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Mr Speaker
A Whip or a Minister nods in such situations. Nothing further is said or done. There can be no opposition.
Oral Answers to Questions
(4 years, 10 months ago)
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Alex Norris (Nottingham North) (Lab/Co-op)
The Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Michael Gove)
How grateful I am, Mr Speaker, to hear you say that there can indeed be no opposition.
Tackling the climate change and environment emergency is a cross-Government priority and an issue that I discuss regularly with Cabinet colleagues. The greening government commitments include specific targets for reducing greenhouse gas emissions and improving sustainable procurement. Those commitments demonstrate the Government’s leadership in improving the environmental sustainability of their own estate, and the 2018 revisions to the Green Book have also improved the evaluation of the natural capital impacts of Government decision making.
Alex Norris
Tomorrow, young people in Nottingham will demonstrate because we are not moving quickly enough on our climate emergency. This House declared such an emergency on 1 May, saying that the Government should
“set ambitious, short-term targets for… low carbon energy and transport”.
When we will see those targets?
Michael Gove
It is already the case that we are the first Government of a developed nation to embrace the ambition of reaching net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. I congratulate the Members across the House who have campaigned to ensure that that commitment is at the heart of this Government’s proposals—indeed, it is a vision—to ensure that we leave a cleaner, greener planet for the next generation.
Vicky Ford (Chelmsford) (Con)
Will my right hon. Friend join me in congratulating the Foreign Secretary and the Foreign Office team on their amazing diplomatic success in the negotiations with Italy, which mean that next year’s global climate change conference is almost certain to come to London?
Michael Gove
The Foreign Secretary has done an outstanding job on the diplomatic stage and will continue to do so. Co-operating with our partners across western Europe, including Italy, will ensure that the 2020 conference of the parties brings nations together to deal with this global challenge. The Secretary of State for International Development has also played a distinguished role alongside the Foreign Secretary in using our global footprint to ensure that our planet is in a more sustainable state.
Gerald Jones (Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney) (Lab)
Michael Gove
I congratulate the students in his constituency and so many other students across the country on helping to ensure that our climate and environment emergency is at the heart of our decision making. We will put greening government and greening the whole country at the heart of our decision making in the forthcoming spending review.
Tom Pursglove (Corby) (Con)
The Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr Robert Goodwill)
I met with the Secretary of State for International Trade yesterday, and he told me that he had just come back from Turkey, where he had been exploring opportunities for British trade, including in food and drink. On Monday, I signed an agreement with China which means that British beef could be back on Chinese dinner plates by the end of the year, which could be worth £230 million over five years to our world-class beef producers. Those are just two examples of the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and the Department for International Trade working closely to raise the international profile and reputation of the UK’s high-quality food and drink products, to open new markets, and to boost our exports.
Tom Pursglove
I am grateful to the Minister for that timely answer. How successful has the GREAT campaign been at showcasing UK produce to markets around the world?
Mr Goodwill
It has been great, as it says on the can. DEFRA’s “Food is GREAT” campaign supports DIT’s trade promotion activity, including at trade shows and meet-the-buyer events. It helps businesses to succeed in overseas markets by ensuring global recognition of UK excellence in food and drink, while encouraging our food and drink companies to export more.
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
This just shows what a barmy army we have on the Government Front Bench. To want more beef to be produced and shipped thousands of miles to China shows that they have not learned the lessons of sustainability or climate change danger. They had better learn those lessons quickly and do something to save our planet.
Mr Goodwill
As a former Shipping Minister, I can tell the hon. Gentleman that 30% of containers go back to China empty, so there is tremendous potential for shipping goods to China without increasing our carbon footprint.
Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)
British breakfast cereals are among the best in the world and none is finer than Weetabix, which is based in the Kettering constituency and which sources its wheat from farms within a 50-mile radius of the factory. Will my right hon. Friend be the great British breakfast champion?
Mr Goodwill
I am a great fan of Weetabix, not least because I am a wheat producer myself. Indeed, I have driven past the Weetabix factory in his constituency with my hon. Friend, and I quite fancy going to visit when my diary allows.
Deidre Brock (Edinburgh North and Leith) (SNP)
At the Select Committee on Scottish Affairs, the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs said that the EU would continue to protect UK protected geographical indications because they are European law. That seems to be incorrect. Was he mistaken, or did someone mislead him? Will he now put the record straight?
Mr Goodwill
Geographical indications are important not only for producers but so that consumers know they are getting the real thing. It is important that we get that protection in our negotiations with the EU through the implementation period while, at the same time, talking to other trading partners around the world who may have different systems. We need to ensure that those systems dovetail closely with ours.
Martin Vickers (Cleethorpes) (Con)
On a recent visit to seafood companies in the Grimsby and Cleethorpes area, the American ambassador encouraged Young’s Seafood to export even more to the United States. What assistance can the Department give?
Mr Goodwill
We are keen to export seafood around the world. Brown crab from my constituency is exported to China, whelks are exported to South Korea, and I hope that the Americans will enjoy even more of our seafood and other products when we leave the EU and can negotiate trade agreements around the world.
Luke Pollard (Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport) (Lab/Co-op)
I want to press the Minister on geographical indications, which are vital in our marketing of goods and products made across the country. In the event of a no deal, about which the frontrunner in the Tory leadership contest seems quite keen, protections for Cornish pasties, Buxton blue cheese, traditional Welsh perry, Cornish clotted cream and Whitstable oysters, to name but a few, will be at risk. What steps is DEFRA taking to ensure that those vital goods produced by our farmers and growers are protected come Halloween this year?
Mr Goodwill
In a no-deal situation, we would wish to set up our own scheme and to negotiate with our friends across the channel to ensure some degree of co-operation, but I stress that no deal is not an option I would want to support. We need to get a deal, and we need to get it over the line. If, like me, Opposition Members had voted for the deal on the three occasions it came before the House, we would have left the European Union on 29 March and we would be in a much better situation for UK producers.
Maggie Throup (Erewash) (Con)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (David Rutley)
To increase tree planting rates, we have changed how our main grant schemes work. The woodland carbon fund now supports infrastructure such as roads and is available for smaller projects. The countryside stewardship woodland creation grant is now open for applications all year, rather than in short windows, which demonstrates the Government’s commitment to planting 11 million trees during this Parliament.
Maggie Throup
I thank my hon. Friend for his response. However, his passion for planting trees seems to be in conflict with the practice of both Network Rail and Highways England, which have decimated thousands of mature trees that lined the railway and motorway embankments through Long Eaton, Sawley and Breaston in my constituency and that acted as a vital natural sound and visual barrier. May I urge him and his counterparts in the Department for Transport to intervene to ensure that mature trees are reinstated on those embankments as soon as possible?
David Rutley
My hon. Friend is, and continues to be, a strong champion for Erewash in all ways. I recognise that removing trees can be concerning, which is why DEFRA is working closely with the DFT to deliver a new policy for Network Rail, with the aim of improving its current approach to managing vegetation so that it enhances biodiversity on our rail network. That is in line with the recommendations of John Varley’s review of Network Rail’s vegetation management.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
I planted some 3,500 trees on my land 10 years ago, so I see the benefits. Will the Minister further outline what help, advice and practical and financial support is available for landowners to prepare land for trees to be planted?
David Rutley
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his efforts in helping to achieve our wider target. As I have explained, we are working hard to make our current schemes much more flexible. We will also be introducing the woodland carbon guarantee—£50 million in the Budget—and we launched the £10 million urban tree challenge fund just a few weeks ago.
Andrew Bridgen (North West Leicestershire) (Con)
Will the Minister join me in celebrating the 9 million trees planted over the past 30 years to create the new national forest? My constituency, at the centre of it, has seen a massive improvement in not only the environment but the quality of life, for visitors and residents alike.
David Rutley
I have had the chance to go to the national forest in my hon. Friend’s constituency on two occasions, and he is a fantastic champion and ambassador for the national forest. We need to take lessons from that and apply them in the northern forest as well, to see what the exciting opportunities can be.
Sue Hayman (Workington) (Lab)
The role of tree planting in tackling climate change is well documented. The right hon. Member for Penrith and The Border (Rory Stewart) promised during his leadership bid to plant 100 million trees. The Minister has been mentioning targets, so it is disappointing to read this week that the Government are falling woefully short—by 71%—of their targets. Can the Minister explain why that is? What is he doing about it? How long will it be before we see the Secretary of State’s targets actually met?
David Rutley
We have set out a clear target of planting 11 million trees in this Parliament. We are at 3.6 million now and on the trajectory to achieve that target of 11 million, so I assure the hon. Lady that we are working in that direction. We have also set out strong aspirations to increase our woodland cover from 10% to 12% within the 25-year environment plan. We have stretching targets and we will move further forward.
Dr Rupa Huq (Ealing Central and Acton) (Lab)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (David Rutley)
The Government have been undertaking extensive work to prepare for a no-deal scenario for the past two years, to ensure that trade continues to operate smoothly from the day we leave. We have long-established relationships with industry, and we are working closely with key stakeholders to prepare for all scenarios. The UK has a high level of food security, built on diverse sources, and this will continue to be the case when we leave the EU.
Dr Huq
In reality, only just over half of the food we eat is made in Britain, with more than a third coming from the EU. Given that the Food and Drink Federation is predicting that after a no-deal Brexit fresh fruit and veg would run out after two weeks, why are the remaining contenders in the Tory leadership battle continuing to entertain this damaging prospect? Does he not agree that scurvy back on our streets is more important than the whims of fundamentalist party members’ wishes?
David Rutley
The hon. Lady has ruined a perfectly reasonable question by exaggerating. Of course we are preparing for every eventuality. As we have said already in these questions, a deal is the best outcome, and we all have a responsibility to help deliver that. We are preparing for all outcomes.
Michael Fabricant (Lichfield) (Con)
So will my hon. Friend confirm that my constituents do not need to stock up with tins of Spam or apricots in syrup?
David Rutley
We are not going to endorse any particular brand, but it is important to note that we have a rich and diverse source of food, and that will continue when we leave the EU.
John Mc Nally (Falkirk) (SNP)
Can the Secretary of State reassure my local businesses, which supply millions of people across the UK with high-quality food products, that enough refrigeration units will be in place to cope with the predicted delays at UK ports after our exit from the EU?
David Rutley
The hon. Gentleman can be assured that I have regular meetings—each week—with the main stakeholders in the food industry to prepare for no deal. We are looking at all eventualities. Primarily, we are looking at how we can ensure the flow of trade; that is our vital priority.
Bim Afolami (Hitchin and Harpenden) (Con)
The Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Michael Gove)
Yesterday, the Rural Payments Agency announced that it will make payments next month to all those who have been waiting on the historical revenue payments, and therefore every farmer who has been taking part in environmental and countryside stewardship schemes, which deliver important benefits for our environment, will receive the money that they deserve.
Bim Afolami
I thank the Secretary of State for that answer, because many farmers in my constituency have regularly complained to me about the delays in countryside stewardship scheme payments. Will he expand on that answer for those who, in some instances, have had to wait more than 600 days for payments?
Michael Gove
My hon. Friend is a brilliant advocate for Hertfordshire farmers and indeed for workers across the English countryside. He is absolutely right: past performance has not been good enough. That is why I am so pleased that the RPA’s chief executive, Paul Caldwell, will make sure that all back payments are cleared next month.
Mr Speaker
I hope the hon. Member for Hitchin and Harpenden (Bim Afolami) realises that he has just been canvassed.
Helen Goodman (Bishop Auckland) (Lab)
Last Thursday, the shadow Secretary of State, my hon. Friend the Member for Workington (Sue Hayman), and I visited Upper Teesdale Agricultural Support Services. We met farmers who had not been paid for 18 months, so payments in July would be welcome. Will they get interest on the late payments?
Michael Gove
The hon. Lady is a superb advocate for the farmers of upper Teesdale, County Durham and England, and it is not too late for her to cross the House. She makes a fair point, and I will look into it.
Neil Parish (Tiverton and Honiton) (Con)
Further to the question from my hon. Friend the Member for Hitchin and Harpenden (Bim Afolami), as we leave the European Union we will build up more and more environmentally friendly agricultural policy, so stewardship schemes will be more important than ever. There has been a loss of faith in them, and I am worried about the future programme, because farmers really do not like the complexity and have waited far too long for their payments.
Michael Gove
My hon. Friend makes a fair point; the schemes have been bedevilled by unnecessary complexity in the past. It is critical that as we leave the European Union and have new environmental land management schemes, they are both simpler and more effective in supporting farmers in the wonderful work that they do.
Several hon. Members rose—
Mr Speaker
In calling Dr David Drew, I remind Members and inform others that the hon. Gentleman has a doctorate in rural economy.
Dr David Drew (Stroud) (Lab/Co-op)
I know that, as always, you are my biggest fan, Mr Speaker.
I hear what the Secretary of State says, but one reason for the current collapse in the take-up of environmental agri-ecology schemes is the slowness and lateness of payments, which is bedevilling the pilots for the environmental land management schemes. Will the Secretary of State assure me that those pilots will now get under way?
Craig Tracey (North Warwickshire) (Con)
Robert Courts (Witney) (Con)
Sir Desmond Swayne (New Forest West) (Con)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Dr Thérèse Coffey)
We have strengthened the national planning policy framework to make it clear that all development within its scope should achieve net gains for biodiversity. We have consulted on proposals to mandate biodiversity net gain for development, and will use the forthcoming environment Bill to legislate for a net gain system.
Craig Tracey
I thank the Minister for that answer, but will she assure me that she is taking action to ensure that all major infrastructure projects comply with all environmental licences, permissions and protections?
Dr Coffey
Large infrastructure projects may require an environmental impact assessment of the likely effects. In the case of nationally significant infrastructure projects, the EIA forms a part of the planning process and the development consent order. I assure my hon. Friend that each consenting regime has appropriate enforcement mechanisms.
Robert Courts
West Oxfordshire wants the design of the Oxfordshire Cotswolds garden village to enhance, not harm, the environment. What guidance have Ministers given to developers on how garden villages can enhance things such as wildlife corridors and biodiversity in new developments?
Dr Coffey
Well-planned, locally led garden communities can play a vital role, not only in meeting the country’s housing needs and providing a stable pipeline of high-quality homes but by providing such opportunities as my hon. Friend referred to. In fact, they will be mandated to do so, to improve wildlife corridors and promote health and wellbeing and quality of life. That could be a win-win for my hon. Friend’s constituents.
Dr Coffey
We have updated the planning guidance for the planning policy. As we set out in the consultation, we intend to develop in the environment Bill an update of metrics for biodiversity and wider environmental net gains. We will provide practical tools to support developers and, critically, local planning authorities to achieve better environmental outcomes for every development.
Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)
A 38 Degrees petition started by Norman Pasley from Bristol is calling for legislation on the installation of swift boxes in all new housing developments, and it has more than 130,000 signatures. As parliamentary species champion for the swift, I urge Ministers to support the campaign. Perhaps the Secretary of State in particular would like to make it his legacy from his time at the Department.
Dr Coffey
Hopefully, the hon. Lady will be swift in her praise for the work we are doing with the forthcoming environment Bill. As the species champion for bitterns, which are literally booming as we speak, I know that this issue matters. We want to take more proactive approaches to how we protect species. I am not sure whether a swift box in every single house is the right thing, as opposed to all sorts of other things such as beetle hotels—there is a wide variety—but we need to make sure that we encourage a wide range of biodiversity for birds, for wildlife and for the protection of nature for future generations.
Gareth Snell (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Lab/Co-op)
The crowing from the Department about their bird policy this morning is rather touching. The Minister will be aware that changes by the water undertakers to discharge water regulations are causing concern for the Bathroom Manufacturers Association and house builders. Will she meet me and a small delegation to discuss how future developments can better look after our waste water?
Jessica Morden (Newport East) (Lab)
The RSPB and the Wildlife Trusts, which both have fantastic reserves in my constituency in the Newport wetlands and the Magor marsh, are strongly supportive of establishing a nature recovery network to restore and repair habitats. Will the Government commit to putting that on a statutory footing?
Dame Caroline Spelman (Meriden) (Con)
My constituents are up in arms about the felling of trees and vegetation to make way for HS2 during the nesting season. Will my hon. Friend confirm the Government’s commitment to biodiversity net gain for new developments?
Dr Coffey
That is absolutely the case. My right hon. Friend spoke to me this morning about this issue. I will follow up on it, because when major infrastructure projects go ahead, it is important that people should have confidence, and while some vegetation might need to be removed, HS2 is supposed to be planting at least 5 million trees. We will make sure that it does so.
Susan Elan Jones (Clwyd South) (Lab)
The Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr Robert Goodwill)
The Government have introduced a new immigration pilot scheme for 2019 and 2020 to enable up to 2,500 non-European economic area migrant workers to come to the UK to undertake seasonal employment in the edible horticultural sector. DEFRA and the Home Office will evaluate the outcome before taking any decisions on future arrangements.
Susan Elan Jones
Government Members seem to be obsessed with 31 October. That is a pity, because harvest is coming rather sooner, and I wish they would show a similar interest in that. The National Farmers Union has made it absolutely clear that we need a permanent, fully functioning system and that at least 10,000 new workers are required in this area. Why will the Government not act, and why will the Home Office not take proper action?
Mr Goodwill
It is important that we evaluate the pilot before moving further. From my point of view, we are meeting the requirements. We had 700 workers here already by the end of May and we expect to reach the peak in the middle of the summer picking season, although the Home Office might look at how many of those workers go back to the Russian Federation, Ukraine and Moldova at the end. We will need to evaluate that after the pilot before going further.
Colin Clark (Gordon) (Con)
Mr Goodwill
Absolutely. We understand how big an issue this is. Some 28% of those working in food and drink manufacturing, including fish processing, are from the European Union. That is 106,000 people. It is important that they understand that, whichever way we leave the European Union, including no deal, they will still be able to come here to work and participate in these important industries.
Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (David Rutley)
In November 2018 we announced that we will consult on a new English tree strategy, setting out how we will accelerate woodland creation to reach our aspiration of increasing woodland cover in England from 10% to 12% by 2060. The consultation on the English tree strategy will be launched later this year, and our recently reappointed tree champion is leading our engagement on this.
Rachael Maskell
But clearly the strategy is not working when councils such as City of York Council fail to sign up to the White Rose Forest project. As we have heard, the Government have failed to reach their target by 71%, so there is no chance that we will see a growth in the number of trees across our country. Will the Minister look at mandating local authorities to sign up to the Government’s initiative?
David Rutley
We will do all we can to encourage local authorities to get involved. It is good to hear that Yorkshire Water is planting 1 million trees in Yorkshire. We need to do more, particularly in the hon. Lady’s area, with natural flood management techniques upstream. There is lots we can do.
George Eustice (Camborne and Redruth) (Con)
The Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr Robert Goodwill)
Our rare and native breeds are an important genetic resource. There are several purposes under clauses 1 and 2 of the Agriculture Bill for which financial assistance could be provided to support our genetic heritage.
George Eustice
I declare my interest in that my family are long-standing breeders of both the British Lop pig and pedigree South Devon cattle, but genetic diversity is critical to maintaining resilience in our livestock sectors, and protecting genetic resources is a primary responsibility DEFRA. Will the Minister therefore agree to convene a meeting at DEFRA of representatives of our native and rare breeds to discuss what support would be appropriate for them under future policy?
Mr Goodwill
I was already aware of my hon. Friend’s considerable interest in this policy area. I am pleased to tell him that a workshop with breed societies will be taking place in London on 12 September to look at the issues that he has in mind. Later today I will be visiting the Lincolnshire show, where I hope to see some of the rare breeds that are bound to be there.
Mr Speaker
This is all very encouraging, but I must say that as we are discussing rare breeds, I feel a great sense of personal sadness that we are not joined this morning by the right hon. Member for Mid Sussex (Sir Nicholas Soames), who knows a thing or two about these matters.
Several hon. Members rose—
The Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Michael Gove)
As does my hon. Friend the Member for Banbury (Victoria Prentis).
Mr Speaker
I had not seen the hon. Lady but I have now, and I am grateful to the Secretary of State, who is doing what might be called a side line.
Victoria Prentis (Banbury) (Con)
I probably should also declare an interest in South Devon cattle, as my family have bred them for generations as well. However, I wanted to ask the Minister about rare wildlife, if I might segue into the matter. Given all his work on general licences recently, what communications has he had with the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds about sites of special scientific interest and the work it does culling birds in those areas?
Mr Goodwill
It is important, particularly for ground-nesting birds, that other bird species that can predate on them and damage their nests are controlled. The RSPB carries out that work on land that it controls, and I hope that it will continue doing so to protect those particular rare species.
Stephen Lloyd (Eastbourne) (Ind)
The Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Michael Gove)
During 2018, badger control operations in 32 areas of England were all successful in meeting their targets. According to Natural England’s chief scientist, the results show that
“industry-led badger control continues to deliver the level of effectiveness required by the policy to be confident of achieving disease control benefits”.
Assessments of the effectiveness of badger control are published annually on gov.uk.
Stephen Lloyd
Given the extended roll-out, it is estimated that about 150,000 badgers will have been culled by the end of 2020. This animal, which has been around since the ice age, faces extinction in various parts of the country. What would the Secretary of State say about investing the money in a national badger vaccination programme? To quote the Wildlife Trusts, should not the Government be investing in “medicine, not marksmen”?
Michael Gove
The hon. Gentleman makes an important point. When it comes to dealing with bovine TB—a terrible disease that damages the lives of cattle and the livelihoods of farmers—we need to consider all steps that are appropriate. Culling and vaccination are both tools in our armoury.
Wera Hobhouse (Bath) (LD)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Dr Thérèse Coffey)
My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has regular discussions with his counterpart at the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government. Discussions are also held at an official level about delivering the clean air strategy and relevant provisions that we hope to bring forward in the forthcoming environment Bill. Local authorities will continue to play a vital role in delivering improvements to the air that we all breathe.
Wera Hobhouse
The Minister knows that Bath has a considerable air pollution problem. Idling cars make a measurable contribution to inner-city pollution. I recently tabled a private Member’s Bill to give local authorities greater enforcement powers to stop idling cars. Will the Minister consider my proposal to strengthen anti-idling legislation?
Greg Hands (Chelsea and Fulham) (Con)
One local council that could do a much better job on air quality is Labour-controlled Hammersmith and Fulham, by reopening Hammersmith bridge. The diversion of traffic through Fulham and Chelsea is horrendous. Will the Minister join me in calling on the council and the Mayor of London to introduce proper air quality monitoring, particularly on Fulham High Street, to properly assess the catastrophic impact of the council’s decision?
Mr Speaker
The hon. Member for Aberdeen South (Ross Thomson) has withdrawn his question, so I call Mr David Duguid.
David Duguid (Banff and Buchan) (Con)
The Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Michael Gove)
The Government’s vision for future fisheries policy as we leave the European Union is set out in the fisheries White Paper “Sustainable fisheries for future generations”, which was published in July 2018.
David Duguid
Will my right hon. Friend confirm his commitment to boosting investment in the fisheries sector to help with expansion outside the common fisheries policy but also to promote export opportunities and the UK domestic market for Scottish seafood after Brexit?
Michael Gove
Absolutely I will. The UK Government will work with the Scottish Government to make sure that we have investment in port facilities in Peterhead and Fraserburgh, and that we have the marketing budget necessary to ensure that the power of our United Kingdom is harnessed to help Scots fishermen and, indeed, Scottish fish processors.
Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (SNP)
The Secretary of State has already promised Danish and Iberian fishing fleets that their access to UK waters will continue unhindered after Brexit. How many promises has he made to other foreign countries, and what percentage of the quotas is going to be reserved for UK fishing?
Michael Gove
I have promised no such thing. What I have promised is to ensure that we are out of the European Union and out of the common fisheries policy, in stark contrast to the Scottish National party, which wants to keep us in the European Union and in the common fisheries policy. The Scottish National party and the Scottish Government claim to stand up for Scotland, but at every turn they prefer the politics of grievance and the ideology of separation to the interests of Scotland’s fishermen and Scotland’s citizens.
Jo Swinson (East Dunbartonshire) (LD)
The Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Michael Gove)
I am delighted to announce that Tamara Finkelstein OBE has been appointed as the new permanent secretary at DEFRA. She is the fourth woman in succession to be permanent secretary at this Department. With respect to the hon. Member for East Dunbartonshire (Jo Swinson), I do think it is a very, very good thing if important institutions in this country are, wherever possible, led by women.
Jo Swinson
I congratulate the new permanent secretary at the Secretary of State’s Department. It is always good to see senior women in leadership roles.
The Government have set out a new net zero emissions target. Putting our country on track to meet that in order to tackle the climate emergency is going to take urgent and bold action, so will the Secretary of State commit to bringing forward the date to end the sale of new petrol and diesel cars to 2030, allow onshore wind facilities to be built again, and re-establish the Department of Energy and Climate Change?
Michael Gove
Those are important points, well made. Bringing forward the target by which we get rid of petrol and diesel cars is always kept under review. At the moment, we believe that the target is achievable and stretching, but we will of course keep it under review as more progress is made. On renewable energy, we lead the world in offshore wind, and we have also done a huge amount on solar energy, in particular—99% of the solar power generated in this country has been generated since 2010. I pay tribute to Ministers who served in the coalition Government between 2010 and 2015 for their work in this area.
Andrew Griffiths (Burton) (Con)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Dr Thérèse Coffey)
The environmental impact of bags, including bags for life, can be reduced simply through reusing them. We will be publishing our response on extending the carrier bag charge to all retailers very soon, so we are not currently considering stopping the use of plastic bags altogether. In our bio-economy strategy, we have committed to issuing a call for evidence, because it is important to note that these biodegradable bags need careful treatment when they come to the end of their life.
Sandy Martin (Ipswich) (Lab)
Following the recent Scottish deposit return scheme proposals and the conclusion of the Government’s consultation on a DRS, can the Secretary of State tell us how the Government intend to learn from best practice? Does he hope to emulate the 98.5% recycling rate achieved by Germany for plastic and glass bottles and metal drink cans? Will he commit to a deposit return scheme that matches the ambition of other Governments in Europe, to achieve a UK-wide standard, as suggested in “Our Waste, Our Resources”?
Dr Coffey
This is something that the Government have worked on extensively. I have visited several countries, including Germany, and it is fair to say that not all deposit return schemes take glass. As I have said to the House before, the front end of these schemes is very simple, but how we make the back end work is complex. That is why it is taking some time. We are considering carefully with the devolved Administrations how we can make progress, and I hope we will be able to announce more soon.
Chris Green (Bolton West) (Con)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (David Rutley)
I agree. The Smithills estate was where the first tree of the northern forest was planted, which is a very important step forward. It is a great site, overshadowed by the wonderful Winter Hill TV mast. I love it, and I am grateful for my hon. Friend’s support for it.
Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)
Michael Gove
I am grateful for the hon. Lady’s valuable advice. She is right: when it comes to dealing with air quality, we need to deal with ammonia emissions. We have a number of policies that we will implement as part of our environment Bill.
Mary Robinson (Cheadle) (Con)
The River Mersey, which originates in Stockport and flows through my constituency on its journey to Liverpool, has been named and shamed by Greenpeace as proportionately more polluted than the great Pacific garbage patch. That follows a University of Manchester study showing that microplastics in the river bed sediment were higher than in any other environment. What work is the Department doing to address the issue of microplastics entering the waterways, and what pressure is being put on the industry to address it?
Dr Coffey
I grew up in Liverpool, and it is sad to hear that terrible statistic revealed by Greenpeace. I think it is fair to say that the Government have already taken action by reducing microplastics from certain cosmetic products and rinse-off products. We will do more by taking forward the ban on plastic straws and other single-use plastic items. We will continue to work with the water industry on what more we can do about filtration, so that we keep plastics out of the rivers.
Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab)
Given the extraordinarily high contribution of cars on our roads to poor air quality, will the Secretary of State lobby the Department for Transport to review all major road schemes to see whether they will contribute to poor air quality, and look at modal shift, to get people off our roads and out of their cars?
Michael Gove
The hon. Gentleman knows of what he speaks, as a distinguished former taxi driver, as well as a very effective spokesman for the people of Eltham in the borough of Greenwich. We absolutely do need to take account in all new road building schemes of the impact of pollution.
Neil Parish (Tiverton and Honiton) (Con)
Yesterday I was able to sponsor National Refill Day with Water UK. Reusing our water bottles means that we could get rid of millions of plastic bottles that we do not need. It is about not only recycling plastic, but using a lot less. Does the Secretary of State welcome that?
Michael Gove
I hugely welcome that, and I am grateful to water companies and others who have made the provision of water fountains a critical part of ensuring that we use less plastic.
Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)
The Heathrow masterplan released this week promises 40,000 more vehicles on our roads, 6 million more tonnes of CO2 released per annum and new noise for hundreds of thousands of households. What discussions has the Secretary of State had with the Secretary of State for Transport about the environmental consequences of Heathrow expansion?
Michael Gove
Intense and productive discussions, but it is also important to recognise that a majority of Labour MPs and Scottish National party MPs support Heathrow expansion.
Patrick Grady (Glasgow North) (SNP)
The Secretary of State has answered this several times, but it bears asking again: is it still his contention that other European Union countries are looking enviously at this Government’s efforts to leave the EU?
Michael Gove
Increasingly enviously, and I think it is the case that other European Union countries, many of which I love, are looking enviously at the gallimaufry of talent that exists on the Government Benches at this time. I suspect that those other European Union countries appreciate the festival of democracy in which we are currently engaged.
Several hon. Members rose—
Mr Speaker
Order. Before we turn to the next session of oral questions, I must advise the House that the urgent question I had granted to the hon. Member for Stone (Sir William Cash) has now been withdrawn by the hon. Gentleman, so we will proceed from Question Time to the business question, and then to the two ministerial statements that are scheduled to follow it. That is really for the benefit of Members’ timekeeping, so that they know when the sessions they may wish to attend will be.
Daniel Kawczynski (Shrewsbury and Atcham) (Con)
Vicky Foxcroft (Lewisham, Deptford) (Lab)
The Second Church Estates Commissioner (Dame Caroline Spelman)
The Church was represented at the knife crime summit organised by the Prime Minister at No. 10 earlier this year, and the General Synod will be debating this subject at its session next month. There is no question but that this issue is of the utmost seriousness, as too many young lives are being lost.
Daniel Kawczynski
I thank my right hon. Friend for that answer. Youth violence is often a symptom of a lack of role models and moral leaders. What part does she feel the Church can play to help communities in this area?
Dame Caroline Spelman
I think it is very well known that the Church provides role models for young people, such as youth workers. In the community, we work alongside young people in schools, youth groups and congregations. Our clergy, teachers and members of our congregations are supporting young people who are at risk of getting caught up in violence and their families, and young people in pupil referral units.
Vicky Foxcroft
My constituent Ben Lindsay recently set up Power the Fight, a charity that enables churches to become part of the solution to tackling youth violence. The period after school is one of the most dangerous times for violence among young people. Churches have resources, buildings and volunteers that Power the Fight believes could be used to disrupt violence and keep young people safe. Will the right hon. Lady meet me and my constituent to talk about this valuable work?
Dame Caroline Spelman
I am very happy to meet the hon. Lady, who will know that the Church uses its community halls and facilities in particular to reach out to young people. There are a number of examples of that, but may I especially cite the work of Premier Christian Radio, which broadcasts from London? It has raised awareness of youth violence and what the Church can do to help. We are certainly active in this area, and I would be happy to meet her.
Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)
Will my right hon. Friend join me in praising the work of street pastors, including those active in Kettering, who often find themselves helping to defuse potentially violent situations in our town centres late at night?
Dame Caroline Spelman
My hon. Friend is absolutely right to pay tribute to the work of street pastors. In Birmingham, the nearest city to my constituency, I have gone out with street pastors at night and seen them minister to very vulnerable young people, making sure they are safe on their streets. The street pastors do amazing work.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
I thank the right hon. Lady for her response. Will she outline the benefits that church-run youth clubs provide, and has she had discussions with the Chancellor to secure additional funding for faith-based youth clubs?
Dame Caroline Spelman
I think I have been outlining that. The Church actually provides youth workers in our communities where many have fallen away, and it continues to support the presence of such role models in our society, as is recognised by the Government. I could give the hon. Gentleman a whole series of examples of how the Government’s community fund is being used, through churches, to deliver knife crime awareness training and to help to tackle this problem. Indeed, many churches provide amnesty boxes for weapons that may otherwise cause people to lose their lives.
Mr Speaker
As the hon. Member for Kettering (Mr Hollobone) is a member of Kettering Borough Council and also a special constable, my only surprise is that he does not serve as a street pastor, but that may be only a matter of time.
Greg Hands (Chelsea and Fulham) (Con)
Dame Caroline Spelman
London presents a very positive picture in the life of the Church for the recruitment of clergy. The Church set itself a target to increase the number of vocations in all dioceses by 50% by next year. Most dioceses are well on track, and London expects to reach that target this year.
Greg Hands
I welcome that great news on recruitment in London. A year ago three of our major parishes in Fulham had vacancies, but in April I was delighted to attend the induction of Rev. Ross Gunderson at St Etheldreda. Next Wednesday will be the induction of Rev. Penny Seabrook at All Saints, and we hope soon to fill the vacancy at St John Walham Green. Will my right hon. Friend join me in congratulating and welcoming our new clergy in Fulham?
Dame Caroline Spelman
With pleasure—I wish all those incumbents great success in their new parishes. That demonstrates that the commitment to more training for vocations is really working, and I should share with the House the fact that there is now a 50:50 ratio of men and women in training.
Patrick Grady (Glasgow North) (SNP)
Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington)
The Commission has heard various oral representations. At its meeting on 14 May 2018, it considered a statement of accommodation requirements for the House of Commons decant. Most recently, on 20 May, the Commission considered the northern estate programme, which includes the temporary Chamber for the House of Commons, and endorsed the scheme’s proposals. Those proposals are currently out to a public consultation that closes on 28 June, and all comments and observations will be welcomed.
Patrick Grady
The right hon. Gentleman will not be surprised if I ask whether there is the intention to ensure that any temporary Chamber is equipped with facilities for electronic voting so that we can at least experiment with a bit of modernisation. However, when MPs and the public make submissions to the consultation, will they have the opportunity to suggest even more radical proposals, such as desks that we might lean on or facilities for plugging in electronic devices, as are seen in other Parliaments around the world?
Tom Brake
It was no surprise that the hon. Gentleman made his point about electronic voting, which is something that I would like to see tested in the temporary Chamber—that is a personal opinion. I will monitor the responses to the consultation that are received by 28 June, and I will be astonished and extremely disappointed if the hon. Gentleman does not submit a response setting out exactly how he would like the temporary Chamber to operate.
Michael Fabricant (Lichfield) (Con)
The Second Church Estates Commissioner (Dame Caroline Spelman)
It is estimated that in 2017 there were more than 10 million tourist and leisure visitors to our cathedrals, including Westminster Abbey, generating some £125 million for their local economies. That is a 37% increase from 2004, the last time that that was measured.
Michael Fabricant
That is encouraging news; I know how Lichfield Cathedral benefits the local community.
Mr Speaker, you may be interested to learn that next year will be the 900th anniversary of the birth of Thomas à Becket and the 400th anniversary of the establishment of the American colony of the Pilgrim Fathers. To mark that, I believe there will be an initiative: the year of the cathedrals. Will my right hon. Friend say a little more about how that will stimulate local economies?
Dame Caroline Spelman
We had a meeting of the deans of cathedrals in Parliament this week, and the Dean of Lichfield, who is a fantastic champion for that cathedral, came up with an interesting proposal, through the Association of English Cathedrals, to introduce a pilgrimage passport. That would encourage people—not just from this country, but from abroad—to visit more of our cathedrals, obtaining a stamp at every one, and would indeed assist the overall economy.
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
Having a cathedral city is a very fine thing, but will the right hon. Lady explain the arcane procedures through which a town can get a cathedral? Many places that I would call diddly-squat little places have a cathedral, whereas Huddersfield, a bursting, successful major university town, does not have the status of a cathedral city.
Dame Caroline Spelman
The hon. Gentleman is right: the process is arcane and complicated. My nearest city of Birmingham has what is known as a parish church cathedral, whereas Coventry, the city across the other side of my constituency, had an ancient cathedral which was bombed and then renewed. I think the best thing I can do for the hon. Gentleman is to write to him about how this is arrived at.
Mr Speaker
As the hon. Gentleman is now at the mid-point of his parliamentary career, having served for 40 years, perhaps he can devote the next 40 to campaigning on this important matter for his constituents.
Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)
Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington)
Parliamentary authorities continue to review the use of bicycle spaces to ensure that demand is met.
Rachael Maskell
Like many colleagues, I cycle to the parliamentary estate and I have to say that the parking facilities are woeful. If we are going to achieve a modal shift to encourage more employees of the House, as well as Members of Parliament, to cycle to this place, it is absolutely vital that we have adequate parking facilities. Will the right hon. Gentleman meet me and others to explore how that can be achieved?
Tom Brake
I am very happy to do so. I am a cyclist myself, and I must say that the facilities within Parliament are perhaps not quite what they should be, certainly given the lack of covered parking provision for cycles, so I would be very happy to meet the hon. Lady. I should point out that access to the parliamentary estate for cyclists has been improved, but I agree that there is a need to look at not just current provision, but provision under the northern estate programme and, at a future date, the restoration and renewal of the Palace.
Mr Speaker
Order. We have not reached the hon. Lady yet. She is ahead of herself.
Diana Johnson (Kingston upon Hull North) (Lab)
The Second Church Estates Commissioner (Dame Caroline Spelman)
The national Church institutions have a unified pay policy that operates across all the institutions. There is an eight-band pay structure that is designed to ensure that staff in posts of equal value are paid the same. If we were to exclude staff in the Church Commissioners investment division, the ratio between the highest and lowest paid would be 7.3:1.
Diana Johnson
I am grateful to the right hon. Lady for that answer. The Archbishop of Canterbury has talked extensively about the need for economic justice, so I was shocked to read in Personnel Today that the Church Commissioners have a 23:1 pay ratio between the highest and lowest paid in the organisation. The highest paid person receives £256,000 and one staff member was given a bonus of £250,000. For charities, the ratio is 10:1 and for local government the ratio is 15:1, so what does she think about what is going on in the Church Commissioners?
Dame Caroline Spelman
As I explained, the ratio, if we exclude the highest paid investment division, is 7.3:1. The investment division includes asset managers, who have to manage assets of over £8 billion. They are paid at the market rate for asset management, but they are nowhere near the top of the range. External advice is taken by the Church Commissioners on what and how we should pay, but those are the going rates for top asset managers in this country, and the assets of the Church of England have to be well managed.
Helen Goodman (Bishop Auckland) (Lab)
Dame Caroline Spelman
This question relates to the previous one in an interesting way.
This month, the Church of England was ranked second globally in an industry survey of responsible investors. One of our most recent engagements has been holding to account the mining company, Vale, as responsible for the collapse of the dam in Brumadinho, Brazil. That underlines the point that really good, responsible asset management is something that one has to pay for.
Helen Goodman
I am grateful to the right hon. Lady for that answer. The dam collapse claimed the lives of 246 people. Vale is a British company and it is totally unacceptable to have lower standards of health and safety abroad than at home. What is the Church of England’s strategy, as an investor, for tackling that?
Dame Caroline Spelman
The Church Commissioners hosted a roundtable meeting with other investors and senior management from a number of the largest mining companies in the world, which exposed the fact that this is a widespread problem. To date, 29 of the top 50 mining companies have made disclosures about tailings dams. This is how investors can have an influence in an ethical way over their policy.
Sir Desmond Swayne (New Forest West) (Con)
Dame Caroline Spelman
The Church of England signed an accord with the Government in 2017 that signalled its intent to support national targets on mobile and broadband connectivity, particularly in rural and hard-to-reach areas. At previous Question Times, I have encouraged Members of the House by saying that if they have notspots for broadband and mobile provision, all the towers, spires, buildings and land of the Church of England are at their disposal to address that.
Sir Desmond Swayne
But the new telecommunications code has wrecked the market by advantaging big business at the expense of small sports clubs and churches. Can I enlist the support of the Commissioners?
Dame Caroline Spelman
There is evidence that changes by the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport to the electronic communications code are making it more complicated, although not impossible, for churches and other community buildings to be used to address shortcomings in the roll-out of digital infrastructure. We should work together and go and lobby DCMS to tackle the unintended consequences of the changes in that communications code.
Dr David Drew (Stroud) (Lab/Co-op)
The right hon. Lady will be aware of the growing controversy over 5G and of those who worry about its installation. It would be quite wrong if the Church was brought into those arguments in such a way that an unfair burden was put on it.
Dame Caroline Spelman
Perhaps the hon. Gentleman would like to join the lobbying party, because this is one more aspect that needs to be seriously looked into. There are gaps in provision under 4G, and the worst possible thing would be for the digital divide to continue or get worse as we move to 5G technology, so I think we should seek an early meeting.
Andrew Griffiths (Burton) (Con)
Dame Caroline Spelman
The Church welcomed the decision by the Foreign Secretary to invite the Bishop of Truro to chair an independent review of the work of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. That is not a Church of England inquiry, but a Foreign Office inquiry. However, the Church is actively encouraging its agencies and charities to feed in their experiences.
Andrew Griffiths
I thank my right hon. Friend for that answer. I wholeheartedly support her in congratulating the Foreign Secretary and the Bishop of Truro on producing the report, which highlights the persecution of Christians not only on a large scale, as we saw in places such as Sri Lanka, but on a small scale in everyday life. Is not promoting the good work of Christians and Christianity in our society one of the best things that we can do? May I draw her attention to the Renew church in Uttoxeter, which has its mission week this week involving digging gardens, helping schools, washing cars and showing the best of Christianity?
Dame Caroline Spelman
It is just the interim report that has been published, and the important thing was that it mapped where the persecution takes place around the world. We await phase 2 with great interest, when we expect to hear more about what we can actually get done. I agree with my hon. Friend about the kind of approach that could be taken.
Mr Gavin Shuker (Luton South) (Ind)
Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington)
An option to move Parliament out of the Palace of Westminster to a new purpose-built building was included in the restoration and renewal pre-feasibility study of 2012. The House of Commons Commission reviewed that study in October that year and decided to rule the option out, agreeing that no further analysis would be undertaken on it. The House of Lords Commission took a similar view, and that commitment was reaffirmed by the Joint Committee on the Palace of Westminster in 2016, and more recently, in resolutions of both Houses in 2018.
Mr Shuker
I note the right hon. Gentleman’s answer, but when we rebuilt this Chamber, Churchill said:
“We shape our buildings and afterwards our buildings shape us.”—[Official Report, 28 October 1943; Vol. 393, c. 403.]
Given just how broken our political culture has now been demonstrated to be, does the right hon. Gentleman agree that it is time to take a bold approach and move into a modern Parliament in one of the great cities of the UK?
Tom Brake
I thank the hon. Gentleman for his supplementary question; I might have expected him to call for Parliament to be moved to Luton, but he did not. Clearly a decision has been taken. Some of the things that he would like might be possible for the temporary Chamber—that matter that was raised earlier—and I hope that he will want to make a written submission pressing for that Chamber to be used to trial and test some of the things that would improve our democracy.
Petition
(4 years, 10 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Watch Debate
Maria Caulfield (Lewes) (Con)
I rise to present a petition from 125 pupils of Western Road School in Lewes, in addition to the 624 signatures presented to this place earlier this week from constituents in Lewes. The petitioners declare that
“climate change is a serious and pressing concern and needs urgent attention from the Governments of the world”,
and further, that the UK has leading role to play in tackling climate change in the future.
Following is the full text of the petition:
[The petition of residents of the constituency of Lewes,
Declares that climate change is a serious and pressing concern and needs urgent attention from the Governments of the world.
The petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons urges the Government to ensure that London hosts the upcoming COP 26 Climate Change Conference in 2020.
And the petitioners remain, etc.]
[P002475]
Business of the House
(4 years, 10 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Valerie Vaz (Walsall South) (Lab)
Will the Leader of the House please give us the forthcoming business?
The Leader of the House of Commons (Mel Stride)
The business for the week commencing 24 June will include the following:
Monday 24 June—Second reading of the Kew Gardens (Leases) (No.3) Bill [Lords], followed by a motion to approve a statutory instrument relating to the draft Climate Change Act 2008 (2050 Target Amendment) Order 2019.
Tuesday 25 June—Second reading of the Divorce, Dissolution and Separation Bill.
Wednesday 26 June—Opposition day (un-allotted half day). There will be a debate on a motion on immigration in the name of the Scottish National party, followed by a general debate on Armed Forces Day.
Thursday 27 June—Debate on a motion relating to the contribution of co-operatives and mutuals to the economy, followed by a general debate on the children’s future food report. The subjects of these debates were determined by the Backbench Business Committee.
Friday 28 June—The House will not be sitting.
Colleagues will also wish to know that subject to the progress of business, the House will rise for the summer recess at the close of business on Thursday 25 July, and will return on Tuesday 3 September.
Valerie Vaz
That is very helpful to all Members.
I thank the Leader of the House for announcing the business, and I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Gateshead (Ian Mearns) for suggesting the business. I am pleased that we now have a recess date, but can the Leader of the House tell us who will be at the Dispatch Box on Wednesday 24 July?
Valerie Vaz
Well, that is what I am asking him. I am asking him when the identity of the new Prime Minister will be confirmed. I understand that all the results will be out on 22 July; perhaps he could let us know. I am pleased to learn that the House will sit in September, and I am sure that the Leader of the House will announce the conference recess dates as well. I think it is only fair to the outgoing Prime Minister that she knows when her last Question Time will be, and, more important, only fair to us—to Parliament.
The Leader of the House will know that we have had a busy week. He will also know that on Tuesday we had a Back-Bench debate about the Cox report. When is he likely to table a motion for a debate in Government time? It may be necessary to change a Standing Order, so will he find a date as a matter of urgency, before the House rises on 25 July?
I know that Back-Bench debates are important, but there is a backlog of very important legislation. The Financial Services (Implementation of Legislation) Bill, the Immigration and Social Security Co-ordination (EU Withdrawal) Bill, the Agriculture Bill and the Fisheries Bill need Report stages, and the Trade Bill is again stuck in the other place. When are we likely to debate those Bills?
Ministers are so occupied with their bids to become the next Prime Minister. Only after dropping out of the Conservative leadership race did the Health Secretary order a root-and-branch review of NHS food. Parts of the country have been unsettled by torrential rain, homes have been left without power and roads have been flooded in Lincolnshire—people in Wainfleet are in tears—but there has been no statement from the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. I know that there have been questions to him, but there has been no specific statement about the people in Wainfleet. The Home Secretary has said that he will put 20,000 more police officers on the beat if he is elected leader, but the Government have cut the number already. He is merely repeating a commitment made by Her Majesty’s Opposition.
As for the right hon. Member for Uxbridge and South Ruislip (Boris Johnson), he has been careless with his words. He has said that his comments about Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe had made “no difference”, but they were used at her trial. He has put a woman’s life at risk and separated a family. For the record, Nazanin was on holiday visiting her parents. She has been in jail for three years. I met Richard Ratcliffe yesterday, and other Members have visited him too. Will the Leader of the House raise Nazanin’s case with both the former and the current Foreign Secretary, and send the Iranian Government the message that they should show the international community their seriousness, and free Nazanin and reunite the family now?
A motion scheduled for next Tuesday is to approve a statutory instrument relating to the draft Climate Change Act 2008 (2050 Target Amendment) Order 2019. The motion is a step in the right direction, but why are we waiting until 2050? Heathrow is already the largest single source of carbon emissions in the UK. Plans published on Tuesday revealed that Heathrow airport will construct a third runway by 2026 and complete its 50% expansion by 2050. This includes diverting rivers, moving roads and rerouting the M25 through a tunnel under the new runway. The Government’s own figures show that nearly 1 million households are to face increased daytime noise from allowing a further 700 flights a day. May we have a statement on the new plans for the expansion of Heathrow airport, including the environmental impacts?
It is Children’s Hospice Week this week. Hospices across the country are under threat, including one in my constituency, Acorns. It employs 70 people to care for 233 Black Country children and their families. It is facing closure due to lack of Government funding. I met my constituent Mark Lyttle, a bereaved parent, who spoke about his daughter Isabella, who was cared for by Acorns. Mark said Acorns Walsall extended and improved her quality of life and provides the family with ongoing bereavement help, because, sadly, Isabella passed away earlier this year at the age of 11. Black Country MPs across parties are working to save this hospice, and it is the only one of the three in the area to close.
I know that the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care should be accountable. We have heard the phrase “A bedpan dropping and we hear it Whitehall,” but so much for accountability: at this stage we have to write to the Health Secretary and the head of NHS England, and the Prime Minister said yesterday that they would match-fund what the clinical commissioning groups put forward. May we use the good offices of the Leader of the House to raise this with the Health Secretary? We need the Health Secretary to make the decision so that children’s hospices, particularly Acorns, have their long-term funding. We cannot crowdfund and fundraise to save a children’s hospice.
The third anniversary of Jo Cox’s murder was on 16 June. The hon. Member for Banbury (Victoria Prentis) is working very hard on one of Kim Leadbeater’s key asks for all of us: to focus on the humanitarian emergency in Syria, one of the issues that mattered most to Jo, by highlighting the plight of civilians trapped under the merciless bombing in Idlib.
It has been a busy week for me and the Leader of the House. Yesterday we agreed that we would save the education centre. It is also Refugee Week, and the education and engagement service will be providing a workshop to the refugee and migrant centre in Walsall, “An introduction to your UK Parliament”. I am pleased that that is going ahead and that education is also to be part of any restoration and renewal.
Finally, I offer my commiserations to the Scottish football team but wish the Lionesses well in the next stage of the World cup.
Mel Stride
I thank the hon. Lady for her various questions, which I will go through in some detail in a moment. I also thank her for welcoming the recess dates, which I think we are all relieved have now finally been announced.
Having just announced the summer recess dates, an idea has occurred to me. We meet as a merry band on Thursdays—we are like a tightly knit club—and I wonder if this recess we might perhaps keep the camaraderie going, and all go off on holiday together. I would be happy to hire a bus or a charabanc, Mr Speaker, and as the new Leader who, as you know, has brought such a powerful sense of direction and renewed purpose to this House, I would be happy to drive it. Nothing would give me more pleasure than for my new-found friend, the shadow Leader of the House, to join me. She would be serenaded of course by the ever-cheerful hon. Member for Perth and North Perthshire (Pete Wishart) on the pipes, or maybe the banjo, and accompanied by my right hon. Friend the Member for South Holland and The Deepings (Sir John Hayes) displaying his musical prowess on the spoons while spouting Wordsworth and Keats and John Clare and regaling us with cheery tales of those halcyon Victorian times when small boys cheerfully shinned up chimneys and widespread malnutrition and rickets were a mere footnote to a far happier age. And as the sun slips below the horizon we will hear the extraordinary tales of the hon. Member for Gateshead (Ian Mearns) explaining how he quietly took over the entire business of government with his Backbench Business Committee. Or perhaps we should stick to our original plans.
The hon. Lady raised several important points. First, she asks who will be at the Dispatch Box when Parliament goes into recess. Of course, that is unknown; I have no crystal ball. There are four finalists, all extremely strong candidates, and we will have to wait and see. I can offer her a membership form for the Conservative party so that next time she can participate in the excitement and fun. I was grateful to receive her satisfaction, however, at our having set out the situation for September and at the fact that we will be sitting from early that month.
The hon. Lady mentioned the Cox report. Her request for a debate would need to be taken up through the usual channels, but I have taken her request on board—it is the second time she has raised it with me—and undertake to come back to her later today at least with something by way of a response, even if it is to say that I have asked the usual channels at my end of the usual channel to consider it seriously. She also asked about various pieces of future legislation and when they will be coming forward. They will come forward in due course. On flood defences, which she mentioned, we have of course just had Environment, Food and Rural Affairs questions, which was an opportunity for Members to address that issue.
The hon. Lady made various important points about Mrs Zaghari-Ratcliffe, who has now spent three years in jail in Iran. I can assure her that, whatever may or may not have been said by others in the past, the Government are working extremely hard to do whatever they can to ensure her imminent release. She also raised carbon emissions, which she will know the Government have reduced by 25% in terms of greenhouse gases since 2010. We have now had over 1,700 hours of producing power in our country without the use of coal, which is the longest stretch in the history of power production in the United Kingdom.
The hon. Lady made some very important points about hospices, particularly relating to the care of children, on which subject there will be an Adjournment debate on 1 July in the name of my hon. Friend the Member for Sleaford and North Hykeham (Dr Johnson). The hon. Lady may wish to attend and urge others to do likewise. I would certainly be prepared to facilitate the approaches she requested to the Secretary of State for Health in terms of funding.
The hon. Lady made some very important points about Jo Cox and the excellent work of Kim Leadbeater and her concerns about humanitarian aid in Syria. In that regard, we have a proud record in this country and have allocated some billions of pounds of assistance. Given that she also referred to Refugee Week, I should remind the House that we have agreed to take 20,000 refugees and 3,000 children from Syria.
Like the hon. Lady, I was pleased that during the remaining stages of the Parliamentary Buildings (Restoration and Renewal) Bill yesterday we underscored our commitment to education in this place, and, like her also, I commiserate with our Scottish colleagues on the football result yesterday while also cheering on the England team.
Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)
I think that the Backbench Business Committee is universally regarded in this House as a complete success. One of the great policies of David Cameron and Nick Clegg was to bring in a business of the House commission within two years of the coalition Government coming to power. The chaos in this place over the last few months caused by people trying to suspend Standing Orders was the result of our not having a business of the House committee. Can we have a debate on this matter? If we are to have a new Prime Minister, it would be a very good thing if all the parties could agree to have a business of the House committee so that we do not repeat the farce of the last few months.
Mel Stride
The Government’s position on a House business committee remains unchanged: we will not be bringing forward proposals to establish such a committee. There was an absence of consensus on the issue at the end of the previous Parliament, and we believe that that remains the case today.
Pete Wishart (Perth and North Perthshire) (SNP)
I thank the Leader of the House for announcing the purgatory for next week. As for his recess plans, they sound like some kind of holiday from hell, and I think I will resist the temptation to join him in that particular venture. I also thank him for his kind regards about the Scotland football team. I think we are recovering from the heartbreak of last night, and we all wish the Lionesses the very best in the remaining stages of the contest.
This business statement is unbelievable. Other than half a day for the Scottish National party, it is another week of absolutely nothing. This House should now be done under the Vagrancy Act. Never before in the history of Parliament has so little been done by so many on behalf of so few, as Churchill would never have said. But small mercies—at last this is the final day of the contest to see who will be gubbed by the right hon. Member for Uxbridge and South Ruislip (Boris Johnson). It has become a kind of grotesque “Love Island”, without the love, the entertainment or the island. Maybe it is just Boris island. And I seriously do not get all this fuss about the issue of the racist rantings of the right hon. Gentleman being raised. If people say racist and unacceptable things, they have to expect to be held to account for them. I represent the most marginal SNP/Tory seat in the country. My leaflet is set to go, and it is simply a picture of the right hon. Gentleman and all his choice comments, with added quotes from Ruth Davidson. Scotland just will not take to his appalling “Etonic” buffoonery, and reasonable soft Tory voters in Scotland will be deserting the Tories in droves.
May we have a debate about Brexit? Remember that? They gave us extra time to try to resolve it, but they also told us to use that time wisely. We have not debated it in weeks, and there is no plan to debate it in the coming weeks. It is four weeks until the summer recess, and no progress has been made. Can the Leader of the House confirm that we will not be seeing the withdrawal agreement again? It must be dead and buried now. There is a new word that I want to introduce to the parliamentary lexicon, and that word is “unicornism”. That now seems to be the central policy of this Government in their approach to Brexit. They are doing nothing other than waste time and run down the clock. Halloween will soon be upon us, and the nightmare on Brexit Street will be set to haunt us all.
Mel Stride
I thank the hon. Gentleman for his weekly contribution. I have to say that it had a familiar ring to it, although I have to disagree with him about the summer recess. How could it possibly be a holiday from hell with him there? It would be nothing other than a great pleasure. He did give us the same old tunes, though. Last week I said he was using the Abba playbook, but this week I am going to elevate him to the Beatles. His meandering litany of woe was “The Long and Winding Road” that we had to endure, but as we know, it will all end up in the same place for the “Nowhere Man”. Anyway. They don’t get any better, do they?
The hon. Gentleman asks for a Brexit debate. The House has certainly debated Brexit at significant length over a very significant period—the best part of three years now. He could have chosen this very week to debate it in the half day allotted to the Scottish National party, although I have no doubt that, in the immigration debate that the SNP has chosen, he will be able to weave the European Union in somewhere.
Sir David Amess (Southend West) (Con)
Will my right hon. Friend find time for a debate on the future of the BBC? There have already been concerns about taking away free TV licences from the over-75s, but frankly, after that dreadful debate on Monday between my parliamentary colleagues, the quality of public broadcasting needs to be looked at, and presumably, during the course of our debate, we could find out who the idiot was in central office who agreed to the format of that programme in the first place.
Mel Stride
My hon. Friend tempts me. On the specific issue of the free TV licence, we are urging the BBC to rethink its position. I have to say that I agree with my hon. Friend’s observation on the televised hustings, which made the candidates look like some kind of boy band perched on their stools. The BBC should always be an institution that is debated, including in further debates in this House.
Ian Mearns (Gateshead) (Lab)
I was sad to see the demise of the Scottish ladies’ football team last night, when they snatched defeat from the jaws of victory late in the game after taking a 3-0 lead. I was reminded that it has been only 41 years since Ally MacLeod and his tartan army ventured forth to Buenos Aires and sadly came back undone.
The Backbench Business Committee had a dozen applications for estimates day debates, and the business for those days has now been determined as relating to the spending of the Department for Work and Pensions, the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government, the Department for International Development and the Department for Education. Will the Leader of the House confirm the dates for those debates? We had been led to believe that they would occur on 2 and 3 July, but I understand that there is now some doubt about that.
Despite the fact that the Backbench Business Committee has been getting an awful lot of business, I remind the Leader of the House that we still have unmet demand. He should also take note that, on Monday, the House went on to the Adjournment debate at 7.08 pm and adjourned at 7.47 pm. If the Leader of the House and the business team think that there is likely to be a shortfall in business—this was despite four urgent questions on Monday—could he think about making the Backbench Business Committee aware so that we could put something on at short notice?
Mel Stride
The dates for the estimates days are not currently available, but I will ensure that we get them to the hon. Gentleman as soon as possible. I take note of his rather interesting observation about the possibility of a Backbench Business debate coming to the Floor of the House when other business is running short. There may be all sorts of technical issues around that, but I am happy to take his suggestion away and give it some thought.
Sir John Hayes (South Holland and The Deepings) (Con)
A civilised society is defined by the way that it copes with and counters disadvantage. I was therefore alarmed to discover yesterday that 79% of assistance dog owners had been made to feel unwelcome or had received second-class service because they had their assistance dog with them, and in particular that 73% of those with guide dogs or assistance dogs had been turned away by a minicab or taxi driver. The Government commissioned a report on taxi licensing, and one of its recommendations was that we deal with this prejudice against people with guide dogs and other assistance dogs. It is time that the Government acted and joined you, Mr Speaker, and I, whose mission has always been to redistribute advantage.
Mel Stride
I thank my right hon. Friend for his question, and I agree with him that access for assistance dogs and their owners, especially in taxis and other modes of transport, is extremely important. I would be happy to facilitate on his behalf an appropriate meeting with a Minister in the Department for Transport.
I know that my right hon. Friend is rather fond of poetry and, having been forewarned of his question, I found a poem by Julian Stearns Cutler that I think is quite appropriate to him as well as to dogs:
“You’re only a dog, old fellow;
a dog, and you’ve had your day;
But never a friend of all my friends
has been truer than you alway”.
Mr Speaker
Well, what a beautiful reply from the Treasury Bench. I must say to the right hon. Member for South Holland and The Deepings (Sir John Hayes) that I have just received his most gracious, handwritten, borderline poetic letter in his illustrious capacity as chair of the all-party parliamentary group for Lebanon, and I intend to reply by hand—although probably not, as he would prefer, by the use of the quill pen—similarly graciously and within a very short timeframe. My response to his request will be in the affirmative, and I expect that he will wish to dance round a red telephone box, if he can find one, in appreciation of my reply.
Mr Speaker
My letter is not in verse. I know my limitations. I cannot compete with the right hon. Member for South Holland and The Deepings on that front.
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
The right hon. Member for South Holland and The Deepings (Sir John Hayes) recently joined me as a trustee of the John Clare Trust.
I welcome the Leader of the House’s comments on Jo Cox. She was a Labour family friend, and her constituency was close to mine. I know we do not talk about these things, but I still worry about the safety and security of Members, particularly female Members, of this House, and I do not think we have yet come to terms with some of the vulnerabilities involved. That is not for major debate.
In most of our towns and cities, we are poisoning many women—pregnant women and older women—and men, too, with the dirty air they breathe every day. Can we have an urgent debate on a fast programme of activity, not the Government’s 2040 deadline, to cut down the poisonous air our people are breathing in every day?
Mel Stride
I echo the hon. Gentleman’s comments about Jo Cox and, more generally, about security. It would not be appropriate for me to discuss it on the Floor of the House, but I assure him that I have already met the Chairman of Ways and Means and others to discuss matters of security across the parliamentary estate, which I take extremely seriously.
We have a clean air strategy, of course, and the Government have done a great deal to cut many emissions substantially over the past several years. Given that the Chair of the Backbench Business Committee, the hon. Member for Gateshead (Ian Mearns), is still looking for opportunities for yet further debates, clean air might be a good subject. The hon. Member for Huddersfield (Mr Sheerman) might like to approach him on that basis.
Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (SNP)
In eight recent Department for Work and Pensions appeal cases in my constituency the DWP has not submitted information to the court in time. That has led to the hearings being postponed, which is obviously distressing for the appellants. Will the Government make a statement on what they will do to make sure that the DWP adheres to proper timescales? Will the Leader of the House confirm that this is sheer incompetence from the DWP, and not a deliberate Government strategy?
Mel Stride
I have two answers for the hon. Gentleman. First, when it comes to specific DWP cases—he cited some cases in his question—I am happy to facilitate an approach to the relevant Minister to make sure those cases are specifically looked at. On his more general point about how these cases are handled, DWP questions on 1 July will be a good opportunity to raise the matter.
Helen Jones (Warrington North) (Lab)
It has been revealed today that Warrington Hospital has published a list of charges for operations that used to be free on the NHS. These are not cosmetic procedures but things like hip and knee operations and cataract removals. Can we have a debate on the creeping privatisation of the NHS under this Government and the denial of essential treatment to people who cannot afford to pay?
Mel Stride
As a party and as a Government, we are entirely committed to healthcare being free at the point of delivery and on a universal basis. The Opposition often assert that wholesale privatisation of the NHS is occurring, which is simply not the case. The private sector has been involved in the NHS ever since its inception. Most of the drugs used by the NHS come from private companies, and general practitioners are effectively employed on a similar basis. As to the record of this Government, we have made the largest cash injection into the NHS in its history.
Ruth Jones (Newport West) (Lab)
The Leader of the House is well aware of the plight of Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, who has already been mentioned in the House this morning. Richard Ratcliffe, her husband, is now on hunger strike outside the Iranian embassy here in London to show solidarity with his wife and to highlight the appalling conditions in which she is being held.
Mr Ratcliffe’s sister lives in my Newport West constituency, and she is extremely concerned about the physical and mental health of both Richard and Nazanin. Given that the previous Foreign Secretary made a bad situation worse with his comments on her detention, will the current Foreign Secretary come to the House to update us on the efforts being made to get Nazanin back home as quickly as possible to be reunited with her daughter and husband?
Mel Stride
I have already touched on the issue of Mrs Zaghari-Ratcliffe and repeat that it is totally unacceptable that she should be held. We are engaged with the Iranian Government. I also respect the fact that her husband has entered into a hunger strike, as she has at the same time. For that reason, and all the others of her detainment, we wish to see her released as quickly as possible. My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister has raised Mrs Zaghari-Ratcliffe’s case with President Rouhani, and we will continue to push diplomatically on this matter.
Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington) (LD)
I am upset with the Leader of the House, as he did not invite me on his bus tour, but perhaps he will let me know what slogan he intended having on the side of the bus. I am also disappointed that the urgent question has been cancelled; I wonder whether the hon. Member for Stone (Sir William Cash) has been sat on. I will turn the homework that I had done for the UQ into a question for the Leader of the House. Will he make time for a debate, in Government time, about how extreme is the new normal in the Tory party and, therefore, the Government? He will know that a majority of Conservative party members are willing to see their party destroyed and the UK broken up in order to secure Brexit. It seems that defaulting on our debts, as Argentina did, is also the preferred course of action. So may we have that debate, when we could also debate the damage that no deal would do to the UK economy and the damage a default on our debt would do to our international credibility?
Mel Stride
May I apologise profusely for not having invited the right hon. Gentleman on our holiday? I assure him that there would be nothing disagreeable on the side of the bus, but we do have a dress code and so, for that reason, I am not entirely sure he would be able to join us—but who knows?
I have no idea why my hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Sir William Cash) withdrew his UQ, but I can assure the House that he was not sat on—and certainly not by me. I can think of nothing worse than the prospect of sitting on him. As for the issue of debates on the EU, I think I have addressed that earlier; there will be plenty of opportunities, in different guises, to discuss that, and I look forward to the right hon. Gentleman bringing his suggestions forward.
Mr Speaker
The hon. Member for Stone (Sir William Cash) judged that the situation had changed since his submission of the urgent question, and presumably it had changed to his satisfaction. I know no further than that. I am not surprised that the Leader of the House did not sit on the hon. Member for Stone, and indeed I should be very surprised if any Member on the Treasury Bench attempted to do so, for there has been one consistent thread in the career of the hon. Member for Stone and that is that he has had a relationship with the Whips characterised by trust and understanding—I do not think he has always trusted them and they most certainly have not always understood him.
Nick Smith (Blaenau Gwent) (Lab)
New guidance from the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence says that employers should help their staff to take part in physical activity. This measure would improve mental and physical health, and support our NHS, so may we have a statement from the Government about promoting physical activity in the workplace?
Mel Stride
Before I answer that question, may I reply to you, Mr Speaker, about my hon. Friend the Member for Stone and reassure everybody I have invited on the holiday that he will not be there, and so there will be no sitting on him, be it on the holiday or otherwise? I say that just so we are absolutely clear what is going on in these important questions.
As for the issue of employers and physical health, there is clearly a link between physical activity and ensuring both physical and mental health. This might be an opportunity to speak to the Chair of the Backbench Business Committee about another worthy possible contender for his attention.
Faisal Rashid (Warrington South) (Lab)
Yesterday, reports emerged that the Warrington and Halton Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust has been advertising a price list for operations that were once free on the NHS. Vital procedures such as hip and knee operations will cost more than £18,000, which is way outside most ordinary people’s budgets. Recently, we have been seeing the privatisation of our NHS advertised to my constituents, with sick and vulnerable people being exploited for profit. Will the Leader of the House give time for a ministerial statement or a debate on this important issue?
Mel Stride
I say gently to the hon. Gentleman that that question was in effect asked some moments ago. My answer remains the same.
Mrs Madeleine Moon (Bridgend) (Lab)
The House will be aware that Ford has announced redundancies in my Bridgend constituency. Some 1,700 people are going to lose their and their families’ income, livelihoods and futures. May we have a debate about the Treasury’s benefiting from the misfortune of those who lose their job and face redundancy payments? At the moment, people will lose 40% of any redundancy payment over £30,000, and if those who will be able to access their pension once they are over 55 reach their 55th birthday after 2026, they will have to wait until 2027 to access it, thereby losing a further £40,000 to £60,000. It is wrong for the Government to benefit from the misfortune of those who are losing their jobs, and with a harsh Brexit ahead of us there will be many more to come. We need to resolve this situation now.
Mel Stride
I agree with the hon. Lady that it is most unfortunate that there are redundancies at the Bridgend plant. The Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, the Secretary of State and his Ministers have been very much engaged in and closely connected to what is happening there.
The hon. Lady raised the specific issue of termination payments and rightly said that tax was due on payments over a £30,000 threshold, although there are some exceptions to that. I believe that is one of the most generous arrangements in the world and think I am right in saying—I stand to be corrected—that in Germany, for example, there is no threshold in play at all. However, she raised important points, particularly in respect of pensions, so I direct her to Treasury questions, which will be held on 2 July.
Justin Madders (Ellesmere Port and Neston) (Lab)
May we please have a debate on the statutory requirements for changes to bus services and the consultation process? Stagecoach has announced that seven services in and around my constituency might change. It has not given any details on what the changes are, other than to say that people in Neston will no longer be able to go to Arrowe Park Hospital. It is all squirrelled away online and is very inaccessible. It really is not good enough. Can we have a proper consultation process on changes to important local services?
Mel Stride
That would make an excellent subject for an Adjournment debate, at which the hon. Gentleman would have an opportunity to ask the appropriate Minister specific questions about the specific routes and so on in his constituency.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
On Sunday 16 June, the Quebec Government passed Bill 21, which prevents judges, police officers, teachers and other public servants from wearing religious symbols such as the kippah, the turban and the hijab while at work. The Bill clearly contravenes article 18 of the international covenant on civil and political rights, which says that the right to manifest one’s religion or beliefs may be subject only to such limitations as are necessary to protect public safety, order, health or morals, or the rights and freedoms of others. To say that a teacher who wears a cross or a hijab is somehow a threat to public safety and health is an assertion that is both offensive and groundless. It is important that the UK raises this issue with our Canadian friends. Will the Leader of the House agree to a statement on the matter or, better still, refer it to a Minister from the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and request that the FCO contacts the Quebec Government immediately?
Mel Stride
I thank the hon. Gentleman for his important question. Ultimately, it would not be appropriate for me to comment directly from the Dispatch Box on the position taken by the Canadian Government and their legislation—not least because I am not entirely familiar with the precise detail—other than to restate our position, which is that in this Parliament we are entirely committed to freedom of religious belief and the promotion of respect between people.
Marsha De Cordova (Battersea) (Lab)
Today is Nystagmus Awareness Day. Nystagmus affects one in every 1,000 babies born in the UK and is a condition that I have. It means that my eyes wobble left and right and up and down, and I am registered severely sight-impaired. Today, it is estimated that nearly 2 million people are living with sight loss, but the number of people registered is significantly lower. Will the Leader of the House join me in celebrating Nystagmus Awareness Day? May we have a debate on the importance of registering people who are living with sight loss?
Mel Stride
May I entirely associate myself with those remarks and welcome Nystagmus Day? I would be happy to meet with the hon. Lady to discuss making available appropriate time in some form or another to debate this matter.
Colleen Fletcher (Coventry North East) (Lab)
In 2018-19, people from Coventry spent 674 days delayed in hospital because no suitable housing was available. That is the highest number on record. It is a shocking indictment of the Government’s time in office that we now have the highest number of homeless people trapped in hospital. May we therefore have a debate on the homelessness crisis in our country, its impact on our NHS and how the Government plan to improve collaborative working between housing and health services to stop people being unnecessarily pushed into homelessness or stuck in hospital for extended periods?
Mel Stride
There are several important points to make about the important issue of homelessness which the hon. Lady has raised. The first is the Government’s commitment to ensuring that we build more homes. We have built 220,000 new homes, the highest number for any year other than one in the last 31 years. She will know that we have announced a substantial, multimillion- pound fund to address rough sleeping. We have seen a slight decline over the more recent period, but there is still a lot more to do. This is an important issue that will always be worthy of debate, and if the hon. Lady would like to apply for an Adjournment debate, that might be a useful approach to take.
Patrick Grady (Glasgow North) (SNP)
I think this is the first chance that I have had to welcome the new Leader of the House to his place. We are grateful for the SNP Opposition day, and I hope that the three hours next Wednesday will be protected.
I echo the calls for a statement by the Foreign Secretary on the situation of Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe. I had the huge privilege of meeting her husband outside the Iranian embassy this morning. He is showing huge determination and solidarity. I know that Members from across the House have been to visit, so perhaps the Leader of the House can encourage some of his colleagues on the Front Bench—perhaps the Home Secretary, the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and the Foreign Secretary—to show their solidarity with Richard and Nazanin’s family and finally get the justice that the family are so hungry for.
Mel Stride
I thank the hon. Gentleman for his question; this matter has now been raised, quite rightly, for the third time in these business questions. I have set out the various actions that the Government continue to take to press the Iranian regime to do the right thing and release Mrs Zaghari-Ratcliffe, and I know that the hon. Gentleman’s comments about Richard’s hunger strike will have been heard throughout the House.
Susan Elan Jones (Clwyd South) (Lab)
It is 10 years since the Pontcysyllte aqueduct and canal became a UNESCO world heritage site, thereby joining sites such as the Taj Mahal, the Great Barrier Reef and the Great Wall of China—although Pontcysyllte is of course superior to all of them. It was built in 13 years by those great civil engineers Thomas Telford and William Jessop, and has a height of 126 feet. One can go on it on a boat; it is a most amazing place to travel. It is a masterpiece of waterworks engineering and a pioneering example of iron construction, and it was at the heart of the industrial revolution. I am a little worried that all Members will want to come on holiday at the same time, so perhaps they can promise not to do that. Will the Leader of the House explain how I can best promote the wonders of Pontcysyllte aqueduct and the canal across our nation and in this House?
Mel Stride
That was a wonderful question. I will not attempt to pronounce the name of the canal, on the basis that I will probably not do it as well as the hon. Lady, but it is a marvellous construction and was the work of Telford and Jessop, as she said. I am delighted that it has achieved world heritage status. She asked how she can promote the canal; I would suggest that she has done just that with her question, but if she wants another opportunity, we will have Digital, Culture, Media and Sport questions on 4 July.
Mr Adrian Bailey (West Bromwich West) (Lab/Co-op)
The Royal Mail Group and the Communication Workers Union have agreed a groundbreaking collective defined- contribution pension scheme for the group’s 141,000 UK employees. The trouble is that it needs to be enabled by legislation. Will the Leader of the House commit to introducing the necessary legislation prior to the summer recess?
Mel Stride
I am happy to look at the issue that the hon. Gentleman has raised, particularly as he suggests that it may relate to a requirement for future legislation. I also point him to Work and Pensions questions on 1 July.
Joan Ryan (Enfield North) (Change UK)
A recent Smith Institute report confirms that Enfield has the third highest number of low-paid people of all London boroughs. Even more concerning is that, according to the report, the low pay rate is £8.33 an hour. The current London living wage is supposed to be £10.55 an hour. Ministers are often telling us about employment levels, but these can mask the growth in poverty and poverty pay. May we have an early debate in Government time on the record levels of low pay and poverty that are causing such hardship to families and children in Enfield and up and down the country?
Mel Stride
The Government strongly share the sentiments expressed by the right hon. Lady that we should do whatever we can to improve the position of the low paid. That is why we have taken 3 million to 4 million of the lowest paid out of tax altogether since 2010 by increasing the personal allowance, and why we have worked hard to get the economy moving to the point at which real pay has been increasing for the last 19 months consecutively. It is also why this party brought in the national living wage and why we saw such an increase in the national living wage at the start of this financial year.
Diana Johnson (Kingston upon Hull North) (Lab)
Leo Goodwin, the managing director of TransPennine Express, received a lot of publicity last year because he earns £360,000. He is well known in Hull because he is presiding over a complete shambles in the management of Hull Paragon station. There are botched toilet facilities that were supposed to be rebuilt, there is signage covered in duct tape, and there are empty retail units that TransPennine built but cannot actually fill. To make things worse, on Monday this week TransPennine decided, without consultation with key stakeholders, to close one of the main entrances to the station between half-past 9 and half-past 4 o’clock—really putting up the white flag to a very small number of people who commit antisocial behaviour. This has meant that passengers, particularly disabled passengers, are having trouble accessing the station. May we please have a debate about companies that run stations appallingly?
Mel Stride
The very specific points that the hon. Lady raises regarding TransPennine Express, the station and access issues would probably most appropriately be directed to an Adjournment debate, which would give the hon. Lady an opportunity to address them directly with the appropriate Minister at the Department for Transport.
Patricia Gibson (North Ayrshire and Arran) (SNP)
My constituent was given a 10-year personal independence payment award in 2018 because of her heart condition. Recently she had a heart attack and spent 24 days in hospital. Having informed the DWP, she was sent for a PIP reassessment, at which she lost her entitlement. I was able to get that decision reversed, but we can all imagine how distressing that was for my constituent. Will the Leader of the House make a statement setting out the widespread concerns about PIP assessments, and how urgently this system needs to be reviewed and improved so that such an appalling situation does not happen again?
Mel Stride
The situation that the hon. Lady describes sounds extremely unfortunate, to say the least. I commend her for the work that she appears to have undertaken to ensure that the original decision was overturned at appeal. I stress that there is the right of appeal in such cases, and that is an important check and balance in the system. If she has further cases of a similar nature and wishes me to facilitate an approach to Ministers at the Department for Work and Pensions, I would be very happy to do so.
Jessica Morden (Newport East) (Lab)
Rebecca Parker from Newport was in the news recently calling out high street retailers for the huge disparity between clothes size labels and the actual size of the garment, with the detrimental effect on self-confidence, particularly for young people, that that brings. As body image was this year’s theme of Mental Health Awareness Week, could we have a debate on how the Government can work with retailers to address this?
Mel Stride
The hon. Lady raises an extremely important point. I say that as a father of three daughters, actually. I know exactly the element around body image and so on that comes at young women, in particular, from a variety of angles, including the one that she has raised. If she would like to meet me, perhaps after these questions, I would be very happy to talk further about how we could perhaps facilitate something in the way of a debate.
Dr David Drew (Stroud) (Lab/Co-op)
May I say how much I am looking forward to debating the Second Reading of the Kew Gardens (Leases) (No. 3) Bill on Monday, when we will talk about 11 houses? However, I would be even happier if we were talking about the Report stage of the Agriculture Bill. Where is it, when is it coming back, and is it going to be fit for purpose when it does?
Mel Stride
The Agriculture Bill is there in draft. It is fit for purpose, and it will be coming back in due course.
Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)
The York Central development will see the wrong kind of housing built, which people in my community cannot afford. It will choke off economic opportunity and draw cars into the centre of our congested, gridlocked city. Can we have a debate on how public land must be used for the public good?
Mel Stride
I think that issue might be one for an Adjournment debate to give the hon. Lady an opportunity to discuss it with Ministers. She will know that, as I said earlier, we have made very significant progress in terms of house building. The number of homes built in the last year for which there are figures available is at the highest level for all but one of the past 31 years.
Several hon. Members rose—
Chris Stephens (Glasgow South West) (SNP)
Tails never fails, Mr Speaker—thank you.
On a more serious note, two of my constituents were in the House on Monday as part of a Red Cross event for Refugee Week. One of them has a letter from Serco telling them to leave their accommodation—written to them two weeks ago, not this week as Serco is publicly suggesting. So can I ask, for the second week in a row, for the Home Office to make a statement or hold a debate on asylum seeker evictions in the city of Glasgow by Home Office contractor Serco?
Mel Stride
Serco has not enforced eviction in Glasgow and continues, at its own expense, to house the group that the hon. Gentleman rightly refers to. It estimated that the number of people not leaving their properties had grown to over 300 and that was impacting on its capacity to house new asylum seekers. That is the background to this matter. It is a Home Office matter, as he indicated. I would be very happy to facilitate whatever discussions he feels that he needs with Ministers there.
Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)
Today is Clean Air Day. Leeds was due to implement the first clean air zone in the country. However, this week it was confirmed to Leeds and Birmingham Councils that the equipment for charging and for vehicle recognition would not be delivered on time by the end of the year. Given that the UK is due to host the UN climate change conference in 2020, can we expect a ministerial statement on this failure to deliver the clean air zones on time in 2019?
Mel Stride
I think the Government’s record on bringing down emissions—I mentioned, for example, the 25% reduction in emissions since 2010—has been a very good one. We have legislation coming on the Order Paper next week in relation to making sure that we set strong net zero carbon emissions targets up to 2050. We remain committed, through our actions on clear air, to keep moving strongly in that direction. It will not be quickly enough for the hon. Gentleman, perhaps, but there will no doubt be ample opportunities, through the Backbench Business Committee and other routes, to debate these matters very fully in the weeks ahead.
Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)
There is growing concern that, despite all the assurances given to the contrary, as EU legislation—particularly, in this instance, pesticide policy—is being converted into British law, it is being weakened significantly. One example is the removal of a blanket ban on hormone-disrupting chemicals, which are known to cause cancer, birth defects and immune disorders. Can we have an urgent statement from a Minister on how we can ensure that the process of transferring over EU law is being done properly and with due scrutiny?
Mel Stride
The hon. Lady raises an important point about pesticide use. I know that there have been lots of debates about, for example, the effects of neonicotinoids on the bee population and the fertilisation of plants. She will want to ask Ministers specific questions. We had Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs questions this morning, but if she wants to use me as a conduit to send some questions and suggestions to Ministers, I would be happy to serve that purpose.
Drew Hendry
Thank you, Mr Speaker. It is always a delight to be saved and savoured.
Can we have a debate in Government time on Ofgem’s handling of the renewable heat incentive scheme? Several of my constituents have been served with repayment notices of eye-watering proportions—for example, £17,000 and £20,000—to be paid within six months. That is despite them previously getting clean audits. They have been left carrying the can for the guilty companies that have simply vanished, and they are in desperate straits.
Mel Stride
That is an excellent opportunity for an Adjournment debate, and I recommend that the hon. Gentleman put in for one, so that he can grill the appropriate Minister accordingly.
Online Pornography: Age Verification
(4 years, 10 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (Jeremy Wright)
With permission, Mr Speaker, I would like to make a statement. As the House knows, the Government announced that age verification for online pornography, under the Digital Economy Act 2017, would come into force on 15 July 2019. It has come to my attention in recent days that an important notification process was not undertaken for an element of this policy, and I regret to say that that will delay the commencement date. I wanted to take the opportunity to come to the House as soon as possible to apologise for the mistake that has been made and to explain its implications.
In autumn last year, we laid three instruments before the House for approval. One of them—the guidance on age verification arrangements—sets out standards that companies need to comply with. That should have been notified to the European Commission, in line with the technical standards and regulations directive, and it was not. Upon learning of that administrative oversight, I instructed my Department to notify this guidance to the EU and re-lay the guidance in Parliament as soon as possible. However, I expect that that will result in a delay in the region of six months.
As the House would expect, I want to understand how this occurred. I have therefore instructed my Department’s permanent secretary to conduct a thorough investigation. That investigation will have external elements to ensure that all necessary lessons are learned. Mechanisms will also be put in place to ensure that this cannot happen again. In the meantime, there is nothing to stop responsible providers of online pornography implementing age verification mechanisms on a voluntary basis, and I hope and expect that many will do so.
The House will also know that there are a number of other ways in which the Government are pursuing our objective of keeping young people safer online. The online harms White Paper sets out our plans for world-leading legislation to make the UK the safest place in the world to be online. Alongside the White Paper, we published the social media code of practice under the Digital Economy Act 2017, which gives guidance to providers of social media platforms on appropriate actions that they should take to prevent bullying, insulting, intimidating and humiliating behaviours on their sites. We will also publish interim codes of practice detailing the steps that we expect companies to take to tackle terrorist content, and online child sexual abuse and exploitation. These will pave the way for the new regulatory requirements.
We set out in the White Paper our expectation that companies should protect children from inappropriate content, and we will produce a draft code of practice on child online safety to set clear standards for companies to keep children safe online, ahead of the new regulatory framework. During the consultation on the White Paper, technical challenges associated with identifying the specific ages of users were raised, so I have commissioned new guidance, to be published in the autumn, about the use of technology to ensure that children are protected from inappropriate content online.
The new regulatory framework for online harms that was announced in the White Paper will be introduced as soon as possible, because it will make a significant difference to the action taken by companies to keep children safe online. I intend to publish the Government response to the consultation by the end of the year, and to introduce legislation as soon as parliamentary time allows after that.
I recognise that many Members of the House and many people beyond it have campaigned passionately for age verification to come into force as soon as possible to ensure that children are protected from pornographic material they should not see. I apologise to them all for the fact that a mistake has been made that means these measures will not be brought into force as soon as they and I would like. However, there are also those who do not want these measures to be brought in at all, so let me make it clear that my statement is an apology for delay, not a change of policy or a lessening of this Government’s determination to bring these changes about. Age verification for online pornography needs to happen. I believe that it is the clear will of the House and those we represent that it should happen, and that it is in the clear interests of our children that it must.
Cat Smith (Lancaster and Fleetwood) (Lab)
I thank the Secretary of State for advance sight of his statement and the sincerity with which he has made this apology today. However, the statement is proof that a serious and important policy has descended into an utter shambles under this Government. I would like to ask the Secretary of State one question that he did not answer in his statement: when did he find out about this? He says that it was in the last few days, but could he be a bit clearer about that?
Age verification was supposed to be introduced last April; it was delayed. Then it was going to be introduced next month, and today we hear it is going to be delayed again. The Secretary of State says he regrets this. We do too, very much, because it is not good enough—it is not acceptable and it is letting children down. Recent reports showed that 70% of eight to 17-year-olds have seen images and videos that are not suitable for their age in the past year. Given the rise in the use of mobile devices and tablets in the past decade, the case for appropriate online pornography enforcement has increased.
The Secretary of State says that an administrative error caused the failure to notify the European Commission of key details, but are there more fundamental problems with this policy? Can the Secretary of State give us a commitment about exactly when it will be introduced? Indeed, is he confident that it will ever be introduced? When the legislation was going through this place, Labour raised serious concerns about whether the verification process was viable, and whether the process could work if very personal data was given over to commercial pornography sites. This delay shows we were right to be concerned. Is he confident that such extremely sensitive personal data will be safe from leaks or hacks?
Media reports from earlier this year showed serious flaws in the system, with journalists able to create fake profiles that circumvented age checks in minutes. Is the Secretary of State sure that when—if—the policy is finally introduced, it will actually work? The ultimate sanction under the age verification regime was the power to block rogue sites, with internet service providers compelled to comply, but new encrypted browser software is about to undermine this system fundamentally. The encryption will mean that ISPs are blind to the sites that users visit on the internet, and they will be unable to block rogue sites that compromise the safety of children. That system—DNS over HTTPS—undermines not only the age verification system, but the entire foundations of the regulation laid out by the Government in the online harms White Paper. Does the Secretary of State agree that online companies are outsmarting the Government, and that we urgently need to know how the Government plan to catch up?
Jeremy Wright
I thank the hon. Lady for her remarks. As she knows, I have spoken to the shadow Secretary of State about this issue—I accept that he cannot be here today and I am grateful to her for stepping in.
The hon. Lady raised a number of issues, starting with when I discovered the error. The answer to that is Friday last week, and my hon. Friend the Minister for Digital and the Creative Industries found out a couple of days before that. As the House would expect, we have spent the intervening time seeking to confirm that there is no alternative way of doing what I have described. We do not believe there is, hence the course of actions that I have set out to the House.
The hon. Lady rightly asked about personal data and privacy, which is an area of concern. As she knows, it was discussed during the passage of the Digital Economy Act 2017 and subsequently. I do not believe that it is impossible to reconcile the important requirement that people’s data and privacy are protected with the equally important requirement that children are protected from material they should not see. It is perfectly feasible to do those two things in parallel, which is what we seek through our approach. As she knows, the British Board of Film Classification, which will be the regulator for this, has taken steps to ensure that beyond the requirement on all relevant companies under the general data protection regulation parameters, an additional scheme will be available to those who wish to take advantage of it. That scheme will set out a higher gold standard for privacy, which we believe should be publicised to those who may wish to use these services.
The hon. Lady mentioned sanctions, but she will recognise that the issue under discussion is not sanctions for a breach of the requirements, but notification of them to the European Union. It is important to understand changes in technology and the additional challenges they throw up, and she is right to say that the so-called “D over H” changes will present additional challenges. We are working through those now and speaking to the browsers, which is where we must focus our attention. As the hon. Lady rightly says, the use of these protocols will make it more difficult, if not impossible, for ISPs to do what we ask, but it is possible for browsers to do that. We are therefore talking to browsers about how that might practically be done, and the Minister and I will continue those conversations to ensure that these provisions can continue to be effective.
Mr John Whittingdale (Maldon) (Con)
Is my right hon. and learned Friend aware that this is not the first time that a DCMS measure has had to be reintroduced because of a failure to notify the EU Commission? I hope that that problem will soon be removed, but while it exists, will he use this extra time to ensure that we get the measure right? There are still concerns on the grounds of freedom of speech and privacy, and about the ease with which measures can be circumvented through the use of virtual private networks. Will he raise similar concerns with the Information Commissioner to ensure that the age appropriate design code is right? It is much more important that it is properly designed than that it is rushed into place.
Jeremy Wright
I suspect that my right hon. Friend knows from experience that this is not the first time that such a thing has happened, but I am doing my level best to ensure it is the last. It is important that we have new mechanisms to ensure that such oversights are not repeated, and that is exactly what I am doing at the moment. He is correct that we should use the time we now have to get this right and to work through some of the additional challenges that I described a moment ago—we will do that. It is important that we understand these technological changes and, if I may say so, that validates our approach in the online harms White Paper, which was not to be prescriptive about technology, but to ensure that we adapt our systems as technology moves. We will seek to do the same on this point.
My right hon. Friend mentioned the age appropriate design code which, as he rightly says, is produced by the Information Commissioner, not the Government. He is right that it is important that we do not to rush this and that the Information Commissioner takes full account of the responses to the consultation. Having spoken to the Information Commissioner, I know that she will take full account of all the comments before taking the matter any further.
Patricia Gibson (North Ayrshire and Arran) (SNP)
I agree with the Secretary of State that age verification needs to happen. The delay announced today is one thing, but the delays actually stretch back to April. This latest delay does not inspire confidence, which is extremely serious, given that this is about protecting children from harmful content. Another six-month delay is not acceptable. Can he guarantee that there will be no further slippage in the implementation of age verification? Does he agree that robust age verification must apply to social media companies, which may operate around the fringes of the law? Can he reassure us that he will do all that he can to prevent those who are unwilling to provide age verification from accessing pornography and other inappropriate material posted on a social media platform? Does he agree that that needs to be dealt with robustly as a matter of huge concern, as further delays will start to look like a lack of commitment on the Government’s part?
Jeremy Wright
I can reassure the hon. Lady that there is no lack of commitment on the Government’s part, as I hope she would expect. When we discovered that the mistake had been made and realised there was no way to avoid its consequences, the right thing to do was to come and say so to the House of Commons, to apologise not just to the House but, as I said, to those beyond it who have campaigned on this matter, and to set out what we now believe needs to be done.
We will of course do everything we can to ensure there is no further slippage. Both my hon. Friend the Minister and I will spend a good deal of time making sure that we have the necessary measures in place to ensure that such mistakes do not happen again.
The hon. Lady is right to say that social media companies have a responsibility. She will know that in our White Paper on so-called online harms, one area of focus was making sure that young people are not exposed to material to which they should not be exposed. We believe that the duty of care that the White Paper will institute should apply to social media companies across the board. They should be responsible for making sure, where they reasonably can, that harms do not reach their users. Through that process, we expect to develop a regulatory framework that will make that happen. I do not believe that online companies should wait for the regulator to be in place before they change their behaviour, and a sensible company will not do so. When the regulator starts work, it will want to be persuaded not just that an online company is doing the right thing on the day of the beginning of that work, but that it has been doing so for some time.
I very much hope that that will make a difference—I believe it will. The hon. Lady has my commitment that we will continue to work on a whole range of measures to ensure that young people are as safe online as they can be.
Alex Chalk (Cheltenham) (Con)
I commend the Secretary of State for being so open and frank about this administrative mistake; if I may say so, that is absolutely the right approach. However, as has already been acknowledged, this is not the first time that such a thing has happened. I understand that measures are being put in place to ensure that it does not happen again, but when will that happen so that we can be confident that the Department is operating as it should?
Jeremy Wright
We will conduct that exercise as quickly as we can. As I indicated in my statement, it is important that there is an external element in the process so that people outside the Department can look at what has happened and give us appropriate advice on how that can be avoided in the future. I also think that we will need to look at the mechanisms that are applied to ensure that such an administrative error cannot be made again.
It is worth my saying that it is an important convention of this House—I know, Mr Speaker, that you resolutely defend it—that Ministers should take responsibility for mistakes made by their Department. I am not here to talk about an error of a particular official; I am here to talk about a departmental mistake for which I take responsibility as Secretary of State. It is only right, too, that I reinforce the commitment and dedication of my Department’s civil servants to keeping young people safe online. The measures that we have taken over the past 12 months have represented significant steps forward, and I am grateful to my Department for having achieved that. I do not in any way defend this mistake, but I think it would be wrong to give the impression that the hard-working civil servants of the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport are not doing everything that they can to keep young people safe online.
Diana Johnson (Kingston upon Hull North) (Lab)
The Secretary of State is a very honourable man, and it is commendable that he has come to speak to the House today, but many people will be very disappointed by this delay. He said in his statement that he expected this to
“result in a delay in the region of six months”,
but often in this place we are able to expedite matters when they are urgent. Is there no opportunity to speed things up, rather than our having to wait for six months?
Jeremy Wright
I am grateful to the hon. Lady for what she says, and she asks a fair question. One reason why I did not come to the House before now was that I sought to explore exactly what we might be able to do either to avoid this delay altogether or to minimise it. Perhaps it would help if I explained why I think that six months is roughly the appropriate time. Let me set out what has to happen now: we need to go back to the European Commission, and the rules under the relevant directive say that there must be a three-month standstill period after we have properly notified the regulations to the Commission. If it wishes to look into this in more detail—I hope that it will not—there could be a further month of standstill before we can take matters further, so that is four months. We will then need to re-lay the regulations before the House. As she knows, under the negative procedure, which is what these will be subject to, there is a period during which they can be prayed against, which accounts for roughly another 40 days. If we add all that together, we come to roughly six months. As she will recognise, if we could proceed quicker than that, we would, but I do not believe that that will be feasible, so it is right that I am realistic at this stage.
Nigel Huddleston (Mid Worcestershire) (Con)
The Secretary of State has made a sincere and frank statement to the House about the reasons for the delay, and I appreciate that this is a change of timescale, not policy. I understand that the technology to enable the changes required by this policy already exists and could be implemented. Will he therefore comment on whether the stakeholders responsible for this—the key internet players—are co-operating on the right scale and at the right speed? We know that they can co-operate, but are they doing so?
Jeremy Wright
My hon. Friend makes a fair point. It is important that we have the necessary co-operation. Of course, that will need to come with the regulator, the BBFC, and those discussions are continuing, as he would expect. I have been clear that the reason for the delay is an administrative error—it is not anything else. We expect compliance by the companies that provide online pornography and, as I say, I see no reason why, in most cases, they cannot begin to comply voluntarily. They had expected to be compelled to do this from 15 July, so they should be in a position to comply. There seems to be no reason why they should not, but we do not rely on voluntary compliance and we will therefore pursue—somewhat later than we hoped—the regulations that I have described.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
I welcome the Secretary of State’s statement and his honesty. The protection of our children is paramount for everyone in the Chamber. Does he agree that typing in a year of birth is not an acceptable form of security to protect children’s innocence? Parents, including my constituents, demand that there must be greater verification. What does his Department believe can be done to enhance the verification process?
Jeremy Wright
I know the hon. Gentleman’s long-standing commitment to and interest in this issue. He is right that we should not accept that someone simply ticking a box or saying, “I am 18,” is sufficient for the companies concerned. The regulations that we have laid once, and will now re-lay, make it clear that from the point of view of the BBFC, as the regulator, that will not be an acceptable way of complying with the regulations. Companies will need to do more than that. There will need to be a way of demonstrating that someone is over 18 before they have access to this material so that companies can be sure of that fact, with us as legislators being sure that we are taking every measure that we can to keep young people away from material that will be harmful to them.
Vicky Ford (Chelmsford) (Con)
It is vital that our legislation is fit for purpose in a digital age, and it is very unfortunate that age verification for online porn is being delayed. I join my neighbour, my right hon. Friend the Member for Maldon (Mr Whittingdale), in calling for us to ensure that this time is used well. I urge the Secretary of State to keep up a relentless focus on making sure that children are safe online, particularly regarding content on social media sites—especially inappropriate content on Twitter—and action on online harassment and bullying. Fundamentally, if a teenage girl walks down the street and some male in a mac flashes his pieces at her, that is illegal. It should not be legal to send that teenage girl a photo via AirDrop in a public place.
Jeremy Wright
I entirely understand my hon. Friend’s point. She is right: the principle that what is unlawful offline should be unlawful online guides much of the legislative activity in which we have engaged. As she says, we must maintain our focus on keeping young people—indeed, people of all ages—safe from online harms. As she knows, in parallel with these regulations, we will pursue the course set out in the White Paper.
We believe that the White Paper, along with the social media code of practice—which, as I mentioned earlier, has been published in conjunction with it—will start to drive these improvements, but the era of self-regulation has come to an end. It is important for the Government and legislators in the House to take seriously their responsibilities to keep people safe online, so that we know that social media companies will be more responsible in the future.
Export Licences: High Court Judgment
(4 years, 10 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Secretary of State for International Trade and President of the Board of Trade (Dr Liam Fox)
With permission, Mr Speaker, I will make a statement about the High Court judgment on military export licences to Saudi Arabia.
Today, the Court of Appeal handed down its judgment following the appeal by Campaign Against Arms Trade against the divisional court’s decision in July 2017 to dismiss CAAT’s claim for a judicial review of licensing decisions about military exports to Saudi Arabia for possible use in the conflict in Yemen. The case was heard by the Court of Appeal between 9 and 11 April this year. The original judicial review and the appeal relate to decisions made between December 2015 and February 2017.
Since the divisional court’s judgment in July 2017, the Government have continued to apply the rigorous and robust multi-layered process of analysis in making our licensing decisions, as highlighted in that judgment. We have, in the words of the 2017 judgment, engaged in
“anxious scrutiny—indeed…what seems like anguished scrutiny at some stages”.
The Government have always taken their export control obligations very seriously, and continue to do so.
There were three grounds of appeal. The judgment found in the Government’s favour on two of them, and against on the other, referred to as ground 1. We disagree with the judgment against the Government on ground 1, and will seek permission to appeal against it.
Today’s judgment is not about whether the Government have made the right or wrong decisions about granting export licences, but concerns the rationality of the process used to reach decisions. The process was upheld by the divisional court in July 2017. The central issue in relation to military exports to Saudi Arabia in the context of the conflict in Yemen is criterion 2c of the consolidated EU and national arms export licensing criteria, which states that the Government will
“not grant a licence if there is a clear risk that the items might be used in the commission of a serious violation of international humanitarian law.”
The criteria provide the rules for assessing military exports. Among other things, they cover concerns about human rights and international humanitarian law, the development of weapons of mass destruction, international obligations including sanctions and treaty commitments and the risk of diversion. They provide a thorough and rigorous risk assessment framework for the reaching of licensing decisions.
As the judgment makes clear, the Secretary of State responsible for licensing decisions has to rely on advice from those with specialist, diplomatic and military knowledge. In relation to criterion 2c, that means advice from the Foreign Secretary. Before the establishment of the Department for International Trade in 2016, the decision maker was the then Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy. In July 2016, the responsibility passed to me.
So how have decisions been made under criterion 2c? We have used six strands of information and analysis to inform decisions: analysis of all allegations of breaches of international humanitarian law that are known to us; an understanding of Saudi military procedures; continuing engagement with the Saudis at the highest level; post-incident dialogue, including dialogue with respect to investigations; Saudi public commitments to IHL; and regular IHL assessments based on developments in the conflict in Yemen.
Each of these strands takes into account a wide range of sources and analysis, including those of a sensitive nature to which other parties, such as non-governmental organisations and the United Nations, do not have access. Taken together, these strands of analysis and information, which are reviewed regularly by the FCO in comprehensive reports to the Foreign Secretary and which engage continuously with the record of the Saudis in relation to IHL, form the basis of the Foreign Secretary’s advice to the Secretary of State making licensing decisions.
Given all this, why did CAAT appeal the 2017 judgment? The ground on which the Government lost in the Court of Appeal judgment concerned whether we were under an obligation to make some overall assessment of whether there had been historical violations of IHL, including whether a pattern of violations could be discerned. Our approach is in line with the EU common position; it is therefore focused on a predictive evaluation of risk as to the attitude and future conduct of the Saudi-led coalition and recognises the inherent difficulties of seeking to reach findings on IHL for specific incidents where we do not have access to the complete information. Indeed, the divisional court pointed to the “self-evident” impracticality of doing so.
Even so, we have fully and robustly engaged with incidents of concern and sought to test and understand the risk of future incidents. We have all along considered the historical record of Saudi Arabia in respect of IHL. Our whole assessment has been infused with IHL considerations; indeed, everything has been looked at through the prism of IHL.
Today’s judgment is clear that the context is not one in which the Government are sitting like a court adjudicating on alleged past violations, but rather the context is a prospective and predictive exercise as to whether there is a clear risk that exports might be used in the commission of a serious violation of IHL in the future. In this context, past incidents are only part of the picture. The judgment emphasises that Government advisers were keenly alive to the question of possible violation of IHL. It also acknowledges that the processes used to advise the Secretary of State responsible for licensing decisions were rigorous and robust, upon which a decision maker could rely and, indeed, had to rely.
Nevertheless, the judgment concludes that CAAT succeeded in the central argument advanced in relation to ground 1 of its appeal. In the Court’s judgment the question whether there was a historical pattern of breaches of IHL required to be faced; even if it could not be answered with reasonable confidence for every incident, at least the attempt had to be made. Because the Government have not reached findings on IHL for specific incidents as part of our assessment of clear risk under criterion 2c, the Court of Appeal concluded that the decision-making process was irrational and therefore unlawful. The consequence is that we are remitted to reconsider our decisions in accordance with the correct legal approach. As I said earlier, we disagree with the judgment and will seek permission to appeal.
Alongside this, we are carefully considering the implications of the judgment for decision making. While we do this, we will not grant any new licences for exports to Saudi Arabia and its coalition partners that might be used in the conflict in Yemen. As the Court of Appeal makes clear, different people may or may not approve of the sale of arms to Saudi Arabia. The judicial review is not an appeal against the Government’s decisions on their merits.
Once again, I stress that this judgment is not about whether the Government made the right or wrong decisions, but is about whether the decision-making process was rational, and the judgment emphasises that there would not be only one answer on future risk if historical violations were found to have taken place; in other words, changing the process as set out by the Court does not necessarily mean any of the decisions would be different.
The context is a complex and ever changing conflict. The Court of Appeal judgment does not undermine the UK’s overall framework for export controls as set out in the consolidated criteria. These criteria have stood the test of time and are shared by EU member states. The Court’s judgment is about how decisions were made in relation to one element of one of those criteria in a specific context, and I commend this statement to the House.
Barry Gardiner (Brent North) (Lab)
I thank the Secretary of State for advance sight of the statement. This week, the House marked in debate the 70th anniversary of the Geneva convention and the 20th anniversary of the United Nation’s Security Council first putting on its agenda the protection of civilians in armed conflict. The irony of today’s judgment by the Court of Appeal is that the United Kingdom is the penholder at the Security Council for that mandate. We are supposed to be guardians of international humanitarian law, not the people found in breach of it.
The Court of Appeal’s ruling is a damning indictment of the Government’s handling of export licences to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. It finds that their handling has not been lawful. The Court found that the Government
“made no concluded assessments of whether the Saudi-led coalition had committed violations of international humanitarian law in the past, during the Yemen conflict, and made no attempt to do so”.
Does the Secretary of State accept that this constitutes a clear breach of the Government’s legal obligations to assess an export destination country’s respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms and that under criterion 2c of the licensing criteria the Government should have carried out such an assessment and denied licences if there was
“a clear risk that the items might be used in the commission of a serious violation of international humanitarian law”?
The Secretary of State has tried to excuse himself by pleading that this judgment is not about whether the Government have made the right or wrong decision, but about whether the decision-making process was rational. Surely even he must understand that if the decision-making process was not rational, the Government could have had no confidence that it was correct and that it therefore follows that he could have had no confidence that there was no material risk of these exports being used contrary to international humanitarian law.
That the Government have failed to carry out such assessments is a matter of national shame. I am afraid that the Secretary of State’s suggestion that there has been anxious scrutiny of these decisions looks threadbare. I welcome his announcement that there will be a suspension of the granting of new licences to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, pending the Government’s appeal, but that is not enough. Given that the process itself is flawed, will he confirm whether the same process has been used for exports to Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates, which are also involved in the Yemeni conflict? Will he confirm that he is also suspending all new licences to those countries?
The Opposition believe there should be an independent investigation into the Yemen conflict and that it is shameful that the Government should seek to appeal today’s judgment. We are also concerned that there should be no sudden upsurge in open licences to these countries as a way to bypass the suspension. Can the Secretary of State confirm that this will not be allowed?
During the legal proceedings in the case against the Government, it transpired that the Government had not been properly monitoring whether the Saudi-led coalition had been engaged in breaches of IHL and had refused to properly set out whether British exports or service personnel had been directly or indirectly involved in any breaches by the Saudi-led coalition, despite widespread evidence of airstrikes on non-military targets, double-tap bombing raids and the deaths of thousands of civilians. Can the Secretary of State tell the House categorically that there has been adequate monitoring of potential breaches of IHL such that no UK personnel could be implicated in any breach?
The Secretary of State is well aware that several other countries have suspended arms sales to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia over concerns about those breaches in Yemen, including our European counterparts Germany and Denmark. He has suggested that it is his view that the Government approach is in line with the EU common position. What assessment has he made of international reports into possible breaches and what discussions has he had with his counterparts in Germany and Denmark about the evidence upon which they have decided to suspend arms sales?
The Secretary of State, in his response to the claims brought forward by the Campaign Against Arms Trade, has stated that the Government monitor potential breaches in a number of ways, including a Ministry of Defence recording tool, extensive on-the-ground military and diplomatic staff, positive close relations with Saudi Arabian officials, and the findings of the 14 investigations by the Saudi-led coalition into whether they themselves had committed any such breaches. It subsequently transpired during proceedings that the Ministry of Defence tracker may not have been recording such data, so the Secretary of State’s review of potential breaches of international humanitarian law seems to be entirely determined by what his Saudi Arabian counterparts have advised him. At what stage did he first become aware that the Ministry of Defence tracker programme was not recording such breaches? Can he confirm whether his Department was aware that such breaches were not being reviewed or recorded?
The Court of Appeal has determined that the Secretary of State must retake the export licence decisions and must therefore conduct a conclusive review of past violations of international humanitarian law in advance. Can he confirm that he intends to adhere to the Court’s findings, and will he tell the House what steps he is taking to conduct such an investigation? Given the serious breach of this Government’s duty of care with regard to export licences, we believe that there are clear grounds for a thorough investigation into the Government’s handling of them, and that there must be a full parliamentary or public inquiry to find out how that was allowed to happen and which Ministers were responsible for those breaches.
I note that several times in his statement the Secretary of State was keen to finger the former Foreign Secretary as the one with the “specialist, diplomatic and military knowledge” whose advice he was obliged to take under criterion 2c of the consolidated criteria. The House may be surprised to learn of that official description of the right hon. Member for Uxbridge and South Ruislip (Boris Johnson). Can the Secretary of State explain, given that he has previously assured the House that he will
“personally lead on helping the defence and security industries to export and will be involved in the most significant global deals across all sectors”,
why he does not take full responsibility himself?
Dr Fox
The House has grown accustomed to the outraged tone of the hon. Gentleman, but it does not actually reflect the balanced tone of the judgment. He said in his questions that this country had been found in breach of international humanitarian law. I find that outrageous, coming from the official Opposition of this country, and I hope that he will retract it. I think the record will show that that is completely untrue. It is an outrageous slur on this country.
The hon. Gentleman raised a number of valid and important questions, and I shall try to take them in turn as best I can. He asked about open licences. They are subject to the same scrutiny, and sometimes take between two and five months to pass, so they are not a means of bypassing the scrutiny set out in the consolidated criteria. I think that the House will be clear on that. As to how we look at existing licences, and at licences elsewhere, I have made it clear that we will review all licences in the light of the Court’s judgment. It is worth noting, however, that the Campaign Against Arms Trade did not seek an order to suspend licences, and that the Court has not ordered that in its judgment.
The hon. Gentleman asked about how the UK monitors international humanitarian law allegations. The Ministry of Defence monitors incidents of alleged IHL violations arising from airstrikes conducted by the Saudi-led coalition in Yemen using all information available. This in turn is used to determine an overall view on the approach and attitude of the coalition. It informs the risk assessment made under the licensing criteria, where there is a clear risk that the items to be exported might be used in the commission of a serious violation. We consider a range of information from Government sources, foreign Governments, the media and international non-governmental organisations. We are now carefully considering the detail of the Court of Appeal judgment and its implications for this risk assessment and for decision making.
The hon. Gentleman asked about our discussions with the Germans. We of course have ongoing discussions with our European partners, but let me be clear that we are following the consolidated guidelines and the common EU position on this. I can tell him that there has been no breach in the duty of care in how the Government have approached this, and I make no allegations about any colleague, but I am not surprised that the hon. Gentleman has tried to drag personalities into this serious debate on such serious international issues. If there has been a breach of duty in this House, it is the breach of scrutiny by the Opposition.
Dr Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)
Do the Government accept that, as the years have rolled by since the 9/11 atrocities, it has become harder and harder to justify the closeness of our relationship with Saudi Arabia, but in defence of what the Government are trying to do, would it not be sensible for my right hon. Friend to have conversations with the Foreign Secretary, perhaps with a view to publishing a digest of some of the representations that we make to the Saudis in trying to keep them from straying further away from acceptable standards of international behaviour?
Dr Fox
The Foreign Secretary and I have answered numerous questions on this issue in the House of Commons, and we have certainly cited some of those incidents and been questioned on specific incidents in the House. On my right hon. Friend’s key point, I do not think the proximity or otherwise to 9/11 is the key determinant here; rather, it is whether Saudi Arabia acts as an important source of intelligence for this country in our shared combat against a global terrorism. It is a valuable partner in that particular battle and has helped to keep numerous UK citizens safe.
Stewart Hosie (Dundee East) (SNP)
I thank the Secretary of State for his statement and for giving me advance sight of it. I recognise that, under criterion 2c of the consolidated criteria, the Government will not grant a licence if there is a clear risk that the items might be used in the commission of a serious violation of international humanitarian law. I also recognise that the judgment is not about whether the Government made the right or wrong decisions, but about whether the decision making was rational. I also recognise the words from the 2017 ruling that there was
“anxious scrutiny—indeed…what seems like anguished scrutiny at some stages”
over the decision making process. However, that anxiety and anguish are as nothing compared to the civilians who have been on the receiving end of Saudi armaments since the war in Yemen began.
I also note that since that war started, the UK has licensed some £4.7 billion-worth of arms sales to Saudi Arabia in a conflict whose death toll is now approaching 100,000 people. So may I ask the Secretary of State two questions? The ruling means that the UK must retake its decision on the correct legal basis, taking into account past possible human rights abuses from Saudi Arabia. Will this Government now take seriously the deep concern, anguish and anxiety that there are substantial human rights abuses emanating from Saudi Arabia? Secondly, I was disappointed to hear him say that it was the Government’s intention to appeal. I understand the legal costs so far are somewhere over £100,000. May I ask him to respect the ruling today, not to proceed with an appeal, and not to throw good money after bad?
Dr Fox
The hon. Gentleman asks an important key question on the specifics. Of course, criterion 2c is a predictive element. We have to look at what we think the future risk is in granting licences, and we take into account all the information that we have had, not least since the last licensing period decision that we have looked at. That takes into account all the sources I have already given him. He asks about the wider issues. I want to make it clear to the House that in reaching the decisions, I have to rely on advice from those with specialist diplomatic and military expertise, but the law does not permit me, in taking these decisions on licensing exports of weapons, to take into account the UK’s strategic economic, social, commercial and industrial interests. These are very important issues, but there are areas of wider policy and they are not areas that I am allowed to take into account when I take these particular decisions.
Mr Andrew Mitchell (Sutton Coldfield) (Con)
I have some sympathy with the position that my right hon. Friend has set out the Dispatch Box today. He will recall that I have had, to say the least, the most profound reservations over the past three or four years about the Government’s policy in respect of what is happening in Yemen. However, he will also know that I have never called for an arms embargo for the simple reason that it would have little humanitarian impact. Does he appreciate that the Master of the Rolls, Sir Terence Etherton, said in his judgment today that the Government
“made no concluded assessments of whether the Saudi-led coalition had committed violations of international humanitarian law in the past, during the Yemen conflict, and made no attempt to do so”?
That is the crux of the matter that is before the House today.
I say to my right hon. Friend and to the other members of the Government Front Bench that they should listen more carefully to what Parliament has said consistently in almost every debate on this matter over the past three years. As recently as Tuesday, there was a Westminster Hall debate marking the 70th anniversary of the arrangements that were made in respect of international humanitarian law. After all these investigations of breaches of international humanitarian law, the argument has been that it is wrong for Britain and one side of the conflict to mark their own homework. It is essential that such breaches are looked at by an accepted and impartial international force, such as the UN. If the Government had heeded the warnings from the House of Commons, they would not be in the position that they are in today.
Dr Fox
I agree with my right hon. Friend about the humanitarian costs involved in the conflict, and I also agree that there can be no military solution to this particular conflict. There can only be a negotiated and political solution. However, we do monitor allegations of IHL breaches, and we do take that into account when making decisions. Of course, the predictive nature of this process means that we have to look at the past pattern of behaviour, the information we have available, and what mitigations may have been put in place to ensure that any incidents are not repeated. We are unable to make absolute definitions about whether there has been a breach when we are not party to the full information, but we make those decisions based on the predictive element of criterion 2c and on the evidence that is available from both public and protected sources.
Hilary Benn (Leeds Central) (Lab)
The Government’s position is, frankly, inexplicable, because the Secretary of State referred to all the careful analysis that has been done, but anyone else undertaking an assessment of future risk—this goes to the heart of the point that the right hon. Member for Sutton Coldfield (Mr Mitchell) just raised—would look at the past behaviour of those using the weapons that we have sold to Saudi Arabia. As the Secretary of State well knows, others have done so, and the UN panel of experts found over three years ago that
“the coalition had conducted airstrikes targeting civilians and civilian objects, in violation of international humanitarian law”.
The Government cannot continue to say, “We’re sorry. We haven’t been able to make an assessment, but we are not sure that there is a risk about the future.” I will ask a direct question of the Secretary of State: is it the Government’s view that Saudi Arabia has engaged in activities that have breached international humanitarian law?
Dr Fox
I disagree with the premise of the question itself. The right hon. Gentleman says that the Government’s position is inexplicable, but it is not. We are following the EU and national criteria set out for arms exports, and we are following the EU common position. We look at all reports of potential breaches of international humanitarian law, but we must also take into account, by the nature of the predictive elements in criterion 2c, what we think the future risk will be based on, for example, any mitigations.
Tom Pursglove (Corby) (Con)
The Government have consistently maintained that this country has one of the strictest export control regimes of anywhere in the world, but on what grounds do they base those claims?
Dr Fox
The divisional court’s judgment set out in terms why we operate a robust system, and I explained in my statement that we have gone well beyond what I think is naturally expected under criterion 2c. We operate what I believe is the most robust arms export policy of anywhere in the world. We operate under the EU and national consolidated criteria and alongside the EU common position. I do not believe that anyone else operates a more robust policy.
Diana Johnson (Kingston upon Hull North) (Lab)
The Secretary of State has referred to the European common position several times. What is his assessment of the European countries that have decided to suspend arms exports to Saudi Arabia? Why does he disagree with their position?
Dr Fox
The hon. Lady asks a good question. We discuss matters with our European colleagues, including our German colleagues, at the highest level, and it is our policy to continue to apply the EU common position to licensing. We do not comment on the commercial arrangements that underpin the export of military equipment and services, which are, of course, confidential. Our European partners and others are entitled to deviate from the EU common position if they wish, but we intend to follow it.
Nigel Huddleston (Mid Worcestershire) (Con)
We all get emails from our constituents expressing concerns about the global arms trade. Will my right hon. Friend therefore assure me and my constituents that the UK does indeed have one of the most robust arms export regimes in the world? Does he share my wish that other countries had such robust regimes?
Dr Fox
I do wish that more countries shared the criteria that we and our European partners operate in this particular field. However, I also believe that countries are entitled to defend themselves. If we were to have no international rules around arms exports, the whole global arms industry would be a laissez-faire space in which many innocent citizens around the world would be denied the protections offered by our export licences.
Wera Hobhouse (Bath) (LD)
It is undeniable that the Government’s defiance in respect of the Court of Appeal ruling is disappointing. Given the public interest in the unfolding tragedy in Yemen, will the Secretary of State not at least acknowledge that there must be more transparency in how his Department deals with this issue? We understand the obvious sensitivities, but the public and the House deserve to understand how the Department is coming to its decisions.
Dr Fox
I have made it clear on a number of occasions how we come to decisions and the process of ministerial accountability in that. The Court of Appeal judged that the process needs to change in order to be lawful, but it also made the point that changing the process would not necessarily have led to different decisions from those arrived at by the Government.
I say to the hon. Lady that I took offence at the comments of the hon. Member for East Dunbartonshire (Jo Swinson), the Liberal Democrat spokesperson on this matter, when she said:
“Saudi Arabia is an enemy of British values, including human rights and the rule of law.”
Such sweeping generalisations show a lack of grasp of the detail and understanding of the complexities of international relations.
Alex Chalk (Cheltenham) (Con)
On the one hand, the Court of Appeal is saying that the British Government must investigate allegations of previous international humanitarian law violations before granting export licences but, on the other hand, the British Government are saying, “Look. That is very difficult for us to do, because some of these incidents take place in foreign countries thousands of miles away.” Does not the solution to this lie in the hands of the Saudi Arabian Government themselves? We must say to them, “If you want to buy our weapons, where allegations exist they must be properly and independently investigated, and those findings must be shared with us before licences are granted.”
Dr Fox
My hon. Friend makes an important point. The joint incidents assessment team was set up by the Saudi Government in February 2016 to help with that. It examines military activity in civilian areas to minimise possible civilian casualties and assesses the coalition’s rules of engagement. We have had input into that to ensure that the coalition is operating in a way that we would find acceptable.
Of course, we simply would not take that as being the end of the matter when it comes to information. As I have said, we look at a range of information from foreign Government sources, from our own Government sources, both those in the public domain and those that are restricted, and from NGOs and the media. It is in taking that complete picture that we are able to assess what we believe the risks to be, but we are always looking to see whether further sources of information may help to improve our decision making, alongside the decision making of our allies.
Lloyd Russell-Moyle (Brighton, Kemptown) (Lab/Co-op)
I have just returned from the Court of Appeal, where I listened to the judgment. The judges, in paragraph 141, say there was a decision in 2016 no longer to apply criterion 2 on the checking of IHL. This resulted in 100,000 deaths. Who made that decision?
My Committees, the Committees on Arms Export Controls, have manifestly failed to hold the Government to account. We now need urgent reform of the Committees’ powers, including creating a standalone Committee. Will the Minister confirm that he will not allow the use of any existing open licences to coalition partners during this review?
Finally, after the arms scandals of the 1980s and ’90s we had the Scott inquiry, and we now need an independent judge-led or parliamentary inquiry not just on this particular issue but on the failings of our arms control system—taking it away from the political interference and political control of Ministers to a truly independent and world-class system, which we do not have at the moment.
Dr Fox
We are ultimately accountable in the courts, as we have been, and the divisional court was clear in its praise for how Government rigour was applied to this process. We are not in breach of the consolidated criteria, nor has the Court of Appeal said that. What the Court of Appeal said is that the process by which decisions are reached needs to change, and needs to take into account the possibility of international humanitarian law having been breached. To compare that, for example, to the incidents in the Scott report is simply not credible.
Of course, we will review all licences in light of today’s judgment, as we are required to do. That will include open licences.
Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)
The UK’s significant levels of arms production and exports is often justified by the need to protect jobs, and today we have been told that there is a risk of terrorism if we do not export arms to this appalling regime. Rather than being complicit in killing almost 100,000 Yemenis, if the Government really want to protect jobs, reduce the risk of terrorism and enhance the UK’s reputation around the world, why not stop Brexit?
Backbench Business
Refugee Family Reunion
(4 years, 10 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP)
I beg to move,
That this House notes that 20 June is World Refugee Day; further notes that, with record levels of global displacement across the world, many refugee families have been separated by war and persecution; welcomes that in 2018 the UK granted 5,806 family reunion visas to partners and children of refugees in the UK; and calls on the Government to introduce reforms to family reunion rules to ensure that the close relatives of all refugees in the UK have safe and legal pathways to reunite with their families in the UK.
Much has been happening in and around the House of Commons, and in many other places, to mark World Refugee Day and Loneliness Awareness Week. There has been a lack of progress on the Refugees (Family Reunion) (No. 2) Bill, which should have been passed by the House of Commons under this Government.
The idea of a “pull factor” was one of the hares set running on Second Reading on 16 March 2018, and the Bill has not progressed much further. Lord Kerr addressed that in the House of Lords:
“Is it really plausible that, say in Idlib—
or, indeed, any city in the world—
“if it is under siege in six weeks’ time, the family sits around the dining table, pick a child and tell it that it must set off across the battle lines and the Mediterranean, to try to get into England so that it can then pull the family into England? That is implausible. We are talking about refugee reunion and about children. We really must stop talking about this wildly implausible pull factor. They come here to escape being killed; they do not come here in order to become a magnet for the rest of the family.”—[Official Report, House of Lords, 11 May 2018; Vol. 791, c. 372.]
If we bear that in mind in this debate, and in each and every other debate on refugees, we will do ourselves and, indeed, refugees a great service by showing them the respect they deserve for what they have been through.
It would be worth while, as I did on Second Reading, to begin by talking about the idea of refugees. I began that debate by talking about Yohannes, a young welder from Eritrea living in Canterbury. Last month, I came across an article in The Independent headlined, “Germany’s refugee intake begins to boost economy as settlers soothe country’s worker shortage”. I re-emphasise that today’s refugee is tomorrow’s worker contributing to the economy.
Patrick Grady (Glasgow North) (SNP)
I warmly congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this debate. He has been a powerful champion and advocate, and I hope that, at the end, the Government will allow time for his Bill to proceed. Once families are reunited under his proposals, it is important that they contribute properly to the economy. Does he agree that the Government must move forward on extending the right to work to asylum seekers?
Angus Brendan MacNeil
My hon. Friend makes the case well. We should treat asylum seekers as normally as possible. We often talk about spectrums nowadays, and there is perhaps an argument that we are all on a spectrum of refugees, asylum seekers and movers. A person who moves from one town to another for work is a person on the move. We have various words to grade that movement.
I have been cautioned about making the comparison because, in a way, it minimises or downplays the trauma some people have been through, but on the other hand it is a way of partially seeing ourselves in other people’s shoes. We are not quite escaping war and the threat of being killed, but moving for economic circumstances is a normal thing to do. The more we treat the situation as normal, as my hon. Friend clearly said, the better.
Germany is fairly normal. The article in The Independent says:
“In his native Syria, Mohammed Kassim worked as an electrician. But having learned the trade informally, he lacked the credentials to show for it. Now, in his adopted homeland, the 30-year-old is receiving the training he never had and he is getting paid to do it by a company dangling the promise of a job that could vault him from struggling refugee to member of the German middle class.”
That is the sort of story we want to hear, four years after many people came to Germany. Of course, it is not all sweetness and light. A number of those people are still unemployed, but that is changing. The article continues:
“But after spending billions of euros to accommodate the newcomers, Germany is beginning to reap some gains.”
The German economy is benefiting from the presence of more people, who happen to be refugees.
I will set out the global context. There are about 24 million refugees worldwide, and every day some 44,000 people are forced to flee their home as a result of conflict and persecution. To give some idea, 44,000 people would probably fill Ibrox and Parkhead in the Scottish premier league, and would certainly fill the average stadium in the English premiership. That is a lot of people who are forced to move every day, and this movement of people within and across borders is creating significant policy challenges for Governments across the world and is linked to enormous humanitarian needs.
It is worth reminding ourselves of the definition. A person seeking asylum has normally left their own country due to war, persecution or violence and has requested sanctuary in another country, and their application to receive legal protection has yet to be processed. Importantly, refugees are at the next stage—this is where my Bill comes in. A refugee is someone who has been forced to flee his country and has been recognised as having a well-founded fear of persecution. They are not only fleeing as an asylum seeker, but this has now been accepted by others. The reason for persecution could be race, religion, nationality, political opinion or membership of a particular social group, as we recently saw in Myanmar. A refugee has been granted special legal protection on that basis. War and ethnic, tribal or religious violence are leading causes of refugees fleeing their country. It is worth bearing that in mind.
Wera Hobhouse (Bath) (LD)
In previous debates, we have drawn attention to refugee children and the fact that they cannot sponsor a relative to come over—this is unlike what happens in other countries. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that that is deplorable and adds to the trauma these children are already facing?
Angus Brendan MacNeil
The hon. Lady makes a point that is central to this speech and to the reason behind today’s debate.
Ben Lake (Ceredigion) (PC)
I agree with the hon. Lady on what she said. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that the current situation has been exacerbated by the UK’s decision to opt out of applying article 10 of the EU directive on family reunion, which would have allowed unaccompanied children to act as sponsors for their family members?
Angus Brendan MacNeil
I thank the hon. Gentleman for that intervention. I am glad I have taken both interventions together, because they overlap neatly. This perhaps dovetails into something else, which is that the UK opted out of some EU directives; if only Scotland could opt out of some UK directives. We will park that one there, but it does show that the idea of Brexit—[Interruption.] We had better park that one as well. The hon. Lady and hon. Gentleman got it right, as did the British Red Cross policy briefing for this debate.
The Red Cross recommendations are:
“Give adult refugees the right to sponsor their parents, siblings and children up to the age of 25 to join them in the UK under family reunification rules.”
That is normal in other places in Europe—places that have not opted out. It is the norm. The second recommendation is:
“Give child refugees the right to sponsor their parents as well as any siblings up to the age of 25 to join them in the UK under family reunification rules.”
The third recommendation is:
“Reintroduce legal aid for family reunion applications.”
Members will not be surprised to learn that those recommendations mirror closely, if not precisely, what my Bill set out to do. I refer to the Bill that has been choked by the Government in this House of Commons, despite the fact that it has had laudable and welcome support from Members from Labour, the Liberal Democrats, Change UK, Plaid Cymru and the Scottish National party, and from luminaries among the Conservative Back Benchers. All those voices from across the political spectrum were supporting the Bill.
I just want to say one thing to the Government and to colleagues across this House, as I know you want me to speak for only 12 to 15 minutes, Madam Deputy Speaker—[Interruption.] I should have mentioned that the Democratic Unionist party is supporting my Bill. Indeed, the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) is here, so thank goodness I remembered before I was reminded; otherwise, we might have had an Adjournment debate on the issue. The Bill has been supported across the House, and the plea I make to colleagues is that if the Government do not move on this now—there will be reshuffles, so there will be different personnel at the Home Office and things might move on a bit better—whoever else comes out at the beginning of the ballot in the next Parliament should be willing and open to move forward on this Bill, because it is shameful that the Government have not moved with this. Time in politics is short and time in government is even shorter, and things could have been done that have not happened. The Government could have looked back proudly had they reacted and done this, but I hope, and warn them, that this will not be the only time; I expect this to come forward again.
Dr David Drew (Stroud) (Lab/Co-op)
The hon. Gentleman is commendably keeping to time, and I shall be brief. One thing that the Government could do, in advance of whatever attitude they take to his Bill, is recognise that Syrians whom many of our communities have accepted are desperate to bring their families in. Does he agree that it would be right and proper if the Government were to encourage that, rather than put hurdles in these people’s way?
Angus Brendan MacNeil
Absolutely; people would be able to function far better. One thing that struck me from speaking to refugees—these things do not come through in briefing papers so clearly—is the difficulty they have sleeping at night because of worry. If someone is waking up at night worrying about family members, that must have an impact on the way they can conduct, advance and live the rest of their life. That must be a problem, so I absolutely agree with what the hon. Gentleman said, and I am glad he has raised that issue.
Lloyd Russell-Moyle (Brighton, Kemptown) (Lab/Co-op)
Does the hon. Gentleman agree that one other barrier the Government must address is the high cost of citizenship applications, particularly for child refugees, who might have been here for many years? It costs the Government £300 to process a citizenship application, but they charge children, refugees, more than £1,200 to process one. This is profiteering; the Government make more than £2 million a week on these applications. That is one area where the Government could make the process of welcoming people to our country much better.
Angus Brendan MacNeil
The hon. Gentleman presents the point perfectly, and well done for that. It shows the feeling across the House on this, and I totally agree with what he said. There is so much the Government could do. There is so much the Home Office could do. It could be a facilitator. It could help, but for some reason it chooses not to be the great help it could be, and that is very disappointing.
At one of the events we held this week, we heard from Play for Progress, which helps with therapy, counselling and dealing with post-traumatic stress disorders through music, trust and knowing people. It is run by two doctors, Anna Macdonald and Saliah Khan. I thank the Inter-Parliamentary Union for giving us the room on Tuesday. We heard how the idea of using X-rays, which are not certain in their outcomes, to prove that people are of a certain age was unethical. We are talking about the use of X-rays to determine this from people’s bones, even when a paediatrician has said someone is a child and a number of medical experts have done the same. In some cases a social worker, but in most cases a bureaucrat will be saying that someone is not a child. The doctors pointed out that not only does one try to avoid using X-rays on children, but this is being done to try to prove an inconclusive point. It is being done for non-medical needs—for bureaucratic needs. That betrays a sad attitude within the Home Office and where it is leading this.
A constituent of mine from Lewis wants the Education Secretary to “increase funding for ESOL” so that people can learn English as a second language. She said that the money that would be spent on that would soon be recouped, through taxes during a person’s
“first eight months of employment at the national average wage.”
I will bring my remarks to an end, as otherwise you will start clearing your throat, Madam Deputy Speaker, as is the given signal. First, however, I wish to thank the number of organisations that have been helpful to me. I am sure that if I am not in the top seven in the ballot next time, they will help whoever is near the top. I wish to thank Lucy Wake at Amnesty International, Sam Nadel at Oxfam, James Bulman at the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, Seb Klier at the Refugee Council and Jon Featonby at the British Red Cross for all the help they gave on the Bill. The great thing is that that shows that many people care about refugees. We are living in fairly stable circumstances, whereas in the past many people from the highlands and islands moved for economic reasons and due to highland clearances. It is not inconceivable that things will change and in the future our great grandchildren or those who come after might be in a situation that results in their becoming refugees.
I wish to end on a case study. People’s stories and situations are better here than the facts that we can drily drag from any situation. The case is as follows:
“Muhammed and Amal are from Syria. They fled to Libya with their four children shortly after the conflict began. Life in Libya became increasingly dangerous while they were there and after two years Muhammed decided to make the journey to Europe. Muhammed was granted refugee status in the UK. Aware that his son, Kusai, was due to turn 18 very soon, making him ineligible for family reunion, Muhammed immediately began the process of applying to bring his family to the UK.
That application was rejected. Muhammed knew that his 20-year-old daughter, Athar, might not be accepted but also knew that, under family reunion law, he had the right to bring his wife and any children under the age of 18 to the UK. It turned out that the reason for the rejection was Kusai’s passport expiring while the family was in Libya. While awaiting that decision Kusai turned 18 and became ineligible for family reunion. Muhammed appealed, and a judged ruled that while Muhammed’s wife and two youngest children were eligible for family reunion and could come to the UK, Kusai and Athar were rejected on the basis of being over 18 years old.
While Athar has remained in the region, Kusai decided to take matters into his own hands and took the dangerous journey across the Mediterranean to a makeshift camp in unthinkable conditions in Calais.”
That was in the famous jungle. That is the story that people have and it forms part of the points I can raise in my 15 minutes on refugees. Many other Members will raise different and better points, and we will all learn today from Members in all parts of the House as they say what they have to say. I look forward to hearing it.
Robert Neill (Bromley and Chislehurst) (Con)
It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar (Angus Brendan MacNeil), not least because I can congratulate him on having secured this debate on an important topic, and also because, as he knows, my great-grandfather left the Western Isles after the clearances and was himself someone who, for economic reasons, was driven first to Glasgow and eventually to England. Had it worked out otherwise, I might have been a constituent of the hon. Gentleman’s, and in a rather small constituency who knows what could have happened. Let me leave that point to one side and move on to another personal matter.
Every day—today is as every day—I walk from home down to Chislehurst railway station. I go down a road called Old Hill, and on the junction with Lubbock Road there is a seat with a memorial plaque on it that is inscribed in these terms:
“Rev. & Mrs. I. E Davidson & Friends
Gratefully remembered by
All the BMJ Children
(68 of them rescued from Central Europe 1939)”.
The BMJ referred to is the Barbican Mission to the Jews. Reverend Davidson and his wife were based at Christ church in Lubbock Road in Chislehurst, where they set up a home for children who had been rescued, predominantly from Czechoslovakia and neighbouring countries, during the Kindertransport. They found refuge and a welcome in my home community of Chislehurst and are remembered there to this day with fondness and affection. This is an appropriate opportunity for me to pay tribute to their memory, and to all the people in our community in Bromley and Chislehurst who to this day keep alive that memory and that work for those who have suffered through displacement.
I was a sponsor of the Refugees (Family Reunion) (No. 2) Bill and hope the Government will reflect on the failure to allow that modest Bill to progress. In my judgment it is a shame, because the attitude embodied by the Davidsons and their friends and neighbours in Chislehurst before the second world war is the most genuine reflection of this country’s record and approach to refugees. The facts show that Britain has a very good track record on resettling the most vulnerable. It is worth observing that the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees has said that the UK maintains its standing as one of the most generous countries for refugee resettlement. The UNHCR judges the community sponsorship programme, which enables community groups to welcome and support refugees directly, to be a success, although it is still in its early phases, and hopes that it will continue. In a sense, community sponsorship of that sort builds on the work of the Davidsons and their friends in the Barbican Mission all those years ago. I very much hope that the Government will continue that work and build on it.
In a recent written statement, the Home Secretary observed:
“The UK has a long history of supporting refugees in need of protection.”
He noted that we have welcomed tens of thousands of people in recent years and, since 2016, have resettled
“more refugees from outside Europe than any other EU member state”,
and I am glad that my right hon. Friend also confirmed
“the UK’s ongoing commitment to resettlement and set out our plans for after 2020.”—[Official Report, 17 June 2019; Vol. 662, c. 1-2WS.]
Compared with that good track record and generous spirit, it seems to me a little jarring that we have a restriction that prevents children who have come here lawfully as refugees—whose refugee status has been accepted—from being able to bring their closest relatives to come and support them. We are not talking about a large number of people, nor are we talking about abuse of the asylum system. The key point to remember is that these people have been found and accepted to be genuinely in need and have proper refugee status.
As the hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar said, it is shame that the policy seems currently to be driven on the basis of the frankly ill-informed and unsubstantiated fear of a pull factor. The hon. Gentleman referred to the speech of Lord Kerr in the other place, in which the noble Lord dismissed that fear, but I wish to take the matter one step further. This country’s upper tribunal recently considered a case in relation to this matter, and the judgement was critical of the Government’s position. Mr Justice McCloskey overturned a decision to refuse the application made by a 19-year-old boy, who was recognised as a refugee when he was 16, to be allowed to sponsor his mother and brother to join him in the UK. One of the arguments on which the Government had relied in the initial decision was that it was in the public interest not to allow the family reunion application. The Government argued that other would-be child refugees
“would be at risk of trafficking and exploitation in their quest to reach the United Kingdom”—
that is the suggestion of the pull factor. In his judgment, Mr Justice McCloskey was pretty damning of that suggestion, saying that
“there is no evidence underlying”
that argument. He went on to say—I agree with him on this—that allowing reunification
“will promote, rather than undermine, the public interest in this respect.”
Mr Justice McCloskey is right, the Government are wrong, and they should think again in that regard.
Because we are talking about a small number of people and because the current system is based on what appears to be a policy premise that is unsubstantiated by evidence—that position is clearly borne out by the court, and I have seen no intrinsic or palpable evidence anywhere to suggest that a pull factor can be shown to exist—it seems to me that, although in many respects I am proud of what my Government have done, in this respect they let themselves down by taking a needlessly restrictive and, forgive me for saying so, a somewhat mean-spirited approach in relation to this comparatively small number of people. We have an opportunity to look at this again. By allowing refugee children to sponsor their immediate families, we would reduce the number of people who make irregular journeys to reach the UK. There is evidence of people sometimes making irregular journeys because they are unable to come through the proper channels.
Angus Brendan MacNeil
The hon. Gentleman is making a great speech. One point to consider is that over the past 18 months the Home Office has said on several occasions that it is following the progress of the family reunion Bill and talking to stakeholders—a sort of indication of change—but what has really happened, change-wise? The Home Office cannot stall on this much longer, given the body and breadth of opinion stating that the rules should change and come into line with those elsewhere, and that we should be decent to this small number of people.
Robert Neill
The hon. Gentleman is right. Whenever I talk to people in my constituency, whatever their political association, their gut reaction to this issue is that it just seems only fair, decent and reasonable to allow reunification. That is right and I hope the Government will think again.
The hon. Gentleman observes correctly that this has been a matter of debate and consideration in a number of places. In 2016, the Home Affairs Committee said:
“It seems to us perverse that children who have been granted refugee status in the UK are not then allowed to bring their close family to join them in the same way as an adult would be able to do. The right to live safely with family should apply to child refugees just as it does to adults.”
That must be right. If we want people who are genuine refugees to settle in this country, to integrate well with our society and to make a success of themselves, as so many of those children who were housed in Lubbock Road in Chislehurst were able to do—their stories are available in the archives of Christ church, Chislehurst—it seems to me to be only generous and decent to enable them to bring their close family, which is therefore a limited and concise number.
The Government have the opportunity to carry out a review, and I hope the Minister, who I know is a humane and caring person, will reflect on this matter. We need not put a needless stain on our reputation, which is otherwise good, by adopting such a restrictive approach in relation to this small number of children. In that spirit, I hope that the Government will think again about this matter. If this debate on World Refugee Day serves to do that, as it serves to honour the memory of the Davidsons and many others who helped people at that time, that will be a good thing and we will not have wasted our time today.
Debbie Abrahams (Oldham East and Saddleworth) (Lab)
I congratulate the hon. Member for the Western Isles (Angus Brendan MacNeil)—I apologise for not trying to pronounce his constituency, but my linguistic skills are more akin to those of Del Boy. I also congratulate the hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Robert Neill) on his speech. It takes great courage to speak truth to power and he always does it with such good grace.
I want to speak in favour of the motion. Today is World Refugee Day, and it is important to set out the issues in our history of supporting refugees following the second world war, as the hon. Gentleman mentioned. In my experience, there is not a great deal of understanding about who refugees are, what their background is, why they have come, and so on, and a lot of confusion about refugees and migrants as a whole. Unfortunately, in some cases that has been exploited by some people, who have sought to portray refugees and migrants as a whole as different or “others” or tried to make people afraid of them. Who can forget Nigel Farage’s infamous poster in the 2016 EU referendum, which tried to demonise Syrian refugees who were fleeing for their lives and portray them all as terrorists?
Or who can forget the shameful front pages of too many of our tabloids in the run-up to the referendum, which tried to alienate refugees from the public, or at least their readers? King’s College London has published a report, which I recommend people read, analysing tabloid front pages. Immigration was the second most mentioned issue, with 99 front pages on immigration in the 10 weeks preceding the 2016 EU referendum, 76% of them negative. Hon. Members should please read some excerpts from the report. It is shameful and begs the question of what is happening not just to evidence-based journalism, but to ethical journalism. That is compounded by what we see on social media and the lack of regulation there.
It would be fair to say that some people have raised concerns about immigration. We will all have had issues raised with us on the doorsteps, particularly where there are housing pressures and when other public services such as the NHS and, increasingly, education are in crisis. However, immigration is also raised in areas where there is little diversity or fewer problems with services. That says a lot about how the media have portrayed the issue and how we have failed across the political spectrum to have a debate about immigration, migrants and refugees. We need to acknowledge that and step up to the plate, because we have created a vacuum and been replaced—I am not going to give a certain person the dignity of having his name mentioned in this place, but he was the leader of one party and became the leader of another.
Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)
Like my hon. Friend and many other Members, we have a high number of refugees in Coventry. We have experienced problems with people waiting a long time to find out their status. Very often they find out that a family member back home, in the country they are running away from, has been taken ill and do not know where they are. The other major problem is that some refugees spend months or maybe years without a status and unable to work, which creates a terrible situation.
Debbie Abrahams
My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. I will come to that issue in a moment.
As leader of his party, that person excelled at pointing the finger at migrants, intentionally misleading the British public about EU citizens, who include the 1.3 million British people exercising their freedom to live and work across the EU, and conflating them with refugees seeking sanctuary in fear for their lives. We must not forget why we had a UN convention, as the hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst mentioned, following the second world war, when Jewish people had nowhere to go. We remember what happened there. That person and his kind—I include the current incumbent of the White House in that—repeatedly use inflammatory and demonising language about refugees and migrants that is meant to instil fear. I would argue that large swathes of the print media have enabled that, which is compounded by social media.
I am proud that, in the wake of the second world war, the UK helped to draft, and was one of the first signatories to, the UN convention on refugees, so that anyone, anywhere, could claim refuge from persecution. We believe—I am talking about the people speaking in today’s debate—that most people feel that way too. But for some people, superimposed on top of those feelings are fears about jobs and public services and about difference: “What about my job? Will employers want to pay me less or even replace me? What about my children’s education? Will there be enough school places? Where will they live? What about housing supply?”
We have failed to answer those questions, and we have an obligation to do so. We must respond by engaging in communities to understand the local impacts of migration. We must make sure that communities with migrant populations are appropriately resourced and supported, so that the pressure on services is mitigated, migrant and indigenous communities get to know each other, and employers are prohibited from undercutting wages. Indeed, one issue uncovered prior to the EU referendum that got little coverage was the direct recruitment of people from abroad, which should not be allowed.
I would like to talk about a couple of refugees, Samia and Marzia, and say why they came to the UK and how I got to know them. Samia is a refugee from Syria. I first got to know her when she came to my Oldham office on a Friday night in 2015, saying that she was going to be made homeless. Although she had been granted refugee status fairly quickly, which is not everyone’s experience—I would like to raise that point with the Minister—she was no longer eligible for temporary accommodation because of issues with her residence permit. She could not get the accommodation that she needed and was going to be literally turned out on to the streets.
I pay tribute to my wonderful team. My office deals with a number of immigration and asylum claims, and I cannot speak highly enough of what they do. They sprang into action and managed to get a temporary stay for Samia while her new residence permit was sorted out. While all that was happening, we learned more about why and how Samia had arrived in the UK. She was an architect in Syria and fled her home, which she loves, leaving friends and family, after the bombing started in 2014. She described her fear for life. Unfortunately, she was separated from Samir, her husband. She arrived on her own in the UK and was sent to Oldham, where we met. The next step for us was to find Samir and reunite the family.
I am happy to say that there is a good ending to this story. We were able to find Samir, and this lovely couple, who are both architects, were reunited. They now live in Oxford and are contributing to our economy. We do not hear enough about those kinds of stories or how refugees are a net benefit to this country.
I first met Marzia at an International Women’s Day event in Oldham five years ago. She was a family court judge in the criminal justice system in Afghanistan. She had the temerity to set up education centres for girls, which unfortunately was not very popular with the Taliban. She was targeted by them, and after being run over and spending many weeks in hospital, she was told when finally released that she was going to be killed. She fled Afghanistan in fear for her life and arrived in the UK. Once in the UK, she moved to Oldham—I will say a little about that in a moment. As she told me, at the age of 43, having left her family, friends and career as a professional lawyer, she had to start all over again, learn a new language, which is increasingly difficult with cuts to English classes for speakers of other languages, and find a new identity and purpose.
Marzia said:
“The negative assumptions about me contributed to the deterioration of my mental health. The asylum system is harsh.”
Now Marzia is a British citizen, and I was delighted to be invited to her citizenship ceremony. She works in my office as a caseworker, helping people who were once in her position. Her views on the asylum system are scathing. She says:
“We have had some refugees who have waited 15 years for a decision about their status. Do you think this is right? 15 years in no man’s land… They are expected to learn English in spite of there being no free English classes, to pay for English when you’re not allowed to work and have £5.00 a day to live off.”
In addition to working for me, Marzia speaks about her experiences wherever she can. She has even written a book about not just her life in Afghanistan and the circumstances that led her to leave, but her experience of the asylum system. She wants people to understand the propaganda in the tabloids and increasingly online.
We must remember why the refugee convention exists and think about what we would want if our families were affected. That is why I am calling on the Government to ensure compassion, dignity and humanity in the asylum system; not to let people languish for years in no man’s land without determining their status; to ensure there are funded English classes to help people integrate in their new homes and communities; to enable people to work while they await their status; to support local authorities through a new migrant impact fund to ensure asylum seekers and refugees are properly supported and integrated into their new communities; and especially to fast-track the process of reuniting children with their families. As Marzia says,
“I am a refugee but I am a human being, like you.”
Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith) (Lab)
I congratulate the hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar (Angus Brendan MacNeil) on securing this debate and more specifically on his persistence in addressing this issue. To be honest, this could be quite a short debate, because it is on a narrow point, the issues are clear and we are going over the same ground that we have gone over many times before. What we actually need now is some action from the Government to comply with these points, not more long rhetorical speeches.
On Tuesday this week, I joined a demonstration in Parliament Square organised by Safe Passage, which is an excellent organisation that campaigns for refugee and migrant children. One of the key speakers—in the sheeting rain for some time—was the noble Lord Dubs, who I am proud to say is a near neighbour of mine in Hammersmith. As is well known, he was a refugee himself and secured the important Dubs amendment. It is still to the Government’s shame that, I think, less than 300 of the 3,000 children who should have come to the UK as part of the Dubs amendment are actually here. [Interruption.] The Minister is mouthing from a sedentary position that the figure may be slightly more than that, but I suspect that whatever figure she comes up with will still be nugatory by comparison with not just what was required, but what was promised.
The same reasons that are given for the cases we are discussing today are given for the Dubs children—that we do not want to have pull factors or that local authorities will be overwhelmed by the numbers of children arriving. Those are very threadbare arguments. One of the other speakers at the demonstration was Stephen Cowan, who is the leader of my own council in Hammersmith and Fulham. He pointed out that that council alone, which is a small council, had agreed to take 200 unaccompanied children over a 10-year period. Other speakers at the event included a group of children from the London Borough of Islington who had got together a petition, gone to see the mayor of Islington and persuaded Islington Council to take in 100 children over 10 years. In other words, there was no shortage of compassion and practical remedies being offered, and every time it is the Government who are not stepping up to the plate.
Even if children reach the UK—often through dangerous and torturous means—they find that there are additional burdens to go through for their relatives to join them here. I have visited Calais twice. Displaced people are seeking refuge every day, whether in Calais, Lesbos or in war zones themselves. Generally speaking, they seek refuge in other developing countries; 85% of refugees are in developing countries and 0.02% of the world’s displaced people are in the UK, so although we have a good record on this issue over the decades, we are not doing enough now.
As is addressed in the Bill introduced by the hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar, there are practical complexities, which are often deliberate. For example, there may be no access to a consular, or indeed any, process of registration at the place that migrants are actually coming from. Whether the issues are legal or financial, the process is very difficult. Then there is the matter of legal aid, which was withdrawn under the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012. Only through enforcement by the courts—and reluctantly—have the Government agreed to any restoration of legal aid, although that has still not happened. We are still in the desultory territory of exceptional case funding, and we know how limited that is.
When will the Government ensure free access to legal aid for migrant children in these circumstances? These are simple points. When will there be good representation and assistance for unaccompanied children in the UK or families who want their adult children to come here? When will family reunions be permitted—when will the rules be changed, so that reunions come within the scope of the immigration rules? When will the promises that have been previously made, including to Lord Dubs, be honoured? If the Minister can answer those simple questions today, we can move on. Otherwise, I suspect will be back here having this debate again very shortly.
Bambos Charalambous (Enfield, Southgate) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Hammersmith (Andy Slaughter). I congratulate the hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar (Angus Brendan MacNeil) on bringing this motion to the House on World Refugee Day. I am proud to be a sponsor of his Bill, which will be of great benefit to society in general and to the young people who need the help it offers.
Angus Brendan MacNeil
Does the hon. Gentleman agree that, as this Parliament keeps limping on, there is certainly plenty of time for the Government to get the Bill in Committee and table a money resolution so that we can make progress? I am sure that he, like me, would like to see that happen.
Bambos Charalambous
It is frustrating that the Bill has stalled because the Government will not give it a money resolution, and it is very sad that we are in this situation after the Bill has passed its Second Reading. I entirely agree with the hon. Gentleman that we need to see progress.
On 9 February, I visited some of the refugee camps just over the channel with Care4Calais—a charity that distributes clothes, sleeping bags, tents and other necessities. I cannot forget the harsh conditions in which the refugees there find themselves, with little electricity or hot food, no hot water, no heating, no privacy and the constant background of cold and damp. All this is coupled with the knowledge that their loved ones still face danger back in the country they have escaped.
I heard at first hand from refugees in Calais about the life-threatening situations they had fled. For some, it was religious persecution; for others, the stark realities of war and sometimes torture. Many of the refugees were young—still in their early teens—but already they had experienced horrors in their lives that many of us would find difficult to imagine. The terrifying steps these refugees will take to escape torture and persecution are telling. I spoke to young boys who had clung to the underside of lorries, risking death for hours, and others who had been stowed in the boots of cars. I met a family who had crossed the sea in winter in a tiny dinghy the size of one of the rowing boats in St James’s Park.
We must ask ourselves what prompts people to take such extreme actions. These are not the actions of people who have the choice of a comfortable life back home, nor of people who have taken decisions lightly: no, they are the actions of desperate people who want to survive and build a better life; people who need and deserve the help of rich nations like our own.
It was clear in Calais how often it is the young men who will make the journey first in the hope that they can carve an escape route for their loved ones. One young man I spoke to in Calais told me that he often speaks to his mother on the phone. I asked him, “Does she know where you’re living now?” He smiled ruefully and answered, “She’ll cry if I tell her, so I say I’m in a hotel. I just want a good job so I can make her safe.” I asked him what brought him to the camp. Like so many others, he said that it was his family’s conversion to Christianity that effectively placed a death sentence on their heads.
We cannot sit back and ignore this kind of persecution or people’s death-defying attempts to escape, and should they make the journey safely here, we surely owe it to them to allow family reunion. Some argue that to reunite children with their families will mean taking in too many people. I am afraid that that argument is one of prejudice and selfishness. According to Oxfam, the UK has taken in substantially fewer people than would constitute its fair share. In 2018, the UK received five asylum applications for every 10,000 people living in the UK, while the European average is 14. Even at that number, over two thirds of applications are rejected. In this context, it seems nothing less than cruel to block the reunion of refugee children with their families. It is well known that doing so will condemn these children to greater likelihood of mental health problems and leave them less able to engage with society. This right already exists for adult refugees in the UK, who are able to bring their families over to join them having been successful in their asylum application. It is therefore perverse that the same right is not given to child refugees.
One of my own team in Parliament is part of a family who fled torture in Algeria in the 1960s. Her family are proud of their integration and achievements in this country: proud to be British, proud to contribute economically and socially, and proud to have done well in their chosen professions. They have thrived, but how many others are prevented from doing so because they are being cut off from their loved ones?
That brings me on to the subject of legal aid. It is now seven years since legal aid was made unavailable for family reunion cases. Although the need for family reunion has greatly increased, the Ministry of Justice has been prevented from bringing justice to refugee children. The fact that £600 million has been taken from the legal aid budget in the name of austerity has meant more isolated children, left to fend for themselves. Refugee family reunion has been described by the Government as a straightforward immigration matter, but there is clear evidence to show that this is not the case.
In its report, “Not so straightforward”, the British Red Cross argues that a substantial percentage of refugee family reunion cases are highly complex. These cases are in fact anything but straightforward. Yet because of the removal of legal aid, refugees wishing to reunite with their families must apply without legal help or must themselves pay to hire legal advisers. Of course, refugees are rarely able to hire solicitors or legal advisers on their own due to financial insecurity. Instead, they are left to navigate a fiendishly complicated system that sometimes requires DNA evidence and documents that have been long since destroyed in the rush to escape war or torture.
If we are to be the open, civilised and tolerant country that we aspire to be, we urgently need to make refugee family reunion possible. Part of this would include the Ministry of Justice committing to a statutory funding regime for legal assistance for refugee family reunion cases. We cannot pass by on the other side. It is time as a nation that we behaved like the good Samaritan we should be and took family reunion seriously.
Gill Furniss (Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough) (Lab)
Today marks World Refugee Day. I am proud to represent Brightside and Hillsborough in Sheffield. We have a proud legacy of welcoming and supporting refugees over many decades. My city was the first “city of sanctuary”, established more than a decade ago. We are home to a vulnerable person relocation scheme. I am pleased that our Labour council has recommitted to the scheme until 2020, and hopefully beyond. Yet the scale of the challenge is enormous. Globally, there are 25 million people who are refugees and 68.5 million forcibly displaced from their homes due to war, persecution or environmental catastrophe. Today we are reminded of their plight and suffering, but also recognise the enormous contribution that refugees make here in the UK and beyond.
In March 2018, I stood before the House to deliver a speech in favour of the Second Reading of the private Member’s Bill on family reunion introduced by the hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar (Angus Brendan MacNeil). I explained that I supported the Bill for all the refugee and migrant constituents in Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough, and for their loved ones who were unable to join them in the UK. I talked about my constituent Abdul—a young man from Syria who had settled in Sheffield after completing his degree there. Abdul attempted to rejoin his family in Syria, facing many dangerous situations along the way. It quickly became apparent to him that a reunion in Syria would not be possible due to the ongoing war, so he returned to the UK. On his return, Abdul made every effort to ensure that his family would join him safely in the country he now called his home. He sought help from every agency and organisation available to him to be able to be reunited with his family as quickly as possible. Despite his efforts, and compliance with the Home Office guidance and procedures, the process proved to be painfully slow and disappointing. It was an arduous journey for Abdul, separated from his elderly parents who had serious health problems for over 11 years while the request for reunion was dealt with.
I am very pleased that after that speech and following my plea to the Minister, Abdul and his family were finally reunited. I met the family a few weeks after they had arrived safely. It is fair to say that it was an emotional day for us all. Both I and his mother cried. I would like to place on record my sincere gratitude to the Immigration Minister, who responded swiftly to my request and was able to assist Abdul and his family. However, while Home Office policy can be useful in exceptional scenarios like that of Abdul and his family, I am afraid it is not good enough that families are still suffering, proving that the system is not fit for purpose—and the cases continue to come forward.
Only recently I have been approached with another deeply worrying case. Ms Sermani is a Syrian refugee, too, who came to the UK through family reunion to join her husband. She was separated from her children, aged six and 10, while undertaking the extremely dangerous journey to safety. Four years have now passed, and we are aware that the children, now 10 and 14, are currently living in Turkey. Their biological father disappeared during the war, and his whereabouts are not known. It is quite possible that he will have lost his life during the conflict in Syria.
It has been four desperately sad years since Ms Sermani has seen her young children. I cannot begin to imagine what it must feel like to live with so much distance between them. Despite her numerous attempts to bring them to the UK, she has had no success. I have been informed by the Home Office that under current rules, as she came to the UK under her husband’s refugee status, she does not have refugee status in her own right. This means that she cannot bring her children to join her through a family reunion application. Her husband is unable to make the application for them to reunite under his status as he is not their biological father. It is beyond shocking that we are confronted with this situation. Due to Home Office rules, the children will remain in another country without either parent.
I raise Ms Sermani’s case, with her consent, to highlight her personal plight but also the real, practical problems we are facing when dealing with such cases. These arbitrary criteria leave people extremely vulnerable, falling through the cracks of the system. The current bureaucratic barriers are actively keeping parents separated from their children. This is not the Britain that I know and we must do better.
Angus Brendan MacNeil
The hon. Lady highlights an interesting case. Surely there have to be guiding principles from which the Home Office’s rules stem. The rules have not been written from those principles in a way that allows that person to come here. In the absence of rules, the Home Office should fall back on principles, and the woman being able to be reunited with her children is a case in point.
Gill Furniss
I thank the hon. Gentleman for those remarks. I hope that my speech today will alleviate the process for this family. I hope the Minister is willing to help, and I ask her to reconsider the application of Ms Sermani in my constituency. I also ask her to look at what more the Government can do to ensure that the guidance allows for greater flexibility in cases that do not fit the criteria directly.
Finally, as we mark World Refugee Day, I urge the Minister to allow the Refugees (Family Reunion) (No. 2) Bill to come back to the House, so that we may move forward. It is vital that the House has the opportunity to debate the Bill in Committee as soon as possible. We owe it to the many people who will rely on the passing of the Bill to be reunited with their loved ones.
Ruth Jones (Newport West) (Lab)
I commend the hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar (Angus Brendan MacNeil) for bringing the important subject of refugee family reunion to the Chamber—I apologise for not being able to pronounce his constituency; I promise to rectify that.
I commend the Red Cross for the drop-in event it held earlier this week, with refugees from various areas. I was able to meet up with one of my constituents, a young man called Yusuf who is a refugee. He does not sit around waiting for his status—he is helping other refugees and ensuring that they are not isolated. He is a brilliant young man and a brilliant example of how refugees want to get stuck in and involved in this country.
It is important to remember that refugees do not willingly give up their home and community to move to another country. They have been forced to flee, whether by war, violence or persecution, and have had to leave all familiar people and places and deal with a completely new life, learn a new language and set up a new home. We need to understand how dislocated and alone they must be feeling, and we should do everything we can to welcome them and help them settle.
That should include refugees being able to work—a right that is currently denied them as they go through the complex and detailed process of seeking the right to reside here in the UK. I appreciate that we are dealing with family reunion matters, but I need to highlight the need for refugees to have the right to work while they wait the many months or even years that it takes to obtain legal status. Not being able to spend their time usefully employed can have a seriously detrimental effect on their mental health. Madam Deputy Speaker, if you were alone in a foreign country with no money and had to sit and stare at four walls all day, how would you feel? How would anyone here feel? Many refugees want to work. They have the skills that we desperately need here in the UK, so we should be helping them to use those skills to help themselves and the community they find themselves in.
To return to the motion under debate, I support the call for close relatives of all refugees in the UK to be able to reunite with their families. I note with concern that legal aid for family reunion applications was removed in 2013 because it was felt that those applications are straightforward and easy to prepare. In reality, they are far from straightforward—they are difficult for any refugee to deal with, especially in a language they are not familiar with. Legal aid for these applications is available in Scotland and Northern Ireland, and in the interests of fairness, I argue that it should be reinstated in England and Wales.
Currently children who have been granted refugee status in the UK are not allowed to bring their close family to join them in the same way that an adult can. That is an unfair and discriminatory practice on the grounds of age.
In Newport West, we have a diverse mix of people from all across the globe, and we have always welcomed the stranger. However, refugees who arrive in Newport are often disoriented and need help to navigate their way through bureaucratic processes and the practical business of settling down in a foreign land. We are fortunate to have an organisation called The Sanctuary, which provides a welcome and support for refugees in Newport. The project grew out of a desire to support a few Eritrean women who started attending Bethel Community Church in the centre of the city, but it now has its own property and staff, who provide a fantastic service to refugees and asylum seekers across Newport.
The Sanctuary provides practical help and support by providing English classes, advocacy support, mother and toddler groups and an after-school youth club, which provides a safe place for unaccompanied minors. I am so pleased that refugees in Newport West can access the services and support at The Sanctuary. The staff there play an important role in ensuring that refugees settle and integrate into our community and can play a full part in our city.
It is important that the Government act to ensure that close relatives of all refugees in the UK are able to reunite with their families in the UK, and I add my voice to the call for these reforms to be introduced swiftly and without delay.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
It is always good to have the opportunity to speak about these matters. I thank the hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar (Angus Brendan MacNeil)—I hope that is the right pronunciation; I have been practising it for the last 15 minutes. The hon. Member for Oldham East and Saddleworth (Debbie Abrahams) said she was challenged by it, and so was I. The hon. Gentleman has been a great advocate from the very beginning, and he deserves a lot of credit for his leadership on this matter. He has the support of a movement of MPs from all parties for what he is trying to secure.
I am pleased to see the Minister in her place. Just a few weeks ago, I had the opportunity to meet her in my capacity as chair of the all-party parliamentary group for international freedom of religion or belief, and we discussed some of the things that her Department is doing. I thank her for the way she responded to the issues we brought to her attention and for what her Department is doing. I also thank her for giving me the opportunity to name some of the refugees whose cases are in the system. All MPs probably take advantage of the opportunity of meeting her to drop into conversation the name of someone whose case we feel should be looked at urgently.
I firmly believe that, as Members of Parliament, we have a solemn duty to be a voice for the voiceless and to speak out for all those who are oppressed, regardless of their nationality, race, colour or creed. For that reason, I am delighted that Members of this House have the opportunity and the privilege to recognise World Refugee Day. This House shines today, and Members’ contributions have been excellent.
We are seeing record levels of displacement globally, with more than 70 million people displaced worldwide—70 million. Sometimes numbers are bandied around, and we do not know how to process them, so let me put it another way. We are dealing with a situation where the entire population of Ireland and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland are forced out of their homes. Imagine driving down London’s streets with nobody there—that is what it means.
Something must be done to tackle this situation, and to do that, we need to tackle all the root causes. That is why I would like to discuss one of the biggest drivers of displacement: the persecution of religious and belief minorities and systematic violations of the fundamental right to freedom of religion or belief. I thank the hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar for referring to the persecution of Christians. In a report entitled “The Persecution of Christians and Global Displacement”, Open Doors stated that religious persecution was a “dangerously underestimated” factor behind some people’s decision to flee their home. The charity estimated that around half of Syria’s 1.7 million Christians have left their country due to a combination of conflict and religious persecution.
When the Minister and I met a few weeks ago, I mentioned that six Syrian families have been relocated to my constituency of Strangford, and particularly Newtownards. That is an excellent Government scheme, and I commend them for that, but it is only part of the success story. Those families are traumatised and under pressure. They have come to a strange town, and not all of them can speak the language; the children can learn it quickly, but their parents cannot. I met all the families through The Link charity and Strean presbyterian church in Newtownards. It was wonderful to see the community come together through their churches and their faith. These are Christian families who had to leave Syria—some of the 1.7 million people who were displaced—and come to Newtownards. The community got together, with the support of Government, to secure them housing, access to hospital care and education for their children and to try to get them employment. It always encourages me greatly as the Member for Strangford to see just how generous people are when it comes to making things happen.
We see a similar pattern in Iraq, where the numbers of Christians have fallen dramatically due to religious persecution. It is estimated that there were approximately 1.5 million Christians there in 2003, but now numbers are in the hundreds of thousands. The assessment is that there are now approximately 250,000 Christians.
As chair of the all-party group on international freedom of religion or belief, I also speak out on behalf of many non-Christians who fled their homes because it was not possible to practise, change or give up their faith or belief without suffering discrimination or, in many cases, extreme violence. For example, there are an estimated 1.1 million Rohingya Muslims in Bangladesh due to displacement by the brutal onslaught of the Burmese military. We have spoken about that in this Chamber before, and it really hurts me—it hurts us all here—when we have to listen to horrific stories of brutality, violence, sexual abuse, physical abuse and the murder of loved ones.
Although there have inevitably been difficulties and tensions, it is deeply humbling to reflect on the kindness with which a country with extremely limited resources such as Bangladesh has welcomed those in desperate need. On this World Refugee Day, I think it is worth asking ourselves: would we have the same courage and would we have the same compassion to do the same? Bangladesh is a very poor country, but it has welcomed those people in—the 1.1 million Rohingya. It is also worth asking ourselves if the UK and the international community truly have done everything in our power to tackle this issue.
Apart from Myanmar and the middle east, there are many other parts of the world where huge numbers have been displaced due to religious persecution. For example, the Boko Haram insurgency in Nigeria has displaced over 2 million people. For this reason, promoting freedom of religious belief and encouraging peaceful co-existence between different religious communities is vital to any long-term solutions for the refugee crisis.
It is also why policy development for these two areas should not be totally separate; we have to marry those two together. On this point, I would like to congratulate the Home Office—I did it earlier, and I want to reiterate it—on its development of a new training module for asylum caseworkers to help them better assess applications made on the grounds of religion or belief-based persecution. I understand that all caseworkers will have received this training by the end of June—that was confirmed at the meeting—and I commend the Government for their efforts. Let us give credit where credit is due, which I think it is important to do in any debate we have in this House. This is an important step, which I hope will go some way to addressing the disproportionately low numbers of religious or belief minority refugees who have been granted asylum by the United Kingdom.
Figures obtained by the Barnabas Fund under a freedom of information request show that out of some 4,850 Syrian refugees accepted for resettlement by the Home Office in 2017, only 11 were Christian. Again, I would just say that we have over half of them in Newtownards. This is only 0.2% of all the Syrian refugees accepted by the UK. I know that the Government have been very generous, but may I very gently say that I would have liked to see a wee bit more focus on Christian refugees so that they get an equal opportunity of being accepted?
In January, the hon. Member for North East Fife (Stephen Gethins)—he was in earlier on, but is away just now—and the hon. Members for Manchester, Gorton (Afzal Khan) and for Argyll and Bute (Brendan O’Hara) visited Lebanon, with the support of Aid to the Church in Need, to investigate why so few religious minority refugees were being referred by the UN High Commissioner for Refugees. Can the Minister give us some response to that, although it is not her responsibility directly, so that we can hear what discussions have taken place?
Several issues were discussed during the trip, but one of the principal concerns was that there seem to be communication issues between the UNHCR and religious minority refugees. We know that through the all-party group on international freedom of religion or belief, as well as through the Barnabas Fund, Open Doors and Release International, which are all coming back with the same thing. Nearly all the refugees whom the delegation met were unclear about their rights and UNHCR’s available support, leading to a feeling that the UNHCR was not for them—that is very worrying—and that they should seek support elsewhere. The UNHCR has to realise that it is for everyone, and let us make sure that this is rammed home today.
It is important to note that the UNHCR is under enormous pressure, which I understand and respect, and that it is underfunded, which I understand as well, and overworked, so this is not intended as a criticism. I am trying to highlight areas where the United Kingdom and the UNHCR might be able to work together to improve the situation.
I congratulate the Home Office on the 5,806 family reunion visas granted in 2018, and I add my name to the call for the Government to introduce reforms to family reunion rules to ensure that the close relatives of all refugees in the UK have safe and legal pathways to unite with their families in the UK.
The six families that have been integrated among the communities in Newtownards and have done extremely well also have other relatives, as the Minister knows, who are still detained in and unable to get out of Syria. These are family members, so when it comes to the title of this debate—“Refugee family reunion” is what it says up there on the Annunciator and on the Order Papers in front of us—this is about making sure that the families who have also sought asylum can get asylum alongside their families. Every one of us has families, and knows how important it is to have family. Almost the only thing that keeps us sane is our family and it is really good to have that, but how much more so for those refugees to have their families and to have them close.
Stuart C. McDonald (Cumbernauld, Kilsyth and Kirkintilloch East) (SNP)
I, too, start by paying a massive tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar (Angus Brendan MacNeil), first, for securing this debate, but secondly, for his relentless pursuit of reform of the family reunion rules in the face of what hon. Members have rightly described as pretty shabby Government behaviour in relation to his private Member’s Bill. I dare say there were other topics he could have picked for his Bill that would have made him even more popular among the citizens of the Outer Hebrides, if that was possible, but he chose this one because he believes passionately in it. He has thrown himself into this cause heart and soul, and I thank him for doing so. More generally, we have had some incredibly powerful and measured speeches from across the Chamber, so I thank all hon. Members for their contributions.
This debate and the motion tabled have been a very fitting way to mark both World Refugee Day and Refugee Week. It is a week during which we celebrate the rights enshrined in the refugee convention—as has been pointed out, we helped to draft it—and also commit to defending the principle that states should provide shelter for those fleeing persecution from other countries. As hon. Members have pointed out, it is also a week during which we celebrate the huge benefits that refugees can bring to their new homes if they are given the chance to flourish.
It is often said in this Chamber, and it has been said again today, that we have a strong track record of offering sanctuary to refugees, and I agree, although the hon. Member for Oldham East and Saddleworth (Debbie Abrahams) was quite right to point out some of the challenges posed by certain political and tabloid voices, and the need for all of us to be leaders in defending the rights of refugees. However, we should not see this simply as an act of charity, because this country does benefit too. We must also say thank you to our refugee community for the massive contribution they make in all walks of life.
World Refugee Day is also a good time to thank all the organisations and individuals up and down the UK that work relentlessly to support refugees and campaign on their behalf. As we have heard, many of these organisations have been in Parliament this week, either hosting or attending Refugee Week events. We have had Play for Progress, which my hon. Friend the Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar hosted. I was lucky enough to host René Cassin, and we have had the International Red Cross, the International Observatory of Human Rights and many more. I would like to take this chance to pay particular tribute to the Scottish Refugee Council, which does tremendous work day in, day out. It is a source of lots of information and ideas for me, and I wish it well as it launches its own refugee festival today.
Finally on the subject of Refugee Week, like the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon), I am pleased to see the Minister for Immigration here today because—and this may cause shockwaves in the Chamber—I too want to commend her and the Home Office for what they have announced this week about refugee resettlement. As the hon. Gentleman has said, the Syrian vulnerable persons scheme has been a tremendous success, and it is excellent that the experience and expertise gained in operating that system, offering safety to 20,000 vulnerable Syrians by 2020, will not suddenly become redundant, but instead be put to greater use in a broader resettlement scheme thereafter. As an Opposition spokesperson, it would be remiss of me not to suggest that the Government might go further both on numbers and in giving a longer-term commitment, but it is a very welcome step in the right direction, and I thank the Minister and her Department for that.
The reason why resettlement is more important than ever is, as my hon. Friend the Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar and the hon. Member for Strangford have said, that the global displacement of people has reached record levels. Just yesterday, the UNHCR reported that the population of displaced citizens has now reached 70.8 million people, and 25.9 million of them are refugees, which is almost double the number from a decade ago. The UNHCR estimates that 1.4 million refugees need to be resettled, but last year only 81,300 places were offered by 29 states—a gap of 90% that is getting bigger rather than smaller. Every place we can offer truly counts. Hon. Members have said that we can, and should, do more with the Dubs amendment, with relocations from Europe, and with the asylum system, and I agree.
The key part of my hon. Friend’s Bill—family reunion—can be part of solving the crisis that I have just spoken about. Many of those who apply to come to the UK under the refugee family reunion rules—and those who would apply under the expanded rules that we seek through the Bill—are themselves refugees, and it makes sense for them to be alongside their refugee families in the UK, rather than isolated in refugee camps. More fundamentally, however, family reunion is about the rights of those refugees who are already here. Refugee status will never be fully effective unless it comes with all those rights that are essential to allow a person to rebuild their life. The convention relating to the status of refugees ensures that refugees can work, study, and access housing and social security on the same basis as the host country’s citizens.
What could be more essential for someone trying to rebuild their life than the presence of their family? As the hon. Member for Strangford said, the Government do allow family reunion, and last year there were 5,806 cases of partners and children who were able to join refugees here. We welcome that, but our refugee family reunion rules remain more restrictive than international best practice, and more restrictive than leading refugee organisations would wish.
As the hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Robert Neill) rightly said, the reforms in my hon. Friend’s Bill are modest, and they are also reasonable for all the reasons that have been set out today and in numerous debates beforehand. How can it ever be right that someone’s 18-year-old daughter cannot join her refugee parents here, but her 17 and 15-year-old siblings can? How can we say to refugee children living among us in the UK that even though they know where their parents are, we will not allow them to come here?
In response to such questions, the Government generally point to alternative routes in the immigration rules, but as everyone knows, those alternatives are more complicated, much more restrictive, and they come with far fewer rights than refugee family reunion. As the hon. Member for Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough (Gill Furniss) said, it is great that now and again there are exceptional cases and exceptional results are granted, but we want all refugees in the circumstances set out in the Bill to be able to access refugee family reunion rules in a straightforward manner.
In response to what the Home Affairs Committee called the “perverse” rule that stops children sponsoring their parents to come in under family reunion rules, the Home Office plays the “pull factor” card—an argument I hate. As the hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst said, that argument is not founded on evidence, and it runs contrary to everything that leading international refugee organisations tell us. To my mind, it is also totally immoral because when looked at from a different angle, it essentially makes an example of refugee children who are already here. It says to refugee children, “We must ensure that you live separately from your parents so as to discourage others from coming here”, which is a brutal way for any Department to operate.
Such reasoning is also deeply flawed. If I had fled my country of origin and discovered that my child had ended up as a refugee in a third country, I would move heaven and earth to join them there. If I could not do it through family reunion rules, I would pay people smugglers or buy a dinghy to do it myself. Refusing to recognise the right of child refugees to sponsor their parents does not stop people using unsafe illegal routes—on the contrary, it forces more people to use them—and my hon. Friend’s Bill is about creating safe, legal alternatives.
The hon. Members for Hammersmith (Andy Slaughter), for Enfield, Southgate (Bambos Charalambous), and for Newport West (Ruth Jones) raised the issue of legal aid, which is also covered by my hon. Friend’s Bill. I know from my experience as an immigration solicitor how complicated those applications can sometimes be. The issue is set out in an excellent report entitled “Not so straightforward” by the British Red Cross, which notes
“the need for qualified legal support in refugee family reunion”.
People can still get that support in Scotland and Northern Ireland, and they should have it in England and Wales as well.
My hon. Friend has won this argument and he won the vote last year, and it is disgraceful that the Government are not honouring and implementing the will of the House. It is not clear whether the Bill is being blocked by the Home Office or the Treasury or—more likely—by the Whips and business managers.
Patrick Grady (Glasgow North) (SNP)
Is it particularly frustrating that the Government are not willing to provide time for our hon. Friend’s Bill to progress, given how much time is available? Nothing else of any substance is happening, and with the greatest of respect to the next Backbench Business debate, if Members keep that going until 5 o’clock we will be quite impressed. Time and capacity is available, and many other private Member’s Bills are also not getting the light of day that they deserve.
Stuart C. McDonald
My hon. Friend makes a powerful point. There is enough time for a five-day debate on the Bill.
Andy Slaughter
I fully intend to keep the next debate going until 5 o’clock, and I hope that the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) will join me in that ambition.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Sir Lindsay Hoyle)
That is also subject to the Chair’s agreement.
Stuart C. McDonald
I certainly do not doubt their ability to do that, Mr Deputy Speaker. In conclusion, the continued blocking of this Bill is disrespectful to Parliament, but more importantly it is disrespectful and damaging to our refugee community. A fitting conclusion to Refugee Week would be for the Government to listen and to reunite more families, which is exactly the instruction that Parliament has given.
Afzal Khan (Manchester, Gorton) (Lab)
I congratulate the hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar (Angus Brendan MacNeil) on securing this debate on World Refugee Day and on his excellent speech, and I thank all those who have contributed to this excellent debate. On this special day I thank and acknowledge the many charities that work with refugees, including Amnesty International, Oxfam, the Refugee Council, the Red Cross and the many other groups, including in my city, that have worked for decades to help refugees. The hon. Gentleman has been a consistent campaigner for refugee family reunion. I was extremely happy to speak on Second Reading of his private Member’s Bill, and in his debate during Refugee Week last year. The Government’s paralysis makes this feel like groundhog day.
I know from personal experience how frustrating it is when the Government stall a Bill’s progress. I am at my wits’ end about the Parliamentary Constituencies (Amendment) Bill, which has been in purgatory even longer than the hon. Gentleman’s Bill. Its Second Reading was in December 2017, and we still have no money resolution. The Committee has now met 31 times without discussing a single line of the Bill, which must be a record. The Immigration and Social Security Co-ordination (EU Withdrawal) Bill is another route to addressing this issue, but it has also got lost somewhere in Committee. The Government are at the end of their feeble life and are running scared of the House, even on issues as important and urgent as refugee family reunion.
The key to any successful refugee story is integration. People who flee violence come to rebuild their lives in the UK, but how can we expect anybody to recover from the trauma of conflict, and put the pieces of their lives back together, without the support of their family? Children who have had to flee their homes are currently barred from bringing close family members to join them in the UK. As the debate on refugee family reunion goes round and round, the Government continue to rely on discredited claims about “pull factors”. They argue that allowing children to sponsor family members will encourage more children to make the dangerous journey to the UK, but the evidence does not support that position. In fact, providing safe, legal routes to family reunion prevents dangerous journeys, and only when people feel that they have run out of options do they take the enormous risk of making their own way to the UK.
As long as there exist the “push factors” of war, conflict and violence, children will be forced to leave their homes and become separated from their families. It is our humanitarian duty to ensure that any child who makes it to our shores has the best shot at making a better life for themselves, which must include being surrounded by their family.
The Labour party believes in the right to a family life. At the moment, the definition of “family” under the refugee reunion rules is too narrow. It includes only a pre-flight spouse or partner and dependent children under the age of 18. As someone with adult children who are no longer dependent on me, I object strongly to the insinuation that they are no longer close family. In war and conflict, family relationships can become even more complicated. For example, younger children are often under the care of older siblings. Under a Labour Government, if you are a child who is granted the right to be here, so will your parents or carers be. If you have been brought up by carers or parents with a right to be here, so will you, even after you turn 18. In the refugee context, it is essential that close family do not lose out because they are not included in the arbitrary rules set down by the Government.
I was very happy to hear Members’ emphasis on the importance of legal aid in refugee family reunion cases. We recently had a major victory of unaccompanied and separated children coming back into the scope of legal aid. The fact that they were ever excluded is a testament to how far the Government went with their swingeing cuts to legal aid and the punitive hostile environment. I congratulate the Children’s Society on its significant victory.
During the passage of the Immigration Social Security Co-ordination (EU Withdrawal) Bill, Labour has called for legal aid to be reinstated for early legal advice for all immigration matters. The Home Office often claims that legal aid is not necessary to complete an immigration application, but that is simply not the case, especially for children, those who do not speak the language, or people who are otherwise very vulnerable. Recent figures show that over half of all immigration appeals are now successful. That is shockingly high and shows how important court cases are in holding the Government to account on immigration. Justice is meaningless if people do not have the means to claim it, and legal aid is a fundamental part of enabling people to access justice. We know that early access to legal aid helps to save money in the long run, as people are less likely to end up in needless court hearings and appeals.
In conclusion, the Minister has been saying for over a year that she will take a close look at family reunion rules, but we have yet to see any concrete progress. The Government do not even need legislation to get these changes passed. It is in the Home Secretary’s gift, under the immigration rules, to change the eligibility for family reunion and ensure refugees do not spend another birthday, Christmas or Eid separated from their relatives. I hope the Minister will commit to that today.
The Minister for Immigration (Caroline Nokes)
Mr Deputy Speaker, I may crave your indulgence for a bit more time than was originally anticipated, because there has been a lot of content in this debate. I congratulate the hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar (Angus Brendan MacNeil) on securing this important debate on refugee family reunion. I welcome his ongoing dedication to the issue, and his insight and passionate contribution this afternoon. Indeed, we saw that from Members across the House during the debate.
It is of course apposite that we are discussing this issue on World Refugee Day and during Refugee week, as we celebrate the important contribution refugees make as they rebuild their lives in the UK. We have a proud history of providing protection to those who need it, honouring our international commitments under the refugee convention and the European convention on human rights. In the year ending March 2019, we granted refugee status or another form of protection to over 17,000 people, an increase of over 20% on the previous 12 months. Over that same period, we also issued about 5,700 visas to family members of refugees in the UK.
Sadly, as we have heard from several Members, global humanitarian need continues to grow, with over 70 million people around the world forced from their homes and about 25 million refugees. The UK’s resettlement schemes are an integral component of our humanitarian response to that challenge, addressing the needs of some of the most vulnerable refugees, and providing safe and legal routes for tens of thousands of people to start new lives here. In every year since 2016, the UK resettled more refugees from outside Europe than any other EU member state.
As many will be aware, earlier this week the Government reaffirmed their ongoing commitment to refugee resettlement. We are on track to deliver our current commitments to 2020 and have now resettled nearly 16,000 refugees under our vulnerable persons resettlement scheme. Importantly, from 2020—I have been particularly keen on this—we will consolidate our biggest resettlement routes in a single new global scheme, under which we will aim to resettle in the region of 5,000 of the world’s most vulnerable refugees in the first year of operation. More than half of those resettled under our existing programmes are children, the majority of whom have been resettled with their families. I expect that to continue.
A key part of the new resettlement offer will be that those resettled through our community sponsorship and mandate routes will be in addition to our yearly, global commitment. While numbers have historically been small, we intend to explore ways to maximise the contributions of both these routes. The mandate resettlement scheme resettles recognised refugees who have a close family member in the UK who is willing to accommodate them. Going forward, I will look at options to adjust the scope of those eligible to allow for a higher uptake in referrals for resettlement from UNHCR.
The hon. Member for Manchester, Gorton (Afzal Khan) made reference to being the parent of grown-up children who are now independent of him. I can honestly say that I am the parent of a grown-up child who is most certainly still dependent on me. [Laughter.] I am very conscious that across the globe there are many what I regard as young people, between the ages of 18 to 25, who are still dependent on their parents. It is in that particular aspect that I have a very keen interest.
I will now turn to the comments made by Back-Bench Members, because they have been insightful and useful to this debate. The hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar spoke about his encounter with Yohannes and the importance of work for resettled refugees. I have been impressed and delighted, over the course of the past 18 months, to meet resettled refugees who all emphasise the importance of work in giving them a route to integration. I have met employers who have played their part, too.
It is important to draw a distinction between those who are here seeking asylum and those who are here as refugees already with status. I will freely admit that the proportion of those who have status and are in work is still woefully low. We are at a time of incredibly high employment—higher than at any time in my life—yet for those who have been resettled the numbers are still low. There are some inspiring stories, but it is absolutely imperative that we work hand in glove with the Department for Work and Pensions, the Department for Education and civil society to help people into work.
Some of the most inspiring schemes have been community sponsorships—various Members across the House have made reference to them—where the community wraps its arms around individuals, taking them on a journey to find school places for their children, helps them with their English, ensures childcare support while they attend ESOL classes, and helps with CVs and getting into work. I pay particular tribute to World Jewish Relief, which has a fantastic programme running in Bradford. It focuses determinedly on giving people interview experience and finding them appropriate clothing to wear to interviews, help with English, help with CVs and help into work.
Jim Shannon
Some of the Christian Syrian refugees in Newtownards are talented in carpentry and their work is as good as that of any carpenter. The only thing holding them back is their grasp of the language. If they understand the language, they are then able to go on building sites in safety. Language is the thing that opens the door.
Caroline Nokes
The hon. Gentleman makes a really important point. Sometimes it is language and sometimes it is the recognition of qualifications. I tell people repeatedly the story of a Syrian refugee in Kent who was qualified as an accountant in Syria, yet can only work as a bookkeeper here. As a Government, we have to be imaginative. Her English was brilliant. She needed not English language lessons, but to be able to upgrade her qualification. It is important that we are creative in finding routes to work.
The hon. Member for Oldham East and Saddleworth (Debbie Abrahams) gave a very wide-ranging speech and I agreed with much of it. She spoke of the dreadful language use in 2016. I am always reminded of a poster I used to drive past on the A3. I am quite ashamed to repeat the words, but I will do so. It simply said, “The Turks are coming”. I have always sought in this role to be careful and measured about the language I use, and to bring a very human tone to the debate around immigration. It has been an interesting and challenging debate over the past 18 months, but we need to move away from speaking in tabloid headlines.
Debbie Abrahams
The Minister is making some very powerful points. As I was trying to hint at, or perhaps more than hint at, does she believe that all leaders, including us—as MPs, we are leaders—and particularly, leaders of parties need to demonstrate in their language and behaviour that such language is unacceptable?
Caroline Nokes
I absolutely agree and that applies not just here, but in other Parliaments around the globe, and this is about not just language, but tone.
My hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Robert Neill) spoke about the Reverend Davidson and the children brought here as part of the Kindertransport. Several months ago, I met Vera Schaufeld, who was a Kindertransport child. She had an immense impact on me and I am very much aware of the incredible work of the noble Lord Dubs in the other House, who has been an inspiration to many of us.
The hon. Member for Hammersmith (Andy Slaughter) spoke about the Dubs amendment, and I remind him of one point. While we were discussing that amendment, he cited the figure of 3,000, but the Government were always clear that we would discuss the matter with local authorities and find common ground about the number of places that they had available. The final figure that was settled on was 480. We have always refused to give a running commentary on how we are doing on numbers, but it is important to reflect that at the start of 2018 we changed the qualifying date so that more transfers would be possible. At the end of last year, we removed the date altogether, so that we could continue our work with France, Greece and Italy to meet that commitment. Of course, there is still the challenge of best interests tests, where children must go through the process with the UNHCR. Sometimes that is not as swift as either I or the UNHCR would like.
The hon. Member for Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough (Gill Furniss) spoke about Abdul, who had settled in her constituency, and the heartwarming story that he had been reunited with his family. She said some very kind words about me, as did various other Members. It almost felt like this was some sort of swansong at the Dispatch Box, but I reassure hon. Members that the Scottish National party has called an Opposition day debate on immigration next week and some other Scottish colleagues will see me return to Westminster Hall the week after—I am not quite gone yet.
The hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) mentioned resettlement in Strangford and the important role of faith communities. I am always struck by that, and it is not simply Christian communities. In Lambeth this week, I saw a number of resettled refugees, including one young Muslim woman from Syria who had been resettled in an apartment in the synagogue. It was an absolutely brilliant example of how faiths are working together. I am absolutely delighted to hear tales such as that, and what has really been impressed on me over the last year is the very important role of the faith communities, and indeed, of all those involved in community sponsorship, which has been such an important part of our schemes.
Let me turn briefly to the policy background, because I am sure that I am about to run out of time. I reassure hon. Members that we recognise the importance of family reunion, and our policy provides safe and legal routes to bring families together. The hon. Member for Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough cited a particular case, but over the past five years we have granted over 26,000 family reunion visas to family members of refugees in the UK. There are also separate provisions in the rules that allow extended family to sponsor children to come here. Where there are serious and compelling circumstances, refugees can sponsor adult dependent relatives living overseas to join them when, owing to age, illness or disability, that person requires long-term personal care that can be provided only by relatives in the UK.
Child sponsors is an incredibly controversial issue and I am sure that it will provoke Members into seeking to intervene on me. It is important that we maintain the safety of children. Over the last six months or so, I have been really struck by the numbers of perilous journeys that have been made across the channel. In very many instances, children have been on board wholly unsuitable craft in the busiest shipping lane in the world. We know that those people have fallen prey to organised crime gangs and people smugglers and that they have paid enormous sums of money to have their lives put at risk. I am sympathetic to the view that we should carefully consider how we might expand our family reunion schemes, but I do not wish to do anything that sees yet more people and yet more children put in those terrible situations. We know that they are exploited by organised crime, and while we work hard with our colleagues here and abroad to ensure that there are arrests and convictions, it is an incredibly dreadful situation that we must seek to contend with.
Stuart C. McDonald
Everybody across the House wants to avoid people having to turn to people smugglers to get anywhere around the globe, but the point made by the hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Robert Neill) was that the rules, as they stand, force parents to turn to people smugglers if they are going to be able to join their family in the United Kingdom. It is having the opposite impact to what the Minister would like.
Caroline Nokes
I thank the hon. Gentleman for that intervention—the Whip is smiling at me. I just want to make the point, in slight defence of myself, that I am not blocking the Bill. The hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar knows that he must continue to persist with business managers, as I am sure he will.
In conclusion, I thank Members for their insightful and thought-provoking contributions. I will—I hope—continue to reflect on them in considering the Government’s approach on this going forward. I look forward to further debate on these points and others with hon. Members and stakeholders, who have made such an important contribution.
Angus Brendan MacNeil
I welcome the tone of this debate; it has been absolutely fantastic. By comparison with the debate on 16 March last year, there have been no voices speaking against or running up false flags. We are trying to do something that is very unambitious—we are only trying to catch up with 25 other European countries that have no difficulty operating the modest change that we are trying to bring in. As my hon. Friend the Member for Cumbernauld, Kilsyth and Kirkintilloch East (Stuart C. McDonald) said, people are using dinghies and so on to cross the channel because they cannot get here legally, and we are just trying to open up the legal avenues.
I thank the many Members who have contributed, including the hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Robert Neill); I thank him for his knowledge, what he added to the debate and what he told us about Chislehurst and his honourable past. The hon. Member for Oldham East and Saddleworth (Debbie Abrahams) gave a great, wide-ranging speech. The hon. Member for Hammersmith (Andy Slaughter) pointed out that we should not have any need for this debate. The hon. Member for Enfield, Southgate (Bambos Charalambous) related the story of his trip to the jungle. I mentioned in my speech that when we meet people, it opens up another avenue of thought. People are in the jungle because they have changed their religion—in the instance he raised, they had become Christian—and have to escape for the protection of their own lives.
The hon. Member for Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough (Gill Furniss) made a very interesting point about the case that she is dealing with involving the woman who cannot bring her children over, and I hope that the Home Office will have been listening. I do not think I have interacted with the hon. Member for Newport West (Ruth Jones) before, but she is certainly following in the footsteps of the great Paul Flynn, who was a friend of mine in the House, and I welcome the humanitarian note that she struck. The hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon), who demonstrated his excellent Gaelic pronunciation, gave a speech, again, driven by his humanity.
I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Cumbernauld, Kilsyth and Kirkintilloch East for making very good points, and I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow North (Patrick Grady) for his intervention, in which he said that we have the time in this Parliament for a lot of things to happen. I take the Minister’s point about an instruction to the business managers, who are just few yards outside the door, to enable this to happen. I hope that the business managers in the Conservative Whips Office are listening to this microphone and making sure that that happens.
I want to mention Jalal from Afghanistan, who spoke at our event on Tuesday about what it is like being a young refugee. He spoke very well in, I think, his third or fourth language, including about the difficulties that young men, in particular, face and how they can fall through the gaps. There is a lot to be done and yet to do, but we are only trying to do something very little at the moment.
Finally, I appreciate Members’ very good efforts to say the name of my constituency. I sometimes do not find it easy to say the name of Welsh constituencies, but that gives us a little reminder, by serendipity, of the language challenge that is presented to many refugees. We only have to learn two or three words to say “Na h-Eileanan an Iar” but most Members here did it very well, albeit with concentration. I thank them for that and for their contributions, and I will let you move on, Mr Deputy Speaker, as I see that you are very anxious to do so.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Sir Lindsay Hoyle)
That was the longest two minutes I have ever seen.
Question put and agreed to.
Resolved,
That this House notes that 20 June is World Refugee Day; further notes that, with record levels of global displacement across the world, many refugee families have been separated by war and persecution; welcomes that in 2018 the UK granted 5,806 family reunion visas to partners and children of refugees in the UK; and calls on the Government to introduce reforms to family reunion rules to ensure that the close relatives of all refugees in the UK have safe and legal pathways to reunite with their families in the UK.
Court Closures: Access to Justice
(4 years, 10 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Bambos Charalambous (Enfield, Southgate) (Lab)
I beg to move,
That this House has considered court closures and access to justice.
I am pleased to have secured this debate. It concerns a topic of extreme importance, the rule of law and justice in our country. One of the underlying tenets of our legal system is that there should be equality before the law. I shall shortly explain how the piecemeal way in which the Government have implemented the court closures, coupled with the cuts in legal aid, has undermined that principle and left vulnerable people, disabled people and those with low incomes trying to gain access to justice with the scales firmly tipped against them. Our legal system can only deliver justice if everyone can access it fairly and engage with it, but the fact is that those pursuing local justice now find that it is not so local.
My first charge against the Government is that the court closure programme, since 2010, has been disjointed and fragmented, and is not logical. Cambridge magistrates court is a fine modern court, purpose-built in 2010. It is close to the railway and bus stations in central Cambridge, has modern facilities, and is ideally placed to serve the needs of the local community. Last year, it somehow found its way on to a list of eight courts that were due to be closed this year for—allegedly—being underused, dilapidated or close to other services. Of those eight, seven have been or will be closed by the end of the year. The Cambridge court survived only because it was on a long finance lease with restrictions. Had that not been the case, it would surely have closed a mere nine years after it had opened. This bizarre situation demonstrates the inconsistent decision making of Ministers.
Then there is the chaos and confusion surrounding the closure of Lambeth county court, in a prime location in Cleaver Square in Kennington. In 2015, it was announced that the court would close, despite overwhelming consultation responses opposing the move, and that all housing possession cases would be transferred to Camberwell magistrates court. Then Camberwell was earmarked for closure, and so a new plan was hatched. In early September 2017, Lambeth closed, but some court users were told that it would remain open to deal with some possession cases, while others would be dealt with at Stratford and at Clerkenwell and Shoreditch county court. Then court users were told that the Inner London Crown court would deal with Lambeth’s possession cases. Finally, it was settled that they would be dealt with at Clerkenwell and Shoreditch. That just shows how ill prepared Her Majesty’s Courts and Tribunals Service is to deal with its own court closures.
Debbie Abrahams (Oldham East and Saddleworth) (Lab)
I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing the debate.
Oldham magistrates court was closed a few years ago. What is so disappointing is that there has been no compensation in the form of reasonable adjustments to accommodate disabled people—for example, those with agoraphobia who want to give evidence via a video link. Is that not an absolute travesty? Disabled people already face a host of difficulties, and this is yet another.
Bambos Charalambous
That is an excellent point. It typifies the piecemeal way in which the closures have been implemented. The process has not been joined up. I believe that it has been driven by cost-cutting measures rather than an overarching view. I shall say more about that later.
According to the Law Society, there are now no youth courts in the boroughs of Southwark, Lewisham or Greenwich. All the cases from those boroughs now go to Bromley youth court. The four boroughs have a higher total population than the cities of Leeds and Manchester combined, yet they have to make do with one youth court for all their needs.
The closure of 258 courts over the past nine years has been nothing less than shambolic. It is not part of any master plan, but is rather a slavish knee-jerk response to the Treasury’s demands for more cuts from the Ministry of Justice. Worse still, it has taken no account of the impact on disadvantaged people and people on low incomes, who are disproportionately affected by the closures. That brings me to my second point. According to the Magistrates Association, since 2010 more than half the 323 magistrates courts—a total of 162—have closed. In some cases, defendants, witnesses, police, lawyers and magistrates are now travelling 50 miles to obtain local justice. I do not believe for one minute that the cost of making all those court users travel such distances has been factored into any court closure programme.
When the closure programmes began in 2010, the initial proposal behind the closures was that 90% of all court users would be able to reach the court within one hour. Since then, the goalposts have moved, and the overwhelming majority of court users are expected to reach the court by public transport between the hours of 7.30 am and 7.30 pm.
The Government have completed no equality assessment of the impact on those with protected characteristics, the disadvantaged and people with low incomes. In its evidence to the Justice Committee in March 2019, the Equality and Human Rights Commission stated that it had been told by Her Majesty’s Courts and Tribunals Service that it did not hold comprehensive data on court users on which to assess the impact of court closures, but that instead it compared the local population with the regional population to establish whether certain groups were over-represented. No account has been taken of the cost of travelling by public transport at peak times, or the need for additional childcare costs to accommodate longer journey times.
The only data that has been produced on this issue is from the University of Suffolk, suggesting that another impact of long travel times could be the non-attendance of defendants. In February this year, the Grimsby Telegraph ran a story about the failure of a staggering 79 defendants to attend Grimsby magistrates court in the month of January 2019. One explanation given by the paper was that since the closure of Scunthorpe magistrates court, 27.5 miles away, many of the defendants had been unable to afford the train fare. If they were travelling today before 9 am, it would cost them £15.80 one way—a huge amount for someone on universal credit to pay to go to court. In cases of non-attendance at a hearing, the magistrates must issue a warrant for the defendants’ arrest and they will be brought to court by the police, who will have used valuable time and resources as a result.
Alex Chalk (Cheltenham) (Con)
Will the defendant give way? [Laughter.] I am so sorry for calling the hon. Gentleman a defendant. He is not a defendant at all; he is an honourable and upstanding Member of the House.
The hon. Gentleman has made an important point about defendants attending court, and he has made an important point about travel costs. However, we must keep our feet on the ground. If acquitted, the defendant will ordinarily be entitled to the reimbursement of his travel costs. Only guilty defendants will be required to pay. Does the hon. Gentleman not accept that that, too, is an important point?
Bambos Charalambous
I plead not guilty to being a defendant.
While what the hon. Gentleman has said may be the case, the fact remains that those costs are incurred initially by the person making the journey, which causes hardship in the short term.
Wera Hobhouse (Bath) (LD)
Is it not also true that people often do not know exactly what the procedures are and are deterred by uncertainty about the costs that they will face?
Bambos Charalambous
The hon. Lady is absolutely right. Many people do not obtain the legal advice that they need to make such informed decisions, and that, too, is part of the problem.
Robert Neill (Bromley and Chislehurst) (Con)
The hon. Gentleman made a wrong career move at some point. [Laughter.] At the risk of attempting to cross-examine him, may I suggest that the answer to that point might be that, while it is perfectly true that the acquitted defendants will be entitled to apply for the return of their costs, there is a broader public interest in bringing the guilty defendants to court so that they can be convicted and justice can thereby be done?
Bambos Charalambous
The hon. Gentleman has made an excellent point. He is quite right: that is indeed the case.
Women’s Aid has highlighted that fact that, in rural areas in particular, survivors of domestic abuse must travel long distances to reach family courts. Apart from the question of childcare arrangements and the cost of travel, there is a serious safety concern, as the perpetrators of the abuse may be travelling on the same route at the same time, owing to the infrequency of public transport services in those areas. That has the potential to make an already stressful and harrowing experience even worse. I note that Her Majesty’s Courts and Tribunals Service has confirmed that it is considering whether to pay for taxis to ferry defendants and witnesses from the most remote parts of the country to hearings. This just goes to demonstrate that little or no consideration has been given to the impact of court closures on court users.
As alluded to by my hon. Friend the Member for Oldham East and Saddleworth (Debbie Abrahams), there is a court modernisation programme and most people are broadly supportive of this £1.2 billion programme and making best use of technology to help alleviate the pressures on courts and tribunals, but this is not the panacea for court closures. There are those who will be digitally excluded due to difficulty in reading or writing, but even those who can navigate their way through the technology will still need proper advice.
Many litigants in person do not understand the legalities in their case. This can lead to unintended consequences such as pleading guilty to something they have a defence to, or choosing a path that may lead to them being penalised with costs. The cuts to legal aid funding and the lack of access to legal advice leads to a raw deal for some. They should be getting justice. The Public Accounts Committee said in its report “Transforming courts and tribunals” that
“without sufficient access to legal advice, people could make uninformed and inappropriate decisions about how to plead, and that the roll-out of virtual hearings could introduce bias and lead to unfair outcomes.”
Video hearings are not suitable for all cases because the informality of giving evidence by video could result in adverse inferences being taken about a person’s demeanour, which would not be the case if that evidence was being given face to face.
Some courts are not even ready to deal with court modernisation. Court No. 1 in Taunton only has one plug socket on the lawyers’ bench, making it impossible for all lawyers present to charge their laptops. Wi-fi is also poor or non-existent in some courts.
The reality is that HMCTS has no overarching vision of what it expects courts and tribunals to look like in the future. Unless it provides data to make it possible to make a robust assessment of the equality impacts of current court closures, it should cease closing courts.
Debbie Abrahams
My hon. Friend is talking about the impact of court closures on access to justice. If we look in a cumulative way at all the different cuts—for example, to legal aid—as well as what he is describing now, we see that the lack of access to justice that many of our constituents are facing is profound. Does he agree that this is a real indictment and shows the impact of this Government’s policies on the justice system?
Bambos Charalambous
My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. She is certainly right about the cumulative effect of cuts to legal aid and court closures making it harder for the most disadvantaged to access justice as they should be able to.
Local justice and fairness and equality before the law need to apply to everyone equally. The court closures programme has fundamentally failed and skewed things against those on low incomes and the disadvantaged. This has to stop and has to stop now: justice must be for everyone, not just those who can afford it.
Robert Neill (Bromley and Chislehurst) (Con)
It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Enfield, Southgate (Bambos Charalambous), my fellow Justice Committee member, and I congratulate him on securing this debate on a very important topic. I was happy to have been a supporter of his application for the debate, and I am grateful to the Backbench Business Committee for giving us this opportunity.
Access to justice is a fundamental issue. It is not just a transaction issue between the parties to a case; it is fundamental to the running of a civilised society. It ought to be regarded as not just a transactional matter between individuals either, but as something that is the warp and woof of the checks and balances that make our society work. Therefore, the right to have access to justice is a fundamental civic right of every individual and it is important that we aim to produce a system that achieves that without unreasonable obstacles.
Of course, we are obliged to garner public funds with care and make sure they are spent wisely, but it is equally important that the state has an obligation to provide an accessible justice system as part of its duties to protect its citizens. Therefore, we perhaps need to take a step back and look at what we do in relation to courts and other justice issues in the context of that overarching principle.
The issue of court closures has been of real concern to Members in all parts of the House, and for legitimate reasons. I do not say that every court closure is an unreasonable step, and I do not say that every court that was in existence when I started at the Bar is viable now. I appeared in some pretty unsatisfactory old magistrates courts and county courts up and down the country, where there was no means of separating witnesses from defendants for example. In some cases there might have been victims of crime present, and the facilities for having a conference with a client in any sort of confidentiality were non-existent. I actually had a conference in a lavatory once in an old magistrates court in East Anglia because there was nowhere else where we could not be heard by either the prosecutor or prosecution witnesses. It was pouring with rain outside so that seemed to be the easiest way to do it—I did not charge any extra, not even a penny. Courts like that should not be in use.
So there are good examples of where it was right to have got rid of old and inappropriate stock, because people who go to court as witnesses and as parties to civil proceedings are entitled to a basic level of service. Therefore, some rationalisation is legitimate and sensible but it must be balanced against the need for proper accessibility and to maintain, particularly in criminal, but also in family and civil, proceedings, a sense of local justice. I will return to that.
The courts rationalisation programme is often seen as part of a broader programme of court modernisation and rationalisation. As I have said, I do not have a problem with the overall thrust of that programme, which was endorsed by the Lord Chancellor, the Lord Chief Justice and the Senior President of Tribunals. It is based upon sound principles. It stems from two significant reports by distinguished judges: Lord Briggs’s report into civil procedure, and the report of Lord Justice Leveson—Sir Brian Leveson—in relation to criminal procedure. May I say in passing that both of those judges have given very great service to our judiciary? Lord Briggs later went to the Supreme Court and Sir Brian Leveson retires tomorrow as president of the Queen’s Bench Division. I pay tribute to the work he did; he has been one of the exceptional criminal jurists and criminal judges and practitioners of our generation, and the country as a whole owes Sir Brian a very great debt for his public service.
So these were well-founded principles and they had good judicial input into their design. The problem is that, as many witnesses have told the Justice Committee in the course of inquiries into the programme and related topics, there is concern that the outworking of that programme places more emphasis than it should on costs and savings rather than on improving services for parties to the hearing and the court user.
The chairman of the Magistrates Association, Mr John Bache, gave evidence to our Committee only a few weeks ago to the effect that, of course, there is always a balance to be struck—we want both fairness and efficiency in a justice system; nobody wants only one or the other. However, he and his members are concerned that in some cases at present the balance tips too far towards efficiency at the cost of fairness, and that cannot be the right way around.
Alex Chalk
My hon. Friend is making an excellent speech. In the course of this debate we have talked about convenience for defendants and witnesses, but ought we not also to consider convenience for magistrates? Magistrates give of their time to help in the community and perform an invaluable role, but if they have to travel huge distances that will inevitably provide a disincentive. The Government should be very alive to that in making these changes.
Robert Neill
My hon. Friend is absolutely right, and as he will know the Committee, of which he was for a time a distinguished member and for whose work I am very grateful, recently published a report into the magistracy that deals with a number of challenges facing the magistracy. It is convenient that I refer to this point, given that 90-odd% of criminal cases are dealt with by magistrates, who, as he says, are unpaid—they are volunteers; they are the bedrock of the criminal justice system. The point of a magistrates system is that they are lay people—mini juries, in effect—delivering local justice. Defendants are thereby judged by one’s peers, not only in the sense of one’s status in society, but in the sense that they come broadly from the community from which they themselves come.
That has always been fundamental to our system in criminal work. The difficulty has been the number of pressures on the recruitment of magistrates, and one, which was identified to us by the Magistrates Association and other witnesses, is the effect of court closures. Where they become as drastic as they have in some cases, they act as a disincentive to magistrates to continue on the bench, as travel times are much longer than they were. They can also skewer recruitment patterns for new magistrates. A number of studies indicate that the drop-out rate for magistrates in rural areas, where courts often sit only in the county town, is more marked and that there is a tendency in areas where the court has moved to an urban centre for magistrates to be recruited predominantly from the surrounding town areas rather than the rural areas.
Victoria Prentis (Banbury) (Con)
I wonder if my hon. Friend remembers, as I do, the very powerful evidence we heard from Welsh magistrates in our work on the Justice Select Committee about the difficulties they are having recruiting magistrates in rural parts of Wales.
Robert Neill
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The evidence from the Welsh magistrates was particularly marked. They have the additional issue that they often need to recruit magistrates who are bilingual, since the Welsh language is usable in court proceedings. Rural areas of Wales suffer greatly from the dearth of magistrates, we are told, as well as from the difficulty of defendants, witnesses, police officers and lawyers having to travel long distances to get to court. The balance there has to be kept permanently under review.
There are other challenges as well. I know that the Minister will respond in full to a magistrates report, and I hope he will take that on board. One of the things we say is that we should have a holistic approach to the recruitment of magistrates—a workforce strategy—and that must include looking at what is reasonable in terms of the travel times that they are expected to undergo.
Other unintended consequences can stem from that. The hon. Member for Enfield, Southgate referred to the closure of four youth courts in London and the amalgamation in Bromley magistrates court, which, as he says, creates difficulties. Even though the geographic distances within London—some of us here are London MPs—might not be great, travel is not necessarily easy, particularly if one is using public transport, and even more so if defendants or other parties to proceedings have chaotic lifestyles. In civil and family cases, they may be people undergoing real stress—because of relationship breakdown, debt problems in civil proceedings, and so on—and the greater the travel burden put on them, the greater the risk that they do not attend and the hearing is ineffective or that those with a legitimate claim in such proceedings are deterred from taking their case forward.
Much progress has been made to make it easier to initiate things such as money claims and divorce proceedings online, which is welcome, but as the former Lord Chief Justice, Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd, observed wisely in the other place recently, there is a difference between an online process to deal with transactional matters and online proceedings. As the president of the family division, Sir Andrew McFarlane, observed that video or virtual evidence is unlikely to be as appropriate in family cases as in other cases. For example, it can be easier to resolve things such as straightforward claims for damages—money claims—online. It seems important to us that we find that balance and ensure greater nuance and sensitivity in where we reduce our court facilities.
There is also the issue of travel times. The suggestion seems to be that it is reasonable for someone to leave home at 7.30 am to get to a court hearing and then to get home two hours after it finishes, which might be at 5.30 pm. I did a lot of that when I was practising at the Bar, but I understood that, having chosen that job. It is not the same for someone who is a witness in proceedings or who has been summoned to assist the public good by giving evidence about an incident they witnessed. It does not seem reasonable to expect those people to put up with long journey times. Legal aid lawyers are not well remunerated, and their having to travel long hours on modest fees while also preparing their cases properly does not always ensure that justice is fully served.
I hope that we will be cautious in how far we go. It is perfectly fair to point out that the volume of work going through courts—magistrates, Crown and county—has declined and that that fact will obviously be reflected in the court estate to some extent, but I would be happier if I thought that the money being saved was being immediately spent on the upkeep of the retained estate. I regret to say, however, that that is manifestly not the case. The Criminal Bar Association recently posted online a photograph of the wall in the robing room at Southwark Crown court. As well as various stains and cracks—it is a 1970s building—a number of phone numbers had been written on the wall next to the telephone. The phone numbers were so old they predated the 0207 and 0208 numbers, which shows how long it has been since the place was painted. In Snaresbrook Crown court, I have seen buckets in the judge’s corridor and so on. We are not recycling the money even to maintain the estate we have. We have to get that right somehow.
Victoria Prentis
I wonder if I could draw my hon. Friend’s attention, and perhaps by proxy the Minister’s attention, to the excellent and important evidence given by Ian Burnett to the House of Lords Constitution Committee about the quality of repairs to court buildings and the effect it has on judicial morale.
Robert Neill
The evidence of Lord Burnett of Maldon, the Lord Chief Justice, was most compelling, and I know that the Minister, who is a diligent Minister and who I welcome to his place in the Ministry of Justice, will want to take that heavily on board. We pride ourselves on having a Rolls-Royce system of justice in this country, and in terms of the intellect and integrity of our judiciary, that is absolutely right, but sometimes the buildings in which they operate—
Robert Neill
As my hon. Friend says, they are much more like a Škoda.
Having drawn those matters to the House’s attention, as well as my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests, which I should have done at the beginning, I hope that the Minister will take the opportunity to reflect on the voluminous evidence that our Committee and others have amassed not about how we should abandon the reform program—absolutely not—but about how we can take it forward efficiently and effectively. We must strike that balance. We must achieve efficiency but never at the expense of justice and fairness in what is a fundamental civic right.
Ellie Reeves (Lewisham West and Penge) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to speak in this important debate, and I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Enfield, Southgate (Bambos Charalambous) on securing it. It is also a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Robert Neill), the Chair of the Justice Committee. The £1 billion pound modernisation programme undertaken by Her Majesty’s Courts and Tribunals Service was designed to move cases online and to increase the use of digital methods to improve the speed and efficiency of our court system. However, as the Public Accounts Committee’s report into transforming courts and tribunals made clear, the pressure to deliver quickly and make savings is limiting HMCTS’s ability to consult meaningfully with stakeholders and risks it driving forward changes before it fully understands their impact on users and on the justice system more widely, particularly in regard to access to justice.
As a member of the Justice Committee, I am pleased that we are currently undertaking an inquiry into the courts and tribunal reforms. It is clear that the implications are going to be significant. As we have seen in countless other examples from welfare to healthcare, the digitisation and modernisation of Government systems invariably leads to delays and operational issues. Sufficient time is never committed for proper testing and evaluation to ensure that the technology and methods implemented are actually fit for purpose.
On current predictions, HMCTS expects 2.4 million cases a year to be dealt with outside physical courtrooms by 2023, leading it to employ 5,000 fewer staff. While many organisations, including the Law Society and the Magistrates Association have welcomed the increased use of technology, they continue to express concern that the Government’s desire to increase efficiency is coming at the cost of accessibility. I have concerns that by switching to a “digital by default” approach, we are in danger of excluding many people from being able to fully interact with the justice system, given that vulnerable people such as those with learning difficulties, mental health conditions, addictions, disabilities and English as a second language are often disproportionately represented among court users. By assuming that everyone is able to adjust to digital-only platforms, we risk denying people the ability to seek and access justice. The Government’s desire to save money by moving to digital solutions while failing to recognise the impact of their introduction may cost more in the long run, not just financially but by reducing access to justice for many.
While the Government have accelerated the roll-out of digital portals, they have also presided over the dismantling of our court system. Between 2010 and 2019, we have seen 295 court facilities close their doors for good, including more than 50% of the magistrates courts in England and Wales. The combination of this and increased digital-only processes is another example of trying to do too much too quickly, and the results will always have negative consequences on access to justice.
Resolution, the family law group, recently ran a survey of its members following the roll-out of some of the reforms. On access to justice, 87% strongly disagree or disagree that a more accessible service is being delivered, and 94% disagree or strongly disagree that faster processing times are being delivered. Not only is access to justice being denied but the reform agenda is making an already difficult process harder still. Many cases that end up going through the court system will involve vulnerable people in difficult circumstances, such as cases involving children going into care. By limiting the processes by which people interact with the court system, along with the continued closure of the estate, we are setting up barriers that will in turn prevent full access to justice, and particularly the ability of many to access their nearest court.
Following the Lord Chancellor’s recent response to the “Fit for the future: transforming the court and tribunal estate” consultation, I share the concerns of groups such as the Law Society that have drawn specific attention to the accessibility of our future court system. I am disappointed that the response categorised a reasonable journey as one that allowed court attendees to leave home no earlier than 7.30 am to attend a hearing and return home by 7.30 pm the same day, using public transport where necessary. For those who have caring responsibilities, family or childcare arrangements and for disabled people and the elderly, a 12-hour window is far from accessible. Some may have access to a car, but those who rely on public transport could have numerous legs to their journey and, given that thousands of bus routes have faced being cut under this Government, it is inevitable that there will be a detrimental impact on the ability of many to get to court in a reasonable time. This could affect their ability to access justice.
Robert Neill
The hon. Lady is making a powerful case. Does she agree that there is another issue that can arise as a result of court closures? She and I know that the four youth courts that have been amalgamated now sit at Bromley, and that many of the youngsters who appear in front of those courts are involved in gang culture. This creates real listing difficulties for the court staff, who have to try to ensure that they do not list cases involving rival gangs from different areas of that part of south London at the same time, given the potential for disorder that can genuinely occur. This is a matter of concern for the police in our shared borough.
Ellie Reeves
The hon. Gentleman makes an excellent point. I, too, know the difficulties that this is creating for the police and the court service locally. These complex considerations have to be taken into account, but they are sometimes not thought about when introducing these sorts of reforms.
The current outline for a reasonable journey assumes that everything in court that day runs to time and to plan. Court listings are usually oversubscribed under the current set-up, so many people often make their way to court, which often takes several hours, in anticipation of a hearing that never takes place. Not only does that have negative consequences for victims, witnesses and defendants and inevitably cost more, given that solicitors’ fees must still be paid, but it is quite possible that the combination of more difficult journeys and the continued floating or warned-list system will lead to the unintended consequence of people just not turning up at all. Research has shown that those effects, combined with court closures, have led to an increase in no-shows and an increase in warrants of arrest for defendants in locations where magistrates courts have closed.
Victoria Prentis
Does the hon. Lady share my concern that the Department has done no real research on the number of no-shows?
Ellie Reeves
That is a good point. The reforms are being pushed through without a proper look at what they mean in practice.
A survey of Resolution members by the Family Law Group showed that nearly 50% of respondents said that the courts that they had historically used had been closed and that, as a result, many clients’ travel time to court had increased to two hours each way. There were also over 200 examples of clients suffering financially or emotionally as the result of a court closure or a failure in court administration.
I am also concerned that court closures are leading to a wider reduction in facilities and services available to those who interact with the justice system. Previously, people in court could attend a counter for assistance or advice, particularly when having to fill out the relevant paperwork for their hearings. Resolution’s evidence went on to detail the struggle that many of their clients experience due to the need to phone ahead to arrange things that were previously done in court at a counter. The evidence described clients calling a centre only to find that up to 100 people were ahead of them in the queue and finding that support staff, while not unhelpful, had only limited information, making it difficult to progress any queries. In addition, the fact that individuals now have to book an appointment before being able to attend the court counter creates another barrier to getting stuff done, both for professionals and for members of the public. As I stated earlier, given that vulnerable people are disproportionately represented among court users, reducing the availability of services and switching them to online or telephone-based solutions instead risks excluding many from full interaction with our justice system.
The overarching message from stakeholders is that, while reform can improve the workings of the court system, the pace at which courts have closed, combined with the inaccessible roll-out of the digitalisation reforms, has left behind a gulf in access to justice. Cuts to staffing will see those who have to use our courts system finding the whole process even more difficult to navigate. The courts and staff who are left have to deal with increasing caseloads. The Government’s reforms have a facade of ease of use and straightforwardness, but the cuts that have hit the courts have left us with a system in disarray.
In evidence to the Justice Committee, the Criminal Bar Association succinctly stated that
“many of the reforms already implemented and those proposed are framed too much around efficiency at the expense of ensuring a fair process for all.”
I urge the Minister to look at the speed at which the reforms are rolled out and to consider the evidence that too much is happening too quickly. He should also listen to the recommendations of the Public and Commercial Services Union and many other bodies involved in our courts and justice system and prevent any further court closures until it can be proven that they are not having a detrimental impact on access to justice.
Victoria Prentis (Banbury) (Con)
It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Lewisham West and Penge (Ellie Reeves) and all my learned friends from the Justice Committee. I am grateful to the Backbench Business Committee and the hon. Member for Enfield, Southgate (Bambos Charalambous), whose application I was proud to sponsor. The Justice Committee has been looking at this area for some time, and the poor Minister is being inundated with the statistics and evidence that we have gathered during the course of our inquiries over the past few years.
My hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Robert Neill) gave an important speech about access to justice, and Opposition Members also made important contributions, so I make no apology for going from the sublime to the very local. I am going to talk about Banbury and Bicester, because we are an interesting example of what happens when courts close.
In July 2015—remember those days?—I was a new MP and the world was rosy. Soon after I was elected, and not entirely to my distaste, it was proposed that Bicester magistrates court would be closed. At the time, along with Banbury and Oxford, it was one of three magistrates courts in Oxfordshire.
I was not too distressed about the news, even as a new, keen MP, because I was told that Bicester magistrates court was operating at 11% capacity. On both sides of the House, we can probably all agree that 11% capacity is not ideal for a court to operate at; it was employing people and taking up a large building on a prime site. I did not resist the proposal, but I made strong representations on the need for Banbury magistrates court to remain open and for the Department to keep an open mind about mobile justice and the real effect on access to justice. I am trying to show that I am not anti-court closure per se, but that what matters is that people can access justice.
The closure went ahead, and the building has since been transferred to Homes England for development. Work has not yet started on the building, which irritates me every time I drive home. At the time, my general support for the proposed closure of Bicester magistrates, as the Department knows well because I told it very clearly, was predicated on Banbury still being open and having the capacity to absorb a possible surge in demand.
I also suggested, to the delight of the Daily Mail, that alternative venues for justice, such as pubs and town halls, be explored as part of a wider discussion about the future of the courts estate. As a Government lawyer for 17 years, I have experience of organising secret hearings in unusual locations, and I am convinced that justice is not about place but about what is done in that place. I am happy to continue making that case both to the new Minister and to the House.
North Oxfordshire is an area facing unprecedented growth, with approximately three houses being finished each day. Cherwell District Council is leading the way and, as the Minister knows only too well, the route for the Oxford to Cambridge expressway, which has yet to be announced, will almost certainly come very close to us. The local population is therefore projected to grow by 25% in the coming years.
We hope that all those people will be law-abiding and will never need recourse to either a criminal court or a family court, but the reality is that some of them will. In our daily lives, many of us do not come across the type of person who uses the courts—although, as MPs, we often do. I am talking about those who are really difficult to reach.
The Minister has done a great deal of work on hidden disabilities and authored the fantastic Maynard review. He fully understands this matter, but I implore him, when thinking about court users in the round, to really think about the type of people we are trying to get to court buildings early in the day. They often have hidden disabilities, they are often not very literate and they have difficulties with ready cash to pay for train fares and bus fares. They are genuinely one of the hardest sections of society to reach, let alone to get to a court building by 9 o’clock in the morning.
The closure of Banbury magistrates court has to be viewed against the backdrop of a febrile local atmosphere caused by the removal of some services, notably obstetrics at the local Horton General Hospital. There is considerable local disquiet about services being taken from Banbury to Oxford, with our area being used merely as a dormitory. I noticed—the hon. Member for Lewisham West and Penge also mentioned this—that, snuck into the recent “Fit for the Future” consultation document, is a measure that has moved the goalposts; it is suggested that any time between 7.30 am to 7.30 pm is acceptable for travelling to court.
For the consultation that we filled in on the closure of Banbury magistrates court—one that provoked many responses, none of which were taken any notice of as far as I am aware—the document stated that a journey from Banbury to Oxford takes approximately an hour and 10 minutes by car. I would suggest that that is a very optimistic estimate. I conducted my own travel survey in January 2017, as a result of worries locally about closing local health services. It was clear from the 450 responses I received to my survey that the average journey time to Oxford from Banbury or the surrounding villages is approximately 90 minutes.
It is not clear from the consultation document we received at the time we were consulted about the Banbury court whether consideration was given to the lack of parking facilities at the receiving site in Oxford. Court users will have to allow enormous amounts of additional time to find a parking space. Once that is taken into account, it is possible that a one-way journey from Banbury to Oxford could easily take more than two hours. If I were travelling to court in Oxford, as I did from time to time in my working life before I entered this place, I would allow two hours at least.
The other thing we have to remember is that the vulnerable group of users I mentioned do not necessarily have access to cars. As the consultation document suggests, Banbury is also served by a regular train to Oxford. Although the train provides a realistic alternative mode of transport—for those who live in Banbury itself—the 36-minute journey time suggested in the consultation does not take into account travel times to Banbury station. We have extremely limited bus services locally, and many villages are not served by public transport at all.
I am also concerned about whether real evidence was collected on the absorbing court to determine whether it could cope with the extra work. The Justice Committee had some disturbing evidence given to us last week, unprompted by me, about the shortage of judges in Oxford and therefore the inability of the court to absorb this extra work. We know that in 2016-17 Banbury magistrates sat for a total of 2,211 hours, which we think works out at about 58% usage, with 2,009 hours being spent on criminal work and 202 hours being spent on family work. During the same period, Oxford magistrates had 1,184 spare sitting hours. Even my maths can tell me that there is a shortfall in capacity of about 1,000 sitting hours, and that does not take into account any increase in crime locally which we may get because of the vast increase in the local population.
I was brushed off by representatives of the Department, who suggested that the court could absorb the gap by regular Saturday sessions or sittings beyond the usual five-hour day. I gently remind the Department, which is extremely keen to increase diversity in the professions, that sitting at irregular times does not go with increasing diversity. I hope that the Ministry of Justice will undertake specific engagement with the relevant magistrates associations to ensure all options are fully scoped before decisions are taken in the future.
I am keen, as I have said many times in this House and almost weekly before the Justice Committee, on exploring alternative venues for justice. I am therefore very pleased to welcome the new Minister to his place, because I believe he shares my desire to do this. I met the previous Minister along with two of my favourite local magistrates, who came to help me make our case for piloting alternative venues locally. Given the limited capacity at the receiving site in Oxford, and the risk of over-centralisation and the effect that has on my vulnerable constituents, we have suggested that real consideration be given to using Bodicote House, which is the home of Cherwell District Council, as an alternative venue for justice. The Department has done some scoping work on the suggestion, and I would really like to press forward by having Banbury be one of the pilot sites for this new idea. Every time I mention the idea to certain officials, I am met with the response, “Security is a problem,” but it is a problem that we will be able to overcome if we work together in a constructive fashion.
In welcoming the new Minister to this debate and to his new position, I politely encourage him to help me in my mission to bring justice to local people, and to join me by agreeing that justice is not a place but a precious concept—but only if people can access it.
Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith) (Lab)
I declare my interests as a non-practising barrister and the fifth member of the Justice Committee to speak in the debate, albeit the most junior and recently elevated to that position.
I am sure it is a coincidence, but like me other Members will have found in their inboxes this morning a press release from the Ministry of Justice telling them that £15 million of extra Government funding will be spent to improve more than 200 courts. I am sure the fact that that came out on the morning of this debate is just happenstance. When I read it in more detail and found that revolutionary things are being done such as a new roof on Chester Crown court, a new lift at Swansea civil justice centre and plumbing upgrades in Newton Abbot, I wondered whether it was really something that needs to feature in the popular press at the moment. Is it really so revolutionary that these things are happening? It is £15 million for what is actually basic maintenance.
Perhaps I can contrast all that with the £43 million that the Department made from the sale of Hammersmith magistrates court last year—that is three times the entire budget that the Department has committed to the repairs. If the tales of toilets and buckets from the Chair of the Justice Committee are to be believed, it may be that even that £15 million will be inadequate for the task. The sad thing is that at the time Hammersmith court was closed, it was a fully functioning, well-used, fully accessible building in a convenient location. It had the first ever domestic violence court in the country. Sadly, as nothing has yet happened to it, it is now used only for the filming of crime dramas. The most recent time I was there, I was down in a cell with an entire film crew.
I do not want to share private grief, but I shall briefly outline our experience in west London, because it is emblematic of what is happening across the board. The modern court in Hammersmith was built around 20 years ago, and our old, lovely but ageing Victorian magistrates court later moved into it, followed later by our lovely but ageing Edwardian county court. So be it. Over the past 10 years, the county court work was moved over to Wandsworth to allow work from other closed magistrates courts in London to move into the building. We were then told that all the magistrates court work would go to places as convenient to my constituents as Hendon. Then, last year, we were told that Wandsworth county court was to close and that the county court work would go across London to Clerkenwell. It is difficult to keep up with this: there have been four changes in respect of county court work over a period of around 10 years.
The farce then turns to tragedy. This information has been given to me by court users, and not just users of our own courts. My hon. Friend the Member for Enfield, Southgate (Bambos Charalambous) referred to what is happening at Clerkenwell and Shoreditch county court. I am told that files are being lost there, hearings have not taken place more than a year after work was transferred, telephones are not answered, paperwork has been lost, and bailiffs warrants are being executed despite warrants being suspended. My source says:
“The court is essentially in chaos”,
with 70% of staff being agency workers. This is the court, right on the other side of London, that my constituents are being directed to.
Possession work now forms a substantial part of county courts’ work, because without early legal advice people can often end up homeless when they should have received it at an earlier stage. Most cases relate to benefit problems and defects in the benefits system and therefore involve very poor people. Lots of people now walk to court. My excellent law centre, under director Sue James, co-locates its advice services with food banks and will now have to travel across London to provide those emergency services. This is a very unsatisfactory state of affairs, particularly as nearby Brentford county court has five courtrooms, only two of which are used because only two judges sit there. That in turn makes me suspicious about the utilisation figures that we are given.
Robert Neill
The hon. Gentleman makes a fair point. He will have heard, as I have, the concerning reports on a number of occasions from the Criminal Bar Association about under-utilisation sometimes being caused by courtrooms left sitting empty while recorders—part-time judges who classically could be used to fill out the slack—are not offered enough slots in which to sit by the Ministry of Justice. It seems a completely false economy.
Andy Slaughter
That is absolutely right. It is the combination of cuts in service that is causing the problems, and one problem is being referenced to another. Under-utilisation is a problem of not having judges to sit in court rather than a problem of not having the cases to refer to that court, as in the example that I have given. That makes me suspicious about the longer hours—the 7.30 to 7.30 window and the flexibility, with warned lists, that means that advocates and clients could be there all day. If there are not enough judges to sit in the courts in the first place, what is the point of courts sitting from early in the morning until late at night? To put it mildly, this has not been very well thought through.
To turn from the particular to the general, it has been mentioned that half the magistrates courts in the country have closed since 2010. One of the first things I did when I was appointed shadow Justice Minister back in 2010 was to respond to that first statement. Little did I know where we were going—that there would be perhaps one cull a year of courts across the country from then onwards. There must come a point when matters have gone too far. One reason for the wholesale, untrammelled closure of courts was obviously austerity. We are not just talking about capital receipts for closed buildings; we are also talking about thousands of staff going—I think another 5,000 staff are due to go over the next two years.
There is no denying that, but the justification given was the now more than £1 billion digitisation programme that was being introduced. The Association of Her Majesty’s District Judges says that half the money has been spent but only a limited benefit has yet been seen or realised. We have seen the sale and closure of courts and the restriction of access to justice before any of the benefits. We are taking a leap in the dark and being asked to trust that the Government have got it right. Frankly, judging by most Governments’ IT programmes and success, I always think we ought to be very sceptical about whether they have got it right. The only consistent thing is the amount spent on management consultants—I see that about £61 million has been spent on them as part of this programme. None of this bodes well.
Some people will say that we can get too attached to our local courts, but local justice is important. It is a cumulative process. The cuts to legal aid, the introduction of fees and the closure of courts are having a detrimental effect on people’s rights to access justice, and to do so speedily, conveniently and fairly. It therefore seems entirely reasonable to ask, as the Labour party does, for a moratorium on closures. It is also reasonable to ask for more evidence of the justifications for any closures and of the benefits that are allegedly going to be gained from the money released by those closures. There is a new Minister in post, who I am sure is looking at the issue with a fresh pair of eyes. I hope we are going to hear very shortly that he will look at these matters again and perhaps come to some different conclusions from those of his predecessors.
Wera Hobhouse (Bath) (LD)
I am keenly aware that I am probably the only person here who is not a member of the illustrious group of MPs on the Justice Committee. I hope that colleagues will forgive me for the fact that I am going to talk not about the intricacies of court closures, but more generally about access to justice. I am here today to share stories about justice and about what being unable to access to justice looks like. As we have already heard, these stories are all too common and an example of the Government’s refusal to accept that cuts have gone too far and that we need to change direction. Our justice system is in crisis and the time has come for the Government to roll up their sleeves and do something about it.
The city of Bath has been lucky. Despite murmurs a few years ago that Bath county court might close, it remains open and is a location for people across our city to seek justice and settle disputes. However, access to justice is about far more than just a courtroom; I listened carefully to the hon. Member for Banbury (Victoria Prentis) saying that we could actually be quite creative about where justice takes place.
My constituency of Bath has been rated by the Law Society as a legal aid desert. In all of Bath and North East Somerset, there is only one law firm that is authorised to provide legal aid advice on housing, including on cases of unlawful eviction, where families are faced with homelessness. This is not unusual. More than half of all local authority areas in England and Wales do not have a single housing legal aid provider. Legal aid deserts have emerged across the country in key areas of law such as immigration and mental health because normal firms can no longer afford to offer these services at a reduced price. Constituents come to my office all the time concerned about financial or civil court cases where they cannot afford representation and hope that my caseworkers can help. We do what we can, but all too often these situations are desperate, and without legal training, there is a limit to what my team and I can do.
Our justice system punishes individuals who try to represent themselves. This is very unfair in a context where ways to access legal aid are few and far between. A 19-year-old girl from Bath recently represented herself in a right to remain case that determined her right to stay in the UK. She had been brought to the UK as a child and did not know, until she tried to apply to university, that she had far outstayed the requirements of the visitor visa that she was brought here on. Not having the money to pay for representation, she represented herself and ended up giving the wrong information to the immigration authorities. As a result, she was put at risk of deportation back to a country where she did not know anyone and did not speak the language. She was lucky that we were able to build a local campaign and crowdfund money to pay for her to get a lawyer, who eventually won back her right to live in this country on human rights grounds, but our system must not rely on luck to determine who can and cannot pursue justice.
Many more constituents have come to me with stories that cannot be resolved because they simply are not able to prepare for the justice they deserve. The context varies—from abusive partners who have ignored court orders and continued the abuse, to a financial settlement from a divorce that has not been honoured, leaving a pensioner in financial crisis. The common thread between the stories is the hardship that my constituents endure after being unable to access justice.
The Government must restore early legal aid advice in cases of welfare, debt, employment, immigration, housing and family law. Although these are considered aspects of civil law, the impact on individuals in these areas cannot be overstated. Family, employment, welfare and the right to stay in one’s country are basic building blocks for a settled life. When access to justice suffers, so does our society. Issues such as discrimination in the workplace go unchecked and can further perpetuate a culture of discrimination and bullying for years to come. Currently, in accusations of work-based discrimination, only one in 200 cases receive funding for representation in court. Exceptional case funding, which was supposed to fund cases involving serious human rights violations, has proven to be very ineffective. There have been 10 applications in the past year concerning work-based discrimination, and all have been rejected. This emergency funding should be reformed as soon as possible in a way that makes it accessible and useful to those who need it.
Without access, our justice system loses its authority, becoming a luxury only afforded to the wealthiest members of our communities. It is no longer simply a case of reducing the cuts; instead, we must seriously reinvest in a fair and effective justice system that is accessible to everyone.
Richard Burgon (Leeds East) (Lab)
I thank my hon. Friends the Members for Enfield, Southgate (Bambos Charalambous) and for Lewisham West and Penge (Ellie Reeves) and the hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Robert Neill)—the Chair of the Justice Committee—for securing this debate. It is a pleasure to hear from so many members of the Justice Committee, as a former member myself.
This ought to be one of the many debates that we are having in this House about an unprecedented shift in how justice is delivered in this country. The scale of the change is enormous, with hundreds of courts closed and thousands of staff lost, millions fewer cases heard in the courts over the coming years, a £1 billion-plus reform programme and plans for annual savings of £200 million. That is a tremendous change.
Whether for good or for bad, it is undemocratic and deeply concerning that these changes are not properly debated in this Chamber in Government time before being implemented. However, in the spirit of cross-Bench co-operation that Backbench Business debates encourage, I want to acknowledge that the former Justice Secretary, the right hon. Member for South West Norfolk (Elizabeth Truss)—someone also from Leeds originally but with whom I have strong political disagreements, it will not surprise people to know—did present a prisons and courts Bill before the last general election, with proposals in black and white to be discussed and amended had it not fallen with that general election.
By contrast, another former Justice Secretary, now the Transport Secretary, rushed through a major justice shake-up in probation that was forced through ignoring the words of the experts, with vast cost to the public and to public safety. I warn the current Justice Secretary that emulating the Transport Secretary’s approach to major justice reforms will come back to haunt him. This risks being his own probation crisis.
Of course, no Labour Member is against technology. Undoubtedly, technology can, with genuine investment and backed by rigorous evidence, aid access to justice. Likewise, no one doubts that our courts need modernisation —that needs to happen—but Labour is concerned that the court closures are a smokescreen for austerity and will cause long-term damage to access to justice. The Public Accounts Committee says that
“the planned changes to the courts and tribunal system are on a scale never before attempted anywhere in the world.”
As one former judge recently asked, why have court buildings been sold before the changes that are part of the reform programme had been put in place, tested, evaluated and shown to work? Why is there not a substantial pilot? Why has sufficient research not been done into the impacts of digital courts? Why has there not been proper public or parliamentary scrutiny?
Labour is calling for a moratorium on further cuts and closures until these reforms can be subjected to full parliamentary and public scrutiny. It is a demand that we share with the Association of Her Majesty’s District Judges. While stating that it
“could not be more supportive of modernisation”,
the ADJ has called for
“a pause in the court closure programme until a proper stock take of the present position has been carried out”.
That seems eminently sensible.
We are looking at the impact on access to justice of court closures, but as many Members have said, courts cannot be seen in isolation, especially when the Ministry of Justice has faced the deepest cuts of any Department—cuts totalling 40%. Those cuts are driving a justice crisis. Cuts to police and Crown Prosecution Service budgets compound the problem, and with fewer people charged, fewer prosecutions and fewer people pursuing cases due to a lack of legal aid, justice is denied time and again. It is simply not credible to suggest that investment in technology is the answer to this crisis in access to justice.
Such austerity is the context in which half of all magistrates courts have been closed and a third of county courts have been shut. Selling off local courts piles yet more pressure on the remaining courts and risks hearings being further delayed and rescheduled. That can have a distressing impact on victims and witnesses and creates a justice system that is less accessible for local people, forcing them to travel vast distances, as we have heard today.
The Law Society notes how Her Majesty’s Courts and Tribunals Service’s definition of a day’s travel to court impacts on those with caring responsibilities, the elderly and disabled people. My hon. Friend the Member for High Peak (Ruth George) has told me about the devastating impact of the closure of Buxton court on her constituents facing eviction. Now facing a journey to Derby without any direct train, many of her constituents are simply unable to defend themselves. My hon. Friend the Member for Halifax (Holly Lynch) contacted me in advance of the debate to tell me how the closure of Halifax family court left victims of domestic violence facing a 12-month wait for their day in court.
The first commissioned academic study into the impact of the court closures, by the University of Suffolk, found that costs for some defendants, witnesses and advocates to attend magistrates court had doubled. New research by Dr Daniel Newman and Dr Roxanna Dehaghani found that the high cost of transport in Wales can be prohibitive. For those who think that that is far-fetched, here is an example from the Law Society: a young person in the Greater Manchester area would have to spend almost all their universal credit daily allowance of £8.30 on a £7 tram fare from Bury to central Manchester.
While the Government flog off the family silver by selling off our courts, they are also hollowing out the service, with deep cuts to staff since 2013. Thousands more staff are set to be cut from the Courts and Tribunals Service by 2023. The number of magistrates has fallen by a third since 2012, and the number of judges by almost a fifth. At the same time, the overall case load of HMCTS is not down, but up. It is worth highlighting that around two thirds of the savings so far have come from not replacing staff who have left. Who pays the price? Victims, witnesses and innocent defendants all face a much more difficult court experience.
As judges themselves warned, there has been a
“haemorrhaging of experienced staff, a serious decline in staff and judicial morale, delays in all aspects of process and court systems that are even more broken.”
HMCTS’s staff survey found that 81% of staff say that cuts are interfering with their ability to give legal advice and ensure a fair hearing. It is so symbolic of the ideological “cut first, plan later” approach of this Government that their own figures show an increase in reliance on agency staff in our courts. I recently exposed how tens of thousands of years of vital prison officer experience have been lost due to Government cuts, which has contributed to the epidemic of violence in our prisons. I fear that the court staff cuts will be a similar ticking time bomb.
We are now told that every penny is being redirected into courts reforms, but courts were initially closed as part of the Government’s austerity programme. Only the more recent court closures have been justified by investment in the courts reform programme, and most of those cannot be justified even on that basis. Labour’s analysis of the sale of 126 court premises in England and Wales between 2010 and 2018 showed that 80% went for little more than the average UK house price, with some disposed of for as little as £1. Of course, tens of millions of pounds is being given to consultants to carry out the courts reforms. PricewaterhouseCoopers has done especially well, according to the Government’s own figures, having received over £30 million of public money so far. Let us be clear: not every penny is being reinvested in our justice system.
To conclude, in its damning report on the courts reform programme last year, the Public Accounts Committee said:
“Government has cut corners in its rush to push through these reforms. The timetable was unrealistic, consultation has been inadequate and, even now, HMCTS has not clearly explained what the changes will mean in practice.”
I, Labour and so many others share those concerns. Our fear that this is being rushed through regardless of the consequences is a fear shared across the justice sector. It is not a concern with technology; it is a concern that technology is being used as a smokescreen for cuts—an attempt to disguise austerity. It is time for a moratorium on further closures and further cuts until the impact has been properly assessed. Surely, if the Minister is confident about these reforms, he has nothing whatsoever to fear from such scrutiny.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Paul Maynard)
It is a pleasure to take part in this debate, or should I call it a Justice Committee reunion? I feel rather inadequate in never having been part of this fantastic Committee, with such wonderful people. However, this debate also brings together at least three people in the Chamber who have seen their courts close in the last round of cuts: my hon. Friend the Member for Banbury (Victoria Prentis); you, Mr Deputy Speaker, have seen Chorley go; and me. I have seen Fleetwood close, which was just outside my boundary but served many of my constituents, so I have seen this issue from both sides of the fence.
The ability to access justice is a fundamental right in our society. That is why the Government are investing £1 billion in the most ambitious programme of its kind in the world. It will create a system that works better for those who need it. It will be easier to run and it will provide better value for taxpayers. Access to justice matters because everyone should have a stake in our legal system. None of our plans replaces the need for traditional courts or for people to travel to those buildings. It will not exclude people who do not have access to a computer or the internet. However, it will transform the way people use our courts and tribunals, opening up new ways to access justice.
To undertake a radical modernisation of the operation of our courts and tribunals with the same estate that was in place in the era of carbon paper, manual typewriters and fax machines—yes, there are still some fax machines left in our court estate—would be wasteful and dilute the benefits of reform. As we modernise, it would be inappropriate to define access to justice merely in terms of proximity to our nearest court building.
However, no one should deny the challenges we have in our court estate. Many of our buildings have been underused. In the financial year ending in 2017, 41% of courts and tribunals were used for less than half their available time. Keeping these buildings open costs us money that we could spend on making justice more accessible in other ways. As it stands, the court and tribunal estate is a patchwork that has developed over time and a legacy from many predecessor organisations. This has meant a concentration of buildings in some locations. Of the 337 operational court and tribunal buildings, 245 are within five miles of another court or tribunal, so this should be kept under review. We should test whether buildings are really needed or suitable for the uses to which we put them.
The closure of a court is not a decision taken lightly, and we consult widely and think carefully about the responses we receive before making a final decision. We have changed our minds following a consultation, and retained courts because of the responses received—Northallerton magistrates court being one example. Only when convinced that effective access to justice can be maintained has the Lord Chancellor agreed to the closure of a court. In some cases, we have moderated the impact of a closure by continuing to provide local access through a supplementary provision, such as a video link, or by holding hearings in a different public building.
I take great interest in the potential that so-called “supplementary provision” can offer, although I have a certain nervousness about pubs. I know that inquests were once held in pubs, and witnesses gathered in them back in the Victorian era. I am not sure, however, that current concern for the dignity and gravitas of the court can be met by our local Wetherspoons, but I look forward to hearing what my hon. Friend the Member for Banbury proposes for her home town.
I do not accept the characterisation of this programme as being just about cutting costs without any regard for those who use our courts, and neither do I recognise the stories of inconsistency and chaos set out by the hon. Member for Enfield, Southgate (Bambos Charalambous). At the start of last year we engaged widely on our future strategy, and many Members have referred to the document, “Fit for the future: transforming the court and tribunal estate”, which underpins much of our decision making. I urge a further reading of paragraph 2.5, which lists the issues that must be considered. Those include the length of a journey, and the timeframe of between 7.30 am and 7.30 pm,
“the difficulty of the journey, including frequency of public transport and the number of changes required; the cost of potential journeys; the type of cases heard at the court or tribunal; the opening hours of the court or tribunal; the needs of vulnerable users; and whether there are available mitigations to reduce the impact on users with longer journey times, if the numbers of such users are small.”
We also consider supplementary provision where that is appropriate to the nature of the case, the court’s workload, and the agreement of the judiciary. Our assessment therefore goes much deeper than whether to tick off two particular times of the day.
I heard about the study that has taken place in Suffolk, and I look forward to meeting my hon. Friend the Member for Bury St Edmunds (Jo Churchill), who has been particularly affected by that issue. We have set out a clearer definition of what we consider to be a reasonable journey, but in my view the issue has not affected the failure to attend rate. Indeed, since about 2013, studies show the numbers of those affected by this issue to be in the low to mid 90,000s, which has declined since 2010. We wish to take into account a range of factors. Compared with December 2010, the proportion of the population now within the stated distance for reaching a magistrates’ court has declined by just 1.6%, so people are not being affected to the extent that many are concerned about.
I urge anyone with an interest in the future of our courts and tribunals to read our response to the consultation, and our new “Court and Tribunal Design guide”, which I fear has not received the same level of attention, despite being just as interesting. It sets out how we will make our courtrooms more flexible, enhance security standards, and provide for the needs of vulnerable victims and witnesses. Those things are just as important for access to justice as the other issues raised today.
As a former Minister for transport accessibility, who is also sitting next to the current Minister responsible for that, I am all too aware of the importance of inclusive public transport. I tried to introduce the idea of the inclusive court to my Department, and the work done by my hon. Friend and I focuses particularly on the needs of those with hidden disabilities. Accessibility is not just about the wheelchair ramp into court; it is about understanding those who have speech, language and communication difficulties, so that when they are in court they understand what is occurring.
I referred to the “Fit for the Future” document, but there is no Government document that cannot be refreshed when evidence changes. We are working hard to improve the quality of the court and tribunal estate. Her Majesty’s Courts and Tribunals Service was formed from a diverse range of earlier organisations. No one wants to see buckets in the court, or ripped seats, soggy walls, and chipped paintwork. Since 2016 we have invested more than £148 million in capital improvements, including the £15 million from the Treasury that so underwhelmed the hon. Member for Hammersmith (Andy Slaughter) at the start of his speech. I agree that that would not solve every problem in the estate, but I think of it as a down payment in our initial efforts to make a difference. If anyone wishes to visit Blackpool court just outside my constituency boundary they will see another court that is in serious need of investment, although we are hoping to move site very shortly. I am all too familiar with the need to ensure that we have a dignified court network and I recognise the role it plays in maintaining judicial morale.
The hon. Member for Lewisham West and Penge (Ellie Reeves) mentioned digital services. The principal aim is not to close off routes to justice, but to open new ones. We will continue to support paper processes for those who need them. For some, that will still be the best route into our courts and tribunals, but for those who want to use digital services but have trouble doing so, we are providing a range of support to help to ensure the process is accessible to all through telephone support, webchat, or, when required, face-to-face support. We have seen an improvement with online applications for divorce. When it was paper-based, 40% of forms were being returned and that is now down to 2%. That makes life easier for those engaging with the process. Online pleas are possible for traffic offences and a significant number of online civil money claims are now taking place with significant support for those participating in them. However, as she mentioned, evaluation does matter. Merely because we can do something online does not mean that we should do it in each and every case, so it is right to interrogate the overall reform programme.
Court reform is just one way to deliver the inclusive court that I personally want to see. There is no location in the public realm where the vulnerability of the individual can place their liberty at greater risk than in our justice system. If justice is truly to be done, it is vital that all sides, whether as a defendant or as someone bringing a case, understand how justice is being done to them.
Paul Maynard
I will always give way to the Chairman of the Select Committee.
Robert Neill
I am grateful to the Minister and I appreciate what he says. He raises a specific point about the justice system being seen to be available. One concern arising in evidence given to the Justice Committee about the use of online procedure is that we must be careful that it does not develop into a situation where justice is not done in public and is therefore not seen to be done. This is another case where it could be a good idea, but we have to be careful to get the balance right.
Paul Maynard
I have heard many of those concerns, not least from judges themselves, about the role of video hearings. I recognise that there is a particular sensitivity here, which I am exploring carefully.
I was going to mention the Select Committee’s report on magistracy—that is a complicated word for me to get out—which I thought was fantastic and chimed with much I have encountered already in my short time in the role. I met a young magistrate called Luke Rigg a couple of weeks ago. He is a shining example of those we wish to see taking up the role of magistrate. Magistrates are the glue that holds our justice system together and they often go unrecognised. I urge anyone watching this debate to seriously consider becoming a magistrate. It is a fantastic way to get under the skin of a local community and I hope that far more people will do it.
On that note, I thank all Members for their participation. They have given me plenty of food for thought in my early days. I look forward to being grilled more heavily when the Select Committee drags me before it.
Bambos Charalambous
I thank all members of the Justice Committee for their excellent contributions. I also thank the hon. Member for Bath (Wera Hobhouse) for her contribution on legal advice. She is welcome to join the Justice Committee.
I am pleased to hear that the Minister wants inclusive courts, but he needs to take note of the lack of data on the impact of court closures. Any future court closures will have a cumulative effect due to the closures that have already taken place. As my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds East (Richard Burgon) said, we need to consider having a pause before any further court closures take place, because they will have an impact on the disadvantaged.
This has been an excellent debate and some excellent points have been made. I hope the Minister takes them on board and that we see a proper consultation process in the future where a difference is made, voices are heard and justice is the winner at the end of the day.
Question put and agreed to.
Resolved,
That this House has considered court closures and access to justice.
UK Bid to Host UN Climate Conference 2020
Maria Caulfield (Lewes) (Con)
I rise to present a petition from 125 pupils of Western Road School in Lewes, in addition to the 624 signatures presented to this place earlier this week from constituents in Lewes. The petitioners declare that
“climate change is a serious and pressing concern and needs urgent attention from the Governments of the world”,
and further, that the UK has leading role to play in tackling climate change in the future.
Following is the full text of the petition:
[The petition of residents of the constituency of Lewes,
Declares that climate change is a serious and pressing concern and needs urgent attention from the Governments of the world.
The petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons urges the Government to ensure that London hosts the upcoming COP 26 Climate Change Conference in 2020.
And the petitioners remain, etc.]
[P002475]
Port Agents: Medical Duty of Care
(4 years, 10 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mr Deputy Speaker (Sir Lindsay Hoyle)
Before I call Alec Shelbrooke, I just say that we recognise that your family are here today and that this is going to be a difficult time.
Alec Shelbrooke (Elmet and Rothwell) (Con)
Thank you very much, Mr Deputy Speaker. For transparency, I make the House aware that I have declared a relevant interest with the Table Office.
On 13 February this year, Gordon Hoyland Spencer passed away at the Sue Ryder Wheatfields Hospice in Leeds. He was a beloved husband, father, grandfather, and also my much cherished father-in-law. This did not need to happen.
Gordon Spencer was a hard-working entrepreneur who, with his wife Jackie and family, built a large and successful enterprise. Gordon and his wife Jackie started life in the back streets of Leeds, working on the shop floor in the industrial and textile mills. However, both of them had an indomitable entrepreneurial spirit and, coupled with a hard-working ethic, this led to them building two large and successful businesses in facilities management and property. Their facilities management company started out as a window-cleaning round that Gordon bought to earn some extra income in order to buy a carpet for their cottage some 60 years ago. Their son, daughter, daughter-in-law and grandson all work in the business, making the companies a truly family enterprise. Combined, these companies today now employ over 11,000 people in the UK and it is one of the largest privately-owned facilities management companies in the country—a true facilitator of the northern powerhouse.
Gordon was also instrumental, as part of a group of Leeds-based landlords, in contributing to the Housing Act 1988, which brought in protection for both landlords and tenants through the shorthold tenancy agreement. He wanted to ensure not only that landlords would be able to receive the rent that they were owed but that tenants had protection from unscrupulous landlords.
Gordon and Jackie were married for 62 years—something quite unheard of these days. They have three children and two very adored grandchildren. Gordon was very much a family-oriented man and loved nothing more than spending time with his family. He was a devoted dad, husband and grandfather. In their retirement, Gordon and Jackie enjoyed travelling and had undertaken several world cruises, but two destinations had always eluded them: the cherry blossoms in Japan for Jackie and the Taj Mahal in India for Gordon. On 5 January this year, Gordon and Jackie set sail on a four-month world cruise with Cruise & Maritime Voyages that would take them to these last two bucket-list destinations.
Shortly after the cruise started, Gordon became unwell with a chest infection and cough. Jackie took Gordon to see the ship’s doctor, who diagnosed double pneumonia and high blood pressure and started treatment with antibiotics. Through an ECG, it was diagnosed that Gordon had a left bundle branch block, which causes an irregularity in the heartbeat but is not considered pre-emptive to a heart attack. The doctor also performed troponin tests and categorically confirmed that Gordon had not had a heart attack. Troponin is an enzyme that the heart emits. A higher level of troponin is the indication of myocardial infarction, or a heart attack. Despite the high blood pressure and the left bundle branch block, because Gordon’s troponin tests were negative, there was not sufficient evidence to suggest that Gordon had had a heart attack or was at risk of having a heart attack. This is a very significant point, in relation to the actions that happened next when Gordon and Jackie were disembarked in Barbados and where they consequently were sent for medical treatment.
Bridgetown is the capital of Barbados and is home to the Queen Elizabeth Hospital, which is the island’s primary acute medical care facility and provides extensive care in a wide array of medical specialties. A report in 2013 entitled “Caring for Non-residents in Barbados” by the Medical Tourism Research Group outlined the medical arrangements in Barbados. It states:
“Within the Caribbean, Barbados is regarded as a favoured destination for regional patients, particularly for those from smaller islands lacking advanced diagnostic and treatment facilities and the capacity to offer to treat high-risk patients…BFC, the Sparman Clinic, Island Dialysis, and Bayview Hospital all attract private regional patients; however, according to our interviewees, the public Queen Elizabeth Hospital is the primary health care destination for regional patients.
The Queen Elizabeth Hospital serves as the main referral hospital for the entire Eastern Caribbean…Consultants at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital…have the ability to admit private patients such as ill vacationers not covered by the island’s public system”.
On Friday 18 January, with a major hospital available just two miles from the port for an 86-year-old man with double pneumonia—who, according to the ship’s doctor, was improving at the point of medical disembarkation—the port agent in Bridgetown decided to send Gordon to the privately run Sparman clinic, some three miles from the port. The clinic is owned and operated by Dr Alfred Sparman, and is advertised as a heart specialist clinic. The ship’s doctor’s notes and lab results, which clearly stated that Gordon had not had a heart attack, were given to the Sparman clinic on Gordon’s arrival. However, the medical notes made by Dr Sparman afterwards state that Gordon was admitted to the clinic with double pneumonia and having had a heart attack, which was not the case.
On arrival at the clinic, Jackie was asked to pay US$10,000 before the clinic would admit or treat Gordon. Jackie maxed out her credit cards to pay the up-front costs, which left her without funds to find accommodation while in Barbados. On Monday 21 January—I emphasise that I am speaking about this year—Gordon’s children arrived in Barbados to assist their parents. At that point, Gordon was on a nasal cannula and an antibiotic drip, but had received no further treatment during the three days since being admitted to the clinic. He appeared to be weak and short of breath, but was able to sit up in bed, was eating, and was fully coherent.
Jackie had been sleeping on the couch in the observation room, because she did not have the funds to procure other accommodation. The Sparman clinic is actually a doctor’s surgery with a waiting area, one small operating theatre where most cardiovascular surgeries are performed, and an observation room which doubles as a patient bedroom and intensive care unit and contains mostly wooden and soft furniture.
Dr Sparman met the family to discuss Gordon’s prognosis in the clinic’s conference room, which contained a cracked board table held together with gaffer tape and several broken and cracked leather chairs. In addition, client records were strewn across the floor and piled high in boxes. I mention the dilapidated state of the entire clinic because, given that a state-of-the-art hospital was less than half a mile away in Bridgetown, it is difficult to understand how this clinic was deemed appropriate to offer any level of suitable healthcare to a critically ill patient with double pneumonia.
During the meeting, Dr Sparman advised the family that Gordon was very ill and had suffered a heart attack as a result of the strain that the pneumonia had put on his heart. He suspected that Gordon also had a blockage in one of his arteries, and therefore needed an angioplasty and an angiogram. He ended the meeting by stating that once the surgery was completed, Gordon would feel much better—better than he had felt for years —and that the family would be able to fly him home via a commercial airline by the end of the week. However, the medical report received from the clinic after Gordon was released clearly shows that at the time of the meeting with Dr Sparman, Gordon’s troponin levels, while now showing positive for the enzyme, were still well outside the parameters that would indicate that a heart attack had occurred or was likely to occur.
In the days leading up to the operation, Gordon’s condition began to deteriorate. He was in a highly agitated state. He lacked the strength to move his position in the bed, and was offered little assistance from the nurses, which led to great discomfort for him. Moreover, the air conditioning in the observation room, where Gordon was staying, was not working, which resulted in uncomfortable temperatures in a Caribbean hospital—so much so that Gordon had struggled to sleep since his arrival at the clinic, and was now exhausted. Despite several requests from the family for the unit to be mended, the clinic never repaired it. Gordon was clearly weakening. By the day of the operation he had been refusing food for more than 24 hours, had developed spasms that wracked his entire body, and had begun vomiting.
The operation finally took place six days after Gordon had arrived at the clinic. This was a man who had been able to walk, talk and eat just a few days earlier, but who was now visibly declining in front of everyone. This was due to a combination of lack of sleep because of the broken air-conditioning unit, lack of nutrition because Gordon was not placed on a protein drip until several days after he had stopped eating, considerable discomfort from his lack of strength to move position, and no aid offered and an overall general lack of proper nursing care.
Yet there were still more delays, not least when the family were then presented with a bill for $45,000 and advised that Dr Sparman would not perform the surgery without the money first. The family came up with the money and, despite Gordon’s severely weakened state, Dr Sparman proceeded with the surgery.
If Gordon had been admitted to the general hospital in the first place it is highly likely that he would have received pre-emptive treatment much earlier and would not have had to wait six days for a corrective procedure had he needed it. He most likely would have been making a full recovery, but at the Sparman Clinic there were continuous delays and a general lack of care.
According to the lab results, half an hour before the operation a troponin test was conducted. At this point, Gordon’s troponin levels had elevated to a point that showed that a heart attack was imminent. The family was not aware of this, but Dr Sparman would have been. Within half an hour of the operation commencing Dr Sparman returned to the family and said he had been unable to perform the procedure as Gordon had started going into cardiac arrest, so the operation was aborted.
After the operation Gordon began to deteriorate rapidly and within 24 hours he was under sedation and had been placed on tracheal intubation. A ventilator did the breathing for him, which was strapped to Gordon’s face using string. His blood pressure was now dangerously low, his body was still racked with spasms and he now also had kidney failure.
Gordon was initially sedated using Valium, but after he came round twice and tried to pull the tube from his mouth Dr Sparman changed the sedation to diazepam and tied Gordon’s hands to the bedframe. The diazepam worked in terms of ensuring that Gordon did not come round again and it also stopped the spasms; however, Gordon never fully regained consciousness after the drug was administered. For the remaining three days that Gordon spent at the clinic under sedation and intubated his body position was never moved once by the nursing staff and his family were not permitted to move him.
At this point, a member of staff at the clinic—who would prefer to remain anonymous—advised that Gordon should be airlifted out of the clinic as soon as possible. It was implied that he was not going to get better at the Sparman Clinic. The family immediately started to arrange a medical airlift back to the UK. At this very stressful time, the family were presented with another bill, for $11,000.
I hope I have managed to describe to the House the utter lack of care that Gordon received, and that the primary motivation appeared to be to delay the correct and proper treatment that Gordon needed in order to extract more money from the family.
The family were now working fastidiously with a medical flight team to repatriate Gordon to the UK. However, after speaking with consultants in the UK it was deemed that Gordon was too ill to endure the flight and needed to have an angioplasty and angiogram prior to repatriation, but it was also advised that in Gordon’s present condition this operation was high risk. Gordon was critically ill, and the risk factors associated with either the operation or the flight carried great life-threatening consequences.
Dr Sparman made it clear that the decision to have the surgery was entirely up to the family. I must reiterate this point: Dr Sparman placed life-threatening medical decisions in the hands of Gordon’s family, who had no medical training whatever. At a loss to know what choice to make, the family consulted the head cardiologist at the Queen Elizabeth hospital, who advised them to remove Gordon from the Sparman Clinic immediately and bring him to the hospital as soon as possible, and not to go ahead with the surgery. The family began making plans to move Gordon, but Dr Sparman advised them that he was too ill and would not make the journey and now began pressuring them to go ahead with the surgery.
In desperation, the family sought further advice from a relative in England who is a doctor. Based on the information that Sparman provided to the relative, it was advised that the surgery should go ahead. So the family had no choice but to put their faith in Dr Sparman.
At this point, the family were presented with another bill, for a total of $70,000, of which the family had already paid $56,000. The family were advised that the surgery would not go ahead without the balance being paid, so they had no choice but to once again come up with the money. It would appear that, in response to the threat to move Gordon out of the clinic, Dr Sparman was determined to now go ahead with the surgery, putting immense emotional pressure on my family and presenting more bills, in case he lost “the business.”
Gordon came out of surgery with only a 10% chance of survival according to Dr Sparman and two days later he was deemed stable enough for the medical evacuation. Dr Sparman arranged the medication to be administered during the medical flight, and this was given to the flight team—in a fast food bag. The sedative he provided for Gordon for the flight was once again diazepam. The air medical team queried the use of the drug as a sedative, saying that such a high quantity as had been prescribed to Gordon was not administered in the USA because it took far too long to disperse through the system in patients with that level of critical illness and especially patients with kidney failure. The absolute failure to care for Gordon’s wellbeing, coupled with a wholly inappropriate drug for his age and state of illness and in a quantity that was beyond irresponsible, placed a constant strain on his heart.
I must emphasise that we would never have been in this position had Gordon been sent to the main hospital and properly treated for the pneumonia the moment he arrived.
Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)
I interrupt my good friend to ask something I have been waiting to hear. Who made the decision to send Gordon to Sparman rather than the hospital? Was the decision taken on board the ship? Was there some kind of cosy arrangement or deal? Does he know?
Alec Shelbrooke
I am most grateful to my hon. and gallant Friend. I will come to that in my speech, but it was not the decision of the cruise liner; it was the decision of the port agent.
In the 11 days Gordon spent at the Sparman clinic, he received limited nutritional care and substandard nursing that gave rise to horrific first-degree bed sores that visibly shocked the medical staff at the Leeds General Infirmary and was placed in a poorly air-conditioned room, which led to his exhaustion. This all led Gordon to have much higher levels of anxiety, fear, pain and rapid health deterioration, which put increased pressure on his heart, at a time when he should have been able to rest, be properly hydrated and nutritiously fed, and so continue the recovery from his pneumonia that the ship’s doctor said he was comfortably making without any heart issues at that time.
Gordon was repatriated to the UK and admitted to the Leeds General Infirmary early on Tuesday 28 January. On inspecting the report from Dr Sparman, the consultants could not understand why Gordon was still so critically ill. The medical reports implied that he was and should be in recovery. They were also very concerned at the gravity of Gordon’s bed sores, which were first degree and had resulted from his position not being changed whilst he was in the Sparman clinic. I re-emphasise that not only did the nursing staff refuse to move Gordon, but Dr Sparman had tied his hands to the bed and prevented the family from moving him. These are basic nursing practices. Anybody in the medical profession knows that patients left in the same position will develop bed sores. I emphasise again that the staff at the Leeds General Infirmary audibly gasped when they saw the state of my father-in-law. They also questioned the prolonged use and high dosage of the drug diazepam that was administered.
Sadly, after the consultants at the LGI had performed their tests on Gordon, it was determined that his heart had greatly deteriorated and was in a much worse condition than had been reflected in Dr Sparman’s notes. In fact, the prognosis was not good. In addition to chronic heart failure, Gordon had kidney failure and brain damage from lack of oxygen. Despite his being taken off the diazepam sedation on arrival at the LGI, Gordon’s kidneys were not able to dispel the drug, and that, coupled with his now having multiple organ failure and brain damage, meant that Gordon never properly regained consciousness. Thirteen days after being admitted to the LGI, the family, with very heavy hearts, had to admit defeat and Gordon’s life support was stopped. He died on 13 February, leaving behind a devastated and traumatised family.
Owing to the circumstances around Gordon’s death the post mortem is still ongoing as the Coroner’s Office considers it to be a very complex case, which means we have been unable to get the final pathology report and still await his final death certificate.
My family paid approximately $200,000 in total for the barbaric treatment my father-in-law received in Barbados and the subsequent medical repatriation to the UK, and they have nothing to show for that money other than traumatic memories of the tragic and painful death of Gordon. After the horrific treatment and trauma my father-in-law had been through, we did not think we could be hit with anything else, but we were. It was only after returning to the UK that the family started doing simple Google searches on Dr Alfred Sparman, and they highlighted a horrifying picture.
In 1986, Sparman was convicted of the offence of disorderly conduct, to which he pleaded guilty. In 1991, he was convicted of the crimes of sexual abuse in the first degree and unlawful imprisonment in New York and sentenced to five years’ probation. In January 1996, Sparman was registered as a sex offender in Florida, but in June he applied for licensure to practise medicine in Florida. The state of Florida revoked his medical licence in 1997. In 1999, Sparman received a licence to practise medicine in Tennessee, but this was revoked in February 2001 owing to
“unprofessional conduct; a previous felony conviction for sexual abuse in New York, and false statement on medical application.”
In June 2001, he was again registered as a sex offender in the state of Florida.
It was in 2001 that Sparman went to Barbados and opened his clinic. In 2004, he had his board certification in internal medicine suspended by the American Board of Internal Medicine, but he continues to this day to advertise himself as an “American Board-Certified Physician”. In 2005, he was reregistered as a sexual predator and offender in the state of Florida. In 2010, he was reregistered as a sex offender in the state of Tennessee, and the register also contains a list of Sparman’s aliases: John W. Freeman and Alfred W. Eversley.
On top of the crimes for which he has been convicted, Sparman has advertised himself as a “Board-Certified Cardiologist” but never passed the board certification cardiology exams in the USA. He has also advertised himself as a Fellow of the American College of Cardiology but the FACC has no record of his being a fellow. He was reprimanded by the Medical Council of Barbados and asked to remove “FACC” from his letterhead. He advertises himself as an interventional cardiologist but has no specialist training in interventional cardiology. He has had a number of complaints made against him to the Medical Council of Barbados. He has also tried to poach paying cardiology patients—that is, tourists—from the Queen Elizabeth Hospital. All this information can be found in a simple online due diligence check. In addition, there are countless stories online of other people who have suffered at the hands of Dr Sparman.
So why was Gordon sent to the clinic of a supposed doctor who was stripped of his licence to practise medicine in the US, who is a registered sex offender, who has numerous speculations surrounding him regarding his conduct and who has blatantly lied about his accreditations? Why was Gordon sent to a heart clinic in the first place when he was diagnosed with double pneumonia, rather than being sent to the Queen Elizabeth Hospital? We will never know the answers to those questions.
A representative of Cruise & Maritime Voyages has confirmed that it was the port agent who determined where my father-in-law was taken for his medical care once he was disembarked. The port agent is governed by maritime law. A port agent is the designated person or agency held responsible for handling shipments and cargo and the general interest of its customers at ports and harbours worldwide, on behalf of ship owners, managers and charterers. Quite frankly, the decision that the port agent made to send Gordon to the Sparman clinic, instead of to the main hospital, killed him. And to add a final insult to all the injury, instead of Gordon visiting his “bucket list” destination, the Taj Mahal, with his beloved wife, Jackie instead laid his ashes there.
I ask the Minister and her Department today to seek a change to international maritime law, by lobbying the International Maritime Organisation, regarding the duty of care and due diligence, through a fit and proper persons test, that a port agent must carry out when identifying and commissioning onshore medical facilities and practitioners for those who are disembarked for medical emergencies. The international conventions for the safety of life at sea of 1974 and 1988 have been used to bring in the highest standards of health and safety for those at sea, whether they be crew or passengers. These provisions were amended in 2004 through the international ship and port facility security code after the security concerns raised after 9/11, and I would argue that this shows that the wellbeing of seafarers carries on within the port, not just on the vessel.
Gordon was always proud of the work he did in bringing about changes to landlord law to achieve the protection and standards required, especially for tenants, and although this will never bring him back, it would be a final fitting tribute to his life to know that, even in death, he was able to try to make the world a better place, to ensure that this never happens to anybody else.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Ms Nusrat Ghani)
I must start by passing on my deepest condolences to my hon. Friend the Member for Elmet and Rothwell (Alec Shelbrooke) and his family on the tragic death of Gordon Hoyland Spencer. I had the privilege of meeting Mr Spencer’s family earlier today and saw their grief and despair. My hon. Friend gave a powerful, brave, emotional speech, and it was incredibly difficult to digest such a long list of tragic incidents that should just not have happened. What makes Mr Spencer’s death all the more heartbreaking is that it could so easily have been prevented by prompt and correct treatment and good quality care. Quite understandably, my hon. Friend wants action to prevent any other families going through a similar agony.
Under the International Labour Organisation’s maritime labour convention, ships carrying 100 or more persons and ordinarily engaged on international voyages of more than three days’ duration shall carry a qualified medical doctor who is responsible for providing medical care. Ships’ doctors, like any other doctor, have a duty of care to their patients governed by ethical responsibilities. That would usually include discharging sick patients into what they consider appropriate medical care facilities ashore, in compliance with the code of medical ethics in their country of registration or licence. In doing so, a ship’s doctor may liaise with an assistance company appointed by the passenger’s insurer, which should be able to advise on appropriate care providers ashore.
According to my hon. Friend’s account, it would appear that Mr Spencer received appropriate care and treatment while on board the vessel and was recovering—we must note that. However, the facilities available on board were not sufficient to further Mr Spencer’s recovery and a decision was made that he should be medically discharged in Barbados. I understand that the port agent facilitated the transfer of Mr Spencer to a cardiology clinic rather than to the general hospital.
The port agent’s role is primarily to help facilitate the ship’s transit through the port, and the engagement and choice of an agent is at the shipping company’s discretion. A ship’s agent may, if asked, provide the details of local medical facilities, but the responsibility remains with the ship’s doctor to discharge sick passengers into what they consider to be an appropriate medical facility ashore. My hon. Friend has requested that international maritime law should be amended to place a duty of care and due diligence on a port agent, through a fit and proper person test, when they are identifying and commissioning onshore medical facilities for those who are disembarked for medical emergencies.
Port agents are required to comply with relevant domestic law and the port statute, but they are not regulated by international maritime law. However, considering the case that my hon. Friend has presented today, I will ask the officials at the Department for Transport and the Maritime and Coastguard Agency to consider whether such regulation would fall within the remit of the International Maritime Organisation or whether it would be appropriate for another international body. I will also write to the Cruise Lines International Association, the international trade association for the industry, to highlight the issues that this incident has raised in order to highlight its duty of care and responsibilities with regard to port agents.
Furthermore, I will raise the case directly with the IMO, and, considering how personal the case is for my hon. Friend, I wonder whether he could bear to share his experiences again. I know that this will be emotional and difficult for him, but I respectfully ask him to join me for a meeting that I will convene directly with the IMO’s secretary-general so that my hon. Friend can share his experiences and make representations to see whether we can lobby and obtain a change in the law.
Alec Shelbrooke
I am most grateful to my hon. Friend for that offer. I wonder whether the invitation could be extended to my family, who were in Barbados at the time and experienced what happened at first hand.
Ms Ghani
That would be absolutely fit and proper. I accept it, and we will do what we can as soon as we can.
We have heard this afternoon of the tragic and preventable death of Gordon Hoyland Spencer. I share my hon. Friend’s commitment that, although nothing can be done to reverse what happened, Gordon’s death should act as a call for action to the maritime industry. Passengers should be cared for to the highest possible standard, particularly when they are most in need, and the Government will play their part in helping to ensure that no one has to repeat the painful experiences of Gordon and his family.
Bob Stewart
I believe the Minister is shortly to finish, but I wonder what the heck is going to happen to this so-called Dr Sparman. How can we allow this man to continue his work in Barbados? What can the British Government do to stop it? Are we going to report the man to the Barbadian Government? And are we going to complain about how the port agent dealt with this case? I believe that practical step might prevent another family from going through the hell that the Shelbrooke family have been through.
Ms Ghani
Absolutely. The fact this has been raised on the Floor of the House will be reflected by all Government agencies, and I do not doubt for a moment that this message will reach Barbados, especially once the meeting takes place with the IMO.
I commend my hon. Friend the Member for Elmet and Rothwell for bringing this debate to the House, Once again, I express my profound sympathies to him, to Gordon’s widow Jackie and to the entire family. I look forward, if I can use that word, to working with my hon. Friend to campaign on this incredibly important issue and to ensuring that we do all we can to prevent another incident like this one.
Question put and agreed to.
Westminster Hall
(4 years, 10 months ago)
Westminster HallRead Full debate Read Hansard Text
Westminster Hall is an alternative Chamber for MPs to hold debates, named after the adjoining Westminster Hall.
Each debate is chaired by an MP from the Panel of Chairs, rather than the Speaker or Deputy Speaker. A Government Minister will give the final speech, and no votes may be called on the debate topic.
This information is provided by Parallel Parliament and does not comprise part of the offical record
Sudan
(4 years, 10 months ago)
Westminster HallRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Westminster Hall is an alternative Chamber for MPs to hold debates, named after the adjoining Westminster Hall.
Each debate is chaired by an MP from the Panel of Chairs, rather than the Speaker or Deputy Speaker. A Government Minister will give the final speech, and no votes may be called on the debate topic.
This information is provided by Parallel Parliament and does not comprise part of the offical record
Dr David Drew (Stroud) (Lab/Co-op)
I beg to move,
That this House has considered the political situation in Sudan.
It is a delight to serve under your chairmanship, Dame Cheryl. I have put in for a debate on this subject on a number of occasions. I was getting a bit despondent that I had not secured one, given the depth of the crisis in Sudan, so I was pleased that the unusual channels managed to find space for one. I hope everyone present contributes. I do not intend to say much; rather, I intend to ask a series of questions of the Government, and I hope we can move forward on what we should be doing.
I went to Sudan in September with the shadow Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Heywood and Middleton (Liz McInnes). We had some inkling that problems may be afoot, but I do not think any of us anticipated how bad things would become. That is why I am pleased that we can at the very least debate the issue today. It is such a tragic situation.
My interest in Sudan goes back a long time. I have visited the country four times. I was always interested in the religious aspect of the conflict before the country split. We now have two elements to Sudan: the situation in South Sudan does not quite mirror what has happened in the north, but that country has its own problems. Perhaps we will discuss them on another occasion.
The Library produced an excellent briefing for the debate, for hon. Members who do not know, those briefings are always published online, that gives as good a summary of the background as is possible in three pages. I will not go through it, except to say that when Bashir was removed in April, some of us feared that there would at the very least be a vacuum, which would be filled by someone else, who would not necessarily be any better.
I welcome the Minister, and I look forward to hearing what she has to say. I also welcome the hon. Member for North West Norfolk (Sir Henry Bellingham), who chairs the all-party parliamentary group on Sudan and South Sudan with great alacrity. We are here to ensure that we do what I have always pledged to do when I have met the Sudanese: not to forget the situation in Sudan. They often feel that their crises, while not belittled, are given a secondary level of interest because of all the other things going on in our world.
Sadly, following the removal of Bashir, violence broke out on the streets of Khartoum at the start of June, and what is happening in other parts of the country will be as bad as, if not worse than, whatever is going on in Khartoum. I will mention later what my hon. Friend the Member for Heywood and Middleton and I found on our visit to Darfur.
We will keep our eyes very much on what is happening. We will not let the atrocities escape our notice. I hope that, in due course, we will have got a bit more stability into the country and that the Government will take appropriate action with international colleagues to deal with those responsible for the worst aspects of those atrocities. I will talk later about my discussions with the diaspora. I hope the Minister is able to respond to the things they have to say—I am only their mouthpiece—and to the things I ask of the Government.
The EU has taken a strong stance on what has been happening in Sudan, but we must understand that the situation will not be sorted out quickly. The African Union has made its own representations to try to bring about peace. Egypt, because of its relationship with Sudan, has expressed concern, and it was good that the Ethiopian Prime Minister, Abiy Ahmed, visited in an attempt to mediate between the Transitional Military Council and the Forces of Freedom and Change, which seem to be the two sides most engaged in what is going on. Sadly, as a result of that, some FFC people were arrested, and at least one has been thrown out of the country. That is not exactly helping the dialogue.
I am concerned about the relationship between Sudan and the United Arab Emirates and particularly Saudi Arabia. For those who do not know, most of the fighting in Yemen is being done by Sudanese Rapid Support Forces, which we would call Janjaweed. That has added to the escalation of the troubles on the streets of Khartoum. At a time when the UK Government are being called to account for their own arms shipment arrangements with the Saudis, it is apposite that we recognise that we must put pressure on the Saudis, who hold the ring with respect to the arrangements by which the Transitional Military Council—the Government, if we can call it a Government—currently holds power. I hope the Minister says a little about that.
I will ask a series of questions of the Minister and then finish with what the diaspora have to say, which is very important. We have many thousands of Sudanese in this country, who are at the very least intensely worried about what is happening to their families and friends and who want, for reasons we know, a new Sudan to come out of the current situation.
The UK Government have made clear public statements condemning the way events have evolved. Our brave ambassador has been called in at least once to be dressed down by the Sudanese regime. Having known that regime for many years, I know that is not a good experience, so I pass on my thanks to him. It is important that we put it on the record that the Government believe the Transitional Military Council, and in particular Hemeti, who seems to have taken control, is responsible for what is happening and will pay the price. We should use all diplomatic means to ensure that, in due course, there is a proper transfer of power from the Transitional Military Council.
I take the word “transitional” to mean that this is not another Bashir regime in the making, but something that will genuinely begin to govern Sudan in the way it should be governed. The new Government have to recognise the diversity of the people of Sudan, including women and younger people. I have hope for Sudan because I know from talking to younger people that they believe there is a different world out there. They believe something could be done to bring the country forward into the 21st century. Sadly, too often, they are disappointed.
We should lead efforts at the United Nations Human Rights Council, and we must ensure, as a member of the Security Council, that Sudan is properly held to account through international mechanisms. I would say that even if it were not for the current difficulties in Sudan. I have said before to the Minister—she will not be surprised to hear this—that I hope she talks to the Home Office to ensure there are no deportations to anywhere in Sudan. There should have been no deportations anyway to Darfur, because of the ongoing problems there. It is important that people here and people there know that we recognise that the situation is so dire that we cannot send anyone back to that bedevilled country at the moment.
Because of the UK’s relationship with the other members of the troika—the US and Norway—it has a key role to play in making sure that the diplomatic effort is stepped up and that we bring the different parties together, which must include a real effort to de-escalate what is happening on the streets. We must condemn all state and pseudo-state armed actors, particularly the paramilitary groups—whether we call them Janjaweed or RSF—and individual militias, which have sadly always played a part in Sudan.
The eyes of the world are on Khartoum, but I fear that problems may break out again in Darfur. The Minister kindly said that the British Government are against any further draw down in the numbers of military and police there, but we must keep our eyes on the situation, because if it explodes again, that would be catastrophic. I would be grateful if the Minister said that we were categorically committed to that, and that we welcomed the others that provide the numbers—mainly African Union players now—keeping to their side of the bargain to make sure we do not reduce the numbers anymore.
We must also make sure that no one can escape here. One aspect of trying to control how certain people have behaved and of holding them to account is freezing their assets and dealing with them through unexplained wealth orders and repatriation. We have a history of certain people visiting for health treatment, which does not go down well with people who know enough about what they have done in the past. That takes me to the International Criminal Court. Bashir is cited, but it is no good just citing these people; we have to follow that with action, which must include other people who have perpetrated violence in Sudan.
The British Government have to explain to the Government of Sudan, as far as they exist, that they have to keep their obligations under international law and that any transgression will be punished. I am not in favour of disengagement—it is important that we keep our ambassador there—but they have to understand that they are accountable for what they have done, including the way they are imprisoning people, the aspects of completely out-of-control behaviour by some militias on the streets, and the torture. Sudan is notorious for ghost houses. We need to know that people are not being tortured as a matter of course. I hope that we will follow that up and deal with it subsequently.
We must uphold international law on all the conventions on torture and any other inhuman or degrading treatment. That dovetails with the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights, which should hold a rule 112 hearing on the implementation of cases that have been brought to light at the 65th ordinary session in Banjul, Gambia.
I will finish with a few comments from the diaspora, who are clearly desperately worried. There are thousands of Sudanese people in this country. We have to remember that, at one time, one in five refugees was Sudanese—that is what comes from 50 years of civil war. Clearly, refugee numbers from other parts of the world have grown, but there are still an awful lot of Sudanese people trying to get out of that country or already here.
The diaspora are adamant that they want a full international investigation into what happened on 3 June and subsequently. They want to make sure that the Government are not in any way fuelling the problem by finding ways to get money through to the regime. I made a Channel 4 programme—it has not yet been broadcast, so I do not want to spike its news—that discovered that the EU moneys that have been going into force protection and border controls have found their way to Janjaweed, because it has been doing some of that work. We need an investigation to make sure that those moneys have stopped.
Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)
I have an interest in Sudan, in so far as when I was a young boy living in Aden, my nurse came from there, and I have a great deal of affection for her still. In my experience, the problem with aid is that it needs to be supervised all the way down. When we give money or goods to somewhere such as Sudan, the only way to guarantee its effectiveness is to have someone on the ground watching it being distributed at the point of delivery. Does the hon. Gentleman agree?
Dr Drew
I do, and that is the allegation about some of the EU money. We wanted to stop the flow of migration, but this is a case of out of sight, out of mind, so we have not taken much notice of how these things have been done. If that money has found its way to the RSF, we should do something about that immediately. It is shameful, because that is not what the money was for.
The diaspora have also made it clear that they do not want any further cuts to the money going to UNAMID—the United Nations-African Union hybrid operation in Darfur. They would like access to the potential international mediation talks on 25 June in Berlin for the Sudanese Professionals Association, which has been a leading body in the Forces of Freedom and Change and has been instrumental in holding the Government to account. They also think it is important not to cut diplomatic ties, but they want to make it clear through our condemnations that people who have perpetrated the violence, and worse, will be held to account. That means that the RSF should be disarmed and removed from the streets of Sudan immediately.
It is important that we play our part. Britain is a key player in Sudan. We cannot ignore our past—it was a British colony. More than anything, however, because of our relationship with the troika—with the Americans and the Norwegians—the Sudanese people look to us to provide leadership to make sure that what is happening is not ignored and is given the correct priority, and that peace is brought to that bedevilled country. That will not be done easily—we have taken 50 years so far, unsuccessfully—but there is hope. We have to make sure that we put pressure on the transgressors and that we follow it through. We have done that in the past, but we must be even keener now to ensure that our obligations are fulfilled.
Sir Henry Bellingham (North West Norfolk) (Con)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Dame Cheryl. It is also a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Stroud (Dr Drew), who, as the vice-chairman of the all-party parliamentary group, has been indefatigable in his support of Sudan and South Sudan. I declare my interests, particularly as the chair of the APPG.
I agree with much of what the hon. Gentleman has said, because when General Omar al-Bashir finally departed on 11 April, there was a great deal of hope and rejoicing. That was a remarkable event, because it marked the end of 30 years of brutal dictatorship. During that time, huge misery was heaped on Sudan; appalling crimes against humanity were committed in Darfur, South Kordofan and Blue Nile; and there was the secession of South Sudan.
Incidentally, we should not forget the plight of South Sudan, where little progress has been made on the peace process. Some 60% of the population does not have food security. Of a population of 12 million, 2.2 million are refugees and 1.9 million are internally displaced people. Since 2013, 100 humanitarian aid workers have been killed there.
The removal of President General Omar al-Bashir was an extraordinary event. As the hon. Member for Stroud said, there were high hopes for the future at the time, and there have been a number of positive developments and trends. In some ways, the uprising was one of the most progressive in the region. The Forces of Freedom and Change, which some people call the alliance, and the Sudanese Professionals Association combined management organisations, workers’ organisations and trade unions—not that there are trade unions in that country as we know them here—and also managed to bring in a number of the more liberal Muslim groups. Crucially, unlike in Syria, Libya and Yemen, Sudan’s Islamic fundamentalists were kept out of it.
One of the key characteristics of the demonstration was that the demonstrators were determined to keep them as peaceful as possible at all times. After seeing the General deposed, they rightly did not want to leave the squares and areas around public buildings empty; they wanted to continue occupying them. That appeared to be working, and there was ongoing dialogue with the Transitional Military Council under Abdel Fattah al-Burhan. A lot of us at the time were quietly optimistic that progress would be made, but then the appalling events of 3 June happened, when the Transitional Military Council used total brutality and force on unarmed, innocent protesters who were sitting in and doing nothing but peacefully protesting for the future. Well over 100 were killed, and a number of key people were arrested, including SPLM-N leaders Ismail Jalab, Yasir Arman and Mubarak Ardol.
I share the concern of the hon. Member for Stroud about the role of the Rapid Support Forces. The former Janjaweed militia, under Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, who is now the deputy head of the Transitional Military Council, has brutalised people on the streets, and we understand that it has used rape as a method of putting down demonstrations. Reprehensibly, some soldiers are preventing medical staff from going into hospitals.
All that is very depressing and, in some ways, unexpected. We must look at the international response, as the hon. Member for Stroud has done. I agree that the EU has been very strong and powerful in its condemnation. I would like to see more coming out of the UN. One of the problems is that if a more robust and direct resolution is drafted, the danger is that it will be vetoed by either China or Russia. I ask the Minister to tell us what more can be done within the UN. One of the strongest messages that the UK can send is that there can be absolutely no impunity or any form of amnesty for the people in the Transitional Military Council who have committed crimes against humanity and crimes against innocent people. Any indication that those wretched crimes will be swept under the carpet will only encourage the TMC to carry on with its current attitude, which is improving somewhat but there is still a long way to go.
Bob Stewart
I thank my hon. Friend for letting me intervene. It is crucial that the International Criminal Court now takes more of an interest in what is happening in Sudan and South Sudan. It has the capability to investigate, and we should put the Government of Sudan on notice that if they do not take action, which is their first duty when war crimes have been committed, the International Criminal Court will come knocking at some stage—albeit in 10 or 20 years’ time.
Sir Henry Bellingham
I certainly agree. There can be no question of General Omar al-Bashir escaping those charges in the ICC. There needs to be an ICC investigation into the crimes that took place in early June. It is absolutely essential that that happens.
Sir Henry Bellingham
Exactly. Of course, General Omar al-Bashir has committed crimes in the past in Darfur and elsewhere. The crimes committed by the Rapid Support Forces and the TMC very recently must be fully investigated. I would be grateful if the Minister commented on that point, but it seems that UK has significant influence over it, particularly through our position in the UN.
As far as the regional players are concerned, I was—like the hon. Member for Stroud—encouraged that the Ethiopian Prime Minister, Abiy Ahmed, recently visited Khartoum and had discussions with the TMC. There is quite a lot of evidence that the pressure from the international community is changing the attitude of the Gulf states that were fairly equivocal towards Sudan. The latest news is actually fairly encouraging. The protesters have agreed to end their campaign of civil disobedience and resume talks, so we are at a pivotal point. That is why it is absolutely essential that the troika put maximum pressure on the TMC and use the threats that my hon. Friend the Member for Beckenham (Bob Stewart) referred to. This is an absolutely vital moment for states in the region, including Egypt, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, to put pressure on the Transitional Military Council to ensure that if the protesters end their campaign of civil disobedience, as appears to be happening, talks take place immediately. The protesters should end the campaign only if the TMC acts in good faith and enters into dialogue.
There is a great deal at stake for the people of Sudan, who have suffered so much for so long, for the region, given the strategic importance of Sudan in the horn of Africa: and for the UK. We have a historical duty to Sudan, and we must ensure that, if the country can move forward in a democratic direction, its huge potential is exploited and made the most of. The prospects for enhanced trade and building ever greater links between the UK, the diaspora here and Sudan, are limitless. Furthermore, we are obviously very involved in the Khartoum process, which is looking at the refugee crisis in the Sahel and the Maghreb. If this tragedy and disaster is not solved quickly, the refugee crisis will get worse.
Given the country’s tumultuous history and the tragedy since independence from Anglo-Egyptian rule 60 years ago, it is easy to be cautious and pessimistic, but I have always been a glass-half-full person. In my visits to Sudan, I have always been impressed by the optimism and the sense of aspiration among the Sudanese people. That has always struck me as being one of the great features of that country. As we waited patiently for the dictatorial rule of General Bashir to come to an end, that optimism increased.
I will end with a quote from someone many of us know quite well—Alex de Waal, who is a long-time Africa expert. He said that Sudan
“is poised between an inspirational transformation and dangerous disorder.”
Let us hope that, with the Minister’s help and the help of all the other agencies and organisations involved, it will indeed be the former—above all, for the sake of the Sudanese people.
Nic Dakin (Scunthorpe) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Dame Cheryl, and to follow the hon. Member for North West Norfolk (Sir Henry Bellingham), who chairs the all-party group for Sudan and South Sudan so well. He has demonstrated his great knowledge of that part of the world and his staunch commitment to continuing to shine a light on what is going on in Sudan. We must make it clear, through our voice in this place, that we support the Minister and the shadow Minister in their work to bring about improvements through the leadership that the United Kingdom has always been able to provide in the world. Sudan needs the United Kingdom’s leadership at this time, in this matter.
I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud (Dr Drew); his great knowledge of that part of the world shone through his remarks. He cares deeply, and his concerns about what is happening in Sudan, how the situation affects the diaspora living here, and the threats it is creating for neighbouring countries, are important.
I am afraid I do not have the knowledge or expertise of the hon. Members who have already spoken and said so much. The hon. Member for North West Norfolk was right when he said that when these disturbances began in December, around bread and grain shortages, and gathered pace to become a more general expression of dissatisfaction as to the need for this regime to come to an end and to move on to a new chapter, there was a sense of optimism in the world, and among friends of Sudan who saw what was going on. Sadly, on 3 June, when peaceful protesters were killed in Khartoum and the images broadcast across the world, that initial hope was dashed.
We have continued to receive reports of the military killing unarmed people in hospitals and elsewhere, and shocking reports of other dreadful things taking place. It was right for the African Union to cut off all activities with Sudan following the extreme bloodshed, demonstrating its clear position. It is good that the pressure from the United Kingdom, the United States and others, and the clear voice of the EU have led some Gulf states to soften their behaviours since their initial reaction.
It is a very difficult situation at the moment. As both my colleagues have said, everyone who knows Sudan well remains hopeful about what is going on with civic society, and about what is going on with younger people, but there is a need to provide the opportunity for that hope to thrive. As has been said, it is important that it is made very clear that the people responsible for what is happening at the moment will be held to account by the international community, and that the temporary Transitional Military Council should be exactly that—transitional—as my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud said. There should be a clear path to proper democracy and order in government, in which the people of Sudan can have confidence.
It is a troubled region. Darfur is synonymous with awful historical events and we do not want that awfulness to return. Leadership from all of us, working together, is needed to support the UK Government to provide leadership through the troika, the United Nations and the EU. The United Kingdom has a pivotal position. I look forward to what the Minister and the shadow Minister have to say about how we move forward, building on the strong, unified messages that have already been coming across the political landscape in the UK. I hope those messages are being well heard in Sudan, and that we can take the necessary steps forward to help that troubled country to a better future—the future it deserves.
Stephen Gethins (North East Fife) (SNP)
I am grateful to the hon. Member for Stroud (Dr Drew) for securing this important debate.
The SNP would like to see a multilateral approach to this issue, where we can work with colleagues in the European Union and the African Union. This is an exceptionally distressing conflict situation, as other Members have rightly highlighted. There are incredibly worrying reports of civilians being killed, and, as the chair of the APPG, the hon. Member for North West Norfolk (Sir Henry Bellingham), highlighted, there are also reports of sexual violence being used as a tool of war.
Those responsible must be held to account; that includes the militias. As the hon. Member for Beckenham (Bob Stewart) pointed out, even if they are not held accountable tomorrow, the day after or even the month after, they need to know that they will be held accountable. He was right to say that; I recognise the work that he has done and his track record in helping to ensure that people are brought to justice for heinous crimes, even years afterwards. The international community does not, and should not, go away just because these things have disappeared from the front pages of the newspapers or are no longer being debated in Parliament.
Bob Stewart
I intervene on my friend because if 100 civilians had been killed in a European country there would be one hell of a row about it. Although people here, such as my good friend, my hon. Friend the Member for North West Norfolk (Sir Henry Bellingham), and the Opposition speakers are raising this issue, there are not many people here today. That is sad, because what has happened is something approaching genocide. We have not even touched on some of the other issues, such as the persecution of Christians.
Stephen Gethins
I thank the hon. Gentleman; as usual he raises an incredibly important point that, given his experiences and his track record, has particular resonance. I pay credit to him. As I have said to him, I was a great admirer of his before I came to Parliament because of his work on this. I acknowledge that we may disagree on an issue or two, but I pay credit to the work he has done, and continues to do, in pursuing these issues.
Years from now, we will continue that work and accountability will be key. I know that the Minister will reaffirm our utter steadfastness in defending human rights, along with our partners in the African Union and the European Union. I add my words to those expressing thanks to the UK ambassador to Sudan and members of staff in the embassy in Khartoum, who have an extraordinarily difficult job and who are carrying out their duties in a brave and dignified fashion. I hope the Minister will pass on that message from me and other Members.
On the UK Government’s own powers, I hope the Minister will continue to make clear statements of condemnation about militias like the Janjaweed and make it clear that although militias appear to be involved in the Transitional Military Council, the council will bear full responsibility for the actions of the militias, as well as their own army. That is a lesson taken from other conflict situations.
I am not sure whether the Minister is able to touch on issues about misinformation; there are concerns about it and we have seen it deployed as a tactic elsewhere in the world. Will she and her Department look at instances of misinformation and how we can counter them? Ensuring that there is a true and accurate reflection of what is going on is important for accountability, but also for our own policy making and making sure that we respond in an appropriate manner. Misinformation is appearing increasingly often throughout the world.
I add my support for the argument that inclusion must be at the heart of any transfer of powers, and I hope that the UK will pursue it, but I also add my voice to those saying that we must halt the deportations to Sudan. I know that is a Home Office issue, but will the Minister pass on that message from this debate? The deportations must be halted; they are not appropriate, and especially now, on World Refugee Day of all days, it is fitting to stress that again. Can we also learn from mistakes elsewhere—as we have learned in Myanmar, for example—that sufficient time and capacity must be given to any transfer to a democracy, along with de-escalation work? That takes investment and it takes more time.
I thank the chair of the APPG, the hon. Member for North West Norfolk, for his reference to the situation in South Sudan, which is also incredibly important. I pay tribute to non-governmental organisations from across the United Kingdom that are working in both South Sudan and Sudan in very difficult circumstances. I know that the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and the Department for International Development try to support them, but I wonder whether there is any additional support or capacity building with those NGOs. I hope that colleagues will not mind if I thank in particular Ian Macaulay and the Church of Scotland for their fantastic work across Sudan and South Sudan.
Finally, what interventions does the Foreign Office plan to make with Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates over their links with and influence over the militias and the Transitional Military Council? What conversations have been had with those countries? If they have the influence that has been reported, we need to have some pretty tough conversations with them, to say that we are paying attention and that what is happening is unacceptable. I thank all hon. Members for their contributions, and I particularly thank the hon. Member for Stroud for bringing this debate to Parliament.
Liz McInnes (Heywood and Middleton) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairwomanship, Dame Cheryl.
I thank everybody who has made a contribution to the debate, particularly my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud (Dr Drew). He spoke about the delegation to Sudan that he and I took part in last year, and he is right to say that we had an idea of the problems that were brewing at the time. President Bashir had been selected as the candidate for the next elections; there was a feeling that, while there were issues, he had brought stability to the country. There was a strong feeling that he was the candidate—but with serious reservations. We had many meetings with politicians in Sudan, and that thread ran through all our discussions. But as my hon. Friend said in his opening remarks, none of us quite anticipated the scale of the current crisis. I think of the relative calm we encountered in September last year, and the protests and killings that have taken place since in Khartoum and elsewhere in Sudan. Everybody has talked about the difficulties of accessing information from Sudan. The news we have had does not cover the whole story, and I will go on to talk about press freedom.
I thank all hon. Members who have spoken—the chair of the APPG, the hon. Member for North West Norfolk (Sir Henry Bellingham), who is a fount of knowledge on Sudan and South Sudan, my hon. Friend the Member for Scunthorpe (Nic Dakin) and the hon. Member for Beckenham (Bob Stewart). It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for North East Fife (Stephen Gethins), who made some pertinent points. He put one question to the Minister that I would also like to ask, about calling a halt to deportations to Sudan in the midst of the current crisis. I would be interested to hear from the Minister whether she has had any discussions with the Home Office on that issue. It is vital that we do not send people back to a conflict zone.
Many MPs with Sudanese diasporas in their constituencies have approached me in the past few weeks, bringing messages from their constituents and asking me why we are not talking more about Sudan. I am therefore grateful that my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud secured this important debate, and there was also an urgent question last week. However, although it is important that we have these debates, talking on its own is not enough. What we need is action, and with that in mind I have several asks of the Minister, which I hope she will be able to address.
The first thing I want to ask the Minister is what we can do to put pressure on the internet providers in Sudan. I have already mentioned the difficulties we have in getting information out of Sudan, and one problem is that the internet providers have shut down the internet, or have been shut down by the Sudanese authorities. The major providers are the South African company MTN and a Kuwaiti company. It is unlikely that the UK can do much about them, but, nevertheless, I would be interested to hear what action the Foreign Office is taking to try at least to restore internet access to the people of Sudan.
There is also the important issue of press freedom—I know it is an issue dear to the Foreign Secretary’s heart, because he is holding a conference on it next month. Sudanese journalists have been targeted since the public protests began. Their media accreditations have been revoked, and many journalists have been detained. The International Federation of Journalists has joined its affiliate, the Sudanese Journalists Union, in condemning any attempts to intimidate the press. The IFJ is urging the authorities to end the clampdown and respect journalists’ rights to report in a safe working environment.
In May, the Sudanese authorities closed al-Jazeera’s offices in Khartoum and withdrew the work permits of all its staff. Again, the IFJ and the Federation of African Journalists have condemned the move as an attack on freedom of information and called for an immediate end to the clampdown on the media. Given the Foreign Secretary’s major and important work on press freedom, I would be interested to hear the Minister’s comments on how the UK intends to support press freedom in Sudan, which is vital.
It has been noted already that the Ethiopian Prime Minister has tried to mediate; sadly, one result was that some of the opposition politicians he spoke to were then imprisoned. It is important to note that, while the Ethiopian position is that Sudan should move to any civilian Government, many people, including many members of the Sudanese diaspora, would prefer groups that are already in the Forces of Freedom and Change and not Islamist or unheard-of groups. I would be interested to hear the Minister’s thoughts on that and on whether it should be UK foreign policy to support groups from the Forces of Freedom and Change.
The African Union has quite rightly suspended Sudan’s membership until a civilian-led transitional authority has been established. We need to place further pressure on the Transitional Military Council to continue the political transition. My hon. Friend the Member for Stroud is right to raise the UK’s important role as part of the troika, and it is vital that we use our influence there.
We need an internationally led independent investigation into the recent events. We need an investigation into the killings, the rapes and the injuries inflicted on innocent, peaceful protestors. Britain must recognise its historical duty to Sudan and play a key part in enabling that.
I want to make a few remarks about UK aid. My hon. Friend also raised the issue of EU moneys finding their way to the RSF, but I will concentrate on DFID moneys. We will provide £65 million of aid in 2018-19 and £50 million in 2019-20, the majority of which will go on humanitarian assistance and development work. However, given the current crisis, has the Minister given any thought to increasing or redirecting UK aid, and will she make aid conditional on achieving a peaceful transition to a civilian Government?
My hon. Friend and the hon. Member for North East Fife both talked about the bravery of the UK ambassador, and I support those remarks. He provides people with support, and it is vital that we keep up that vital diplomatic role in Sudan.
Bob Stewart
On bravery, my hon. Friend the Member for North West Norfolk (Sir Henry Bellingham) raised the issue of the number of casualties among non-governmental organisation workers. My wife was a delegate in South Sudan and was actually taken hostage for three weeks, so I am speaking out of self-interest here. The people who operate for non-governmental organisations in Sudan and South Sudan put their lives at risk all the time; they are incredibly brave. We should mark that point. I am in awe of some of those I have met.
Liz McInnes
The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right to comment on the bravery of people who work for our NGOs, including his wife, whom I have had the pleasure of meeting. She is an indomitable woman. We had a debate here a while ago on South Sudan, and my hon. Friend the Member for Scunthorpe talked about South Sudan being the most dangerous place in the world for aid workers—in our discussion on Sudan, we must not forget the work that goes on in South Sudan as well. I thank the hon. Gentleman for that timely intervention.
I agree with the chair of the all-party parliamentary group, the hon. Member for North West Norfolk, that we need more action and a strong resolution from the UN. We are grateful to the UN for halting the drawdown of UNAMID. When my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud and I were in Sudan, we visited Darfur and spoke to people involved in UNAMID, the police and the military, who told us their concerns about the drawdown, but this crisis has necessitated the UN’s keeping UNAMID as it is. Rather than a policy of no further drawdown, does the Minister think we should engage in talks about increasing UNAMID’s presence? I am interested to hear her thoughts on that.
The two final points I want to make are on the involvement of the ICC and the investigation of war crimes, which I think have been mentioned by everybody who has spoken. We absolutely have to hold the TMC to account for what has happened in recent months. There are also the outstanding ICC charges against President Bashir for war crimes and human rights abuses. All these issues need to be investigated, and we in the UK should put pressure on Sudan to ensure that those investigations take place.
Sir Henry Bellingham
For the last, I think, 10 years, General Omar al-Bashir has avoided travel to countries where he might be arrested, having been indicted for war crimes by the ICC. Now is surely the time when he must be taken to The Hague to face those serious charges regarding crimes against humanity.
Liz McInnes
I entirely agree. This situation has been allowed to sit in limbo for far too long. It is a matter of international law that President Bashir should face up to the charges against him.
Liz McInnes
Yes.
Finally, I want to press the Minister on UK attempts to strike trade deals with Sudan, which I raised with her last week. I would also be grateful if she commented on our approach to trade with Sudan. Given the political crisis, I am really interested to hear her view on potential trading relationships and on whether we will see a change of view from the current Foreign Secretary, given that his predecessor was very keen to hold UK-Sudan trade and investment forum talks in December 2017.
The Minister for Africa (Harriett Baldwin)
It is an absolute honour to serve under your chairmanship, Dame Cheryl, particularly while you are having such a busy and prominent role on national television. I add my congratulations to the hon. Member for Stroud (Dr Drew) on securing the debate and on showing the importance of persistence when applying for these things.
What has come through loud and clear, through the participation of so many members of the all-party parliamentary group, is that the British people and the British Parliament have certainly not in any way forgotten this crisis. We will continue to play close attention, both through our diplomatic networks but also as parliamentarians, to the situation in Sudan. We stand with the Sudanese people and their desire to move from 30 years under the military rule of President Bashir to a brighter future under civilian-led government.
It is been an historic year for that transition. If someone had said to me when the shadow Minister and I visited that there would be a popular uprising and that Bashir would be gone at this point, I think we would all have found it very difficult to believe, but it has happened. As a number of Members noted, the situation in Sudan is incredibly fragile. It does not have the strength of the democratic institutions that we have here. Clearly, the talks between the Transitional Military Council and the protestors represented by the Forces of Freedom and Change have been fraught and require a certain amount of external pressure and mediation to make sure that they continue to progress.
The quality of the debate raised a range of important points, which I will try to tackle. A number of them were common points. There was common acknowledgement that we value the strength of the diaspora here in the UK and those people-to-people links. We all send our great respect to our ambassador in Khartoum and his team, who have twice had to draw down to essential staff only and are working in difficult circumstances. I certainly have great pleasure in passing that on from parliamentarians. There was also a request that the UK continue, in all the different international forums in which we participate, to use our diplomatic connections to make sure that we not only keep this at the forefront of international forums but that we try to unite the international messaging around a common position. That is important.
We have been playing that role, whether on Monday, when I was at the EU Foreign Affairs Council, or in our ongoing discussions with representatives from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, or with other friends of Sudan. Importantly, we row in behind our friends in the African Union and the initiative shown by the Ethiopian Prime Minister, always remembering how important it is that we send a unified and coherent message at every diplomatic opportunity. That has been more challenging in the context of the United Nations Security Council, where we have been able to get a statement issued, but probably not as strong as the one that we would have wanted to put out on our own. We will also, at next week’s United Nations Human Rights Council, be able to lead a discussion; we are giving leadership on that as well. The UK has in a range of ways been trying to ensure that the diplomatic community and the international community are sending a common message, and I can assure colleagues that we will continue to use every single one of those opportunities.
A number of different points were raised by hon. Members. On the important point about returns, we have been in contact with colleagues at the Home Office. I can tell the House that the Government’s published statistics for the year up to the end of March 2019 show six returns in total, for non-asylum cases and asylum cases. The Home Office recognises that the human rights situation is very difficult in Sudan. In the first quarter of 2019, three quarters of the people claiming to be Sudanese asylum seekers were granted protection. All asylum claims made by Sudanese nationals in the UK are considered on their individual merits against relevant case law and up-to-date country information.
A number of colleagues raised the important question of overseas development assistance and whether any of that is inadvertently supporting the Government or Transitional Military Council, or finding its way to the Rapid Support Forces. I can assure colleagues that last December I took the decision to suspend some of the work that we were doing, after a full look at some of the economic support work that we were proposing to take forward in terms of the Government. On the EU’s work specifically in relation to the regional operations centre in Khartoum, which is funded by EU funds and obviously therefore has a 15% contribution from the UK, I can inform colleagues that as a consequence of recent events, EU-funded work on the regional operations centre is suspended. That suspension lasts until the end of this week. There will be a decision tomorrow on a resumption of activities; that will take place after tomorrow’s management board, but I cannot see that anyone will argue for a resumption in the current situation. There are often reports that the UK, via the EU, funds the Rapid Support Forces, but I can assure colleagues that that is not the case. The question of misinformation came up, and I think it is always important to be factual on these things.
I think that accountability was mentioned by everyone in the debate—by the hon. Member for Stroud, by my hon. Friend the Member for North West Norfolk (Sir Henry Bellingham), by my hon. Friend the Member for Beckenham (Bob Stewart) in his intervention and by the hon. Members for Scunthorpe (Nic Dakin), for North East Fife (Stephen Gethins) and for Heywood and Middleton (Liz McInnes). We would encourage the Sudanese people to retain and preserve evidence to enable future investigations to take place. The Foreign and Commonwealth Office is looking to draw on recent experience in other countries—for example, Syria and Myanmar—to see whether it applies in this instance, so I would encourage people to retain evidence for future investigations.
The latest UN reporting on violence in Darfur is the statement made on 17 June by the humanitarian co-ordinator in Sudan. The main points are reports of intercommunal violence in various Darfur states, including recent clashes in Deleij, which left 17 people dead and 100 dwellings destroyed; and calls for the Transitional Military Council to ensure access for humanitarian supplies and timely facilitation of administrative procedures for entry of aid workers into Sudan and internal travel within it. That statement was published. There is also, should people wish to download it, an emergency flash update, dated 12 June, from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. That is helpful information. I want to reassure colleagues that the UK’s humanitarian assistance is delivered through organisations such as the World Food Programme and other UN bodies.
A range of colleagues asked about current UNAMID troop numbers. After the technical roll-over, which we hope will be adopted on 27 June, there will be 4,375 troops in UNAMID. That is 325 above the mandated ceiling, as the mission has been unable to undertake some planned team site closures because of the issue with the Rapid Support Forces. It is important for colleagues to understand that although I have set out the UK’s position very clearly on a number of occasions, that roll-over has not yet been agreed.
On the question about media freedom and the bravery of journalists—bravery that my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary is rightly putting at the forefront of next month’s conference—I can update colleagues. Since President Bashir’s removal on 11 April, the BBC has had access to Khartoum and has been able to broadcast its morning programme from there. BBC Arabic TV and radio are quite widely available via satellite, but since 2010 the BBC has been banned from broadcasting on FM radio. Our ambassador has for some time been lobbying the information Ministry for restored access. I concur with the Opposition spokesman, the hon. Member for Heywood and Middleton, that there is a long way to go to a free media in Sudan.
On the point made by the hon. Member for Scunthorpe, a clear path is what is needed. This will clearly be a long road; it is not something that can be switched on overnight. Donor countries such as ours, working with like-minded countries, can set out a path, which will have conditions attached in relation to progress. There is huge potential for the Sudanese economy should that transition path be followed and should things evolve. There is enormous potential for us as a member of the international community, working with the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, other like-minded countries, EU development assistance and some of our own bilateral funding, not only to step up the humanitarian assistance—bearing in mind how widespread food insecurity is in Sudan—but to make the long-term inward investments that will be needed for that economy to prosper. Although we are not currently able to move forward on trade deals—clearly, there is no trade deal with the EU because the Cotonou conditions were never met—I think the sincere hope of everyone here is that the transition to a civilian-led Government will include our being able to engage more deeply at an economic level.
Bob Stewart
I am sure that my hon. Friend the Minister is already on this one, but in Sudan and South Sudan, there is quite a lot of religious persecution. I hope that the Foreign Office is keeping an eye on that as well as, of course, racism between tribes. We think racism is just in Europe, but there is a heck of a lot of racism between tribes in Africa. But I am particularly concerned about Christians; there is quite a lot of persecution of Christians, still, in Sudan and in South Sudan.
Harriett Baldwin
My hon. and gallant Friend is right to raise that matter. He will be aware that the Foreign Secretary has put freedom of religion and belief at the heart of our work, which is led by the Bishop of Truro, who has visited recently, as has Lord Ahmad, who leads the ministerial team on this work. My hon. and gallant Friend is absolutely right that we benefit from a tolerant, multi-faith and multi-ethnic society in the UK, and we encourage other countries to move forward on that agenda.
The shadow Minister asked some sensible questions on internet access. There has been an 80% drop in connectivity—it has not been completely obliterated. There is some food for thought there about what we can do through the International Telecommunication Union. I will take that away and see whether we can do something internationally on that.
In conclusion, the political situation in Sudan is very difficult. We know it is extremely fragile. The transition from authoritarian rule to a civilian-led Government will be difficult. The UK will row in behind the legitimate demands of the Sudanese people for a better future for Sudan. Ensuring a swift, orderly and peaceful transition to civilian-led Government is an important priority. The UK will continue, as part of the troika, to work with our international partners, including the African Union-led initiatives and our friends in the European Union. We will use our seat at the United Nations Security Council and the UN Human Rights Council, and work with regional allies, to continue to further those objectives.
Dr Drew
Although we have not had great numbers, we have had a very thoughtful and comprehensive debate on Sudan. No doubt, we will have to revisit this matter. In conclusion, the role of the Americans cannot be underestimated. When we were there, we were always told that the Americans sent their heavy battalions to talk to the Sudanese when President Bashir was out of the country. Now that Bashir is no longer the key player, it is important that we directly address the new special envoy, Donald Booth, as well as Tibor Nagy, the US Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs.
Harriett Baldwin
Donald Booth is in town today, and I met with him earlier.
Dr Drew
That is good news from the horse’s mouth. It is important that we understand that the Americans may not have played the role of removing Bashir, but the impacts of the sanctions—remember that the country is still seen as a potential threat for terrorism—have brought the country to where it is. We need to lift the country to ensure that we, with the Americans and Norwegians, can bring some sort of ceasefire to the streets, and then we can move forward to a proper peace settlement.
Question put and agreed to.
Resolved,
That this House has considered the political situation in Sudan.
Secondary Education: Raising Aspiration
(4 years, 10 months ago)
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Dr Matthew Offord (Hendon) (Con)
I beg to move,
That this House has considered raising aspiration in secondary education.
I am grateful to serve under your chairmanship this afternoon, Mr Sharma. I am not sure whether anything else is happening in the House today that means that Members might be otherwise engaged, but I am very pleased to have the opportunity to have this debate and to ask the Minister some questions about how the Government are addressing the issue of aspiration.
Aspiration is important to me. In my maiden speech on 24 June 2010, I told the House about a constituent whose only aspiration in life was for her child to receive the tenancy of her socially rented property. On the other side of my constituency, parents told me about their children—how they were going to go to university, how they would certainly buy their own home in the local area and how they hoped to get married as well. That really illustrated to me the disparity in aspiration between different parts of my constituency and, I believe, across the country. I repeat today what I said in my maiden speech nine years ago: we live in one of the most prosperous cities in the western world, but there remain yawning chasms between the aspirations of some of the people I and other MPs represent and the aspirations of others. However, for some people, including Members of this place, aspiration is not that important—I will not take the number of Members here as a reflection of that, although I have to say to the Opposition spokesman, the hon. Member for Blackpool South (Gordon Marsden), that I will take any interventions at any time he wishes to intervene on me.
Aspiration is not important to everyone because some people are of the view that people are either born with a spirit of aspiration or have had it bought on their behalf. That view fosters an assumption that some people are born into this world with a natural capacity to lead, while everybody else does not have that capacity, and that nothing can therefore be done to change the situation.
I certainly do not agree with that view, but we have only to consider our recent record on Prime Ministers to see the strength of it. Only three of the last 11 British Prime Ministers attended state secondary schools. In total, 28 Prime Ministers have been educated at Oxford University and 14 at Cambridge, and nine Prime Ministers were educated at Eton and Christ Church. John Major was the last Prime Minister not to have attended a university; overall, only nine British Prime Ministers did not graduate from university after leaving secondary education. I present those figures not as an attack on private education—I believe strongly in private education and anyone’s right to attend a private institution—but as an illustration that aspiration is imbued in some people.
People may know that tonight there is the premiere of Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje’s biographical film “Farming”. It tells the story of how Adewale, who is Nigerian, was “farmed out” as a boy by his parents to a white British family in Dagenham, in the hope that he would have a better future than he might otherwise have had. When I heard that this morning on the radio, it illustrated to me that aspiration is affected by not only class and financial attainment but racial and nationality backgrounds.
However, I would go further. When I conducted my PhD research, I attempted to discover whether UK legislation was implemented consistently across different rural areas and, if not, how that affected social exclusion and, particularly, tackling the problem. The first criterion was objective, as the law is the law, but the issue of social exclusion is subjective in the eyes of decision makers. On many occasions, I was told things such as, “We don’t do things like that here”, “That is not something that would be part of our local economy” and, “Access to higher education, certain public services, housing or financial attainment is difficult to achieve in places like this.”
Those views are borne out by the Department for Education’s own research. In its report “School and College-level Strategies to Raise Aspirations of High-achieving Disadvantaged Pupils to Pursue Higher Education”, which was published more than five years ago in January 2014, the DFE said:
“Prioritisation of aspiration-raising varies by geographical location, with London schools making this a particular priority…the difference appears to relate to the relatively high proportion of disadvantaged students in London schools and colleges as well as their close proximity to a large number of HEIs”—
higher education institutions—
“including selective or leading universities”.
Gordon Marsden (Blackpool South) (Lab)
I am listening with great interest to what the hon. Gentleman is saying; he has spoken previously in the House on these issues and commanded my attention. Does he believe, as I do, that London is, of course, a great place, but it also has many cold spots as well as hot ones, and that is also true of coastal and rural areas and schools? As a Blackpool MP, one of the problems I have found over the years is that the overall statistics for a constituency might look great, but the cold spots, which are often difficult to address in policy terms, are also substantial.
Dr Offord
I certainly agree with the hon. Gentleman, and I will take this opportunity to say that my PhD—I am sure he has not read it—was about rural areas and coastal communities, which are very similar in their ability not only to attract inward investment but to provide the kind of public services that many people want. I know well not only the coastline of his own constituency, but that further up the coast, around Cumbria, where I have also lived. There are some coastal communities in that part of the world—I look towards my hon. Friend the Member for Copeland (Trudy Harrison) as I say this—in places such as Flimby, where it is difficult to obtain access to not only employment but higher and indeed secondary education; in those kinds of places, gaining access is not as easy as it is in parts of London. I attribute that to issues such as the difficulty of attending schools or further education colleges because of their geographical location.
When I was preparing for this debate, George and Hilary in my office asked me what I meant by “aspiration”, and it is important that I set out what I mean. By “aspiration” I mean what a child or young person hopes to achieve for themselves in the future. In my mind, that is very different from educational attainment, although for people to achieve their aspirations—in particular, for young people to achieve their aspirations for careers and education and their financial aspirations—they need good educational outcomes. Consequently, I believe that raising aspiration incentivises improved educational attainment.
In an attempt to focus on what I would like the Government to direct their attention towards, I have identified three categories of intervention that I believe foster aspiration: first, interventions that focus on children’s parents and families; secondly, interventions that focus on teaching practice; and, thirdly, out-of-school interventions or extracurricular activities, sometimes involving peers or mentors. The approaches used in these interventions are particularly diverse. Some aim to change aspirations directly by exposing children to new opportunities, while others aim to raise aspirations by developing children’s general self-esteem, motivation or self-efficacy.
I spoke in a recent education funding debate about Copthall School in my constituency, which is for girls. Around 80% of the pupils speak English as a second language, and around half are entitled to free school meals or the pupil premium. The staff and governors are making a great effort to promote aspiration among their pupils, and I am enormously encouraged by what they are achieving. One initiative they are very pleased to promote is the Gatsby career benchmarks, which they describe as
“aspirational and absolutely necessary as a vehicle for social justice.”
It is worth commenting on that programme, as it achieves three vital outcomes: first, it raises aspirations among young people and promotes access to all career paths, not just academic ones; secondly, it enables the development of the skills and the outlook that pupils need to achieve career wellbeing, including adaptability and resilience; and, finally, it underpins the Department for Education’s own guidance to schools on meeting their statutory responsibility to offer career guidance.
As I was writing this speech yesterday, I received a letter from my right hon. Friend the Minister for Apprenticeships and Skills, about the Gatsby programme. In concluding, she requested feedback from colleagues about any conversations they might have with schools in their constituencies in the coming weeks. However, I can give some feedback right now to the Minister here today. I have been advised by Copthall School:
“As you will see from the list at the end of this email, at Copthall we are doing a lot to meet the eight Gatsby benchmarks. However, it is a challenge to meet them all, particularly at a time when school funding is in crisis. Most schools have insufficient funding to fully implement the Gatsby benchmarks.”
Yesterday, the Minister and I had a discussion in the corridor, and he said he looked forward to this debate to hear more about my education history, following some of my revelations in previous debates. However, I have to disappoint him: I do not consider this a confessional chamber, but somewhere where I represent my constituents, so on this occasion I will not reveal more. My experience at school certainly had a dramatic impact on my views on aspiration and education, but it would be unfair of me to criticise my school, and particularly the teachers, 30 years after I left, because most people have moved on from their posts, and life was a great deal different then. It would also be wrong of me to comment on the life achievements of others—my peers—who are completely content with their personal history, although I am keen that the mistakes of the past are not repeated.
One mistake that existed in the past and that continues to exist today is the tendency to separate academic and technical education routes into two simplistic alternatives. The problem is that that does not reflect the learner’s journey, which often moves between academic and technical routes at different times in their life. Permeability and flexibility between types of learning in our education system are vital if we are to enable learners to fulfil their potential and progress through both A and T-levels to higher level learning, and to achieve the goals in the Government’s industrial strategy of increasing social mobility and productivity.
As T-levels are introduced, it will be important to avoid sweeping away other qualifications, such as BTECs, which provide important and established progression routes into higher education, in the interests of creating a tidy qualification landscape. More than 100,000 students a year progress with a BTEC on its own or in combination with A-levels. UCAS data shows that, for the 2017 application cycle, only 61% of 18-year-olds held only A-level qualifications, with 11% of remaining applicants holding BTECs only, and 8% a combination of BTECs and A-levels. As a higher proportion of students opting for BTECs come from disadvantaged backgrounds, those qualifications play a critical role in supporting social mobility, providing a pathway for disadvantaged students to progress through to higher-level learning, either on an academic programme or on a higher or degree apprenticeship.
Our most disadvantaged children are often those in care and in need, something that the Secretary of State has also written to me about. Many have little aspiration and currently fall unacceptably far behind in attainment. Last year, the equivalent of one in 10 children needed a social worker at some point. The attainment of such children who require such help is greater than that of those who come from a low-income background. What hope do we give to those children? We must raise their aspiration so they expect more of themselves and believe they can succeed, and we must support schools to support children themselves.
Last year, the number of looked-after children in England reached 75,420, an increase of 4% on the previous year, and it has been increasing since 2008, when the total was 60,000. Young people in care are six times more likely to be excluded from school and more likely to be unemployed after leaving school, and 45% of them suffer from mental ill health. They are clearly being failed.
When I was deputy leader of Barnet Council, I introduced a scheme whereby the council would effectively act as a family business. If we have a family business, we often employ our own children or relatives. My initiative allowed the looked-after children, whom we were corporate parents to, to have a place in a family firm. I was very pleased that one individual not only took the opportunity to involve himself in marketing, but went on to university and provided a career for himself. Others fell by the wayside. It was not a scheme where everyone had an automatic right to a place, but there was an opportunity for them to aspire to achieve something through the services available through the local council. I was keen on the scheme because, as a child, I had a friend who lived in a children’s home, and I always understood that the opportunities available to him and other people in the care home were not the same as those available to someone like me, who lived in a loving family environment. I would like the Government to promote such initiatives. Indeed, local authorities could take the initiative to promote themselves within their communities.
To return to A-levels, high-quality careers information, advice and guidance for students and parents are essential to ensure successful implementation in the coming years. Clear signposting is needed within the curriculum to create awareness of the T-level option and ensure that young people avoid shutting down options—for example, by choosing academic subjects that will not feed into T-level study. That is particularly important, as the choices made about post-16 study will narrow further study and career options. Students at this age are still forming their identities and expectations of life, so it is vital that early information is provided.
Universities have direct experience of recruiting students from a diverse range of qualification backgrounds to access and succeed in higher education. It will be important to engage with higher education admissions professionals on T-levels to ensure that universities develop an understanding of T-levels and are able to communicate entry requirements to prospective students and level 3 providers. It will also be important to assist universities in meeting the specific needs of students progressing from those qualifications into higher education. Information around access to higher education from T-levels should also be communicated to students further down the line when they are making choices about level 3 study in schools and considering pathways and routes from T-levels.
The promotion of aspiration should occur not only in the secondary school sector. Middlesex University is located in my constituency. It has demonstrated to me on numerous occasions its considerable experience and expertise in raising aspiration and boosting social mobility. Some 52% of its current students are eligible for free school meals; 85% of the cohort falls into one of the five widening participation categories; and 50% of students are the first in their families to go to university. There seems to be a link between the university’s promotion of aspiration and its student numbers, as can be seen in its innovative Make your Mark initiative.
In 2018-19, Middlesex University engaged 6,986 school and college students and 286 parents through its outreach activity in 86 workshops in local schools. The outreach work helps young people to understand the opportunities available to them. The Make Your Mark initiative provides guidance for young people on what is likely to be the best pathway for them, including vocational routes such as apprenticeships, through an interactive web microsite. The university has produced a guide and website for 11 to 16-year-olds, featuring blogs, quizzes, insight into what university life and study are all about, and tips on exam success and money matters.
Universities, given the access that they have to schools, have more potential to be the one-stop shops for careers information and guidance at every level. There is also scope for employers, FE and HE to collaborate more effectively in providing high-quality careers information and guidance in schools, centred around the key themes in the Government’s industrial strategy. The careers and qualifications landscape is becoming increasingly complex, and school careers teams struggle to provide guidance where it is needed most.
Instilling a sense of aspiration in young people would set their lives on a trajectory for success, so I would like the Government to take certain actions. A sense of aspiration would create an inclination for learning that continued after formal education and would create a foundation that could be built on in future years to achieve what, for some people, would be incredible results.
I want the Government to engage with the aspiration agenda; the last time it was considered was five years ago in the report that I mentioned. In that time, life has certainly moved on. I want the agenda to expand beyond education attainment and higher education and to promote not only lifelong learning, but other aspects of vocational qualifications. I want more action to address imbalances in connections and opportunities between deprived pupils from comprehensive schools and those from private and grammar schools with more affluent governing bodies. And, as I said, I want lifelong learning promoted.
Finally, I ask the Minister to recognise that not all parts of the United Kingdom are the same. There are places in my constituency where there is still a yawning chasm in aspiration, and they are not the same as other parts of the country, as the hon. Member for Blackpool South mentioned.
In conclusion, the Government can do a lot more to work in collaboration with not only schools and universities but local government, which is in a unique place to be able to deliver an agenda that has been included in the industrial strategy.
Gordon Marsden (Blackpool South) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Sharma. I congratulate the hon. Member for Hendon (Dr Offord) on securing this afternoon’s debate. We have quality, not quantity, today; quality was certainly there in great profusion in his speech. He placed a very thoughtful focus on the disparity of aspiration and the issues of achievement. He usefully identified the three key areas, which we could all riff off—the focus on parents and families, on teachers and on extracurricular activity. He reminded us that this subject has been a passion of his and was included in his maiden speech some nine years ago.
I listened with great attention to what the hon. Gentleman said. In this House there is a small group of people who are very dedicated on this subject, but we do not always address in an integrated way the issues of those smaller groups of people, such as looked-after children or young care leavers. There are about 1,000 identified young care leavers in Blackpool. I was interested to hear of the hon. Gentleman’s Barnet initiative—I was going to say the Barnett formula—and he may remember from a previous debate that for a small portion of my life as a student, I resided in his constituency, so I know the differentials of which he speaks.
I was particularly interested in the hon. Gentleman’s comments on the Copthall School. The Gatsby benchmarks are great, but they demand a very intensive approach. We have to be careful that for groups such as the Copthall School they do not end up as the equivalent of the freedom to dine at the Ritz. That is an important issue, which politicians of all parties need to address.
I agree with what the hon. Gentleman said on the flexibility to move between the academic, the technical and the vocational. Those words get bandied about too often in this place as if they were in silos, which then achieves that result. Flexibility has always been vital and it is even more vital now, given the speed at which subjects, their teaching and careers will mutate over the next few years. The right hon. Member for South Holland and The Deepings (Sir John Hayes), the former Skills Minister—I am proud to call him my friend, although he is on the other side—along with my hon. Friend the Member for Huddersfield (Mr Sheerman), is addressing that point as we speak, taking forward a skills commission that will look at some of those areas. What the hon. Member for Hendon said on that subject was absolutely spot on.
I was glad to hear the hon. Gentleman’s comments on BTECs. We agree with him. A consultation is out, and the Minister might wish to tell us today when he expects to be able to respond to that consultation. The He knows that there has been a very broad chorus of concern about the possibility of BTECs and other qualifications being swept away before T-levels have been able to prove their worth in practice.
Finally, the hon. Member for Hendon mentioned the importance of the university contribution, and I shall mention a couple of universities as I go along. He mentioned Middlesex University, which I am familiar with. I am pleased to say that I shared a platform with the vice-chancellor, Tim Blackman, only a few weeks ago at an event at the Bridge Group, and I am absolutely delighted that, in the Open University’s 50th anniversary year, Tim is to become its new vice-chancellor. All those are good and positive things.
I believe that aspiration and austerity are incongruous bedfellows. If a Government of any description decide to implement an austerity programme over a long time, as this one and their predecessors have done, there is a danger of that aspiration diminishing. In our view, the Government’s decision to go down that road was not an inevitability—certainly not for the long period that it has continued. I shall not go over the arguments about whether they inherited a growing economy in 2010—we believe that they did, on the base of 2008—but whatever the case, it is concerning that the UN special rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights recently said that the Government’s policies of austerity have continued unabated, and that a third of children are now in poverty. Austerity is always a political and ideological choice in some sense or other, and that has been clear in the education system.
I am sad to say that we have seen about 1,000 Sure Start programmes cut from the early years; I genuinely mean that, because Sure Start was one of the great achievements of the Labour Government of 1997 to 2010. Children’s services, schools and further and higher education have also seen considerable cuts since the Conservative party came to power in 2010. The Minister and his colleagues in the Department, in their heart of hearts—I know he has one—know that this is not acceptable. After all, the Secretary of State only recently said that he had heard the concerns about funding loud and clear, and last year it was reported that he was trying to squeeze more money out of the Treasury. However, the Government took £3.5 billion out of the capital spend at the last Budget, and so far the Treasury—although we await a spending review, of course—has only offered schools £400 million, in October 2018. That is thin gruel indeed.
To summarise, those cuts, along with the impact of the public sector pay freeze and then the cap, have created a serious problem in teacher recruitment and retention. The hon. Member for Hendon referred to the importance of teachers. There have been inevitable consequences. The Government have missed the teacher recruitment and retention target for five years, and in the past two years, more teachers have left the profession than have joined it. The hon. Gentleman referred to that in the House, when he said:
“Under this Government, the number of teachers has not kept pace with increasing pupil numbers.”—[Official Report, 29 November 2018; Vol. 650, c. 482.]
I have a question for the Minister: how can we expect schoolchildren to aspire in the way that the hon. Gentleman talked about when there are not enough teachers to encourage them?
On top of that, we have the Government’s commitment to T-levels. The hon. Gentleman talked about their importance, and I agree with him. We share the long-standing concerns of Lord Sainsbury and support the recommendations of the skills plan that was drawn up and presented to the Government, which the Government approved; my friend, the principal of Blackpool and The Fylde College, Bev Robinson, had a considerable part in that plan. Despite all those things, schools and colleges are still unable to deliver at a secondary level the high-quality education that people deserve, because they simply do not have the funding to make ends meet.
The aim, of course, is to expand and attract the coverage of vocational education schools to the secondary sector, which is laudable, but the question is the same. The Government have talked about the subjects and standards that they want to roll out for T-levels, but as to who will actually teach them, there has barely been a peep. Maybe there will be a peep today—I do not know. Are they going to be existing secondary school teachers? Are they FE college lecturers, or associates, or other people entirely? If the Government are serious about T-levels being an ecosystem and not another shiny brand that goes the way of other initiatives, they really must focus on them and not simply spend a quarter of a million pounds on a T-level logo.
Those are important issues. Aspiration, of course, can be hugely developed by teachers, but there is so much more that we can do to unlock the innate inquisitiveness, interest and ambition of young people as they enter secondary education. That transition from primary to secondary, as they approach puberty, in schools where they may have left their primary school friends behind, is often very challenging, not least for young people with special educational needs and disabilities, as the hon. Member for Hendon said. That is why the Sutton Trust and others have said over the years that we need earlier interventions and encounters to play a vital role in improving that aspiration. As I said, I recently argued at the Bridge Group and at this year’s Annual Apprenticeship Conference that that is as relevant to achieving wider social mobility in the vocational and technical sphere as it is in the academic.
I believe we should be looking at sustained and dedicated programmes with schools, for children at a much earlier age, and for particular social and ethnic groupings. I believe that approach is likely to yield much better results than many of the current interventions, late in secondary school, where universities will spend tens of millions of pounds but sometimes, arguably, only strengthen offers and representations from some young people who are likely to have gone to there in substantial numbers anyway.
Earlier this week, in the House of Lords, I was privileged to be present at the launch of a new initiative by the National Education Opportunities Network. Graeme Atherton, who founded NEON in 2012 and has directed it since then, was launching its initiative to improve access for white students from lower socioeconomic backgrounds. Some 10 new HE provider initiatives are being brought together to better support that group, which is one of the least able and likely, from a secondary background, to attend higher education. It is about raising horizons and expectations, not about fixing pupils’ future career patterns at the age of 10. However, I believe the Government urgently need to look at how that integrates with their careers advice strategy—focusing on what happens in individual areas and the way in which Labour, as a party in government, would make more sense of the fractured and fragmented system of information, advice and guidance that we currently have at secondary level, which we believe is an important consideration. I and my colleague, my hon. Friend the Member for Ashton-under-Lyne (Angela Rayner)—our shadow Education Secretary—were at a roundtable with stakeholders only this week, discussing how that work might go forward. The Office for Students also has an important role in this area, and I am pleased that it is encouraging collaborative outreach programmes such as those that I have described.
We have been saying for some time that, in a secondary system in which students in schools, FE and sixth-form colleges gain their all-important A-levels or other qualifications at around the age of 18, there must be a robust, independent and wide-ranging review of admissions processes to higher education. That review should focus on a range of things, but particularly the unconditional offers to students of that age that have exploded in recent times, which some have said put those from disadvantaged backgrounds at a key handicap. That is why we believe there is a case for post-qualification admissions, and we were interested to see that the Government have recently asked the OfS to conduct such an inquiry.
The latest OECD international survey on teaching and learning does not, for us in England, make for great reading. England has the world’s eighth-biggest problem with secondary school teacher shortages and the third-highest level of shortages in Europe. For a long time, our party has called for a laser-like focus on the problem of teacher workload; across the continent, secondary school teachers work 37.5 hours a week on average, but in England, that figure is about 47 hours. The question is how much of that is actual teaching, as opposed to paper or virtual bureaucracy. In an environment that leaves many feeling like the proverbial mouse on the treadmill, how are those teachers going to communicate ambition? The digital world and the fourth industrial revolution are all moving ahead at an incandescent pace, and teachers are an absolutely vital element in taking that forward, whether in colleges or schools.
We have 600,000 young people in the category of NEETs—those not in education, employment or training. The Government tell us that that is a stable figure, but it should not be stable; we should be moving on, and I do not see where the Government are taking that issue at the moment. Perhaps the Minister would like to enlighten us.
The Timpson review, which the Government have received, points out that excluded pupils are more likely to already be disadvantaged by class, income, special educational needs or disabilities, with certain ethnic minority groups at a higher risk. Those are the students most in need of support. “Newsnight” recently uncovered more than 1,500 children with SENs or disabilities who are without a school place in England, which only emphasises the problems that Edward Timpson—a respected former Conservative MP and Education Minister—sought to address. The issue of off-rolling needs to be a priority.
The situation, as I say, puts aspiration at serious risk. Right hon. and hon. Members may be familiar with the House of Lords report on the future of seaside towns and cities by my noble Friend the Lord Bassam. That report found that significantly fewer young people from seaside towns and coastal communities can access higher education than those in other parts of England, and that since 2010, there has been a 27% decline in the number of those young people accessing HE. That is another important issue; the Government have identified opportunity access areas, one of which has been Blackpool, but those need to be dealt with more expansively and progressively. The Government’s disappointingly tepid response to the excellent Lords commission illustrates the urgent need to plug this in as a priority for social mobility and economic progress. Many seaside towns suffer from low educational attainment, and local economies then suffer due to skills shortages. These are obviously areas where educational aspiration needs to rank high, and I hope the Minister will consider his Department’s response to that report.
My hon. Friend the Member for Wythenshawe and Sale East (Mike Kane) has spoken in the House about last year’s BBC report that found that malnourished pupils in poorer areas were filling their pockets with food from school canteens due to poverty. My colleague and hon. Friend the Member for Washington and Sunderland West (Mrs Hodgson), the shadow public health Minister, has also raised the issue of food at school, school meals, and the gaps through which pupils will fall. As any teacher will tell us, they cannot teach children properly if those children are starving, let alone encourage aspiration.
The hon. Member for Hendon talked about lifelong learning; we agree with him entirely. Of course, people can have second and third chances if they have failures at secondary level, but the whole process needs to reflect that. That is one of the things that we are trying to do through the Lifelong Learning Commission that we have set up, which is looking at these issues. The hon. Gentleman, however, has given us a great deal of food for thought—the Minister especially, I hope. We await his response.
The Minister for School Standards (Nick Gibb)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Sharma; I think it is the first time I have done so. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Hendon (Dr Offord) on having secured this debate, and on the interesting and persuasive way in which he introduced it.
Since 2010, the Government have worked hard to drive up academic standards. Our mission has been to ensure that every state school is a good school, teaching a rigorous and balanced curriculum and offering pupils world-class qualifications. Only by having high standards across the board can we enable secondary schools to raise and meet young people’s aspirations. In schools, we are transforming careers education—something dear to my hon. Friend’s heart—to harness young people’s aspirations. Our 2017 careers strategy committed investment, support and resources to help schools make visible and lasting improvements, and since 2010 we have seen an increase in the proportion of pupils receiving a good-quality education. As of December 2018, 1.9 million more children were in good or outstanding schools compared with 2010. Some 85% of children are in good schools, compared with only 66% in 2010, which is partly due to our reforms.
As with implementing any effective change, there is no single silver bullet that will bring about a significant and sustainable improvement in standards. We are under no illusions: there is still much more to be done. However, since 2010, the Government have made radical reforms with a focus on improving school standards. As part of our aspiration to provide children with a world-class education, we reformed the national curriculum, restoring knowledge to its heart and raising expectations of what children should be taught. That is now being delivered by all maintained schools, and sets an ambitious benchmark for academies that we expect them to at least match.
Too many pupils, particularly those from disadvantaged backgrounds, were being entered for low-quality qualifications. We therefore reformed GCSEs to put them on a par with qualifications in the best-performing jurisdictions in the world. The result is a suite of new GCSEs that rigorously assess the knowledge and skills acquired by pupils during key stage 4, and are in line with expected standards in countries with high-performing education systems. A-levels have also been reformed to improve students’ readiness for the demands of higher education.
We introduced the English baccalaureate school performance measure, consisting of English, maths, at least two sciences, history or geography, and a language. Those subjects form part of a compulsory curriculum in many of the highest performing countries internationally, at least up to the age of 15 or 16. The percentage of pupils in state-funded schools taking the EBacc has risen from 22% in 2010 to 38% in 2018. My hon. Friend mentioned Copthall School, and I pay tribute to the headteacher and staff of that school, which has high rates of pupil progress. It is well above average at 0.76 for Progress 8. That does not mean much to many people, but that is a high level of progress. The EBacc entry rate is 50%, which is significantly higher than the national entry rate of 38%. The Government’s ambition is for that entry rate to rise to 75% by 2022 and to 90% by 2025. I do not underestimate the challenge that presents, and I will go on to say what we are doing to support schools to achieve that aim. It is right that we aim to provide the best possible education and therefore more opportunities for young people.
Getting the fundamentals right at an early age is vital for a pupil’s success at secondary school and in later life. Children who are reading well by the age of five are six times more likely than their peers to be on track by age 11 in reading and, counterintuitively, 11 times more likely to be on track in mathematics. Ensuring that all pupils in England’s schools are taught to read effectively has been central to our reforms, and we are now beginning to see the fruits of that work. By the end of year 1, most children should be able to decode simple words using phonics and, once they can do that, they can focus on their wider reading skills and develop a love and habit of reading. In England, phonics performance has significantly improved since we introduced the phonics screening check in 2012. At that time, just 58% of six-year-olds correctly read at least 32 out of the 40 words in the check. In 2018, that figure was 82%.
We can see how that work is having an impact. In 2016, England achieved its highest ever score in the reading ability of nine-year-olds, moving from joint 10th to joint 8th in the Progress in International Reading Literacy Study rankings. That follows our greater focus on reading in the primary curriculum and a particular focus on phonics. Continuing improvement in reading ability should mean that more children arrive in secondary school able to access the curriculum and with a higher level of literacy than their predecessors.
Maths, science and computing are also fundamental to raising aspirations. We have funded 35 maths hubs to spread evidence-based approaches to maths teaching through the teaching for mastery programme. An investment of £76 million will expand the programme to reach 11,000 primary and secondary schools by 2023. To encourage more pupils to consider level 3 mathematics qualifications and to continue the rise we have seen in A-level entries over the past eight years, we have launched the advanced mathematics support programme, giving schools an extra £600 a year for each additional pupil taking maths or further maths A-level or any level 3 mathematics qualification.
For the good of our economy, we need more young people to pursue degrees and careers in the sciences, including computer science. We have already seen excellent progress, with entries to STEM A-levels increasing by 23% since 2010. We have also launched a four-year computing programme supported by £84 million of funding. That includes a national centre for computing education, at least 40 hubs providing training to schools and a continuing professional development programme to train up to 8,000 secondary teachers without a post-A level qualification in computing.
My hon. Friend talked a lot about careers advice. He is right that if young people are to raise their aspirations and capitalise on the opportunities available to them, they need good careers guidance. In December 2017, the Government published our careers strategy, setting out proposals to improve the quality and coverage of careers advice in schools and to give more aspirational careers advice for young people. The strategy identifies how the worlds of work and education can come together to support young people, using the Gatsby benchmarks, to which he referred. They are based on rigorous national and international research and are the gold standard for careers provision in England. As part of meeting the Gatsby benchmarks, schools should make sure that students understand the full range of education and training opportunities available to them. Exposure to further and higher education and apprenticeships helps to raise aspiration and allows young people to make the right choices for them.
Information on education or training options provided by schools at key transition points too often fails to correct, or even reinforces, the impression that technical and professional education and apprenticeships are second best to academic study. My hon. Friend is concerned about that, and we share that concern. A new law, introduced in January 2018—commonly known as the Baker clause—requires all secondary schools and academies to open their doors to university technical colleges, FE colleges and apprenticeship providers. That will give all young people a better understanding of the qualifications, courses and subjects available at key transition points.
Gordon Marsden
The Minister knows that we strongly welcome the Baker clause. There are anecdotal accounts about how successful or otherwise it has been so far. Does the Department have any statistics on how the Baker reforms have impacted on that area as of yet?
Nick Gibb
I do not have those figures to hand, so I will write to the hon. Gentleman when and if we have those statistics. We are as concerned about the issue as he is.
We expect to see schools setting up careers events, assemblies and options evenings so that providers can talk to pupils about what they offer and what it is like to learn in a different environment. The evidence is clear that sustained and varied contacts with mentors, coaches, employer networks, FE colleges, universities, alumni or other high-achieving individuals can motivate pupils to think beyond their immediate experiences, encouraging them to consider a broader and more ambitious range of future education and career options.
Activities involving employers, such as careers insights, mentoring, work tasters and work experience are important in giving young people the skills they need to succeed. Such interactions help open young people’s eyes to choices and opportunities, raise aspirations and prepare them for the world of work. As such, we want to create quality interactions between schools and businesses. The careers statutory guidance makes it clear that schools should offer work placements, work experience and other employer-based activities as part of their careers strategies for pupils in year 8 to year 13. Secondary schools will be expected to provide pupils with at least one meaningful interaction with employers per pupil per year, with a particular focus on STEM employers.
With an expanded role, the Careers & Enterprise Company, which was established in 2014, works to link schools with employers, making sure that every young person has access to inspiring encounters with the world of work, including work experience and other employer-based activities. It does that through its enterprise adviser network, which is delivered in partnership with local enterprise partnerships, providing information tailored to local skills and the local labour market. The network operates in all 38 local enterprise partnership areas and has grown rapidly. More than 2,000 business volunteers have been mobilised to work with schools and colleges on their careers strategies through the enterprise adviser network, and participants have reported a 50% increase in employer encounters for pupils. That partially answers the question raised by the hon. Gentleman, but we will come back to him with a fuller answer.
Through its work, the Careers & Enterprise Company has identified and is targeting those areas where additional provision is most needed. It is funding work during 2019-20 to test new approaches and produce resources to improve careers information, advice and guidance for individuals who are disadvantaged, including those with special educational needs and disabilities, looked-after children and those from minority ethnic groups.
My hon. Friend the Member for Hendon referred in particular to children in care. Last Monday, we published our children in need review. He also referred to the post-16 qualification review and expressed his view about BTECs. That consultation opened on 19 March 2019 and closed on 10 June 2019. We will respond in due course, and the views that he has expressed today will be taken into account as part of that review process.
Since 2010, the Government have introduced a range of reforms with the sole focus of raising standards. I have set out those standards in relation to secondary education and highlighted how those reforms have been complemented by a range of targeted programmes to support and develop teachers’ practice and to provide timely and effective careers advice for students.
Dr Offord
We have certainly had a good opportunity to discuss the issue. Given the nature of today’s debate, I did not want to intervene on either the Opposition or Government Front Bencher. However, I will raise a few issues.
The Opposition spokesman, the hon. Member for Blackpool South (Gordon Marsden), mentioned young carers, which is a very important aspect that is often overlooked. They are a hidden problem within the education system, and it is not always possible for teachers or other school staff to be aware of the requirements being levied on young pupils through disability or social problems experienced by their parents. We certainly need to take their responsibilities at home into account, particularly with regard to their attainment and aspirational opportunities.
The hon. Gentleman spoke particularly about teachers. However, I discussed the influence of not only the teaching establishment but external education providers, such as the Duke of Edinburgh scheme. It is not just about the number and remuneration of teachers. I disagree profoundly with the Labour party’s recent policy of opposing SATs, and their commitment to abolish them. That would be a retrograde step. Parents need the opportunity to gauge a school’s progress and understand how their children’s education is being advanced.
The hon. Gentleman mentioned the 600,000 NEETs, which he said has been a stubborn figure that has not moved. That is certainly another area that I would like to look at, and I encourage the Government to do likewise. The Local Government Association should take the lead when it comes to both NEETs and young carers. The Local Government Act 2000 allows local authorities to do anything within their social, environmental and wellbeing powers to address problems in their local areas. This is a particular problem, not only in rural areas but in coastal constituencies, and local authorities are best able to address it.
The hon. Gentleman also mentioned a 27% decline in access to higher education among coastal communities. We should be careful with statistics—I certainly have been very careful with the ones that I have used today—because it could simply be that those people have gone into forms of education and training other than higher education. Indeed, they may even have gone into employment of their own accord, such as self-employment.
To address some of the Minister’s comments, I have become a great fan of the EBacc system. Making choices about A-levels at a younger age—often 15 or even younger—is not always the best option. When I visited Middlesex University I was told that when pupils are asked whether they want to be a doctor or surgeon most of them say, “No way! Why would I want to do that?” However, when they are asked questions such as whether they want to work with people, they are more likely to say that they would. That can be extended to considering other opportunities. Whether somebody ultimately engages in medicine and becomes a surgeon or looks at other areas, offering an occupation rather than an opportunity at a young age is the wrong approach.
The Minister and I have previously discussed reading, which he is as passionate about as I am. I know that he reads every day before he goes to sleep, and I read every day, on the tube and whenever I can. I am very encouraged by the statistics that he mentioned about reading ability. For me, reading has become a lifelong passion. It is my mother teaching me to read, as well as my education, that has led to lifelong learning. That has all come from reading, so it can only be good.
Finally, the Minister mentioned the Baker clause, which is very welcome, and the 23% increase in the number of STEM subjects at A-level. I have certainly seen that in schools in my constituency, including Copthall School for girls, which I have now mentioned on two occasions in this place.
Action has been taken by the Government and progress has been made, but raising aspiration cannot be achieved simply by Government. I mentioned the Local Government Association, and the Opposition spokesman mentioned teachers. Parents and relatives also have a responsibility to ensure aspiration in their children by providing guidance and encouragement along their pathway through life. Through a collaboration of all those different influences, we can achieve higher rates of aspiration, and make our country an even better place.
Question put and agreed to.
Resolved,
That this House has considered raising aspiration in secondary education.
Written Statements
(4 years, 10 months ago)
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Small Businesses: Late Payments
(4 years, 10 months ago)
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The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (Kelly Tolhurst)
On 4 October 2018, we launched a call for evidence, asking for views on how to create a responsible payment culture for small business. I have published the full Government response to that call for evidence and placed copies in the Libraries of both Houses.
The Government are committed to supporting small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) to start well and grow, including a network of 38 growth hubs across England providing advice, guidance and support. As part of our industrial strategy we have an action plan to unlock over £20 billion of investment in innovative and high potential businesses. And where we see practices that unfairly constrain SMEs’ finance choices, we are prepared to act. For example, we recently removed a barrier that was preventing some SMEs from using invoice finance because of prohibitive contract terms imposed by their customers. This new measure is expected to provide a long-term boost to the UK economy worth almost £1 billion.
While there are a number of measures already in place to tackle late payment, from the prompt payment code, the ability to charge interest on late payments and increased transparency through the payment practices reporting duty, the call for evidence told us that there is more to do to improve the payment landscape. This is why I have announced that I will now take further and firmer action to tackle the scourge of late payments, while maintaining a holistic approach to culture change by using all of the avenues available to us in this space.
I will shortly be launching a consultation seeking views on strengthening the small business commissioner’s (hereafter “the commissioner”) ability to assist and advocate for small business in the area of late payments, through the provision of powers to compel the disclosure of information and seeking views on suitable sanctions for failure to comply.
I have also announced that the responsibility of the voluntary prompt payment code is to move to the commissioner and be reformed: this will unify prompt payment measures with the commissioner and address weaknesses within the current code’s operation.
I will take a tough compliance approach to large companies who do not comply with the payment practices reporting duty. The legislation allows for the prosecution of those who do not comply and I will use this enforcement power against those who do not comply where necessary.
The Government will launch a business basics fund competition with funding of up to £1 million, which will encourage SMEs to utilise payment technology.
I also intend to establish a ministerially led group to bring together key Government Departments to act on improving prompt payment across both the public and private sectors.
We are working with UK Finance and the finance sector to review the role supply chain finance plays in fair and prompt payment, including the potential for an industry led standard for good practice in supply chain finance. We also want to bring greater transparency to how supply chain finance is reported in company accounts and assessed in audits, by working with the Financial Reporting Council to develop guidance and build it into their sampling of companies’ accounts.
Our modern industrial strategy aims to make Britain the best place to start and grow a business and removing barriers to growth is key to this. The response to the call for evidence and the package of measures I have announced will tackle the continuing issue of late payments to ensure this happens.
[HCWS1645]
Competitiveness Council 27-28 May 2019: Post-Council Statement
(4 years, 10 months ago)
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The Minister for Universities, Science, Research and Innovation (Chris Skidmore)
The Competitiveness Council took place on 27-28 May. The UK was represented by Katrina Williams, deputy permanent representative to the EU on day one (Internal market and industry); and by myself on day two (Research and space).
Day one (Internal market and industry)
The final Competitiveness Council of the Romanian presidency agreed three sets of Council conclusions: on the single market; on industrial policy and on tourism and reviewed the legislative achievements of the last six months.
The Council discussed the link between competition policy and EU competitiveness. Commissioner Bienkowska presented the Commission’s analysis on market integration, market concentration in the EU and protectionist practices in third countries. Ministers discussed EU competition rules and EU trade policy with regards to third country competition. The UK cited the Furman review which recommends updating competition policy for the digital age.
Ministers held a wide-ranging discussion on priorities for the future of EU industrial and single market policy. On industry there was broad agreement that the new Commission should develop an integrated industrial strategy which recognises global challenges. Discussions focused on the need to develop strategic value chains within Europe and welcomed the focus on important projects of common Europe interest (IPCEIs). The UK highlighted the need to recognise the global nature of value chains when developing policies. The increasing servitisation of manufacturing, the importance of digitalisation and the need to support the transition to a low-carbon economy were also key themes. The Council adopted conclusions on a vision for an EU industrial policy strategy (9263/19) and the future of the single market (9402/19). Ministers also agreed conclusions on the importance of tourism (document 9264/19).
The Commission reported progress on current legislative items: the directive on cross-border conversions, mergers and divisions; the directives on the modernisation of the EU consumer protection rules; and the collective interests of consumers and the general safety of vehicles regulation. The Commission also outlined its work on better regulation and provided an update on the future of the Rapex market surveillance system following the 2018 assessment.
The presidency reported on its conference in Craiova, Romania on the automotive sector on 18 March. The forum discussed challenges around low emission vehicles; connected and autonomous vehicles; and the competitiveness of European industry.
The Commission reflected on work to move the EU towards a circular economy and to achieve the objective of recycling 10 million tonnes of plastic by 2025.
The incoming Finnish presidency set out its future priorities: environmentally and socially sustainable growth with an integrated view of the single market and a modern industrial policy.
Day two - Research
Day two of the Competitiveness Council (Internal market, industry, research and space) took place on the 28 May in Brussels. I represented the UK.
The Competitiveness Council started with a policy debate on strengthening Europe’s role as a global actor and promoting international co-operation, space diplomacy and contributing to building the global space governance. The UK stressed the importance of open collaboration with third countries and entities with expertise, such as the European Space Agency (ESA), in order to achieve the strategic objectives of the EU in space.
Following the policy debate there was a brief “extraordinary ESA Council”, which adopted the “space as an enabler” conclusions.
The 11th EU-ESA Council was jointly chaired by the Spanish ESA presidency and Romanian EU Council presidency. They facilitated an exchange of views on the topic of “space as an enabler”. In the UK’s intervention Minister Skidmore highlighted the need to focus on better exploitation of the new technologies—artificial intelligence, internet of things and quantum technology—which would drive the 4th industrial revolution.
The Romanian presidency then resumed the Competitiveness Council with a policy debate on research and innovation as a driving force for a more competitive European Union. The UK stressed the importance of researcher freedom, closing the innovation gap and operating in a global context—as well the importance of training the next generation: in this context, the UK announced that EU students starting courses in England in the 2020-21 academic year will have guaranteed home fee status and financial support for the duration of their courses. EEA/EFTA and Swiss nationals (and their family members) will remain eligible for support on the same basis as now.
During any other business the Slovakian delegation outlined the recently signed BIOEAST initiative whilst the Romanian presidency recalled the launch of the joint strategic research and innovation agenda for the Black sea (SRIA) on 8 May. The incoming Finnish presidency concluded the Council by providing information on the work programme of their EU Council presidency.
[HCWS1640]
Groceries Code Adjudicator
(4 years, 10 months ago)
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The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (Kelly Tolhurst)
I have today launched the statutory review of the Groceries Code Adjudicator (GCA).
The GCA was established by the Groceries Code Adjudicator Act 2013 (“the Act”). Its role is to monitor and enforce the groceries supply code of practice (“the code”), which the UK’s designated large grocery retailers must comply with when dealing with their direct suppliers.
Section 15 of the Act requires the Government to review periodically the performance of the GCA. The first review carried out in 2016 covered the period from the creation of the GCA (in June 2013) to 31 March 2016. The second review will cover the period from 1 April 2016 to 31 March 2019.
The primary purpose of the review is to look back over the period 1 April 2016 to 31 March 2019 and to seek views and evidence which will allow the Government to make an assessment of the performance of the GCA against the measures set out in the Act. These measures are explained in the terms of reference. The statutory review is not a review of the code or the remit of the GCA. The code is a competition measure owned by the Competition and Markets Authority as the UK’s independent competition authority.
The Act requires us to consult the following:
the GCA;
the Competition and Markets Authority;
the retailers subject to the code;
one or more persons representing the interests of suppliers;
one or more persons representing the interests of consumers; and
any other appropriate person.
The consultation will run for 12 weeks and can be accessed at: https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/groceries-code-adjudicator-statutory-review-2016-to-2019. Stakeholders have until 12 September 2019 to respond. Following this, BEIS will analyse the responses. A report on the findings will then be published and laid before Parliament.
The Terms of Reference for the GCA Review have today been placed in the Libraries of both Houses.
[HCWS1641]
Education, Youth, Culture and Sport Council
(4 years, 10 months ago)
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The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (Mims Davies)
The Education, Youth, Culture and Sport (EYCS) Council took place in Brussels on 22-23 May 2019. The UK’s deputy permanent representative to the EU, Katrina Williams, represented the UK for the youth session on 22 May. The Minister for School Standards, my right hon. Friend the Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton (Nick Gibb), represented the UK in the education session. The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, Lord Ashton, represented the UK on 23 May for the culture/audio-visual session and part of the sports session.
Youth
The session began with the adoption of both the Council conclusions on young people and the future of work and the resolution on the governance of the EU youth dialogue.
This was then followed by a policy debate on young people as agents of democracy in the EU.
Other
There was information from the European Commission in regards to DiscoverEU and information from the Portuguese delegation on the world conference of Ministers responsible for Youth 2019 and Youth Forum Lisboa (22-23 June 2019).
Culture/audio-visual
The meeting began with the adoption of both the Council conclusions on young creative generations and conclusions on co-productions. This was followed by a policy debate on “from tackling disinformation to rebuilding EU citizens’ trust in the media”.
Other
Information was provided by the Hungarian delegation on the nomination of Veszprém for the European capital of culture 2023. In addition, information was also provided from the Spanish and Portuguese delegations on celebrating the fifth centenary of the first circum- navigation of the world, led by Fernão de Magalhães and Juan Sebastián Elcano.
Sport
The sport session of EYCS began with the adoption of a resolution on EU member states’ representation and co-ordination for the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) meeting in Montreal. In addition, Council conclusions on access to sport for persons with disabilities we also adopted.
The session then proceeded with a policy debate on increasing the participation of children and young people in sport in 21st century Europe.
Other
There was information from the EU member states’ representatives in the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) foundation board on the meeting with WADA that took place in Montreal on 14-16 May 2019, information from the Finnish presidency on the work programme of the incoming presidency and information from the Danish delegation about the Council of Europe convention on the manipulation of sports competitions (match fixing).
To conclude, there was information from the Bulgarian, Greek and Romanian delegations on the signing of a memorandum of understanding between Bulgaria, Greece, Romania and Serbia to host either the Euro 2028 championship or the 2030 World cup.
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Telecoms Council
(4 years, 10 months ago)
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The Minister for Digital and the Creative Industries (Margot James)
The Telecommunications formation of the Transport, Telecommunications and Energy Council took place in Luxembourg on 7 June 2019. The deputy permanent representative to the EU, Katrina Williams, represented the UK.
The Council held a policy debate and adopted conclusions on the future of a highly digitised Europe beyond 2020: “Boosting digital and economic competitiveness across the Union and digital cohesion”. The Council then considered a progress report on the e-privacy regulation.
The Romanian presidency then provided information on the digital Europe programme in the next multi-annual financial framework from 2021-27, and the proposed regulation establishing the European cybersecurity competence centre and the network of co-ordination centres. The Czech presidency then provided information on the Prague 5G security conference. The EU’s counter-terrorism co-ordinator provided information on 5G and law enforcement.
The Romanian presidency then provided an overview of presidency events in Romania. The incoming Finnish presidency provided information on its work plan.
Due to a lack of ministerial quorum at the Council, the decision on the position to be taken by EU member states on behalf of the European Union in the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) world radiocommunication conference 2019 (WRC-19) will now be adopted at the Employment, Social Policy, Health, and Consumer Affairs Council as an A-point on 13-14 June. The recast public sector information directive was adopted as an A-point at the Justice and Home Affairs Council on 6 June.
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Bovine TB
(4 years, 10 months ago)
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The Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr Robert Goodwill)
Today I am updating the House on the implementation of the Government’s strategy to eradicate bovine TB in England by 2038.
Bovine TB remains one of the greatest animal health threats to the UK, causing significant hardship and distress for hard-working farmers and rural communities. Government and industry are therefore continuing to take strong action to eradicate the disease.
Professor Sir Charles Godfray’s independent review of the strategy highlighted a number of potential further actions while noting the difficulties associated with eradicating bovine TB. The review’s conclusions include improving surveillance in cattle herds, the need to continue to address the disease in badgers and for more research and development (R&D). We continue to assess the review’s findings and plan to publish a full response in due course. I am however today providing further information on reinforcing TB testing in the high-risk area, announcing plans to invite further applications to our badger vaccination grant scheme and confirming the licensing and authorisation by Natural England of three supplementary badger control areas for 2019. Further information is available on gov.uk.
In May 2018 we announced that from 2020 we would introduce six-monthly cattle surveillance testing, with less frequent testing for lower risk herds, in the high-risk area (HRA) of England to enable earlier detection and eradication of disease, and to prevent it spreading to new areas. Having considered the likely demands that roll-out across the whole of the HRA in one step would place on cattle herd owners and the veterinary businesses that carry out the vast majority of the testing we are now working on a phased introduction from 2020. We will provide further details to affected cattle keepers and veterinary businesses in due course.
Vaccination of badgers against TB using BCG can provide a level of protection and can play a role in limiting TB spread to healthy badger populations. Therefore, a third round of applications for the “Badger edge vaccination scheme” (BEVS 2) is now open, with further grant funding available to private groups wishing to carry out badger vaccination in the edge area of England. Groups will receive at least 50% funding towards their eligible costs. This builds on the four initial four-year projects we have funded.
Alongside this we are investing in social and economic research to understand farmer behaviours and drivers of: cattle purchase and movement; attitudes to risk-based trading; attitudes to biosecurity, wildlife control and vaccination; and analysis of pros and cons of compensation versus insurance schemes.
In May 2019 fieldwork closed on a self-completion postal survey. Over 1,250 responses were received from herd owners across England. This will provide national representative estimates of cattle farmers’ attitudes and behaviours and towards biosecurity, cattle purchasing, and what influences on-farm decision making. We expect to publish headline findings in July 2019.
In July 2019 fieldwork will commence on a telephone survey of 1,500 HRA and edge area farms which have suffered a breakdown. The survey will estimate the monetary costs involved in a bovine TB breakdown which herd owners are not compensated for, including increased staffing and housing costs, and loss of productivity. This will allow accurate analysis of the financial impact of the disease to industry and individual farms. The project will report early in 2020.
We are determined to eradicate this devastating disease as quickly as possible.
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Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse: Archdiocese of Birmingham Case Study
(4 years, 10 months ago)
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The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Sajid Javid)
Today the independent inquiry into child sexual abuse has published its latest case study report, which can be found at www.iicsa.org.uk
This report relates to the Archdiocese of Birmingham in the inquiry’s Roman Catholic Church investigation. I pay tribute to the strength and courage of the victims and survivors who have shared their experiences to ensure the inquiry can deliver its vital work.
Government will review this report and consider how to respond to its content in due course.
I would like to thank Professor Jay and her panel for their continued work to uncover the truth, expose what went wrong in the past and to leam the lessons for the future.
[HCWS1642]
Employment, Social Policy, Health and Consumer Affairs Council
(4 years, 10 months ago)
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The Minister for Employment (Alok Sharma)
The Employment, Social Policy, Health and Consumer Affairs Council took place on 13 June 2019 in Luxembourg. The deputy permanent representative to the European Union, Katrina Williams, represented the UK.
The Council adopted conclusions on: closing the gender pay gap; implications for the safety and health of workers in the changing world of work; and the EU Council auditors’ report on the fund for European aid to the most deprived (FEAD).
The Council noted a progress report on the directive on equal treatment and debated employment and social policy aspects of country specific recommendations.
The presidency gave updates on two current legislative proposals: a regulation on European social statistics and revision of the regulations on the co-ordination of social security systems. The Council closed with information on events and initiatives in the broader field of employment and social policy.
In the margins of the meeting, Bratislava, Slovakia, was elected to host the new European labour authority.
[HCWS1638]
Office for Nuclear Regulation Annual Report and Accounts 2018-19
(4 years, 10 months ago)
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The Minister for Disabled People, Health and Work (Justin Tomlinson)
Later today the Office for Nuclear Regulation’s annual report and accounts for 2018-19 will be published. Having consulted the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, who is accountable for nuclear security, and the Office for Nuclear Regulation, I can confirm, in accordance with paragraph 25(3) of schedule 7 to the Energy Act 2013, that there have been no exclusions to the published document on the grounds of national security.
[HCWS1639]
House of Lords
Northern Ireland: Inter-party Talks
(4 years, 10 months ago)
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Lord Lexden
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what progress has been made in the inter-party talks in Northern Ireland.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Northern Ireland Office and Scotland Office (Lord Duncan of Springbank) (Con)
We are now six weeks into talks aimed at restoring power-sharing, devolved government. The issues on which the parties are focusing include language, identity and sustainability. These are complex and sensitive matters, but the parties have approached them in a spirit of engagement and with a willingness to find solutions. However, there remain significant gaps between the parties that still need to be bridged if we are to secure an agreement.
Lord Lexden (Con)
Is it not the case that none of the parties in Northern Ireland is, at the moment, expressing optimism about the talks? A few days ago, the leader of the Ulster Unionist Party said:
“It’s time to get the political leaders together for some hard political graft”.
Why on earth has this not happened already? Is it because Sinn Féin is once again putting forward impossible demands, instead of negotiating constructively?
While the impasse drags on and on, will the Government now get on and provide compensation for the victims of institutional child sex abuse in Northern Ireland? The Northern Ireland parties are united on this issue and the Northern Ireland Office’s inaction, in defiance of their wishes, is a complete disgrace.
Lord Duncan of Springbank
My noble friend raises two points. On the first, it is important to strike the right language. This is a positive time in the talks; I believe that progress is being made. It would be premature to say that we are at the final moment, but right now the conversations are being conducted in the most positive language that we have heard in some time. I answered a Question on institutional abuse last week. I note again that a number of issues need to be resolved, as a result of matters raised by the parties themselves. Once these have been examined, analysed and converted into the next step, progress will be made.
Lord Morgan (Lab)
My Lords, are the Government not in a hopelessly impossible dilemma? On one hand, they are supposed to be keeping the ring at a time when Northern Ireland does not have a Government. On the other, they are propped up by a small group of pro-Brexit Ulster unionists, even though Northern Ireland voted strongly to remain. Therefore, is the loss of unity of the United Kingdom one of the many aspects of the catastrophe that Brexit is likely to impose on this country?
Lord Duncan of Springbank
My answer is categorically no. Unity is not in question; unity is not in doubt. Matters in Northern Ireland must be resolved by the parties in Northern Ireland. Only they can reach the consensus required to deliver a sustainable Executive.
Lord Bruce of Bennachie (LD)
Does the House recognise that the upturn in support for the Alliance Party in the recent elections demonstrates that there is a mood in Northern Ireland for reconciliation and compromise, to which the political parties need to respond? In what way will be the Government be prepared to ensure that these talks continue until a conclusion is reached, bringing in outside agencies if necessary, and to legislate in this place if that helps to take pressure off some of the difficult issues? These things can all bring a solution and the people of Northern Ireland have expressed a wish to get a result.
Lord Duncan of Springbank
No stone will be left unturned in the effort to secure a restored Executive. The talks going on now are conducted in the most positive of times. It is important that, during this period, we make hay while the sun shines.
Lord Bew (CB)
My Lords, one thing delaying progress in these talks is uncertainty about the outcome of the judge-led inquiry into the renewable heating scandal. Is the Minister in a position to give any information on when the judge will finally report? All parties are waiting to see what the fallout will be before they commit themselves further in the talks process.
Lord Duncan of Springbank
The noble Lord raises a question to which I do not have the answer, but when I have it I will ensure that he and the rest of the House know exactly when the report will be published.
Lord Cormack (Con)
My Lords, we have repeatedly raised two points in your Lordships’ House. First, could we not have the Assembly summoned? There is nothing to prevent the Assembly meeting without an Executive. My noble friend Lord Trimble has raised this on a number of occasions. Secondly, could we please have some progress on the appointment of a so-called facilitator? It has gone on for month after month. I pay tribute to my noble friend, but speed is of the essence and we are not seeing any speed.
Lord Duncan of Springbank
My noble friend raises points he has raised in the past. It is important to stress that we are witnessing, I hope, a progressive step, out of which will emerge resolution of the issues that both he and the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland passionately care about.
Lord Hay of Ballyore (DUP)
My Lords, we all want talks re-established at Stormont in the hope that the political parties in Northern Ireland can come to an agreement that allows the Assembly and the Executive to get up and running. But does the Minister agree that any agreement reached at the talks at Stormont must be balanced and fair, so that both communities—every community—can buy in and take ownership of that agreement? We cannot have a situation where one side takes over.
Lord Duncan of Springbank
The noble Lord is absolutely right: it must be balanced, fair and, importantly, sustainable.
Lord Hain (Lab)
My Lords, does the Minister agree that it will be a shameful betrayal of the fine memory of Lyra McKee if the parties—both the DUP and Sinn Féin—do not bear in mind what she stood for and reach an agreement? In facilitating that, does he agree that the personal involvement of the next Prime Minister, whoever that is, is critical, as my noble friend Lord Murphy, the Labour Leader and I have repeatedly urged? He must get directly involved and convene a summit, because that is sometimes the only way to crack these problems.
Lord Duncan of Springbank
The noble Lord is right to raise the sad death of Lyra McKee. I think that has added momentum and impetus to the current talks and it would be a betrayal of all she stood for if we do not finally secure a restored Executive. I can assure the noble Lord that the Prime Minister has taken an active interest and even last night was in direct contact with the Taoiseach to discuss these matters and give, as best we can, a favourable momentum to the ongoing talks.
Baroness Smith of Basildon (Lab)
I thank the Minister for referring to the Prime Minister. I have to say that this week has not been an encouraging one for the NIO. It started with the NIO trying to hold an event that all MLAs refused to attend. It moved on to rumours that vital talks are to be paused over the summer, and at the last count we had four possible Conservative Prime Ministers who all think that no deal is an acceptable outcome, given the implications for Northern Ireland. It is essential that the Government engage better, the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Lexden, in his Question. The Minister told us that the Prime Minister had a conversation with the Taoiseach last night. How many times has the current Prime Minister met with all the Northern Ireland political parties? Will the Minister commit to doing everything he can to ensure that the next Prime Minister meets every party from Northern Ireland as soon as possible after he enters No. 10?
Lord Duncan of Springbank
The noble Baroness raises several points. The important thing to stress is that the resolution of this issue rests not in London but in Belfast between those parties. The Prime Minister and the Taoiseach have sought, by their various offices, to engage directly with that. As to the future Prime Minister, I do not know whether he will ask my advice, but I will be very happy to give it to him.
Brexit: Discussions with the European Union
(4 years, 10 months ago)
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Baroness McIntosh of Pickering
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what progress they have made in discussions with the European Union about the United Kingdom’s withdrawal from the European Union.
The Minister of State, Department for Exiting the European Union (Lord Callanan) (Con)
My Lords, the UK and the EU have agreed a deal that works for the UK’s economy, security and the union. As noble Lords will be aware, the House of Commons has rejected this deal on three occasions. It is now for the next Prime Minister to seek a way forward that honours the result of the 2016 referendum.
Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Con)
My Lords, I am grateful to my noble friend for that reply. As he is aware, there are effectively only three months remaining in which to negotiate a variation of the deal that will get past the House of Commons. Will my noble friend take this opportunity to tell the House what discussions are taking place at the level of officials to see what leeway can be achieved regarding the political declaration? We are mindful that each of the remaining candidates is in favour of a deal, and it would be shameful if it fell through because of lack of time to negotiate.
Lord Callanan
Informal discussions are always going on. The Prime Minister is in Brussels today for the European Council, where she will be having bilateral meetings with several other European leaders.
Baroness Ludford (LD)
My Lords, the various backers of Boris Johnson, such as Dominic Raab and David Davis, have backed him on the basis that we must leave the EU on 31 October. However, in the debate on Monday the putative future Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, refused to give such an absolute guarantee. He thought that leaving on 31 October was only “eminently feasible”. Could the Minister tell us what precisely is the Brexit policy of the person who looks likely to be the next Prime Minister?
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town (Lab)
I wish it was that funny. Could the Minister undertake to explain to Mr Johnson that if there is no deal, there will be no transition period? If he does nothing else, he will have earned his place here as a Minister if he takes this message back, because Mr Johnson does not seem to understand it.
Lord Callanan
I am fascinated by the degree to which the Opposition want to comment on Conservative leadership elections—I note that nobody is commenting on the Liberal Democrat leadership election at the moment. I and other ministerial colleagues have had discussions with a number of the candidates. We have had some fascinating discourse on the possible options for the new Prime Minister to take forward.
Baroness Tonge (Non-Afl)
My Lords, in the absence of any progress on a deal with the European Union and, concurrently, of any progress on the re-formation of a Government for Northern Ireland, when will we put the women of Northern Ireland out of their misery and allow our abortion laws to apply there ?
Lord Callanan
As the noble Baroness will be well aware, that is really not a policy responsibility of my department, so I will pass on that one.
Lord Hamilton of Epsom (Con)
Can my noble friend tell us when the EU will take responsibility for half of this deal, which has been turned down by gigantic majorities in the House of Commons?
Lord Callanan
My noble friend is well aware that the deal was agreed jointly between the UK Government and the EU. Any solution will also need to be agreed jointly.
Lord Pannick (CB)
Can the Minister assure the House that Parliament will not be prorogued to prevent it expressing a view on the appropriate way forward before 31 October?
Lord Callanan
Parliament has expressed its view on these matters many times, both in the other place and in this House. I am sure that both Houses will continue to express their views in the future.
Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall (Lab)
My Lords, the Minister expressed some surprise in an earlier answer at the interest that was being shown in the Conservative Party leadership. I am sure he will not be surprised to learn that the interest is due to this being an election for not just the Conservative Party leader but the next Prime Minister. Could he therefore give a slightly better answer on what he anticipates the policy of that upcoming Prime Minister to be?
Lord Callanan
I take the noble Baroness’s point: I was being slightly facetious in my answer. Of course there is interest in what the policy of the next Prime Minister will be, but I do not know who that person will be yet and therefore I do not know exactly what that policy will be.
Lord Mackay of Clashfern (Con)
My Lords, might there be an opportunity for the House of Commons to indicate what alteration to the present agreement it is seeking? I have not yet seen a detailed amendment proposed in the House of Commons to the existing agreement in the hope that a modification of it could be agreed.
Lord Callanan
As always, my noble and learned friend makes some wise points, but an amendment was agreed in the House of Commons: the so-called Brady amendment on alternative arrangements to ensure no hard border. That remains the one positive amendment passed, indicating where support in the House of Commons might lie, but of course we need to persuade the EU of the merits of that.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
I am always happy to give way to the noble and learned Lord, Lord Mackay of Clashfern, for whom the House has the greatest respect. However, as even this House seems to be exhausted by this issue and as discussions appear to be in limbo, what is the Minister doing with his day?
Lord Callanan
This morning, answering the noble Lord’s question. My time is gainfully occupied. I was in Portugal last week to sign a treaty on reciprocal voting rights to ensure that UK citizens in Portugal and Portuguese citizens in the UK can participate in local elections. We are pursuing a number of such treaties. We are also getting on with no-deal preparation because, as I have repeated many times, that remains the legal default.
Catalytic Converter Thefts
Lord Berkeley of Knighton
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the recent increase in thefts of catalytic converters; and of the impact of these thefts on (1) motorists, and (2) the insurance industry.
Baroness Barran (Con)
My Lords, we know that a rise in the value of metal may be a driver of recent increases in metal theft. We do not have specific data on the theft of catalytic converters. However, recorded offences of metal theft in March 2018 were still 73% lower than in March 2013. We absolutely recognise the distress, disruption and potential cost that this crime can cause victims.
Lord Berkeley of Knighton (CB)
I am very grateful to the Minister for that Answer, which amplifies the point I wish to elucidate, which is that we do not know how widespread this crime is. I declare at this point that my interest was piqued when I was, shall we say, catalytically bereaved, but it is no laughing matter, because it costs £2,000 to replace a converter, some motorists have lost two or even three, and a gang is going round armed with a metal bar to deter people who would stop their malfeasance. Does she have any idea, perhaps from speaking to motor manufacturers, how motorists can best protect their converters—perhaps mechanically—both now and in future?
Baroness Barran
I regret the noble Lord’s catalytic bereavement—it sounds unpleasant—but he asks a helpful question to which there are two answers. First, practical advice is available from police forces and easily accessible online. They advise installing what is known as a Thatcham-approved alarm, which goes off if a vehicle is lifted or tilted. One can also buy protection devices for catalytic converters as a form of guard, there are marker systems and, obviously, the police advise parking in a well-lit garage. Secondly, my honourable friend the Minister in the other place has set up a vehicle theft task force, which is working with the motor and insurance industries on longer-term solutions.
Earl Attlee (Con)
My Lords, does the Minister agree that this is neither a technical nor a policing issue but, at its root, a social one? In particular, our prison system is not configured or resourced to reprogramme, educate and train our errant youngsters so that they can engage exclusively in legitimate economic activity.
Baroness Barran
My noble friend speaks with great knowledge of the prison system—
Baroness Barran
I should clarify; his knowledge does not come from personal experience, as I understand it. He makes a fair point. There are many reasons, including social ones, behind crime. Of all types of crime, this is one where a technical solution is relevant. Metal theft is down by 73% since the scrap metal Act was introduced in 2013. In this industry, technical innovation has helped to reduce crime.
Lord Paddick (LD)
My Lords, Antonia Grey, the public affairs manager for the British Metals Recycling Association, said:
“It is highly likely that these stolen catalytic converters are finding their way into the recycling system here by being taken to illegal scrap metal dealers who are openly offering to pay cash for materials. This is happening because there is now no enforcement of the law at a time when the budgets of police and local authorities have been eviscerated”.
Does the Minister agree?
Baroness Barran
I am aware that if you go online—there is no end to the research one does in your Lordships’ House to find out about these things—you find a number of dealers advertising cash for scrap metal, as the noble Lord mentions. Often, however, when you go on to the site, it offers delayed payment, so the dealers may be using a cash offer as a hook. The noble Lord makes a fair point. Obviously, the rise in metal prices has an impact on the attractiveness of this crime type but the scrap metal Act was reviewed in 2017 and found to be working well. We believe that part of the increase in recorded metal thefts is due to better police recording. I repeat: overall crime in this area is down by 73%.
Lord Faulkner of Worcester (Lab)
My Lords, next Wednesday, I will ask the Government a Question on the theft of metal more generally, not just catalytic converters; I think the noble Lord, Lord Henley, will answer. I was interested in the Minister’s figure relating to the drop in metal theft since the 2013 Act. That certainly occurred to begin with; one reason for that was the work of the metal theft task force. However, that task force was abandoned; the latest figures, some of which I will bring to the House next week, show that since it was scrapped, the incidence of metal theft has gone up again. Does the Minister agree?
Baroness Barran
I can only apologise that I am not familiar with the details of the task force but I agree that metal theft has increased by 30% over the past year. I look forward to the noble Lord’s Question.
Lord Hogan-Howe (CB)
My Lords, does the Minister agree that crime was generally coming down until about three years ago? One of the principal reasons for that was design. Two things have happened: car design has not kept up with thieves’ ability to steal cars and, sadly, car manufacturers have not continued to prevent catalytic converters being removed and still being useful as converters or scrap metal. Surely that is where the Government ought to aim their attention. It is a long-term project because changing the type takes a while in Europe and, for the manufacturer, the lead time to change a design is long. However, I see no efforts to change car design or catalytic converters yet.
Baroness Barran
The noble Lord is right that car theft has gone up by about 7% in the past year. In particular, the theft of cars less than a year old, which I think the noble Lord referred to, has increased over the past five years from a fairly steady 5% to 10% to closer to 20%. The vehicle theft task force will look at these exact areas, working with the motor and insurance industries to improve vehicle security standards.
Youth Violence
The Lord Bishop of St Albans
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what steps they are taking to address youth violence.
Baroness Barran (Con)
My Lords, with the leave of the House, before I respond to the right reverend Prelate I am sure that the Chamber will join me in feeling profound regret at the recent tragic events and note that our thoughts are with the families of those who have been affected on our streets. The Government are taking steps to address all aspects of youth violence, from prevention to enforcement. Diverting young people away from crime is at the heart of our approach, which is why we are investing more than £220 million in early intervention schemes to steer children and young people away from serious violence.
The Lord Bishop of St Albans
My Lords, last weekend at least four people were killed through serious violence on the streets of the capital, and on Tuesday a young person in Luton, in my own diocese, was stabbed more than 20 times. Among all those who are trying to work on this problem, the churches have been involved, and indeed one church has produced a public statue of a phoenix made from 500 knives that had been reclaimed through a knife amnesty—a question of turning swords into ploughshares. Can the Minister tell us whether Her Majesty’s Government have made an assessment of the effectiveness of weapons amnesties in reducing the number of weapons on the streets, and whether more such initiatives are being planned?
Baroness Barran
The right reverend Prelate paints a powerful image of the phoenix made from knives. On amnesty initiatives, individual police forces can use amnesties and surrender bins whenever they want; those are operational decisions that can be taken at a local level. Such initiatives are a key component of Operation Sceptre, and the most recent week of co-ordinated national action took place in March, during which time more than 10,000 knives were surrendered, including in surrender bins. We are expecting another week of action in the autumn. However, we cannot look at any of these initiatives in isolation; it is a combination that will make the difference.
Lord Rosser (Lab)
My Lords, I share the Minister’s words on the recent tragic events. In 2010, there were 3,600 Sure Start centres offering childcare and play sessions, parenting advice and employment coaching. Up to 1,000 centres have closed since then, with a cut of some 62% in council early years service spending since 2010, and the trend is continuing. Over just the four years to 2017-18, the number of children using Sure Start in the 30 most deprived authorities was down by 22%, and by 12% in the 30 least deprived councils. What is the Government’s analysis of the impact that the austerity-driven reduction over nearly 10 years in the number of Sure Start centres, and the level of service that they can continue to provide, is already having and will continue to have on the level of youth violence?
Baroness Barran
The Government response to the question put by the noble Lord is again to say, as was set out in the report of the Children’s Commissioner published in February this year, that many factors influence youth violence. We do not help young people if we try to pin it exclusively on one. The noble Lord makes a fair point about changes in provision for early years, but significant changes have also occurred in the drugs market which have had a significant influence. The Government’s focus is to move away from a purely criminal justice response towards a public health response and a long-term commitment in this area.
Baroness Manzoor (Con)
My Lords, the violence and the deaths of young people on our streets are nothing short of a national emergency on a national scale. Can my noble friend the Minister say exactly what the Government are doing now to address this issue, particularly in relation to police visibility on our streets, youth funding and school exclusions?
Baroness Barran
Well, I have with me a copy of Hansard from Monday, when my honourable friend the Minister in the other place gave a list of what we are doing. I fear that time does permit me to read it, but it runs to more than half a column. So this really is an area where the Government are doing a great deal.
In response to my noble friend’s specific questions, police funding is increasing by over £1 billion this year, as your Lordships are aware, and we are aware of plans to recruit of a further 3,500 police officers and staff. With youth services, we are particularly proud of the Youth Endowment Fund that the Government have announced, which will be delivered over 10 years. Those of us who have worked in the charity sector know how valuable 10-year funding is. The figures on school exclusions are not entirely clear about the impact of exclusions, but 21% of young people convicted of possession of a knife were excluded from school, 50% of them after the event.
Lord Paddick (LD)
My Lords, I appreciate that the noble Baroness said that the Government were doing a lot, but their so-called Serious Violence Strategy is actually an underfunded collection of unconnected existing initiatives and various piecemeal pots of money that have been indiscriminately thrown at the problem over recent years. When will the Government take youth violence seriously by setting specific goals based on a coherent and comprehensive strategy to address both the symptoms and causes of youth violence?
Baroness Barran
I think the noble Lord is a little harsh. The Government absolutely recognise that a huge culture change is required and that for too long the police have been the service of last resort in addressing youth violence. That will never get to the root of the problem unless we are able to engage other services—education, health and so forth. So just two days ago, as the noble Lord may be aware, my right honourable friend the Home Secretary announced funding for the initial establishment of 18 violence reduction units, which I hope will produce exactly the results the noble Lord aspires to.
Arrangement of Business
Lord Taylor of Holbeach (Con)
My Lords, I am sure it will be for the convenience of the House if I rise at this point to make a short statement about recess dates for the summer. The dates will be available as usual in the Printed Paper Office. Of course, the following dates are provisional and subject to the progress of business. But noble Lords might like to note that we will rise at the conclusion of business on Thursday 25 July and return on Tuesday 3 September.
Digital Economy Act 2017 (Amendment) Bill [HL]
Thursday 20th June 2019
(4 years, 10 months ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Digital Economy Act 2017 (Amendment) View all Digital Economy Act 2017 (Amendment) Debates Read Hansard Text
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab Co-op)
My Lords, this Bill would amend the Digital Economy Act 2017 in respect of TV licence fee concessions by reference to age, and shift the responsibility from the BBC back to the Government, where it belongs.
Sentencing (Pre-consolidation Amendments) Bill [HL]
The Senior Deputy Speaker
That, as proposed by the Committee of Selection, the following Lords be appointed to the Special Public Bill Committee on the Sentencing (Pre-consolidation Amendments) Bill [HL]:
Bassam of Brighton, L, Berridge, B, Falconer of Thoroton, L, Faulks, L, Garnier, L, Judge, L (Chairman), Keen of Elie, L, Kirkhope of Harrogate, L, Thomas of Gresford, L, Whitaker, B.
That the Committee have power to send for persons, papers and records;
That the evidence taken by the Committee be published, if the Committee so wishes.
Anti-Semitism
(4 years, 10 months ago)
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Baroness Berridge
To move that this House takes note of the incidence of anti-Semitism worldwide.
Baroness Berridge (Con)
My Lords, I am grateful to all noble Lords who are speaking in today’s debate, which is the second on anti-Semitism within a year in your Lordships’ House—perhaps evidence that this is a light sleeper, to borrow a phrase. Of course, I am not Jewish, but I co-chair the APPG for International Freedom of Religion or Belief, and anti-Semitism is a denial of such freedom. I am also a professing Christian who attends Protestant churches but has Catholic lineage.
When first preparing for this debate, I was struck by the origins of the word “anti-Semitism”. To use “ism” makes it sound to ordinary people like an ideology or a religion such as Hinduism, pluralism or capitalism. Of course, “Semitism” relates to the Semite people, who, according to the Encyclopaedia Britannica, include,
“Arabs, Akkadians, Canaanites, Hebrews, some Ethiopians and Aramaean tribes”.
Modern usage does not include all those people, but it does definitely tell us that what we are talking about is hating people, not a religion or an ideology. That is a vital distinction that enables us to maintain freedom of speech. But the use of “ism” was deliberate, as the term was first used in 1879 by the German agitator Wilhelm Marr to make the anti-Jewish campaign seem more reasonable, rational and perhaps more like the European Enlightenment. It is a great shame that the term has stuck as it is anything but rational. I fear that using “anti-Semitism” today could make it seem like a concern of the liberal elite.
My initial instinct is supported by the recent survey by the Jewish Chronicle that fewer than half the people in Britain know what anti-Semitism means, so using the substance of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance definition—“hatred of Jews”—makes things simple and clearer, and I commend it.
Globally, we are seeing in Europe, America and even Argentina a resurgence of hatred, threats of violence, harassment, vandalism and even murder and kidnap of Jews because of who they are. The hatred that led to the Holocaust and 6 million dead Jews in Europe is a lesson from history that is not being taught in enough history lessons. From Berlin to Buenos Aires, incidents of Jew hatred have increased drastically in recent years. According to the Kantor Center of Tel Aviv University, in the last year alone, Italy saw a 60% increase in recorded incidents, South Africa a 25% increase, France 74% and Australia 59%. The number involving violence or the threat of violence also rose globally by 13%. The US had the largest number of violent cases—more than 100—including of course the tragic shooting in a Pittsburgh synagogue in October that claimed 11 lives.
In the city of Rosario in Argentina as recently as last week, a local rabbi was attacked by three men who shouted anti-Semitic words at him before removing his rabbi’s hat, trampling it on the ground and assaulting him. That attack is the third physical attack and anti-Semitic assault in Argentina in less than two months. Similarly, the UK last year recorded a record high of anti-Semitic incidents for the third year in a row.
One key feature of this trend is the increasing prevalence of materials online. According to Tel Aviv University, in Argentina last year complaints of anti-Semitic incidents doubled compared with 2017, and 80% were online. All of Belgium’s 101 documented cases were online in what mostly involved the spread of conspiracy theories and Nazi rhetoric. In a CNN/ComRes poll, 15% of all people surveyed in Poland and 19% in Hungary said that they had unfavourable views of Jews and about 10% of all respondents in seven European countries said the same. That is quite an admission even in a confidential poll.
The nature of Jew hatred includes imposing false stereotypes and conspiracy theories. In Poland and Hungary, about four out of 10 people said that Jews had,
“too much influence in business and finance”,
around the world, and 20% of British respondents thought that the global Jewish population was 20%. Those figures are deeply concerning and it is not a surprise that when 16,500 Jews from 12 European countries were interviewed by the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights last year, 85% said that the community’s main concern was anti-Semitism. Less reported was that 72% of those Jews surveyed also expressed concern about the increasing intolerance towards Muslims. Hatred of the other does not usually stay with one category of “the other”. The main threat in Europe is neo-Nazi far-right views which extol hatred of Jews, not predominantly extreme Islamist views on Jews.
In her recent book, Antisemitism: What It Is. What It Isn’t. Why It Matters, the noble Baroness, Lady Neuberger, references research by the Institute for Jewish Policy Research that put the rates of emigration from France, Belgium and Italy to Israel beyond that which would normally be found due to economic factors. Jews leaving Europe because they do not feel safe—who ever thought we would be saying that in the 21st century? Jews are not asking for special treatment. The atrocities of the Second World War led not to a UN declaration on just Jewish religious freedom but on freedom of religion or belief for all. Jews are not saying we cannot criticise the Israeli state and its policies. As the noble Baroness, Lady Neuberger, says in her book:
“It is one thing to deny Israel a right to exist at all. But arguing about Israel’s borders, or criticising its treatment of its Arab population, or of Palestinians in the Occupied Territories, is another thing entirely. The argument is about policies, not about a right to exist. And though many Israelis, and the Israeli government, would not agree with me in saying this, those are legitimate issues to raise”.
She also says that,
“it must be legitimate to criticise Zionism as a political philosophy”.
I hope this deals with the myth that Jews do not believe in freedom of speech and that you will be told you are anti-Semitic if you criticise Israel per se. When I visited Israel it seemed to me that free speech between Israelis and criticism of their Government were alive and well on talk radio.
There are hundreds of images and posts on the internet, let alone on the dark web, by white supremacists, neo-Nazis and the far right claiming Christian inspiration for their views. If only we could say that this is a new phenomenon. This is why I outlined my own faith at the start. In 2017 there was a muted celebration of 500 years since the Reformation. With the state of Europe’s attitude towards to Jews, celebrating a man for his undoubted doctrinal brilliance but whose views on Jews moved from warmth to hatred and wrath was difficult. Martin Luther’s 1542 treatise On the Jews and their Lies is staggering. He refers to “whoring and murderous people” and “a rabble of snakes”, saying:
“Even if they were punished in the most gruesome manner that the streets ran with their blood, that their dead would be counted, not in the hundreds of thousands but in the millions”.
Did this pave the way for Hitler and the views posted today? In a talk given at St Aldate’s Church, Oxford, the Reverend Simon Ponsonby persuasively outlined that Hitler, some of the German Church, the Nazis, the populists, the Jews and the English Church all made the link. After all, Kristallnacht was on Luther’s public birthday. William Temple, then Archbishop of York, said:
“It is easy to see how Luther prepared the way for Hitler”.
Time does not permit similar analysis of the struggle within Catholic thought, but the comment of Cardinal Maridiaga, who was a papal runner-up, is quoted in the book written by the noble Baroness, Lady Neuberger. He blames the “Jewish-controlled media”—namely, the Boston Globe—for the sex scandal of the Catholic Church. That is the kind of comment that Vatican II at the very latest thought to make a thing of the past. It is at such moments that I have put down many of my reading materials this week and said “What? These are intelligent people”.
I am not responsible for the collective views of the Church of the past, but due to the rise of Christian imagery once again I want Jews to know that I am convinced—and distressed—that without these awful teachings at the time of the advent of the printing press it is hard to think that Jew hatred would have taken root in Europe in the way it did. Aggressive nationalism and assertions of Christian Europe, particularly in eastern Europe, are feeding on this history and putting at risk anyone considered other—Jew, Muslim and, potentially, Roma, alike.
Today we have the advent of the internet. We have a virtual oil slick, like the pollution streaming out into the Gulf of Mexico in 2010. It is not merely a conduit, as European law would like us to believe. It connects people to spread their hate-filled views. Thankfully, in the past few weeks there seems to be a new wave of contrition from ISP executives, with Instagram’s Adam Mosseri saying,
“We can’t solve bullying on our own”,
and Apple’s CEO Tim Cook saying only last Sunday at Stanford University to graduating students that the tech industry,
“is becoming known for a less noble innovation: the belief that you can claim credit without accepting responsibility … If you build a chaos factory, you can’t dodge responsibility for the chaos”.
While the internet is undoubtedly bringing immense good, parts of it are a verbal cesspit which we all must clear up. The next generation want us to clean up the ocean, but they have good cause to ask us why, when ISPs have all that money—with more cash reserves than most nation states—we did not make them use it to clear up the internet and spread the message, for instance, that there is no “other”—we are all human; that the individual’s mistakes or crimes are not the fault of the collective group; and that you can hate my views, my behaviour and my politics, but verbal or physical violence or threats are unacceptable and often unlawful.
National Governments must pool their authority. The world is watching us here in the UK as to how we deal with online harms. Our leadership is important as a nation that respects free speech within the law. Generally, our law makes an important distinction between the hatred of ideas, philosophy or opinions, and words or actions expressing hatred of people. Our law applies to everyone and should be so enforced. I have a quote:
“I have some Jewish friends, very good friends. They are not like the other Jews, that’s why they are my friends”—
these are the words of the Prime Minister of Malaysia at the Cambridge Union a few days ago, and the audience laughed. Is this what we expect of a visiting Commonwealth Head of Government—that he should think this is appropriate, and lawful? I will use an analogy to force home the point: “I have some black friends, very good friends. They are not like the other blacks, that’s why they are my friends”. This is unacceptable. UK law and its enforcement have to get this right, stamping out safe spaces for hatred. Obviously, we have the Metropolitan Police talking to Jo Brand. We have to get the enforcement right; we have to do this together. So I ask my noble friend the Minister: what mechanism will be used supranationally to bring ISPs to book? Is it on the agenda of the G20? I am not hopeful that the United Nations really has the clout to deal with this.
It is always an honour to speak in your Lordships’ House, but preparing this speech was not a pleasure. It was not a healthy diet for my mind, so goodness knows what it is like living any of the experiences that I have outlined. I hope noble Lords will forgive me, but I am looking forward to returning to the different echo chamber in which I live.
Lord Harris of Haringey (Lab)
I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Berridge, as I am sure the whole House is, for securing the debate on this important subject. Quite rightly, she has highlighted shocking examples around the world. The re-emergence of hatred of Jews—to use the phrase she prefers—in continental Europe less than 75 years after the Shoah ended is a stark warning of the fragility of our post-war norms. Surveys show that, in many parts of Europe, Jews feel unsafe and insecure while far-right parties that unashamedly parade anti-Semitic tropes gain significant numbers of votes.
However, I want to focus nearer to home, on this country; with a deep sense of shame, I want to talk about the party I have been a member of for almost 50 years. Labour has a proud history of combating racism and discrimination, and of opposing fascism and anti-Semitism. It is therefore profoundly shocking for those of us brought up in that tradition to find our party now the subject of a formal investigation by the Equality and Human Rights Commission. This is nothing short of humiliating for those of us on these Benches, it is causing dismay among party members outside this House, and is deeply alienating for those we might hope would vote for us, whether they are from the Jewish community or not.
It undermines the Labour Party’s whole ethos, the values of equality, decency and solidarity that brought so many of us on these benches into the Labour Party in the first place. Over three months ago, I wrote as chair of the Labour Peers’ group to Jeremy Corbyn, the leader of the party. That letter expressed our dismay—no, worse than that, our alarm—at the continuing failure to remove anti-Semites from our party. I have not had the courtesy of a reply. Last week, I met two women who had been verbally and physically harassed at a meeting of their local Labour Party because they were Jewish.
I wish I could say that this was an isolated instance but, alas, it was not. The process of dealing with complaints of anti-Semitic behaviour within the party has been slow, tortuous and frequently inconclusive. Too often individuals are suspended only when their cases receive external publicity. Action was taken against one member of the party’s National Executive Committee only after a second anti-Semitic rant was recorded and publicised; he had been let off with a warning after the first one.
Too often those who have complained about anti-Semitism have been dismissed as being apologists for, or even in the pay of, the Israeli Government or Mossad, or we are told that the cases are few and far between. Any anti-Semite in the Labour Party is one too many. The party’s abject failure to deal effectively with anti-Semitism over the last three years cannot be ascribed to inadequate resourcing of the complaints and compliance function in the Labour Party head office, or blamed on inadequate or outdated processes. The failure is a political one; it is a failure of leadership.
Those of your Lordships who have been responsible for major organisations know that the tone, style and ethos of such organisations are set at the top. That is what leadership means. Leadership is not about hiding behind procedure, blaming more junior officials or allowing your acolytes to dismiss legitimate complaints as the spite of those who disagree with your political approach. We on these Benches must take on the task of cleansing our party of anti-Semitism and those who condone and foster it. If this debate tells us anything, however, it is that this is a global problem as well. Parliamentarians both here and elsewhere in the world need to make a stand. The lessons of the millions who died in Europe must never be forgotten—never.
Baroness Ludford (LD)
My Lords, I congratulate strongly the noble Baroness, Lady Berridge, not only on securing this debate but on an excellent speech. Like her, I am not Jewish, but I am very sensitive to anti-Semitism not only as the oldest hate, but also as a bellwether for other types of hate. I declare my interest as a vice-president of the Liberal Democrat Friends of Israel and a supporter of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on British Jews.
The fact that this debate is more necessary than ever in my lifetime shows how anti-Semitism is becoming pervasive, as was brought out in the report last year by the EU Agency for Fundamental Rights, which was mentioned by the noble Baroness, Lady Berridge. The report found that negative stereotypes are being reproduced and ingrained and that this pervasive anti-Semitism is undermining Jews’ feelings of safety and security throughout Europe, such that they and their family and friends cannot live lives free of worry. I am deeply ashamed that this is happening to my fellow citizens. I do not want to live in a society in which they are afraid and subject to prejudice, discrimination and hate.
The same survey found that anti-Semitism is not only pervasive but has also become normalised. The report states,
“people face so much antisemitic abuse that some of the incidents they experience appear trivial to them”.
That is totally shocking. One clue to this sense of normalisation is that the range of perpetrators is wide, spanning the entire social and political spectrum. Like the noble Baroness, I was truly outraged not only that the Malaysian Prime Minister made the remarks he made at the meeting in Cambridge, but that they were apparently followed by a round of laughter. I find that incredible.
I talked earlier of stereotypes. A poll by the news organisation CNN last September showed that three in 10 adults said that Jewish people have too much influence in finance and business; one in five said they have too much influence on the media; and three in 10 said that Jewish people use the Holocaust to advance their own position.
Some of your Lordships, like me, will have heard Allan Little’s recent series for BBC Radio 4 called “A History of Hate”, covering events in Rwanda, Bosnia, apartheid South Africa and other places. His first programme was about pogroms in Russia a century ago. Anti-Semitism originated as traditional religious prejudice, but it transformed into what a historian called “modern anti-Semitism”: visions of Jews conspiring to take over all the main institutions of the state, encapsulated in the fake news Protocols of the Elders of Zion. Interestingly, Professor Deborah Lipstadt saw the origins of that Jewish lobby stereotype in ancient times, in perceptions of a small group of Jewish money changers persuading the mighty Roman Empire to kill Christ because he threatened their lucrative business in the temple. These prejudices are very ancient.
This is, of course, a debate on anti-Semitism, but people who hate on the basis of faith often hate on the basis of other features—other faiths, race and gender. I know that we are all conscious of that fact. I do not have time to talk about Islamophobia, but I think it noteworthy that the candidates for the Conservative leadership have pledged to look at Islamophobia in their own party. As the noble Baroness, Lady Berridge, said, we need a step change in education. That is the top priority.
Lord Pickles (Con)
My Lords, I draw attention to my entry in the register of interests as a member of organisations involved in post-Holocaust issues and countering anti-Semitism. I congratulate my noble friend Lady Berridge on securing this debate. It comes at a very apposite time, in that it coincides with the first joint meeting on Monday of special envoys on anti-Semitism, organised in Bucharest by the Romanian President of the Council of the EU and the World Jewish Congress. I represented the UK at the event and spoke during one of its plenaries on how the UK had implemented the IHRA definition of anti-Semitism. The noble Lord, Lord Harris, spoke of the need for international effort to counter anti-Semitism, and these are the first tentative steps.
The meeting concluded with a four-point action plan. The first is on the security of Jewish communities, and states that public authorities—central and local—have a responsibility to ensure the security of the members of the Jewish community and the institutions, and to support and protect the victims of anti-Semitic and hate crimes. The German ombudsman on Jewish issues, Felix Klein, has been rather misquoted in some of the briefing, with his worries about Jewish people wearing outward signs of their religion on the street. This is a misrepresentation; he was expressing a worry.
I have seen this with my own eyes at the Conservative conference in Manchester a couple of years ago, when a young man wearing a kippah was abused by a very well-dressed, middle-class, left-wing crowd. The Y-word, the C-word and the F-word were used. There were references to the smoking chimneys of Auschwitz. He was spat upon and, to their eternal shame, the police stood by and did nothing. A true test of a civilised society is that outward signs of someone’s religion should be able to be displayed openly and without fear.
The second action point was the endorsement of the non-legally binding working definition of anti-Semitism adopted by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance. It is a matter of some pleasure that the UK was the first to adopt that definition.
The third action point was financing Holocaust research, education and remembrance in an efficient way to combat existing threats to the remembrance of the Holocaust, such as Holocaust denial and distortion, together with encouraging academic research and protecting academic freedom from undue influence. The Holocaust Educational Trust, the Holocaust Memorial Day Trust and the memorial planned for outside this building are a good example. I met with a prominent objector to the memorial yesterday. At first we talked about views, trees and open spaces. He said that it was a good idea but in the wrong place, going on to say, “I don’t see why we should have a monument outside Parliament to the so-called Holocaust”. I queried the qualification “so-called”. He said, “Holocaust means ‘burnt offering’, and most of them were gassed”. Leaving aside the victims of the Nazis who were starved, worked to death, hanged or shot, pedantic semantics is no real defence of casual anti-Semitism.
Fourthly, the recording and collecting of hate crime data should be improved, including that on combating anti-Semitism. Compared to other countries our figures are high and, I suspect, underreported. Some countries feel smug by comparison, because they do not record those figures, but ignorance is not bliss. If you do not record, you do not know.
In conclusion, why are we fighting anti-Semitism? Why is it so important? The US envoy, Elan Carr, put it far more eloquently than I could:
“Antisemitism is not just about Jews. Every society that has drunk anti-Semitism has rotted from the inside”.
The Lord Bishop of Chester
My Lords, I echo the excellent opening speech by the noble Baroness, Lady Berridge, by saying that I view anti-Semitism as perhaps the greatest tragedy and disgrace in the history of the Christian Church.
Christian complicity arose after the break between the Church and the Synagogue in the late first century of our era, and with the emergence of the view that the Christian Church had replaced the Jews as God’s chosen people. The properly New Testament view that Christians had been graciously grafted into Israel to share its promises and inheritance reasserted itself only in the 20th century, after nearly two millennia. This was partly the result of renewed biblical scholarship and partly due to the efforts of a small but distinguished group of continental Christian theologians led by Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Karl Barth, who saw the evil of Nazism.
The Bonhoeffer-Barth view, with its rejection of the previously well-nigh universal belief that the Christian Church had replaced the Jews was expressed in its own terms by the Second Vatican Council, and is now widely accepted across all the Churches. I had hoped—naively, no doubt—that these changes would come to exert a downward pressure on anti-Semitism. I have been shocked and deeply disappointed by the contemporary re-emergence of anti-Semitism. What are the underlying causes? Further research into this question is still needed, but clearly today there is a connection with opposition to the current policies of the State of Israel—which so easily becomes falsely associated with the belief that Israel itself has no right to exist. This seems to be the crux of the problems that have beset the Labour leadership in recent times.
I have taken a keen interest in these issues, and have visited Israel seven times in my time as a bishop, taking around 500 people from my diocese there over the years. One cannot but be deeply impressed by modern Israel in many ways—its economy, its cultural life, its protection of ancient archaeology and its commitment to democracy and the rule of law. Anyone who thinks that the modern State of Israel should somehow disappear is tilting at the moon from every possible angle. Quite beyond the facts on the ground, including the military facts, there is another reason why the State of Israel is here to stay. Studies of Jewish life on the continent before World War II have demonstrated that, paradoxically, Zionists who wanted a new Jewish state in Palestine shared this hope with many anti-Semites, who wanted large numbers of Jews to leave Europe. Continental anti-Semitism wanted Jews expelled or destroyed, and their influence curtailed. Zionists could in this sense agree that Jews, like everyone else, must have a national home which would be open to all Jews, as is still the case today. It is largely forgotten that in the late 1930s, Nazis could assist Zionists to organise the departure of Jews to Palestine, before the dark reality of the Holocaust took over.
There is a sense in which the appalling and tragic anti-Semitism of the Holocaust itself helped to achieve the Zionist hope. In the great sweep of history—and, I would add, from my perspective, the providence of God—it is hardly an accident that the modern State of Israel was founded just after the most systematic attempt in history to erase Jewish people from the earth. The challenge for us today is to do our best, in every way we can, to erase anti-Semitism from future history.
Lord Leigh of Hurley (Con)
My Lords, I too congratulate my noble friend Lady Berridge on securing this debate. As your Lordships will see in the register of interests, I am somewhat involved in the Jewish community and am constantly deeply moved by, and in awe of, those people from outside that community who clearly care about and are prepared to fight anti- Semitism, as opposed to others who just walk away.
What is anti-Semitism? When I was 15, Sir Bernard Waley-Cohen, a former Lord Mayor of London, told me that it was disliking Jews more than was strictly necessary—but that was a while ago. I pay public tribute to my noble friend Lord Pickles for his incredible work in securing the internationally recognised definition in the UK, which has eventually been adopted even by those who fought against it, including the recently elected Labour MP for Peterborough.
The Anti-Defamation League’s survey in 2014 really is an extraordinary piece of work; I speak as president of the Institute for Jewish Policy Research, which was mentioned by my noble friend Lady Berridge. The ADL interviewed 53,000 people in 96 languages in 100 countries. Sadly, it found anti-Semitic attitudes in around a quarter to a third of all global citizens, even though 27% of people had never met a Jewish person. Somewhat reassuringly, it found that 99% of people in the UK had heard about the Holocaust, although this dropped to under 10% in certain other countries. Perhaps not surprisingly, 70% of people in the Middle East had heard about the Holocaust but chose to dismiss it as a myth, or as having been greatly exaggerated. It is, of course, not surprising that we see such anti-Semitism in the Middle East. Most Arab countries expelled their Jewish populations without notice or compensation some 60 years ago. It is estimated that some 800,000 people were simply expelled from the countries in which they had lived—not for decades but for millennia—simply because they were Jewish.
We need to challenge those who do not enjoy our enlightened approach to anti-Semitism much more rigorously, particularly when it invades our shores. My noble friend Lady Berridge quoted the Prime Minister of Malaysia, who spoke at Cambridge last weekend. Malaysia is the country that would not allow disabled athletes to swim in the Paralympic Games to be held in Malaysia, simply because they were Israeli. What action do the Government propose to take in speaking to the Prime Minister of Malaysia?
Considering our own country, I am sure we have all asked ourselves how it is possible that a political party with strong Jewish roots, which prides itself on compassion for the underdog, social justice and an abhorrence of racism, has become so mired in anti-Semitism that it faces an investigation by the EHRC. This question was posed most eloquently by the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Haringey. All the surveys consistently show that the UK is one of the world leaders in its abhorrence of anti-Semitism because citizens in the UK are tolerant, open, and welcoming, so how has this been completely reversed by some political leaders? Has left-wing anti-Semitism risen because antagonism to Israel has made it a rallying cause? I am aware that I speak in the presence of the noble Lord, Lord Sacks, but do not forget that my ancestors left the slavery of Egypt—seeking to live in peace in Israel—well before they became Jews. Tragically, the slur that Zionism is racism has taken hold.
I have not the time to examine the depressing path down which otherwise good people were led by lies and misinformation about Israel and who, like Mr Abdullah Patel recently, may have allowed this misplaced hatred of Israel to morph into anti-Semitism. But no one can deny that it exists, and it is left to the bravery of speakers such as those in today’s debate to try to change this flow. Even more parochially to this House, I am sorry to say that many members of the Jewish community were hugely disappointed in the Chakrabarti report, which missed a golden opportunity when it could so easily have changed the attitudes and direction of the Labour Party. The worldwide fight against anti-Semitism is a very noble one, but for us it must start in this country. Let us hope that it is reinforced by this debate today.
Lord Parekh (Lab)
My Lords, I come from a country with no history of anti-Semitism, namely India. In the 11th century, the maharajah of Travancore-Cochin made a declaration to Joseph Rabban, who was leading Jews from Syria into India, offering him all the facilities of a local potentate. He could collect taxes and ride in a palanquin, and his people could follow their own customs. As a result, Jews have flourished in India, and I was taught by a Jew who was a professor of English literature. In business they have flourished too.
There are Jewish characters in the literature, and they are always represented as decent, well-behaved, clean and tidy, good at making money and loyal to the country. These views of what it is to be Jewish spread, and it is also striking that Mahatma Gandhi’s closest friends were Jewish—Polak and Kallenbach. In the 1930s, he even suggested that several Jewish refugees could come to India as, he said, “In a population of 300 million, what is a few hundred thousand?” The British Government said they could not come because they needed work permits. Anyway, this was my brief history, not having been exposed to the history of the Holocaust and systematic Jewish persecution. I heard about that when I came to England about 45 years ago, and I have been very bothered about this whole question.
This systematic persecution of a whole people lasted over 2,000 years, culminating in the Holocaust, when millions were humiliated, despised, made into the objects of stupid experiments and dehumanised. The question that I have asked myself is: why is there anti-Semitism? What are its causes? From where does it spring? Some light was thrown on this in the 1980s, when people said that Indians will have a Jewish future and Afro-Caribbeans will have an Irish future. That set me thinking about whether the Indian experience of being thrown out of four countries—Sri Lanka, Myanmar and all that—can throw some light on what happened to the Jews. In trying to understand this, I will submit a few observations that I have made over the years.
Anti-Semitism springs from a variety of factors. Some are specific to a particular historical period; some are common to all historical periods. As the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Chester said, the Jews have been accused of killing our Lord—deicide—and this is not assuaged by simply talking about Judeo-Christian tradition, because to talk about Judeo-Christian tradition is to reduce Judaism to a mere precursor to Christianity. It is to assimilate it into Christianity and not to appreciate its autonomy and identity.
There is also the intolerance of difference. Jews, in my view, were the first multicultural people who asked for their laws, dress and other things to be respected. In a society where multiculturalism was resented, obviously, the Jewish community was resented. Then, of course, a highly successful community, in all walks of life, is resented for obvious reasons. There is also a deep sense of guilt about what happened in the Holocaust. Every European nation was involved in this, not just Germany. Other countries also co-operated in rounding up Jews and treating them abominably. There is a sense of guilt—every time they think of the Jews, they think of the Holocaust and they note there is a sense of guilt. Nobody likes to be reminded of a horrendous period in one’s history.
There is another factor that is specific to our age, which is Israel’s treatment of Palestinians, which should not go unmentioned. The relationship between the two is basically that between the lion and the mouse. What are Palestinians? If Israel wanted, it could snuff them out in a few seconds. Here is a country with enormous soft power and enormous strength. It should have the sense of security and self-confidence to say to helpless people, “You send out rockets and do silly things, but we are prepared to be magnanimous and forgiving. Let us open a new chapter in a peaceful relationship”. Such an act of generosity and self-confidence would do a great deal. A community that has suffered so much could easily turn its suffering into a signal of sympathy with suffering elsewhere.
Lord Alton of Liverpool (CB)
My Lords, the noble Baroness, Lady Berridge, deserves the thanks of the whole House for securing this important debate and for the eloquent way in which she introduced it. No one, as a consequence of their beliefs or who they are, should have to live their life in abject fear of racial or religious hatred, yet, as we have been reminded, recent research and reported instances of attacks show that far too many people do.
The rise in anti-Semitism, sometimes incubated within the walls of this Palace, is completely unacceptable. I have watched with incredulity and dismay as Luciana Berger, who inherited some of my former Liverpool constituency, has been hounded and vilified. It is truly shocking to read reports of Jewish homes being daubed with offensive graffiti and of the desecration of Jewish cemeteries, along with the promotion of hatred on university campuses and through social media. In 2018, the Community Security Trust logged 1,652 anti-Semitic incidents, a 16% increase.
I attended the recent launch of the ComRes polling data on anti-Semitism commissioned for CNN and referred to earlier. It was abundantly clear that we have become far too complacent about this cancer. Forty per cent of those surveyed said that anti-Semitism is a growing problem in this country today; 41% said that Jewish people are at risk of hate speech, while 49% thought that the Government should do more to combat anti-Semitism.
To the question why people were hostile to Jews, the answers ranged from the usual canards about Jews having too much influence, to antagonism towards Israel. It was striking that half of the adults surveyed were unaware of ever having socialised with a Jewish person. Absurdly, one in five thought that more than 20% of the world’s population is Jewish. Disturbingly, less than half thought that Israel had a right to exist as a Jewish state.
Earlier this year, some of us heard Helen Aronson, a survivor of the Lodz ghetto in Poland, tell parliamentarians:
“It is vital that we do everything in our power to ensure that these things never happen again, anywhere in the world”.
To do that, we need much better teaching resources and, as the last survivors die, interactive learning hubs where their stories go on being told to future generations. We can also do far more to promote religious freedom, using initiatives such as the newly created United Nations International Day Commemorating the Victims of Acts of Violence Based on Religion or Belief—there will be an event here in the House on 23 July to mark its creation.
In 1933, the Jewish writer, Franz Werfel published The Forty Days of Musa Dagh, a novel about the loss of 1.5 million lives in the Armenian genocide. Those mass murders led to Raphael Lemkin, a Jewish lawyer, 43 of whose family were murdered in the Holocaust, coining the word “genocide” and framing the genocide convention. Werfel’s books and those of Stefan Zweig were burnt by the Nazis. Zweig’s The World of Yesterday: Memoirs of a European charts the rise of visceral hatred and how scapegoating and xenophobia, cultivated by populist leaders, can morph into the hecatombs of the concentration camps. Zweig described how university professors were forced to scrub streets with their bare hands, how devout Jews were humiliated in their synagogues and how apartments were broken into and jewels torn out of the ears of trembling women. And the world remained largely silent.
The haunting question remains: can we do better and act more decisively in our own generation?
Lord Finkelstein (Con)
My Lords, I declare my interests as a member of Northwood and Pinner Liberal Synagogue, a columnist on the JC and a consumer of the products of B&K deli in Hatch End. I thank many noble Lords for wonderful speeches: the noble Baroness, Lady Berridge, the super-magnificent noble Lord, Lord Pickles—that is his official title—the noble Lord, Lord Harris, for his superb speech and the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Chester. On one occasion, I ran into the Peers’ Writing Room, smashed my leg on the table and, I am rather ashamed to say, exclaimed, “Jesus!” very loudly. The right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Chester looked up and said, “Can I help you?” Today, he did exactly that.
I will start with one of the most interesting books I have read this year, The Communist Party of Great Britain: A Historical Analysis to 1941. Published in 1995, it was written by Andrew Murray, one of the closest friends and advisers of the leader of the Opposition. Mr Murray defended the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact and described the fall of the Berlin Wall as an,
“historic setback for human progress”.
This was not the end to the illumination that his book provided. The most useful parts were those that explained the centrality to his thinking of Lenin’s theory of imperialism. This genuinely opened the door to me: I felt that I finally understood the mystery that I had been puzzling over. I have so many wonderful, lovely progressive friends, and great admiration for Labour Members of this House. I know that, like me, they puzzle over how so many progressive, compassionate, humane people can be prey to anti-Semitism.
I think I do get it now—at least a little bit—and, necessarily briefly, I will share it with the House. Lenin argued that capitalism is economically sustainable only because companies seek profits abroad. They then need Governments to protect their foreign investments through military adventure. So imperialism protects capitalism, and to bring down capitalism you have to bring down imperialism. So anti-colonial resistance movements—Iran, Chávez, Hezbollah—are the core of the anti-capitalist movement. Why does this lend itself to anti-Semitism? First, because anti-imperialists such as JA Hobson have always seen Jews as the owners of finance houses on whose behalf racist imperialism is conducted. In other words, these particular anti-imperialists are anti-racists who blame Jews for racism. This is an explanation of the mystery of how people who claim that they are anti-racist can in fact be anti-Semitic. It is the Jews’ fault.
Secondly, anti-imperialists now see the great world empire as the United States, see the Middle East as the centre of this empire and see Israel and Zionism—the Jews, in other words—as the great creators and symbol of this imperialism. In other words, left anti-Semitism is not a few stray tweets and a gaffe or two. Nor does it belong to all members of the Labour Party. It is a system of thought that belongs to a strand of progressive thinking which can only be eradicated by challenging the central tenets of that thinking.
Lord Dykes (CB)
My Lords, it is a great pleasure to follow Daniel Finkelstein—the noble Lord, Lord Finkelstein—who is considered to be the main Times journalist with a sense of humour. He has shown it again today and we thank him for his wise words. I am also looking forward to listening to the noble Baroness, Lady Warsi. I am sandwiched between two very intelligent people who will contribute enormously to this debate. I am also very glad that the noble Lord, Lord Ahmad, is the Minister replying. He is greatly respected in all parts of this House.
I will speak, briefly, from the heart. I tried to follow the complicated description of anti-Semitism given by the noble Lord, Lord Finkelstein, but it is still a mystery for someone such as me. I was close to many Jewish friends and other Jewish people in my constituency. I was informally and unofficially an honorary member of at least five synagogues and went regularly to shul whenever I had the opportunity. I still cannot understand anti-Semitism, and that is why this debate is so important. The horrific examples described by the noble Lord, Lord Pickles, and other noble Lords are so grotesque and horrible that they are very difficult to believe. That is why we have to keep reminding people that anti-Semitism exists in this world. The contribution of the Jewish community in Britain—what they have done for this country—has been truly magnificent. I am glad that there is less of that feeling, at least among people who are intelligent enough to study these things closely. Perhaps many people do not bother, but those who do would feel that to be the case.
I live in France as well, which also has a great connection with the Jewish community, which is slightly bigger than the official number in the United Kingdom. There is anti-Semitism in France as well, which is a terrible thing. I can understand why Labour Peers are deeply upset about what is happening in their own party; I feel very sympathetic towards them as well. On many occasions when I was in Harrow I noticed that people were fearful, even in the safe environment of a wealthy area of north-west London, because of their background and history.
I am very closely connected with Germany: I speak German, I go there frequently and I admire the way the Germans faced up to the sense of guilt that they have all accepted—with a few peculiar exceptions. They have done that in a way that fills me with great pleasure when I think of what happened in that country—unbelievable things that are still difficult to believe. That is why there are still so many books written about the Holocaust and the Third Reich, not only in Germany but elsewhere. It is interesting to note that in Berlin there is now a huge, or at least relatively large, Jewish community of young Israelis, for example, who have gone there to work or study and who live in Berlin or Düsseldorf or other cities. That is an example of what we all need to do, to really get to know the details of all this tragedy over the years, to make sure that it is never repeated.
I agree with what the noble Baroness, Lady Neuberger, was quoted as saying in one of her recent books. None of that has anything to do with me wishing to criticise the present Government of Netanyahu in Israel. That is a perfectly legitimate thing for anyone to do, be they Jewish or not: there are many Jewish critics of Netanyahu’s Government, both in Israel and outside. That is a totally separate subject; it cannot be confused with this deep, huge ur-psychological disease of anti-Semitism. We all need to work together to make sure that we eradicate it for ever from our world society.
Baroness Warsi (Con)
My Lords, I am rarely here on a Thursday now, because the Whips have not obliged us to be here. I have been tempted back to the wonderful place known as Yorkshire, surrounded by the amazing vibrancy of a factory making beds; even more so during this time when cricket also beckons. However, when I saw this debate listed on the Order Paper I felt it was necessary for me to be here, to give support and lend my voice to the efforts to highlight the rising challenge of anti-Semitism. I am grateful to my noble friend Lady Berridge, who so powerfully and in such a detailed way opened this debate and set the scene for the tremendous contributions we have heard so far and I am sure will continue to hear until the end of the debate.
Racism, as we have heard, is not found just in the kind of circles we would have found it in in the past. It is in very respectable circles; it is rooted in liberalism. There is also faith-based racism: it is not true that people of faith are welcoming of other people of faith. Therefore, I felt it was important, as a Muslim, to lend my voice to this fight against anti-Semitism. It is something I have spoken about before. In 2013 in a speech at Georgetown, speaking about the exodus of Christians from the Middle East, I said that it should not be left to Christians to speak for Christians, for Muslims to speak for Muslims and for Jews to speak for Jews. As a Muslim, this is a fundamental part of my faith. The teachings I grew up with said that everyone in humanity is my brother or sister in faith, or my brother or sister in humanity, and it is therefore right for us to speak when anyone is persecuted.
After all, in the past we have defeated intolerance only when we have come together. Apartheid was defeated in South Africa only when people of all backgrounds held hands to ensure that it was challenged. The American civil rights movement received the boost it needed when the international community—black, white and brown, people of all backgrounds—came together. Here in the United Kingdom, gay rights were truly established only when the wider community got on board. Anti-Semitism will stop rearing its ugly head only when all of us, of whatever faith we belong to or of none, oppose and challenge it.
The rise of anti-Semitism is real and deeply disturbing. The briefing from the All-Party Parliamentary Group Against Antisemitism, which all noble Lords will have received, paints a very grim picture: Jews in Europe attacked and threatened for wearing skull caps; attacks on Jewish religious practices such as dietary requirements and circumcision; and the tragic loss of life during the Tree of Life synagogue terrorist attack in Pittsburgh, where Jews were gunned down in their place of worship. There is also the demonisation of a community by politicians such as Viktor Orbán in Hungary, who chooses to use tropes and conspiracy theories—which sadly we have too often heard before—and attempts to revise history to downplay the horrors that led to the Holocaust.
The time restrictions in this debate simply do not allow us to do justice to this subject, but it does allow me, as a Muslim, to stand and speak in solidarity against the racism that Jews around the world face and to ensure that British Jews hear very clearly that they do not need to fight this battle alone: this is a fight for all of us.
Lord Campbell-Savours (Lab)
My Lords, my concern is the dilution of the term “anti-Semitism” and the resultant public response. The line between legitimate criticism of Israel’s actions in the West Bank and Gaza as against real anti-Jewish prejudice has become blurred. The danger in blurring is that the public will set a high bar for the treatment of accusations of anti-Semitism. I find that deeply disturbing, and the international definition is not resolving the problem.
Equally strongly, I reject accusations that my party is institutionally racist. I accept that there is a problem in my party—as, indeed, in all parties—but what is happening is that many in my party are deeply concerned and confused by Netanyahu’s attitude to the settlements and calls for annexation. There is a particular problem in Labour-supporting ethnic minority communities, who join with Palestinians in feeling targeted as fellow Muslims, and a small minority of whom are clearly anti-Semitic. The treatment of the Palestinians is being used by racists across Europe to foster prejudice against Jews. It is all very frightening, and Israel needs to reflect.
This brings me to Corbyn. I do not believe that Corbyn is prejudiced; caught in the headlamp of public outrage, he is agonising over how to respond. He needs to fight back by repeatedly clarifying where he draws the lines and by leading the attack in ridding my party of any anti-Semitic elements which have infiltrated it. I suspect that he is not responding adequately because he is wary of being trapped in a dialogue, defending questionable and sometimes ill-conceived past actions which have on occasion been interpreted, quite reasonably, as anti-Semitic.
However, I firmly believe that, had Corbyn been in Parliament in the 1930s, given his current record on human rights—his lifetime cause has been human rights, often taking positions with which I have profoundly disagreed—he would have been the British politician championing calls for Jewish immigration into the United Kingdom while others across the parties were battening down the hatches and blocking the pre-Holocaust movement of Jews in flight from Nazism. People simply do not understand what Corbyn is all about. He is obsessed with human rights and sometimes he gets the nuances completely wrong.
Finally, I will comment on anti-Semitism on the internet. As the Janner case unravels, we and IICSA will have to face up to the truth: we will find a strong link between anti-Semitism and the accusations. Equally, we will find that the lead accuser, repeatedly named in the media in November 1991 as Paul Winston, who has not been linked in any way to anti-Semitism but who has a substantial criminal record arising from problems in his childhood, is now being used by anti-Semites to foster hatred of the Jews.
I am troubled by the blurring and dilution of the debate, and by online racism. We need to act now.
Lord Harries of Pentregarth (CB)
The Runnymede report on anti-Semitism had as its title some very telling words of Conor Cruise O’Brien—A Very Light Sleeper. Sadly, since that report was published in 1994, particularly in the past two years, there has been a terrible increase in anti-Semitic incidents and verbal abuse. This has been well set out with facts and figures from other noble Lords and I will not repeat what they have said, except to stress that I find this deeply disturbing and totally unacceptable.
For nine years, I had the privilege of being chairman of the Council of Christians and Jews, which continues to do so much good work to combat anti-Semitism and put the State of Israel in proper, true perspective. However, there is no doubt that the historical link of churches in this country with those in the Middle East, and the fact that many Christian aid agencies work there, mean that the State of Israel is, as we know all too well, a source of continuing tension.
My starting point is some words of an American scholar, Paul Van Buren, who surveyed all the Protestant church documents on the subject of Israel since World War II and concluded:
“Because the state of Israel is in part the product of the ancient and living hope of the Jewish people and is of deep concern to almost all Jews, disregard for its safety and welfare is incompatible with concern for the Jewish people”.
That, I stress, is the bare minimum: disregard for the safety and welfare of Israel is incompatible with concern for the Jewish people.
In this connection, I find it very disturbing that the word Zionist has become so tendentious in modern times. The hope of returning to Jerusalem has been part of the soul of Judaism ever since the first century, when the Jews were expelled from their country. It gathered pace in the 19th century with the emergence of what we think of as Zionism, a noble movement expressing the legitimate desire of the Jewish people to return to their historic homeland with the freedom to create a society of their own. The word Zionist should not be used as a term of abuse. When it is, we have to ask why.
The excellent new book by the noble Baroness, Lady Neuberger, is entitled Anti-Semitism: What It Is. What It Isn’t. Why It Matters. She is quite clear that there can be legitimate criticisms of the policy of particular Israeli Governments without these being anti-Semitic. It is always important to note that the fiercest critics of particular Governments come from Israel itself and are often echoed by Jews in this country. There is, however, no doubt in her mind—or the minds of many of us—that legitimate criticism has too often recently morphed into an anti-Zionism tinged with anti-Semitism.
It is clear, as the Government repeatedly state, that the settlements are illegal under international law, but that criticism must not be allowed to detract from the legitimacy of the State of Israel. Whatever criticism there may be of recent legislation on the position of Arab citizens in Israel—and the noble Baroness is very critical—it is not true that Israel is a racist state. The International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance definition of anti-Semitism contains 11 examples. One states:
“Denying the Jewish people their right to self-determination, e.g., by claiming that the existence of a State of Israel is a racist endeavour”.
We are right to hold Israel accountable to the high standards of David Ben-Gurion, who said:
“The State of Israel will prove itself not by material wealth, not by military might or technical achievement, but by its moral character and human values”.
If we judge that particular policies sometimes fail that test, we need to bear in mind that Israel safeguards fundamental human rights not even acknowledged in some of the surrounding countries.
The present increase in anti-Semitic attacks and verbal vitriol, both in the UK and abroad, is deeply worrying, totally unacceptable and must be countered at every opportunity.
Lord Polak (Con)
My Lords, I refer the House to my entry in the register of interests and pay tribute to my noble friend Lady Berridge for her thoughtful, wide-ranging and somewhat sad speech. I prepared for this debate by typing “anti-Semitism” into the Google bar and clicking on “News”. On 18 June, the Jerusalem Post reported on a panel at a conference under the headline:
“Key to Fighting Anti-Semitism? Encouraging Jewish Communities”.
The Jewish community of the US is now exploring what is done in Europe to protect synagogues, schools and other Jewish communal buildings. Cited in that article, the journalist Caroline Glick put it rather well when she said that anti-Semites are not such because of what Jews do:
“Their hatred defines them … They are beyond our control. They are not antisemitic because of what we are, but because they are bigots and they attach their bigotry to the Jewish people”.
Also on 18 June, another Jerusalem Post article reported John Cusack’s retweeting of a picture. He later admitted that the image was not just critical of Israel but anti-Semitic. On the same day, CBS News reported António Guterres, the UN Secretary-General, warning that the world is “in danger of forgetting” the lessons of the Holocaust, saying that,
“we are dealing with something that has spread … and we are facing a massive phenomenon”.
On 4 June, Eva Cossé, a Human Rights Watch researcher, produced an article entitled “The Alarming Rise of Anti- Semitism in Europe”, citing the 2018 survey mentioned by my noble friend Lady Berridge. On 5 June, the Jewish Telegraphic Agency quoted the Volkswagen CEO saying that he had an “obligation” to fight anti-Semitism, stating:
“We have more obligation than others. The whole company was built up by the Nazi regime”.
Significantly, he is not just talking but taking action: a couple of weeks ago, the car manufacturing giant announced that it was funding the return of the Anti-Defamation League in Europe. This is just a snapshot of the past few days. Where are we and how did we get here? I respectfully disagree with the noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, and pay tribute to the noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Harries, for his clear and honest speech. I have said it before and I will repeat it again: when Jeremy Corbyn was elected leader of the Labour Party, I argued that his views and opinions, which had been confined to the far-left corner of our society, would gravitate to the centre of British politics. Sadly, that has happened. His views and friends have become mainstream.
The few examples of the results of my Google search are shameful and unacceptable, as is the singling out of the one Jewish state—even in this House, our House of Lords, where scores of hostile Questions attacking the democratic Jewish state are tabled daily, with little evidence of questions being posed on dangerous totalitarian or despotic regimes across the globe. Just this week, two highly respectable mainstream institutions in British society have shown poor judgment, to put it mildly: the Cambridge Union, in hosting the Malaysian Prime Minister, and the BBC, which clearly has many questions to answer about Abdullah Patel from Bristol.
The time has come for action, not words—in fact, the time for action came a few years ago. I welcome the fine words of my noble friend Lady Warsi. It is time for great British institutions like the Cambridge Union, the Labour Party and the BBC to act and clear out those who seek to divide us. This sort of hate must not be tolerated and must be called out. As I said after the tragic Pittsburgh shooting last October:
“It is often said that anti-Semitism is a problem for the Jewish community … but does my noble friend agree that it should be seen as a grave threat to British values and British decency and to all that we hold dear?”—[Official Report, 29/10/18; col. 1122.]
Lord Mitchell (CB)
My Lords, I, too, thank the noble Baroness, Lady Berridge, for introducing the debate, and in particular for starting off by referring to the Prime Minister of Malaysia. He may be 93 years old, but Mahathir Mohamad has given us a powerful backdrop for the debate. Addressing the Cambridge Union a few days ago, he said:
“I have some Jewish friends, very good friends. They are not like the other Jews, that’s why they are my friends”.
He even said that some of his best friends were Jewish. Well, with friends like him, who needs enemies? Malaysia is 5,000 miles away from the Middle East. It has no Jews and few Christians, yet 72% of its population have strong anti-Semitic views. Come to think of it, its record on gay rights is not that great either.
In 2015, the Anti-Defamation League in the United States updated its periodic analysis of anti-Semitism around the world. While some of the results surprise, others do not. At the top, 71% of Turks hold strong anti-Semitic views, as do 67% of Greeks, while 60% of Iranians have the same. These countries are followed by the usual eastern European countries, all hovering around 30%. As my own family background bears witness, eastern Europe has been a hotbed of anti-Semitism for many centuries, and old habits die hard. That said, Ukraine, which has a high rating of 32%, not only has a Jewish Prime Minister but a Jewish president. As they say in Brooklyn, “Go figure”.
The lowest scores are also predictable, with the Netherlands at 11%, the United States at 10% and Denmark at 8%. Where does our country stand? We are at 12%, which is not great but not too bad either. The ADL and Jewish policy review surveys both report that Jews are well regarded in the UK. However, these sentiments are not reflected or shared in the opinions of British Jews themselves, who feel that anti-Semitism is a major and growing threat. In the UK, attitudes towards Jews have also been analysed by political leaning. Hostility from the far right is centred around ancient anti-Semitism: Jews have too much power, they have different loyalties from the rest of the population and they get rich at the expense of others. From the far left, the vitriol is centred more on Israel. Israel is an apartheid state, it is committing mass murder in Palestine and it has too much control over global affairs. These attitudes are strongly prevalent in the circles that control the Labour Party and it is why I reluctantly resigned three years ago. Here I must pay tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Haringey, for his powerful and emotional speech. I will reflect on what he had to say.
We have just celebrated the 75th anniversary of the D-day landings, an event that marked the beginning of the end of the Third Reich. Over the next 10 months we will commemorate the liberation of Europe as well as its death camps. Noble Lords will probably be aware that there is a well-developed project for a Holocaust remembrance centre to be constructed next to these Houses of Parliament in Victoria Gardens. It has been backed by all five past and present living Prime Ministers. In Berlin, the German Holocaust Memorial is sited opposite the Bundestag. How fitting it would be for our own national memorial to the world’s greatest crime to be built here, alongside the Mother of Parliaments.
Lord Sheikh (Con)
My Lords, I have spoken on several occasions in your Lordships’ House against all types of discrimination. As human beings, we have the right to be judged as individuals, irrespective of ethnicity, nationality or religious beliefs. The number of recorded anti-Semitic incidents, which range from vandalism to physical violence, has risen. The charity, Community Security Trust, counted 1,652 such incidents in 2018 which is the highest annual total since the charity was founded in 1984. The Anti-Defamation League also states that there has been a sharp increase in the number of anti-Semitic incidents. There is a correlation between the rise of populism and bigotry. The United Nations Secretary-General has spoken about the corrosive impact of populism in fuelling,
“racism, xenophobia, anti-Semitism or Islamophobia”,
in our societies. We as parliamentarians have a duty to challenge and reject the inflammatory rhetoric used by populists to sow division within our communities. Social media have proven to be an aggravating factor in the fight against all forms of discrimination. I should be grateful if the Minister informed noble Lords about any discussions which have taken place with social media providers about their obligations in this matter.
As your Lordships are painfully aware, anti-Semitism has deep roots in Europe. The number of anti-Semitic acts in France rose by 74% in 2018, and 1,646 instances of anti-Semitism were recorded in Germany last year. A united approach is needed to tackle anti-Semitism in Europe, which is why I wholeheartedly support the action plan of the European Jewish Congress. This plan urges the EU’s 28 member states, individually and collectively, to allocate greater resources for monitoring and measuring anti-Semitism. European leaders have since pledged to work together to make life safer for European Jews. I would be grateful if my noble friend the Minister informed your Lordships’ House as to the steps Her Majesty’s Government are taking to honour this pledge.
One of the greatest tenets in British society is an individual’s right to freedom of speech, but this freedom must be exercised with care. I am concerned when those in positions of influence wilfully spread conspiracy theories about particular groups in our society. I was therefore greatly concerned to learn that the Equality and Human Rights Commission felt it necessary to launch a formal investigation into reports of anti-Semitism in the Labour Party. Any such behaviour in a political party is totally unacceptable.
Unfortunately, anti-Semitism is not limited to Europe. The Pittsburgh synagogue massacre and Charlottesville clashes in the United States were bleak reminders of the threat facing innocent people from hateful ideology. Those who harbour such views do not limit their bigotry to one group but discriminate against anyone who is different from them in any way. It is vital that we as parliamentarians show leadership in our communities when it comes to fighting anti-Semitism or any form of bigotry. Let us all get together to fight anti-Semitism.
Baroness Tonge (Non-Afl)
My Lords, I felt a little like Daniel in the lions’ den at the beginning of the debate today; I just trust I will be spared, as he was, at the end of the debate. I congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Berridge, on an excellent, informative and interesting speech. I also single out the speech from the noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, and endorse what he says about Jeremy Corbyn. He is not anti-Semitic; he is a man who feels passionately about human rights and, like me, does not always express it in the right sort of way. Nevertheless, he cares deeply about human rights.
I was born during the Second World War, and stories of the Holocaust haunted my childhood—and I mean haunted. We heard them at church, Sunday school and home; it was a dreadful time.
I have seen the statistics and accept that there has been a rise in anti-Semitic incidents over the last three years, but I also note—from reports by Tell MAMA and the recent report from the all-party group led by the noble Baroness, Lady Warsi—that there has been a much greater rise in Islamophobic incidents over the same period and that they are more frequent and severe. I am therefore saddened that we cannot discuss the rise in prejudice generally and—this is very important—the actions of the far-right political movements fanning the flames and poisoning our society. It is a very worrying development indeed, and we should have a debate at some stage.
However, according to the Kantor Center, which produces reports on anti-Semitism annually, there was a surge in violent anti-Semitic activity during and after Operation Protective Edge in 2014—a vicious and deadly attack on Gaza by the Israeli armed forces, in which thousands of Gazans were killed and injured. The killing and maiming continue, of course, with further attacks on Gaza and at the Friday protests.
These events are not quickly forgotten, and I suggest that some if not many people who commit anti-Semitic acts do not distinguish between ordinary Jewish people—I know that noble Lords hate that phrase—and the Zionist Israeli Government of what is now called the Jewish State of Israel. It is too difficult a distinction for many people to make.
I have said harsh things about the Government of Israel and their cheerleaders in this country over the years—I know that. But I am sick of the filthy abuse that I get online, sick of the accusations of anti-Semitism being levelled against me and appalled that I never get any apology, even when the accusations are found to be fabricated, as they were two years ago.
Finally, I wish noble Lords to know that I am not anti-Semitic. I have never been anti-Semitic, and I never will be anti-Semitic. I have Jewish and gentile friends who will vouch for me. But I am anti-injustice, and I think that the people of Palestine have suffered a terrible injustice over the last 100 years at the hands of the Zionist movement—I apologise if noble Lords do not like that phrase—and presently by the Israeli Government. On that I shall not be silenced.
Lord Sacks (CB)
My Lords, I am exceptionally grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Berridge, for tabling this debate, and to the many speakers who have conveyed to the Jewish communities here and elsewhere that we are not alone—that we have friends. At this time, that is very important.
I have just returned from a conference in Warsaw. It is a city that I do not know well, and I was shaken to discover that the Warsaw ghetto, which existed between November 1940 and May 1943, was pretty much in the centre of town. With its nine-foot-high walls topped by barbed wire, holding 400,000 Jews, its existence must have been known by everyone in Warsaw.
It was there that Jews were systematically starved and enslaved. In the summer of 1942, 254,000 of them were sent by train to their deaths by gas in the extermination camp called Treblinka. In April and May 1943, the Germans set about the destruction of the ghetto and the extermination of its population—300,000 were killed by bullet or gas, and 92,000 died through typhoid and starvation. That happened in open view in the centre of one of the great cities of Europe and no one protested. Try to imagine 400,000 Hindus or Sikhs imprisoned within ghetto walls in the middle of London. Imagine people passing those walls every day, knowing that behind them thousands were dying or being sent to their deaths, and no one saying a word. How did it happen?
It happened because in the 19th century, in the heart of emancipated Europe, anti- Semitism, once dismissed as a primitive prejudice of the Middle Ages, was reborn, mutated, promoted and tolerated throughout Europe. By no means was it confined to Germany. If you had been asked at the turn of the 20th century what were its epicentres, a reasonable answer would have been the Paris of the Dreyfus trial and Vienna under its mayor Karl Lueger. People who should have known better gave it respectability. They created the climate for a great crime against humanity.
That is where we are today. Within living memory of the Holocaust, anti-Semitism has returned, exactly as it did in the 19th century, just when people had begun to feel that they had finally vanquished the hatreds of the past. Today, there is hardly a country in the world, certainly not a single one in Europe, where Jews feel safe. It is hard to emphasise how serious that is, not just for Jews but for our shared humanity, and not just for what it represents now, but for the danger that it signals for the future. A society, or for that matter a political party, that tolerates anti-Semitism—that tolerates any hate—has forfeited all moral credibility. You cannot build a future on the malign myths of the past. You cannot sustain freedom on the basis of hostility and hate.
Baroness Altmann (Con)
My Lords, it is an honour and a privilege to speak in this debate and to follow the noble Lord, Lord Sacks. I pay tribute to my noble friend Lady Berridge for introducing this debate so passionately. What can one say about the rise in global anti-Semitism within living memory of the Holocaust? That far-right extremism is increasing, and its traditional nationalist hatred of the other is worrying. But even more disturbing is that the far left has taken over mainstream political leadership with its own version of anti-Jewish rhetoric about the arch-capitalists, bankers and enemies of the working class. Those anti-Semitic sentiments are not about the situation in Israel: they predate the Jewish state, as so brilliantly explained by my noble friend Lord Finkelstein.
Across the globe, there are signs of increasing intolerance and normalisation of verbal acts of hate. Politicians perhaps believe that tapping into fear or hatred wins elections. Some support hatemongers perhaps hoping for support for another cause that they believe in or for a quiet life, or sometimes their own self-interest. As human beings, there are reasons to tremble at the current political landscape.
Exploiting hatred as political currency has its price, and I briefly build on the example already cited by the noble Lord, Lord Sacks, of Karl Lueger, who founded the Austrian Christian Social Party in the 1890s. His political support was drawn largely from petit-bourgeois tradespeople. Lueger discovered that anti-Semitic rhetoric was a vote winner. Historian Léon Poliakov, in his book The History of Anti-Semitism, noted,
“in Vienna any political group that wanted to appeal to the artisans had no chance of success without an anti-Semitic platform”.
Lueger is often cited as one of the first politicians who made use of populism as a political tool. Although his Jewish friends at the time considered that it was just a pose to get votes, exploiting the popular sentiment for his own purposes, it had dire consequences. His style of politics inspired right-wing Austrian leaders in 1918 to 1933, which began to undermine the cohesion of the Austrian state and, more importantly, inspired Adolf Hitler, who paid enthusiastic tributes to Lueger in Mein Kampf.
As parliamentarians, we must stand up against the fires of hate. The flames cannot be deployed strategically and remain contained. Conspiracy theories that shrug off facts, promulgation of propaganda or anti-Semitic tropes can unleash uncontrollable forces. What is the appropriate response? Do we follow our instincts for a quiet life and hope that it will all go away, even as it creeps further into the mainstream? Do we stand by and read one more book on the Holocaust believing that it is a way of standing up against the evils of hatred? No, we must speak out. We must consistently reject denial, dissembling and diversion and claims that anti-Semitic sentiments were apparently endorsed accidentally, unwittingly and unknowingly. We must keep speaking up against anti-Jewish hyperbole spread by left-wing racist ideology whether masquerading as anti-Zionism or anti-capitalism. Those views are lapping at the shores of Governments across the globe, not just in the Middle East but here in Europe and beyond.
Therefore, I am enormously grateful to parliamentary colleagues who have stood up against the rising anti-Semitic tide—for the work of the All-Party Parliamentary Group against Antisemitism and other APPGs that support tolerance and respect, to the leadership of the Conservative Party and to Conservative Friends of Israel, to Labour Friends of Israel and Liberal Democrat Friends of Israel, and to my noble friend Lord Pickles and Ed Balls, who have pushed for the Holocaust memorial to be established in the heart of Westminster, as well as many others whom I do not have time to enumerate.
Will the Minister detail which European programmes to combat anti-Semitism the Government will withdraw from or continue to support after Brexit? Has he had discussions with others in government about the effectiveness of the German approach to outlawing Holocaust denial and whether there are any plans to discuss such measures in the UK? Doing nothing must not be an option. Jews must not be sheep again. We promised we would never let it happen, and we must live up to that commitment.
Lord Singh of Wimbledon (CB)
My Lords, I, too, thank my noble friend Lady Berridge for obtaining this important debate. I have many wonderful Jewish friends, none more so than my good noble friend Lord Sacks and his wonderful family. We share the same family values and quirky sense of humour.
I have visited Auschwitz and seen something of the horrors that thousands of Jews—innocent men, women and children—suffered. In the collective madness of the 1930s and 1940s, Jews were vilified not only in Germany but across much of Europe, including this country. As child I was frequently called a Jew by those who wished to hurt me. However, I believe that talk of a worldwide anti-Jewish conspiracy is misleading and, importantly, takes us away from the real problem which is the way in which unprincipled politicians play on ignorance and majority bigotry, regardless of the consequences suffered by others, to achieve their ends. In Germany, Hitler blamed the Jews. In the India of 1984, it was the tiny Sikh minority. The killing of innocents in gas chambers is evil, but is it any more evil than dousing men, women and children with kerosene and burning them alive? In Hitler’s Germany, Jews were made to wear distinctive clothing to show their inferior status. More recently, a decimated Sikh community in Afghanistan has been made to wear distinguishing patches and to fly a yellow flag outside their homes to make them an easy target for majority bigotry. Majority bigotry knows no boundaries and, as my noble friend Lord Sacks reminded us, has no constraints.
We like to believe prejudice is found in only a few. Sadly, it is far more widespread. We are all, in effect, hard-wired to be wary of difference. Unacceptable but understandable prejudice is easily manipulated to become irrational hatred. Since the Second World War, we have seen unspeakable acts of violence against targeted groups in Cambodia, Rwanda, and Bosnia, and I could go on. Special sympathy-seeking terms such as anti-Semitism or Islamophobia are understandable, but they take us away from the real problem, which is combating the more widespread bigotry suffered by all faiths. To borrow from Shakespeare, if Hindus, Muslims, Sikhs and others are cut, do we not bleed? Taken to an extreme, this giving of special consideration to some groups at the expense of others is, at best, unintended racism. Bigotry will continue to flourish until, in the closing words of the Sikh daily prayer, we look beyond ourselves and our group to the well-being of all members of our one human family.
Lord Shinkwin (Con)
My Lords, I congratulate my noble friend Lady Berridge on securing this debate, and I draw the House’s attention to my entry in the register.
Before today’s debate, I asked some Holocaust survivors for their thoughts on the increasing incidence of anti-Semitism. Survivor Manfred Goldberg told me:
“I recall politicians from right across the political spectrum committing themselves to policies which would ensure that such an avalanche of hatred could never, ever recur. I remember again and again hearing them utter emphatically ‘never again’ in their speeches. I truly did not dream that in my lifetime there could be such a thriving industry of Holocaust deniers. It is unbelievable while survivors are still alive. I just cannot comprehend how this denial momentum developed”.
Fellow survivor Mala Tribich MBE speaks at schools and organisations to pass on the message, which she insists each new generation has to understand, that racism, discrimination and intolerance have to be challenged by us all or we have learned nothing from history. She told me that at the end of World War II,
“when I was liberated from Bergen-Belsen, the revelation of what had been happening in the occupied countries to Jews brought about such worldwide revulsion that I thought anti-Semitism would be a thing of the past. Sadly, the irrational hatred of Jewish people has not disappeared, and the rise of anti-Semitism makes me fear for the future once more. As a Holocaust survivor, I am especially concerned that young people understand what prejudice and discrimination can lead to”.
Child survivor Eve Kugler told me:
“I am hugely concerned about the rise in anti-Semitism. For me, what began with signs everywhere in our German city warning ‘Jews forbidden here’ ended with the pogrom of Kristallnacht, the night when half a dozen Nazis invaded my home, arrested my father and consigned him to the concentration camp of Buchenwald. I cannot stress enough the fact that the increase in anti-Semitism is a danger not just to Jews but to everyone, a danger we ignore at our peril”.
That was the message I gave at the various Yom HaShoah ceremonies that I was recently honoured to address as a guest of the South African Jewish Board of Deputies. I put on record my thanks to the board for its kind and generous hospitality and also my admiration for the wonderful work that its national director Wendy Kahn and her colleagues do to promote the Jewish community and its continuing and significant contribution to South Africa. I also thank the high commissioner to South Africa, Nigel Casey, for his support.
Like other noble Lords, I applaud the excellent work done to counter anti-Semitism in the UK by organisations such as the Holocaust Educational Trust, the Holocaust Day Memorial Trust and the Council of Christians and Jews. In conclusion, we must listen to survivors. As my noble friend Lord Polak reminded us, how we respond to the resurgence of the racist poison that is anti-Semitism says so much about our values. Only by standing in solidarity can we, together, defeat it.
Lord Gold (Con)
My Lords, I too thank my noble friend Lady Berridge for initiating this important debate and congratulate her on such a powerful opening speech. Most disturbingly, the existence of anti-Semitism remains, as we have heard, a major worldwide problem in 2019, when in so many ways we are a more liberal and tolerant society than ever before. We have heard horrific statistics of increased anti-Semitic incidents, which are not just verbal but violent. More Jews were killed in anti-Semitic violence around the world in 2018 than during any other year in decades. The number of anti-Semitic incidents recorded in the UK alone in 2018 was the highest ever. As we have heard, anti-Semitism is no longer confined to the activities of the far left or the far right but has become mainstream; it is seen in public forums, debates and discussions and manifested in all media channels, including most notably the social networks.
The Jewish population today feels increasingly insecure. In Europe, a survey conducted by the Fundamental Rights Agency reported that more than 40% of Jews surveyed feared that they might be physically attacked, and almost 47% feared becoming victim to anti-Semitic verbal insult or harassment. Often, anti-Semitism is hidden—loosely, I might add—behind criticism of the State of Israel. That was an excuse recently used by students at Essex University to vote against the creation of a Jewish society there—a decision happily now reversed after media outcry.
We can speculate as to why anti-Semitism has been increasing but, as other noble Lords have said, there can be no doubt that social media is making it easy for hate groups to find each other and join up to spread their hatred. Just earlier this week, two young men were convicted at the Old Bailey of encouraging acts of terrorism after describing Prince Harry as a “race traitor”. These two blatant anti-Semites had used a social media platform to link up with like-minded individuals in the USA through a frightening neo-Nazi group which I will not give publicity to by naming.
How can we stop this rise in worldwide anti-Semitism? I shall make four suggestions, as there is clearly no one answer. First, as other noble Lords have said, there is a need to control social media. Here in the UK, the Government have promised measures to regulate companies over harmful content, including through fines and blocking services. If these companies cannot self-regulate, however, action must now be taken without delay. Will the Minister let us know what plans the Government will be unveiling in this respect?
Secondly, the justice system must come down hard on those who perpetrate anti-Semitic hate material; they must know that there will be serious consequences. But it is also clear that we need far better education to make people realise that everyone should be treated equally and nobody, including Jews, should be demonised. That education must spread to our universities, too. The Government should support those universities that stand up to fight anti-Semitism, ensuring that teaching staff do not spread hatred and that anti-Semitic guest speakers such as the Prime Minister of Malaysia, whom we have heard about, are not welcome in our universities or on these shores.
Next, we must call out all incidents of anti-Semitism. We must not be afraid to speak up when we witness anti-Semitic acts or hear anti-Semitic statements. I have tremendous admiration for those brave people in the Labour Party who have stood up against the anti-Semitism they have seen perpetrated in their party. I listened to the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Haringey, with such admiration, and I thank him. Action has been promised by the Labour leadership but it remains elusive. I am not equipped to say whether Jeremy Corbyn is anti-Semitic, but if he is not, let him demonstrate that fact by his actions.
Finally, as my fourth idea, I want to mention role models—especially for young people—who should stand up and denounce anti-Semitism. Recently, the Building Bridges campaign at Chelsea Football Club, which has been working with children and young people in schools, demonstrated what can be done. The club has teamed up with the Holocaust Educational Trust, the Jewish Museum London and others to raise awareness of anti-Semitism, as well as its impact on the Jewish community and society as a whole. It is action of this kind that we must encourage; we must never give in or give up.
Lord Palmer of Childs Hill (LD)
My Lords, I first thank the noble Baroness, Lady Berridge, for introducing this debate in such detail. I declare my interest as president of the Liberal Democrat Friends of Israel; having heard the noble Lord, Lord Finkelstein, I must also declare my shopping habits in Golders Green.
The Motion asks the House to take note of anti-Semitism worldwide. A strange feature of anti-Semitism is that it occurs even in areas where there are no Jews. Anti-Semitism is possibly the original source of fake news. This can cover many areas. The most popular appears to be blaming Jewish bankers, the favourite being the house of Rothschild due to the difficulty in finding other so-called Jewish banks. The lie is to portray these bankers as aiming for world domination. They also falsely accuse George Soros. I am grateful to my noble friend Lady Ludford and the noble Lord, Lord Alton, for giving all the statistics so that I do not have to repeat them.
Then there is the preposterous fake news blaming the Jews, the Zionists and the Israelis for the disaster of 9/11 and the Twin Towers. This is despite documented proof that these were a series of co-ordinated terrorist attacks by the Islamic terror group al-Qaeda. None of this fake news on anti-Semitism is new. Still quoted in some countries is the notorious Protocols of the Elders of Zion, which was briefly mentioned earlier. This is a fabricated anti-Semitic text purporting to describe a Jewish plan for global domination. This hoax—yes, it was a hoax—was first published in Russia in 1903 and translated into many languages. It is still widely available and presented as a genuine document. In the 1920s, Henry Ford funded the printing of 500,000 copies to distribute throughout the USA, and it was, of course, widely read in Nazi Germany. A translation appeared in Cairo in 1929 and again in 1951.
The third-largest Jewish community in the world is in France. That country has suffered from anti-Semitic murders, including in Toulouse and Paris. Last year, more than 3,000 Jews emigrated from France to Israel; the numbers for earlier years are similar. In 2015, 6,628 Jews emigrated from France to Israel—of course, this does not count all those in France who emigrated elsewhere. The noble Baroness, Lady Berridge, identified many countries; let me add a couple. A survey identified Hungary as the most anti-Semitic country in eastern Europe; incidents included phone threats, vandalising Jewish tombstones and vandalising a Holocaust memorial. Let us look further afield: in Venezuela—loved by dear Mr Corbyn—under Chavez and Maduro, the Jewish community has declined from 20,000 to less than 7,000. In the Middle East, outside Israel, Jews are not welcomed. Jews have difficulty entering Saudi Arabia and it is forbidden for religious minorities openly to practise their religion there. In the United States, the most shocking incidents were when 11 were killed at a synagogue in Pittsburgh and four killed in Poway, California. This is against a background of anti-Semitic cartoons in the New York Times and a supremacist march in Charlottesville with chants of “Jews will not replace us”.
Mention has been made of the Prime Minister of Malaysia; I will not repeat that. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Sacks, for mentioning Poland because it gives me an opportunity to say—I had not thought to say it—that my late maternal grandmother never left Poland. She was never heard of after the end of the Second World War. This affects many of us in this country personally; we are still alive remembering our close relatives such as my maternal grandmother.
Having set the worldwide scene, let me be more parochial. I am pleased to say that, as an Orthodox Jew born and living in the UK, I had not until recently seen a growth of anti-Semitism. I will, however, relate how I experience anti-Semitism, which some may not recognise as such. My noble friend Lady Ludford said that many of these things are often thought of as trivial, but they are not.
In 1997 I was a candidate in the general election, having fought four previous general elections. The Labour Party canvassers had a doorstep patter along the lines that they were calling on behalf of the Christian gentleman. The clear implication was that I qualified as neither a Christian nor a gentleman. At all public meetings one of the first questions from the audience was whether the candidates, including me, subscribed to Christian values. My reply was that I agreed with Judaeo-Christian values, which sort of got me out of the hole. It was the election in which I was stopped and told—believe it—“Jew, go home”. Has the modern, Corbyn-led Labour Party changed other than to get worse? I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Harris, for his very brave comments about the Labour Party and I am proud that he said them. I do not agree with the noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, or the noble Baroness, Lady Tonge, that we do not understand what Jeremy Corbyn is about. I understand what he is about and I do not approve of it. It is as near to anti-Semitic as one can get.
We have not heard a lot of campus stories. What happens to students on campus is sometimes quite horrific. At a prominent UK university, a Jewish student went out for the evening without locking the door to his room. When he returned, he found that a swastika had been etched into the pinboard on his wall. That is a genuine story. A lecturer at a Midlands university recently hosted and spoke at an event titled “Palestinian Rights, Prevent and the Misuse of Antisemitism”. Three Jewish students attended the event and afterwards went up to talk to the lecturer who had hosted the meeting to disagree with some of the points made. The net result was that the lecturer made an official complaint against these Jewish students, accusing them of intimidation for approaching her at the end of the meeting and of having recorded the meeting, which they had not. Some of those who attended may have done so but these students did not. The Jewish students spent three months worrying about this until they were eventually told that it had been dealt with.
I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Warsi, for her speech because it gave me great comfort. If we have a debate in this Chamber on Islamophobia, which is also a problem, many of us will rise to speak in that debate as well.
The modern manifestation of anti-Semitism is the way in which Zionism is portrayed. Wikipedia, always a good source, states that Zionism is the notion of creating a sovereign, self-ruling homeland for the Jewish people in the land of Israel. Zionism is a nationality as well as a religion, and these people deserve their own state in their ancestral homeland, Israel. I welcome the right reverend Prelate’s comment that it would be tilting at the moon for Israel to disappear—I think I have got that right. I take that as a blessing, and maybe it will help Israel in the future. I fail to see how a desire for a homeland for Jews can be seen as apartheid or racist, but it is so portrayed. Why is this anti-Semitic?
I stress that in Israel all religions are accepted; apostates, those who change their religion, are not harmed. LGBT people are accepted, and the country has one of the largest Gay Pride marches in the world. I thank the noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Harries of Pentregarth, for what he said about religions in Israel. Who knows what is happening in Israel with its politics at the moment—it could be anything, including another general election in September. The interesting thing is that in the most recent general election in Israel, the third-largest group in the Knesset was made up of the Arab parties. In the previous Knesset, when they stood as one group, they formed the second-largest group. This hardly sounds like an apartheid state. Compare this with Israel’s neighbours and near neighbours. Such accusations are anti-Semitic because no such accusations are made—nor should they be—of countries in which the official religion, often the only religion accepted, is Islam, Hinduism, Christianity in all its forms or Buddhism, or even of atheist countries. I stress that criticising certain actions of the Israeli Government is not on its own anti-Semitic. In fact, criticism of that Government is a very popular sport among Israelis. However, when someone attacks Israel, homeland of the Jewish people, and attacks no other country, that is anti-Semitic.
Lord Collins of Highbury (Lab)
My Lords, I, too, thank the noble Baroness, Lady Berridge, not only for securing this debate but for her excellent and powerful introduction. Like her, I found it difficult to prepare for the debate. I thank the APPG for its briefings because they told us how horrific the situation is. It is a wake-up call.
My parents—not my school, sadly—taught me never to forget the evil crimes of the Nazis, as passionately described by the noble Lord, Lord Sacks. Yet as we have heard in the debate, more than 70 years after the Shoah we see the repeated use—in the US by senior politicians and elsewhere—of anti-Semitic tropes reminiscent of the words of Goebbels. This is a demonstration that the evil of anti-Semitism is still present and remains a real threat to the lives and welfare of Jewish communities throughout the world. In the US, as we have heard, we saw the massacre at the Pittsburgh synagogue. We have heard about the increasing levels of violence across Europe, including in this country.
The noble Baroness, Lady Berridge, the noble Lord, Lord Alton, and other noble Lords have referred to the CNN polling by ComRes. Like them, I was particularly shocked by its findings. We have been too complacent about this rise of anti-Semitism. The key findings of the survey are that 28% say that Jewish people have too much influence in finance and business across the world compared with other people; 20% say that Jewish people have too much influence in the media across the world compared with other people; and, what is worse, 31% think that Jewish people use the Holocaust to advance their position and to achieve certain goals. That is horrific. Also, 44% of adults in the European countries surveyed see anti-Semitism as a growing problem in their countries. However, their answers to other questions suggest that they may think this is happening somewhere else: someone else is doing the bad thing, somewhere else.
In his speech at the end of last year, the noble Lord, Lord Ahmad, argued that the rising tide of anti-Semitism and,
“the issues of rising religious hate crime against minority communities”,
posed a real challenge in the UK and abroad. He said that “divisive voices and actions” could be defeated,
“only through collective and collaborative action”.
That is what today’s debate is about—what we, not others, do together. At the General Assembly of the United Nations, the noble Lord stressed the commitment to stamping out anti-Semitism and called on the international community to combat it in all its forms.
Here I pay tribute to the work of the noble Lord, Lord Pickles, the UK’s envoy for post-Holocaust issues. He has done a tremendous job in promoting internationally the call for other countries to adopt the IHRA definition of anti-Semitism. That has been critical. Of course, the Minister has been working at the General Assembly and with UNESCO at a high-level meeting, focusing on the importance of education. That is certainly a vital ingredient in challenging this evil.
The noble Baroness, Lady Berridge, and the noble Lord, Lord Gold, highlighted the feeling among the Jewish community, particularly in Europe. They feel at risk. We have certainly heard about the surveys that have been conducted: 90% of those surveyed by the FRA, for example, felt anti-Semitism was growing in their country. We have heard reference to the 2014 ADL survey, which stated the Hungary was the most anti-Semitic country in Eastern Europe, with 41% of the population holding such views. That was highlighted in its elections, with Jobbik, a far-right party, receiving 17% of the vote. Its vice-president and vice-chairman proudly refer to themselves as Nazis and anti-Semites. That is in an EU country, a member of our family. We should be concerned about that and how we address it.
The Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s choice of language about the investor and philanthropist George Soros reflects the age-old conspiracy theories about Jewish wealth and power. I quote him—this is a leader of an EU country:
“We are fighting an enemy that is different from us. Not open, but hiding; not straightforward but crafty; not honest but base; not national but international; does not believe in working but speculates with money; does not have its own homeland but feels it owns the whole world”.
Today’s debate is about what we are doing to challenge such attitudes and how we are meeting our commitments. I hope the Minister will be able to address the commitments he has made and what progress we have been making.
One plea I would make is about what we do not just as a Parliament and a Government, but in civil society, our churches, our trade unions and, of course, just as importantly, our political parties when we hear anti-Semitism.
I will conclude by addressing the remarks of my noble friend Lord Harris. In April last year my honourable friend and trade union sister Ruth Smeeth said in a Commons debate:
“There have always been racists and anti-Semites in our country, lurking on the fringes of our society—both left and right—and I dare say there always will be. What is so heartbreaking is the concerted effort in some quarters to downplay the problem”.—[Official Report, Commons, 17/4/18; col. 273.]
I heard the noble Lord, Lord Finkelstein, and I certainly agree with his analysis. Sadly, like him, I have read many of Andrew Murray’s books. One thing I disagree with him on is that Leninism is not progressive trend. It is anti-democratic and its tradition has no place in a party that believes in parliamentary democracy. We on this side firmly believe that.
In my party, the process of dealing with complaints of anti-Semitic behaviour by individuals, as my noble friend Lord Harris said, has been too slow and far too often individuals are suspended only when their cases receive publicity. As Tom Watson, the party’s deputy leader, made clear, the reforms made by the party to address this have not been adequate. But this is not an administrative failure; it is, as my noble friend said, a political one. Addressing it requires leadership, which Jeremy Corbyn, working together with Tom Watson, must provide.
The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon) (Con)
My Lords, I join all noble Lords in thanking my noble friend Lady Berridge, not only for securing this debate. I have known her for a long time. I think we entered your Lordships’ House more or less at the same time. I was struck not only by her speech but by her excellent summary. I hazard a guess that everyone in this Chamber could relate to the sentiments and emotions she expressed in her introduction. I congratulate her on setting off this incredible debate robustly and insightfully.
In doing so, I also thank all noble Lords. This has been one of those debates where not only is it appropriate that a Minister answers from the Dispatch Box on behalf of Her Majesty’s Government, but it is my immense honour to do so because it recognises the importance of this issue, not just as a country and in terms of what we are doing but as a collective, as the noble Lord, Lord Collins, so aptly put it. I stand by that. He and I work on these issues collectively. It requires that collective and collaborative response.
In introducing the debate, my noble friend asked whether it is right to attach “ism” to anti-Semitism. On a slightly lighter note, I was struck by how many isms we got through. There was Zionism, capitalism, Leninism, imperialism—the list went on. Most of those were contained in the four-minute contribution of my noble friend Lord Finkelstein.
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon
He could, yes. I tripped somewhat on that one.
On a serious note, this is deeply disturbing. The noble Lord, Lord Palmer of Childs Hill, and all noble Lords made the point that in the same month that we commemorate the 75th anniversary of the Normandy landings, which marked the beginning of the end of the Holocaust, we still have to hold this debate on anti-Semitism. As the noble Lord, Lord Harris, reminded us in his powerful remarks, it shows the need to continue to act on this important issue. It is also clear to me that this old evil continues to blight the lives of Jewish communities throughout the world.
At this point, I pay tribute to two of my noble friends from when I took on my first ministerial job in the Department for Communities and Local Government. I of course refer to my noble friend Lord Pickles—should I call him my noble chum?—and my noble friend Lady Warsi. They encouraged me to go to Auschwitz-Birkenau as one of my first trips as Communities Minister. I travelled with a group of students. I am proud of the commitments that Governments have made, both at that time in the coalition Government and subsequently in the Government I now serve in, to continue on the platform of education that the noble Lord, Lord Collins, referred to. I deliberately went with those schoolchildren because I saw for myself what that history would mean to their lives, and the importance of investing in their education early so that tomorrow, when they take leadership of our great country and all the different industries and sectors that define the modern, diverse United Kingdom, they do so with a recognition of the horrors of the past, but having learned from them so they build that cohesive, collective, progressive country we all desire to see. I am grateful to both my noble friends in that respect.
As we have heard from the noble Lord, Lord Palmer, and the noble Baroness, Lady Ludford, looking around the world and right here in the UK in 2018, the Community Security Trust logged a record high of more than 1,600 anti-Semitic attacks. The USA has suffered appalling fatal shootings in synagogues. People have been attacked simply for practising their faith. In Australia vandalism and intimidation have afflicted Jewish communities, and in the Middle East and elsewhere tensions remain high.
Several noble Lords, including my noble friends Lord Leigh, Lord Polak, Lord Gold and Lady Berridge, the noble Baroness, Lady Ludford, and the noble Lord, Lord Mitchell, mentioned Malaysia. As many noble Lords will recall, Malaysia is a member of the Commonwealth. I am a Minister of State for the Commonwealth and assure them that we were the first to object most vociferously to its holding of the Games, since it sought to ban athletes who wanted to participate, because they were from Israel. I am proud that we did. In response to the recent statement by Malaysia’s Prime Minister, I will digress with a personal anecdote. Many years ago, as I undertook political life and people got to know me, after a while one came forward and said, “You know what, Tariq? You are just normal”. I did not take that as an insult. What they alluded to was that, yes, I was of Indian-Pakistani heritage and Muslim by faith but those things that impacted me as a citizen of this country—as a proud Brit—were exactly the issues that mattered to anyone else. However, when Prime Ministers of other countries come to our country and try to disturb, divide and then dismiss these important issues, we need to stand up and make it clear that they may express those views, but we will oppose them bilaterally. It is important that our institutions also recognise that wherever they find any form of bigotry or—yes—anti-Semitism, they must reject it in its entirety.
My noble friends Lord Leigh and Lord Sheikh and other noble Lords talked of tackling global anti-Semitism. In a couple of weeks’ time it will be a year since I was appointed the Prime Minister’s special envoy on freedom of religion. It is a great honour, but it would be remiss of me not to recognise, as many noble Lords have also, the important work of the UK’s special envoy, my noble friend Lord Pickles. He raises the subject of anti-Semitism directly with other Governments, many of whom recognise, as we do, the need for specific and collaborative action. Earlier this week, as we heard from my noble friend, he attended in Bucharest the first international meeting of special envoys tackling anti-Semitism, along with members of the World Jewish Congress. In March he was in Poland, in discussion with community leaders.
I did not expect a Brexit question, but my noble friend Lady Altmann managed to weave one in—congratulations on that. I assure her, and my noble friend Lord Pickles, that I am working very closely with Ján Figel, the European Commission’s FoRB envoy. We continue to raise these issues, and will continue to collaborate in post-Brexit Britain.
These channels of communication are vital, because we must never retreat into fearfulness. We must step forward. If we ignore this issue, it will not go away. The theme of next January’s Holocaust Memorial Day is “stand together”. That is what we all must do and the Government are determined to do: stand with people of all faiths and none. As we heard from the noble Lord, Lord Sacks, the worst humanitarian crimes of history have occurred when groups were singled out, marginalised and scapegoated. I am delighted that he has joined us for this debate today, although when he was sitting next to the noble Lord, Lord Singh of Wimbledon, I felt that on those Benches we had our own little “Thought for the Day” going on.
The fundamental democratic values of individual liberty and mutual respect must at this juncture in 2019, as we have heard from many noble Lords, lead us to collectively stand together with our neighbours to call out marginalisation of any community, wherever we see it. I note very carefully the challenges that the Labour Party has faced, which the noble Lord, Lord Harris, spoke about. Equally, as I look towards my party, I pay tribute to my noble friend Lady Warsi, and her campaign to ensure that if there are bigots in our party, there are people calling out instances of Islamophobia for what they are. They must be investigated fully.
I absolutely agree with the noble Lord, Lord Singh. It is important that we act collectively on this issue. He referred to more recent examples, but the history of the Holocaust teaches us that if we ignore these crimes, they become crimes against humanity; therefore, we must stand together to defeat any kind of prejudice, wherever we see it. The UK Government have been at the forefront of calling out prejudice and discrimination in all its forms. The noble Lord, Lord Collins, referred to my speech at the UN General Assembly last year. Education is so important. Interestingly, I was interviewed afterwards and the journalist said, “Minister, despite being a Muslim, you’re very strong on anti-Semitism”. I corrected him, saying that it is because I am a Muslim that I am strong on anti-Semitism because of the common humanity that unites people of every faith. As we have heard time and again, and as my noble friends Lady Warsi and Lord Sheikh have said, the greatest test of an individual is standing up not for the rights of yourself but for the rights of others. Through our diplomatic activity, we actively promote freedom of religion or belief. Indeed, in my role as special envoy I have prioritised the need to tackle discrimination on the basis of religious or ethnic identity in all our posts, wherever we find it—be it through collaborative work at the United Nations, through our work at the OSCE or with the EU. Ministers and senior officials regularly raise individual and community cases with Governments directly, and challenge practices and laws that discriminate on the basis of a person’s belief or religion.
Let me say a word about Israel. I have visited Israel as a Minister, but I have also visited Israel privately, with my family. As we were rightly reminded by the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Chester, Israel is a country that brings together communities of all faiths, as I saw when we visited Jerusalem. As I saw when I visited Haifa, it is a country that protects those minorities who are often persecuted elsewhere. I say to the noble Baroness, Lady Tonge, that because of the strength of that relationship, when it comes to those challenges—when it comes to some of those questions she has raised with me—we are able to raise them bilaterally. We will continue to do so, because being a democracy means being transparent and responsive in defence of any challenge that may be posed, but it is a strength of the relationship that the United Kingdom—
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon
In the interests of time, I will not give way, but I am happy to meet the noble Baroness, as she knows.
This relationship is an important one, as with any country—I mentioned Malaysia earlier. We must stress in our bilateral exchanges that where we disagree with a country, we will raise it. We will continue to invest in our relationships worldwide. It is the strength of those relationships that allows us to challenge on certain issues.
I turn to the IHRA definition of anti-Semitism. As my noble friend Lord Pickles reminded us, the UK was among the first to adopt the working definition of anti-Semitism in 2016. We value the definition because it illustrates specific examples of behaviour that may be anti-Semitic. This means that while it is not legally binding, it is a useful tool for criminal justice agencies and other public bodies in understanding how anti-Semitism manifests itself in the world today. It also helps combat Holocaust denial, in an age of indifference to objective truth. For these reasons, we are lobbying others to adopt the definition. My noble friend Lord Pickles has been especially active in this area, recently mentoring Australia on its journey to join this alliance.
My noble friends Lord Sheikh and Lord Gold raised specific questions about online abuse. I agree that religious intolerance spreads quickly and globally online. The Government recognises the extent of this threat. I assure noble Lords that we are working with internet providers and other Governments to regulate social media, shut down hate speech and protect users. For example, in November 2018, we supported an international experts’ conference which looked at anti-Semitic abuse online, particularly against women. We are currently working with the Antisemitism Policy Trust on this very issue.
My noble friend Lady Berridge asked about the G20 agenda for the meeting which will take place later this month in Japan. The specific issue of online harms is certainly being looked at. I will also raise the issue that she raised about anti-Semitism, which I am sure will feature in the margins of that meeting.
My noble friend Lord Polak asked a simple question about how we come together on collective action. He will know from our conversations that I have a simple answer to his question: yes, of course I agree. In his powerful contribution, he talked about how communities can achieve the outcomes that we desire only by acting together.
The noble Lords, Lord Harris of Haringey and Lord Campbell-Savours, talked about the domestic challenges. We must acknowledge the global nature of the problem, while knowing that there are actions we can take at home. The Government have maintained a close relationship with Jewish communities through the cross-government working group to tackle anti-Semitism. We have committed £14 million to the protective security grant to keep Jewish schools and institutions safe. I hold regular faith round tables, at which Jewish and other faith leaders join me to discuss current issues and emerging concerns.
I am sure I speak for many in your Lordships’ Chamber when I pay particular tribute to our Prime Minister, Mrs May. When my right honourable friend was Home Secretary, I saw the passion and conviction she had for ensuring that those funds were not just protected and sustained but strengthened. I am sure that, in time, history will judge her for the important role that she played in tackling anti-Semitism.
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon
The noble Lord, Lord Alton, and the noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Harries, talked about the importance of the evidence base and statistics. It is shocking when we see the challenges that we face here in 2019. Again, those underline the importance of acting together.
Reference was also made to the new Holocaust memorial. I am delighted, honoured and proud, as I think we should all be, that the UK is leading in this respect. The additional £25 million in government funding will go a great way towards it. I say to my noble friend Lord Shinkwin that one thing which has struck me—I am sure this will touch the hearts of many, including the noble Lord, Lord Mitchell, who referenced it—is that as we see those Holocaust survivors pass on, would it not be incredible if those survivors were the ones laying the first bricks as we break ground on that site? This is one area I am looking at, including in my most recent discussions with the Chief Rabbi. I hope noble Lords will agree that we should work together in pursuit of that aim.
There is much I could say but in the limited time I have, I wish to thank again every noble Lord who has taken part in this extremely important debate. As our Prime Minister, Mrs May, said in May, through that Holocaust memorial we must,
“ensure that every generation understands the responsibility that we all share—to fight against hatred and prejudice in all its forms, wherever it is found”.
In the words of the revered and respected Rabbi Hillel, who said in the Babylonian Talmud 2,000 years ago:
“That which is hateful to you, do not do to your neighbour. That is the whole Torah; the rest is commentary”.
We have reflected on these words, which stay true to this day.
The next Holocaust Memorial Day marks the 75th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz. It also marks the 25th anniversary of the genocide of the Bosniak Muslims in Srebrenica. Only yesterday, I returned from Sarajevo, the capital of a country which is building from its past. I was very heartened by the interreligious council that I met there. There were Muslim and Christian representatives, including Orthodox and Catholic representatives. But the chairman of that council is Jewish and this showed how, in a country that only 20-odd years ago was torn apart by conflict, faith communities and faith leaders are coming together collectively to address the issues, including the priority of bringing justice to the victims of sexual violence in conflict.
I have never felt that faith is to blame. In all faiths and beliefs, collectively, lies the answer; that is what brings us together today. Perhaps I may end with the wise words of my mother, which define my own ideology thus. One day when I returned, as a Muslim attending a Christian school, from learning about Judaism, she said very sweetly to me: “Tariq, there is no confusion. When we build, we build with the foundations and the foundations of our faith are Judaism. After those foundations, the walls of Christianity were erected and after that, the roof of Islam completed the house of Abraham. The other windows and doors represent other faiths and beliefs, which together constitute the house of God”.
Baroness Berridge
My Lords, I thank noble Lords for their contributions today but in my passion, I think I have caused a little confusion to Hansard, whose staff have been sending me some notes. I hope that I did not confuse your Lordships but when I mentioned Jo Brand, I was endorsing the work of the Metropolitan Police: when people are already throwing milkshakes, to suggest battery acid is inappropriate. To be fair to her, I think she corrected herself immediately afterwards and realised that she had stepped across the line. When I referenced the quote from Luther, I did not put a subject in the sentence, which begins:
“Even if they were punished in that most gruesome manner”.
I will provide the full quote to Hansard, which is from a public lecture in Oxford last year.
There are of course too many speakers to mention everyone individually, but I am sure that all your Lordships wish the special envoys all the best for their meeting on Monday. I hope that theirs will be a meeting of the super-magnificents, as my noble friend Lord Polak described them. I draw attention briefly to my noble friend Lady Warsi’s comment that we should speak on behalf of others; many people in today’s debate have exhibited that quality. I was very inspired by the comment of the noble Lord, Lord Sacks, that freedom cannot be built on the basis of hostility and hate.
The theme throughout has been that if our citizens, or European citizens, are listening to this debate and have problems, their problems may be the fault of their Government or of the EU; their problems, perish the thought, may even be their own fault. But what they are not is the fault of the Jews.
Parliamentary Buildings (Restoration and Renewal) Bill
Thursday 20th June 2019
(4 years, 10 months ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Parliamentary Buildings (Restoration and Renewal) Act 2019 View all Parliamentary Buildings (Restoration and Renewal) Act 2019 Debates Read Hansard Text Amendment Paper: Consideration of Amendments as at 19 June 2019 - (19 Jun 2019)
Age Verification
(4 years, 10 months ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (Lord Ashton of Hyde) (Con)
My Lords, with the leave of the House I will repeat a Statement made by my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for DCMS in the other place earlier today. The Statement is as follows:
“Mr Speaker, I would like to make a Statement in relation to the implementation of age verification for online pornography. As the House knows, the Government announced that age verification for online pornography, under the Digital Economy Act, would come into force on 15 July 2019. It has come to my attention in recent days that an important notification process was not undertaken for an element of this policy, and I regret to say that this will delay the commencement date. I wanted to take the opportunity to come to the House as soon as possible to apologise for the mistake that has been made and explain its implications.
In autumn 2018, we laid three instruments before the House for approval. One of those instruments, the Guidance on Age Verification Arrangements, sets out standards that companies need to comply with. This should have been notified to the EU Commission in line with the technical standards and regulations directive, and it was not. Upon learning of this administrative oversight, I have instructed my department to notify this guidance to the EU and re-lay the guidance in Parliament as soon as possible. However, I expect that this will result in a delay in the region of six months.
As the House would expect, I want to understand how this occurred. I have therefore instructed my department’s Permanent Secretary to conduct a thorough investigation. That investigation will have external elements to ensure that all the necessary lessons are learned. Mechanisms will also be put in place to make sure that this cannot happen again. In the meantime, there is nothing to stop responsible providers of online pornography implementing age-verification mechanisms on a voluntary basis, and I hope and expect that many will do so.
The House will also know that there are a number of other ways in which the Government are pushing our objective of keeping young people safer online. The Online Harms White Paper sets out our plans for world-leading legislation to make the UK the safest place in the world to be online. Alongside the White Paper, we also published the social media code of practice under the 2017 Digital Economy Act, which gives guidance to providers of social media platforms on appropriate actions they should take to prevent bullying, and insulting, intimidating and humiliating behaviours on their sites. We will also publish interim codes of practice detailing steps that we expect companies to take to tackle terrorist content and online child sexual abuse and exploitation. These will pave the way for the new regulatory requirements.
We set out in the White Paper our expectations that companies should protect children from inappropriate content. We will produce a draft code of practice on child online safety to set clear standards for companies to keep children safe online, ahead of the new regulatory framework. During the consultation on the White Paper, we heard about the technical challenges associated with identifying the specific ages of users, and so I have commissioned new guidance, to be published in the autumn, about the use of technology to ensure that children are protected from inappropriate content online.
The new regulatory framework for online harms announced in the White Paper will be introduced as soon as possible, because it will make a significant difference to action taken by companies to keep children safe online. I intend to publish the Government response to the consultation by the end of the year, and to introduce legislation as soon as parliamentary time allows after that, but I recognise that many Members of this House and people beyond it have campaigned passionately for age verification to come into force as soon as possible to ensure that children are protected from pornographic material they should not see. I apologise to them all for the fact that a mistake has been made which means that these measures will not be brought as soon as they and I would like.
But there are also those who do not want these measures to be brought in at all, so I make it clear that, although my Statement is an apology for delay, it is not a change of policy or a lessening of the Government’s determination to bring these changes about. Age verification for online pornography needs to happen, and I believe that it is the clear will of the House and those we represent that it should and that, in the clear interests of our children, it must”.
Lord Stevenson of Balmacara (Lab)
My Lords, I am grateful to the Minister for repeating the Statement made earlier. I have come, as is probably obvious from my dress, from a memorial service for the late Jeremy Heywood, former head of the British Civil Service and Cabinet Secretary. The theme of that wonderful event was the quality of the British Civil Service. Its skills and expertise are unparalleled in the modern world, and it is a true legacy of his work in that period. It is therefore rather sad to come from that to this, which appears to be an apologia for the work of civil servants. I assume that it is civil servants we are talking about here and not Ministers, although the Minister did not say that in the Statement. Honest mistakes happen, and I do not suggest that anything other than that is at stake here.
Having said that, it would be helpful to know more about what has been happening and how it will be progressed to make sure we learn from the mistakes. When was this error discovered? I note that the issue is about the Technical Standards and Regulations Directive; it does not say this in the Statement, but that was brought in in 2015, so we have had some four years of experience of it. I cannot believe that the Minister will say in response that the department has had no experience of that regulations directive, because it has passed a large number of regulations over the last few years, which we have enjoyed going through together. But it certainly means that the department is aware of the structure under which this regulations directive operates. It is therefore surprising that it was unable to meet the standard for the age verification for online pornography SI that we are talking about.
Secondly, as it does not say this in the Statement, I would be grateful if the Minister could confirm when the Secretary of State learned of this error. Could he give us some more details about how it came to pass?
The Statement says there is going to be a review. That is obviously right. There are two things I want to ask about that. First, it says, rather interestingly, that there will be “external elements”. I assume that does not mean they are going to meet outside in the park and do it in the sun, but could the Minister flesh that out a little? Are we talking here about a mixed group, including external independent persons, who will be able to bring objectivity to the arrangements? It would help if he could make that clear. Secondly, will the review be published when it is completed? With an error of this magnitude, which is going to cause so much difficultly, there is a case for that, so I would be grateful if the Minister could respond.
Behind all this, is there not a bigger question? The Statement hinted that there are those who feel that the way the Government are progressing in this matter is not right. It is based on an assumption that technology will operate in a way that it probably will not, and is based on an old-fashioned view about how technology will help us get to the point that we all want across this House and wider society, which is where children should not be exposed to pornography. The truth is that, although the Statement says that this set of regulations was due to come into force on 15 July, in fact that is a later date than was originally proposed, which was much earlier in the year. This is probably because the issue of the technology itself has not yet been clarified.
There is a wider question about that. The Statement falls into the mistake of equating age verification with action to prevent pornography coming before children. As the latter part of the Statement makes clear, a lot more needs to be done here. This particular regulation—although in no sense do I want to dilute our support for it—may prove not to be the most important element of what we are talking about. The draft code of practice on online child safety, engagement with companies and the new guidance that has been published are all very well, but the online harms White Paper, with its requirement for a duty of care to be placed on companies providing material for the internet, will be the one major step forward that surely will break the dam on this issue. We must focus on that.
Therefore, we should perhaps take time to reflect on whether we are pressing too hard for something that may not turn out to be the long-term solution, without giving the body—even though I think the BBFC is the wrong body—the powers to carry out the work of closing down sites and stopping money flowing to them. Nevertheless, we support the general aim and objective set out in the White Paper and wish to see it brought forward. Age verification is a surrogate for what we are trying to do. It will not solve the problem by itself. It has already been proved that it is easy to get round. Can the Minister confirm that he takes the broader point that there is more here than this particular issue?
Lord Clement-Jones (LD)
My Lords, I too thank the Minister for repeating the Statement. This is unfortunate to say the least, and it means these AV requirements will be put in place nearly three years after the original Digital Economy Act was passed. If the Minister does the maths, he will find it has been three years since they were incorporated into the Act.
The noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, asked all the right questions and made a comment about the professionalism of our Civil Service. But I find it staggering that, if you recall, we had exactly the same situation with the Video Recordings Act when notification did not take place. We all had to come back here and re-pass aspects of that Act because that notification had not taken place. I do not understand why that experience was not engraved on every heart in the DCMS or Home Office. I think it was a Home Office requirement at the time, but I dare say the people themselves transferred to the DCMS subsequently. In those circumstances, will compensation be available to companies that have developed age-verification solutions and gone through the voluntary certification and assessment process in anticipation of the guidance going live this July? I would expect nothing less.
During the passage of the Digital Economy Act, we on these Benches agreed in principle with the concept of age verification for pornographic sites for the purposes of child protection, but we wanted greater safeguards in the Bill in terms of third-party verification and privacy. Sadly, that did not happen. My noble friend Lord Paddick and I argued in 2017 for statutory third-party age verification and queried that last year when the regulator was nominated as the BBFC.
What is the current level of voluntary operation of age-verification methods, in response to the guidance or as an independent action? Does any site operate a voluntary age-verification process? If so, are such processes now exclusively third party, which was the essence of our original amendment and why we felt that that was an important privacy aspect? Explicitly, what will be the procedure for the re-approval of the guidance? Will it be by the negative or the affirmative procedure?
My noble friend Lord Paddick argued last year for a much greater commitment to compulsory age-appropriate sex and relationship education for all children, including telling children what they should do if they encounter online pornography. That is an important other side of the coin. What resource is devoted to this increasingly important aspect of sex education? What difference will the new DNS over HTTPS protocol make to the eventual ability of the BBFC to enforce these requirements or to force internet service providers to comply?
The Secretary of State refers in the Statement to the implementation of the online harms White Paper, which is strongly related to the age-verification agenda. The Minister knows that we have reservations about over-hasty legislation; we believe that pre-legislative scrutiny would be wise and would iron out some of the scope and definitional problems. There are conflicting views about the width of the duty of care and, on the other hand, the dangers of being over-prescriptive. There are many voices still to be heard before we can be sure that the legislation will be sound. Is not a draft Bill the way forward?
There is no reason, however, why Ofcom should not be designated early after the end of the consultation—after all, it has the clout, the technological understanding, and experience in regulating content where it converges with technology, in using enforcement and information-gathering powers and in co-operating with other regulators. It could draw up the first code of practice on online safety, mentioned in the Statement.
There is some concern that current policies are driving us into a world where age verification will be required for all kinds of access other than to pornography. That seems to be the implication of the Secretary of State’s remarks about technical challenges associated with identifying the specific age of companies’ users. Is that the intention? We need to be extremely wary of the consequences of that. That must be fully debated before we go further on age-verification requirements.
Lord Ashton of Hyde
My Lords, I thank both noble Lords for their sensible comments and repeat our apology. The noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, commented on the memorial service for Lord Heywood and the quality of the Civil Service, so I agree that it is unfortunate that we are today bringing forward this Statement. I want to make it clear that Ministers, not civil servants, are responsible for the department. Both the Secretary of State and I take our responsibilities seriously. I take this opportunity to pay tribute to the civil servants—nearly all the time, though not in this case—and to say that they work extremely hard to protect children. They are absolutely committed and work flat out—I shall come to the online harms White Paper—so the responsibility lies fairly and squarely with Ministers.
The noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, asked how we learned and when. We were informed early last week—on 11 June, I think. A letter from the BBFC was written on 11 June; the Secretary of State was informed on Friday 14 June. Earlier this week he asked civil servants to tell him what the implications were and whether we could do anything to get age verification in place earlier. He then came before the other House today, as soon as possible, to apologise and explain what had happened.
The noble Lord rightly said that we have had experience of the technical standards and regulations directive. The department notified the Act but not the regulations that fell under it. Again, it was a mistake and we are making sure that it will not happen again.
In connection with making sure that it does not happen again, the noble Lord asked about “external elements”. By that, we mean that the review will include people from outside the department to make sure that there is an independent view. I cannot confirm whether it will be published—I will have to go back to the department to ask that.
As for technology, there have been delays. We need to make sure that the technology is effective and that privacy is taken into account. Obviously, the third-party age verifiers are subject to the new privacy law under the GDPR. One reason for the delay was to make sure that the additional voluntary certification scheme is up and running. I say in answer to the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, that sites were expecting to have to be ready to comply with the requirement on 15 July. There has been no voluntary compliance before that; I am not surprised by that. With sites having been prepared to do it on 15 July, we would expect them to bring it in within the timescale of roughly six months—to which I shall come in a minute. We do not anticipate any compensation being paid, because sites were expected to do it on 15 July. They may have a little more time, but our intention is that they should do it as soon as possible. We will bring back the same regulations, because we have to bear in mind that this is about protecting children who accidentally stumble on pornography that they would not be able to stumble on in the offline world. We are concerned to get this in place as soon as possible, which is why we are very disappointed with our mistake.
The broader point made by both noble Lords was that this is a limited measure. We have always acknowledged that; it is for commercial sites. There are other areas in which children can come across pornography, such as social media sites, even though that is not their primary business. That is where online harms will come in. The noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, asked about pre-legislative scrutiny. We are very much in a cleft stick here. We of course understand the benefits of pre-legislative scrutiny, but we have to move as quickly as we can to correct some of the problems, particularly in respect of things that are already illegal such as child sexual exploitation and terrorism. However, the noble Lord would not expect me to make a commitment on that when the consultation has not even finished; no doubt, he will respond to the consultation to make his point.
The noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, mentioned the Video Recordings Act, where it is true that notification did not place under the old technical services directive. That was 25 years ago, in 1984, and it was corrected in 2010. So the noble Lord is right that there was a similar mistake 25 years ago. We will take measures to ensure that, whether in 25 years, two years, or one year, it will not happen again. I acknowledge that this has happened before, albeit some time ago.
The procedure on the guidance now is that it has to be laid before the EU for three months in draft form. If the EU makes some comments on it, it may have to stay for another month. After that period, it will have to be laid before the House, under the negative procedure, as the House has already agreed. That means we have to allow 40 days for any noble Lord to pray against it. It will take roughly six months to get through both Houses at the end of the up-to-four-month period.
There are several technical issues about the enforceability of the policy—not the policy itself. We also have to take this into account for the online harms White Paper. A suite of enforcement options is available. For example, the regulator can use payment providers and ancillary service providers to enforce the regulations, but these have to come in first and that is what we have had to delay.
Baroness Benjamin (LD)
My Lords, the Minister is well aware of my long-standing support for this age-verification regime and will not be surprised to learn how disappointed I am to hear about this delay. This means that more innocent children will be able to accidentally stumble across pornography, which, research has shown, will have harmful effects on their well-being. This is a huge price to pay for an unavoidable mistake. While I accept the Minister’s assurance that this is a DCMS administrative error, I would be grateful for confirmation that, as soon as the necessary processes have been undertaken with the Commission, the Government will announce the entry into force of this new regime.
It is important that we know that the Government intend to resolve this issue as soon as possible. We need to hear that time and time again. I would also be grateful for reassurance that this delay is in no way related to underlying privacy concerns that I know are being put forward by groups opposed to age verification in principle. I have met the BBFC and age-verification providers and believe that their additional protections are robust. Will the Minister confirm that the BBFC still has the full support of the Government for this certification, which was developed with the support of the department? Can the Minister please reassure me, all the people who have supported this regime and the children who will suffer, that he will take action to protect them as soon as possible?
Lord Ashton of Hyde
Yes, we will take action as soon as possible. As I explained, after the three or four months with the EU in draft are up, we will immediately proceed with laying it before Parliament. The delay is then the 40 days that it has to lie. As soon as it gets through both Houses of Parliament, it will be in force. We certainly intend to go through with it as soon as possible. The noble Baroness might like to check Hansard. She said that it was an “unavoidable mistake”; I have to confess it was an avoidable mistake. We should have avoided it and should avoid it in future. I also confirm that this was a mistake and the delay is in no way related to privacy concerns. That does not mean we are not taking privacy seriously. The additional voluntary certification scheme is important. We take privacy seriously, but that was not the reason for the delay.
The Earl of Erroll (CB)
I also regret this and am very sad about it. We have already been waiting for two years. Talk about dragging feet on this; I cannot believe it takes so long. I do not understand what the problem is with the guidance on age-verification arrangements. I have read it again and it does not contain anything technical. It lays out some fairly obvious things in plain English; it talks about various aspects of this and ends up saying that the Government would like to set up a voluntary certification scheme. That is about it; there is no technical stuff in there at all, so I am not sure why this is being used as an excuse to delay further. Could it possibly be because the BBFC has just launched a certification scheme that is really only about data protection? That is not its job; it is deliberately excluded from the Digital Economy Act. Data protection is the job of the Information Commissioner’s Office, which can levy huge fines. The BBFC is meant to be worrying about age verification and the protection of children online. Why is its certification scheme not about that? Its scheme is very heavyweight on the GDPR—or DPA 2018—stuff. Does it, therefore, think it needs more time? Was this just an excuse to delay it a little further?
If the Government are to issue new guidance in the autumn, I hope they will look at the British Standard. I also hope they will talk to the age-verification providers. They know how to do this, and how to do it anonymously. This is why, looking at the guidance, the BBFC says that the websites should not do it themselves. People bounce off, get verified elsewhere and get an anonymous, encrypted token back to prove they have done it. There is no problem or technical glitch with this. The Home Office may need to start talking to people who know how to do it; this really worries me.
The certification scheme is a good idea, so the websites know that the age-verification providers are all covered correctly. You need the GDPR stuff in there, but can it please be primarily about age verification and not be ridiculously expensive? At the moment, we are looking at £20,000 a pop for the scheme that the BBFC is proposing. A proper scheme, using the BEIS guidance, through the UK Accreditation Service, would have done a proper accreditation for certification providers for a quarter of the price or less. The Government have wasted a lot of money setting this scheme up and a lot of other people will waste a lot of money trying to get certification. As it is not really for age verification, it gives no guarantees of safety. Why are the Government doing it this way? As the whole thing is voluntary anyway, and certification not compulsory, why are they still delaying. Why does the BBFC not just start enforcing on 15 July? People are not going to put in age verification. Why disadvantage yourself, at extra cost, when you have no reason to do so? The websites will not do it until the last minute. In the meantime, the age-verification providers, which are all ready to go, are suffering economically very badly as a result of this delay.
Lord Ashton of Hyde
First, this is not an excuse for delaying. The legal advice that the BBFC has received, confirmed by the legal advice that my department has received, is that the guidance needs to be notified to the EU under the technical standards and regulations directive. The other two measures do not, so we are laying only the ones that we need to. I cannot give the noble Earl chapter and verse about the legal reasons today, but I can assure him there was no doubt about it. It was not even 50:50; it was absolutely correct. If there was any other way that we could have done it, without delaying it for this long, we would have done so.
We do not believe that money has been wasted in preparing this: we think that age verification is what Parliament asked for and what the majority of Members of both Houses want. That is the way it has been set up. Although it is technically quite difficult, it is not incompatible with the regulation of the ICO. The ICO, as the noble Earl rightly said, is responsible for data privacy and personal data breaches. The age-verification system is set up to comply with the GDPR and the Data Protection Act. The additional voluntary certification scheme—which is voluntary—is a further reassurance to users that even higher standards than the minimum standards of the GDPR apply. So I think it is correct that we continue with it.
As for why we are having to delay this measure, if we bring in age verification now, it will be unenforceable in UK law, because it will have been incorrectly proceeded with against EU law and against the technical standards and regulation directive. Unfortunately, we have concluded that there is no choice but to delay it.
Export Licences: High Court Judgment
The Earl of Courtown (Con)
My Lords, with the leave of the House, I shall now repeat a Statement given earlier today by my right honourable friend the Secretary of State. The Statement is as follows:
“Today, the Court of Appeal handed down its judgment following Campaign Against Arms Trade’s appeal against the Divisional Court’s decision, in July 2017, to dismiss CAAT’s claim for judicial review of licensing decisions about military exports to Saudi Arabia for possible use in the conflict in Yemen. The case was heard by the Court of Appeal from 9 to 11 April this year. The original judicial review and the appeal relate to decisions made between December 2015 and February 2017.
Since the Divisional Court’s judgment in July 2017, the Government have continued to apply the rigorous and robust multi-layered process of analysis in making their licensing decisions, as highlighted in that judgment. We have, in the words of the 2017 judgment, engaged in,
‘anxious scrutiny—indeed … what seems like anguished scrutiny at some stages’.
The Government have always taken their export control obligations very seriously and continue to do so.
There were three grounds of appeal. The judgment found in the Government’s favour on two of these grounds and against on the other, referred to as ground 1. We disagree with the judgment against the Government on ground 1 and will seek permission to appeal the judgment.
Today’s judgment is not about whether the Government made the right or wrong decisions about granting export licences, but concerns the rationality of the process used to reach decisions. The process was upheld by the Divisional Court in July 2017. The central issue in relation to military exports to Saudi Arabia in the context of the conflict in Yemen is Criterion 2c of the Consolidated EU and National Arms Export Licensing Criteria: that the Government will,
‘not grant a licence if there is a clear risk that the items might be used in the commission of a serious violation of international humanitarian law’.
These criteria provide the rules for assessing military exports. Among other things, they cover concerns about human rights and international humanitarian law; the development of weapons of mass destruction; international obligations, including sanctions and treaty commitments; and risk of diversion. They provide a thorough and rigorous risk-assessment framework for reaching licensing decisions.
As the judgment makes clear, the Secretary of State responsible for licensing decisions has,
‘to rely on advice from those with specialist diplomatic and military knowledge’.
In relation to Criterion 2c, this means advice from the Foreign Secretary. Before the establishment of DIT in July 2016, the decision-maker was the then Secretary of State for Business. From July 2016, the responsibility passed to me.
How have decisions been made under Criterion 2c? We have used six strands of information and analysis to inform decisions: analysis of all allegations of IHL breaches known to us; an understanding of Saudi military procedures; continuing engagement with the Saudis at the highest level; post-incident dialogue, including with respect to investigations; Saudi public commitments to IHL; and regular IHL assessments based on developments in the conflict in Yemen. Each of these strands takes into account a wide range of sources and analysis, including those of a sensitive nature to which other parties, such as NGOs and the UN, do not have access. Taken together, these strands of analysis and information, which are reviewed regularly by the FCO in comprehensive reports to the Foreign Secretary and which engage continuously with the record of the Saudis in relation to IHL, form the basis of the Foreign Secretary’s advice to the Secretary of State making licensing decisions.
Given all this, why did CAAT appeal the 2017 judgment? The ground on which we lost in the Court of Appeal judgment concerned whether we were under an obligation to make some overall assessment of whether there had been historic violations of IHL, including whether a pattern of violations could be discerned. Our approach is in line with the EU common position. It has therefore focused on a predictive evaluation of risk as to the attitude and future conduct of the Saudi-led coalition and recognises the inherent difficulties of seeking to reach findings on IHL for specific incidents where we do not have access to complete information. Indeed, the Divisional Court pointed to the “self-evident impracticality” of doing so. Even so, we have fully and robustly engaged with incidents of concern and sought to test and understand the risk of future incidents. We have all along considered the historic record of Saudi Arabia in respect of IHL. Our whole assessment has been infused with IHL considerations. Everything was looked at through the prism of IHL.
Today’s judgment is clear that the context is not one in which the Government are sitting like a court adjudicating on alleged past violations, but rather, in the context of a prospective and predictive exercise, as to whether there is a clear risk that exports might be used in the commission of a serious violation of IHL in the future. In this context, past incidents are only part of the picture. The judgment emphasises that government advisers were keenly alive to the question of possible violation of IHL. It also acknowledges that the processes used to advise the Secretary of State responsible for licensing decisions were rigorous and robust, upon which the decision-maker could rely and had to rely.
Nevertheless, the judgment concludes that CAAT succeeded in the central argument advanced in relation to ground 1 of its appeal. In the court’s judgment the question of whether there was an historic pattern of breaches of IHL was a question which was required to be faced. Even if it could not be answered with reasonable confidence for every incident, at least the attempt had to be made. Because we have not reached findings on IHL for specific incidents as part of our assessment of clear risk, under Criterion 2c, the Court of Appeal concluded that our decision-making process was irrational and therefore unlawful. The consequence is that we are remitted to reconsider our decisions in accordance with the correct legal approach.
As I said earlier, we disagree with this judgment and will seek permission to appeal. Alongside this, we are carefully considering the implications of the judgement for decision-making. While we do this, we will not grant any new licences for exports to Saudi Arabia and its coalition partners which might be used in the conflict in Yemen. As the Court of Appeal makes clear, different people may or may not approve the sale of arms to Saudi Arabia. The judicial review is not an appeal against the Government’s decisions on their merits.
Once again, I stress that this judgment is not about whether the Government made the right or wrong decisions, but whether the decision-making process was rational. The judgment emphasises that there would not be only one answer on future risk if historic violations were found to have taken place. In other words, changing the process, as set out by the court, does not necessarily mean that any of the decisions would be different. The context is a complex and ever-changing conflict. The Court of Appeal judgment does not undermine the UK’s overall framework for export controls as set out in the consolidated criteria. These criteria have stood the test of time and are shared by EU member states. The court’s judgment is about how decisions were made in relation to one element of one of these criteria in a specific context. I commend this Statement to the House”.
My Lords, that concludes the Statement.
Lord Stevenson of Balmacara (Lab)
My Lords, I am very grateful to the Minister for repeating the Statement made in another place. I recognise that it is a complex area for which he may not have the full briefing at his fingertips, and I shall not be pressing him too hard on some its more exotic elements, including the question of whether or not the Ruggie principles have been adapted and successfully applied in this case.
The Statement ends with a rather interesting point:
“The Court of Appeal judgment does not undermine the UK’s overall framework for export controls as set out in the”,
EU consolidated criteria. These criteria have been there for some time and are,
“shared by EU member states”.
I put it to the Minister that that cannot be quite correct, because I understand from reading press reports that Germany and Denmark, which are both members of the EU, have in fact decided to withdraw sales of arms to Saudi Arabia. So, in a sense, different decisions have already been reached; this is not a universal position. Does he have any thoughts on that?
Secondly, as the Minister rightly points out, this is a judicial review. It is not a test of whether or not the policy adopted by Her Majesty’s Government is correct. We follow entirely on that point of view, but it leads to roughly the same position, which is that the Government have been given a pretty severe blow to their current workings. Errors in the process, to the legal mind at least, have been pointed out and will need to be looked at again. I am glad to hear that the granting of export licences has now been cancelled until such time as this is resolved. The issue of course will be uncertain until such time as any appeal is launched and heard. Could the Minister say a bit more about that? It is being reviewed, but this will obviously affect how things go forward, so does he think that it is likely?
The key factor in the finding is that the Government,
“made no concluded assessments of whether the Saudi-led coalition had committed violations of international humanitarian law in the past, during the Yemen conflict, and made no attempt to do so”.
Irrespective of whether or not the end result would be the same, the fact that the Government have no concluded assessments is the reason why the judgment has been overturned in the Appeal Court. In a sense, that is probably all that needs to be said on that, except that there is a question of whether it raises any issues about the broader context in which these decisions are reached.
We had a number of amendments down in Committee and on Report for the Trade Bill when it recently passed through your Lordships’ House which probed some of the issues being raised in the judgment today. It is, as the Minister said, a complex situation involving the Ministry of Defence, the Department for International Trade and the Foreign Office—it has recently been revamped following the formation of the separate department DfIT; previously BEIS was the lead body on the trade element. We received assurances that this was not only a very efficient and effective system but that it was effectively best in class in comparison with the rest of the world. Could the Minister confirm that that is still the view of Her Majesty’s Government on this issue, irrespective of the judgment, and that he is content that the present arrangements are robust and reliable?
Turning to the actual impact of the judgment, I have touched on the question of whether or not arms sales should be suspended if they are likely to be used in the Yemen conflict. The Minister has confirmed that that has happened. Therefore, could he follow up, given that that is the situation and there is an issue at stake here, on whether it might be appropriate to establish a public inquiry so that we can better understand the issues and make sure that lessons are learned? Will he comment on that?
My third point is a more complex one, and I will fully understand if the Minister does not have the information with him; he may wish to write to me. In press reports there is wide evidence of air strikes on non-military targets in Yemen. I refer to a recent Guardian article—it may not be his regular reading, but it is available on the web. It says that the British Government have in recent years,
“deployed RAF personnel to work as engineers, and to train Saudi pilots and targeteers—while an even larger role is played by”,
the private company,
“BAE Systems, Britain’s biggest arms company, which the government has subcontracted to provide weapons, maintenance and engineers inside Saudi Arabia”.
There is also a quote from the Channel 4 programme “Dispatches”, in which a BAE employee said:
“If we weren’t there, in seven to 14 days there wouldn’t be a jet in the sky”.
We are clearly supplying matériel not just to Saudi Arabia for the use of the coalition in the battles in Yemen; we are also supplying it to individuals, who are performing acts which might be considered to be in support of the work which has now been found to be illegal by the Court of Appeal. If that is the case and there are British personnel actively carrying out this work, is there not a danger that they might be prosecuted for what they are doing in the International Criminal Court? If so, could he confirm what Her Majesty’s Government’s position on that would be?
Baroness Northover (LD)
My Lords, I too thank the Minister for repeating the Statement.
The judges concluded that it was “irrational and therefore unlawful” for the Government to have made the export licensing decisions without making adequate assessment of whether past incidents amounted to breaches of international humanitarian law and whether measures subsequently taken meant that there was no longer a “clear risk” that future exports might breach such law. They said:
“The question whether there was an historic pattern of breaches of IHL ... was a question which required to be faced”.
Does the Minister agree that this clearly and obviously must be the case? The pattern of serious violations did not simply need to be “taken into account”, as the Divisional Court found; the Court of Appeal ruled that the pattern has to be properly assessed and considered. In other words, the question of whether Saudi Arabia has breached international humanitarian law has to be answered. Does the Minister not regard this conclusion as an extraordinary indictment—that the Government had not properly made such assessments, despite all the pressure on them to do so, not least in Parliament?
Does he note that the US Senate will be voting on more than a dozen resolutions today aimed at blocking the Trump Administration’s sale of weapons to Saudi Arabia? What is the view of the UK Government on that? Indeed, they say that others may come to other conclusions, but some of the same evidence may be available to them as well as to us.
The Government imply in the Statement that they are making adequate assessments—in which case, as part of that wider consideration, have they looked at what happened, for example, to Jamal Khashoggi? Are they taking note of the UN report, for example, which states that the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia should be investigated over his murder because there is “credible evidence” that he and other senior officials may be liable for the killing? The UN special rapporteur says that the death of the journalist was “an international crime”. She says:
“It is the conclusion of the special rapporteur that Mr Khashoggi has been the victim of a deliberate, premeditated execution, an extrajudicial killing for which the state of Saudi Arabia is responsible under international human rights law”.
We are here looking at international human rights law and the extent to which Saudi Arabia adheres to it.
Have the Government also noted the imprisonment and execution of dissidents, including minors? Have they noted that Saudi-led forces have hit civilians, hospitals, schools and school buses in Yemen? We have asked questions about these attacks and have been assured that the Government did not think that international humanitarian law was broken. How could they say that if it was not properly assessed?
Like the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, I note the decision of Germany and Denmark not to sell arms to Saudi Arabia. Again, I point to the evidence that they will be looking at, which will be similar to the evidence that we can see.
The Government are signing up to agreements on human rights—work led by the Dutch in the EU. How does this square with that? Does he recall that the International Relations Committee concluded that the UK Government were, if only just, on the wrong side in this matter—I note that the noble Lord, Lord Howell, is in his place?
Astonishingly, one strand to which the Government pay attention is Saudi Arabia’s public statements about its commitment to adhere to international humanitarian law. Surely the time has come to examine the evidence properly and in a disinterested way. If this is done, does the Minister not believe that the time has come to ban the sale of arms to Saudi Arabia?
The Earl of Courtown
My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, and the noble Baroness, Lady Northover, for their questions. First, I correct one point he made. We have said that no new licences will be issued while we examine the findings of the judicial review. He mentioned a number of issues in the overall framework of the situation and drew attention, as did she, to what is happening with our colleagues in Europe, particularly Germany and Denmark. They have both introduced specific policies over and above the EU common position. Our view is that the common position provides us with a sufficient basis for decision-making. The noble Lord also mentioned the Trade Bill, which went through the House last year—and this year as well. I cannot take account of factors such as the UK’s strategic economic and social interests in reaching licensing decisions. Decisions are made on the basis of the consolidated criteria, which I listed in the Statement.
The noble Lord and the noble Baroness both referred to non-military targets. Any loss of civilian life must be abhorred in the strongest terms. With our close relationship with the Saudi Arabian Government, we can make those comments to them. We have regular meetings at many levels of government where our views on these matters are forcefully made. The UK military personnel in Saudi Arabia are not involved in the conflict. UK engineers are present under contract to maintain aircraft for the Royal Saudi Air Force. Our assistance is limited to addressing the specific threats faced by the Saudis. We are providing information, advice and training to help Saudi Arabia to respond to those threats. We have also shared with the Saudis techniques to minimise civilian casualties. The UK has a range of personnel deployed across the region, but all remain under UK command and control. The noble Lord also asked a specific question about UK personnel there. I will write to him with further detail.
The noble Baroness drew attention to arms sales by the United States of America. We will of course keep a close watch on what eventually happens in the United States—as will my colleagues in the department. She also mentioned the dreadful incident of the death of Mr Khashoggi. It is an appalling state of affairs that Mr Khashoggi died, but it has no relationship to the criteria for export sales. She asked me a number of other questions to which I shall reply to her in writing, if that is sufficient.
Lord Howell of Guildford (Con)
My Lords, the noble Baroness, Lady Northover, reminds us that this judgment has similarities with the recommendations of your Lordships’ International Relations Committee when we examined the subject some months ago. We then argued, as is implicit in the judgment, that this is a matter not of suspension but of process. In our report, we argued that there needed to be more rigorous checks on export licences in future, given particular horrific incidents in Yemen of a kind which, sadly, continue and have shocked the entire world. We also argued in that short report that we needed to be less reliant on Saudi and local sources for verification and inspection of incidents. In the Statement, the noble Earl mentioned the processes by which decisions are reached when terrible things happen on whether British armaments could be in any way involved. We took evidence to the effect that there was a rather heavy reliance on local reports from the Saudi region and the Saudi authorities, and suggested that that was too great and that other sources of checking and verification would be an improvement. Can the Minister assure me that, whatever the legal outcome of this process, with the appeal and all the rest, those common-sense moves for much more rigorous checks on export licences and less reliance on the say-so of authentication coming from Saudi Arabia itself will be made?
The Earl of Courtown
My Lords, I thank my noble friend, who has extensive knowledge of the subject, and specifically for his committee’s report. He asks the Government to look again at the whole question of the issue of licences. We will look carefully at that, as well as at the court judgment, which we will consider in particular over the next few weeks. As I said, we will also consider existing licences. We will review all the licences in the light of the court judgment, but the points he made are well taken and I will ensure that the department is aware of them.
Lord Judd (Lab)
My Lords, does not the Minister agree that it is at the very least unfortunate that, although we welcome the suspension of arms sales, the Government do so with ill grace and reluctance, instead of making it a positive part of policy in the overall context? Events in Yemen have been terrible, and we should be at pains to make it clear that we do not associate ourselves, even indirectly, with a regime which has played such a questionable role. Does not he further agree that this again underlines the point that arms are not just another export, with which we go ahead unless there is a very special reason not to? Arms are lethal. They are highly dangerous in an unstable world and we should embark on arms sales only where they further our foreign policy objectives in very specific and accountable terms.
The Earl of Courtown
My Lords, the noble Lord may remember that, in another guise, I was the Whip in both the FCO and the Department for International Development. I had to respond to a Question on the present conditions and the availability of relief in Yemen. The loss of life touched me deeply; what happened there is appalling. I note the noble Lord’s very good points but we are not standing still. This morning I spoke to the Minister, my noble friend Lady Sugg, about our activity in Yemen; she reminded me that, on 24 February 2019, my right honourable friend the Prime Minister announced that the UK would provide an additional £200 million in response to the humanitarian crisis in Yemen. Our total commitment is now £770 million. That is important because it provides vital food, water and medicine to those who need them most. Conditions are a little better than they were—for example, there is more access to the ports —but the logistics could not be described as perfect, to say the least.
Lord Hannay of Chiswick (CB)
My Lords, can the Minister be a little clearer about the impact of the Government’s decision not to enter into new contracts while the court case continues? Can he say whether that means that they will not make deliveries under existing contracts while the case is pending? That is rather important. After all, a number of these contracts are colossal and not all of them are delivered at the same time.
Secondly, will the Minister admit that your Lordships’ International Relations Committee was rather closer than the Government were to what turned out to be the ruling of the Court of Appeal? It would be helpful for the Government to say when your Lordships’ House gets something right. Will the prevention of further action on sales mean that we will not negotiate sales, instead waiting until after this case finishes to conclude and deliver them? Further clarification on those points would be rather helpful. I hope that the Minister will be able to do something about that.
Finally, will the department look carefully at the Minister’s response to the debate on our report and the two subsequent government written responses, and if any points in them are no longer true, will the Minister perhaps refresh them?
The Earl of Courtown
My Lords, I thank the noble Lord for his questions. He refers to the report from my noble friend’s committee; I was aware of it but I have not read it. I know that reports from such committees are highly regarded throughout the country and further afield. I will take back to the department his points on the report, particularly regarding any possible changes to Her Majesty’s Government’s response to it.
The noble Lord also mentioned the position on extant licences. As I said, we will review all licences in the light of the court’s judgment. He went further, asking about entering into more sales contracts; I do not have an answer for him on that, so I will have to write to him. We are not issuing any new licences but, as the noble Lord will be aware, these licences last for between three and five years, and many licences could have been issued some time ago. Also, many licences do not end up in arms sales.
Lord Burnett (LD)
My Lords, I want to take the issue a little wider than the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, and my noble friend Lady Northover did. Does this judgment—or this case, for that matter—have any impact or bearing on British troops or advisers who are in Yemen or have been, or may be, deployed there? They could well be using equipment exported by virtue of the authority of these licences. If the noble Earl wants to write to me about that, I would welcome a letter.
The Earl of Courtown
I thank the noble Lord for his question. I will write to him on some of the finer details. As he is aware, and as I said, our assistance is limited to addressing the specific threats faced by the Saudis. We are providing information, advice and training, as well as sharing techniques, to help Saudi Arabia to respond to the threats. A range of UK personnel has been deployed in the area, as I said; I underline the fact that they all remain under UK command and control. The noble Lord asked a number of specific questions relating to our personnel; I will ensure that he gets a correct reply.
Lord Bates (Con)
My Lords, I thank my noble friend for the Statement. I draw particular attention to his saying:
“We have all along considered the historic record of Saudi Arabia”,
on international human rights law. That was backed up in an International Relations Committee report. The Minister gave evidence, saying that the Government believed that they were on the “right side” of international humanitarian law, but the committee concluded that they were,
“narrowly on the wrong side”.
What sources were used to arrive at that judgment?
The international Human Rights Council commissioned a group of eminent experts to look at incidents. It looked at 110 attacks, including 11 on marketplaces and five on weddings and funerals, and concluded:
“Individuals in the Government and the coalition, including Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, may have conducted attacks in violation of the principles of distinction, proportionality and precaution that may amount to war crimes … Individuals in the Government and the coalition, including Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, have committed acts that may amount to war crimes, including cruel treatment and torture, outrages upon personal dignity, rape and conscripting or enlisting children under the age of 15”.
So, when Her Majesty’s Government concluded that they were on the “right side” of international humanitarian law, what sources did they use to arrive at that conclusion, and what was the veracity of those sources?
Finally, many of us have praised fully the role that Her Majesty’s Government have taken on as “penholder” in the UN Security Council negotiations on the peace process in Yemen. Martin Griffiths and Mark Lowcock are out there; Charles Garraway is part of a group of eminent experts. We have given £570 million in humanitarian aid. We feel immensely proud of all that. We feel that the perpetuation of the granting of these licences, against all the verifiable evidence, besmirches our reputation internationally. Does my noble friend accept that?
The Earl of Courtown
My Lords, I thank my noble friend for his question and for giving me prior warning of it. We have assessed the report and the judgment of the Court of Appeal does not accept that the UK military and other analysts and advisers wrongly discounted the evidence coming from NGOs and the UK panel of experts. The judgment accepts that the evidence was considered in each case as a whole, and concerns were raised. My noble friend went into more detail and asked how these allegations are monitored. The Ministry of Defence monitors incidents of alleged IHL violations arising from air strikes conducted by the Saudi-led coalition in Yemen using all available information. This is turn is used to form an overall view on the approach and attitude of the coalition to IHL. That informs the risk assessment under which the licensing criteria are set out. Where there is a clear risk that the items to be exported might be used for the commission of serious violations of IHL, we consider a range of information from government sources, foreign Governments, the media and international non-governmental organisations.
However, at the heart of all this are the peace talks, which are a top priority. There can be no military solution to the conflict. A political settlement is the only way to address the worsening humanitarian crisis and the UK is encouraging the parties to continue to engage constructively with Martin Griffiths, the UN special envoy and the head of the UN mission in Yemen, in support of the Hodeidah agreement.
Baroness Donaghy (Lab)
My Lords, the Statement refers to the EU common position. Did the UK Government play an active part in drawing up that common position and did they make any attempt to weaken it before it was published?
The Earl of Courtown
I am afraid that I cannot answer the question put by the noble Baroness, but I will ensure that she receives the correct information by letter.
Policy-making: Future Generations’ Interests
Lord Bird (CB)
My Lords, I should like to begin this discussion about future generations with an observation about myself. I started my social intervention work very much in the world of emergency responses to a social crisis called homelessness. I spent an enormous amount of time working on trying to perfect my ability to be a damn good intervener in the crisis of homelessness as it presented itself on the streets of London and other cities, and subsequently in other parts of the world. I began at the sharp end of things, where the problem presented itself at its most acute. People were on the streets for myriad reasons. I would say, “Let’s remove them from the streets but, first of all, let’s stop them committing crime”. We had to get them away from wrongdoing through shoplifting, prostitution or aggressive begging. That is where I started, and that is important because I want to take the House on a journey to show why I ended up with the future when, at one stage, I was very much in the present.
To some extent, the only reason I was in the present was because the past had failed. The people you met on the streets were those who had accumulated all sorts of problems in their pasts. That presented itself as an inability to find a place to live and an inability to function in the economy, have a family with children and to lead a rich and healthy life. The crisis was where I began: in a very myopic, small-minded but essential place to be, because that is where the crisis is. You could say that I was a kind of one-man Médecins Sans Frontières. I revolted against many other people who were working with the homeless as though they were very difficult—almost as though they represented a cocktail of social failure. They were dealing with that, but I said that the first thing we had to do was get them out of the sticky stuff. We had to get them away from crime and wrongdoing. We had to take them away from violating other people to violate themselves because many of them had drink and drug problems.
As I reported in the article I wrote for House magazine, I was asked by the Times what I was going to do after 10 years of the Big Issue. I said that I was kind of sick of continuously mending broken clocks. What I wanted to do was to prevent those clocks breaking in the first instance. That is a bit of rhetoric because it was so difficult to talk to anyone about prevention. It was very difficult to talk to Her Majesty’s Government, of whatever political shade, when you said, “Why do we not move more towards prevention? Why do we not put an enormous amount of money and effort into prevention? Why do we not try to prevent the problem happening so that we do not have to clean it up?”
Anyway, after many years I developed a methodology called PECC—prevention, emergency, coping and cure. It was the simplest and dumbest methodology; all it meant was that when you encountered a social intervener, you could say, “What are they? Are they a preventer, are they emergency, are they coping or are they cure? Or are they all of those?” Very few organisations cover them all. Some 80% of the money spent on social intervention goes on emergencies. Human beings are brilliant when things go wrong. We are so clever, but our entire philosophical thinking is based on responding to the horse when it has suddenly left the stable.
I am sorry about this rather long and turgid introduction—noble Lords will know all this about me—but I was cheesed off by that. When I entered the House of Lords I said that I had come to this place to dismantle poverty. That is a bit like saying that I came here to give us a permanent summer and we will all live wonderful lives. I came here to prevent poverty and to dismantle it. I can tell noble Lords that no Administration has ever got that one right. Most Administrations are always ducking and diving, bobbing and weaving. I sit on the Cross Benches and take my Cross Bench-ness very seriously. All my friends are rank Tories—sorry—or divine Labourites. I mix and match with everyone. I do not really care about the nomenclature of people’s political positions, largely because in my work I have been hurt and helped by the right and hurt and helped by the left. It comes and goes, but I came here to dismantle poverty.
If you analyse the work of this House and the other place, you can see from the figures, which are not mine, that around 70% of our time, effort, energy and resources goes into the question of poverty. When we look at poverty, in this country we might be talking about between 20% and 22% of adults and 33% of our children. We are talking about a minority, but an incredibly large one. The world works for quite a number of people, certainly the majority, but that section—we are hyper- ventilating about how large it is—takes up 70% of our work. It ties every one of us up in one way or another. We worry about the size of that minority.
I do not think we can find a way of doing anything about poverty unless we reinvent the future and bring it forward to today. Unless we can find a methodology and the laws to go with it, I do not think we are going anywhere. If anybody asks me, “Having started in poverty, why do you now go on about climate change and all sorts of erudite things for the person on the streets suffering?”, I say that if we want to stop having our streets filled up with the most needy, we need to embrace tomorrow now as well as doing the Médecins Sans Frontières thing—creating brilliant emergency responses. We have to engage with the future.
I was blessed by wandering around on many occasions and sleeping—rough, I have to say—in virtually all the shires. That is how I got to know Great Britain, as it was then, before it became the United Kingdom. I spent quite a bit of time in Wales. I like Wales, because—
Lord Bird
You cannot but love the noble Lord, Lord Roberts. I have spent a bit of time in Wales. Just after the Brexit referendum, I heard that the Welsh Assembly was interested in looking at what we were doing on PECC and considering whether projects were about prevention, emergency, coping or cure. If somebody wanted to invest their money, they would do so on the basis of wanting to get people out of poverty rather than making them comfortable. The Welsh Assembly was looking at this on the basis of wanting to save money, because it realised that after Brexit there would possibly not be so much money around, considering that it gets a shedload of money from Europe. I was touched by that, because it took it on and talked to me as though I were a grown-up—and that is wonderful when you are not a grown-up.
The other thing is that all this information started to come down about the idea of future generations legislation. It was passed into law, and there is a future generations commission. We started to work with it and to look at what it was doing. Every one of my questions about preventing our need to spend 70% of our time and energy on handling the problems of maybe 20% to 30% of the people in this country was answered by the future generations legislation and commission in Wales. Wales is leading the way in the world, I have to say—
Lord Bird
Please, can we throw out some of these Welsh people? One of the countries of the United Kingdom—I describe it as a bijou economy—had the space, time, energy and desire to change the way it encountered the future by creating the future generations legislation. This was everything I wanted to do. I could actually go home; all I needed to do was turn the UK Welsh. How about that?
Lord Bird
Excellent. That is my thinking. I hope we open a debate today. I am really pleased that we have such a long list of people who will begin to talk about how we need future generations legislation and how we need to change the way we budget, change the way we supply our children with education, and stop doing ridiculous things such as closing libraries or making it impossible for our bookshops. We are destroying the intellectual space on our high streets; what are we going to do about that? Preventive spending on future generations is the way forward.
In a way, I have come here today only to start the ball rolling. I will be inaugurating a Private Member’s Bill. I had one a few years back about the need to give honesty and integrity to people in need who were paying so much for their credit. What I really want to do now is move the argument on. Let us embrace the future and not be frightened of it. If we do not do what we have to do—embrace the future and look carefully at the legislation carried out in Wales, the commission and its first four or five years—we are missing a major chance.
We have a real problem: we are not the only ones hyperventilating about the future. The public is hyperventilating more. My 12 year-old daughter, who has organised strikes about the environment, is hyperventilating. My 14 year-old son, my 43 year-old son, my 53 year-old daughter and my 42 year-old daughter—everyone around me—are hyperventilating and getting excited about the possibility of changing the future, and that means we have to bring the future nearer. The best methodology is to adopt a future generations Act.
Baroness Jenkin of Kennington (Con)
My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Bird, is not only a damn good intervener but a hard act to follow. I thank him not only for initiating this debate but for another powerful speech. As a member of the recently reported ad hoc Select Committee on Intergenerational Fairness and Provision, I am glad to have the opportunity to speak. Given the subject matter, I am rather surprised that the noble Baroness, Lady Greengross, and I are the only ones from that committee.
Younger and older generations have always been politically different. The old saying that, “If you are not a socialist when you are young, you have no heart, and if you are not a conservative when you are old, you have no head”, is by no means a new concept, but today this alignment of political intentions has reached extraordinary extremes. Some 83% of Conservative voters are now said to be over the age of 45 and apparently just 4% are under the age of 24. The age at which you are more likely to vote Conservative than Labour is apparently 51. Before the 2017 election campaign, this was just 34. In two years the tipping-point age has increased by 17 years. This is not a problem just for the Conservative Party, though. A sizeable proportion of older voters will now not even consider voting Labour, imposing a hard electoral ceiling and threatening that party longer term as the population ages.
This is a dramatic shift and a reflection of the disillusionment young people feel with politics today. As we uncovered in our recent Tackling Intergenerational Unfairness report, the millennial generation is likely to end up worse off than their parents—the first such generation—as may the generations that follow. The concerns and interests of young people have never been more important, just as their prospects have never looked quite as challenging.
As a House with plenty of wisdom but rather lacking in younger voices, including in today’s debate—although I am glad to see some younger viewers in the Gallery—we must seek to represent them by listening and learning from them, as we did when taking evidence. In the few minutes that I have, I will look at the economy, education and the environment and I will lean on the research report, Generation Why?, published by the think tank Onward.
Members on the Benches opposite may claim that they stand up for young people’s interests. Noble Lords may say that young people want an interventionist state with high public spending and high taxes. However, polling evidence shows that 18 to 24 year-olds are most in favour of keeping taxes low—more than any other age group. Some 58% of 18 to 24 year-olds want the Government to balance public finances and to live within their means. Those of the next generation, and Generation Z in particular, are not some homogenous lefty block, but a complex and thoughtful section of the electorate who largely, even if they do not know it, support centre-right policies.
When Tony Blair set the 2001 target for over 50% of young people to go to university, many saw it as a bold and positive vision. However, as shown by another Onward report, A Question of Degree, a decade after graduation a 10th of current undergraduates will earn less than £25,000, and 83% of student loans will never be paid back in full. The system not only saddles young people with debt that can loom over them for decades, but the lack of income return from many university degrees means that the taxpayer bears the brunt of this broken system. It is therefore no surprise that 44% of people think that too many people go to university, as opposed to 25% who say not enough. University is not for everyone and, as our report recommends and as evidence we took showed, we should prioritise apprenticeships and retraining. The importance of skills and vocational education was one of the key conclusions. The labour market is changing and much more investment is needed in both vocational education and lifelong learning to prepare younger generations for a 100-year life.
As we have seen from the recent Extinction Rebellion protests and the visit of Greta Thunberg to the UK, protecting the environment is crucial. For us Conservatives, there should be a clue in our name. It is no surprise that 18 to 24 year-olds rate concern about environmental issues in the top three challenges facing Britain today. We are the first major economy to make a commitment to a net zero emissions target, which follows our impressive record on emissions reduction since 2010. However, a target must be followed by a clear plan of actionable and affordable policy which will allow us to achieve this. We cannot protect the interests of future generations if we cannot protect the natural world in which they will live.
As a country, we are at a critical moment in our history. We must listen to what young people are saying and find out what they are thinking. We must prioritise jobs, housing, the environment and education, because if we do not grasp this opportunity to win over the next generation with a positive vision for the future, our political system will not survive, and nor will it deserve to.
Lord Giddens (Lab)
My Lords, I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Bird, on having secured this debate and on his characteristically forceful introduction. My approach is a bit more macrocosmic than his, but I hope that it slots in.
The American satirist Yogi Berra once said:
“The future ain’t what it used to be”.
It was intended as a flippant remark, but it actually pinpoints crucial aspects of our society today. Throughout 99% of the human past, the future was indeed mostly what it used to be. For thousands of years, through the rise and fall of numerous civilisations, the vast majority of people lived much the same as their forefathers had done. Only about 200 years ago, with the advent of the Industrial Revolution, it all changed, and it has progressively speeded up. In the 21st century, we live in a world of dizzying transformation. Do not believe those who say that globalisation has come to a halt. Especially with the advent of digital communication, this is far and away the most connected and interdependent world ever.
There are two sides to this. The opportunities are huge. Think of the example of China, which has moved not far short of 1 billion people out of grinding poverty in some 40 years. The risks, however, are at least as great and some of them are truly global. Moreover, most of these cannot be assessed or responded to in terms of the accumulated knowledge of the past, because they are too new. Here indeed, the future ain’t what it used to be. They include humanly induced climate change, nuclear war, global population increase, economic crisis on a global level and others, plus of course the overlap of all of those. By any reckoning, that is pretty awesome stuff.
What a distance and distinction there is between all of this and the evanescent nature of day-to-day politics. When David Cameron became the leader of his party, in his opening speech he said:
“I want to talk about the future”.
He pointed to Prime Minister Tony Blair, saying:
“He was the future once”.—[Official Report, Commons, 7/12/05; col. 861.]
Only a few short years later, leaving the political cockpit for ever, he was to remark:
“After all, as I once said, I was the future once”.—[Official Report, Commons, 13/7/16; col. 294.]
Of course, there are some mechanisms in place to counter the short-termism of everyday democratic politics. What the populists deride as the “deep state”—an impartial and effective Civil Service—is one key way in which continuity is sustained and long-term planning is carried out. It has often been effective; the UK has a good record in reducing climate emissions since the last Labour Administration through to the present. Yet far more radical thinking is needed and, in my view, global activism.
There have to be several planks to such a strategy. One is to draw local and national politics away from its concentration on the here and now. The same, however, has to be true of markets, and that cannot be emphasised too strongly. Markets are driven by short-term pursuit of profit on a global level. The other is to shore up international collaboration. That is crucial and inescapable in an interdependent world such as ours. It is not stretching it too far to say that democracy across the world is in crisis, but crisis very often promotes rethinking and renewal. There are many initiatives in different countries designed to think about the future. They include the Think Long Committee for California, the Future Design movement in Japan and the youth-led organisation Our Children’s Trust. Here I understand that there is an All-Party Parliamentary Group on Future Generations, set up, I gather, with the support of the noble Lord, Lord Rees. He is the guru of the future, as I am sure noble Lords know. On an economic level, impact investment is crucial. Impact investment is more long-term investment, and can counter one of the most noxious things in our world, the short-termism of global economic markets.
Perhaps the greatest problem as the future increasingly bites into our present is the unstable nature of the international system, which is riven with conflicts just when global co-operation is so urgently needed. The year 1989 was supposed to mark the end of history, but it has ceded its place to a world that is in some ways even more unstable. Nationalism has returned in full force at a time when global interdependence is at its highest level ever. Humanly induced climate change, once again a Yogi Berra-type phenomenon for which there is no historical precedent, is an existential threat for future generations. In the light of the recent IPPC report, that threat is no longer distant. Some of the world’s most powerful leaders today are active climate change deniers. The counterforces are none the less strong and global. Who is going to come out on top: Greta Thunberg or two well-known, prominent, populist world leaders? Noble Lords will know where my sympathies lies and where my expectations are heading.
The Lord Bishop of Leeds
My Lords, I, too, am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Bird, for bringing this debate to us. Despite wanting to say one or two things, I hope to listen and to learn from the wisdom of others. This debate is particularly pertinent at a time when phrases such as “the will of the people” are being bandied around, without specifying which people. If we are going to take this seriously, it must include people who are not people yet: future generations. Too often that term is used as a static term. It references the past. It does not create any vision for the future. It takes today seriously at the expense of tomorrow.
I recognise that others in this debate are going to speak on the detail, so I will focus on what I think are more fundamental questions to do with political culture. I had not thought of them in terms of the word “macrocosmic”, but perhaps they are. I shall make three points. First, long-term policy-making demands maturity, wisdom and leadership. It must transcend the short-termism that the noble Lord, Lord Giddens, has just spoken about. In our own generation, Sure Start made a massive difference and was aimed at influencing the lives of families, children and young people as they grew. Where is it? Killed.
Secondly, we cannot indulge in tokenism when we talk about young people—but there is quite a lot of that about. I am very grateful to the staff of the Library for the briefing for this debate, which drew attention to a number of very imaginative initiatives on listening to and engaging with the voices of young people, but they are limited and they must not be tokenistic. Greta Thunberg has been referenced several times as the voice of young people, but am I the only one who feels that sometimes the response, particularly from politicians, is patronising? They say you have to listen to young people, but I say that you should not ask for the views of young people if you do not want to hear what they say. If you say that you are listening but do nothing about it, you will create an even bigger problem in the future, which is rank disillusionment.
Thirdly, and finally, what has run through many debates, particularly over Brexit, is the idea that human beings are economic commodities or consumer targets. Almost the entire Brexit debate has been framed in terms of economics and trade. I keep asking the question: for whom does the economy exist? It is for the good of human beings and wider society; it is not an end, it is a means. We must consider the language we are using and the anthropological assumptions we are making about what a human being is. We are seeing in our education sector a diminution of arts and humanities because they do not guarantee a particular training for a trade or a particular economic return, yet they are crucial to what it means to be human beings either individually or in society. From the expansion of the imagination comes the imagination of a different way of being and a different world. So we need our young people to frame the future narrative and not just inherit the past. This is an issue that we face across the board. I come back to Brexit and the future of Europe. If we are constantly referring back to what our young people are inheriting from the middle of the 20th century, in another 20 or 30 years that does not create a vision for the future.
We have to ask ourselves what future our children are building. I used to visit Kazakhstan—as you do. I have been there a number of times and watched the development of that country as an independent state and the building of its institutions and even its cities—Astana in particular. What used to strike me coming back from Kazakhstan, central Asia, to Frankfurt, Amsterdam or London, was that in Kazakhstan so many of the young people were proud of what they were building, even though there were issues of corruption and lots of other questions about what was going on. They were building something for the future, and that captured their imagination, their energy and their will. When you come back to western Europe and ask what young people are building—what is firing their imagination and energy—the answer is, nothing, because they are simply expected to inherit something that has been handed on to them, and then protect it. This is not good enough. Our young people are the only ones who can write the narrative that will guide the future. If we are going to listen to their voice, we have to be prepared for what they are going to say.
Lord Wigley
My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Bird, for facilitating this fascinating debate. I identified with most of his comments, although I cannot claim his personal involvement.
I will speak briefly from our experience in Wales, as the National Assembly four years ago passed the Well-being of Future Generations (Wales) Act with cross-party support. The objective of that Act is to put sustainable development at the centre of decision-making so as to ensure that we in Wales meet the needs of today in a manner that does not compromise the ability of future generations to meet their own needs in the context of their own time; in other words, to ensure that we do not build hostages to fortune in the way we conduct government at all levels.
For the purposes of the Act, sustainable development is identified as the,
“process of improving the economic, social, environmental and cultural well-being of Wales”,
by acting in line with the,
“sustainable development principle, aimed at achieving”,
seven specific “well-being goals”. These are defined as,
“a prosperous Wales … a resilient Wales … a healthier Wales … a more equal Wales … a Wales of cohesive communities … a Wales of vibrant culture and thriving language … a globally responsible Wales”.
Most of these are self-explanatory, but I will expand on two. “A resilient Wales” is defined as a nation which,
“maintains and enhances a biodiverse natural environment with healthy functioning ecosystems that support social, economic and ecological resilience and the capacity to adapt to change (for example climate change)”.
“A globally responsible Wales” is,
“a nation which, when doing anything to improve the … well-being of Wales, takes account of”,
the effect that has on global well-being.
The Act places a well-being duty on public bodies, including local government, to establish their own well-being goals to comply with the Act. The Act requires such public bodies to take into account five principles: balancing short-term and long-term needs; prevention measures to limit adverse factors; integration to ensure that its well-being goals do not undermine those of other public bodies; collaboration with other bodies to meet objectives; and involvement, encouraging individual citizens to help meet those goals.
The Welsh Government in 2017 adopted 12 well-being objectives to achieve the Act’s basic aims as the foundation of government strategy. It also created public service boards for each local authority area, to ensure co-ordination between central and local government functions, other public bodies and the voluntary sector. Sophie Howe has been appointed the Future Generations Commissioner for Wales. Her job is, inter alia, to advise public bodies on whether their policies are conducive to achieving their well-being objectives. Public bodies are required to take all reasonable steps to follow her recommendations.
The Welsh Government have produced a suite of statutory guidance for public bodies to take into account when fulfilling their legal duties. An in-depth study of current generation attitudes in every county has sought to identify policy priorities regarding that which is important about the environment, social issues, the economy and the culture of the area, which need to be safeguarded or improved for future generations. In my home county, Gwynedd, some of the issues raised should serve as a wake-up call for government, such as the “loss of educated people” and how “lowering levels of anti-social behaviour increases self-confidence”—an interesting dimension. The strongest negatives relate to poverty, the strongest positives to the beauty of our environment.
I realise that this approach has been seen as bureaucratic and that it is one thing to adopt high-minded ideals as objectives; the challenge is to turn them into practice. Successive Welsh Governments have excelled at producing ambitious objectives—economic, environmental and cultural—but been less effective at turning those aims into reality. So is this legislation making any difference? It is early days, but there is evidence that the Welsh Government’s financial priorities have changed to take account of the Act. The Wales Audit Office notes that local authorities are “working differently” as a result of the Act. There are micro-policy examples, such as how wildfires are being prevented and how public authorities recycle office fixtures and fittings—it is as micro as that.
The law has its critics. It has been accused of being toothless, as in the case where parents in the Neath Port Talbot area resorted to the Act to challenge the closure of Cymer school. Mrs Justice Lambert dismissed the case, saying that the Act could not trigger a judicial review. Swansea Council has been accused of selling foreshore land in violation of the Act. Similarly, Bridgend Council has been criticised for selling a school playing field.
There is also criticism of decisions apparently taken in line with the Act’s requirements. The Welsh Government recently rejected the proposed M4 improvements at Newport, and it is believed that the future generations Act contributed to that decision, for better or worse. Only yesterday Dr Dai Lloyd AM questioned in the National Assembly how our Government tracks the implementation of the Act’s principles.
It is too easy to shrug off our individual and collective responsibilities for sustainability, biodiversity and global warming. It is easy to forget that our actions may undermine the well-being of others around the globe and jeopardise the world that our grandchildren will inherit.
Wales’s Act should be relevant to rolling out the UK Government’s aim to be carbon neutral by 2050. It can accelerate this rollout and help formalise methods of consultation to carry local communities in support of such government decisions, and help those decisions to reflect local aspirations.
The fact that these aims are challenging is no excuse for turning our backs. We as individuals, communities and nations have a responsibility in all parts of these islands to open our eyes to the threats implicit in our actions and to take the necessary action to safeguard the well-being of others.
I welcome this debate and the fact that legislators at Westminster are seriously addressing this matter and will consider how such policies are working out in Wales. Policies adopted in Wales have already commended themselves to other Governments on these islands. Our smoking ban, our plastic bag charge and our organ transplant legislation are just three examples.
The United Nations has commented, in the context of the Welsh future generations Act:
“What Wales is doing today the world will do tomorrow”.
In that spirit, I am delighted to support the noble Lord, Lord Bird, in his endeavours.
Lord Layard (Lab)
My Lords, I welcome this debate about what is a central issue of our time. It is an ethical issue because the starting point of ethics is that every human being matters equally. This means that future generations are of equal importance to our own. However, they are not in a position to speak for themselves, so we have to act for them and invest in their future as if it were our own. In that context, I want to discuss two of the most important legacies we will leave to the future: the climate and social infrastructure.
For reasons that are well known, we cannot allow the temperature to rise by more than 1.5 degrees centigrade above the pre-industrial level. How can we achieve this? We must have regulations, and these involve an element of sacrifice. Surely, however, the most important thing is to invest in research and development because, once clean energy is cheaper to produce than dirty energy, the problem is solved at no further ongoing cost. This requires a scientific effort similar to that needed to win a war, produce the atom bomb or land people on the moon. We need such an effort that is internationally co-ordinated.
Interestingly, this is exactly what has been happening in the field of semiconductors. The astonishing pace of cost reduction in this field was no accident; it was achieved by a major international division of research effort co-ordinated through the International Technology Roadmap for Semiconductors, which had much public money behind it. We now need the same effort in the field of energy research. We have the existing Mission Innovation, which was influenced by six Members of this House and Sir David King, but it has very little profile and no clear target. What we now need is an international effort with a high profile, a clear target and very powerful funding. Britain is well placed to play a leading role. We already have the Faraday Institution on energy storage, and Cambridge has launched a major research centre for climate repair under Sir David King. I urge the British Government once again to take a lead and to propose to the G20 a high-profile, well-funded, well co-ordinated, green research programme with a target—this is the key point—to produce clean energy in every country at a lower cost than from fossil fuels by 2030. We need a clear target and a race to solve this problem; otherwise, the climate will not survive in a way that maintains our existing way of life.
I turn to national infrastructure. I believe the most important infrastructure we leave to future generations is social infrastructure. This was conclusively illustrated in Germany after the Second World War, when the country’s physical infrastructure was shattered but its social infrastructure was largely intact. It recovered rapidly. I find it quite upsetting when it is assumed by, I think, probably most Members of this House that we now need a lot of investment in physical infrastructure and that that is our problem. No: our main problem is our social infrastructure.
The case for this has been compellingly made in the recent report of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Wellbeing Economics concerning the principles that should guide the next spending review. I strongly recommend that report to your Lordships and I will say a little about it. It is based on key findings from the new science of well-being, which are influencing our friends in the Welsh Government and throughout the world. This is the new way of thinking about public policy.
What are some of these findings and implications? First, the single biggest cause of misery in a rich country is mental illness, so the NHS should have a separate budget for mental health, which should go twice as far as the budget for physical health. Secondly, looking ahead, as the noble Lord, Lord Bird, did, the best predictor of a happy adult life is mental health in childhood, so we should make child well-being a major goal of our schools. We should encourage schools to measure child well-being and use well-tested ways of promoting it.
The next key thing for young people is when they leave school. We must have equal treatment for the 50% of people who do not go to university. This was said earlier, but what is not recognised clearly is that there is one single key to achieving that, which was not even mentioned in the Augar report: just as people going to university have uncapped automatic per capita funding if they go on, we absolutely have to have that in the system of further education and apprenticeships. Finally, we must invest better in social care for when we reach the end of life.
I applaud the Welsh initiative. It is the right way of thinking. The noble Lord, Lord Bird, is absolutely right. We must think more of the future, we must use science to save our climate, and for goodness’ sake, let us give priority to social infrastructure.
The Lord Bishop of Oxford
My Lords, I too welcome this debate and thank the noble Lord, Lord Bird, very warmly for bringing it. I welcome his proposals. As the noble Lord, Lord Layard, said, the foundation is a moral and ethical case. That moral case has shifted in recent years because of the realisation of the effects of the Anthropocene era. Humanity’s effect on the environment means that the interests of not just the next generation but every generation beyond that need to be protected in our policy-making and debate.
As a number of noble Lords have said, the world is living through a deepening environmental catastrophe. The impact of change on our climate is already severe. It will become worse with each decade and every generation. The world is currently heading for average global warming of 2 degrees and more by 2050. Global net carbon emissions continue to rise. The risks of unforeseen and catastrophic compound effects on the environment increase with every year.
The two Biblical images of hell are a burning planet, too hot to sustain life, and a rubbish dump. We are in danger of bequeathing both to our children, our grandchildren and every generation that follows. It is hugely irresponsible to take short-term decisions in the interests of only the current generation or the current economy, and so, as other noble Lords have done, I warmly welcome the Government’s historic commitment to a net zero carbon economy by 2050, and congratulate the Prime Minister on naming this goal as a vital part of her legacy. I welcome the Government’s international leadership and the bid to host the vital 2020 climate summit. These goals need support across Parliament, and the voice of those future generations needs to be strengthened in that debate.
Future generations also need to be protected in the rapid pace of technological change. Here I speak as a board member of the Centre for Data Ethics and Innovation. The pace of change and the effects of technology on the mental health of the young are significant. I warmly commend the Information Commissioner’s Office, and its recent guidelines on age-appropriate design, which aim to protect the most vulnerable from the predatory technology companies. I also warmly commend the Government for bringing forward the online harms White Paper. I hope both will be turning points in the development of new technologies which protect rather than exploit the most vulnerable. In the coming years we will need agility and public leadership in responding to new technologies and data in the areas of health, education, the labour market, smart cities, algorithmic decision-making, facial recognition and the regulation of the mining of personal information for commercial gain. The interests of future generations will also need a voice.
Finally, these proposals are so helpful in that they address a decrease in social cohesion taking place across the generations, which noble Lords have noted. The All-Party Group on Social Integration recently published a comprehensive study of intergenerational connection and its decrease. The generations have become increasingly segregated. We can either allow that process of drift to continue, with serious social consequences, or we can exercise leadership to build and protect social capital between the generations. Families and faith communities have a vital role to play, and are part of the glue which binds generations together. Local government has a role, as do business and the third sector, but national government must play its part. It has been hugely instructive in this debate to hear of the lessons being learned in Wales.
The proposals to give a structured voice to the interests of future generations are warmly to be welcomed. I warmly support the proposals of the noble Lord, Lord Bird, and hope that they will attract support across the whole House.
Baroness Massey of Darwen (Lab)
My Lords, the House owes a great debt to the noble Lord, Lord Bird, for securing this important debate, and for introducing it with such passion. It is important because what could be more essential than ensuring that future generations have a say in what will be their future, whatever it may bring? I was much struck by the quotation from the excellent Library briefing:
“the standard approach to policy making is to prioritise the interests of current generations”.
I would like to offer some comments on the importance of involving children and young people in decision-making, about their lives now and the lives of their generation and beyond.
I too have worked with young people in Kazakhstan. In the UK and other countries, there are excellent examples of involving young people, but we have no co-ordinated strategy. As the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child states, children—this means up to the age of 18—have the right to be heard. This not only gives them respect and self-confidence; children and young people can also contribute to better laws, policies and strategies. They have a fresh eye and experience policies and strategies for themselves. I have seen this happen time and again.
Today, I want to give some examples of how young people participate in the UK. All the initiatives I shall describe have made an extreme effort to involve children from vulnerable and diverse backgrounds, not just the elite in a tokenistic way. One positive involvement is of course that of school councils: children from the youngest age give their views on all aspects of the school, be it school meals, toilet facilities or, on a higher plane, teaching programmes. Our brilliant charity sector often involves children at local and national levels in strategies on projects, as do the UK’s Children’s Commissioners.
All the nations of the UK have youth parliaments. Our own Parliament here has an exciting education department, which involves children in visits to Parliament and in conducting their own debates in your Lordships’ Chamber. I have experienced two of those and they were absolutely superb. The Lord Speaker’s Peers in Schools programme involves peers addressing school audiences up and down the country. We also have an APPG on future generations.
As a further example from sport, the young people’s cricket charity Chance to Shine recently held an open day at Lord’s cricket ground where 450 children—boys and girls from around the country—took part in a range of activities, including an assembly in celebration of cricket. I should declare an interest as a Lady Taverner. The children talked about the values of cricket, focusing on teamwork, perseverance and fair play. There are many lessons there for future policymakers. Chance to Shine focuses mainly on inner-city schools; maybe one of these children will one day be president of the MCC.
The message is clear: first, inspire and engage children; then develop their skills and self-confidence, listen to them and involve them in planning for the future. In Scotland during May delegates from East Lothian Council, the Scottish Government, the Children and Young People’s Commissioner Scotland and representatives from the NGO sector joined 13 members of the Children’s Parliament, a local partnership and a youth centre to consider how to embed a children’s rights approach across services and facilities in Tranent. The local MP, Martin Whitfield, took part and gave me this information. I know that similar initiatives have taken place in Wales and Northern Ireland.
There are examples of police forces consulting and involving children and young people. I was most impressed a few years ago, when chairing the APPG for Children, that the police took part in an inquiry—with children—to discuss policies such as stop and search and the holding of vulnerable children, sometimes with mental health problems, in police cells overnight. Things changed then because Ministers listened to young people.
Ministers have also listened to young people in forming a joint Council of Europe/UK Parliament seminar on child mental health and child-friendly justice. The seminar worked in mixed groups of children and adults, where one girl said, “We are experts by experience”. These young people have since developed dialogue with Ministers and expanded their group. Jackie Doyle-Price and Edward Argar have been particularly enthusiastic.
The recent NHS long-term plan involved consultation with the NHS Youth Forum, while the British Youth Council ran an engagement event for seldom-heard young people. The Association for Young People’s Health, of which I am a patron, ran a survey of young people as part of the Young People’s Health Partnership; it then held a stakeholder event for 14 young people, working alongside 57 professionals. It was an excellent collaboration with young people, using their experience.
I have given but a few examples of protecting and representing the interests of young people and future generations in policy-making. Would the Minister be prepared to pull together all this excellent practice and look at what could be shared and acted upon? Perhaps she could call together a group from those debating today to suggest ways forward: for example, a House of Lords Committee to take evidence and form a strategy on the involvement of young people in their future. I look forward to her response.
Lord Crisp (CB)
My Lords, I welcome this debate and I welcome the thinking that is starting to happen on this topic around the world. Like my noble friend Lord Bird, I am attracted to the Welsh model and support his call for a UK equivalent. I am also grateful to him for giving me the opportunity not only to talk about this but to be made to think and read about it in advance, and bring it to top of mind.
There is a clear set of problems here, as noble Lords have said. Climate change and national debt epitomise this clearly. We are passing a burden to future generations, and we should not underestimate or neglect that. As has been argued in the papers that the Library has produced, our current means of economic analysis of future costs tends towards more short-termism. This is aggravated by the political cycle, which encourages short-termism and, at the moment, is further aggravated by the lack of political vision in the country. It seems that maybe my noble friend Lord Bird has got his timing absolutely right: where there is a lack of vision, there is also an opportunity. Maybe this is the sort of opportunity that an incoming Government—assuming that we have another stable Government in due course—might see as something that could help unify the country. Bring people together to think clearly about the future, as the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Leeds mentioned about Kazakhstan, where I too have dropped in occasionally, as one does. In countries such as Kazakhstan they focus on the future and think about what is coming, whereas we perhaps concentrate more on the past.
There is also a problem today, as noble Lords know and have said, that younger people as a whole are disadvantaged compared with older generations such as mine, in matters as radical and important as life expectancy—which seems to be going down—opportunity, access to owning their own homes and student debt. Some people feel completely left out of society and its benefits, and many are becoming cynical, not least about politics. Here I note the point of the noble Baroness, Lady Jenkin, that it is dangerous if people, particularly the young, lose trust in our political system.
Maybe there is another way to look at this. It could appear as if we in the older generations are being asked, reluctantly, to give up some of our power and privilege for future generations. But what do we stand to gain by doing so? Is it not in our interests as well? Generations are different, as has been said. It is interesting, from talking to employers with major workforces, that there are four or five different generations, with different needs, expectations and ways of working today. Different generations are different. They are different from us and see life in different ways. I am conscious of this in working with a lot of young nurses and doctors. They have different needs, different skills and different talents. They have an enormous amount to offer. Here I echo the noble Baroness, Lady Massey.
It always seemed an enormous paradox that most planning is done by the over-55s, and they promptly retire five years later. As I have learned today from the noble Baroness, Lady Jenkin, most planning is done by people who have just decided to become Conservative voters—if I understood what she said. Could we not do something different? Is it not better now, instead of just representing the interests of young people, to engage and involve them? There is a simple point here: should that not be good practice in all our planning mechanisms, not just in a single commission? I know we now try to organise ourselves to have gender and ethnicity balance, but should we not always engage younger people and make sure that our planning programmes always have some people aged 35 or under?
A common-sense new-normal way of thinking about the future and planning things should engage young people in every location where planning is underway. This adds to the richness of the debate. I know, because we have done that deliberately in the last two commissions I chaired. We have not had a youth group to advise us but people who actually have a seat at the table. On a good day, we in the older part of the committee or commission add a bit of wisdom and experience, and they add some new insight and energy, though we both have our bad days as well, when different qualities come to the fore.
It is worth noting that young people tend to create the future. This is not a new thing about tech pioneers. I mentioned I am working with nurses a lot at the moment, and it is interesting to reflect that, when Florence Nightingale was in the Crimea and doing the sorts of things that started to change the world of nursing, she was in her early and mid-30s. This is not a new phenomenon. Young people have a great deal to offer us, and those of us over 55 need perhaps to create a few more spaces at the table.
That is perhaps more directly relevant to the debate on Monday in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Holmes of Richmond, when we will look at the composition of public bodies, so let me return to the point about a commission and a real focus from policy nationally on future generations. I agree with the Centre for the Understanding of Sustainable Prosperity, which proposes a UK commissioner, reform of the National Infra- structure Commission and imposing statutory duties on Ministers and public bodies to publish the implications of policy. Those need to be worked through, but they seem a good starting point for the future. How do the Government plan to think about these things and respond to such proposals?
Finally, action related to the future generations along the lines that we have talked about today could be one of the great unifying issues for a new Government. I commend this point to the Minister.
Lord Bethell (Con)
I join others in offering profound thanks to the noble Lord, Lord Bird, for bringing forward this thoughtful debate and asking how we might get away from “presentism” and instead figure out how to prevent ourselves, as people and as a society, harming one another. It is in an incredibly honourable cause in which I want to try to help. However, I shall start by sharing with the House some of my reservations about the approach being suggested.
I worry about political interventions that seek to speak on behalf of people who are not present and do not have a vote at the time. I worry about political groups that claim to have some more profound insight into the human condition than the voting man or woman. I worry about anyone who feels that they somehow care more about the world than the mother, father, son or daughter in the voting booth on election day.
A commissioner for future generations or a future generations Act has been spoken about persuasively and fondly, but I confess to the House that I come from a political tradition that was cast from radical liberalism and fired in the Cold War and that such words send shivers down my spine. To quote Dennis Thompson of Harvard University, who has spoken powerfully on this subject, I worry about,
“utopian idealists, religious zealots, or radical revolutionaries”,
who claim to speak on behalf of future generations, but who,
“call for great sacrifices from the present generation”.
I do not want to be too vivid about it, but a commission for future generations creates for me images of autocrats whose cold logic, divorced from the disciplines of the ballot box, leads to extreme decisions.
I also question some of the assumptions made in this debate: that our democracy is uncompromisingly short-termist, populist or self-indulgent. How else would we, Britain, have stood alone in 1941 and mobilised a citizens’ army or, more recently, enshrined in law a commitment to spend 0.7% of our gross national income on foreign aid, or reduced our carbon emissions by 40%—or any number of policy commitments that sacrifice present benefits for future generations or those living in other lands?
Instead of disrupting our democratic institutions and traditions, we should look to bolster the traditional sources of challenge and insight that we have in our country already. I would guide the conversation away from bureaucratic mechanics such as impact assessments, officeholders such as commissioners or legal structures such as future generations Acts. For instance, I am sceptical about whether we need more bureaucracy such as a Committee for the Future, as in Finland. The excellent briefing note put together by the Library contains an incredibly persuasive but worrying list of examples from other countries. I am also sceptical about intergenerational impact assessments. In my experience, the much less complicated impact assessments that are already in place do not shed much light and are probably an unnecessary burden on our overstretched civil servants.
I am very open to the idea of strengthening the capabilities of this House. Having read the thoughtful report from the Intergenerational Fairness and Provision Committee, mentioned by my noble friend Lady Jenkin, I support the idea of a standing House of Lords committee to study such threats; that would be a sensible development.
There are three others that I endorse and will direct the attention of the House towards, to ensure that my four horrible children are protected and their interests taken into account. The first is a cultural point. To meet the challenge of climate change, which is probably a stand-out example of where future generations’ interests should be considered, we have to overcome the partisanship of modern times and refind the spirit of cross-party consensus building that is necessary for long-term solutions. How can we possibly find a solution to UK issues such as the housing and social care crises, or major international ones such as migration and climate change, if we do not tackle the political culture and learn to work together? We will just lurch around ineffectively instead of building strong solutions. I am concerned that Acts of Parliament and commissioners will not necessarily contribute to that.
Secondly, we absolutely have to break the electoral stranglehold of Britain’s gerontocracy by making a much greater commitment to civics and ethics in the curriculum. The lesson of Extinction Rebellion is not to create a new bureaucracy around future generations but that the kids are interested in politics when there is something they care about. We are just not talking to them in an engaging way.
Lastly, we need to bring the public back into Parliament. It is great that we have the TV cameras here, and I thank those who are watching us from above. However, it saddens me that we are talking about the challenge of future generations and the balconies are half empty. As part of the refurbishment of Parliament that is on the horizon, I would like to see a massive investment in opening it to people. Let us clear out the ground floor and make it wide open to people. In particular, I would like to see every schoolchild in Britain visit Parliament as part of the curriculum, partly so that they have a bond with their future and partly so that we can see them there, watching our decisions as we talk about their future.
The Earl of Listowel (CB)
My Lords, I support the noble Lord, Lord Bethell, in his wise words. We clearly have to rebuild the spirit of cross-party consensus and ensure that the public thoroughly understand the workings of Parliament. The buck does stop here. I am a little concerned that, if we farm out responsibility to commissioners and others, we might not work so hard to build consensus on the way forward—although I can also see virtues in the other approach. I am most grateful to my noble friend for securing this important and highly stimulating debate. I noted what the noble Lord, Lord Layard, said about the social infrastructure. Back in the 1950s in Stepney, families were facing the outcome of the Blitz on low incomes and with insecurity. But grandmothers, and their daughters, held those extended families together. When those families began to move out, they became less resilient and began to break down.
In protecting the interests of our children in the future, we would do well to consider how we make the best possible childhoods for them. What can we do now to ensure good childhoods for our future children? Part of that is being more coherent and consistent in policy and more consensual in what we do. We make up and then undo; we build and unbuild; we invest and disinvest. We cannot build a good future for our children if we cannot find a more consensual approach. Most basically, children need stable relationships. In the earliest days, they need a strong attachment to their mothers. They need important people in their lives who stick around. They need secure housing and schools that they can rely on not being moved away from.
This is thoroughly recognised in the care system. So many times over so many years I have heard young people in care saying that the most important thing to them is a stable, long-term, benign relationship. This is recognised in policy: it is called permanence. So there is a push towards more adoption and longer-term foster placements. There is a push towards staying put—allowing young people to remain with their foster carers until the age of 21. There is a push towards staying close—allowing young people to remain near their children’s homes when they move out of them. We recognise that. The trouble is that in our culture as it plays out today, everything seems to militate against the stability that we need for our children. The law in this country, for instance, is based on an adversarial system; politics is based on an adversarial system. This is very different from many of our continental neighbours, who are far more willing to compromise. In this country, “compromise” is a dirty word—but on the continent any politician realises that one should never get all one wants; it is not helpful always to get all one wants.
I will give an illustration. Sure Start was announced by Gordon Brown and launched by Tessa Jowell in 1998. To paraphrase her words, the first three years of life are so important, I believe we should invest in this way. It was a very welcome introduction, yet a parliamentary briefing tells us that between 2015 and 2017 a large number of children’s centres—I think it may have been 308—closed down. I spoke to health visitors earlier this week who were bemoaning the fact that there are few clinics that are easily accessible to mothers. They have responded to that by developing telephone services, which is a way of responding, but it is certainly not as good as being able to see mothers face to face. On the other hand, there is the situation with health visitors. There was a rapid decline in their numbers in the 2000s, a rapid building up in the early 2010s, and now they are declining by a quarter. This investment and disinvestment is so unhelpful: our children need stability but our political system does not give it to them—not as it currently stands.
If we look to Germany, we see a country with long-term, stable coalition Governments, which I think is very helpful. We can look abroad and try to learn lessons. I cannot give any answers as to how we can change, but I can tell noble Lords that I was present when the research evidence on Sure Start was presented at the Institute for Fiscal Studies two weeks ago. Naomi Eisenstadt and Leon Feinstein, important researchers and practitioners, were also present. The main theme was that it is not any particular Government; whenever there is a change in Minister or a change in Government, everything is turned upside-down again. So if we want stable lives for our children, we need stable policies and we must work harder to co-create policies so that when one party comes in, it does not undo what the others have done.
In Finland decades ago there was a political consensus that education was important and that the best way to give children a good education was to recruit and retain the best teachers. Finlanders were not even aware of how good they were, but in 2000 PISA discovered that they were the best in maths, the best in literacy and the best in science. They just stuck to their guns and recruited and retained the best teachers. If we are to do better for the children of the future, we need to be more consistent.
Lord Judd (Lab)
My Lords, when I am buying my copy of the Big Issue on a wet and windy winter’s day in the car park of Sainsbury’s in Cockermouth, of course I think about the young person selling it to me and the life behind them. These days, I find myself thinking about the noble Lord, Lord Bird, as well. I always think, here is the evidence of a man who does not just say, but does. We were privileged to hear his introduction today. I am glad that the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Leeds mentioned the Library note. I am always deeply impressed by the quality of notes produced by the Libraries for our debates.
It strikes me that behind what we have been talking about today is the fundamental issue of whether we regard the globe as just part of our consumer society, to be consumed and enjoyed in our immediate lives, or whether we have and engender a sense of stewardship and responsibility for what we have inherited and what, hopefully, we will pass on. This sense of stewardship of the globe and all its realities is crucial.
When I came out of government in 1979, I remember my young children asked me very bluntly, “But, dad, what have you learned from your ministerial experiences?” I remember saying then, “What I have learned is that tactics are the total enemy of strategy”. Everybody is so busy managing and dealing with the immediate crisis, difficulties and challenges that no one is really looking at things in perspective and thinking strategically. The list of issues which we hand on from the past is immense; therefore, the list of issues that will affect the next and future generations is also immense.
There is the issue of education and libraries, which the noble Lord, Lord Bird, mentioned. I liked the way he mentioned that they enable young people to have space in which they can discover themselves, grow in confidence and the rest. One major tragedy of our society is that we have confused training and education. Training is desperately important to enable people to do jobs efficiently, but education is indispensable, enabling youngsters to discover their potential—what they could be—not going to their graves never being what they might have been but having had a chance to discover who they are, what their talents are and how to develop them.
There is also the issue of climate change, to which noble Lords have referred. Here, of course, we are challenged by the younger generation itself; it has taken over and is challenging us, demonstrating that this is the key issue for it. Then there is Brexit, and the immense disillusion and disappointment among so many of the young. I had it put to me, “You’ve deprived us of our future—we wanted to belong to the world, and you seem hell-bent on going in the opposite direction”. Therefore, if we have another referendum, I pray that it will follow the example of Scotland and bring the 16 to 17 year-olds in, which worked so well in the Scottish referendum.
There are so many other specific issues: the PFI, for example—all Governments are responsible for this. They are just handing it on to future generations, burdening them with the expenditure rather than facing up to what we could really afford. Then there is the collapse of social services and the burden this will place on future generations. There is also the issue of nuclear waste, which often preoccupies me; if we are going into another generation of nuclear energy, which I am not against, we have to find a solution for the waste. That solution must be the safest possible, which means making sure that we look at every corner of the UK to find the best and safest place in which to put it.
The noble Lord mentioned Wales, where there is a powerful story, which the Library note mentions. There is the Well-Being of Future Generations (Wales) Act 2015, the Future Generations Commissioner and the Auditor-General for Wales, who has responsibility to ensure that public bodies are meeting their sustainable development objectives. Other countries have taken the lead over us—Finland, Hungary, Singapore and Israel.
We must wake up. The future belongs to future generations, and we must ensure that they are in the driving seat.
Lord Rees of Ludlow (CB)
My Lords, we should indeed be grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Bird, for inspiring this debate. Young people in this country face the future with foreboding as well as hope. They confront radical disruption to the nature of work, unequal opportunities and social fragmentation. However, my remarks will focus on concerns that are more global: environmental degradation, unchecked climate change and unintended consequences of advanced technology. I declare an interest as co-founder of a centre in Cambridge with that focus, and I am half-Welsh.
Climate change is a prominent concern. Under business-as-usual scenarios, we cannot rule out, later this century, catastrophic warming and tipping points triggering long-term trends such as the melting of Greenland’s ice. A child born today has a high chance of living beyond 2100. If you care about that generation and those beyond, you should deem it worth paying an insurance premium now to protect against those worst-case scenarios. As economists such as Stern and Weitzman have argued, these are contexts where it is inappropriate to discount the future at the standard rate that a developer planning an office building with a 30-year lifetime would use. As a parenthesis, stimulated by the noble Lord, Lord Judd, I note that there is one policy context where a zero discount rate is applied: to radioactive waste disposal, where the depositories are required to prevent leakage for at least 10,000 years. That is somewhat ironic, given that we cannot plan the rest of energy policy even 30 years ahead.
And another thing: if humanity’s collective footprint gets too heavy, the resultant ecological shock could irreversibly impoverish our biosphere. A UN report this year claimed that 1 million species were risk of extinction. That is 10% of the total estimated number of species—many are not yet identified. We are destroying the book of life before we have read it. To quote the great ecologist E. O. Wilson,
“mass extinction is the sin that future generations will least forgive us for”.
However, politicians will not gain much resonance by advocating sacrifices now when the benefits seem to accrue mainly to distant parts of the world decades in the future. Even within our own country, there is reluctance to spend enough on disaster mitigation—vaccines, flood defences, et cetera. Unless there is a clamour from voters, manifest in politicians’ inboxes and the press, Governments will not properly prioritise measures crucial for future generations. Sustaining that clamour needs effective campaigning, not just experts, and enlisting charismatic individuals to change the public mindset. To quote the great anthropologist Margaret Mead: “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has”.
I give two examples. The papal encyclical Laudato Si eased the path to consensus at the Paris climate conference in 2015. The Pope got a standing ovation at the UN. He has 1 billion followers, mainly in Latin America, Africa and East Asia. There is no gainsaying his impact nor the Church’s global reach, long-term vision and concern for the world’s poor. More parochially, I doubt that Michael Gove would have become exercised about non-degradable plastic waste had it not been for the BBC’s “Blue Planet” programmes, fronted by our secular Pope, David Attenborough—especially the footage of an albatross returning to its nest and regurgitating plastic debris, an image as iconic as the polar bear on a melting ice floe is for climate campaigners. As many noble Lords have emphasised, it is encouraging to witness more activists among the young. They hope to live to the end of the century. Their campaigning is welcome and their commitment gives grounds for hope.
I close with a thought that strikes me when I visit the great cathedral at Ely, near where both I and my noble friend Lord Bird live. Its builders essentially knew of nothing beyond Europe. Many thought that the world was a few thousand years old and might not last another thousand. Despite these constricted horizons in both time and space, despite the deprivation and harshness of their lives, and despite their primitive technology and meagre resources, they conceived a glorious building that they never lived to see finished and which still elevates our spirits centuries later. What a shaming contrast it would be if, despite our far greater resources and wider horizons, we pursued policies that denied future generations a fair inheritance. Our perspectives should be global and stretch at least a century ahead. Our responsibility to our children, to the poorest and to preserve life’s diversity surely demands nothing less. That is why we need institutional changes to enshrine long-term thinking more firmly in decision-making.
Baroness Watkins of Tavistock (CB)
My Lords, I thank my noble friend Lord Bird for securing this important debate. It is an honour to follow my noble friend Lord Rees and the other noble Lords who have spoken with such vision on how to include young people and enhance their involvement in public policy planning.
It is clear to me that the current structures for public consultation on a range of issues neither involve enough representation of the younger members of our society nor consider fully the impact of policy-making on future generations. Rather, we get into a cycle, associated with our electoral cycle, of short-term solutions to long-term problems. The excellent Library briefing for today’s debate states:
“Some theorists have suggested that future generations should not be explicitly represented in policymaking”.
Such theorists argue that “family and institutional ties” take cognisance of future generations’ interests when formulating policy. I believe, however, that hearing younger voices and responding to their ideas is vital. If countries such as Singapore, Israel and Hungary have introduced formal representation for future generations into policy-making, surely the UK should develop an equivalent. As has been acknowledged, there is a Future Generations Commissioner in Wales, where I did my master’s degree, and a Futures Forum in Scotland.
Without a more formal approach to involving young people in decision-making, I suggest that policy-making will continue to favour the current generation of policymakers. Thompson, a Harvard academic, suggests that,
“presentism is not entirely unwelcome”,
in a democracy. He further states:
“Compared to other forms of government, democracy is not disposed to sacrifice”.
I suggest that this is true in this House as well as in wider society. We as a body have very few, if any, Members under the age of 40. We are appointed based on a variety of skills and expertise, but we are appointed for life, making it difficult to refresh and renew our membership. We are trying hard to reduce our numbers: we voted in favour of new appointments to this Chamber being for a fixed term of 15 or 20 years—but not to apply that principle to those of us fortunate enough to sit in this House already.
I can submit further evidence of recent policy that has adversely affected younger generations rather than the generations making up the cohorts of parliamentarians in both this House and the other place. The decision to introduce and then to increase university fees rather than a graduate tax is one such example. Young people who have recently been at university have large debts charged at higher interest than most mortgages at present. Those earning over £25,000 a year are in effect paying basic rate tax and 9% on top of that in loan repayments. They also pay national insurance and in the public sector pay into occupational pensions that will be calculated on lifetime earnings rather than final salaries, unlike my own generation.
Priority issues that concern the younger generations raised through school councils, higher education student bodies and other networks include, as other noble Lords have outlined, the environment, employment, education, housing and homelessness, health and access to care and treatment services. If we are to hear and respond to their voices in developing policy, I believe that there needs to be a more formal structure in each of our four countries and a UK-wide body to democratically develop a greater emphasis on young people’s rights to inform and develop policy. This should ensure that we put the needs of future generations at the heart of policy development.
I believe that a “young people’s parliament” would be able to identify key areas where they wish policy to change. If there were a formal mechanism for Parliament to be held accountable not only for receiving and listening to these concepts but also a duty to formally respond, this would make our democracy truly democratic. Parliamentarians would become more accountable to future generations and avoid the notion outlined by Thompson that,
“democracy is not disposed to sacrifice”.
For example, if young people place significant value on building more homes, what would our response be? Let me postulate that building new homes rapidly would reduce homelessness and children being brought up in bed and breakfast accommodation but might also result in a reduction in the value of some properties owned by older people. Would we as policymakers accept that the benefits for younger generations outweigh a reduction in the value of some of the homes already purchased by older generations? I wonder, in this slightly utopian vision of younger generations informing policy, whether they might wish to raise a graduate tax and stop student loans? Would they want to ensure that our tax system encourages saving, increases funding for social care and reduces means-tested benefits for older generations? I am sorry but I may have said that the wrong way around: introduce means-tested benefits for older generations. I do not know, but I am certain that we should be consulting them more widely. What plans do HM Government have to work further to ensure that they protect and represent the interests of future generations in policymaking and what plans do they have to further expand and strengthen this work?
Finally, I end on a note referred to earlier: does the Minister think that this House would benefit from a range of new Members who were considerably younger than our current membership and could this be achieved by all of our current Members agreeing to a fixed period for our own tenure?
Lord Addington (LD)
My Lords, we have listened to a reliable tour de force from the noble Lord, Lord Bird, to start the debate, and now we have to ask ourselves a series of questions, many of which have been heard before. What are we supposed to do about tomorrow? This question has been raised throughout the debate. We all think that change should happen as long as we do not inconvenience ourselves. It should be done by somebody else. Nimbyism is the greatest enemy of recycling plants that use incineration, which is a great way of getting rid of plastics, and of having a windmill that generates clean energy. Nimbys say, “We do not want new houses if mine will go down in value”—because anybody who has a mortgage has to know that there is something there. We have to try to counter all these things, and the only way we will do this is if we allow ourselves to be reminded that we are only the caretakers. That was probably the last really important speech by Lady Thatcher, in which she pointed out the green agenda. We are the caretakers of the planet. That probably proves that no one party has ever had a monopoly on virtue. Everybody has to approach it and go through.
How we are reminded—the noble Lord, Lord Bethell, was the most strident against institutions reminding us—is a question that we will have to engage with. The great praise that goes to those across Offa’s Dyke today, which is probably justified, means that it is a model. The Government must be looking at this. It is important to know when they will have an idea of how it works and how they would like to change something in this way. Having something here that does not work to remind us of the future is really just another useless bit of legislation—and let us face it; we have all seen plenty of those. How many bits of legislation have we had in this House that have not even been used? How many hours of our lives have we given to those?
Will we have something effective that does this? How will we bring in the young—the group that do not vote en masse? When they do, political calculations are destroyed; I refer in evidence to the 2017 election. When you actually get down and try to engage, how do you make sure they know what is going on and give them an issue? If you are voting against something, you are back to populism: “No, you can’t do that to me; you can’t interfere with my life”. You have to get some process of continuous engagement.
The environment is clearly the one subject on which we have had consistent pressure, for many decades now, to look at the future. What are we prepared to give up and restrict ourselves on, to make sure that we deliver there? How are we prepared to do it? How much tax do we want to pay? How much money are we prepared to sacrifice somewhere else? It comes together with housing, which I have already mentioned. Are we prepared to pay for slightly more expensive housing that is cheaper to run and does not affect the environment as much? How are we prepared to bring these together?
I am sitting even closer to the noble Lord, Lord Bird, than I am to those on my own Benches today. He spoke about investing in human capital. I thought that this might be one speech in which I did not mention special educational needs and dyslexia—but what the hell. If we are going through on this, not properly engaging and identifying problems in the education system means that we will have a poorer society and more people who cannot interact with it. This means that we are carrying more burden than benefit. In a modern world where you need many skilled workers, if you do not identify people who need extra help in the education system, you have problems. I am an example that you can get through, with a little adjustment—it is easier now.
I have a computer that 40 years ago was pure science fiction; I talk to it and it writes stuff. There are dozens of other things that talk back to you; it is pure “Star Trek”, is it not? We are there. But there are other ways that bring in other groups and make them productive. We have knowledge and interaction. At the moment we have a dysfunctional situation in which there are laws that say you should be helped but insufficient money to do it, and it is mainly falling on those areas. We will have to invest to get the best out of this group. If you do not, you have a burden. This is just another example of having to make a sacrifice or restructure now to get a future benefit. We all know that unless we get some reason or prod to do it, the easy answer is to take today’s cake, not to invest for tomorrow and to go forward.
The young will be a good way of encouraging us to do this. The noble Lord, Lord Crisp, talked about getting a few under-35s involved. If I remember correctly, I had 17 and a half years as the under-40 representative in this House. Those days are gone. It was a case of, “It’s jolly nice to have you in the room, but you’re actually saying something?”. That is in us all. We have to institutionalise a way of getting them to come in and be listened to and interacted with. Groups that have input from outside will say something new.
To mention the things that I am interested in, if you put political parties and sporting groups in a darkened room where they can comfortably talk shop to each other in language that they have always used, they will come out with exactly the same answers as they have always done, because that is what we are like. We have to make sure that there is action and that we are challenged. That is why the institutional challenges are helpful. There is no other way of guaranteeing to make sure that it is there. We have to make sure that you come in, challenge and turn it all around and say, “There has to be something else”.
There also has to be a long-term objective and it has to be more solid than just, “We must do something at some point”—because you rapidly run out of road there. On the environment, we are rapidly coming to the end of the road. We are in emergency measures. It is time to stamp your brake down hard and hope you have judged it correctly—not, “Let’s slow down and see if we can do it”. We are going to hit those barriers: it is probably just a matter of how hard. What do we do?
I will try to draw my comments and those of everyone else who has spoken in the debate to a conclusion. To guarantee the future we have to make sure that we continue to listen to those outside the normal groups, particularly those who are not included, and the young. The young are busy living their lives and instructing themselves, so we must encourage them in. It is no use saying, “Why don’t you go and talk to a group of 45 to 55 year-olds who are running a political party, a pressure group or a residents association?”. You have to introduce them in.
We know this in sport. When there is a world cup in rugby or netball, you get new people into that group once they become interested in it. You prepare somebody to welcome them. Politics can learn something from sport. You have to have somebody who is interested on the door. We know from experience that if they turn up and all they see is a bunch of people doing their normal thing and saying, “We might get round to dealing with you in a minute”, they will leave. We must find ways of bringing them in and making sure that they are listened to, talked to and shown a path. If we do not do that, we will merely end up going over the same stuff again, except that it will be a slightly tweaked version of the same thing and the accepted wisdom. We do not have time for that slowness of change.
Lord Davies of Oldham (Lab)
My Lords, this has been an excellent debate and I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Bird, on the subject that he chose and on his speech. As ever, he identified those who have had some of the worst deals from society and deserve not just our sympathy but our aid. At the same time, he succeeds in being optimistic about what we can do. That is a real virtue. I was very pleased, having been born in Tredegar, that he should choose Wales as the home of optimism today. He made a strong case indeed for the Welsh legislation that is making some real changes with regard to Welsh political culture. There is absolutely no reason why all the home countries cannot learn from that and make aspects of our legislation that much more relevant.
This debate was bound to range very widely. I am all too well aware that my noble friend Lord Giddens is really happy only when people are responding to global economics and the challenges presented by what is, after all, one of the greatest problems of resource allocation that one can conceive of. We are always very grateful when he comes along with his lucid arguments on these points. But today we should probably have a narrower focus, if only to pay due respect to the pitch made by the noble Lord, Lord Bird, in his opening speech.
That is why I appreciated the speech by my noble friend Lord Layard; unfortunately, there have been speeches in this debate to which I am now not able to pay sufficient regard. He said that the first issue is climate change. That was echoed by many speakers in this debate. Of course, it is the first issue. Unless we get all our resources devoted to guaranteeing the future of the planet, our hopes for any improvement in society will be as naught. We all know that we are running out of precious time. That is why we are at the point where really significant responses need to be made by the nations of the world. Of course, Britain has a special responsibility to play some leading part in this as we led the Industrial Revolution which created the circumstances in which our present problems abide.
My noble friend Lord Layard also mentioned energy. Without doubt, it is crucial; first, because lots of the energy we use at the moment is the most polluting of the problems that we have with regard to the climate; and, secondly, because we can make breakthroughs. We can see the science and technology which will make breakthroughs in cheaper, more efficient and, above all, safer energy, which can guarantee that we can expect our societies to flourish.
My noble friend’s third point was about the health of the individual. We all respect the fact that the more we can improve the health of our nation, the more we will increase the level of happiness that our people enjoy. There is no doubt that the area we have neglected in the past has been mental health or that at present we need strategies that ensure that mental health gets the biggest bang for the buck. We must find the resources to make improvements there. That helps also to bring the totality of this debate into some concern about the welfare of our fellow citizens.
We should not underestimate the challenge that we face. I have to confess the significance of this point. I remember when the Club of Rome produced The Limits to Growth in the early 1970s. The whole world was aghast not because it was talking about limits to growth in terms of the dangers to the planet which we are looking at now but simply because we would run out of the resources which we would need to translate into economic goods and benefits to society. The Club of Rome continues to produce work and is still active, but I do not think it figures with the degree of prominence that it had for a decade or so in the 1960s and 1970s when it identified the threat. In a sense we have overcome aspects of the physical threat because we know how to garner our resources to make improvements, although certain resources are becoming increasingly scarce. Our problem is the climate, which is a much greater problem than the shortage of resources because we are poisoning our inheritance.
The importance of change was recognised in the UK at the beginning of this century, in two ways. First, we began to address, through the Stern review—behind that, of course, was not just a British citizen but a Member of this House—which played a significant role in identifying the threats of climate change. Secondly, we started to look with a view to the future in perhaps a more significant way than at any time since the 18th or 19th century, when England was the world’s oyster with respect to technological development. At that time, you could build a railway line wherever and as fast as you wanted, provided you had the resources. Our equivalent—there will not be total agreement on this—is HS2.
We have made a commitment to long-term investment in our infrastructure; the rewards for HS2 are still more than a decade away, and there are still doubts about its final structure. Governments always feel that democracies have desperately short-term aspects, but HS2 indicates that democracies can commit themselves to long-term allocation of resources. We are doing that in this instance, and we need to. I do not agree with the point that democracies cannot engender sacrifice: people responded to the sacrifices demanded by democracies from 1914 and again from 1939. People knew they and their families were paying a terrible price when young men went off to war, but they were responding to the democratic impulse that their country needed them.
We are capable of facing up to the greatest challenges of our society. We have to recognise that our progress can be quite significant. Recent reports indicate the way we can go forward. The institute of accountants has indicated that intergenerational relationships are under strain, and we have had enough evidence in this debate to recognise that. It is true that people in generations with the poorest deal are resentful. We have to face the facts. I have a quote here from the chief executive of the Resolution Foundation, Torsten Bell. He said that certain people are dealt a poor deal. By the age of 30, young people are,
“earning no more than those born 15 years earlier”;
the resources going to them are the same 15 years on. On housing, young people today are paying more, owning less and commuting further. That is a pretty poor deal, which brings me to the other two themes that I want to talk about.
To produce a good society, we need two priorities to get past this generational block. We have to concentrate resources on housing, to give our young people the chance to get and rent houses at reasonable cost, where they are currently being exploited. The other thing we must do is to provide lifelong education. We have to create a structure whereby young people, as they go through their work in a rapidly changing technological environment, can develop the skills to match up to it. These are two of the greatest challenges that we face. My party is working hard at the present time on how we will generate the resources to produce lifelong education and a vast improvement in housing policy.
Baroness Stedman-Scott (Con)
My Lords, I hope that everybody will join me in saying what a great debate this has been. The contributions have been excellent, and emotions have quite rightly been stirred on various issues. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Bird, for instigating the debate. He is persistent and consistent in his drive for prevention and all the issues that go with it. I can safely say that all noble Lords love prevention and would love to dismantle poverty—and that we all love Wales.
It is apt that we are discussing this issue when just last week the Prime Minister announced that the Government would reduce net greenhouse gas emissions to zero by 2050, protecting the future of the planet for future generations. The UK is on track to become the first G7 nation to legislate to reduce net emissions to zero. Germany has also recently come out in support of a net zero 2050 EU goal following an intervention from Chancellor Merkel last month.
The right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Oxford, the noble Lords, Lord Rees of Ludlow, Lord Layard and Lord Davies of Oldham, and others have all drawn our attention to the issue of tackling climate change. Between 1990 and 2016, as referred to by the noble Lord, Lord Giddens, the UK reduced its greenhouse gas emissions by 42% while still growing the economy by more than two-thirds. The UK is a centre for clean growth and innovation. Low-carbon technology and clean energy contribute £44.5 billion to our economy every year. As these actions show, this Government are committed to be the first generation to leave the environment in a better state than we found it.
The right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Leeds, my noble friend Lady Jenkin and others reminded us that young people have never been so important to us as they are now. Indeed, this Government have consistently recognised the need to think about future generations in the policy of today. In the most recent Budget, for instance, the Chancellor announced a £200 million youth endowment fund, which will be run independently by the charity Impetus, working in partnership with the Early Intervention Foundation and Social Investment Business across England and Wales. This focus is on long-term early intervention, exactly the intervention needed to protect and support young people and future generations by investing early, recognising, as we all do, that prevention is better than cure.
Let me read a paragraph from a letter on mental health that our Prime Minister sent recently:
“Much of our work over the last three years has rightly focused on those suffering from mental ill-health. But I also believe that the next great revolution in mental health should be in prevention—because we should never accept a rise in mental health problems as simply inevitable”.
We are investing in the education of our future generations through our reforms of apprenticeships and technical education. In 2017 our reforms fundamentally changed what apprenticeships are, to improve their quality and the long-term opportunities they can provide. We have invested nearly £7 billion this year alone in education for 16 to 19 year-olds, but we know we need to go further. That is why we are transforming technical education through T-levels so that young people have the knowledge to get the high-skill, high-wage jobs of the future. We are backing these reforms with an extra £500 million per year once the new T-levels are fully rolled out. As many noble Lords will know, the founder of the Salvation Army, William Booth, said, “That and better will do”.
On debt reduction, thinking about future generations is also reflected by the Government’s fiscal responsibility. Our public sector debt is now falling as a share of GDP, reducing the debt interest burden on future generations, meaning that today’s taxpayers are not creating costs that will have to be met by those yet to be born. We must stick to that.
Part of fiscal responsibility is also about targeting spend so that it is deployed most effectively. This means looking at benefits and costs to current and future generations of policies, programmes and projects. To do this, government policy professionals find support in the policy profession unit, which promotes professional standards in policy-making. It also adheres to government guidance, known as the Green Book, which sets out a way to help us make effective decisions. It calculates the costs and benefits of spending on today’s and future generations. Included in this guidance are a number of steps to take so that the impacts on future generations of a policy or investment are fully captured. The Green Book approach has been exported far and wide, from Wales to New Zealand. This means that when we consider investments in our infrastructure, in roads, rail, hospitals and schools for the future, we consider the costs and benefits consistently, so we seek to invest the marginal pound with maximum impact.
The Government have invested in infrastructure at record levels. Public sector net investment is set to reach its highest sustained levels for 40 years—today’s generation investing in the future. It is through economic growth, promoted by investment in capital, that the resources available to society are increased. These can be used to increase social value, such as improving public services, tackling poverty or protecting the environment.
Many noble Lords mentioned social capital, but while we have a good understanding of the costs and benefits of our investment in infrastructure, as the noble Lord, Lord Giddens, reminded us we also need to understand the impact of our investment in people, which is so important, so that future investment can be better targeted. To improve this understanding, the Government have asked the Office for National Statistics to develop a more sophisticated measure of human capital. The noble Lord, Lord Layard, challenged us to invest in social capital and that we must do.
Many people say that we must have prevention rather than cure. Sometimes we give ourselves the impression that we have not made any progress in this way, but I know that we have. I would be the first person to stand here and say that there is more to do in our welfare reforms and that there are areas that we have to sort out. I am not going to argue with that at all. Sort them we will, but universal credit replaces six benefits with one to simplify the system and make work pay. As a result, people claiming universal credit move into work faster, stay in work longer and spend more time looking to increase their earnings.
When I ran an organisation that helped people get and keep a job, we said all the time that you get a job and then sometimes you lose it. You then had to requalify for benefit. I think it took a month to requalify before you could sign on again. You would then get another job. This would repeat itself for some people, especially those on the margins. We now have a system in which staff in Jobcentre Plus can help someone get a job and, if the person then loses that job, they get hold of them again straightaway to help get them their next job. The person does not leave the system. Also, if, in discussions with your work coach, you say that you need to earn more money, they will help you progress to the next job. This is prevention, and while there is more to do, it is working. Our reforms have made welfare fairer for claimants and taxpayers, and encourage people into work by making sure that work always pays. There are 3.7 million more people in work now than in 2010, resulting in the lowest rate of unemployment for 40 years.
I will answer some of the specific issues noble Lords have raised. If I run out of time, I give you my word that I will write with the answers. The noble Lords, Lord Bird, Lord Addington and Lord Wigley, and other noble Lords, raised the issue of the Welsh system. I know that the noble Lord, Lord Bird, is very keen to see if we can do something like this in England. We are looking very carefully at the Welsh system. The noble Lord shared with me that there is a five-year review. We too will wait and see what that review brings about and consider the findings and our response very carefully.
My noble friend Lady Jenkin, the noble Lord, Lord Crisp, and the noble Baroness, Lady Watkins, raised the issue of student debt and student loans. An expert panel led by Philip Augar published a review that was carried out last month, and the Prime Minister welcomes its findings. It says that there are overwhelming strengths to our education system, but the Government will carefully consider the panel’s proposals and engage further with stakeholders before finalising their approach at the spending review.
The noble Lord, Lord Giddens, does well to challenge us and remind us that we must confront the problems that no other era has had to. The future is not what it used to be, so we must work together to try to find solutions to the problems we face. Believe me, they are bigger than anything we may have seen before.
The right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Leeds challenged us on the Sure Start centres. I am advised that before closing any children’s centres, local authorities must ensure that children and families—particularly the most disadvantaged—will not be adversely affected. This Government are supporting parents with record levels of childcare support and funding. If noble Lords have particular cases involving Sure Start which they wish to write to me about, although I would not be pleased to receive them, I certainly will look at them. I sent somebody in my village to a Sure Start centre this week, and they have been helped.
I thank the noble Lord, Lord Wigley for so eloquently outlining the work of the Welsh Government, and I compliment Sophie Howe and her team on their excellent work. We have talked about mental health, but I wish to inform the noble Lord, Lord Layard, that the Government are committed to achieving parity of esteem between mental and physical health services. Funding for mental health services will grow as a share of the overall NHS budget over the next five years, as set out in the NHS’s long-term plan.
The noble Lord, Lord Layard, raised the issue of national productivity. We are committed to providing high-quality infrastructures to support economic growth and prosperity across all regions of the UK. The Chancellor has set out how over £24 billion of the NPIF was allocated; it includes £740 million for digital infrastructure, £7 billion for research and development and £6.5 billion for transport. Noble Lords will see that those numbers do not add up to the total, but I will not read all the details out now.
The right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Oxford talked to us about hell. You do not hear much about that in church now, so he is right to remind us that it is hot, and that climate change is a hot subject. He also reminded us of the challenge of technological change and the way that it could affect the most vulnerable, which is why they need education and skills to ensure that they can compete in the labour market.
I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Massey, for the time that we were able to spend together. Yesterday, she was able to enlighten me on the excellent work she has been doing and I was really impressed. She asked whether Her Majesty’s Government would be prepared to support a group that pulled all the excellent work together to share good practice. I give her my word that I will go back to the Minister and ask whether that is a possibility. I will do my very best for her.
The noble Lord, Lord Crisp, reminded us that there is a lack of political vision. I am reminded that where there is no vision, the people perish. To have a vision for our country and our politics is very important. Florence Nightingale was in her mid-30s when she did some of her best and most important work, so we must listen to and make space for our young people.
I thank my noble friend Lord Bethell for his challenge. I am not sure what I can do about making sure that the refurbishment of Parliament is accommodated in line with his vision, but I will have a go. I will certainly pass on his challenge. I was delighted by his endorsement of the intergenerational fairness report. We await the Government’s response with anticipation, but I am glad that he is supportive of a standing committee in the House of Lords.
As ever, the noble Earl, Lord Listowel, was a champion for the children. He said that we need stable policies for them. We need stable lives and stable relationships for children, and there is great work going on to achieve that, but some very sad cases come to us by the day. I hope that all noble Lords will do their best to try to improve policy and stop the invest/divest situation.
The noble Lord, Lord Judd, again gave us an excellent contribution. On voting I say to him, in the most pleasant way that I can, that the Government do not have any plans to lower the voting age and were elected on a manifesto commitment to retain the current franchise. The House has debated lowering the voting age in a number of contexts and repeatedly voted against it. For example, during the passage of the Cities and Local Government Devolution Bill in 2016 there was an attempt to lower the voting age in local elections; it was confidently defeated. My noble friend Lord Bethell also raised the issue of young people’s involvement in politics.
I have some good news for the noble Lord, Lord Judd. At the Budget in 2018, the Chancellor announced that PFI will be “retired”—I think that is the polite word—for new projects on the basis that it is inflexible, overly complex and a potential risk to government finances.
There was a wonderful contribution by the noble Lord, Lord Rees of Ludlow. We are in awe of his understanding of the issues. As we are the first country to legislate for long-term climate targets, we can be truly proud of our record in tackling climate change. Standing by is not an option and we have set targets to do better.
In reply to the noble Baroness, Lady Massey, the noble Lord, Lord Crisp, and my noble friend Lord Bethell, last year the House appointed a Select Committee on Intergenerational Fairness and we await the outcome of its report. The noble Baroness, Lady Watkins, asked whether we would benefit from having young people in here. I consider myself young at 63 and I imagine that we would. It takes some time to change things here, though, so in that sense perhaps we had better get on with it.
The noble Lord, Lord Addington, was another endorser of looking at Welsh policy and seeing what happens there. I have given an answer to that. He is persistent and consistent in his quest for better services for dyslexia, and the benefits that technology can achieve. To the noble Lord, Lord Davies, I say that we are committed to providing high-quality infrastructure to support economic growth. The national product investment fund is going to deliver additional money for that, and we remain committed to HS2.
I thank all noble Lords for their contributions. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Bird. I always find his interventions refreshingly honest; they stimulate great debate. I will close with a quote from his article in the House magazine:
“If we don’t want to be the generation who knew what needed to be done, but fiddled while Rome burned, we need to take action. After all, the best way to predict the future is to create it”.
I thank all noble Lords.
Lord Bird
I really enjoyed that and am glad the Minister has said she will look closely at the Welsh commission and legislation. That was a good way of describing it. I do not know if I got there in the end, but I was trying to bring poverty into the future generations debate, along with climate change and other things. I was trying to explain that I arrived at future generations from my work in poverty, as opposed to considering other wider issues. I am glad we are doing this.
The Minister has pointed out all the work being done, and it is great. There is nothing not being done. Some 80% of social provision in this country—maybe a little more or less—is very good and we should be proud of that. But the 20% or 22% is why we need something more forward-looking for future generations. The 22% are always left behind, and they are the people who take up 70% of the political and social actions of both Houses, and all sorts of local authorities and charities. We are obsessed with and besotted by what is about 20% to 30%. I wanted to mention that.
I also mention the contribution from the noble Lord, Lord Bethell, because he was the only one who said it is not worth a candle—in the nicest possible sense. At one stage, I was the printer of the Victorian Society and spent a long time getting into Victorian history. I was often in this House measuring, because the Victorian Society had many plans to open up and save the buildings. This was 40 years ago; of course, there was no response, the money was not spent and here we are having to spend billions in the future.
It is interesting to look at the year 1885 and the Great Stink. What did it lead to? The Great Stink led to Bazalgette’s northern and southern outfalls. Who commissioned that? A commissioner did, the public works commissioner. They could not get the partisans together. Who were the partisans? They were not just political, but the local authorities that did not want to invest in drainage and get rid of all the nasty smells. It was the parish councils and business. Business wanted more of the same. It wanted to put all its trash into the river. It was a commissioner, not very different from commissioner Sophie Howe. I say to the noble Lord, Lord Bethell, if he really wants to look at the development of this country, look at the occasions when the commissioners stepped in and said, “Enough is enough. We have to do something”. I thank all noble Lords for a very exciting debate. You have been very generous to me.