutely clear that my personal interest in proxy voting or baby leave is historical. That is probably rather obvious, but it as well to make the point. I am one of those who dealt with giving birth to my son when there was no such helpful support from the House, the House authorities or anyone else for that matter. I therefore have every sympathy with those who are going through such matters at present. My son was born one week after the 2001 general election, and that was not easy to navigate, because there is no such thing as maternity leave on election day.

The hon. Gentleman was right in the latter part of his point—my interest now is general. It is very important that we make this House work as a reflection of the society that we represent throughout the whole country. That means understanding that producing the next generation is an important and necessary duty, which has to be done by women at the same time as they are doing other things. I am very grateful to him for having noticed my presence, because I thought I was invisible. I should say, while I am waxing lyrical, which I should not be from the Chair, that the hon. Gentleman and his Committee have done a wonderful piece of work on this important matter.

I apologise for the delay. We now come to the petition.

Green Deal Scheme

Tuesday 22nd January 2019 Commons Chamber

17:39

[Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP)]

Apology accepted, Madam Deputy Speaker. I was pleased to hear your comments on that very important issue.

Nearly 300 households in my constituency have been affected by the utterly shameful mis-selling by Robert Skillen’s company, Home Energy and Lifestyle Management Systems—or HELMS, as it is better known—all carried out under the umbrella of the UK Government’s green deal scheme. Far too many people were tricked into signing away their solar energy feed-in tariffs to HELMS’s sister company, PV Solar. In fact, many have not signed them over yet, but PV Solar still collects the tariffs. There is a host of other issues, which I do not have time to go into this evening, but they were outlined by my hon. Friend the Member for Kilmarnock and Loudoun (Alan Brown) when he presented his ten-minute rule Bill earlier today. Suffice it to say that the Government’s response thus far has been utterly woeful and must improve.

The petition states:

The petition of residents of Paisley and Renfrewshire North,

Declares that the Government-backed Green Deal Scheme has adversely affected residents of Paisley and Renfrewshire North both financially and psychologically; further that many residents have, in good faith, invested their life saving or accrued several thousands of pounds of debt to pay for work that was carried out by companies approved by the Green Deal Scheme; further that in some cases the work including the installation of insulation and of solar panels, was incomplete; further that some were sub-standard and in many cases residents were given incorrect information which led them to believe that they would save or make money when in fact they have simply lost money; and further that in other cases the installer did not apply for building warrants and as a result they are unable to sell their properties, or have the peace of mind that their homes are safe to live in, or that the insurance policies residents continue to pay are valid without a building warrant.

The petitions therefore request that the House of Commons urges the Government to compensate financially and protect people who have found themselves suffering in this way after signing up to this Government-backed scheme using Government-approved installers.

And the petitions remain, etc.

[P002301]

Pupil Referral Units

Tuesday 22nd January 2019 Commons Chamber

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—(Paul Maynard.)

17:42

[Chris Green (Bolton West) (Con)]

Pupil referral units perform excellent work in my constituency and across the country in complementing mainstream schools. There are two in my constituency, Youth Challenge and Lever Park, and both are run by Bolton Impact Trust. When I met the trust recently, I was made aware of how vital these units are to the pupils who rely on them and how fantastic they are at delivering the service and support they do to those pupils. Both were rated outstanding in their last Ofsted inspections.

It was a particular delight when I visited to hear of the relationship that Youth Challenge had with local business. It is an important fact about these units that often the experience of children is in vocational work and training and that often those are the kinds of careers they go into once they have finished school, whether that is at age 16 or 18. That transition into mainstream employment is very important. The close relationship that the unit has with local business is very good for local businesses, which increasingly understand the value that these children can contribute to their businesses, and also sets a positive direction of travel and gives the children the opportunity and vision to move into good and productive jobs once they leave education.

The services provided by Bolton Impact Trust really do make a difference. That can come in the form of 1:1 teaching support, which a teacher in a mainstream school, perhaps with a class of 30 or so pupils, cannot provide, but it does others things as well. There is one simple, straightforward thing that it does. Teachers often sit with children at lunchtime, and that engagement between adults and children can produce a useful environment that is more relaxed than a formal classroom setting. It also reinforces the support that referral units give to families. Mums and dads often have a very challenging time. Bringing up any children obviously has its challenges, but the support that these units can give by introducing more stable adult figures to children’s lives is very important.

There is concern about funding, as was confirmed by my visit to Bolton Impact Trust. As the Minister will know, the dedicated schools grant is split into four notional blocks, but I want to focus on the high needs block.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

The hon. Gentleman has raised a vital issue. Given the importance of helping children who are ill, pupil referral units are an essential tool to retaining access to education that is specifically tailored to them. Should that not be protected at all costs?

[Chris Green]

I agree with the hon. Gentleman. Different schools and different parts of the educational structure serve different groups of children. The work done by referral units and, more widely, by specialist schools is very important, and ought to be protected. There will always be a need for these units, and they ought to be reassured that support will continue. Many of the people who work for them are very specialised and highly trained, and we must maintain that continuity in order to maintain that talent.

High needs funding is essential in helping to meet the educational requirements of pupils. The cost of those additional needs can be as much as £10,000 a year, £6,000 more than the normal average of £4,000. As the Minister is no doubt aware, local authorities determine the budgets for referral units and specialist schools on the basis of the number of places that are required before commissioning those places at £10,000 per place per annum, regardless of whether they are taken up.

In that context, it is important to recognise the difference between specialist schools, where there is a certain continuity, and referral units, where the intake can be slightly more erratic. If a place is taken up, the local authority funds a top-up on a daily and weekly basis. That funding model works very well for specialist schools. They normally experience less in-year movement of pupils, which means that forecasting income is comparatively straightforward. The situation in referral units is much more volatile. For example, in September there were 170 pupils on the roll in Bolton, but by the following June the number had risen to 260. There can be a stark contrast between the numbers at one point and the numbers at a later stage.

We need a responsive system. Because specialist schools have a longer-term relationship with children, there tends to be far more clarity about who will be in those schools, and hence more clarity about access to funding. Moreover, the main aim of referral units is to support pupils so successfully that they are able to return to mainstream schools, and an unfortunate consequence of that success is that a unit will lose between £12,000 and £14,000 per pupil per year. The current funding model provides no incentive for a referral unit to deliver successful outcomes. They will of course be focused on delivering successful outcomes, but there is a clear challenge in the funding model. Certain costs, such as for the building and the staff, are permanent regardless of the number of people in the unit, but the income can significantly vary over a period of time. Would it not make more sense to have a funding model that did not disadvantage referral units for successful outcomes, rather than one that could be seen as an incentive to units keeping hold of children? PRUs that are doing very good work, perhaps better than average, must not lose the money that is coming to them more quickly than the average, because that would be a disincentive.

In addition, there is no consistency in how local authorities determine the level of top-up funding for PRUs, and more broadly for specialist schools, when additional funding is required to support challenging behaviours. Often PRUs are unable to determine the level of a pupil’s needs until they have worked with them for a few weeks. At that point, with the pupil’s needs being met, it can be a challenge for the PRU to obtain additional funding from the local authority because the placement has already been made, and naturally, local authorities who are under a great deal of financial pressure, having decided to give a certain amount of funding, would find it challenging to give more funding; there would be resistance to that.

Does the Minister agree that a system which provided greater consistency and security of funding, whereby services are commissioned in a manner which allowed schools and academies to predict their income accurately, would deliver a better service for pupils? That would also lead to a reduction in the degree of friction between local authorities and providers, and allow greater emphasis to be put on educational standards, rather than needing to focus on volatile funding. Often in units much of the management time is spent on asking, “How do we get the money in? How do we get the funding in? How many meetings do we have? How much pressure do we have to apply?” That time ought to be focused more on the needs of the unit itself.

PRUs provide a vital service both locally and nationally, but we must focus on how we can reward units for success. The units in my constituency have been remarkably successful and are deserving of their outstanding status. How can we remove the financial penalty I have described? What steps can the Minister take to address the concerns of referral units and deliver more consistent funding in such an important part of children’s education?

17:53

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education (Nadhim Zahawi)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Bolton West (Chris Green) on securing this important debate. He speaks from experience of his local PRU and the work it does with the local community, businesses and of course families to deliver good outcomes. I am aware that Bolton Impact Trust has been in discussion with the Department about the funding issues and I will write to my hon. Friend on that.

Alternative provision can offer a lifeline to some children and their parents, such as through smaller classes and more tailored support from teachers, helping them flourish, and I thank the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) for raising the issue of children who may be very unwell. It is vital that young people in alternative provision, including those in pupil referral units, receive a high-quality education and are able to fulfil their potential. We need to be just as ambitious for pupils in alternative provision as we are for those in mainstream schools.

We have deliberately maintained a flexible approach to the funding of alternative provision, as we understand that local authorities discharge their responsibilities for those who are not in school in different ways. We expect local authorities to explore the most effective arrangements for alternative provision commissioning and funding in their area. They should always take account of the needs of local schools in determining the demand for alternative provision and how it is delivered, and encourage schools to think collectively about their use of AP, including the consequences of the decisions on excluded pupils.

Many local areas have developed strong partnership arrangements that seek to share responsibilities across schools for AP commissioning and funding. Local authorities and schools should be aware of the cost of maintaining good-quality AP in different settings and be able to make placement decisions on the basis of the cost and quality of what is on offer. There should be informed discussions in the local schools forum about how AP is funded. Funding for pupil referral units is normally provided as place funding and top-up funding. Funding of £10,000 per place is supplemented by top-up funding from the commissioner of the place.

[Vicky Foxcroft (Lewisham, Deptford) (Lab)]

Could the Minister outline what funding is provided for pupil referral units and alternative provision in order to provide the important inreach work being done in mainstream schools to support kids so that they do not end up in a pupil referral unit in the future?

[Nadhim Zahawi]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady for that intervention. I hope that my remarks will continue to deal with the issue of funding and how much investment we are making.

As I was saying, the funding of £10,000 per place is supplemented by top-up funding from the commissioner of the place. Both the number of places to be funded and the amount of top-up funding are matters that are decided locally. Top-up funding is the funding that is required in excess of the £10,000 place funding to reflect the full cost of the provision needed, depending on how long the pupil is expected to be in the unit and on other local factors. It can also reflect costs that enable those units to remain financially viable, which goes to my hon. Friend the Member for Bolton West’s point. It is important that places are available when they are needed.

In our operational guidance, we have advised that commissioning local authorities and schools should carefully consider the top-up funding arrangements to ensure that there are no perverse incentives and that the funding achieves the intended outcomes. It is possible to develop a top-up funding system that more closely reflects the achievement of the desired outcomes, as a way of encouraging high-quality AP. For example, an element of the payment could be withheld from the pupil referral unit until the pupil returns to his or her mainstream school or achieves another outcome.

Funding for AP comes primarily from the high-needs block of the dedicated schools grant. Based on local authorities’ reports of their spending, the Department estimates that around 10% of the high-needs budget is spent on AP. The proportion of spend on AP from the high-needs budget has remained roughly stable in the past few years. Last year, local authorities reported approximately £632 million of expenditure on AP, including on pupil referral units. However, schools are also able to commission AP places and services directly, and when a school does this, it is funded from its delegated share of the school block, which the local authority distributes to it through its local formula. Last year, the core schools and high-needs budget was almost £41 billion. This is set to rise to £43.5 billion next year. While more money is going into our schools, including into the high-needs block, we recognise the budgeting challenges that schools face and that we are asking them to do more.

Acknowledging that and the cost pressures on local authorities, and because children only get one chance at a great education, the Government have prioritised and protected schools and high-needs spending even while having to make difficult public spending decisions in other areas. Last month, we announced £250 million of additional funding for high needs over this financial year and the next, bringing the total high-needs allocation to £6.1 billion this year and £6.3 billion in 2019-20. We have listened to the particular concerns expressed by many local authorities and others, including Members of this House, about high-needs budget pressures, and additional investment will help local authorities to manage those pressures.

However, while funding is important, which is why we have protected the core schools budget in real terms per pupil from last year to next, funding is just one part of the story, because what happens to the money and the quality of AP are both important. That is why my Department is committed to reforming alternative provision and set out its plans for doing so in a reform road map last March. The plan for reform set out the aspirations of strengthening partnership arrangements for commissioning and delivering AP and the steps we are taking.

We are providing a stable evidence base for the reforms. The Department contacted Isos Partnership to undertake research into local AP markets. The research, published late last year, looked at the range and efficacy of different AP commissioning and funding models. It sought to engage local authorities, schools and AP across the country and shows that some areas are developing effective commissioning and funding arrangements between local authorities, schools and alternative providers to ensure that suitable provision is made for children with additional needs.

In Bath and North East Somerset, for example, funding from the high-needs block is devolved by the local authority to six behaviour and attendance panels across the area. These panels of primary and secondary heads are responsible for co-ordinating in-year admissions, supporting children at risk of exclusion, and managing referrals into alternative provision. The vast majority of schools in Nottinghamshire belong to schools partnerships, which receive high-needs funding from the local authority for both alternative provision and SEN support. When a school in Nottinghamshire excludes a pupil, the cost of their placement in alternative provision is recovered from the school or partnership in question. That system has resulted in an inclusive school system, with a low incidence of permanent exclusion—less than half the national average.

To build on what we have learnt of such arrangements, the Department announced its intention last month to launch a call for evidence to understand better the financial incentives that can affect decisions within the wider high needs funding system, including decisions relating to alternative provision, as my hon. Friend the Member for Bolton West rightly highlighted. We are also investing £4 million into an innovation fund for AP. This externally-evaluated fund is supporting nine innovative projects, from across the country, to understand more about how to improve outcomes for children in AP. The initiatives focus on supporting children in AP to make good academic progress and successful post-16 transitions, reintegration into suitable mainstream or special school placements, and increasing parental or carer engagement.

We are committed to protecting all children from exploitation and abuse, whether from county lines, gang activity, or sexual abuse, which is why this Government have invested £3.6 million in a new national county lines co-ordination centre as one of the key commitments in the serious violence strategy. The Department is also providing up to £2 million for a new national response unit to help local authorities to support vulnerable children at risk of exploitation by criminal threats. Good discipline in schools is essential to ensure that all pupils can benefit from the opportunities provided by education. The Government absolutely support headteachers in using exclusion as a sanction, where warranted. It is equally important that the obligations on schools are clear and well understood to ensure that any exclusion is lawful, reasonable and fair.

A review of exclusions, led by Edward Timpson, is under way. The review is considering how schools use exclusion and how it affects all pupils, but it is particularly considering why some groups of children are more likely to be excluded. The review will report its findings early this year, with the Department’s response to follow.

[Vicky Foxcroft]

The Minister said that he would return to the point about the inreach work that PRUs do with mainstream education and about how much funding is allocated towards that work. I have listened with great intent, and I do not believe I have heard that question answered.

[Nadhim Zahawi]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady for coming back on that point, which I was about to address. Local authorities can make arrangements for the supply of specialist support for mainstream schools by staff working in pupil referral units. The Department’s innovation fund has funded projects that include such measures and links between AP and schools. If she is unhappy with my response, and if she writes to me about a specific case, I will be happy to look at that as well.

I thank the hon. Member for Lewisham, Deptford (Vicky Foxcroft), my hon. Friend the Member for Bolton West and the hon. Member for Strangford, who is no longer in his seat, for contributing to this debate. I also pay tribute to the hard work of schools and local authorities, which continue to give their best and to raise the standards of our education system.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

Order. Before I put the Question, I must inform the House that there was an error in calculating the number of votes of Members for English constituencies in the Division on motion 7 on the Higher Education (Fee Limits for Accelerated Courses) (England) Regulations 2018. The figures for the England-only vote should not have been announced as: Ayes, 269; Noes, 200. They should have been announced as: Ayes, 269; Noes, 194. The figures for the vote of the whole House are as previously announced, and the result is unaffected.

I appreciate the attention of the House. It is not an exciting announcement, but it is essential to set the record straight.

Question put and agreed to.

18:08

House adjourned.