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Oral Answers to Questions
(4 years, 5 months ago)
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Dr Luke Evans (Bosworth) (Con)
The Economic Secretary to the Treasury (John Glen)
The bounce-back loan scheme is aimed at helping the smallest businesses across different sectors of the economy to access the finance they need, and we have seen 1 million loans worth almost £31 billion approved since the scheme was launched on 4 May. We are carefully monitoring the use of this scheme by businesses and will keep all policies under review.
Dr Evans [V]
I am grateful for the Minister’s answer. Undoubtedly, bounce-back loans have been a success of this pandemic. However, I have a concern that normally viable small and medium-sized enterprises will face acute problems due to covid and may need to make redundancies. The payments associated with redundancies may, in turn, cause normally viable companies to become insolvent, thus losing all jobs and putting more pressure on the state. With that in mind, will he consider a fund or time-limited mechanism to ensure that SMEs can provide redundancy payments due to covid, thus allowing them to remain solvent, protecting them from further job losses and providing some short-term stability for them to bounce back in the future?
John Glen
I thank my hon. Friend for his question. Of course we recognise the importance of SMEs—there are 5.6 million businesses across the country with fewer than 10 employees, and we need their dynamism and entrepreneurial spirit as the economy starts to recover. The Government have said from the start that they will do whatever it takes to support business. The Chancellor has introduced a significant package of measures, which will be under review, and there will be further announcements in due course.
Sir Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)
The Financial Secretary to the Treasury (Jesse Norman)
Inheritance tax makes an important contribution to the Exchequer. The current threshold of up to £1 million for a qualifying married couple or civil partnership means that 96% of all estates in 2020-21 are forecast to be able to pass on their assets without any inheritance tax liability. Any reform or simplification of inheritance tax would be considered as part of the usual Budget process.
Sir Edward Leigh
When are we going to fulfil numerous promises made as long ago as before the 2010 election, by George Osborne, to help middle-class people pass on more of their property to the young? After all, that is a priority for the young. While we are about it, can we hear from the Chancellor and the Prime Minister less about high-spending lefties like President Roosevelt and more about good Conservatives like Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher—less about subsidies and more about tax cuts and tax simplification?
Jesse Norman
I hesitate to give my right hon. Friend a history lesson, but he will recall that Ronald Reagan was a deep admirer of FDR and quite a heavy spender in his own right. Inheritance tax is paid on only one in 25 estates, and therefore it is not quite as large an issue in terms of the number of people affected as my right hon. Friend suggests. We take these issues very seriously and return to them recurrently at fiscal events.
Dave Doogan (Angus) (SNP)
Margaret Ferrier (Rutherglen and Hamilton West) (SNP)
The Chancellor of the Exchequer (Rishi Sunak)
The Government have taken unprecedented steps to keep as many people as possible in their existing jobs, support viable businesses to stay afloat and protect the incomes of the most vulnerable. We are now carefully and safely reopening our economy.
Dave Doogan [V]
I have previously raised the issue of the 3 million taxpayers being excluded from Government support with the Prime Minister, the First Secretary of State and the Leader of the House, all of whom have repeated details of the Government support provided to other groups. To be clear, it is understood that 2.6 million self-employed people were supported and 9 million people were furloughed. What remains an issue, though, is the 10% of the workforce who have received no meaningful support to help navigate covid. Specifically on the 3 million excluded, will the Chancellor provide an eleventh-hour lifeline such as that provided for the arts, or is he planning to cut 3 million workers adrift? It is one or the other, and it is now or never.
Rishi Sunak
I have said previously that, although we have not been able to help everyone in exactly the way that they would have liked, I am confident that the breadth and scale of the interventions we have provided ensures that everyone is able to access some support. We have also strengthened our security net, with welfare through universal credit, among other things, and our self-employment scheme remains one of the most comprehensive and generous anywhere in the world.
Margaret Ferrier [V]
The economic impact of coronavirus has not been distributed evenly across the UK economy, yet the Scottish Government have extremely limited borrowing powers to stimulate demand and aid recovery in key sectors. A one-size-fits-all approach should no longer be the norm. Will the Chancellor bring forward the review of the fiscal framework, lift the caps on borrowing and give the Scottish Government the tools that they need to invest in Scotland’s future?
Rishi Sunak
My right hon. Friend the Chief Secretary to the Treasury is in constant dialogue with his counterpart, the Finance Minister in Scotland, on these issues, but the people of Scotland are able to benefit from the strong measures that we put in place for the entire United Kingdom. Whether it be our loan schemes or, indeed, our furlough scheme, everyone in every part of this country is able to benefit.
Mel Stride (Central Devon) (Con) [V]
Guidance has recently appeared on Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs website that suggests that those who take covid-19 tests, as provided by their employer, will have to treat the cost of those tests as a taxable benefit in kind, which is very unfortunate, particularly in respect of those frontline workers who may be involved. Will the Chancellor look into this matter, please, as a matter of urgency?
Rishi Sunak
I am delighted that my right hon. Friend has raised this issue with me, and of course we will look into it very quickly.
Alison Thewliss (Glasgow Central) (SNP)
To follow up on the question asked by my hon. Friend the Member for Angus (Dave Doogan), the ExcludedUK all-party group launched this morning with more than 150 Members of this House signing up as members, cheered on by the hon. Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross (Jamie Stone). Will the Chancellor tell me why he has decided that 3 million people are not worthy of support, and why will he not put something in place to protect their incomes?
Rishi Sunak
Everyone in this country has benefited one way or another from what we have been able to do. Although people have not been able to be helped in exactly the way they would have liked, we have been able to put in place measures unprecedented in scale and speed, and that meant we did have to make some difficult decisions to implement those policies. None the less, I do believe that, because of the measures that we have taken to strengthen our safety net, for example, everyone, no matter where they are, has access to more support than they did before this crisis began.
Alison Thewliss
If the Chancellor listened to the evidence from groups such as ExcludedUK, he would know that that is simply not the case. To turn to some of the rhetoric of the past few days, the Government seem to be trying to imitate the rhetoric of President Duterte of the Philippines and President Roosevelt on the new deal, but the measures do not meet the scale of either of those gentlemen’s ambitions. Does he agree with the SNP that we need a stimulus package of at least £80 billion, including a 2% cut to employers’ national insurance contributions and a reduction in VAT for the hospitality sector, as demanded by the Scottish Government? If he does not believe that those steps should be taken, will he allow the Scottish Government to have the full suite of financial powers that they require to meet that challenge?
Rishi Sunak
The hon. Lady talks about scale of ambition. I am proud of what this Government have put in place and the speed at which we have done so. The jobs of 9 million people have been protected through our furlough scheme; 2.7 million self-employed people have had their income supported; and millions of companies have received access to loans, grants, tax deferrals. In sum, this represents £130 billion of support—one of the most comprehensive and generous support packages available of any country anywhere in the world.
Bridget Phillipson (Houghton and Sunderland South) (Lab)
The Chancellor knows that different sectors of our economy face very different challenges in the months ahead, so will he listen to the businesses right across our country that have called again and again for the job retention scheme to have the flexibility to meet those different challenges?
Rishi Sunak
On the job retention scheme, our policy is clear. We have extended the scheme all the way through to the autumn, at which point it winds down gradually and in a way that asks for very modest contributions from employers. None the less, I do recognise that different sectors have faced a different circumstances during this crisis, particularly those in the hospitality, leisure and retail sector, which is why we cut business rates for the entire year for those sectors and, indeed, provided cash grants of £10,000 or £25,000 to almost 1 million businesses up and down the country.
Martin Vickers (Cleethorpes) (Con)
The Exchequer Secretary to the Treasury (Kemi Badenoch)
We recognise every region and community is impacted by this crisis. That is why the Government have announced unprecedented support for businesses and workers around the country. That includes 95 million to fund shovel-ready projects across the east midlands to help to provide a boost to the local economy and create jobs, building on over £120 million of local growth funding for Greater Lincolnshire for local projects such as Lincolnshire Lakes housing scheme.
Martin Vickers
I thank the Minister for that. The Treasury is giving considerable support to our area, such as through the Greater Grimsby town deal. We are hoping for favourable designation for freeport status, but the most pressing case at the moment is support for the Able marine energy park in northern Lincolnshire. Modest support from the Treasury could help to create 2,000 jobs. Will the Minister, or indeed the Chancellor, agree to meet me and my hon. Friends the Members for Great Grimsby (Lia Nici), for Brigg and Goole (Andrew Percy) and for Scunthorpe (Holly Mumby-Croft) to deal with this?
Kemi Badenoch
My hon. Friend rightly champions the strength of his local area as we move to restart the economy and make progress to achieve net zero carbon emissions by 2050. Our renewable energy ambitions will continue to create opportunities at manufacturing centres, such as the Able marine energy park proposal, but I encourage him first to engage with my colleagues from the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, as the lead Department on energy and industrial strategy.
Scott Benton (Blackpool South) (Con)
The Chief Secretary to the Treasury (Steve Barclay)
Upgrading local transport links is a key part of this Government’s commitment to levelling up across the country. That is why we announced at the Budget £500 million for the potholes fund; £4.2 billion has been announced for discussion with the eight devolved Mayors; and there is a further £2 billion across this Parliament for boosting cycling and walking.
Scott Benton
Reinstating a passing loop on to the south Fylde rail line will help to double the number of trains travelling into Blackpool South every single day, bringing additional tourists into Blackpool and helping to create new jobs, investments and opportunities. Does my right hon. Friend agree that delivering these local transport infrastructure projects is vital for furthering economic growth, assisting our recovery from covid-19 and delivering much-needed investment into Blackpool, a part of the world that I know he is very familiar with?
Steve Barclay
It is a key part of this Government’s commitment to improve transport links such as that. I know that my hon. Friend has submitted a proposal, which the Department for Transport is considering. Having been able to hear the trains on that line from my kitchen growing up, it is one that I take a particular interest in, and I know that it is a very strong scheme.
Grahame Morris (Easington) (Lab)
The Chief Secretary to the Treasury (Steve Barclay)
House building is an important catalyst for the wider economy and we have put in place an unprecedented package of support in this sector. Last week, the Prime Minister announced measures to stimulate house building, including a £450 million boost to the short-term house building fund.
Grahame Morris
I thank the Minister for his answer. Horden, Easington and Blackhall in my constituency need investment in housing regeneration. The recovery plan is ready. However, we need investment to help us transform our communities with new, modern, clean and green housing. Will the Chancellor invest in housing regeneration in east Durham, because these schemes can deliver jobs, training, opportunities, green energy and sustainable domestic supply chains, and boost the local economy?
Steve Barclay
This is an area where I agree with the hon. Gentleman. That is why, in addition to the fund I mentioned a moment ago, the Prime Minister also confirmed £12.2 billion of funding for affordable homes, and there is the £400 million brownfield land fund to get schemes working immediately with Mayors for exactly the reason he sets out.
Wes Streeting (Ilford North) (Lab)
The Conservative manifesto promised £9 billion for energy efficiency schemes, but the Committee on Climate Change described even that as
“welcome but not enough to match the size of the challenge”.
Given that the Chancellor is about to announce a £2 billion scheme, why are the Government scaling back their ambition when they should be scaling up to bring down people’s bills, tackle climate change and create the jobs we need to get Britain back to work?
Steve Barclay
If the hon. Gentleman had listened to the answer I gave a moment ago, he would have seen that we are learning from the lessons of the 2008 crash. One of the measures that was put in place then saw a fall of a third in the number of small house builders, so part of the £450 million fund is providing the finance to enable small house builders to build the schemes that Members on both sides of the House agree on. It is about learning the lessons of the schemes that Labour put in place in 2008, which led to a fall in construction work.
Sarah Champion (Rotherham) (Lab)
Anna McMorrin (Cardiff North) (Lab)
Lee Anderson (Ashfield) (Con)
Bambos Charalambous (Enfield, Southgate) (Lab)
Aaron Bell (Newcastle-under-Lyme) (Con)
Ms Angela Eagle (Wallasey) (Lab)
Rosie Cooper (West Lancashire) (Lab)
The Chancellor of the Exchequer (Rishi Sunak)
Through the coronavirus job retention scheme and the self-employment income support scheme, the Government have protected 9.4 million jobs and supported the incomes of 2.7 million self-employed. I remain committed to helping the unemployed return to work and supporting those who are most vulnerable to job loss. We will continue to monitor economic conditions to ensure our labour market policy response is both appropriate and effective.
Sarah Champion [V]
In his announcement of the self-employment income support scheme, the Chancellor told self-employed people that they have not been forgotten and no one will be left behind, but the Treasury Committee has found that more than a million people have been unable to benefit from either that scheme or the job retention scheme. That is certainly what I am finding in Rotherham. Will he commit to acting to ensure that, true to his word, no one is left to face this crisis alone?
Rishi Sunak
Some 95% of those who are majority self-employed are able to benefit from the self-employment scheme. In its design, its duration, the breadth of its coverage and the generosity of its support, the scheme remains the most generous and comprehensive self-employment support scheme in the world.
Anna McMorrin
We are facing the worst economic recession in history and a climate crisis. Despite the warm words yesterday, the green finance announcement does not go far enough. Germany is investing between £40 billion and £50 billion, France £13.5 billion and South Korea £11.5 billion, so £3 billion just does not cut it. Given that half a million 16 to 24-year-olds are currently unemployed, will the Chancellor commit to properly financing a green jobs guarantee to give our young people a future?
Rishi Sunak
The hon. Lady mentioned plans from other countries. It is worth bearing in mind that those plans relate to spending commitments over many years and are actually better compared with what we outlined at Budget, where we set out a £600 billion investment programme over the remainder of this Parliament, including many initiatives such as carbon capture and storage, the nature for climate fund and improvements in air quality. Conservative Members wholeheartedly believe in a green revolution, and we will provide the capital to make that happen.
Lee Anderson
I pay tribute to all the small business owners in Ashfield and Eastwood who have worked really hard to get ready for the reopening of their businesses last weekend in a covid-secure manner—places such as the world-famous Diamond Club, the Dog and Parrot, the Bus Stop Café, St Joseph’s Social Club and the outstanding Teversal Camping and Caravanning Club site. Although I am grateful to the Chancellor for all the financial support he has provided, does he agree that the only way to protect jobs and businesses in the long term is by safely reopening the economy?
Rishi Sunak
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. No support scheme can substitute for safely reopening our economy. I enjoyed seeing his Facebook page with his tour of Sutton, Eastwood and Huthwaite, and all the establishments that he mentioned—including a candle shop, I believe—and I pay tribute to all his local businesses for following the guidance and implementing safe measures so that they can welcome their local communities back with open arms.
Bambos Charalambous
The Government’s intervention to provide financial support to the arts is welcome, but freelance creative workers have received little or no support from the furlough scheme or the self-employment scheme for over 100 days. What specifically will the Chancellor do to correct this in the rescue package announced for the creative industries?
Rishi Sunak
Those in the creative arts, like others, can benefit from the self-employment scheme and other interventions that we have put in place, but it is important to know what happened yesterday: a £1.5 billion support package for our cultural institutions up and down the country, from our crown jewels—our globally recognised assets—to our local community theatres. They will all be able to benefit from the support we have put in place and preserve what is so special about our cultural heritage.
Aaron Bell
I thank the Chancellor for all he has done so far, and I look forward to his statement tomorrow. He mentioned unemployment, and we are aware that it is rising, so one of the most important things we can do is to get people back into work as quickly as possible. In Newcastle-under-Lyme we are benefiting from the Stoke-on-Trent and Staffordshire local enterprise partnership redundancy and recruitment triage service. Will he welcome that? There are areas where employment is growing, and if we can get people who have been made redundant into those jobs as quickly as possible, we will minimise the devastating effects of this coronavirus.
Rishi Sunak
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The importance of job matching is critical and the evidence shows us that it works. I know from my time as a Local Government Minister the innovative approach that Councillor Atkins and his team on the county council and the LEP have taken to various economic initiatives. I pay tribute to them for putting this in place with such speed.
Ms Angela Eagle
The aerospace sector has already said that 9,000 jobs will go in the UK. The north-west is going to be specifically badly affected if the Government just sit back and allow this export-strong, high-skilled, high-wage sector to be decimated. Germany has put a big package in place. America has put a big package in place. France has put a big package in place. So what is the Chancellor going to put in place to protect and guarantee the future of the aerospace sector in the long term?
Rishi Sunak
The interventions in France and Germany related to specific companies, so it obviously would not be appropriate for me to comment on those in this place at this time. The support put in place in the US was primarily to support domestic connectivity. This Government have done that by subsidising considerably our bus network and our rail network to make sure that intra-Union connectivity remains through this crisis.
Rosie Cooper [V]
Will the Government abandon their one-size-fits-all wind-down of the furlough and self-employed schemes and adopt a targeted strategy that acknowledges that hotel workers, chefs and self-employed lighting technicians cannot and should not be treated in the same way as workers in sectors that are already back at full capacity?
Rishi Sunak
The most important thing for all these sectors is for them to be safely reopened. That is why I am delighted that last weekend we were able to meet the target set out in our reopening plan. The Prime Minister has spoken about reopening our remaining closed sectors in the coming weeks, which is welcome news. The hon. Lady is right that these sectors have faced hardship. That is why, as I said, they have received considerable extra support from the Government in the form of business rates holidays and cash grants.
Mr Pat McFadden (Wolverhampton South East) (Lab)
Thousands of jobs losses have been announced in recent days, and many more are expected if the furlough scheme is withdrawn from all sectors at the same time. With young people facing the most difficult labour market conditions for a generation, and many otherwise viable businesses in trouble because of social distancing rules, does the Chancellor accept the case for employment support being aimed directly at the sectors most likely to be hit by job losses in the coming months?
Rishi Sunak
Those who call for a sector-specific approach are not always able to articulate exactly how they would define those sectors and also the supply chain that they serve. The most important thing is to have provided broad, generous and swift coverage to protect 9 million jobs, as this Government have done, and now to reopen these sectors so that we can get as many of those people back to work as quickly as possible to the jobs that they have.
Stephen Metcalfe (South Basildon and East Thurrock) (Con)
The Financial Secretary to the Treasury (Jesse Norman)
The Government recognise the current challenges facing commercial landlords. That is why we have worked very closely with lenders to ensure that support and flexibility is being shown to commercial borrowers. This forms part of a much wider picture of unprecedented support to businesses affected, including via business rates holidays, grants and Government-backed loans—and of course those, in turn, give access to cash to pay for rents and salaries or suppliers.
Stephen Metcalfe [V]
May I draw Members’ attention to my entry in the register?
While many tenants welcome the steps the Government have taken to protect them from eviction, for many small private landlords the rental income on shops, offices and residential property is their only form of income, which in many cases is completely tied up. Will my right hon. Friend therefore work with the sector to explore how to provide financial support to individuals who find that they have no income and no access to any of the other very impressive schemes that the Government have introduced?
Jesse Norman
My hon. Friend will know, of course, that we published a code of practice to encourage all parties involved in a landlord-tenant situation to work together to ensure equity and swift recovery. More widely, we have made available over £330 billion of guarantees through the coronavirus business interruption loan scheme, the large business interruption loan scheme, and the corporate financing facility. But of course I would be happy to continue to discuss this issue with him.
The Economic Secretary to the Treasury (John Glen)
The Government have been carefully considering the potential issuance of a UK sovereign green bond. At present, we have no plans to do that, but we continue to monitor the case for one, and we will keep it under urgent review.
Ben Lake
I am glad that the Government will keep this matter under consideration because, as evidenced recently by Quebec, green bonds can be effective in raising capital investment and investment for operational expenditure to further the green transition. Will the Government also consider enabling the Welsh Government to issue such a bond to help the effort for a greener economy?
John Glen
Clearly, debt and the handling of it is a significant challenge for the Government at this time. The core gilt programme is the most stable and cost-effective way of dealing with our financing needs. The hon. Gentleman makes a reasonable point. We will continue to look constructively at all options and at the changing environment as a consequence of this crisis.
Andrew Bowie (West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine) (Con)
The Chief Secretary to the Treasury (Steve Barclay)
The UK Government’s response to covid-19 has been UK-wide. More than 750,000 people in Scotland have benefited from the job retention scheme and the self-employed income support scheme, and Scotland has received £3.8 billion of Barnett consequentials.
Andrew Bowie
I thank my right hon. Friend for that answer. It shows the benefits of being in the most successful political and economic Union in the history of the world. What support are the Government thinking about giving to the oil and gas sector, which is struggling from the dual blows of record low oil and gas prices and the covid-19 pandemic?
Steve Barclay
My hon. Friend is right to identify the benefit of pooling through the UK approach, and the specific issues relating to the oil and gas industry. That is why industry leaders met the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy on 11 June. Work is ongoing, particularly in relation to what support can be provided to the sector. We are very mindful of its significance to the economy of Scotland.
Gareth Bacon (Orpington) (Con)
The Chief Secretary to the Treasury (Steve Barclay)
Last week, the Government announced a comprehensive package to support councils in responding to the pressures caused by covid-19. We have now provided more than £3.7 billion of additional grant funding for councils, and announced a major new scheme to reimburse them for their lost income.
Gareth Bacon
Fears have been expressed that the Government will fully bail out financially poorly managed local authorities, while better managed local authorities, such as the London Borough of Bromley, may have to meet covid-19 shortfalls through their reserves. Will my right hon. Friend offer reassurances on that point? If covid-19 funding shortfalls remain, will he consider allowing a capitalisation directive to enable councils to fund one-off shortfalls through capital receipts or borrowing?
Steve Barclay
We have always taken the approach that borrowing is allowed for infrastructure and capital projects, but not day-to-day revenue. That policy will continue. At the same time, all councils have received support, and £16 million has been allocated to Bromley. It is right that the support addresses councils’ varied needs, and that is very much the approach that we have taken.
Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)
Of course, one of the areas that local government has gone into more in order to fund its services is commercial investment. The package last week does not cover the shortfall in that, which is hitting some local authorities very hard. A number of them are looking at section 114 notices. Is the Minister prepared to see councils go bankrupt on his watch, or is there a package of support for those councils?
Steve Barclay
The Chair of the Public Accounts Committee will know very well that commercial income carries risk for councils investing in it. We are cognisant of that fact. I advise councils, where there is the risk of a section 114, to talk to the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government ahead of any such decision.
Dan Carden (Liverpool, Walton) (Lab) [V]
The Prime Minister promised to do whatever it takes, and the Housing Minister told councils:
“spend whatever it takes, the Government will reimburse you”.
Will the Minister reaffirm that pledge? Councils need certainty. Many are already cutting services, and the one-size-fits-all approach simply does not work. Will he further commit to the principle that packages announced by the Government should meet the financial cost of coronavirus, and the social need for those local authorities?
Steve Barclay
The hon. Gentleman will know that the cost for local councils will be uncertain for some time, not least in terms of the impact of lost tax income. That is why we have addressed the short-term pressure through the £3.7 billion grant and additional funding that has been allocated, including the recent £600 million for infection control.
Clive Lewis (Norwich South) (Lab)
The Exchequer Secretary to the Treasury (Kemi Badenoch)
The Prime Minister recently set out the first steps of the Government’s strategy to rebuild and fuel economic recovery in response to covid-19. The Government believe the best way to secure a recovery is to invest across the UK to level up, while ensuring that we create the conditions for private enterprise to flourish.
Clive Lewis [V]
The Chancellor will have received a letter signed by Members from across the House, including myself, asking him to consider introducing a four-day working week as a way of helping the country recover and creating a better future post-covid-19. So will he commit to the Treasury exploring a four-day working week as part of its economic planning for the recovery? Will he also meet me and other Members to discuss how we can work together to make shorter working times a reality?
Kemi Badenoch
The Government believe that the best way of dealing with these issues is for workers to look at existing options available for flexible working and discuss them directly with their employers, rather than the Government legislating for the entire UK work- force. However, I am happy to meet the hon. Gentleman to discuss this topic further, if he would like.
Robbie Moore (Keighley) (Con)
Karl MᶜCartney (Lincoln) (Con)
David Johnston (Wantage) (Con)
The Financial Secretary to the Treasury (Jesse Norman)
As Members will know, the Chancellor has announced an unprecedented package of support for high-street businesses affected by the pandemic. In particular, the Government are giving retail, hospitality and leisure businesses a year’s business rates holiday; protecting commercial tenants from eviction and debt recovery; offering grants of up to £25,000 to eligible businesses; and making sure that businesses have access to the financing they need as quickly as possible. We stand ready to take further steps, as necessary.
Robbie Moore
I thank my right hon. Friend for that response. I recently visited a brilliant independent furniture store, Rooms, right in the centre of Keighley, which is run by Andrew Foster, his wife Janine and son Joe. They and many others welcome the 100% business rate relief this year but are concerned about next year and indeed about the fairness of the business rate structure when we consider pure online businesses and those based in premises. Will my right hon. Friend continue to review this area in the light of covid and look more closely to create a fairer business rate structure?
Jesse Norman
I am delighted to hear about Rooms, and many businesses in my constituency have reopened. Reopening the economy is the central step we need for our national recovery. As my hon. Friend will know, we have committed to a fundamental review of the business rates systems and published some comprehensive terms of reference for the review at the spring Budget. In the meantime, we are committed to supporting businesses and have taken actions to reduce the burden of rates, which will save businesses more than £13 billion in the next five years.
Karl MᶜCartney [V]
It is no secret that Chancellors have an overarching influence across all Departments. Within my Lincoln constituency’s county of Greater Lincolnshire we are faced with major local government reorganisation. Does the Treasury take the view that for the UK’s second largest county a single unitary authority would be in the best financial interests of my constituents when enforcing forthcoming local government reform and devolution?
Jesse Norman
It would be wrong for me, as a Minister, to offer a view on this, but I can tell my hon. Friend that my personal experience has been that the more streamlined, the clearer the lines of authority and the more integrated and shared approach that is taken, the more effective the infrastructure delivery is likely to be.
David Johnston
I have been visiting high-street businesses in Wantage, Didcot, Faringdon and elsewhere, and they are hugely grateful for the furlough scheme, the grant scheme and the business rates holiday, but what they most want now is footfall. Does my right hon. Friend agree that that should be the priority? Will he confirm that he is considering all measures to increase footfall on the high street?
Jesse Norman
I absolutely confirm that. The reason we have backed high-street firms so strongly all the way through is precisely that we recognise the central importance of these sectors to getting Britain’s high streets back firing on all cylinders. My hon. Friend will know that we have also introduced the Business and Planning Bill to help businesses in England get back on their feet, and we have accelerated nearly £100 million of investment in town centres and high streets, through the towns fund this year, to the same end.
Sarah Owen (Luton North) (Lab)
The Chief Secretary to the Treasury (Steve Barclay)
Treasury Ministers meet the Secretary of State for Transport and the Home Secretary on a regular basis to discuss a variety of important issues, including the aviation industry.
Sarah Owen [V]
I have asked Ministers multiple times why it is that we have not yet seen a specific package of support for the aviation industry, and I have received general answers about general measures that are clearly not working, with easyJet already consulting on 4,500 job losses. Thousands of jobs in Luton and its council are reliant on income from Luton airport. If the Governments of France and Germany are protecting their aviation workers, why are this Government not doing the same?
Steve Barclay
We continue to work closely with the sector and are willing to consider the situation of individual firms, providing that all other Government schemes have been explored and all commercial options exhausted, including raising capital from existing investors.
Jo Gideon (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Con)
The Exchequer Secretary to the Treasury (Kemi Badenoch)
Alongside unprecedented support for individuals and businesses in the light of the covid-19 outbreak, the Government have announced a £750 million support package for charities, £360 million of which will be allocated directly to charities providing essential services and £200 million will go to local charities through the National Lottery Community Fund.
Kemi Badenoch
My hon. Friend is right to highlight the extraordinary innovations of charities in Stoke-on-Trent and across the country. We have seen innovation and adaptation right across the economy, made possible in part by the unprecedented level of support that we have been referring to during this session. As of the end of last week, £230 million had been disbursed from the Government’s charity support fund.
Damian Collins (Folkestone and Hythe) (Con)
Stephen Doughty (Cardiff South and Penarth) (Lab/Co-op)
The Exchequer Secretary to the Treasury (Kemi Badenoch)
The Treasury is working extensively with employers, taskforces and industry groups to understand the long-term effects of covid-19 across all key areas of the economy, including the artistic, creative, tourism and hospitality sectors. We will continue to monitor the impact of Government support on the economy.
Damian Collins [V]
While hotels, hospitality businesses and holiday parks are reopening in my constituency, many businesses fear that this will be a year of three winters. What support are the Government considering beyond what has been delivered so far? In particular, would the Treasury consider the tourism and hospitality sector’s request to cut VAT to 5% for those businesses?
Kemi Badenoch
As ever, all taxes are kept under review, and changes are announced at fiscal events. My hon. Friend will be pleased to know that admissions to cultural venues, for example, are already exempt from VAT if they are provided by a local authority or an eligible body, such as a charity. We will continue to review the situation.
Stephen Doughty
Like many other Members, I met this morning with ExcludedUK and people such as freelancers, many of whom are in the creative industries, who have fallen between the gaps of the different Government schemes. The package that has been announced for the creative industries is welcome, but what will the Government do to support the many thousands of people in those industries, including in Cardiff South and Penarth, who have fallen between the gaps?
Kemi Badenoch
The UK continues to have one of the world’s most generous coronavirus support schemes, including for many self-employed people such as those to whom the hon. Gentleman refers. He will know that the Government recently announced a £1.57 billion cultural fund, and such funds are being targeted at the very people he mentions.
Jonathan Gullis (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Con)
The Chief Secretary to the Treasury (Steve Barclay)
I regularly meet the Secretary of State for Education to discuss school funding. We are providing a £1 billion package to help students catch up on lost learning, and that sits alongside the £100 million to boost remote education and the additional £7.1 billion of core funding for schools that we announced at the 2019 spending round.
Jonathan Gullis
I know that my right hon. Friend enjoyed his time in Stoke-on-Trent during winter last year, but he will also know that, sadly, the area of Stoke-on-Trent, Kidsgrove and Talke is ranked in the bottom 20% of the social mobility index. Sadly, we are also well below the national averages in both young and old taking up courses at levels 3 and 4. Will he set out the steps that the Department is taking to support further education? Does he agree that post-16 providers, such as Stoke-on-Trent Sixth Form College, play a vital role in levelling up opportunity and upskilling and retraining both young and old, enabling them to be better off than those before them?
Steve Barclay
As a former teacher, my hon. Friend speaks with great authority on such issues. I absolutely agree that a strong post-16 education system is vital to our recovery. That is why we have applied a range of flexibilities to the usual funding arrangements, and the Department for Education has set out further details.
Jane Stevenson (Wolverhampton North East) (Con)
The Economic Secretary to the Treasury (John Glen)
On 20 May, the Government launched the future fund. The fund is an investment scheme for high-growth companies impacted by the pandemic. It provides between £125,000 and £5 million in Government funding through convertible loans, with third-party investors at least matching the Government funding on each loan. As of 5 July, £379 million-worth of convertible loans had been approved through the future fund, and the Government have also made £750 million of support available for innovative firms through Innovate UK grants and loans.
Jane Stevenson
Unemployment in Wolverhampton North East was three times the national average as we came into the pandemic, and many businesses have expressed their gratitude for the wide range of support. As we emerge from the pandemic, can my hon. Friend reassure me that this will be the party that champions innovators, start-ups and SMEs, so that we can get job opportunities and more prosperity in seats such as Wolverhampton North East?
John Glen
My hon. Friend makes a very good point and case for her constituency. As the Prime Minister set out last week, we will double down on levelling up and give everyone growing up in this country the opportunity that they need. The Prime Minister announced the acceleration of £96 million of investment from the towns fund, including nearly £13 million on kick-start activity in the west midlands.
Mr Speaker
Order. May I just say that the Members not reached are pretty upset at others taking too long? They were desperate to get in, but there we are. I am sorry about that.
Henry Smith (Crawley) (Con)
The Chancellor of the Exchequer (Rishi Sunak)
Four months on from the onset of coronavirus, we have slowly and carefully reopened much of our economy, and we can now begin our national recovery. Throughout this crisis, I have repeatedly made it clear that, while we cannot protect every single job, we will do all we can to make sure our businesses and people have the tools they need to get through this and emerge stronger on the other side.
Henry Smith [V]
To help the aviation and travel sectors recover from the negative impact of covid-19, will my right hon. Friend consider suspending air passenger duty until at least the end of summer 2021?
Rishi Sunak
My hon. Friend, as always, is a champion for the industry, and he knows how important it is to the UK economy. I can tell him that, at the Budget, we committed to a consultation on aviation tax reform. We remain committed to that, and will bring forward the timing in due course.
Anneliese Dodds (Oxford East) (Lab/Co-op)
The Chancellor stated earlier that the job retention scheme is being wound down from the autumn. It is actually being wound down from the start of next month across all sectors at the same time, and we are already seeing the impact of that in very substantial redundancies. The Resolution Foundation called this week for a targeted continuation of the scheme for the hardest hit industries and those areas affected by additional lockdowns. The Chancellor has said he does not want to pick winners, but this health crisis has involved Governments designating losers, quite rightly, for public health reasons, so why is he persisting with the one-size-fits-all removal of the job retention scheme, when this will inevitably lead to additional redundancies?
Rishi Sunak
This is not about picking winners or losers. This is about protecting people’s health, and where it is incumbent on the Government to step in and make sure that we can protect people’s health through targeted intervention, that will remain the right thing to do. With regard to economic support, my right hon. Friend the Health Secretary has made it clear that support has been provided to the local council when this has been the place to do so. With regard to the furlough scheme, we are of the belief, rightly, that this is a universal scheme, it is generous, it has been extended to October and it is winding down in a gradual and temperate manner.
Anneliese Dodds
I have to say that it is disappointing to hear that the Chancellor is not budging from this position. As mentioned, it is already leading to additional waves of redundancies—avoidable redundancies in many cases. Labour has repeatedly called on the Government to match the ambitions of Labour’s previous future jobs fund in developing support for unemployed young people, so may I ask the Chancellor why, put together, the traineeship fund and green jobs challenge fund—just announced—amount to less than a quarter of the size of the future jobs fund? That hardly reflects a focus on jobs, jobs, jobs.
Rishi Sunak
I am not quite sure that is right. In reality, the future jobs fund was around £1 billion. We announced yesterday the £2 billion green home grant to provide home efficiency upgrades for hundreds of thousands of homes and create tens of thousands of jobs up and down the country. Not only will households save money on their electricity bills and save carbon, but we will create good local jobs in the process.
Laura Farris (Newbury) (Con)
Rishi Sunak
My hon. Friend is absolutely right: young people are more likely than not to work in affected sectors and more likely than others to be furloughed, and we know from all the evidence that the impact of scarring on young people is very significant, which is why they remain uppermost in my mind. I give my hon. Friend the reassurance that they will be prioritised as we think about our recovery and our labour-market interventions.
Margaret Ferrier (Rutherglen and Hamilton West) (SNP) [V]
The Financial Secretary to the Treasury (Jesse Norman)
As the hon. Lady will know, the Treasury is in constant communication with the FCA on these and other issues. If she would like to bring the specific details to my attention, I will make sure that they are examined by Ministers.
Douglas Ross (Moray) (Con)
Jesse Norman
I am sure my hon. Friend understands that the desire for bespoke deals across every sector is extremely great. Our view has been that what is required is to lift all boats by a general support for the economy, and that is the approach we have taken, which is why the interventions we have made so far include almost £300 billion of guarantees—worth roughly 15% of UK gross domestic product.
Tim Farron (Westmorland and Lonsdale) (LD)
Jesse Norman
As the hon. Gentleman will be aware, an enormous amount of support is already in the system. I am delighted that shops and other organisations are opening up in his constituency; we look to see more of that over time as the support feeds through into the system.
Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con) [V]
Jesse Norman
No one who knows my beautiful right hon. Friend would be surprised that he knows these beauty salons as well as he does, and I salute him for it. On the serious point, he is absolutely right about the importance of these businesses to all our constituencies. He did not mention this, but we should also mention that many of these businesses are run and staffed by women, and it is important that we should pay attention to the equalities impact in that respect. The key thing is that we get these businesses, including beauty salons, open. That is what the Treasury has focused on.
Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)
Rishi Sunak
I am glad that the announcement we made yesterday was warmly welcomed across the cultural sector, by institutions large and small. I can assure the hon. Lady that the support package is not just for large institutions; it will find its way to all our local cultural institutions that play such an important part in our local communities. The Culture Secretary and his team will be here just after Question Time to answer further questions.
Chris Grayling (Epsom and Ewell) (Con)
Rishi Sunak
I wholeheartedly agree with my right hon. Friend that we should put reaching our net zero commitments at the heart of our recovery. He will have heard our recent announcement about green homes grants, which shows our commitment in this area. I know that he has a lot of experience in hydrogen transportation, and I look forward to hearing his thoughts on that so that they can be incorporated into our future plan.
Karin Smyth (Bristol South) (Lab)
Rishi Sunak
I agree with the hon. Member about the importance of post-16 education and further education, which is why I was delighted to announce at the Budget a £400 million increase in post-16 education funding, a record increase in per-pupil funding compared to the last several years, and indeed the Prime Minister has talked about our commitment to upgrading the entire FE college estate across the United Kingdom.
Dr Kieran Mullan (Crewe and Nantwich) (Con)
Rishi Sunak
I know that my hon. Friend is a proud champion of his local theatre, the Lyceum in Crewe, and that he has warmly welcomed our announcement. The Culture Secretary and his team will be here just after Question Time. We share his ambition to ensure that the support reaches all relevant institutions as quickly as is prudently possible.
Kate Osamor (Edmonton) (Lab/Co-op) [V]
Jesse Norman
I entirely agree with the hon. Lady about the importance of credit unions. I am a member of Money Box Credit Union in Hereford and can vouch for their importance, especially for people on low incomes. She makes a very valid point, and it is one that we will continue to consider as we move forward.
Lee Anderson (Ashfield) (Con)
The Chief Secretary to the Treasury (Steve Barclay)
As the Prime Minister said last week, we are doubling down on levelling up, and he committed last week to £95 million for shovel-ready projects in the east midlands, in addition to the £10.25 million of accelerated funding from the towns fund for Kirkby-in-Ashfield. I look forward to working with my hon. Friend in his commitment to levelling up his constituency.
Emma Hardy (Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle) (Lab)
Rishi Sunak
These young people have absolutely not been forgotten, and we remain indebted to them for their dynamism in helping to power our recovery. I am delighted that our start-up loans scheme has recently been expanded and is able to provide cash loans to those budding entrepreneurs in her constituency and others. I urge them to have a look at it to see whether it will help fund their plans.
Mr Speaker
In order to allow the safe exit of hon. Members participating in this item of business and the safe arrival of those participating in the next, I am suspending the House for five minutes.
Petition
Rachel Hopkins (Luton South) (Lab)
I speak on behalf of my constituents in Luton South and those of my hon. Friend the Member for Luton North (Sarah Owen). The petition, on the impact of covid-19 on Luton Council, states:
The Petition of residents of Luton,
Declares that the COVID-19 crisis has radically impacted upon the operation of London Luton Airport, resulting in a significant drop in commercial income, which in turn has impacted upon Luton Borough Council’s provision of vital services; notes that in 2018-19 London Luton Airport Ltd paid £20.2 million in dividends to Luton Borough Council to support its funding of vital services; further notes that Luton is facing a £49 million impact on its 2020-21 budget due to the reduction in revenue from its airport, a drop in council tax and business rates, and other costs due to the crisis; further notes that Luton Borough Council has been forced to produce an emergency budget to find savings of £22 million this financial year; and further notes that a related Change.org petition calling for additional funding to Luton for essential services has over ten thousand signatures.
The petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons urge the Government to review the level of support provided to Luton Borough Council to ensure there is no reduction in vital services.
And the petitioners remain, etc.
[P002586]
Speaker’s Statement
Mr Speaker
I have a short statement to make about the conduct of Divisions. I believe that all Members are now familiar with the process, and the Chair will not give a reminder of it before each Division. The doors will generally be locked 12 minutes after the start of a Division, although the Chair retains the discretion to extend that period if need be.
Coronavirus
(4 years, 5 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Urgent Questions are proposed each morning by backbench MPs, and up to two may be selected each day by the Speaker. Chosen Urgent Questions are announced 30 minutes before Parliament sits each day.
Each Urgent Question requires a Government Minister to give a response on the debate topic.
This information is provided by Parallel Parliament and does not comprise part of the offical record
Jonathan Ashworth (Leicester South) (Lab/Co-op)
(Urgent Question): To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if he will make a statement on coronavirus.
The Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Matt Hancock)
We are bringing coronavirus under control. Yesterday’s figures showed 352 new cases, the lowest since lockdown began. That is down from over 5,000 a day at the peak. Two hundred and nine patients are currently in mechanical ventilator beds with coronavirus, down from 3,300 at the peak. The latest number of deaths recorded in all settings in the UK was 16. New figures this morning show that for the last two weeks, the number of people who have died from all causes has been lower than the normal average for this time of year.
Because we are bringing the virus under control, we have been able to restore some of the things that make life worth living. This weekend, restaurants, pubs and hairdressers were buzzing with activity for the first time in months, and yesterday we were able to ease restrictions for the 2.2 million people who have been shielding across England so that they can now spend more time outdoors in a group of up to six, of course while maintaining social distancing.
Our plan has always been to lift the national lockdown while taking ever more targeted action to suppress the virus. We are seeing a similar approach in other countries, such as Germany, Spain and Australia, where overnight they locked down Melbourne. Last week, we took difficult but vital decisions about Leicester. Since then, we have been working with Leicester and Leicestershire, and I am pleased to say that together, we have brought down the seven-day infection rate from 135 to 117 cases per 100,000 people.
In reopening hospitality, we have also introduced contact tracing for customers. This system is working. I want to thank all those who are making the system work, and to pay tribute in particular to three pubs that have taken specific action: the Lighthouse in Burnham-on-Sea, the Fox and Hounds in Batley, and the Village Home in Gosport. They have all closed for a deep clean and staff testing after, in each case, a customer tested positive. They are doing the right thing by their customers and their communities. This is NHS Test and Trace working precisely as intended. Three pubs shut so that others can be open, and I think the whole House is grateful.
Coronavirus has been the worst global pandemic in a generation. Here, we protected the NHS. We built the new Nightingale hospitals in 10 days. At all times, treatment was available for all. Our medical research has discovered the only drug known to work. We have built, almost from scratch, one of the biggest testing capabilities in the world. We are getting coronavirus cornered, but this is no time to lose our resolve. The virus exists only to spread, so we must all stay alert and enjoy summer safely.
Jonathan Ashworth
I am grateful to the Secretary of State for that answer. He is quite right: we are through the peak, but we must not be remotely complacent, as thousands could still die from this virus over the coming months and into next year.
I welcome the news about Leicester, and I am grateful for the way in which the Secretary of State and his officials have kept me updated. What is the exit strategy for Leicester? How does an area that has gone into a local lockdown escape it? I understand that in Germany, local lockdowns are lifted at around 50 cases per 100,000. Will he apply similar criteria here in the United Kingdom? I think people in Leicester, and potentially in other towns and cities that could go into lockdown, would welcome that clarity.
Of course, the pillar 2 data has been an issue of some contention. Much of it has now been delivered, but there are still complaints that the way in which the data set has been delivered is incomplete. Directors of public health need pillar 2 community data in real time on a daily basis. They need the total number of tests undertaken, as well as those that are just positive, and they need patient-identifiable data so they can put in place the extensive contact tracing needed to keep all our constituents safe.
In Leicester, there has been speculation that the textile trade or food manufacturing has been responsible for the outbreak—we still do not actually know why we had the outbreak in Leicester—but many of the places where there have been outbreaks, whether Kirklees or elsewhere, have usually been characterised by low pay, insecure work and lack of decent sick pay. Will the Secretary of State look again at sick pay entitlement, because people will not isolate unless they are given that financial security?
The Secretary of State said on “The Andrew Marr Show” on Sunday that asymptomatic transmission is a problem. We agree. Could he explain why he is not routinely testing healthcare workers? The position now in this country is that premiership footballers are tested twice a week, but NHS staff are not routinely tested.
Finally, on care homes, the initial guidance from the Government downplayed the risk to care homes. Care providers were sent conflicting guidance throughout the outbreak. Staff could not access testing until mid-April and are still not tested routinely. Personal protective equipment supplies have been inadequate. Thousands of families have lost their loved ones in care homes to this disease. Care workers themselves have died on the frontline. Can the Health Secretary understand why people are so insulted by the Prime Minister’s remarks, when he said:
“too many care homes didn’t really follow the procedures.”?
Can he appreciate the hurt that has led to care home providers today describing those comments as “clumsy and cowardly”? Can he tell us which care homes did not follow procedures and what those procedures were that were apparently not followed? Will he take this opportunity now to apologise for the Prime Minister’s crass remarks?
Matt Hancock
First, the hon. Gentleman rightly asks about the process needed to bring Leicester out of lockdown and back to the level of freedom enjoyed in the rest of the country. What we said, when we took the measures just over a week ago, is that we needed to see 14 days of data, so we propose to make announcements on the next steps on 18 July. Of course, if further measures are needed in the meantime to tighten up we would take them immediately, but, as I said in my statement, the good news is that the data are currently moving in the right direction.
The hon. Gentleman asks specifically about a figure for the point at which such a local lockdown might be lifted. We are not going to use or give a specific figure, because both the level and the rate of change matters. If the level were lower but going up, that could be a worse situation than a higher level that is under control and falling. We have to look at both the level and the rate of change.
I am glad that the hon. Gentleman said that data are being delivered. He mentioned some more detailed data and I am very happy to look into those proposals.
The hon. Gentleman mentions asymptomatic testing and the asymptomatic testing of NHS staff. As this House debated 10 days ago now, we have worked with clinicians to come forward with a scheme that is supported by those clinicians for the regular testing of NHS staff. That scheme is now agreed and in place. Of course, we constantly monitor it and we monitor the number of cases among NHS staff. I am content with that scheme, which was set out almost two weeks ago.
The hon. Gentleman also asks about care homes. Throughout the crisis, care homes have done amazing work. The Prime Minister was explaining that because asymptomatic transmission was not known about, the correct procedures were therefore not known. We have been constantly learning about the virus from the start and improving procedures all the way through. I pay tribute to the care homes of this country, which have done so much to care for the most vulnerable throughout the crisis.
Jeremy Hunt (South West Surrey) (Con)
Last week, the Regius Chair of Medicine at Oxford University, Professor Sir John Bell, told the Science and Technology Committee that saturation testing of NHS hospital staff was an absolute requirement, and should have happened from the get-go. Last week, the Secretary of State delighted the social care sector by announcing that care home staff would be tested weekly. Now is his chance to delight not just Sir John Bell, but 1.4 million people in the NHS, by saying that from the start of next month, they too can have weekly testing. Will he do that?
Matt Hancock
As I mentioned, we have put in place the procedures for regular testing of NHS staff, and those procedures are underlined by the clinical analysis. There is a difference between social care and NHS staff, not least because the impact of coronavirus, in terms of its prevalence, has been higher among social care staff in care homes. We must ensure that such decisions are clinically led, but of course I keep the issue under review and take the comments from the Chair of the Health and Social Care Committee very seriously.
Dr Philippa Whitford (Central Ayrshire) (SNP) [V]
I welcome the fact that the UK Government website has now been corrected to add the 80,000 missing covid cases in England, and gives a more accurate picture of the epidemic. Compared with Scotland, England currently has six times the number of new cases per head of population, and nine times the deaths. Even without a second wave, it is estimated that the current level of covid infections would lead to 27,000 additional deaths by next spring. Does the Secretary of State consider that level acceptable? Scotland, Northern Ireland, and the Republic of Ireland are following covid elimination strategies to drive down circulating virus, and reduce the risk of repeated lockdowns. Will the Secretary of State explain what his strategy is going forward?
Matt Hancock
Yes. Our strategy is to drive the virus right down, and as I said in my opening statement, the latest figures show just 352 new cases recorded in the previous 24 hours. We have been working closely with the Scottish Government, and giving them as much support as we can, for instance to get testing up and running. I am glad that right across the UK, we are succeeding in ensuring that the virus is increasingly under control.
Dr Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)
Will my right hon. Friend give any encouragement that beauty salons will be allowed to open in the reasonably near future? Does he share my concern and disappointment that even though campsites are allowed to reopen, the company in charge of those in the New Forest is threatening to keep them closed until spring next year?
Matt Hancock
My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy is working closely with the beauty industry regarding how it can open in a covid-secure way, taking into account clinical advice. We have, however, been able to change some advice to allow for the reopening of camp sites. I am very pleased about that, and it will help lots of families to enjoy summer safely. It is disappointing to hear of the blanket approach taken to not having any camping in the New Forest—I went camping there as a child, and enjoyed it very much. On a campsite people must be particularly careful of shared facilities, and ensure that they are cleaned properly, but there is a way to open campsites safely and securely, and doing that in the New Forest, and elsewhere, will help people to enjoy summer safely.
Debbie Abrahams (Oldham East and Saddleworth) (Lab) [V]
The Secretary of State’s comments on Sunday, when he suggested that my Greater Manchester public health colleagues needed help in interpreting the pillar 2 data that they received from centrally contracted private labs, was nothing short of insulting. These are some of the most talented, dedicated and professional people with whom I have had the privilege to work. They do not need help; they need timely, patient-identifiable, and complete data, which they have not been getting. Instead of trying to shift the blame for the Government’s mess in handling the covid crisis on to our amazing public health teams and care home staff, what is the Secretary of State doing to ensure that people get those data? Why will he not announce local thresholds for easing and reinstating lockdowns, as Germany and other countries have done? Finally, will he apologise for his patronising remarks to my public health colleagues?
Matt Hancock
I will not allow a divisive approach to tackling this crisis. We will all work together. We will work together with local authorities, local Mayors and local areas, and we will do that in Manchester and across the board. I just hope that the hon. Lady will take the message back to Manchester about how keen we are to work collegiately and together. That is the right way forward.
I have already answered the question on thresholds for changes to local lockdowns. We have to apply judgment. Again, we do this in consultation with and working hand in glove with the local area. On the point about data, the hon. Lady might want to have a word with her friend, the shadow Secretary of State, because he was right to acknowledge that the sharing of this sort of data, which is a complicated task, is constantly improving.
Nigel Mills (Amber Valley) (Con) [V]
Is there more that we can do to help dental practices that are struggling with the need to see fewer patients and with increased costs to provide all the PPE? Many local dental practices are telling me that they will struggle to survive until they get back to normal volumes if they cannot get some help with the increased costs.
Matt Hancock
My hon. Friend raises a really important point. PPE is a significant extra cost right across the health and care system. Dentists who are on NHS contracts have of course had those contracts paid throughout, even when routine dentistry was not open. I am really glad that we have now managed to get routine dentistry open. We are working with dentists and their representatives to ensure that we tackle the real-world challenge of having high-quality and safe dentistry while ensuring that dental practices can also be financially sustainable. It is a challenging problem and I pay tribute to the dentists who are working with us on it.
Ms Angela Eagle (Wallasey) (Lab)
Does the Health Secretary agree with the Prime Minister’s despicable comments, blaming care workers for the huge death toll in care homes, or will he admit that his Government’s own failings left these low-paid and undervalued carers with little or no protective clothing, and many without access to sick pay, fighting a losing battle against this awful disease at the height of the pandemic?
Matt Hancock
I have been clear that we have been learning about this virus and how best to deal with it throughout. My admiration for those who work in social care is second to none. One of the good things about this crisis is that it has shown the whole country how much we value not just those who work in the NHS, but those who work right across social care, caring for the most vulnerable.
Miss Sarah Dines (Derbyshire Dales) (Con)
Cancer takes the lives of loved ones far too early, including that of my father. The pandemic has made it very difficult for people to access the necessary treatment. Can my right hon. Friend reassure me that everything will be done that can be done to ensure that those who need treatment get it soon?
Matt Hancock
Yes. That is an incredibly important point. When people talk about the lives that have sadly been lost to coronavirus and how many might be in the future, we also have to take into account the health impact of non-coronavirus diseases such as cancer whose treatments are affected by the actions that we have had to take. My heart goes out to all those who have not been able to get cancer treatment because it would not have been appropriate clinically to do so when there was a virus about. We are now putting an enormous amount of effort into getting cancer treatment services up and running. Perhaps the most important message—and the biggest barrier to more early diagnosis—is that people must come forward if they suspect that they have a cancerous lump. If they find a lump, they must call a GP, and if they are asked to go to hospital, they must; it will be safe to do so. It is really important that people help us to help them.
Drew Hendry (Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey) (SNP) [V]
Clearly, it is vital to have health services fully prepared for the possibility of a second wave of coronavirus while reopening normal health services. With that in mind, I have a simple question for the Secretary of State: what estimate has he made of the additional funding required for the NHS between now and the end of 2020?
Matt Hancock
We are constantly putting more money into the NHS and have put in an extra £30 billion over the crisis thus far.
John Redwood (Wokingham) (Con)
Could the Secretary of State remind us how big an increase in intensive care capacity there has been for the health service? That increase is a great achievement. Were the unthinkable to happen and there was another surge in the virus, could we have isolation hospitals that dealt with that so that the rest of the hospitals and surgeries could carry on with their other work?
Matt Hancock
Yes. We have doubled the intensive care capacity, which, alongside the Nightingale, has been a remarkable achievement of the NHS. There are now green and blue areas in hospitals, or whole hospitals, depending on the geography—in a rural area, we could not make a whole hospital covid-secure or covid-free, because it would have to serve both covid and non-covid patients. That separation of the NHS into blue and green areas is an important part of their being able to reduce the impact of infection control procedures, which are obviously having a big impact on the provision of services.
Mr Speaker
Chorley A&E may be able to help you with that, Secretary of State.
Steve McCabe (Birmingham, Selly Oak) (Lab)
What is the current level of funding for research projects into the long-term effects of covid-19 funded from the National Institute for Health Research, in which I think the Government claim to put £1 billion?
Matt Hancock
This is a really important point. The hon. Gentleman will have heard at the weekend that the NHS has opened a long-term covid impact service. That is on the health side. On the research side, we have so far put £8.4 million into a research call, but of course we will be happy to expand that if we get research projects that are worthwhile.
Dr Liam Fox (North Somerset) (Con)
What advice and guidance has been developed for shielded adults who have children of school age? It is a question not simply of the transmission risk between children but of the unavoidable contact with other adults. I am sure my right hon. Friend will understand that the earlier such advice is developed and disseminated, the less unnecessary anxiety there will be for these parents during the school holidays.
Matt Hancock
I will write to my right hon. Friend with that advice. Of course, thankfully, as the virus has been brought under control, so the restrictions on those who are shielding can be lifted, so I am glad to say that this is a lessening problem, but certainly ahead of September, in particular, and the full return of schools, we will have to make sure the advice is very clear, and we will do that.
Munira Wilson (Twickenham) (LD)
Day respite care centres, such as Homelink in my constituency, provide much-needed support for people with dementia, learning difficulties and other complex needs and are a lifeline for unpaid carers. Homelink and others are desperate to open as quickly as possible and are working on covid-secure guidelines, but they cannot get free access to testing for staff and their users. Will the Secretary of State please consider making testing for respite carer centres available on the same basis as for care homes?
Matt Hancock
Yes, we have a project under way on this. It is something that the Chair of the Science and Technology Committee has been working on for weeks as well. Again, I will write to the hon. Member with the full details of the plan to make this happen.
Dr Luke Evans (Bosworth) (Con) [V]
May I take this chance to thank the people of Leicester and Leicestershire, the police and public health services for dealing with the local lockdown that has been implemented? When it comes to a local lockdown being announced, the people of Hinckley and Bosworth need two vital pieces of information: what the measures are, and where the boundary is. The Government were quick to put up on their website what those measures were, and they rightly allowed Public Health England and the councils to draw the boundary. What lessons has the Health Secretary learned from the Leicester lockdown, including about passing on information quickly, to be used in future lockdowns , which may well happen in the rest of the country?
Matt Hancock
My hon. Friend is right to praise the work that has been done by Leicestershire County Council, as well as by the city council, with which we are working hand in glove. We are looking at the way that the lockdown was brought in at pace in Leicester, to ensure that, should we need to do that again, it is a yet more effective process. One of the lessons is that the boundary for the action is a critical piece of information. We managed to publish that overnight, within about 12 hours of the decision being publicised. I pay tribute to the county council, which led on that decision. Ensuring that we have both the actions and the boundary ready as soon as possible is critical, because, naturally, local people immediately want to know whether they are in the lockdown area.
Mr Clive Betts (Sheffield South East) (Lab) [V]
I do not know whether the Secretary of State saw today the comments by the president of the Royal Society about the benefits of wearing face masks in indoor public settings, drawing attention to the fact that the prevalence of wearing face masks is much lower in the UK than it is in Spain or Italy. I therefore want to ask him to look at two things. First, will he look at a scheme for issuing a pass or badge to those who have an exemption from wearing a face mask on public transport, so that those who are not exempt can be required to wear them? Secondly, will he look again at the lack of any advice about wearing face masks in supermarkets and other shops? Surely it is just as easy to catch the virus in a supermarket queue as it is on a bus.
Mrs Heather Wheeler (South Derbyshire) (Con) [V]
I congratulate my right hon. Friend on answering this urgent question with the usual aplomb, and I also congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire Dales (Miss Dines) on asking about cancer treatment, which is very important up here in Derbyshire. Is there any news about reopening swimming pools? We have fantastic swimming clubs in South Derbyshire that want their kids to get back to swimming. Although I am grateful for all the pubs that are open, some families prefer to go to bowling alleys. Does he have any news on when they will be able to open?
Matt Hancock
I would love to get swimming pools open as soon as safely possible. As my hon. Friend knows, the emphasis has to be on safety. Alongside gyms, we are working with swimming pools. Of course, there is also some beautiful open water swimming in Derbyshire. Swimming in all its forms—in the sea, in open water and in swimming pools—is very good for your health, and we should try to get it all open as soon as we possibly can, but the nature of swimming and changing rooms means that there are risks, and we have to ensure that those risks are properly taken into account.
Jessica Morden (Newport East) (Lab) [V]
Given the Secretary of State’s earlier comments, will the Government back the campaign by Macmillan Cancer Support and commit to urgently publishing a national cancer recovery plan, to ensure that cancer does not become the forgotten “C” in this pandemic? Will he meet Macmillan to discuss that?
Matt Hancock
I would be very happy to meet Macmillan. The Under-Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, my hon. Friend the Member for Bury St Edmunds (Jo Churchill), who is the Minister responsible for cancer, has been working on exactly this subject, but I would of course be happy to meet Macmillan and other cancer charities, because this is such an important thing to get right.
Emma Hardy (Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle) (Lab)
The Secretary of State will have received the letter I sent him as chair of the all-party parliamentary group on vascular and venous disease, highlighting the suffering that vascular patients are facing because of delayed treatment caused by covid-19. As I have said before, time is tissue—the longer the delay in treatment, the more likely it is that these patients will need an amputation. What are the Government’s plans for addressing this backlog?
Matt Hancock
The hon. Lady is quite right to raise this issue. She has raised it before and we have been working on it. In the first instance, the best way to tackle this backlog is to get treatments open as much as possible and to get the number of treatments back up to par—to where they were before the crisis—and then we will have to work on any backlog. In some areas, there are bigger backlogs than in others. The NHS did a remarkable job during the crisis. We protected the NHS during the crisis, but it has a huge amount of work to do—and we will support it to do that work—because of the inevitable and necessary consequences as part of the response to covid.
Alexander Stafford (Rother Valley) (Con)
Last week, it was revealed that Rotherham had one of the highest rates of infection in the entire country. What reassurances can my right hon. Friend give to the people of Rother Valley that it is safe to go out, it is safe to patronise our businesses, and we are getting control of this virus?
Matt Hancock
It is true that Rotherham has a higher proportion of positive cases than the country as a whole. Nevertheless, that rate is much lower than it was in Leicester, and we are working with the council to ensure that the necessary action is taken. Everybody in the Rother Valley should take comfort from the fact that, nationally, the virus is under control. In rural parts of Yorkshire, the rate is not that much higher than anywhere else. People should go out and enjoy summer safely; the emphasis should be on both “enjoy” and “safely”.
Charlotte Nichols (Warrington North) (Lab)
At the end of March, the Department of Health and Social Care announced that Clipper Logistics would be contracted to provide a portal for community healthcare partners such as local authorities and social care providers to order PPE for their staff. Can the Secretary of State confirm what the value of the contract awarded to Clipper was and how many items of PPE it has delivered?
Matt Hancock
I do not have those figures to hand, but the delivery of PPE through this portal has been a very important part of the response in some parts of the country. I am very glad that, thanks to the incredible hard work of thousands of people in the public and private sectors, we have managed to deliver 2 billion items of PPE and that the very sharp spike in demand for PPE has now been met with a very sharp increase in supply.
Andrew Percy (Brigg and Goole) (Con)
May I thank care home workers in my constituency? I have been called out to patients in care homes a number of times over this period in my role in the ambulance service and seen staff in full PPE locked down and without the support that they normally get from families. I want to thank them for that and say that I am absolutely full of admiration for them. On the issue of nurses, for my trust to catch up it will require a large number of overseas nurses as well as to train new ones. Part two of the Nursing and Midwifery Council qualifications have to be completed within three months, but some of the test centres are not open yet, so can we look into extending that period, or see whether we can get these test centres open and the backlog cleared?
Matt Hancock
Yes. The whole House should pay tribute to my hon. Friend for his work as a first responder during this crisis. He has first-hand experience of the matters of which he speaks. The particular issue that he has raised is not one that has been previously drawn to my attention, but we are doing everything that we can to hire nurses and we are seeing the results of that: over 12,000 more nurses than this time last year in the NHS. We are well on our way to the 50,000 more nurses over this Parliament, on which everybody on the Conservative Benches was elected. I will look into the particular issues he raises and try to solve the problem.
Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP) [V]
Last week’s “Panorama” had a public health expert from Germany saying that, if we only look for people with symptoms, we get not the whole iceberg, but just the tip of it. The Faroe Islands, which have the highest testing in the world per population—between a fifth and a third of the population—found, as far back as March, that 80% to 85% of covid-19 carriers were asymptomatic. What strategy does the Secretary of State have to find those people who are asymptomatic, because we either test and search out the whole iceberg or we keep using the blunt instrument of lockdowns?
Matt Hancock
The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right that around 70% to 80% of positive cases in surveys are of people who are asymptomatic. It is one of the most difficult things about this virus. Hence we have built one of the largest testing capabilities in the world. It is significantly bigger than all the other major countries, bar a small number. We are using that testing capability for asymptomatic testing as well as for symptomatic testing across the NHS and social care. We are supporting Scotland as much as we possibly can in its testing effort, too.
Stella Creasy (Walthamstow) (Lab/Co-op) [V]
The Secretary of State has set out how important data is to his strategy. Can he therefore explain why his Government have a contract with Deloitte to cover the testing for covid-19 which does not require Deloitte to report positive cases of covid-19 to Public Health England or to local authorities?
Matt Hancock
Because the contract is with the Department, and the reporting comes through the Department.
Mr Robert Goodwill (Scarborough and Whitby) (Con)
Does the Secretary of State share my admiration of careworkers on the Yorkshire coast, including those in a care home in my constituency where an outbreak among admin staff in the office was contained and not spread to forward-facing staff or residents? Will he also undertake to support local authorities such as North Yorkshire County Council, which in the past fortnight has had to close two care homes in Scarborough run by the same company, where evidence from the Care Quality Commission showed that the level of care was unacceptable and potentially dangerous?
Matt Hancock
Yes. My right hon. Friend raises an incredibly important point. I pay tribute to those care homes, in Scarborough and across the country, that have done the right thing and are tackling outbreaks when they find them, including some that go to extraordinary lengths to protect their residents, not least because we know that care home residents are among some of the most vulnerable to coronavirus. But at the same time, we must ensure that the level of care remains high, and the CQC does have an incredibly important role in that.
Patrick Grady (Glasgow North) (SNP)
Professor Michael Baker, who formulated New Zealand’s world-leading elimination strategy, has told the UK:
“You have all the tools you need to pursue containment and elimination if you choose to. The alternative is going in and out of lockdown for months, if not years.”
Does the Secretary of State agree with that, and will he therefore confirm whether the UK Government’s strategy for covid-19 is going to be centred on elimination rather than suppression?
Matt Hancock
We are absolutely bringing the case rate right down, and the fact that across the UK as a whole there were only 352 positive cases in the last 24 hour period, which is the lowest since before lockdown, demonstrates that that action is happening. It is because of this action that we have been able to allow people more freedom to enjoy the things they enjoy, and I am glad to say that that strategy has been followed by all four Governments in the UK. There may be differences in detail and differences of a few days in a few bits of the timing, but essentially this has been a UK-wide strategy, followed both by the Labour Welsh Government and by the SNP Government in Scotland.
Dehenna Davison (Bishop Auckland) (Con)
Like so many across our country, I was delighted to visit the pub for the first time over the weekend. I had my first pint in a socially distanced fashion at the Durham Ox in Coundon. I was really impressed by the work that Susan and Phil had done to enforce social distancing and by the ingenious measures they had put in place, including diligently collecting the contact information of the people who entered. So on that note, will my right hon. Friend outline how the covid-secure guidance from the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy is helping to support the vital NHS test, track and trace efforts?
Matt Hancock
That is true. The actions we have put in place mean that we can open hospitality such as pubs, and doing that safely means that we have been able to open more hospitality than we would otherwise have done. I, too, went for a haircut and a pint on Saturday morning—[Laughter.] The haircut was on Saturday morning; the pint was early in the afternoon. I am glad to say that my name and phone number were taken when I turned up at the pub. I have not been back to Suffolk since February. That is one of the things I have missed most about this whole crisis. I am going on Friday and I will go to the pub there. No doubt they too will take my number.
James Sunderland (Bracknell) (Con)
We have heard much in recent weeks about the risks of a second wave. Will the Minister please outline the current science on that and outline when we might be most at risk?
Matt Hancock
The policies we have put in place with the local action are precisely targeted to reduce the risk of a second wave nationally. Nevertheless, as we turn to winter and the weather gets colder, there are signs of some seasonality in this virus, meaning that we will have to be much more careful, both because of the potential impact on how easily the virus transmits and because of changes in behaviour—we know that outdoors is safer and it is just harder to be outdoors in winter. So we must remain vigilant as a country.
Stephanie Peacock (Barnsley East) (Lab)
When the impact of covid-19 on the beauty industry was raised in the Chamber last week, the Prime Minister laughed, despite the fact that it contributes £30 billion to the economy and accounts for one in 60 jobs. Further to the question by the right hon. Member for New Forest East (Dr Lewis), what engagement have the Government had with the sector? Given that hairdressers and pubs are now open, when can beauty salons expect to open too?
Matt Hancock
The decisions that we have taken are based on clinical advice on the risk, because we know that being face to face, when in close contact, is more high-risk than not being face to face. That has been the basis on which the decisions have been taken. Of course I understand the impact on the beauty industry. As I said, my right hon. Friend the Business Secretary is leading on this issue and we will make progress when we safely can.
Brendan Clarke-Smith (Bassetlaw) (Con)
Last week, I visited St Giles School in Retford, where people very kindly gave me one of their excellent cloth face coverings to wear when travelling to Parliament. Will my right hon. Friend join me in reiterating that while cloth face coverings can help to reduce the risk of transmission in some circumstances, face masks worn as part of PPE for healthcare and other workers should be reserved for those who need it?
Matt Hancock
The use of face coverings that are not formal face masks is valuable, especially in some circumstances, and therefore it is mandated on public transport and has long been recommended in some shops. The use of masks, especially the high-end masks, should be reserved for those who need them in clinical settings. However, I am glad to say that the supply of PPE is now much, much more secure than it was a couple of months ago, which means that face masks are more readily and widely available and are increasingly used in non-clinical settings. The low-end surgical masks are the ones that would typically be used in a non-clinical setting. Nevertheless, face coverings are an incredibly important part of our armoury.
Caroline Nokes (Romsey and Southampton North) (Con)
People working in aesthetics—the professionals who tattoo on eyebrows for alopecia sufferers or tattoo on the nipples of cancer patients who have had reconstructive surgery—have been horrified to discover that they are categorised alongside strip clubs. Will my right hon. Friend please look at this issue urgently to understand how the NHS is referring patients to these people, who are still not allowed to open?
Matt Hancock
I will certainly look into the last point. However, that categorisation is not quite right. The beauty industry is an important industry in and of its own right. While we do still have restrictions in certain areas and categories, that does not mean that they should all be lumped in together. The beauty industry is an incredibly important industry and we will get it open as soon as it is safe to do so.
Barbara Keeley (Worsley and Eccles South) (Lab) [V]
At the start of this crisis, the guidance for care homes was unclear. They could not get PPE, and patients were being discharged from hospitals to care homes without being tested for covid. The Prime Minister’s comments have given offence. Does the Secretary of State accept that care home providers cannot be blamed for the deaths of their residents, and that it is time to give care staff the pay and respect they deserve, and to bring forward plans to fund social care properly?
Matt Hancock
The need to reform social care is no less urgent than before the crisis. Indeed, we have learned through the crisis yet more about the nature of the reforms needed, because we have seen the positive impact of much closer, system-level working between the NHS and social care and local authorities. That should inform our thinking about the long-term social care reforms that this country needs to see.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
I thank the Secretary of State very much for all he has done—for his leadership, and his direction and courage.
Macmillan estimates that disruption to normal cancer services could lead to almost 2,000 cases of cancer a week going undiagnosed, with almost half of cancer patients seeing their cancer treatment delayed, cancelled or changed as a result of coronavirus. Given the level of disruption, what additional resources will the Secretary of State put in place to protect and sustain the delivery of cancer care if further waves of the pandemic should occur?
Matt Hancock
The hon. Gentleman has repeatedly raised this vital question; I think he was the first in the House to raise the importance of restarting cancer services, right at the peak of the pandemic. We have been working incredibly hard to do so. Of course, we have put extra funding into the NHS this year—very large sums—because of the crisis, and of course we want to see cancer services fully restored as safely as possible. I just repeat the point that I made to my hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire Dales (Miss Dines): it is critical that people come forward if they suspect that they might have cancer.
Steve Brine (Winchester) (Con)
As the Health Secretary knows, Hampshire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust is currently doing a big engagement process called Hampshire Together, which will look at the future of health services, not just in the acute sector, over the next 30 to 40 years. That is a critical piece of work, going on throughout June and the rest of July. My constituents are emerging from a pandemic; understandably, many are worried about whether they will still be within furlough in a few months’ time and are not thinking about the next 40 years of health services. Will the Health Secretary be minded to big decisions being taken now, while the public are understandably distracted?
Matt Hancock
I take my hon. Friend’s point very seriously. We are planning significant investment in the health service in Hampshire. That has to be done in a way that enhances services locally, in Winchester and across the county. We have learned a huge amount during covid about how the health system works best, with system working, much more community activity, and much more treatment at home by telemedicine, which is one of the things that have gone incredibly well in this crisis.
Martyn Day (Linlithgow and East Falkirk) (SNP) [V]
Polling from YouGov shows that so-called anti-vaccination sentiment is on the increase in the UK, with 16% of UK adults saying they would probably or definitely avoid a covid-19 vaccine. What does the Secretary of State feel that means for the hopes of achieving immunity?
Matt Hancock
The Government of the United Kingdom will recommend a vaccine as soon as one is available that is safe, but only when it is safe. It is so important, and it is incumbent on every single Member of this House, that we make the case for why vaccines are both safe and effective. The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right to raise this issue, and I am grateful to him for doing so. It is an issue, I think, on which all parties agree. Should a vaccine come off, it will be such good news for humanity, frankly, and we will need to make sure that people are given the support and the confidence, and of course the logistical convenience, to be able to get the vaccine should that be clinically appropriate.
Felicity Buchan (Kensington) (Con)
Will my right hon. Friend consider a comprehensive review of Public Health England to see what lessons can be learned and what improvements can be made for any future crises?
Matt Hancock
We are constantly learning what we can do to improve the response to coronavirus. We have been clear about that right from the start. The gathering evidence on asymptomatic transmission that we saw during March and April is a case in point, because it changed policy and how we deal with this virus.
Alun Cairns (Vale of Glamorgan) (Con)
The welcome opening of pubs in England has made a major difference to the morale of a nation. In Wales, pubs will not be able to open until next Monday, and then only outside. Will my right hon. Friend share the best practice of one-way systems and appropriate screening to ensure that landlords, pubs and breweries do not go out of business needlessly, if only Wales follows the English model?
Matt Hancock
I am very happy to work with my Welsh colleagues on how it is possible to open pubs and hospitality in a covid-secure and safe way. Wales has a great tradition of great pubs. I very much hope that they can be open as soon as the Welsh Government make their decision.
Stephen Doughty (Cardiff South and Penarth) (Lab/Co-op)
I remind the Secretary of State about another virus: HIV. As chair of the all-party group on HIV/AIDS, I met colleagues from across both Houses this morning to hear about the impact of the covid-19 crisis on people with HIV in terms of mental health, access to treatment and many other issues, including the disproportionate impact on black, Asian and minority ethnic communities. Will the Health Secretary say what he has been doing specifically to support people with HIV? Will one of his Ministers meet the group to listen to our specific concerns?
Matt Hancock
Yes, this is an incredibly important issue. Our goal as a country to reach no HIV transmissions by 2030 stands unaffected by covid. It is a vital objective, and there is a huge amount of support and effort behind that goal. Access to treatment has, of course, been made more challenging. We talk about the epidemic and think about it as being the biggest since the Spanish flu, but it is not. The biggest epidemic before this one was the HIV epidemic, which we are still working to rid the world of. I have every hope that in our lifetimes we will get there. We will play our part.
Darren Henry (Broxtowe) (Con)
People in Broxtowe have written to me about their fears that due to lockdown their mental health has declined and vital treatment, including therapy, has been postponed. The coronavirus has made them more anxious to seek help and, like many, I am worried about the impact a lack of early intervention can have on vulnerable people. Can my right hon. Friend reassure me that mental health support will be part of the NHS “Open for business” campaign and that people who are concerned about their mental health can safely seek help?
Matt Hancock
Yes, mental health services absolutely are open and people who need support with mental ill health should come forward. They should go to their GP in the first instance. The good news in this area is that telemedicine is particularly effective for psychiatry. Of course, it cannot be effective for all mental illnesses, but it can for many, and it is being used very effectively by psychiatrists across the country.
Mohammad Yasin (Bedford) (Lab) [V]
The initial findings of the investigation into Bedford’s now decreasing infection rate shows that women between 30 and 59 have been most affected. Will the Secretary of State remind everyone that this invisible virus does not just affect the older generation? Does he agree that the published data must include details on ethnicity, the older generation and workplace factors if we are to eliminate the virus and keep the public safe?
Matt Hancock
Yes; we are publishing more and more data about the virus and who has caught it, in the same way that we are giving more and more information to directors of public health so that they can use it for the same purposes. The hon. Gentleman is quite right to say that the virus does not only affect those who are older. Although more people who are older tend to die from the disease, anybody can transmit it, and that is the big risk. I am glad to say that the numbers of cases in Bedford are coming down. We keep a watchful eye to ensure that that continues to be the case.
David Linden (Glasgow East) (SNP)
Obviously coronavirus has impacted all of us, but one group impacted is the parents of premature and sick babies. I commend to the Secretary of State the briefing paper from Bliss, “Parents aren’t visitors”. Is the Secretary of State willing to meet me, as chair of the all-party group on premature and sick babies, and Bliss to consider the impact the virus has had on the parents of premature and sick babies, and to ensure they get the support they need to support their families at this time?
Matt Hancock
Yes, I would be very happy to meet the hon. Gentleman and the group. This is an incredibly important issue and one that is very close to my heart. I think that many in this House will know that one of our Members lost premature twins very recently. It affects many, many families and we must ensure that NHS services are available to give premature babies the very best chance of life.
Andrew Jones (Harrogate and Knaresborough) (Con)
Screening programmes help keep people healthy and this Government have expanded them. As the NHS communicates that it is open and that people should seek treatment, will my right hon. Friend ensure that its leaders focus on getting screening programmes back up to full speed and then encourage people to use them and get screened?
Matt Hancock
I am really glad that my right hon Friend has raised that point, because screening services are so important, including for cancer, which is a subject that has been raised many times in this debate and in the House in general. We are working very hard to expand and reopen screening services, making sure that infection control is possible and that we are using testing effectively, so that when people come forward for screening, they can do so with confidence. My right hon Friend is right to raise the issue. We will keep pushing it, because screening is so important to keeping people healthy.
Tim Farron (Westmorland and Lonsdale) (LD)
Last night’s “Panorama” programme showed the awful truth that we could lose more people to cancer due to delayed treatments and interventions than we do to covid-19 itself. We know we can avoid that tragedy in a number of ways, one of which is to expand the operation and to bring forward the implementation of radiotherapy around the country—this summer, especially—to clear the backlog and to give people hope. That should include delivery close to home in places such as Westmorland General Hospital in Kendal. Will the Secretary of State meet the all-party parliamentary group on radiotherapy to discuss our six-point plan to help give people hope and to save lives immediately and in the long-term?
Matt Hancock
We share a common mission in this space, because we have already invested £200 million in expanding diagnostics, and that is an incredibly important part of the reopening of the NHS. I am very happy to meet the hon. Gentleman and his group and all those interested in the expansion not just of radiography but of all types of diagnostics. We need to ensure we do that in a way that works for patients and therefore opens access. That is incredibly important. We are putting in the investment and we are rolling out the programme. It is happening as we speak, and if he has further ideas to throw into that area, I am very happy to listen to them.
Richard Graham (Gloucester) (Con)
I am grateful to the Secretary of State and all involved first for the temporary testing site, and secondly for the permanent testing site now available for the people of Gloucestershire in Gloucester, but the reality is that capacity is much greater than demand and resources are considerable. Does my right hon. Friend therefore agree that we could make the testing capacity available, for example, to teachers with concerns or to members of black, Asian and minority ethnic communities who need reassurance much faster, before symptoms develop. How can we make that happen?
Matt Hancock
I am absolutely thrilled to get a question on the problem of having too much testing capacity, as opposed to too little. We have one of the biggest testing capacities in the world. We have built that almost from scratch as a country, and we must use it effectively. We have, for instance, rolled out the extra testing in the NHS that the Chair of the Select Committee was asking about earlier. We have rolled out the weekly testing of staff and the monthly testing of patients in care homes. We will follow a clinical path.
My hon. Friend asked about teachers. We are currently survey testing teachers to find out if they are more at risk than the general population, in the same way that care workers, care home workers and NHS staff are. If they are, we will put asymptomatic testing in place. We are doing exactly the same survey testing for taxi drivers, because taxi drivers are at higher risk than the rest of the country. If he will forgive me, we are taking a scientific approach to how we allocate that capacity, but it is true that one of the policy challenges we face as a Department is making sure we use all the testing capacity, and long may that be so.
Mr Speaker
In order to allow the safe exit of hon. Members participating in this item of business, and the safe arrival of those participating in the next, I am now suspending the House for four minutes.
Arts, Culture and Heritage: Support Package
(4 years, 5 months ago)
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Jo Stevens (Cardiff Central) (Lab) [V]
(Urgent Question):To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, if he will make a statement on the Government’s support package for our arts, culture and heritage industries.
The Minister for Digital and Culture (Caroline Dinenage)
The UK’s arts and cultural heritage are not just beloved in the UK, but are the envy of the rest of the world. Our theatres, live music venues, museums and galleries are incredibly valuable to our economy, bringing in £32.3 billion in 2018 and employing approximately 680,000 people. However, they are much more than that: they are the lynchpins of their local communities, entertaining, enlightening and educating us, and bringing us together through shared experiences.
The coronavirus pandemic dealt those sectors a body blow, forcing thousands of institutions to close their doors. The Government have already provided substantial financial assistance to see them through the crisis, including loans, business rate holidays and the self-employed and furloughing schemes. Together, those schemes have provided hundreds of millions of pounds of support, saving livelihoods, beloved organisations and institutions. Of course, we have been working extremely closely with the sector and medical experts to try to get things back up and running as soon as it is safe to do so.
Our battle against coronavirus is not over. With social distancing still in place and crowded venues not possible for the foreseeable future, it was clear that the cultural sector desperately needed help to weather the ongoing storm. The Government have provided it this week, with an unprecedented £1.57 billion rescue package for museums, galleries, theatres, independent cinemas, heritage sites and music venues across the country in the form of emergency grants and loans. It is the single largest one-off investment in UK culture and proof of our commitment to protecting the sectors that do so much to enrich all our lives. It has widely been recognised as exceeding expectations and DDCMS Ministers would like to put on record our thanks to the many people who have worked so incredibly hard on this behind the scenes over the weeks.
The funding will support the country’s long-standing and rightly famous cultural institutions such as the Royal Shakespeare Company, the Ironbridge Gorge Museum, the Mary Rose Trust, which I visited yesterday, and the National Theatre, but it will also support lesser known but equally cherished cultural and heritage institutions and organisations in regions up and down the country—places that have been cultural anchors for their communities for years. That will include theatres, live music venues and museums, but it will not just be about cultural spaces, as it will include dance companies, orchestras and touring arts groups that do not have their own venues but that still play a key role in our cultural life and, of course, still need support. By protecting these organisations as well, the funding will help to support those working across the cultural sector.
The package will also see £120 million invested in rebuilding, upgrading and starting new construction work across our cultural infrastructure as part of our wider effort to build, build, build after coronavirus. This will help to revitalise historic buildings across the country, creating jobs and protecting livelihoods all across our regions. Another £100 million will be allocated to arm’s length bodies such as the British Library, the British Museum and the British Film Institute. An extra £188 million will be given to the devolved Administrations in Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales, as the Government support our whole Union; our cultural strength is stronger as a family of four.
The broader package comes on top of the announcement made last week by the Arts Council to reopen its project grants competition and make an additional £39 million of funding available to support creativity—in particular from freelancers, creative practitioners and independent organisations.
We all want to see full audiences back in our venues and institutions, enjoying the very best of British culture as soon as possible. We will keep our foot very firmly on the pedal, and are finalising guidance for a phased return of the performing arts sectors as we speak. This package allows us to protect some of our precious cultural assets during an uncertain time ahead. It will help thousands of organisations to make it through this crisis and out the other side for future generations to enjoy. I ask the House to join the arts sector in welcoming this massive rescue package. It is a lifeline to help the sector weather this storm and bounce back even stronger.
Jo Stevens [V]
I am grateful for the granting of this urgent question.
We welcome this much-needed injection of cash for the arts and culture sector, but I have to ask: what took the Government so long? We have already seen venues going under and mounting job losses, and warnings from the Opposition and across the sector were ignored for weeks on end. Urgently getting the money to where it is needed now is critical, but according to the Department’s own briefing, funds will not arrive until the autumn. Less than half the £160 million announced in March is with the organisations that need it, and we are now four months on.
It is vital that this money does not just get hoovered up by the biggest venues with the loudest voices. As well as protecting the jewels in the crown, every town and city lucky enough to have a theatre that is a precious part of the local economy must keep it. We were disappointed that yesterday there was yet again no mention of freelancers, who make up 70% of the workforce in theatre alone. These are highly specialist, creative people—musicians, performers and other professionals—who have been excluded from the Treasury schemes since the start of this crisis. I am concerned that the Department does not understand the nature of the work in this sector, which is why we have continually warned against a one-size-fits-all approach.
As has been the case with the Government throughout this crisis, within hours of the announcement yesterday, the package—which was described as “world-leading”—was already starting to unravel.
I have some specific questions for the Secretary of State, therefore, that I hope his Minister can answer.
Is there provision in this package to reverse job cuts, such as those announced at the Royal Exchange in Manchester, and theatre closures, such as the Nuffield Southampton? Yesterday, the Secretary of State refused to confirm that live performance venues would reopen by Christmas. Can the Minister confirm what date the Government are working towards that has allowed them to calculate that this package will secure the future of these industries, as they have said it will do? If venues cannot open for at least six months, has the Secretary of State secured agreement from the Chancellor that the Treasury schemes will be extended for this sector until the Government give the go-ahead for it to reopen?
Will the Minister commit to publishing the health and scientific evidence that says the public can sit in an aeroplane for hours on end but not in a theatre for two hours? Lastly, I want the Government to focus on the people who have made this sector admired around the world and the specialist and highly skilled jobs they do, because once those are lost, they will be almost impossible to recover.
Caroline Dinenage
That was a disappointingly churlish if not unexpected response to what is the largest single financial investment in our culture sector and the biggest package of support for heritage, arts and culture—[Interruption.]
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)
Order. I will not have shouting at the Minister.
Caroline Dinenage
Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker.
It is the biggest package of support and investment for the heritage, arts and culture sector anywhere in the world. I am very clear that our arts, culture and heritage are not the cherry on the cake or even the icing on the cake; they are the cake. It is what makes us British and is integral to our history and our heritage and fundamental to our economy.
The hon. Member talks about this money as if it is the first thing the Department has made available to our sectors, but of course there has already been £215 million of emergency funding for cultural and heritage arm’s length bodies, which since the lockdown started have been working intensively with the sector to understand the scale and pressures and put together this package, which has enabled us to deliver this world-class level of support for our very valued sectors.
The hon. Member talked about the road map. Of course we cannot be 100% clear about when everything will be able to open. I wish it were in my gift to say, but we are dealing with the unknown—with a global pandemic. Even this week, we saw, in Melbourne, Australia, a city of 5 million go back into lockdown. We have, however, set out a road map and said that rehearsals and the videoing of performances behind closed doors can start. In the coming days, we hope to set out stage 3 of that road map, which will be performances that can be done out of doors with social distancing. Shortly, we hope to fill out more information about stage 4, which will be about performances that can happen in indoor venues but with social distancing.
As everyone recognises, the silver bullet for our sectors will be trying to establish when performances can happen without any social distancing indoors. We are doing everything we can to ensure that that happens as soon as possible. We are working closely with Public Health England and have scientific investigations going on within theatres looking at the various threats. We will also be starting pilots to look at the other aspects that affect this. It is incredibly difficult. Theatres are not the same as aircraft. People are necessarily moving around very different buildings and there is the engagement with audiences that there is not on aircraft, but we are doing everything we can. We are entirely aware that this sector and everybody in it, be it the buildings, the venues, the organisations or the freelancers, are fundamental to the British economy and our history, heritage and wellbeing, which is why we are doing everything we can to bring it back as soon as possible, but we have to make sure people can remain safe while engaging with all these sectors.
Julian Knight (Solihull) (Con)
It would be wrong not to recognise the significance of this package and the work that has gone into putting it together. However, this can only be a first step—a vital first step. Does the Minister agree that the vital cultural sectors need a specific, Treasury-backed recovery plan, with a means found to enable large numbers of people to watch live entertainment in an enclosed space while feeling relatively safe? One-metre social distancing does not work in the theatre sector, which would have to run at 20% capacity, and neither does it work economically for outdoor performances. Will the Secretary of State commit to coming before the Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Committee immediately after the summer recess, to discuss how all this can be achieved?
Caroline Dinenage
My hon. Friend has set out a range of challenges that we are seeking to overcome. He will know, for example, that some really innovative digital ideas have been put in place over lockdown to allow people to see live performances from their own homes. We know that that is not in any way a substitute for the real thing. We are working hard to get these things up and running again, including museums and galleries, so that people can physically see and touch the exhibitions as quickly as possible. I know that the Secretary of State is keen to engage with my hon. Friend and his Committee at every possible stage and to keep it up to date on how we are progressing with this, because it is fundamental to so many people up and down the country that we do.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)
We now go to John Nicolson, who has one minute.
John Nicolson (Ochil and South Perthshire) (SNP) [V]
All of us are conscious of how tough these months have been for our galleries, museums, cinemas, theatres and live music venues. For too long, the UK Government left our creative communities to languish in uncertainty and accumulating debt. I regret that this help comes too late for organisations that have already gone under. That said, I welcome the announcement of a £1.57 billion lifeline after weeks of campaigning by the creative communities and my SNP colleagues. To date, however, the UK Government have shown no intention of supporting those not eligible for the self-employment income support scheme. If that is not addressed, we risk losing a generation who cannot afford to survive without income. Will the Minister clarify how much, if any, of this funding will go to self-employed workers in the creative industries who have slipped through the net? How will she ensure that these funds urgently reach the organisations that have been desperately pleading for help?
Caroline Dinenage
I am sure that the hon. Gentleman also meant to welcome the £57 million that will be going to Scotland via the Barnett formula but incidentally forgot to do so. He is right to mention freelancers who are not swept up in the self-employment income support scheme. We have been working tirelessly over recent weeks and months with the sector to understand what enables people to fall through the gap and what more we can do to support them. As a result of these grants and loans, organisations will be able to resume cultural activity, albeit in a socially distanced way, which will increase employment opportunity for freelancers—at the end of the day, that is what they want more than anything: to be able to get back to work. There is also £120 million of funding for capital projects, which will enable projects that have been paused to resume and all the different craftsmen and specialist heritage construction workers to be employed. This package complements the announcement made last week by the Arts Council that it will reopen its project grants competition and make £59 million of funding available to support creativity, in particular from freelancers. We must not forget that, of the £215 million that the Government have already pledged to this through the emergency support package, £160 million was from Arts Council England, of which £20 million has gone to individuals, including freelancers.
Craig Whittaker (Calder Valley) (Con)
While the recovery package provides unprecedented support for locally known jewels like the Hippodrome theatre in Todmorden, the Hebden Bridge Little Theatre, the Rex cinema in Elland and the Brighouse Civic Hall, we all know that no recovery can be complete until audiences are able to enjoy performances once again. Can my hon. Friend confirm that her Department has in place a strategy, if not a date, for easing lockdown restrictions and the eventual return of theatres to full use?
Caroline Dinenage
I set out earlier the road map that we are looking at.
We hope to be able to have socially distanced outdoor performances very shortly, and soon after that, during the summer, we hope to be able to confirm when we can have socially distanced indoor performances. We are working at pace, alongside Public Health England, and doing pilots and other scientific studies to see how soon we can fully get all our theatres and public-heritage and cultural spaces up and running and back to full steam. We want desperately to do that, but we have to keep people safe.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
I welcome the package, and my party welcomes it as well. What support is there to help churches such as St Margaret’s here in Westminster? Will the Minister consider a stand-alone scheme? As well as providing prayer, worship and communion services, such churches are also tourist attractions because of their wonderful history and beautiful buildings, but find themselves in dire straits financially because of their inability to access any grants and because they have no tourists or visitors because the business aspects of their buildings are closed.
Caroline Dinenage
The hon. Gentleman makes an excellent point. We have amazing churches and other religious venues up and down our country that are places not only of worship but for people to visit. In particular, they are huge visitor attractions for people from around the world. We are looking at the situation for them very closely. The detailed guidance on who will be able to claim from this package of measures is currently being put together and we hope to be able to provide more information in the days ahead.
Sir David Evennett (Bexleyheath and Crayford) (Con) [V]
I warmly welcome the Government’s decision to give assistance to the performing arts, which will allow the industry some breathing space and help them to survive. Does my hon. Friend agree that creative industries play a vital role in our economy and are a growth industry, and that there is a need for venues to be open as soon as it is safe for them to be?
Caroline Dinenage
Yes, my right hon. Friend is absolutely right, but the key word is “safe”—we want to keep people safe and do not want to go back into a lockdown scenario, which would be disastrous for our economy, for people up and down our country and for the cultural venues we are talking about. My right hon. Friend is absolutely right to raise this issue. Where it is safe for things to restart, they have been and are restarting: film and television production is among the creative industries, and that has already started, and museums and other cultural institutions are able to reopen, albeit that they have to overcome some obstacles before they can do so fully. As things gradually can open, we want them to do so, because it is fundamental for people’s health and wellbeing for them to be able to access our cultural institutions.
Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)
Grassroots live music venues—such as Brighton’s Green Door Store, Sticky Mike’s and Latest Music Bar—want to know that a fair share of the Government’s funds will reach organisations such as theirs, so will the Minister ensure that the Arts Council works in partnership with the Music Venue Trust on the development of a grant-application process that is accessible to grassroots venues, and that the process reflects the sector’s unique needs? Will she also have a very urgent word with the Chancellor to make sure that he plugs the gaps in the self-employed support scheme? Many people in the creative sector are dependent on it and they are getting desperate.
Caroline Dinenage
The hon. Lady is right to champion the live music venues in Brighton, many of which I have visited myself; they are a real jewel in the crown of Brighton’s entertainment scene. That is why we are keen that Arts Council England works alongside independent experts so that we can make sure that the money is targeted to all the different parts of the sector and the different sectors that need it, where it will make the most difference.
Jason McCartney (Colne Valley) (Con)
We all welcome this huge package of support for the arts and cultural sector. Last night, I spoke to a constituent who works as a percussion musician at the annual pantomime at the Alhambra Theatre in Bradford; thinking of him and all the other performers, electricians, musicians, actors, and especially freelancers, can we please make sure that this funding does get through to support all of them, because they are the real lifeblood of our arts and cultural sector?
Caroline Dinenage
My hon. Friend is right to say that our creative people and artists are the lifeblood of our industry—without them we simply would not have it. The key is that the cultural organisations that rely on audiences have been particularly hard hit, and if we can bring them back into use, there will be work for the freelancers he mentions. The key to bringing them back is the key to supporting the supply chains that feed them. Support has been available through the emergency funds, for example, through Arts Council England, but we understand that the best way to support our amazing freelancers up and down the country is to give them more work that they can do and get things back open as soon as possible.
Lucy Powell (Manchester Central) (Lab/Co-op) [V]
This announcement will be very welcome news for many treasured institutions in Manchester, such as the Royal Exchange Theatre, the HOME cinema and theatre and treasured music venues such as Band on the Wall. Of course, it is a reflection of the Government’s moral obligations to support sectors that are being forced to continue to be closed for sound public health reasons. However, we are talking about a whole ecosystem made up of small production companies, the self-employed, the talent and others. With that in mind, will the Minister go back to the Treasury again and get more support, through an extension of the furlough scheme and support for the self-employed, so that the whole ecosystem can continue through this enforced closure?
Caroline Dinenage
The hon. Lady is right to talk about the ecosystem, because it is what fuels our whole sector. We have been clear that when we produce the guidance on how this money will be allocated, having a mind to the ecosystem it supports will be one of the criteria that we look most favourably upon. I do not think that the Treasury will take kindly to my going back and asking for money after it has just given us £1.5 billion, but it is aware of some of the individuals who have been under extreme pressure in recent weeks and months and will be doing all it can to make sure it fills those gaps.
Sir Robert Neill (Bromley and Chislehurst) (Con)
This very welcome announcement has the potential to be a lifesaver for theatres such as the Churchill, in Bromley, in my constituency, but smaller organisations such as the Bromley Little theatre need urgent clarity about to their eligibility, sooner rather than later. I refer to my interest as chairman of the all-party group on opera. If the Minister has not already done so, will she listen to the “Music Matters” programme that was on Radio 3 on Saturday, which highlighted the sector’s particular problems with the guidance relating to the transmission of coronavirus through song? Opera houses in Europe, with which we are in direct competition, are starting to plan to reopen at the end of the year, with safe mitigation. Our science appears to lag behind that. Will she make sure that the scientific reviews that are being undertaken address that issue as a matter of real urgency?
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)
Before the Minister answers that, I must appeal for much shorter questions, and then she will also be able to give shorter answers. If Members do not ask shorter questions, the people at the end of the list will not have a chance to speak, and that would not be fair.
Caroline Dinenage
Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker.
Yes, we are very aware of the scientific aspect of this. I have been meeting people from orchestras and choral groups frequently during this lockdown period to try to get the evidence and data we need, and actual scientific experiments are taking place, in partnership with Public Health England and others, to try to build the evidence we need on the risks presented by this terrible disease. The Secretary of State is keen to do what we can to get up and running, and he went with Andrew Lloyd Webber the other day to the Palladium to look at some of the mitigation measures it is putting in place. So we are leaving no stone unturned in trying to address this.
Maria Eagle (Garston and Halewood) (Lab)
I welcome the support that has been announced, but does the Minister accept that this package does not address the plight of technical production companies, such as Adlib, based in my constituency, which provides lighting and sound engineering for live performances in theatre, at music events and at festivals, but is not allowed to operate at the moment because of the law and regulations? What help can she offer to this part of the sector so that it can remain in business? It is currently reliant on the furlough scheme, but when that ends, it faces oblivion. What help can she provide it with until there can be a proper reopening of venues, without social distancing?
Caroline Dinenage
We have had an unprecedented package of business support since the beginning of the lockdown, but this is also about getting those venues and organisations that put on events that might require the lighting provided by the hon. Lady’s constituents up and running. That is what we mean by the road map. This is about getting places open as quickly as we can, so that people can start working with those parts of the supply chain that rely so much on a vibrant and functioning arts and culture industry.
Mr Richard Holden (North West Durham) (Con)
The funding has been greatly welcomed by colliery bands, by the Empire theatre in Consett in my constituency, and by Jack Drum Arts, which was recently visited by a Minister from the other place. A lot of building projects for the arts sector have been cancelled or postponed due to the coronavirus outbreak. Will the Minister enlighten us and say what will be done to help them?
Caroline Dinenage
More than £100 million is available for capital projects, to try to kick-start some of the building projects that have been stalled by the onset of covid and to help get people who are working on those important projects back to the workplace.
Navendu Mishra (Stockport) (Lab)
Yesterday morning, the Secretary of State told the BBC that the minimum grant or loan amount is £1 million. Will the Minister explain how that will help many smaller venues, including Stockport Plaza in my constituency? What is the regional breakdown for that money, and how much will venues in Greater Manchester receive?
Caroline Dinenage
The hon. Gentleman is right to champion organisations across his constituency, and I am sure that all hon. Members will do the same. I cannot set out what the breakdown will be just yet, because guidance on how the scheme will be implemented will come forward in the days ahead. One criteria that we are considering most acutely for the allocation of this money regards how we can support communities and places up and down the country, not just in the big metropolitan centres.
Rob Roberts (Delyn) (Con)
Theatr Clwyd in my constituency has welcomed more than half a million viewers to the 2,500 events and community shows a year that it puts on. Recently, the First Minister of Wales said that we do not have the firepower to support this sector in Wales. Given the £59 million in Barnett consequentials that will come from this announcement, and the £2.3 billion that the Westminster Government have sent to Wales so far as part of the covid battle, does my hon. Friend agree that it is time for Labour’s First Minister in Wales to stop the excuses and finally to support that important sector?
Caroline Dinenage
My hon. Friend is right to champion Theatr Clwyd in Mold and to say that this is a significant sum of money for Wales. I spoke to the Welsh Deputy Minister for Culture, Sport and Tourism at the weekend, and he was delighted with this sum of money. Because of the way that the Barnett formula works, we cannot guarantee that the money will be spent on arts and culture, but he is keen to ensure that when the Welsh Government get hold of it, it goes to the right places.
Daisy Cooper (St Albans) (LD)
From Edinburgh to Aldeburgh, the UK’s thriving festival sector reaches almost 5 million people a year. Will the Minister clarify whether festivals will be eligible to get some of the money from this rescue package? If not, does she agree with me and with the British Arts Festivals Association, which is calling for the £120 million that has been allocated for a festival of Britain in 2022 to be reallocated to all the festivals of Britain that need help this year?
Caroline Dinenage
At the moment, festivals often attract funding through some of the Arts Council funds. It is possible that live events will attract such funding, but that will be set out in the guidance when we release it. Our performing arts and cultural sectors want more than anything to get back up to speed, and get up and running, and Festival 2022 presents a remarkable opportunity for all four nations of the United Kingdom to commission work and get people out there doing what they do—performing, creating and entertaining our country.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)
We have to go an awful lot faster.
Sara Britcliffe (Hyndburn) (Con)
This announcement is welcome news to many of across Hyndburn and Haslingden, particularly the civic arts centre and theatre in Oswaldtwistle, but can the Minister assure me that the package will reach smaller venues, including those in my constituency, which are a valuable asset to our communities?
Caroline Dinenage
My hon. Friend has hit the nail on the head. One of the key criteria for allocating the money will be about supporting small cultural organisations that may be the only theatre or museum in their town, that are vital to the arts and culture ecosystem in their area and to other businesses in the supply chain and that are the key focal point of culture and arts in their area. That will be one of the key aspects we look at when allocating this cash.
Tommy Sheppard (Edinburgh East) (SNP) [V]
The £97 million for Scotland, while welcome, is not a proportionate share of £1.57 billion, so I presume that a fair chunk of the package is either not new, or capital spending. Given that, will the Government either revise the consequentials to allow a proportionate share of capital spending in Scotland, or relax the capital controls on the Scottish Government to allow them to provide the same support for the arts in Scotland as exists elsewhere in the UK?
Caroline Dinenage
All this is new money, and £100 million of it is targeted at support for national cultural institutions in England and organisations such as the English Heritage Trust, the Victoria & Albert Museum and the British Library. Some £120 million of it is capital investment to restart construction on cultural infrastructure projects in England, and £188 million, through the Barnett formula, will go to enable the devolved Administrations to support their cultural sectors.
Marco Longhi (Dudley North) (Con)
Our capital city is home to some of our most venerable cultural institutions, but Dudley, as the capital of the Black Country, is also home to some great cultural institutions. Can my hon. Friend assure me that places such as the Black Country Living Museum will directly benefit from the great package that the Government have announced, to tide them through the difficult winter months ahead?
Caroline Dinenage
My hon. Friend is a great advocate for Dudley and all the cultural treasures that it has to offer. As I have said, we very much see this money as supporting the levelling-up agenda and targeting areas up and down the country that really need these vital cultural establishments to be protected.
Catherine West (Hornsey and Wood Green) (Lab)
Hornsey and Wood Green is home to so many in the creative sector, and I have had hundreds of emails pleading with me and asking what is being done. Can the Minister assure me that not too much of the money will be capital spend, but that it will go to the people who make the arts? With their expertise and their love of the arts, it is the people who inspire us.
Caroline Dinenage
The hon. Lady is right to raise that. Of the £1.57 billion, £120 million is capital spend. The rest of it will go directly to organisations and institutions up and down the country.
Jonathan Gullis (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Con)
I am blessed in Stoke-on-Trent, Kidsgrove and Talke to have the stunning Wedgwood Institute in Burslem, the journey from the pits at Chatterley Whitfield Colliery and the pots of Middleport Pottery. The £100 million for capital projects will help to build, build, build shovel-ready projects such as the Harper Street renovation project in Middleport. Will my hon. Friend meet me to discuss how such projects can apply to access the new funding?
Caroline Dinenage
How could I refuse? My hon. Friend is the strongest possible advocate for all Stoke-on-Trent’s cultural offers. I do not think I have ever known so much about pottery as I do since I met him. Of course, we will do everything we can to support them.
Matt Western (Warwick and Leamington) (Lab)
I welcome the announcement, which is terrific for organisations such as the RSC. A lot of its members and employees live in my constituency. Can the Minister explain how fantastic organisations such as Playbox Theatre and Motionhouse dance theatre, which has a world-class reputation, can be assured of benefiting from this money?
Caroline Dinenage
This is about supporting our big, key world-class venues, but it is also about supporting the smaller grass-roots organisations that are a key part of the infrastructure—not just organisations that have venues, but organisations that may be dance groups, other theatrical groups, or what have you, that are not place based—and are really focusing on the communities that they support.
Mr Laurence Robertson (Tewkesbury) (Con)
How can the Government help to get more people, particularly young people, involved in culture and sport of all kinds?
Caroline Dinenage
Again, this is all about the ecosystem that our arts and our culture encourage and about getting young people involved with their local museums and galleries, their local arts and performing arts, and dance and theatre groups. With all those things, if we can capture the imagination of young people very early on, we can open their eyes to a world of culture and arts that will entertain them for the rest of their lives.
Sir George Howarth (Knowsley) (Lab) [V]
In response to an earlier question from my hon. Friend the Member for Garston and Halewood (Maria Eagle) about Adlib in Knowsley, which provides technical support to live events, the Minister effectively said that it will not get any support until the industry gets back up and running and it can then provide its services. Does she accept that, if it is going to take as long as seems to be the case, many companies that provide technical support will have gone out of business by then? Will she reconsider that response, and look at including organisations such as Adlib?
Caroline Dinenage
It is just simply not correct to say that these organisations or these companies have had no support. Our furloughing scheme has supported over 350,000 people in the creative arts and leisure sectors to retain their jobs. We have had huge investment through the various loan schemes that have supported businesses to stay afloat. The Government have poured millions upon millions of pounds into supporting businesses through this pandemic.
Richard Fuller (North East Bedfordshire) (Con)
With cases well below their peak and falling, and with transmission pathways increasingly and more rapidly under control, the Government should now be announcing specific dates for reopening those sectors that regulations required to be closed. That will unleash the investment that can support the whole ecosystem of the arts. Will the Minister consider announcing a specific date on which our arts centres can open?
Caroline Dinenage
We understand that certainty is one of the biggest issues facing our sectors at the moment, and we are doing everything we can to tackle that. In the days ahead, we are hoping to set out a much more fully defined road map, which will help address some of these date issues.
Anna McMorrin (Cardiff North) (Lab)
The Secretary of State said that this important package will not save every job. Our culture sector is the envy of the world, but it is the people and their talent that make it world leading. We know the show will not go on for many, including many of my constituents in Cardiff North, without direct job support. Why will the Secretary of State not support the thousands of workers in this sector who have been abandoned and excluded from support schemes throughout this crisis? Also, will the Minister tell me when the Welsh Government will be getting this funding—
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)
Order. From now on, each person can ask one question, not two or three questions—no speeches; just questions, please. Let us have a bit of discipline.
Caroline Dinenage
With the best will in the world, we cannot insulate every single organisation against the pressures and challenges they face in this pandemic, but we are doing everything we can. This is a life-changing and a lifeline sum of cash that we have managed to secure for this sector. The hon. Member says we have done nothing to support individuals, but £20 million of the £160 million Arts Council England fund has gone to individuals to support them through this terrible crisis.
Stuart Anderson (Wolverhampton South West) (Con)
I am delighted by this announcement, and I would be keen to know what steps the Minister is taking to ensure that a fair share of the £1.57 billion investment reaches local theatres, such as the Wolverhampton Grand theatre in my constituency.
Caroline Dinenage
My hon. Friend is absolutely right to champion the theatre in Wolverhampton. I am sure that it will be absolutely delighted to know that he is fighting its corner. In the days ahead, we will be setting out exactly how this guidance will work and exactly how the money will be allocated, but the focus is on getting it to cultural organisations up and down the country.
Ruth Jones (Newport West) (Lab)
Newport West is home to a vibrant and growing cultural scene. I have been contacted by many constituents, such as Sam Dabb who manages the music venue Le Pub, and actors Daniel Williams and Chris Rankin who, like others, have shared their experiences of being freelancers in today’s harsh economic climate. Although today’s announcement is welcome for some, it has come too late for others, such as the 23 who are losing their jobs at Newsquest—
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)
Order. This is a speech. Will the hon. Lady please ask a question?
Ruth Jones
Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker.
What specific support will the Government give to those who have fallen through the gaps of the financial safety net?
Caroline Dinenage
As I have said, the best thing we can do to support those freelancers who have not been scooped up by the self-employment income support scheme—very many thousands have been—is to get the organisations back up and running so that these individuals can start earning money again.
Damian Collins (Folkestone and Hythe) (Con) [V]
I welcome this incredibly important package of support for the arts, but it is important that it does not become one that principally benefits venues and not the production companies and producers who put on the shows. Has the Minister considered the idea, put forward by Sam Mendes, that the Government could take a financial stake in new productions to ensure that venues are full, both of creativity and of people?
Caroline Dinenage
We have taken soundings from a range of people up and down the sector who have been phenomenal at providing us with all sorts of information and ideas, which has helped us to construct the package. We will set out more clearly how it will work in the days ahead.
Margaret Ferrier (Rutherglen and Hamilton West) (SNP) [V]
Many showmen in my constituency and across Scotland face losing their livelihoods as a result of the pandemic, putting the fun of the fair at risk for future generations. They do not qualify for the new funding for cultural organisations that DCMS announced on Sunday, and the Showmen’s Guild is not represented on the covid-19 recovery group for recreation and leisure. Will the Culture Secretary bring forward a similar bail-out package to support travelling funfairs, given that they will face similar delays in reopening?
Caroline Dinenage
That is a very interesting point. I will take it away and write to the hon. Lady.
Sir Roger Gale (North Thanet) (Con) [V]
The £1.5 billion is a massive sum of money and incredibly welcome. However, further to the question from my hon. Friend the Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Damian Collins), it is the men and women who work in the theatres, not the theatres themselves, who really need the support. My hon. Friend the Minister referred to enhanced opportunities for freelancers. Could she put a little flesh on that bone and tell us how that is likely to work?
Caroline Dinenage
My right hon. Friend is one of our Equity card-carrying Members of Parliament, so I always listen carefully when he talks about this issue. There are a number of ways we can help. First, getting everything back up to speed will of course support our freelancers and the workforce up and down the sector. Arts Council England has reinstated the fund that people can bid into for projects, so a number of other schemes—worth £59 million—are available to offer support.
Hannah Bardell (Livingston) (SNP) [V]
Last week the live music industry hosted a webinar with musician and artist Beverley Knight as part of the “Let the Music Play” campaign. It was clear from her and others that there is deep distress in the live music industry. They talked about the impact on associated jobs that are tied up with the industry but have fallen through the cracks of this Government’s furlough scheme. Can the Minister tell us how those freelance musicians, technicians, producers and associated professionals will get support, as they appear to have been completely forgotten by her Government?
Caroline Dinenage
We know that the music industry has been particularly badly hit, which is why it will definitely be one of the industries that will seek to benefit from this £1.5 billion scheme.
Damian Green (Ashford) (Con)
Like others, I welcome this announcement and hope that it will benefit Revelation St Mary’s in Ashford, one of those churches that is also a cultural centre, which the Minister has already referred to. Can she give us a little more detail about the support for freelancers? In particular, when does she think some of the money will actually get into their pockets and bank accounts? I know from my constituency that some of them are already looking for jobs outside the sector because they are so worried about their future inside it.
Caroline Dinenage
There are two things to say. We want to get this particular tranche of money—this £1.5 billion—out into the sector as soon as possible, because we know that there are organisations that are really desperate. In terms of individuals, there are a number of packages of support. Many of them have been able to claim from the self-employed income support scheme. We know that some have slipped through the gaps, and, of course, as soon as we can get our sector back up and running again, we will be able to employ more of the amazing workforce who make it so special.
Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)
Brentford’s Watermans arts centre, like many arts centres across London, brings arts to all types of communities that do not access the west end. Watermans’ director is grateful for the £87,000 emergency funding, but it is less than a third of what she applied for, so that will only keep it going until September. How will the Government support venues beyond September to survive when they have less than a third of their capacity on their seats and costs are greater than normal?
Caroline Dinenage
The hon. Lady will note that we have just announced a £1.5 billion pound funding package, and her organisation should be able to apply for that. We will announce more details of how it will work in the next couple of days.
Andrew Griffith (Arundel and South Downs) (Con) [V]
I thank my hon. Friend for the unprecedented package of support that was announced. As she gets into the design of individual components, may I ask her to seek a higher number of individual smaller grants, so that local museums, such as the Amberley Museum, the Arundel Museum and the Steyning Museum in my constituency, get a look in?
Caroline Dinenage
It has been like a whistle-stop tour of cultural and arts venues up and down the country today—in fact, I remember visiting the Amberley Museum as a schoolgirl, so it is also a trip down memory lane for me. My hon. Friend is absolutely right. We need to make sure that we can get that money to as many grassroots organisations up and down the country as possible to save them from an unpleasant fate.
Jamie Stone (Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross) (LD)
The £57 million in Barnett consequentials will be very welcome north of the border in Scotland. They will be a lifeline to many people who are absolutely desperate. When the Minister hands the cheque over to the Scottish Government, will she consider discussing with them how some of our great national institutions south of the border, such as the Royal Shakespeare Company and the London Symphony Orchestra, might be encouraged to come to perform in Scotland and, particularly, perhaps the far north of Scotland?
Caroline Dinenage
I think the hon. Gentleman is making a plug for a bit of entertainment in his local area. I am sure that many of our cultural institutions up and down the country will be very keen to get out there plying their trade and travelling around as much as they can, as soon as the covid situation allows them to do that.
Duncan Baker (North Norfolk) (Con)
This is wonderful news. Funding is fantastic, but can my hon. Friend tell me when venues such as the Sheringham little theatre and Wells Maltings in North Norfolk can have a route map and a plan so that they can suddenly throw open their doors again?
Caroline Dinenage
My hon. Friend is absolutely right to raise his local organisations and venues that really want to get back up to speed. We hope to set out the road map of how that will happen, certainly in a socially distanced way, over the next few days.
Mary Kelly Foy (City of Durham) (Lab)
Despite this announcement, there is still a lot of uncertainty in the arts industry, most notably among freelancers. Even when productions can resume during the pandemic, this will not go away. Will the Minister tell me whether the Government will create a plan that ensures that companies and their artists are protected financially if their show is cancelled due to a localised lockdown or if a member of the company tests positive for covid-19?
Caroline Dinenage
We are looking at a range of these issues and the hon. Lady is right to raise them. We are very mindful of the fact that there are a huge range of challenges ahead and that this is not going to be plain sailing in any way, shape or form. Rather than mandating specific routes for organisations, we are asking them to have a plan we can support that will offer good value for money and the best possible resilience for the future.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)
I am making one more appeal for short questions and short answers. Otherwise, the people at the end of the list just do not get a chance, which, as I said before, is not fair.
Margaret Greenwood (Wirral West) (Lab) [V]
One of my constituents owns a company that supplies video, lighting, sound systems and technicians to performance venues on a rental basis, but his business will not benefit from the Government’s announcement. He is really worried that he and many other providers of services to performance venues will have to make many staff redundant within the month. So what will the Minister do as a matter of urgency to support those incredibly important technical staff working in this industry?
Caroline Dinenage
A range of business support measures is available. The bounce back loans have been incredibly successful among so many of the businesses in these sectors. We know that the supply chain is very badly affected by this, but some supply chain organisations have been able to access some of the emergency funding that has been made available by bodies such as the Arts Council.
Peter Gibson (Darlington) (Con)
I welcome this package, but may I ask the Minister for reassurance in respect of the plans for the 200th anniversary of the railways, and will she provide every reassurance that Locomotion No. 1 will stay in Darlington?
Caroline Dinenage
Yes, as far as I understand it, the 200th anniversary of the railways is still going ahead. I know that Locomotion No. 1 is the property of the Science Museum and Dame Mary Archer, the chair of the Science Museum, has agreed to meet my hon. Friend.
Feryal Clark (Enfield North) (Lab)
All Safe and Sound and Handheld Audio Ltd are just two of the companies in my constituency working in the arts and creative sector that have lost 98% of their incomes since the March lockdown and will fall off the cliff when the furlough has ended. Will the Minister tell me what support is available from this rescue package for the ecosystem of such companies and businesses that support our creative and arts sector?
Caroline Dinenage
There is an unprecedented package of business support. The furloughing scheme, the business loan scheme and the bounce back loan scheme have poured millions and millions of pounds into supporting businesses up and down the country.
Giles Watling (Clacton) (Con)
The Princes Theatre, the West Cliff Theatre and the Frinton Summer Theatre, which I used to run, are all in dire need. The Frinton Summer Theatre is not having a season this year. Could my hon. Friend say a bit more about how these funds will be distributed, particularly to the regions? Theatres are closing. Rome is burning. This funding is needed and it is needed urgently.
Caroline Dinenage
My hon. Friend is another of our Equity card carrying Members and one of the greatest champions of the theatre and arts. He has been on so many of the calls that I have been on over recent weeks and months, and I thank him for all that he has done to champion this. We want to make an announcement on how this will work as soon as possible in the days and weeks ahead, and we want to get the money out as soon as possible, because we know that there are some organisations that are literally about to tip over the edge.
Owen Thompson (Midlothian) (SNP)
Live music is of huge cultural importance to Midlothian, and the venues at grassroots level are a massive factor in that, but without the performers, these venues can do nothing. What support can the Minister provide to assure our performers, especially freelance performers, that their livelihoods can continue?
Caroline Dinenage
As I have already said, a very large number of performers have been protected by the self-employed income support scheme. We know that it is not everybody. We have been working really hard to try to ascertain who is falling through the gaps and what more can be done to support them. But there have been a number of packages in place, such as the Arts Council England £20 million fund that has gone to individuals.
Peter Aldous (Waveney) (Con)
This package is very much to be commended but, in distributing these desperately needed funds, will my hon. Friend the Minister get the money out as quickly as possible, as many venues are on the brink? And don’t forget those companies in the supply chain.
Caroline Dinenage
We know that time is not on our side. My hon. Friend is absolutely right to articulate that and we do want to get the money out as quickly as we possibly can.
Tulip Siddiq (Hampstead and Kilburn) (Lab) [V]
My constituency is famous for its theatres and culture and I think I am the only MP whose predecessor won two Oscars, but many of my constituents employed in these sectors are extremely worried, having fallen through the cracks of the Government’s support schemes and now facing the prospect of their workplaces closing. The news of new funding will be welcomed by venues such as the Kiln Theatre in Kilburn and Hampstead Theatre, but how will the Minister ensure that smaller institutions can access it if they are forced to apply for at least £1 million?
Caroline Dinenage
As I say, we will be setting out in the next few days and weeks exactly how the package will work, how people can apply for the money and what the restrictions will be on the amount that can be applied for.
Sir Desmond Swayne (New Forest West) (Con)
Has the Minister listened to “The Archers” recently? It is suicidal. Will she reflect on the fact that the majority of us are more likely to die by our own hand than we are from the virus?
Caroline Dinenage
I will reflect very hard on that. I am a great fan of “The Archers”, obviously.
Karin Smyth (Bristol South) (Lab)
I felt that the Minister was unusually disrespectful to my hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff Central (Jo Stevens), who asked a very important question about freelancers and how the package is not helping, which has been echoed across the House. There is clearly a lot of support for creative freelancers, who are not supported by the job retention scheme and cannot currently access the other schemes. In Bristol South, they are critical to supporting Bristol’s wider creative and music offer. Will the Minister please consider going back to the Treasury to find a way to help that group of people?
Caroline Dinenage
I did not mean to appear disrespectful; I apologise if that is how it came across. I am well aware that a number of people up and down the country have fallen through the gaps and are not being protected in the way we envisaged when we started the self-employed income support scheme. The hon. Lady may be interested to know that, alongside the Government’s significant investment, Netflix, working with UK Theatre, the Society of London Theatre and Sam Mendes, has donated £500,000 to set up a theatre artists fund, which is supporting individuals in the theatre industry who are in dire straits at the moment.
Craig Williams (Montgomeryshire) (Con)
Agricultural shows are the cultural backbone of our rural communities across the United Kingdom. Will the Minister outline what support there is for such shows? While she is passing the £59 million over to the Welsh Government, will she give a little nudge for the Royal Welsh show?
Caroline Dinenage
I love an agricultural show. Sadly, they fall under the remit of the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, but in the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport we are doing everything we can to support rural cultural establishments.
Barbara Keeley (Worsley and Eccles South) (Lab) [V]
I want to raise the survival of orchestras. The support package for organisations is welcome, but as we keep hearing it will not help thousands of freelancers—the musicians who are not eligible for Government support schemes. Other vital measures are reforms to orchestra tax relief and gift aid. To help orchestras survive and rebuild, will the Government look again at support for freelance musicians, and at the vital reforms to orchestra tax relief and gift aid?
Caroline Dinenage
I have met with orchestras almost weekly over the past few weeks as we try to navigate our way through some of the particular challenges that they are experiencing. We will certainly look at some of the hon. Lady’s suggestions.
John Howell (Henley) (Con)
What impact does the Minister think the £120 million of capital investment will have on arts bodies continuing with projects that they had paused?
Caroline Dinenage
We know that many projects were stalled because of covid, and that the workforce—the creative experts and craftsmen—have been sidelined while that work could not take place. We hope that the capital investment will kick-start some of that work so that people are employed in the here and now and these incredible cultural and creative venues are protected for future generations.
Virtual participation in proceedings concluded (Order, 4 June).
Points of Order
Emily Thornberry (Islington South and Finsbury) (Lab)
On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. As you know, there was a written ministerial statement today in which the Secretary of State for International Trade announced that we were to begin selling arms once more to Saudi Arabia for use in Yemen. Of course, that flies in the face of the Court of Appeal decision last year. The Government claim that they have carried out a complete review, and that all the alleged instances of war crimes are simply isolated incidents.
How can a statement of such extraordinary magnitude be made by way of a written statement? I know that tomorrow is a busy day, but can we be assured that the Secretary of State has asked to come before the House, either tomorrow or on Thursday, to be able to answer questions, because there is huge interest in this matter in the House?
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)
I thank the right hon. Lady for her point of order. As ever, she is well aware that the way in which Ministers make their announcements is not a matter for the Chair, in so far as the announcement has been made by way of a written statement, but she will also be very well aware that there are devices that she can use, which Mr Speaker will take very seriously, in order to require a Minister to come to the Dispatch Box and answer the questions that she has every right to put.
Mark Tami (Alyn and Deeside) (Lab)
On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. Following the announcement today of a sector-specific support package for the arts, I wonder whether you have been given notice that the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy intends to come to the House to announce a sector-specific package for aerospace and aviation, as we have seen in France and Germany. The sector has recently announced thousands of job losses, including 1,700 last week by Airbus in Broughton and Filton. Time is running out. The Government need to act, and they need to act now.
Madam Deputy Speaker
I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his point of order. Again, of course, it is not a matter for the Chair, but it is my understanding that the Chancellor of the Exchequer is coming to the House tomorrow. Perhaps the right hon. Gentleman will seek to—ah, I would normally say “seek to catch the Speaker’s eye”. Perhaps he will go on the Member hub and put in to ask his question of the Chancellor tomorrow.
Bill Presented
Decarbonisation and Economic Strategy Bill
Presentation and First Reading (Standing Order No. 57)
Caroline Lucas, supported by Clive Lewis, Wera Hobhouse, Claire Hanna and Stephen Farry, presented a Bill to place duties on the Secretary of State to decarbonise the United Kingdom economy and to reverse inequality; to establish a ten-year economic and public investment strategy in accordance with those duties which promotes a community- and employee-led transition from high-carbon to low- and zero-carbon industry; to require the Government to report on its adherence to the strategy; to establish higher environmental standards for air, water and green spaces; to make provision to protect and restore natural habitats; and for connected purposes.
Bill read the First time; to be read a Second time on 23 October, and to be printed (Bill 155).
Magistrates (Retirement Age)
Tuesday 7th July 2020
(4 years, 5 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Magistrates (Retirement Age) Bill 2019-21 View all Magistrates (Retirement Age) Bill 2019-21 Debates Read Hansard Text
A Ten Minute Rule Bill is a First Reading of a Private Members Bill, but with the sponsor permitted to make a ten minute speech outlining the reasons for the proposed legislation.
There is little chance of the Bill proceeding further unless there is unanimous consent for the Bill or the Government elects to support the Bill directly.
For more information see: Ten Minute Bills
This information is provided by Parallel Parliament and does not comprise part of the offical record
Edward Timpson (Eddisbury) (Con)
I beg to move,
That leave be given to bring in a Bill to amend section 13 of the Courts Act 2003 to change the retirement age for magistrates from 70 to 75; and for connected purposes.
Magistrates, or justices of the peace, are ordinary people hearing cases in court in their community, and have been a fundamental feature of our judicial system since 1361. They continue to be chosen from people of good character, commitment, social awareness and reliability—those who can communicate effectively and are capable of making sound choices when sitting in judgment on their peers.
I had the pleasure of appearing in front of many magistrates while practising on the then Chester and north Wales circuit as a criminal and family barrister in the late ’90s and the noughties. My rose-tinted spectacles remind me that, more often than not, my clients got the rub of the legal green, but I also had to accept that I and the bench did not always have a meeting of minds—in other words, I lost.
The one constant, however, was the selfless and enduring dedication on display by so many of our fellow citizens to the fair and equitable dispensing of justice. I want to take this opportunity to thank all of them, particularly those who have contacted me about this Bill and shared with me their experiences, for their public service. I should add that their overall number includes at least 10 fellow current Members of Parliament.
However, the constant reliable recruitment and retention of our magistracy across England and Wales is under serious strain. The number of magistrates has decreased dramatically over the last decade or so, from about 30,000 to less than 13,000, with the number actually sitting thought to be substantially lower. That has had a profound impact on the case backlog, which is now up to nearly half a million in the magistrates courts; on delays, and even on the way justice is delivered. For example, during 2017-18 there were benches of just two magistrates, including for some trials, in nearly 40,000 court sessions—15% of the total. Inevitably, the covid-19 pandemic has both exacerbated the problem and catalysed the urgency of action, with recruitment and training on hold.
To illustrate this at a more local level, Paul Brearley JP, chairman of the Greater Manchester branch of the Magistrates Association, provided me with details of how the current chronic shortage of magistrates is affecting what is the largest single bench in England and Wales. At its creation in 2014, the bench size was approximately 1,100. As of 24 June this year, the number stood at 792.
From this figure should be deducted 188 justices who are currently on covid-19-related leave of absence and 47 justices appointed but not yet sworn in, leaving just over 550, or about half of the original number, in active service. During the pandemic, no more justices have been appointed, despite the fact that the retirements have continued—15 since lockdown.
Sadly, it is the same story across the country, as other examples I have received from the chairs of the West Yorkshire, north-west Wales and Herefordshire benches bear testament, with the latter seeing a fall from 127 magistrates in 2008 to only 47 in 2020, nine of whom are due to retire in the next 18 months. As we emerge from lockdown, the pressure on our court system has never been greater, and with more police officers on our streets and additional resources for the Crown Prosecution Service, we can expect even more cases, requiring even more capacity.
The measures introduced by the Ministry of Justice to tackle the considerable and escalating delays are welcome, including extending court hours and widening the use of technology where appropriate. Yet much of this will still rely on the human resources— otherwise known as people—working in our courts to meet ever-growing demand. That is irrefutable proof that we desperately need more magistrates as quickly as possible. Any judicial restoration also needs to ensure that it delivers as great a diversity as possible, especially regarding age, ethnicity and social status. As the former chair of the Magistrates Association, Malcolm Richardson, has said:
“The magistracy must reflect the community it serves if courts are to be perceived to be procedurally fair, command public confidence and help civic engagement.”
To that end, I was pleased to hear the Under-Secretary of State for Justice, my hon. Friend the Member for Cheltenham (Alex Chalk), who is sitting on the Front Bench, tell the House only last week that the magistrates recruitment and attraction steering group held its first meeting in February, with a particular focus on increasing diversity, regardless of age.
Despite such laudable and important efforts, recruitment will not, of itself, fix the problem, because the fact remains that nearly 7,500 magistrates—more than half of all current magistrates—will reach the age of 70 in the next decade, and, under current legislation, will be forced to retire. Losing these magistrates at 70 is a triple whammy. First, they are often the most experienced. Secondly, they represent a high proportion of presiding justices—those in the court chairs—in this group. Thirdly, they are likely to be retired from work and so more able to accept extra sittings, including at short notice. Paulette Huntington JP, chair of the West Yorkshire branch, tells me that her magistrates who have retired at age 70 generally tend to be high sitters as they have more time to give, with many clocking up between 50 and 100 sittings per year, and some even more than that due to the volume of work—well over the minimum 26 required. In contrast, it is proving difficult to entice those with work and family commitments to the bench, with fewer employers seemingly content or in a position to sanction regular absences.
While every effort should continue to be made to boost recruitment, simply replacing retiring magistrates would be a significant challenge, and given current shortages would not, in itself, be sufficient. Indeed, this year the number of magistrates recruited is expected to be less than the number who retire, partly due to the need for rigorous selection, mentoring and support of newly appointed magistrates. It is worth noting, too, that these difficulties apply to all jurisdictions—adult, youth, and family. The senior judiciary, including the Lord Chief Justice, the senior presiding judge and the president of the family division, are all aware of the seriousness of the situation, as are, I know, the Minister and the Lord Chancellor.
It need not be this way. Jurors are now selected up to the age of 75, doubtless to enable justice to be delivered by people with wide experience of life. You may also have noticed, Madam Deputy Speaker, that the head of the Supreme Court is aged 75 and the almost 73-year-old Roy Hodgson seems to be doing a reasonable job at Crystal Palace. So why should magistrates be deemed incompetent simply because they have hit an arbitrary age?
There are other sound, compelling reasons to apply such logic. First, people live longer. The current retirement age of 70 was set in 1968, when life expectancy was just 72, and it is now nearly 81. Secondly, people work longer. Thirdly, people retire later. As they say, 70 is the new 50. To ensure ongoing competency beyond 70, the recognised and recently updated system for appraisal of all magistrates and retained registrates would need to be extended, but this should not be a block to progress. As John Bache JP, chairman of the Magistrates Association, told me:
“We are rapidly heading for the perfect storm in the magistrates court. The backlog is increasing while the number of magistrates continues to fall, yet we are discarding those magistrates most able and willing to address this crisis”.
I know that my hon. Friend the Minister, on behalf of the Government, is very sympathetic to these arguments and is keen to make progress sooner rather than later, so I urge the Secretary of State, the Lord Chancellor, for whom I have the utmost respect, to grasp this nettle now and give the magistracy the opportunity through this Bill, especially at this vital time of greatest need, to do what it has done for over 650 years, and deliver timely, fair justice for the communities it serves.
Question put and agreed to.
Ordered,
That Edward Timpson, Tracey Crouch, Jeremy Wright, Greg Clarke, Graham Stringer, Andy Carter, David Simmonds, Richard Graham, Karen Bradley, Andrew Jones, Mr Shailesh Vara and Ben Everitt present the Bill.
Edward Timpson accordingly presented the Bill.
Bill read the First time; to be read a Second time on Friday 11 September and to be printed (Bill 156).
Estimates Day
Main Estimates 2020-21
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)
We now come to the motion on the estimate for the Department for Education. Members will be aware that there are three debates on estimates this afternoon. It will also be obvious that it is now nearly 3 o’clock and that there is limited time for each of these debates. I expect each debate to last for between one hour and one and a quarter hours—certainly no more than that. There will be an immediate time limit of four minutes on all Back-Bench speeches. For Members’ convenience, it might be helpful to note that I estimate that approximately 10 or perhaps 12 Back-Benchers will be called in each of these three debates. I am trying to be fair in giving warning to those who are further down the list that they are unlikely to be called.
We will begin with the motion on the estimate for the Department for Education. The debate would normally be opened by the Chair of the Select Committee on Education, the right hon. Member for Harlow (Robert Halfon), who secured it, but the current rules under which the House is operating mean that this is not possible. Mr Speaker is pleased that the Procedure Committee is reviewing this and related matters as part of its current review. Christian Wakeford will therefore speak on behalf of the Education Committee.
Support for Left-Behind Children
(4 years, 5 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Christian Wakeford (Bury South) (Con)
I thank the Backbench Business Committee for granting this debate on support for disadvantaged children. I have been asked to speak on behalf of the Education Committee and will deliver a speech along the lines of that which my right hon. Friend the Member for Harlow (Robert Halfon) would have given had the House’s temporary coronavirus procedures allowed him to participate.
I should take this opportunity to express my appreciation to all the teachers, support staff, Ministers and Department for Education staff who have been working flat out throughout the coronavirus pandemic. I welcome the increase in funding for education. The Government’s extra spending over the next three years adds up to £14.5 billion. This will return spending on schools in England to the levels seen a decade ago. Back in October 2019, the Government announced a one-off cash injection of £780 million to support children with special educational needs over the 2020-21 academic year in their response to the Committee’s report. Will the Minister confirm that the commitment to school and college spending uplifts announced in the spring budget will stand and be met in the coming academic year?
We also have substantial investment in bricks and mortar. The Prime Minister has rightly said “Build, build, build”. I welcome the £1 billion announced to fund the first 50 projects of a 10-year school-building programme—I myself am currently lobbying for funding for a new school in Radcliffe in my constituency—and the £1.5 billion for the refurbishment of further education colleges over the next five years. On top of that, an extra £1 billion of catch-up funding will tackle the devastating effects of lockdown on many children’s learning and wellbeing—something that I have been campaigning for alongside the Northern Powerhouse Partnership.
Children in poorer households are undoubtedly the most likely to have no internet access and their households are most likely to be struggling to cover the cost of food and other essentials. The extra funding will provide extra tuition for them and level up their learning opportunities to those of children from wealthier families. It would help to hear more from the Minister about how the £650 million going directly to schools will reach our most disadvantaged children. First, will the funding be targeted at areas with the highest levels of deprivation? Will schools have complete autonomy, or will the Department have oversight of spending? Secondly, will Ministers allow the Education Endowment Foundation to signpost non-academic catch-up support to schools, including pastoral care, safeguarding and intervention, in order to look after children who may have spent many months in difficult home circumstances—especially considering the Domestic Abuse Bill, which we debated in this place yesterday?
That brings me on to what should happen over the summer. I welcome the news of a £650 million catch-up fund for schools to host summer schools, the use of which should be encouraged as widely as possible. So many of us have eagerly awaited the Secretary of State’s confirmation that all children would return to the classroom come September—a real relief for frustrated parents, children and teachers alike across the entire country. Anxiety has grown over the past few months because every single day that a child is out of classroom chips away at their future life chances, and the consensus is that the wellbeing and learning of disadvantaged and vulnerable children are being scarred the most.
Why does that matter? It matters because even before lockdown, disadvantaged pupils were already 18 months behind their peers by the time they took their GCSEs. It matters because the Education Policy Institute’s 2019 annual report showed that the rate at which the attainment gap was closing was already beginning to slow before the pandemic, and we have indications that it was actually starting to widen again in 2017-18.
Some groups are particularly impacted. Looked-after children fall well below the average by the time they leave school, and many children live in persistently disadvantaged households. That group of young people are expected to have fallen further behind—more than at any other time in the past 20 years—because of this pandemic. A report produced by the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies warned that a whole cohort of children will have experienced a shock to their education that will persist and affect their schooling and work outcomes for the rest of their lives.
The most vulnerable and poorest of children have been hit the hardest, so I put on the record the Education Committee’s gratitude to schools, parents and children across the country for dealing with the unprecedented educational challenges caused by this pandemic. In particular, I thank teachers and all the support staff who have kept schools and childcare facilities open for vulnerable children and those of critical workers, and I commend all the teachers and teaching assistants who have put in extra hours to adjust to remote teaching methods.
However, schools’ approaches to remote learning have been highly variable, which prompts the question: why? UCL’s Institute of Education estimates that a fifth of children, or over 2 million—let that sink in—have done no schoolwork at home and have managed less than an hour a day during lockdown. Another report by the National Foundation for Educational Research indicates that four in 10 pupils have not been in regular contact with their teacher during lockdown. A six-month learning loss is an eternity in a child’s life, and this is close to being a national educational disaster. Something has clearly gone wrong, and we must examine why.
While many schools have done remarkable work, others have not been able to provide the same offer for one reason or another, and that also needs investigating.
We have questioned why there was not clearer guidance for schools on what was to be expected of them in supporting remote learning and checking on children, something the September for Schools working group, co-ordinated by parents, has called for. Given Ofsted’s oversight of schools, it really should have taken a leading role in setting out expectations during this time. Ofsted seems to have taken a badger approach: reducing its activity and hibernating during these difficult months.
To repeat, 2.4 million children have been doing barely any schoolwork from home. Some 40% of pupils have not had regular contact with their teachers. I know that Her Majesty’s chief inspector will respond by saying that they have encouraged their employees to take up civil service and volunteering roles, and that should be commended.
However, the fact remains that the latest plans for Ofsted do not see inspections resume until January 2021, with visits to schools and brief letters published in the autumn term.
I also want to understand why the Department for Education did not appear to do any analysis itself to consider the impact of school closures on children’s learning. That was confirmed by the Minister for School Standards, my right hon. Friend the Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton (Nick Gibb) in our Committee meeting on 27 May. School closures were widely expected in the weeks before lockdown. Should the Department have published its central guidance earlier to mitigate that? It has not been wholly clear what local authorities were meant to be doing either. Ahead of any further disruption, schools must be set minimum standards for the provision of remote learning and for checking on those not taking part in lessons. The question is whether or not the standards should have been in place before we even went into lockdown. However, as our Chair has already put on record, I recognise the remarkable achievements of the Department, particularly with the Oak National Academy and the free school meal voucher system. I reiterate our appreciation for all the efforts of Ministers and their teams.
It is clear that Ministers faced huge difficulties because of the pandemic, but that does not mean there are not lessons to be learned. Clearly, if we ever face a situation like this again, there must be strict guidelines from the Department on what schools are expected to teach pupils in terms of distance learning, and clearer guidelines for Ofsted and local authorities to provide a supervisory role.
I mentioned previously that I strongly welcome the £1 billion catch-up programme, but, as has been previously highlighted, that does not include early years or post-16 education. Early intervention is vital, and those groups will have been clearly impacted by lockdown. I speak as the father of a toddler myself. I know the impact it has had on her education and development. Will the Minister explain to the House whether there are any separate plans in the offing to support early years?
It is no secret that the UK’s further education sector has been left behind for decades. A briefing on FE by the House of Commons Library outlines concerns about funding that predates the outbreak of covid-19. In 16-to-19 education, funding per student has fallen by 16% in real terms between 2010-11 and 2018-19. The total funding allocated to 16-to-19 providers declined from £6.26 billion in 2013-14 to £5.72 billion in 2018-19. That is a fall of 8.5% in cash terms and 15.7% in real terms. It is the often-neglected part of the education system that is frequently thought of as being for other people’s children. That cannot continue. FE is sometimes referred to as the Cinderella sector, but it is worth remembering that Cinderella became a member of the royal family. We must abolish the two ugly sisters of snobbery and underfunding.
Like me, the Prime Minister believes that apprenticeships will play a vital role in the recovery post-covid. Young people must have the opportunity to get the skills they need for a prosperous future. The Prime Minister has committed to offering every young person an opportunity guarantee, so that they have the chance of an apprenticeship or an in-work placement. That, too, is to be commended. No doubt we will hear more detail on that from the Chancellor tomorrow in his statement. It is no secret that our Committee Chair is a big fan—as am I—of apprenticeships. It is well known that his two favourite words in the English language are “degree apprenticeships”. Apprenticeships combine a real job with training so that people can earn while they learn. They offer opportunities in a huge range of sectors and they have fantastic returns for all involved, so how should we go about guaranteeing an apprenticeship guarantee?
First, now is the time to refocus the apprenticeship levy so that it can be used primarily on apprenticeships for 16 to 24-year-olds and to tackle disadvantage. Secondly, we must look to the public sector to lead the way with a massive increase in jobs and apprenticeship opportunities.
Thirdly, the £3.3 billion national skills fund should be used towards covering training costs and the first year of salary costs for small and medium-sized businesses taking on young apprentices.
Fourthly, we should recalibrate the levy so that employers are incentivised to spend more on taking on younger degree apprentices, those from disadvantaged backgrounds and those in disciplines that meet the country’s skills needs, rather than funding middle management apprenticeships.
Finally, we need proper targets for schools for encouraging pupils to go on to apprenticeships—something that I hope we will be discussing when the Education Committee meets tomorrow. There must be much tougher inspections by Ofsted to ensure that schools encourage pupils to go on to apprenticeships and further education. Enough of the letters that do not make a difference. We need a carrot and stick approach, with encouragement and funding.
I welcome the extra catch-up funding, given everything that has happened in recent months, but there needs to be an even greater focus on those who are being left behind. The attainment gap was worryingly wide before and it is still worryingly wide. Given that millions of children may not have been participating in schooling for nearly six months, this position is expected to get even worse. That is why the Education Committee is working relentlessly on tackling disadvantage and why we are approaching all our work with the social justice agenda firmly in our minds. We need to ensure that all our young people can climb the educational ladder of opportunity. That really must be a priority for the Government over the months and years ahead.
The NHS has a long-term plan—so, too, should education. Education should have a long-term, 10-year plan that is focused on closing the disadvantage gap and ensuring that those left-behind pupils, who have suffered enormously during coronavirus, are able to catch up.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)
We go immediately into a time limit of four minutes.
Wera Hobhouse (Bath) (LD)
I echo many of the things that have been said by the hon. Member for Bury South (Christian Wakeford), but the school funding crisis is not new; the Minister and I have been in many debates on this issue during the previous Parliament. The funding crisis has only been exacerbated by covid-19, and urgent action is needed to stop the widening disadvantage gap before it becomes a big gulf.
It is a shame that the Government have not been able to get around the table with school leaders, teachers and unions to agree a comprehensive plan to help vulnerable children through the pandemic. Like many Members on the Opposition Benches, I supported Marcus Rashford’s campaign to extend free school meals over the summer holiday. However, we need to do much more if we are to curb child poverty. The free school meals scheme remains deeply flawed. Many people in need are not getting the vouchers or are finding that they are not able to spend them in their local supermarket. Families in my constituency have written to tell me that the vouchers cannot be spent in the supermarket of their choice.
Parents in Bath are campaigning hard on the school fruit and vegetable scheme, which was suspended in March. Children are now slowly returning to school, but the Government have given no assurances that the scheme will be reinstated in September. For some children, this scheme provides the only piece of fruit or vegetable that they eat all day. According to Northumbria University, over half of children eligible for free school meal vouchers have experienced a significant drop in the intake of food and vegetables since schools closed in March. We know how important good nutrition is to a child’s ability to learn. Covid-19 has exposed thousands of children to hunger and malnutrition. Unless the Government commit to reinstating the scheme, the disadvantage gap will only get wider. That is why the Liberal Democrats are calling for an emergency uplift in child benefit of £150 per child per month, with £100 for every subsequent child, throughout this crisis.
Councils across the country are concerned that children in need do not have access to a device for online learning or an internet connection, which increases with levels of deprivation. In the most deprived state schools, 26% of teachers thought that over 20% of children in their class did not have access to an electronic device, compared with 4% of teachers in the least deprived schools. The work that the Department has done to provide vulnerable children with access to devices is welcome, but it does not go far enough. Disadvantaged children are still falling through the gaps. The primary reason for getting children back to school is to close this gap. What will happen if schools are required to shut again later this year and need to return to online teaching? The Government must have a contingency plan in place. They must be able to guarantee that every child will have access to the internet as a matter of priority.
It is concerning that 16 to 18-year-olds have not been included in the Government’s catch-up tuition plans. Sixth-form funding is, on average, 10% lower than for younger students. Again, we had many discussions about that in the previous Parliament. Children and staff deserve better than this. It is clear that, despite the crisis we are in, the Government are still not taking the funding crisis seriously enough.
Damian Hinds (East Hampshire) (Con)
I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Member for Harlow (Robert Halfon) and my hon. Friend the Member for Bury South (Christian Wakeford) on his outstanding opening speech, which set out the breadth of issues involved here. At all times, the Department for Education is about both raising attainment for all children in this country and simultaneously narrowing the gap between rich and poor, but never has that combination been more acutely felt and more important than it is right now, because we know that yawning gaps will have developed in this time between different areas, different schools and different children. We need to get all children back on track and narrow that gap simultaneously.
That starts, of course, with being physically back in school. We need to keep building up public confidence in the next couple of months. It will be really important to explain to parents clearly the bubble approach, including why it is whole year groups in secondary schools, which enables both mixed-ability and setted education, as well as options—we cannot return to a full curriculum without that. I suspect that one of the biggest challenges my right hon. Friend the Minister for School Standards will face is transport, particularly in secondary school, where children tend to travel longer distances. I am sure that he is working closely with colleagues in the Department for Transport and the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government to use the maximum bus capacity safely.
This has been a very difficult time for headteachers and teachers, who have really stepped up to the plate, converting their programmes of work in double quick time and keeping their schools open. I know that for headteachers in particular, the weight of responsibility has never felt heavier than it has over the last few weeks. They know that the time to come will be difficult, but they want their children back and are looking forward to September. It will start with some important formative assessment, which I know the Minister will be looking to support.
I welcome the fact that we are returning to a full curriculum and the £1 billion package for catch-up support. I know that the Minister will be conscious of the additional issues and requirements of children with education, health and care plans and those in local authority care or with a social worker.
I want in particular to ask about extracurricular activities, which play such a vital role in children’s activity, mental health, interaction and character and resilience development. I welcomed the news at the weekend about the PE premium and the flexibility on leftover moneys from this year. I welcome, too, the continuance of the holiday activities programme. However, I ask the Minister and his colleagues to look closely at the full range of extracurricular activities and maximise the range that children can take part in—not only more sports but debating and public speaking, drama, school orchestras and school choirs, all of which play such an important role.
This has been an ambitious decade in education, with the extensions in early years education, 1 million new school places, the great progress on primary reading, the ongoing major upgrade to technical and vocational education and, of course, the narrowed attainment gap at every stage—in early years, in infant school, in junior school, at GCSE and at university entry.
This new decade is going to be challenging indeed, and the funding is important. I very much welcome the £14 billion over three years, the T-levels funding, the more recent new school capital and of course the billion-pound catch-up fund, but it is people who will make it happen: children, parents, governors, parent-teacher associations, teachers and heads. I know that my right hon. Friend will be behind them all the way.
Tim Farron (Westmorland and Lonsdale) (LD)
It is most important to put on record how grateful we are to teachers up and down the country, including in my constituency, which is the size of Greater London and has 60-plus educational institutions within it. Let us just remember that it is incredibly hard work and challenging to teach 30 children in one place. Now, teachers have to try to teach 30 children in 30 different places, as they have over the past few months.
Teachers are having to deal with free school meals, often backfilling for the Government scheme not having worked perfectly everywhere, sometimes literally providing food out of their own pocket for needy children in their communities. They are supporting vulnerable children at home and in a school setting. We should bear in mind that teachers have had no break since before Christmas. Many of them, although they would not say so themselves, are utterly shattered. They deserve our thanks and support. They are true heroes of this covid crisis.
Since half-term, headteachers have been making decisions, based on what is in the best interests of their children and the whole school community, about how, when and whether to return. We trust those headteachers and we trust their judgment. They are hampered by a lack of clarity in guidance, some of which is beyond the Government’s control. Nevertheless, the lack of certainty over whether young children can be transmitters of the virus is a cause of great concern for whether and how schools can return.
Despite our teachers, we have nevertheless undoubtedly seen an increase in the gap between those who have opportunities and those who do not. That includes whether a child has parents who are able to support them and whether they have access to wi-fi and equipment. Not everything the Government have done has worked as well as it might. One school in my constituency has 1,000 children, with 180 on free school meals. Twenty laptops turned up after three months. We have to ask ourselves whether that is good enough to support our children in most need.
We are concerned also about the extra burden on teachers who have made assessments on GCSE and A-level grades. We are concerned about what that might mean for some of those young people who are struggling and who are furthest behind, because they will perhaps be hampered by the average rate of previous cohorts, rather than being able to deploy their skills themselves.
We are grateful for funding for development, new buildings and equipment, but more than anything else, schools need revenue funding for teachers and other staff. In Cumbria, we have seen £11 million of cuts to school budgets, representing £237 a head. If we want to help people to catch up and to progress, we need to not be laying off teachers and teaching assistants, as we have been in the past three or four years. We should invest in more teachers and more teaching assistants.
We also need to ensure that we support special educational needs children. At the moment, we have a system—it predates this Government, but nevertheless needs to be changed—where we force schools to fund the first 11 hours of support for an education, health and care plan for special educational needs students. In other words, we penalise those schools who do the right thing by those children who have the most need. That is why we need to ensure that special educational needs support is always funded from the centre, which would advantage those schools and those children who have the greatest need.
Finally, a word about Ofsted and inspection. As schools return in full in September, I want to be sure that Ofsted inspectors will not be adding to pressure and stress for schools, children and governors when they could instead be using their considerable skill to coach, develop and help our teachers in enabling those children who are struggling the most to reach their full potential.
David Simmonds (Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner) (Con)
The variations in school level funding and funding by local authority area have a history in this place that is older than the corn laws, but I commend Ministers in the Department for their progress in making more transparent the national funding formula, represented in these estimates, and bringing about an approach to levelling up the amount of funding that we may see at individual school level. However, the progress that we have seen in the past decade around school standards needs to be set against a legitimate concern about children in those parts of the system who will not be familiar to most mums and dads: those children who are excluded; those who are in alternative provision; those at the more complex end of special educational needs and disabilities; those in alternative education; and, as the Department will know, those who are in unlawfully run schools. These are very small numbers, but they are very important to our society. I urge some consideration for how these funds are distributed and allocated, as this is a crucial issue for the most vulnerable.
We have heard about a school funding crisis, but for the past year for which audited figures are available, the cumulative total of all school deficits in England was £233 million, and the cumulative total of school surpluses in England was in excess of £1.7 billion. The challenge is to ensure that the money that is in the system gets to the children who need it most. That task is done at local level by schools forums—the schools-led bodies that make decisions about the local funding formula. However, there is a tendency, as the Minister will be aware, for the voice of big secondary schools to dominate. I invite him, therefore, to consider how, in the context of schools forum decision making, we might see a stronger voice for early years, alternative provision and SEND schools, particularly as Department for Education figures show that across the country 40% of primary schools, 46% of special schools and 34% of secondary schools have budget surpluses that are deemed to be excessive.
Jonathan Gullis (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Con)
My hon. Friend is probably one of the finest minds on the Education Committee and on education in general. May I urge him to tell us more about how early targeted intervention for those at risk of being excluded, rather than intervening after they have been excluded, results not only in a huge cost saving but in better long-term outcomes for those young people?
David Simmonds
My hon. Friend makes a crucial point, and I know that this is very much front and centre of the Government’s thinking on how we deploy educational resources. In the special estimates, Ministers will spell out in a lot more detail how the recently announced money for the catch-up premium, among other things, is to be distributed.
It is fundamental, in respect of these most vulnerable children, that we consider how the wider system operates, because it is the system that this House is responsible for. There is a risk, when we look at the funding formula, that we prioritise institutional interests, because it is great to be able to point to high-performing schools and outstanding school leaders, but we need to think about the wider context of those children whom institutions are sometimes not so well able to support. This House has, since the Education Act 1944 onwards, passed legislation mandating that every local authority in the country has duties and obligations to support every child. On the whole, local authorities are good at that, and I invite my right hon. Friend the Minister to consider the lessons that might be learned from the operation of our virtual schools. Thanks to the interventions of local authorities—this goes back to what my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent North (Jonathan Gullis) said about identifying the most vulnerable early on—children who are in the care system now have the best school attendance of any category of children, whereas they formerly had the worst. That is an example of getting ahead of a problem and ensuring that those vulnerable children have access.
However, there is an issue around special educational needs and disabilities, which has rightly been highlighted by several Members. The education and healthcare plan—a visionary way of approaching meeting the needs of those vulnerable children—has a significant accountability gap, in that the local authority is responsible for issuing it but it is dependent on the actions of independent players, particularly schools and the NHS. Again, I invite my right hon. Friend when he responds later to consider how we might make that accountability more vigorous.
In conclusion, this is part of a much bigger picture, which the House will be able to debate. Children do not live simply in the context of the world of the Department for Education. The spend of the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government and the Treasury on things such as tax-free childcare is fundamental, but this is a Parliament focused on levelling up opportunity and outcomes for every child, and it is for this House to ensure that we pay robust attention to the whole system that supports every child, not just to the institutional interests of schools.
Ben Bradley (Mansfield) (Con)
It is a pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner (David Simmonds), and I wholly endorse his words. The case for supporting the most vulnerable children is more important than ever. I have always argued that the compulsory education years are a key time for the state to intervene and equip young people with the skills they need to be independent adults, with the opportunities and personal responsibilities to make a success of their lives. For those leaving school this year and in coming years, that is likely to be more challenging than normal, and we must offer extra support so that those young people are not left behind. Many teachers and school leaders have been working hard to understand and implement huge amounts of guidance and changes, and to support children as best they can in difficult circumstances. I know the whole House is incredibly grateful for that work.
The funding boost across our schools will be welcomed and is much needed. The planned increases will now be supplemented by a £1 billion covid catch-up fund to help schools provide additional support for students who will have missed up to six months of education. I am pleased we have been able to get children in key transition years back into school, but hugely frustrated that all children were not able to go back, as that will have a major impact. The commitment to having all children back in school in September is vital. As my right hon. Friend the Member for East Hampshire (Damian Hinds), a former Secretary of State said, if we can, we must get back to a programme that is as full as possible to support our children in September, with all the rounded support and activities that come with that.
Across the age range, support must focus on the most disadvantaged children, because we know that the existing attainment gap will only be exacerbated by time off school. Children who were struggling pre-coronavirus because of chaotic home lives, for example, will have found things even tougher, and we cannot allow that to impact on their long-term life chances any further.
The promise of targeted and funded tuition can be of great benefit to those children, and I hope it will be taken up as widely as possible, along with the £650 million that has been made available for schools to use flexibly. Although that offers an additional challenge for schools, I think it is the right approach. Schools and school leaders know the children best, and they know what is likely to be the best support for their school communities. Combined with a relaxation of the rules on summer clubs, and the reopening of youth provision, that is a major step forward. The challenge is now a logistical one, as schools will have to bring in external providers, find venues, and in many cases try to facilitate that work by pooling resources between schools or across local authorities to get the best provision. That will be a huge challenge in the coming weeks.
Jonathan Gullis
My hon. Friend is another splendid advocate for this topic. Does he think that school buildings are some of the most under-utilised buildings in our local areas, and that the third sector can play a huge part in helping to support the work he suggests?
Ben Bradley
My hon. Friend is right, and I remember from my own time at primary school that external providers came in successfully to do things such as sport and PE. That seems to have disappeared to some extent, whether because of funding or other issues, but a great deal can be done with external providers. I would particularly push for youth work to be a bigger part of our school community and work more closely with our schools and teachers.
On the summer programme, much emphasis has been placed on academic catch-up, which is hugely important, but as chair of the all-party group for sport, it would not be right for me to ignore the importance of regular sport and activity for the mental and physical health of our young people. Some children will have been out and about during lockdown, taking advantage of that hour of daily exercise to try new things and be active, but many others will have been far less active than normal. I am pleased that the Government have committed to the PE premium funding, which was confirmed this weekend. Keeping kids healthy, and teaching the importance of regular exercise and activity, is just as important as the academic side of things, and it needs to be part of catch-up planning. As my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent North (Jonathan Gullis) said, this might even be an opportunity to make more of the school estate and, when school facilities are open over the summer, to open those sports facilities that are often locked behind school gates at evenings and weekends to the wider community. Perhaps we could consider that in more detail.
I would welcome a steer from the Minister about the welcome £1 billion funding for capital investments, how my local schools might bid or access that funding, and when the timescales and plans will be laid out, so that as a local MP I can support them to secure some of that funding, which I know they feel is much needed.
I have only a short amount of time left to speak, so I apologise for rushing Madam Deputy Speaker, but I wish to welcome the approach to further education that Ministers have articulated in recent weeks. We must consider the role of skills in further education—including in our colleges—as more of a priority, and finally accept that the endless drive for all children to go to universities is not always helpful. Further education, including adult learning and retraining will play a huge role in the coming years—I know that West Nottinghamshire College in Mansfield takes that very seriously and is being incredibly proactive and looking for positive intervention. I have laid out a number of ideas on this issue privately to Ministers, and in various recent publications. I think that will be beneficial—many of them are in line with what my hon. Friend the Member for Bury South (Christian Wakeford) said earlier—and I hope that as we lay out new programmes and funding, those ideas will be taken into account.
Lee Anderson (Ashfield) (Con)
First, I want to say a big thank you to all the staff and pupils in schools in Ashfield and Eastwood who have been brilliant during this pandemic: they really have gone the extra mile.
I welcome the Government’s continued commitment to increase investment in our education system, and I also welcome the £1 billion covid catch-up fund, which will help children who have lost teaching time. The national tutoring programme will allow disadvantaged children in Ashfield to access high-quality tuition, which is so important for their development and to give them a better chance of doing well in the future. The extra £1.5 billion to fund additional pension costs for teachers also means that more of the education budget can be directed to the frontline. There can be no doubt but that this Government have the best interests of our children at heart. All this is great news for the schools in my area, such as the brilliant Kingsway Primary School, which I visited recently, that has gone above and beyond to keep open.
Last December, seats such as mine in the midlands and the north turned blue for the first time in decades or for the first time ever, and with that came significant challenges. One of the challenges for me and other Conservative MPs in places such as Ashfield is that some schools have been ignored by previous MPs. They have gone under the radar, with no one to shout about them at the highest level. However, the good news is that in Ashfield we now have a Conservative MP—an MP who went to these very schools, as did his children. My family and my friends went to these schools, so it is personal for me, and I am going to do my best.
Only two thirds of young people in the Ashfield area attend a school judged to be good or outstanding, whereas the figure for Nottinghamshire is nine out of 10 young people attending a school judged to be good or outstanding. I believe that even in some of the most deprived areas schools can thrive with the right management and leadership. It is a bit like the NHS, in that it is not always about throwing endless amounts of cash around: get the right management and dedicated staff, and our schools can flourish.
There can be no better example of this than Leamington Primary School in Ashfield. This school overall serves a disadvantaged area of my community, and it was languishing in the satisfactory category, but it has been transformed since being part of the Flying High Trust. The school has now been rated good, and it is having a tremendous impact on children’s lives. This school was not the first choice for many parents, but now there is a waiting list. The credit for this goes to the headteacher, Kaye McGuire, and the Flying High Trust, which is one of the highest performing primary multi-academy trusts in the country.
With great leadership and hard work, anything is possible—Leamington Primary School is proof of this—but where there is poor management and poor leadership, with no intervention from local MPs no amount of money can make a school successful. So I welcome all the extra investment, which will undoubtedly help the young people in Ashfield get a better education. I would like to thank the Secretary of State for Education for visiting Ashfield recently, and I would also like to thank the Minister for School Standards for agreeing to meet me to discuss how we can improve educational standards in Ashfield.
Matt Vickers (Stockton South) (Con)
Education can be the ultimate gap closer, divide smasher and opportunity provider. Every single child deserves the very best start in life and a quality education regardless of their background, where they live and their financial circumstances.
When I think about my home town of Stockton and the schools I have visited, I know that, along every corridor and in every classroom, there is infinite potential that must be backed and harnessed. I have great schools and amazing teachers, and we must back them—from Thornaby Academy, a Government-backed academy trust where kids are taught to reach for the stars and where the school is a place of aspiration and ambition, to Junction Farm Primary School, with its amazing standards and outstanding support for special educational needs that is second to none.
The Government’s plans will make sure that every pupil in every school gets a funding boost. Every secondary school will receive a minimum of £5,000 per pupil in 2021, and every primary school will be receiving £4,000 per pupil by 2021-22. By delivering a game-changing £14 billion investment, we can deliver a world-class education for all and a country in which it is not about where someone is from, but how hard they work and where they want to go.
During the pandemic, parents across the country have taken up the challenge of becoming DIY teachers, trying their best to support their children’s learning. I cannot imagine that many will have been able to replicate the experiences and enrichments that youngsters receive at school. Some parents will have been better placed to take on the challenge than others, and it is our job to ensure that no child is left behind or falls through the cracks because their parents found it difficult to support them with their school work.
For some youngsters, education provides a way up or a way out, and we cannot let them miss that; 2020 must not be the year when vulnerable youngsters were allowed to fall behind or lose their way. Instead, we should double down to ensure that it is a year of social mobility, when better support and greater investment meant that any child had the greatest chance of success. I welcome the £1 billion covid catch-up package to help schools provide additional support to all children as they return to school. Moreover, I am delighted to see £350 million going towards high-quality tuition for the most disadvantaged children, accelerating their progress and, crucially, narrowing the educational attainment gap. I do not believe that closing the disadvantage gap can be achieved solely in the classroom, so it is right that the Government look more widely, and an extra £43 million for social care and disadvantage, if delivered efficiently and appropriately, can help turbocharge the trajectory of the most disadvantaged. I cannot tell Members how important an increase of 11.5% to help address children’s social care and special educational needs and disability will be for many in my constituency.
As we begin the bounce back from the pandemic, we must put the aspirations of young people at the heart of our mission to level up the country. We need this funding for schools to address both the challenges of coronavirus in the short term and investment in resources to help the children who need it most in the long term, supporting our teachers, backing our schools and unleashing the potential of every child. Let us ensure that this Government will be remembered for putting their money where their mouth is, with real investment in the next generation creating opportunity for all.
Shaun Bailey (West Bromwich West) (Con)
I rise with a sense of trepidation after some of the fantastic contributions during this estimates debate. I am thinking in particular of the measured remarks made by my hon. Friend the Member for Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner (David Simmonds), and the contributions from my hon. Friends the Members for Stockton South (Matt Vickers) and for Mansfield (Ben Bradley).
It is important that we look at why we are here in this debate. Often we think that estimates debates bring fear and dread to the Treasury Bench and a degree of excitement to the Chairs of Select Committee, but in this circumstance we need to examine why we are here. It has been articulated throughout this debate, and we have seen it this year: it is for those kids and for the teachers who have stood up in the most unprecedented times we could have imagined and gone that extra mile to ensure that their communities are protected, that their children still get an education and that, whatever happens, we can carry on as best as we can.
I wish to pay tribute to the schools in my constituency, the likes of Q3 Academy Tipton, which has been revolutionising the way it provides extra support and care for its children during this crisis; Wood Green Academy in Wednesbury, which has been creating personal protective equipment for our local NHS trust as part of its design and technology classes, using its D&T spaces to do that; and Ocker Hill Academy in Tipton, which has been raising money for our local NHS charities. That is the reason we are here today: they have gone the extra mile for their communities and we now need to go the extra mile for them.
I could rehash the stats we have heard from all my hon. Friends today, such as those about the £1 billion catch-up fund, which wholeheartedly has my support, or the wins the Department has had more widely, such as the 6% real-terms increase in school spending, and the increases in spending on further education and on children with special educational needs and disability. That is all great, but I want also to bring us more to discussing the future and to focus on my area, too.
My hon. Friend the Member for Ashfield (Lee Anderson) touched on the fact that parts of this country have missed out on the fantastic levelling up that this Government have undertaken, not just now but previously. While we have seen real-terms increases nationally, my area has, on the whole, not benefited from them at times—in 2013, I believe we saw an 11% drop in some of our real-terms funding. However, we have to look forward. As colleagues, including my hon. Friend the Member for Bury South (Christian Wakeford), have said, this is about ensuring that we see this as not only about how we handle the money but about how that investment is targeted. I reiterate the point that he made so eloquently about FE and that Cinderella story, and getting rid of those ugly sisters of snobbery—I cannot remember who the other one was. He is right because this is not just about classrooms or schools; it is about aspiration. It is about ensuring that a kid in Tipton, Wednesbury or Ashfield feels that they have just as much chance as a kid in Westminster, and that a child from Princes End can aspire just as much as a child from Pimlico. For too long educational attainment has been determined by where a child comes from. We also need to set out the fact that yes, they can achieve with apprenticeships or manual labour, and that there is nothing wrong with that.
This has been a slightly different contribution from the one I had intended to make, so I will wind up simply by saying this: we have to get this right; we have to make sure that the kids in my constituency, and in others like it, feel invested in because for far too long they have felt written off.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)
I am dropping the time limit to three minutes, to try to squeeze in one more contribution. I call David Johnston.
David Johnston (Wantage) (Con)
Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker—this just got harder.
I pay tribute to the teachers of Wantage and Didcot, many of whom worked throughout the entire lockdown period to keep schools open for some children, and I welcome the additional average 5% that each of them will get through this additional funding.
We have a gender gap in education, with girls doing better than boys at every stage, and we have an ethnicity gap, with certain ethnic groups doing better than others, but no gap is bigger than that between poor children and non-poor children. At key stage 2 that gap is 21 per- centage points, and it widens to 28 percentage points at GCSE. During lockdown that gap has got even worse. We see that with online classes: 79% of children attending private school have had online classes, compared with only 41% of the poorest in our state schools.
Over the past few weeks we have heard a lot from the Opposition about laptops and internet access. I agree that is an issue, but there is no substitute for being taught in the classroom. I would like to hear a little less about laptops and internet access, and a little more about the stance that the unions have taken, as they have said both that people should not be going to school and, in the words of one leader, that teachers should not be teaching a full timetable or routinely marking work in this period. Do Opposition Members think that will make the gap better or worse? I am pretty clear that it makes it worse. I welcome the £1 billion catch-up fund and hope that we can get children into schools in September to make use of that as quickly as possible.
There has been a lot of talk about the dangers facing universities, but we must not forget the students. They have had a long-running teaching strike and low contact time—they have had even less time now—and they have been trapped in accommodation contracts that they could not get out of. Then, when they graduate, students doing some courses at some universities will find that they have worse employment outcomes than if they had simply got a job. We must keep them in mind. The Government are right to cover some of the costs of the international fees gap, but some of those universities that have the highest proportion of international students have the worst records of widening access to young people in this country, so something has to be looked at in the business model.
In closing, I have three quick points to make. First, for everything we fund in education we need to look at outcomes and destinations, and then we need to put more money into those things that provide good outcomes and less into those that do not. Secondly, we have not yet found a way of getting our best teachers to go to those areas that really lack good teachers. Thirdly, we have a big mental health challenge coming for young people, and we will have to prioritise that when the schools return.
Jonathan Gullis (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Con)
May I start by placing on the record my thanks to the amazing teachers and support staff across Stoke-on-Trent North, Kidsgrove and Talke, who have gone above and beyond? They are our unsung heroes. We rightly talk about our NHS and care heroes, but we should never forget the amazing contribution of our teachers and support staff.
As a former teacher with eight years’ experience in the profession, and having worked in schools with over 60% pupil premium and over 30% SEND, in some of the most deprived parts of London and Birmingham, I am delighted and proud to be standing here as a Conservative Member of Parliament. I concur with my right hon. Friend the Member for East Hampshire (Damian Hinds), who was part of ensuring that education improved year after year, whether through phonics, the quality of exams or the introduction of a knowledge-rich curriculum. Those are all important parts of the education system, and I am eternally grateful for the work that this Government have done.
With regard to spending, let us not forget the an additional £14 billion is going into education over the next three years, levelling up and ensuring that secondary schools are seeing £5,000 per pupil and primary schools £4,000 per pupil.
Those are not insignificant amounts of money. On top of that, £1 billion is going in to help kids catch up who have missed out due to covid. Another £1 billion is going in so that schools can have some rebuilding, or in some cases some brand new building. And £1.5 billion is going into the further education sector—£358 million is going into further education this year. The Government are delivering because they know that education is the biggest driver of social mobility in this country.
If we do not get education right in Stoke-on-Trent North, Kidsgrove and Talke, a generation will be failed. It breaks my heart when I see that just over 50% of my students get grades 9 to 4 in English and maths, and that we are well below average in kids taking up a level 3 or 4 qualification. I concur with what hon. Members have said: further education and apprenticeships will be the economic driver of recovery, not just for the young, but for the old who will sadly be made redundant due to the cost of covid. We must upskill and retrain them, and enable them to see a brighter future. In Stoke-on-Trent, I hope it is in the tech sector—in silicon Stoke—so that we become the heart of the video games, TV and film industry. Staffordshire University now has eight accredited courses; it is leading the way.
I will just say one quick thing to the Minister: expand and invest in holiday clubs. The Hubb Foundation, run by Carol Shanahan of Port Vale Football Club, is desperate for an opportunity. Give her the funding and she will deliver. Make sure the restriction of numbers at universities does not go on for too long, because it will limit social mobility and harm colleges that have links with universities. Finally, please make sure we have a clear plan for transportation for SEND students in September.
Robbie Moore (Keighley) (Con)
Every parent wants to ensure that their children have the very best start in life, positioning them for a lifelong love of learning, poised for success, coupled with a drive and passion for expanding their mind and outlook on the world. I am very pleased to be contributing to this debate, as there is no more important topic to be discussing in the House than the future of our children and the opportunities of a good education and start in life.
My constituency of Keighley and Ilkley is full of awesome, dedicated teachers and support staff, who are constantly going above and beyond to deliver for their students. I have seen that at first hand over the past 100 days or so, as the whole of the education sector has had to turn on its head and adapt its offering to students very quickly. Of course there have been challenges, but when I have caught up with the many primary schools across Keighley and Ilkley during this period, I have been met with a real can-do attitude among teachers and a willingness to crack on and deliver for their students. That was amplified when I was lucky enough, just a week or so ago, to catch up virtually with some students from Beckfoot Oakbank secondary school in Keighley, who told me that, although they were all looking forward to getting back to school, they had enjoyed learning virtually and had cracked on with it. I want to put on the record my thanks to all the teachers and support staff who have been working extremely hard across Keighley and Ilkley. They have gone above and beyond.
The social and economic status of my community changes dramatically across the constituency. Certain households and communities are much more deprived than others, and certain families need that extra bit of help. During the pandemic, we have seen some of the challenges associated with home learning. Access to the internet and electronic devices was an issue for some families, but I welcome the Government’s support to provide laptops. We also experienced challenges of adults and perhaps parents not having the confidence and skills to teach. There were also issues associated with living in busy households with no quality quiet time. That all illustrates that the best place for children to be is back at school. The Government’s drive to get children back to school is great, but it was incredibly frustrating to see the unions not supporting that, coupled with the pandering from the Opposition. It is great to see the Government Benches full—however, there are only two Labour Members present.
When it comes to education, and the opportunities that follow, access for children grasping their ambitions and desires should not be hampered or bear any correlation to where they come from. It should be based on all the opportunities that we put forward to them.
Peter Aldous (Waveney) (Con)
The Government have moved very quickly to improve education funding and to support the young people who have been left behind. A gap in support that I would like briefly to highlight is that for 16 to 19-year-olds. In Lowestoft all such education is provided at East Coast College.
It is good news that last autumn per student funding for 16 to 19-year-olds was increased, and that money is being provided for capital projects, but it is a concern that 16 to 18-year-olds are not able to access the covid catch-up fund. In Lowestoft, there is a big disadvantage gap that prevents young people from realising their full potential. Work is being done at all ages to eliminate this, including in the 16-to-19 age group, where East Coast College is in the vanguard, bringing in a range of initiatives. Nevertheless, the challenge is significant.
Covid-19 has provided a further unwelcome obstacle to closing the disadvantage gap. Many students leaving school at year 11 have either missed or had an iniquitous school year. They will be moving on with a lot of catching up to do, and colleges such as East Coast will have to provide extra teaching this autumn. At present, there is no funding for this. To address this unfairness—to remove this obstacle—it is important that before the end of term, the Government confirm that all 16-to-18 providers can access covid catch-up funding on the same terms as for 11 to 16-year-olds.
Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)
This has been a very thoughtful debate. I thank the hon. Member for Bury South (Christian Wakeford) for opening it on behalf of the Education Committee.
The Department for Education always has a special responsibility to provide opportunities for the most disadvantaged children to ensure that they enjoy secure, fulfilling and happy childhoods, to provide high-quality education to enable them to achieve their aspirations and reach their potential, and to create a route to lifelong learning that gives them skills for work and enriches their lives and wellbeing. But as many Members have noted, there is an especially significant role for the Department now, in the context of the covid crisis. Most children have been out of school since March, and this will bear most harshly on the most disadvantaged students. A senior official in the Minister’s own Department has been reported as saying that the attainment gap could widen by as much as 75% as a result of the covid impact.
That is in the context of an already troubling picture. Only 57% of children eligible for free school meals achieve a good level of school readiness, compared with 74% of their peers. Only 25% of children with special educational needs and disabilities are school ready, compared with 77% of their peers. By the time children finish primary school, only 51% of disadvantaged children reach the expected standard in reading, writing and maths, and at GCSE only 25% get good passes in maths and English, compared with 50% of all other students. Pupils with special educational needs and disabilities end up 14 months behind their peers at the end of their secondary education, with Gypsy and Roma children more than 34 months behind, and black Caribbean children nine and a half months behind.
I agree with the hon. Member for Stockton South (Matt Vickers) that the poorer educational outcomes achieved by the most disadvantaged children cannot be addressed by education alone. Poverty scars children’s life chances—their ability to learn and make the most of their education. Children who go hungry or who live in overcrowded housing, as the hon. Member for Keighley (Robbie Moore) noted, or whose parents cannot afford educational toys, trips or activities, face extra barriers even before they get to school.
That is why the rise in child poverty over the past 10 years is so dismaying—up from 3.5 million in 2010-11 to 4.2 million today. The hon. Member for Wantage (David Johnston) was right to draw attention to the impact that that poverty has on children’s attainment. None the less, our education system should be working to compensate for that disadvantage. Instead, as children progress through school, the gap between the most disadvantaged and other students actually widens and this, as has been noted around the House, affects the destinations of those children as they complete their schooling. They are more likely to be NEET—not in education, employment or training—and they are less likely to gain qualifications as adults. As the hon. Member for Mansfield (Ben Bradley) noted, at a time when we expect the jobs market to be much more difficult as we emerge from the covid crisis, these young people face a particularly challenging future. The Institute for Public Policy Research has said that there will be a further 620,000 young people unemployed at the end of this year.
I recognise that the Government have made some announcements to try to address that—the apprenticeship guarantee; the traineeships; and the funding for careers advice—but these either remain vague, as in the case of the apprenticeship guarantee or the national skills fund, or they are not going to be adequate, as in the case of the traineeships that were trailed earlier this week. We will need much bolder commitments for these young people.
Although the scale of the challenge to come is immense, as has been noted, post-16 education funding is already in difficulty. The FE sector is expecting a £2 billion funding shortfall in 2021, and colleges have already begun to make redundancies, and had done so even before the covid crisis. This is going to make no sense if we see an increase in student numbers in September, which is quite likely if the jobs market becomes very harsh. It is also right to note that it is not clear why post-16 has been excluded from the catch-up funding, as the hon. Member for Waveney (Peter Aldous) and others rightly pointed out.
The Government need to take a life course approach to tackling the gap in attainment. It begins to open up from the early years. Last year saw a £600 million gap in early years funding and no coherent early years strategy. Giving up on Labour’s Sure Start programme was a serious mistake. Childcare funding is over-complex and shuts out the children who could benefit from the most structured provision. The Government’s own Social Mobility Commission has pointed to the limited reach of the 30-hour offer and suggested its expansion. Ministers have rejected those proposals.
Meanwhile, the impact of the pandemic on the viability of the nursery sector has been devastating. The Early Years Alliance says that one in four may not be open in 12 months—it is one in three in the most disadvantaged areas. Yesterday, the House of Commons Petitions Committee called for an urgent review of funding for the childcare sector and I hope the Minister will follow that up.
On schools, I join a number of colleagues, including the hon. Member for West Bromwich West (Shaun Bailey) and the right hon. Member for East Hampshire (Damian Hinds), in thanking school staff who have been working flat out to support children’s learning during the crisis and are now working on preparations for a return to school in September. The catch-up funding is welcome for children in school, but I agree with the hon. Member for Bury South that we need more details about it: how much will schools receive; will it be per pupil or grant based; which pupils will be eligible for the national tutoring fund; and how much support will it provide to disadvantaged children?
I agree with the hon. Member for Bath (Wera Hobhouse) that the turnaround on extending the voucher system over the summer holidays for those entitled to free school meals is welcome, but, although the Government have allocated £9 million of funding for it, the picture of holiday activity provision over the summer looks pretty patchy. The hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent North (Jonathan Gullis) and I agree about the opportunity that could be taken to invest in holiday clubs. Unfortunately, there has been confusion about social distancing guidance among some providers, and a sense of a lack of drive or ownership in Government, with different Departments passing the buck. Given the impact that the long summer holiday has on the attainment gap, even in normal times, this is concerning and with just a couple of weeks to go until schools break up, I urge the Minister to take stock of what provision will be in place and act to plug gaps as a matter of urgency.
Even before covid, schools were facing funding pressure. The Institute for Fiscal Studies has pointed out that 83% of schools are worse off in real terms than they were in 2015, and that has been played out in, among other ways, a significant increase in class sizes, with 13.4% of children now in classes of more than 31 children and the highest proportion of secondary children in 40 years, and that bears very harshly on disadvantaged children.
The hon. Member for Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner (David Simmonds) was right to talk about how funding is distributed across different schools, and this is going to become especially important in schools with the most disadvantaged children, as we will see need increase in the aftermath of the covid crisis. There will be more demand to meet mental health needs and those of children with special educational needs and disabilities, children from ethnic minorities and disadvantaged pupils. For poor children, the cost of school, uniform, books, trips, activities and so on, if parents cannot afford it, will often also have to be borne by schools. As more children are on free school meals, as more parents are out of work, there will be more who attract the pupil premium. It would be helpful to hear from the Minister how the Department envisages that additional pupil premium cost being met.
I agree with the Secretary of State that we want a broad curriculum, and the resources must be provided to deliver school sport, arts, music, languages and so on. They are important in their own right and help with attainment in core subjects, too. I agree with the hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Tim Farron) about strategies to support the recruitment and retention of teachers to work, especially, with the most disadvantaged children. I wonder whether the Minister can say something about plans to recruit newly qualifying PGCE graduates into the classroom after the summer. Can he also tell us when he will respond to the School Teachers’ Review Body recommendations?
More than 390,000 children now have an education, health and care plan. That is a 65% increase since 2014—far more than anyone anticipated—and many are not receiving the education that they deserve. There has been a significant rise in the number of pupils with education, health and care plans in pupil referral units, and over 1,200 children of compulsory school age are not in education at all. That is a terrible betrayal of those children, and yet, parents continue to report difficulty in getting EHCPs. I understand the reason for the pause during the crisis, but we need to know when the SEND review will be completed. I have been told that some schools have used risk assessments to prevent children from attending school during covid. How on earth was that allowed to happen? I am very pleased that the legal relaxations on SEND provision will not be extended beyond September. Will the Minister say whether he is confident that there will not be a backlog of actions to catch up on and that he can guarantee that all children with special needs will have their needs met in full?
On exclusion, there is clearly a worrying picture of children from certain ethnic minority backgrounds being much more likely to be excluded and the fact that the Government will not have a full picture of black and ethnic minority students in pupil referral units, in particular, because many of those are in the unregistered independent sector and are not subject to Ofsted inspection. Labour’s Education and Skills Act 2008 provided for the registration and inspection by Ofsted of alternative provision in the independent sector, and plans were in place for that to commence in 2012 until they were put on hold by the coalition Government. Will the Minister say whether the Government will now bring forward and fully implement that legislation?
In conclusion, the emergency funding that has been put in place so far has been welcome, but much more is going to be needed as we reach a crisis point for a generation of disadvantaged children. Underlying structural problems remain unresolved and must be addressed. For the most disadvantaged children, their future wellbeing, prosperity and ability to achieve their aspirations and fulfil their potential are dependent on those programmes and that funding being in place.
The Minister for School Standards (Nick Gibb)
I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Member for Harlow (Robert Halfon), the Committee Chair, and my hon. Friend the Member for Bury South (Christian Wakeford) on opening this debate during these unprecedented times. I echo my hon. Friend’s thanks to all teachers and educational staff for their commitment during the crisis, going that extra mile for their communities, in the words of my hon. Friend the Member for West Bromwich West (Shaun Bailey). That sentiment was shared by other Members during this debate, including my hon. Friend the Member for Keighley (Robbie Moore). I welcome the shadow Education Secretary, the hon. Member for Stretford and Urmston (Kate Green), to her place—it is nice to see her in that role.
When we presented the estimates to the House a year ago, we talked about creating a world-class education system that offers opportunity to everyone, irrespective of their circumstances or where they live. We talked about greater, fairer investment in our education system and our success in raising standards since 2010 that has seen the proportion of pupils in good or outstanding schools increase from 66% in 2010 to 86% in 2019. But we could scarcely have imagined how life would change in 2020 as a result of the pandemic. I share the sense of urgency of my hon. Friend the Member for Bury South in respect of the extraordinary measures that we shall need to recover from the effects of school closure, but I am confident that we are providing the tools and resources for schools to succeed.
Let me set out the overall funding picture. In 2020-21, the Department for Education resource budget is around £72 billion—an increase of £3.5 billion since last year. Of that £72 billion, £57.1 billion is for early years and schools; £14.1 billion is primarily for post-16 and skills; and £400 million is for social care, mobility and disadvantage.
This debate is on closing the disadvantage gap and support for left-behind children. Closing the attainment gap has been the driving force behind all our education reforms since 2010, and since then we have been determined to drive out the dreary culture of low expectations that hold back the ambitions of too many children from poorer backgrounds. That point was reflected in the excellent contributions made by my hon. Friends the Members for Stockton South (Matt Vickers) and for Stoke-on-Trent North (Jonathan Gullis).
We are unapologetic about our commitment to teaching all children to read fluently at the very latest by the time they leave primary school. The Government’s championing of synthetic phonics has improved performance, such that in 2019 some 82% of pupils met the expected standard in the phonics screening check, compared with just 58% when the check was introduced in 2012. During that period—an “ambitious decade”, in the words of my right hon. Friend the Member for East Hampshire (Damian Hinds), one of the contributors to that ambition—school standards have risen, and between 2011 and 2019 the gap between disadvantaged pupils and their peers narrowed by 13% at age 11 and by 9% at age 16, as measured by the gap index. Indeed, most disadvantaged pupils now attend good or outstanding schools and the attainment gap has narrowed at every stage from the early years to 16.
Even before the pandemic, we recognised that there was more to do, as my hon. Friend the Member for Ashfield (Lee Anderson) rightly said. Academies continue to embody our belief that autonomy, combined with strong accountability, is the most effective approach to raising standards. The success of leading multi-academy trusts such as Dixons, Star, Ark and Harris show that geography and background need be no barrier to success and high academic standards.
In 2014, we introduced a more knowledge-rich curriculum across England’s schools, alongside reforms to GCSEs to make them more rigorous. The changes were driven by a desire to ensure that all children should benefit from the same curriculum and high expectations that are common to the best state schools in the country. We saw the proportions of pupils taking the EBacc—English baccalaureate—combination of subjects increase to 40% in 2019. The proportion of pupils entered for at least two science GCSEs has risen from 63% in 2010% to 95.6% today. The proportion taking a foreign language has risen from 40% to 46.7%.
Nevertheless, no one should underestimate the scale of the challenge following the closure of schools in March to all but a small number of pupils. Education recovery lies at the heart of our national mission as we emerge from the disruption caused by the coronavirus epidemic. No child should see their life chances damaged by their being out of school for so long.
Jason McCartney (Colne Valley) (Con)
On this topic, I have two quick questions as co-chair of the all-party group on sixth-form education. Will 16-to-18 providers be included in the covid catch-up package? Will sixth-form colleges and other colleges be able to access free school meals for their students throughout the summer?
Nick Gibb
As my hon. Friend will know, sixth-form colleges are not included in the catch-up premium. We are continuing to work with sixth-form colleges and other post-16 institutions to establish the best way to make up the disruption due to covid-19. On free school meals over the summer, we will provide further details for FE colleges in due course. During term time, FE colleges should continue to provide support to students eligible for free school meals.
We have secured significant additional resources from the Treasury so that every school will have extra funding to respond to this unique challenge. On 19 June, we announced a £1 billion covid catch-up package to directly tackle the impact of lost teaching time, including £650 million directly to schools over the 2020-21 academic year. As my hon. Friend the Member for Bury South intimated, the Education Endowment Foundation will provide evidence-based advice on the most effective approaches to helping children catch up, but the discretion lies at school level, with the teachers and headteachers.
The catch-up package also includes a national tutoring programme worth £350 million to increase access to high-quality tuition for the most disadvantaged young people. This £1 billion package is on top of the three-year £14.4 billion funding increase announced last year and the £2.4 billion pupil premium. We have also committed more than £100 million to supporting remote education. By the end of June, over 202,000 laptops and tablets and over 47,000 4G wireless routers had been delivered or dispatched to academy trusts and local authorities for pupils without the means to access remote education. It was a huge logistical exercise in a demanding global market for these pieces of equipment. To support pupils at home, 40 top teachers came together to create our new virtual school, the Oak National Academy, which offers 180 online lessons a week for all pupils. In response to the hon. Member for Bath (Wera Hobhouse), I should add that £205 million has been redeemed in food vouchers by families and schools.
As we announced last year, we are increasing core schools funding by £2.6 billion this academic year and by £4.8 billion and £7.1 billion by 2021-22 and 2022-23 respectively, compared to 2019-20, including additional funding for children with special needs and disabilities. On top of that, we are providing £1.5 billion per year to fund additional pension costs for teachers. Overall, this will bring the schools budget to £52.2 billion by 2022-23.[Official Report, 15 July 2020, Vol. 678, c. 9MC.]
Our commitment to helping every child to reach their potential applies just as strongly to children with special educational needs and disabilities as to any other child. We know that schools share that commitment, but we recognise concerns raised about the cost of high-needs provision. We have increased overall funding allocations to local authorities year on year, and high-needs funding will be £7.2 billion this year—up from £5 billion in 2013. My hon. Friend the Member for Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner (David Simmonds) was also right to highlight the £1.7 billion of accumulated surpluses in local authority schools.
Creating more school places is a key part of the Government’s plan to ensure that every child has the opportunity of a place at a good school, whatever their background. We have committed £7 billion for school places between 2015 and 2021, on top of the free schools programme. This money means we are on track to have created 1 million school places this decade—the largest increase in school capacity for at least two generations.
Alongside new school places, we have allocated more than £7.4 billion since 2015 to maintain and improve school buildings. On 29 June, the Prime Minister announced over £1 billion to fund the first 50 projects of a new 10-year school rebuilding programme as part of radical plans that will invest in our school and college buildings to help deliver the world-class education and training needed to bring prosperity to our country.
I thank all those who work in the early years sector, who dedicate their time, effort and skills to provide high-quality childcare. Our ambition is to provide equality of opportunity for every child and to support parents and carers. Disadvantaged two-year-olds are entitled to at least 15 hours of free early education each week, and over 1 million children have benefited from this since we introduced the programme in September 2013. In addition, in 2017 we introduced the 30-hours entitlement for working parents of three and four-year-olds, and in January 2020 some 345,000 three and four-year-olds benefited from a 30-hours place—an increase on the previous year.
This has been a good debate, and today’s estimates are a reflection of the country’s commitment to education and the key priority that it is for this Government. Since 2010, most children are now attending good or outstanding schools. The attainment gap between disadvantaged pupils and their peers has narrowed at all stages. A record proportion of disadvantaged students are going to university, and we have a world-class curriculum and ambitions for world-class technical education.
The effects of the current epidemic will be felt across society for a considerable time. It was right that we moved rapidly to secure a massive one-off investment in our schools to tackle lost time in education and to foster a greater focus on proven approaches so that all pupils can receive the education that they have a right to expect.
Christian Wakeford
I thank all Members from both sides of the House for their contributions. I find myself in a very unusual position in that I am actually in agreement with the Lib Dems—in particular, with the hon. Member for Bath (Wera Hobhouse) on free school meals. I, too, supported Marcus Rashford’s campaign, and I refer her to my opinion piece in The House magazine. I also fully agree with the hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Tim Farron) on SEND funding. There needs to be a greater focus on that; we cannot go back to business as usual. In my opinion, 26 weeks for an EHCP is far too long, and we need to look at refocusing so that the child and family are truly at the centre of the process.
I completely agree with my right hon. Friend the Member for East Hampshire (Damian Hinds) that we all need to work together—Government Members, Opposition Members, local authorities, teachers and unions—to ensure that all schools can go back in September and that we focus on educating our children once again.
My hon. Friend the Member for Mansfield (Ben Bradley) made a valuable point about skills for life, which he has championed for a long time in this place. I look forward to working with him on that. He has also focused on another disadvantaged group—working-class boys, who far too often slip through the cracks. We need to tackle that issue.
My hon. Friend the Member for Stockton South (Matt Vickers) mentioned DIY teaching. Once again, I put on record my thanks to all the parents out there who have taken on the role of DIY teachers. My own experience so far has included being headbutted by my daughter in the middle of a conference call. She also unplugged my router during the Education Committee to the point that I could not get back into the Committee. It has been a very trying time, so I thank all parents out there.
My hon. Friends the Members for Stoke-on-Trent North (Jonathan Gullis) and for Wantage (David Johnston) are doing great work on social mobility in the Committee, and I look forward to working with them further in this regard. I will come to a close very quickly, Mr Speaker.
We have talked about targeted intervention. If I had one ask from the Minister, it would be truly to target that intervention at the early years, because if we get a young child’s education correct early on, we set up their educational career for the rest of their childhood. If we get it right early, we get it right in its entirety.
Question deferred until Thursday 9 July at Five o’clock (Standing Order No. 54).
HM Revenue and Customs
Coronavirus: Job-Support Schemes
(4 years, 5 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mel Stride (Central Devon) (Con)
May I begin by thanking the Backbench Business Committee for allocating time for this important debate? I say that it is an important debate because, of course, Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs is seeking an additional £52 billion as part of the main estimates, those being attributable to the principal job support measures that the Government have brought forward—about £42 billion for the furlough scheme and a further £10 billion for the self-employed income support scheme. Those are vast sums. Even as a proportion of the entire amount that the Government are spending to support businesses and individuals and the economy during this period, those are very sizeable sums indeed. As we know, the amount that has gone into supporting those on furlough is around the equivalent, on an annualised basis, of the day-to-day spending of our national health service.
I think that, in the round, the Chancellor should be applauded for having come out with these measures to support the economy, individuals and businesses, and for both the scale of what he and the Government have delivered and the pace with which it has been delivered. It is important for me to express on the record my satisfaction with both those points.
However, when we come forward with measures of that scale and at that pace, it is almost inevitable that there will be hard edges to policy and, indeed, gaps through which people fall. There are people whom one would normally want to have support who have not yet received that support. That has been the focus of the considerable amount of work that the Treasury Committee has undertaken, with 12 inquiry sessions and a first call for evidence that received a near-record 16,000 responses from self-employed people and those working in businesses up and down the land who are very concerned about these gaps in provision.
I shall focus briefly on two groups in particular. The first is those who are self-employed and choose to work through a limited liability company, paying themselves both by way of pay-as-you-earn income and through dividends received through that company. The problem arises when it comes to calculating the furlough entitlement for those individuals: it is based solely on their PAYE income and does not take into account in any way the income, albeit self-employment income, that they receive by way of dividend.
Of course, when we had the head of HMRC before our Committee, we asked him about that. I have to say that Jim Harra is a very capable head of HMRC; I worked with Jim when I had strategic responsibility for HMRC as a Minister at the Treasury some time ago, and he is a very capable man. However, he did not give the answer that the Committee wanted to hear on that occasion. He did not allude to the problem being anything to do with the expense involved; he talked about the administrative difficulties of differentiating between income received by self-employed people by way of dividend and other income received by way of dividend, perhaps in respect of passive investments, for example.
I recognise that there is a complication there. However, the question has to be: is it an insurmountable complication? Our Committee’s investigations suggest that it is not. HMRC could adopt an approach of basically paying out on the furlough scheme, having a clawback arrangement in place in the event that mistakes are made, and perhaps having a penalty regime alongside that, first to discourage erroneous claims and secondly to help fund the activity involved in policing those arrangements.
The reality is that we estimate that there are some 700,000 people in that situation who, for the last four months, have not had the support, or the full level of support, that many millions of others up and down the country have received. That cannot be right. It cannot be right because the Government, when they set out their strategy to resolve and tackle the crisis, stated that right at the heart of their mission would be fairness towards individuals and groups. I do not believe that that has been demonstrated in the case of the 700,000 individuals who are not getting the support that they should be.
The second group are the new starters: those who took up employment typically around March this year. There was originally a deadline or cut-off point of 28 February for the receipt of furlough—people had to have been employed prior to that date. That was then shifted, for which the Committee was duly grateful, to 19 March. Yet there will still be many individuals who joined businesses before 19 March but, because there was not an electronic communication regarding that employment between the employer and HMRC prior to 19 March, they do not qualify for furlough support. The Committee believes the Government should look more closely at that. Our recommendation in that respect has been to push the date back to the end of March.
There are a number of other categories of employed and self-employed, such as freelancers, those on short-term contracts and many others, who are not receiving the support we believe they should be entitled to. If we total all of them up, our estimate is that certainly more than 1 million people are falling through the gaps. There are others who estimate that figure to be nearer 2 million or 3 million people.
Steve Brine (Winchester) (Con)
As ever, I am listening very carefully to my right hon. Friend. I have followed the work of his Committee and the very sound things he has said on this matter. He alluded to this, but the heart of this issue, whether it relates to people who are new to self-employment, new to employment or take the majority of their employment through dividends from limited companies, is that we made the bad the enemy of the good. The vast majority in this space who missed out on help were not trying anything on; they were just doing their thing as entrepreneurs in the British economy and were then left out. What we should have done was get help to them to do whatever it takes. HMRC, as we both know, is not averse to taking back what it thinks has been wrongly taken. We really should have got help out there and then claimed it back if needed. Does he agree that the two schemes fell down on the universality of doing whatever it takes?
Mel Stride
I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention and I think he is entirely right. It is simply the case that those who choose to take their income through limited companies by way of dividend are operating entirely within the rules. I do not think there is anybody, HMRC included, who would dispute that, and that lies at the heart of why they should be treated fairly.
Perhaps I could just address two further points in relation to the Government support schemes and ask the Minister if he could comment on them in his wind-up. The first relates to lockdowns. One has already occurred in Leicester, but there may be further lockdowns, unfortunately, across the country. They will be localised, and it is very sensible that they should occur. Undoubtedly, however, they will impose very considerable further economic and social hardship on communities. I have written to my right hon. Friend the Chancellor to ask him what measures he may be considering bringing forward to provide further assistance to those communities in those circumstances. It occurs to me, for example, that the Minister might like to comment on the specific suggestion that businesses in such an area might have more flexible access to the furloughing of staff and be freed from some of the current restrictions in that respect. I would be interested in my right hon. Friend the Financial Secretary’s comments on that.
Secondly, in Treasury questions this morning a number of Members asked whether there would be some kind of targeted support when the wholesale nature of the support schemes ends at the end of October. I think the Chancellor is signalling that he is quite resistant to that. I would want to push back on that and say that we should keep our powder dry and wait and see. The Chancellor rightly said that people talk about sectors but often do not explain exactly which sectors. Part of the reason for that is that it is not clear at this stage, because things are unfolding in such an uncertain manner and it is not absolutely clear where the different parts of the economy will be in autumn. However, I think it only prudent that the Treasury keeps a very close eye on the sectors that are still damaged and inhibited as a result of social distancing, but, critically, still have the ability to grow and thrive once we come through the crisis.
That is the kind of business where I think some targeting of these schemes would be appropriate.
I notice from the clock that I have reached 10 minutes, Mr Deputy Speaker, so in line with your earlier exhortation, I will conclude. I thank the Backbench Business Committee for giving us this opportunity. I ask the Minister please to look closely at the gaps that the Committee has identified. Finally, I wish the Treasury well in the enormously important and difficult decisions that it will have to take in the weeks and months that follow.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)
As was announced at the beginning of the estimates debate, the time limit on Back-Bench contributions is four minutes.
Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)
I thank the right hon. Member for Central Devon (Mel Stride) and his Committee for their work on this issue. I represent a constituency—indeed, part of a borough—that is the epitome of the gig economy. That is an economy and style of working that this Government have helped to foster, with people working in different ways, and on different pay and conditions. It includes everything from people on zero-hours contracts to sole directors of companies, from people on repeated short-term contracts to people who are 100% freelance. Although the Government’s measures have included support for quite a lot of freelance workers, they have excluded, as the right hon. Gentleman has said, at least 700,000—if not, as his Committee estimates, a million—people, who are not supported by the schemes.
I have raised the matter repeatedly in this House, and we have had assurances from the Government that they have introduced a world-beating, groundbreaking set of initiatives to support people who are on furlough and self-employed. They keep parading that as though it were the answer to the question we are asking. Let me be absolutely clear: we could talk a lot about that, but the right hon. Gentleman has covered that territory and I do not need to repeat what he has said. We are talking today about the people who have not had a penny of income for the past four months. For around 100 days, they have had no money coming in.
I completely agree with the hon. Member for Winchester (Steve Brine). Those are not people who have been trying it on, chancing it or thinking that they can avoid tax by some clever dodge; they are hard-working people who have used mechanisms that have been promoted not just by the Government, but by Governments over time, and that have been particularly supported by this Government. They were told, “We will do whatever it takes,” but when push came to shove, they were left out in the cold.
I will give some examples. I came across a shocking example of somebody who worked as an occupational therapist in the NHS—not employed by the NHS, but delivering NHS services—and who was required to go into a personal service company to make sure that they had the required limited liability insurance. That reason drives many individuals to set up such companies. It is either that, or their house or other assets will be on the line—if they have them. I want to be really clear that most of the people who have contacted me about the matter are not on big incomes.
I will take another sector as an example. People who work in broadcasting and television are often on short contract after short contract. They are employed, but only for short timeframes, so they do not qualify for this support. Others who were freelance and employed, but the balance was wrong, got short-changed on this deal.
I think there is a technical challenge with sole directors of companies that is more difficult to solve, notwithstanding what I have said about many people being driven to that route. However, when people have records with HMRC—when they have paid tax while on short contracts or through self-employment, even if not for the length of time stipulated by the Government—it is not beyond the wit of this House, this Government, man or woman to work out how to deliver a solution for them. If they have a tax record, the reverse engineering that was done for other self-employed and employed people could surely be done for members of this group.
I urge the Minister, who has told me that he is reflecting on this, not to reflect but to act. After 100 days, where are people going to find work now? They need a solution, and they need support.
Steve Brine
Several constituents have said to me, “I will be quite honest with you; I did not need the help. I was not able to get any, but I did not need it.” The Government may have feared that everyone who earned the majority of their income from dividends would suddenly come forward and add a huge burden to the self-employment income support scheme, whereas the reality was that we could have trusted people. Yesterday, Barratt displayed a huge amount of corporate responsibility by saying that it would pay back the money that it had claimed through the furlough scheme. The fact is that a lot of people out there did not need the support, and they might not have come forward and claimed it. Perhaps we should have trusted them a little more and been a bit more flexible with the scheme.
Meg Hillier
The hon. Gentleman raises an interesting point. One of the issues that I have been looking at in the Public Accounts Committee is the fraud and error in this. I am absolutely in favour of the schemes that have been proposed. I am also keen that the Government come down hard on anyone who has tried to break the rules—I think we agree on that.
It is really important to remember that a lot of these people are not on big incomes—they have absolutely nothing. Because of the high price of housing in London, they are often renting properties, and they are at their wits’ end in how they can manage. This is devastating for them, and these are the people who will be the engine of any economic uplift. We also need to recognise that if we are going to foster this type of economy and working, there needs to be a safety net for people. They did not choose to take this risk. Someone working in broadcasting does not choose to be on a short-term contract; that is just the way the industry works. And do not get me started on the implications of the IR35 reforms. We have had that debate elsewhere, and it is one for another day, but I hope that others in the Chamber agree with me on that.
We need a solution. These people cannot live on fresh air. They cannot keep going on nothing. In many cases, their income will not magically increase in October or anywhere between now and then or next spring, especially if they work in the hospitality sector. I really hope that we will get some answers from the Minister today, and once again, I applaud the work of the Treasury Committee in highlighting these very real issues for many of my constituents.
Mr Steve Baker (Wycombe) (Con)
I begin by referring Members to my declared shareholding in Glint Pay. I thank HMRC for what it has done to put these schemes in place. It is the most extraordinary achievement that it has managed to put in place the coronavirus job retention scheme and the self-employment income support scheme. Normally, such things would take months and years and often be marred by IT failures and delays, and yet HMRC staff have successfully delivered this. I would far rather that they had successfully delivered than failed and left everyone without support. It is the most tremendous achievement, and the staff involved deserve our praise for what they have done, but I think we can see why it normally takes months and possibly years to deliver such schemes, because that time is required to deal with what have become hard edges.
Before I go any further, I would like to put into context the scale of the spending that we are talking about. If we look at page 355 of the estimates, there is £52 billion listed for covid-19. When I look up and down the detailed entries for the Department for Work and Pensions, I can see only one sum that is higher than the covid provisions for HMRC. Rounding to the nearest billion, the figures listed are £33 billion for universal credit inside the welfare cap, £13 billion for personal independence payments, £17 billion for housing benefit inside the welfare cap, just £5 billion for universal credit outside the welfare cap and £102 billion for the state pension outside the welfare cap. To see £52 billion appear in the estimates for HMRC is quite extraordinary, and I will return to that figure in my concluding remarks.
Mel Stride
My hon. Friend is making an extremely important point. These are just the main estimates, not the supplementary estimates, and the schemes have been extended and modified since those figures were put together. Does he agree that it would be useful to hear from the Minister what additional funds might be sought through the supplementary estimates?
Mr Baker
Yes. I hope that the Minister will give us a detailed explanation of how these figures break down, because the figure to which I just referred is different from the one on the Order Paper. I refer Members to page 357 for the resource to cash reconciliation, which I am sure my right hon. Friend will be fully able to break down in detail if he wishes to.
I want to come on to some of the things that the Chair of the Public Accounts Committee said. In my constituency, there are plenty of people who, in one way or another, work in the arts and are in quite desperate straits. To reinforce her point about tronc, it has been a real disappointment to me that we have not dealt with the issue of people in the hospitality sector receiving perhaps half their income through tips, for which HMRC has PAYE information. I will never forget one particular email from a new father who was shocked to discover that he would be not on 80% of his normal pay but 40%. That is a dramatic difference, and it is because HMRC and the Government have not taken into account tronc payments, which they should. The freelancers issue is important and profound. On dividends and directors, we should recognise that sometimes we are talking about make-up artists, for example, who are paid through dividends.
Mr Baker
I am grateful to the hon. Lady for agreeing. There are real issues of justice and equity at stake here. I remember reading my right hon. Friend the Financial Secretary’s 2008 book “Compassionate Economics” and it is a wonderful book that I recommend to anyone. I know that he is a compassionate man and that these issues will weigh upon him, so it is no way a criticism that I raise such things, but I observe that the edges here are awfully hard.
In the estimates document, HMRC refers to its policy partnership with the Treasury, so I encourage HMRC and Ministers to work together to see across the spectrum of issues—I do not have the time to go through them all—in the Treasury Committee’s report to see whether more can be done, even at this late stage, to help those who have been without help altogether. I place particular emphasis on furlough in relation to airlines and workers at airports. Such groups are very much represented in my constituency—west of Heathrow as we are—and people need help there.
My final point, and the reason for declaring my interest, is that the obvious and most dangerous harm from coronavirus is, of course, that it has killed tens of thousands of people, but well down the hierarchy of problems is that it has taught us all to be socialists. All of us have learned to live at one another’s expense, often ultimately at the generosity of the Bank of England and the creation of easy money. I say to Ministers that, yes, it was necessary to do this, but please do get us out of this mess.
Ms Angela Eagle (Wallasey) (Lab)
The coronavirus pandemic has ushered in an economic emergency of gargantuan proportions. The estimates show that £42 billion will be spent on the coronavirus job retention scheme and £10 billion on the self-employment income support scheme. These are very large numbers, but size is not everything, and questions need to be asked about the effectiveness of the packages the Chancellor has announced. Is this massive resource being spent in the most effective way? Is it being spent fairly? Is it helping those who need it most? Is it creating the optimal conditions for recovery when the pandemic finally recedes? The jury is still out on all those questions.
A lifeboat has been launched in the shape of the furlough scheme and the grants or loans made available as the pandemic took hold. It is a leaky and inadequate lifeboat that has prevented the economy going under completely, but it will all come to nothing unless a proper rescue operation is launched to bring the economy back to safety. The Chancellor must make certain that his economic response does not mirror the Prime Minister’s pre-lockdown dithering and organisational incompetence, which is likely to have cost tens of thousands of lives and exacerbated the economic damage wrought by the pandemic.
The Treasury Committee has published a report that deals with the gaps and unfairnesses in the Government’s schemes. We point out that over a million people have been arbitrarily excluded from the scope of various schemes, even though their livelihoods have been affected by the requirement to lock down and there is no reasonable excuse for leaving them out. As the Federation of Small Businesses pointed out, if those who pay themselves in dividends and who have been excluded from accessing support go out of business, they will take a great many employees on PAYE down with them.
We await the formal Treasury response to the Committee’s detailed points, but when questioned in this place, Ministers tend to boast about the size and cost of the schemes they have introduced without addressing the specific issues.
Meg Hillier
I want to go back to the point about people who had to use personal service company set-ups in order to get liability insurance. Does my hon. Friend agree that it is a crazy system that led to that behaviour, which in turn has led to people going without money?
Ms Eagle
I absolutely agree. This crisis has forced us to look at how our labour market works, and we need to come back to that very strongly indeed.
Tomorrow, I want to hear that the Chancellor is doing something to help the freelancers who power much of our cultural industry but who have thus far been excluded from the help available. I want to see him announce a strategic sectoral approach to job retention to ensure that the economy thrives. The OECD estimates that the UK could suffer the worst covid-19 related damage among the advanced economies, with a decline of 11% in national income and UK unemployment rising to 9% this year. Despite the labour market having been sheltered from a complete meltdown by the furlough scheme, there are ominous signs of a huge strain like a dam waiting to burst. The recent announcement of many thousands of job losses in retail, aviation and leisure could be just the tip of the iceberg if the Chancellor does not take decisive action.
The Government must now switch quickly to a more strategic and tailored response that will enable stabilisation and economic recovery. Certain sectors will continue to be affected because of social distancing rules, and they must be helped. Local authorities and schools, for whom the Chancellor promised he would do “whatever it takes” to fight the virus, should have their costs fully reimbursed. To date, they have received back only a third of what they have spent.
The Chancellor exhorting people to spend, spend, spend, as he did at the weekend, risks entrenching the old debt-fuelled consumer economy in place and squandering the chance to lay the foundations of greener, fairer, more sustainable future prosperity. The Prime Minister blaming everyone but himself, exhorting us to “build, build, build” and trumpeting a Roosevelt-like new deal while promising to spend 0.2% of UK GDP, whereas President Roosevelt spent 40% of US GDP, would be a farcical response to our predicament if we were not in such a perilous situation.
Mr Baker
I remind the hon. Lady that she stood at the Dispatch Box 10 years ago accusing us of being Hooverite in our liberalism. Although that was historically questionable, it is where she was 10 years ago. Surely she must feel that the references to Roosevelt are an improvement.
Ms Eagle
Clearly somebody in the Conservative party has moved on, but when we look at the difference between 0.2% of national GDP and 40% of national GDP, we can see that a few lessons are yet to be learned.
Coming back to a point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Hackney South and Shoreditch (Meg Hillier), the labour market is key. Many vulnerable people in the labour market have been left with nothing as a result of the effects of coronavirus. Many in the labour market have also been put at great risk of contracting the virus, and perhaps have to think about a choice between earning and being ill, which is why we need to look more closely at how our labour market is regulated—and crucially, at the 46% cut to the Health and Safety Executive, which enforces labour market rules. The Prime Minister exhorting us to “build, build, build” is all very well, but it would be a farcical response to our predicament if the country were not in such a perilous position; the comparison is ridiculous. The Chancellor and the Prime Minister need to drop the hype and begin to deliver. Our future economic prosperity depends on it.
Owen Thompson (Midlothian) (SNP)
A few months ago, the Chancellor spoke directly to those who had lost their livelihoods overnight. He said:
“To all those at home right now, anxious about the days ahead, I say this: you will not face this alone.”
Those were reassuring words, and they were backed up by a Government promise to do “whatever it takes” to keep the people of these isles healthy and financially secure. I heard no caveat at that time that included, “unless you are director of your own company”, “unless you are a freelancer” or “unless you are a contractor”.
The warm words do not ring true for those still struggling to keep their head above water. The Trussell Trust reported a staggering 89% rise in the need for emergency food parcels in April, so “whatever it takes” is clearly a lot more than what is being provided. It is not just a few on the periphery of the Chancellor’s vision who are missing out on this vital support. There is a roll call of people who have been forgotten that it would take a pair of blinkers to avoid seeing. Excluded UK estimates that around 3 million are missing out—some 10% of the workforce. Every constituency across the UK will have its own heartbreaking examples of hard-working people who somehow did not qualify for the schemes. These are individuals whose lives have been devastated. They are being let down by a Government who are not meeting their commitment to them. They include the newly self-employed, some of whom left good jobs over a year ago to invest and build their own businesses, but whose income collapsed when covid-19 took root; small limited companies that pay themselves partly through dividends; and freelancers who work multiple jobs.
When someone’s income is the wrong mix of self-employment or short PAYE contracts, neither scheme will help and the computer simply says no. That is the fate of many freelancers in the creative sector, which is so crucial to the economy around the Lothians. Those people do not always make a lot for themselves, but they contribute massively to the communities, our culture and the wider economy.
At the time of the launch of the self-employment income support scheme, the Chancellor said that 95% of those who were majority self-employed would be covered, and that most of those who would not be covered were high earners, but the evidence from countless cases suggests that simply is not the case. There are employees struggling who are not included in the furlough schemes because they picked the wrong time to change their jobs and seasonal workers whose bosses simply did not get the paperwork done in time. UKHospitality told the Treasury Committee that somewhere between 350,000 and 500,000 people in that sector were potentially missing out because they had not had their first payslip before the end of March.
There is growing unease among those who were furloughed that support will start to be tapered before they can build some earnings again and that their job will be on the line, too. We cannot simply shrug our shoulders and say “Too bad, mate”, to all those issues, blaming the complexities of the rules and saying that there are some who may try to bend them. Yes, there are challenges to making the system work, but in an emergency such as this it is the role of Government to put the people first. There is no excuse for missing anyone out.
Now is the time to finesse, improve and extend support for small and medium-sized businesses and freelancers, who will be more than willing to repay the Government’s efforts in their taxes over future years. Withdrawing support at a crucial time would be an economic disaster.
Fairness and equal treatment should be at the heart of action from HMRC, which is why I must mention my great disappointment that the Government refused to review the unfair application of the loan charge and to stop the IR35 tax law changes from pressing ahead. IR35 introduces yet another group of zero-hours employees. The Chancellor has listened to many of these concerns, and I know he has taken steps to resolve some of the issues in the past. I commend him for those efforts, but I urge him not only to keep listening, but to take action.
Judith Cummins (Bradford South) (Lab)
In this debate on the HMRC estimates, I will focus on the potential economic effect of local lockdowns and the need for a flexible local furlough scheme and wider economic support for affected areas. As has been widely reported, Bradford has had a higher than average rate of infection in recent weeks, but I am pleased to say—the whole House will be pleased to hear this—that it has been coming down. However, the risk of things worsening again is very real.
As a city, Bradford has a higher proportion of people who work in high-risk jobs: as key workers in health and social care, in retail and in the gig economy. Out of 198,000 employees in the district, 75% have never worked from home. These people are sadly at higher risk of catching the virus, but they also need more economic support in the event of a local lockdown. Many of my constituents do not have the luxury of vast savings to fall back on. We are not talking here about decisions on whether to take a holiday, but real dilemmas about how people will feed their families.
The furlough scheme and the self-employed income support scheme need the flexibility to deal with local lockdowns. If people in a certain area are told by Government to stay at home, it is only right that they can be furloughed during that period. That must include people who work in an area under lockdown, as well as those who live there. I urge Ministers to bring forward proposals on that now, before it is too late. We urgently need more information from the Government on how local lockdowns will work and what support and information will be provided.
The local data has been too slow to come to local authorities, and the criteria used to determine whether somewhere should go into or come out of lockdown are unclear. Clearer information from Public Health England and the Department of Health and Social Care on local infection rates would also allow areas to plan their responses. The Government should publish local figures on test and trace, so that we can see where the system is not working as well as it should and take steps to improve it.
Importantly, the Government should take proactive measures to prevent places such as Bradford needing to go into a second lockdown. This might include more funding for the council for public health outreach as well as financial incentives for people to do the right thing. The economic impact of a second lockdown on a local area will be huge. The Government must be clear about what financial support they will provide in these circumstances to protect jobs and livelihoods, and to help with local economic recoveries. A failure to act will cause economic devastation for many and, ultimately, by undermining the public health advice, cost lives.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)
Thank you for taking only three minutes, because that is where we are now going in order to get as many in as possible. I call Patricia Gibson, with a three-minute limit.
Patricia Gibson (North Ayrshire and Arran) (SNP)
The Government’s action to save jobs through the job retention scheme was welcome, but there is a growing chorus across this House that too many have fallen through the cracks—the newly employed, the contract workers, the freelancers. This is deeply unfair because these people have been passed over, they have been excluded and they have been abandoned. Of course, whatever system we put in place, this was always going to happen. That is why there should have been a universal system of support for all workers affected. That way, truly no one would have been left behind.
However, there is still time for the Chancellor to put these support mechanisms in place, and we urge him to do so. For example, we urge him to put in place an emergency basic payment to all those who have been left behind. If he does not think that is appropriate or suitable, let us hear his way of dealing with this, because doing nothing is no longer an option. The whole point of the job retention scheme was to save jobs, but if this furlough support is withdrawn too early, on 1 August, and rolled back, it will fail in that goal. The task to save jobs must be completed: it must be allowed to do its job and save tens of thousands of jobs for our constituents.
Of course, the other thing we can do is to convert the loans that businesses have taken out into grants. I petitioned the Chancellor on this very issue in early April, and I am still to receive an answer. The driving force in everything that is done must be about saving jobs and saving our economy. The Bank of England has said that the debt incurred through this crisis must be treated as war debt, and that sounds eminently sensible to me, because in a way this is a war. It has been a war on our health and it has been a war on our economy.
What we need is for the Government to throw every available tool at their disposal at defeating this enemy. We need targeted support for the aviation, tourism and aerospace sector. We need targeted support for our islands, which face a real threat of depopulation. The islands are in a unique position: 300,000 people in the UK live on an island, and they are hit with the double whammy—not just the crippling of our tourism industry, but, as easing takes place, social distancing on the ferries to access islands will create further difficulties for them.
We know that UK Government borrowing will reach £340 billion this year, and quantitative easing will reach £745 billion. Scotland has received a total of £10 billion, but where is the rest of Scotland’s share? What Scotland needs is more effective tools at its disposal to take charge of the situation for ourselves. We need greater powers to deal with this economic tsunami, because that is what it is. It is an economic tsunami, and it is threatening to engulf us, so we need more action, more support for our constituents and more work to save more jobs.
Daisy Cooper (St Albans) (LD)
This morning, almost a quarter of all MPs—about 150 of us—joined a Zoom call for the first meeting of the all-party parliamentary group on the 3 million workers who have been excluded from Government schemes.
Like many others in this House, the Minister will be aware that I have been quite persistent in raising the issue of the plight of limited company directors. On 1 May, I tabled a written question with a very specific, concrete proposal from Directors UK, asking the Treasury if it would consider the idea that limited company directors could submit dividend certificates through an online portal linked to HMRC’s self-assessment process. I was pleased when I got the response five days later, because it said that he would be reviewing that proposal.
A further seven days later, the Minister held a call with a number of Members of this House on the launch of the self-employed system, and again, when I raised it, he agreed to look at this specific proposal about the use of dividend certificates. A further five days later, I wrote again to the Minister, following up on that call and gently reminding him that I was looking forward to receiving a response. A further eight days later, in despair, I wrote to the Chancellor asking about the same issue, as well as many others who have been excluded from the schemes.
A further eight days later, on 3 June, we had another phone call when I raised this issue once again, and asked explicitly for a written response on why the dividend certificates idea had not been considered and why we could not get an answer. Much later, on 23 June, I got a response from a Treasury official—it was a response, but not an answer, and said simply that under current reporting mechanisms, it is not possible for HMRC to distinguish between dividends that are derived from an individual’s own company and those from other sources. It went on to state that targeting additional support for those who pay their wages via dividends is much more complex than existing income support schemes. It seems that the Treasury has thrown its hands up in the air and stuck the issue in the “too hard” basket. With all due respect, the Government must do better. It is clear that the Chair of the Treasury Committee, the right hon. Member for Central Devon (Mel Stride), and many other Members agree.
Here we are, with directors of limited companies, new employees and the newly self-employed, all of whom feel utterly abandoned by the Government who have labelled them as “too complicated” to support. That is also having an enormous impact on people’s mental health, and many cannot see a way out. They are spending their life savings, and are worried for their livelihoods and their homes. I have been trying hard for two months to get an answer to the specific, concrete proposal about the use of dividend certificates. I now ask again, for a sixth time, whether we may have an answer to that specific proposal, whether it can be used technically, and, if it cannot, for an explanation as to why it will not work so that Directors UK and others can come back with a new idea.
Chris Stephens (Glasgow South West) (SNP)
It is a pleasure to take part in this debate, and I join Members across the House in representing the excluded in the United Kingdom. I am fascinated by the view that those who have chosen to adhere to Government advice and set up limited companies are currently being treated as if they are some sort of Mr Bill Gates. Those who decided to set up such companies are not all a Bill Gates. They were told to do this. Indeed, the advice they were given was to create such an arrangement for financial security, yet they now find that there is no financial security for them. I join other hon. Members in hoping that the Government will address that issue.
The Government must also address the issue of who is self-employed and who is not. They have had the Taylor review for three years but they have sat on it, and far too many people in the economy are directly employed yet designated as self-employed. They are also missing out on Government support, particularly those who, over the past couple of years, have found themselves directly employed and then moved to being self-employed. I hope the Government will consider that area.
I want to offer huge thanks to the HMRC staff who have performed heroics to ensure that companies have been paid through the various support schemes. We have seen the benefits of home working, and many of those employed by HMRC have been working from home and gone the extra mile to ensure that companies are paid. What is the thanks they get? They get a notice from HMRC, notifying them that they could very well find themselves in a redundancy situation. That is an absurdity. HMRC went ahead with its office closure programme, but we have now seen the benefits of home working. Why should someone who has been asked to travel 100 miles to their next workplace be faced with a redundancy notice when this crisis, this pandemic, has proven the benefits of working from home to keep the economic wheels turning? I hope that the Minister will respond to that disgraceful treatment of HMRC staff. Perhaps instead they should be given the reward they deserve, which is an above-inflation interim pay rise, as that is exactly what the civil service deserves in these times.
Stephen Farry (North Down) (Alliance)
I want to start by acknowledging the scale of the intervention from the Government with regard to the self-employed support scheme and the job retention scheme, and also to recognise the speed with which they moved to put those in place. But what could have been a universally good and welcome story has been somewhat soured by the gaps that have been identified. I do accept that gaps were inevitable, especially with something that was put in place so quickly: that is not the criticism. Where there is valid criticism is in the fact that many solutions have been put forward over the intervening months, and these have been essentially pushed back without any real consideration of those who have been dismissed. Whenever we write to the Treasury or HMRC, we tend to get the schemes explained back to us when we are actually asking for flexibilities around them. We know the rules around them already—that was not exactly the point.
Many Members have raised concerns about this on the Floor of the House. All the Opposition parties have spoken to the Prime Minister behind the scenes and received warm words but no action. It is important that we pay tribute to groups like ExcludedUK who have been campaigning on this issue. The fact that we now have the all-party parliamentary group on ExcludedUK established under the leadership of the hon. Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross (Jamie Stone), with 180 Members signed up to it for its first meeting, is an indication of the scale, right across this House, of the concern around these ongoing situations. I am certainly pleased to have become the secretary of that group, and declare that for the record.
The Chair of the Treasury Committee, the right hon. Member for Central Devon (Mel Stride), has outlined the different categories, so there is no need to repeat that, but I do want to pay tribute to the work of the Committee and its report. Some of the gaps that have been identified are around young entrepreneurs and freelancers. They are the future of the economy, and we have a Government who want to encourage entrepreneurship, in theory at the very least. People are offended by being labelled as potential fraud risks. There are also issues around access to finance, given that some of them depend on different types of finance rather than through the traditional banks. There is also an issue emerging around 14 July as the qualifying date for the second phase of the self-employment scheme, which ignores the fact that some people have not been able to work through June but are only now, through the relaxation of the rules, going back into work.
I also want to put on record the issue around Northern Ireland driving licences and the use of Irish passports for registration. While a workaround solution was found in that regard, some people from Northern Ireland have had to jump through more hoops than others, and that reflects some of the problems of putting the Good Friday agreement identity rights into law in the UK as a whole. We need to fix the gaps and extend the future prospects of the key areas of aerospace, tourism and the leisure.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
I begin by thanking the Government for the steps that they took at the outset of this pandemic. There are many shops on my high streets and many businesses in my constituency that would have not been open today were it not for the grants and for the staff receiving the furlough. I believe in giving credit, so I give credit to the Minister and to the Government for all the help that they have given. I want the Minister to remember that that is my starting point, because I am not criticising but I want to highlight a number of issues.
With reference to the self-employed income support scheme, my constituent Alan Petticrew ran into difficulties due to the fact that trading profits must be no more than £50,000 and at least equal to non-trading income for 2018-19. Alan’s trading profits were less than that so he received no assistance at all, despite the fact that he had overheads and creditors. The Government can and should make provision for limited company directors. It is not right that anyone who has suffered financially as a result of the public health measures should be left out of support. It is not right for the economic recovery either. The UK relies on an army of limited company directors and freelancers for economic growth. They already face more uncertainty, risks and lower levels of protection than other workers, and the recovery will be slower if they are not about.
Carla Lockhart (Upper Bann) (DUP)
The Treasury has done a magnificent job, but ultimately Martin Lewis has summed it up: a number of people have not benefited, including people who have changed jobs, started a business in the past 18 months, been freelance, directors or agency workers, or had an employer who did not really care.
Jim Shannon
I thank my hon. Friend for her intervention. She is absolutely right. That will be reflected in all our constituencies across the whole of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
My next example is that of our fishing sector. A self-employed fisherman whose average earnings were just above the threshold for the self-employed scheme was not entitled to any financial support from the scheme. The guidelines should have been amended, as the scheme pay-out was capped at £2,500 and seemed discriminatory in that it only offered assistance to the self-employed earning under £50,000. This was also not in line with the PAYE scheme. The Government stated that this affected only a small percentage of people—it is just unfortunate that many of those people happen to be in my constituency and are my constituents. Not everyone who was employed during the tax year 2018-19 but has since become self-employed qualified, so they had no recourse to wages. That was despite being employed and switching to being self-employed. Again, the issues are very clear. Some people’s income through employment was more than their income through self-employment because they decided to become self-employed part of the way through the year 2018-19, and they did not qualify. Again, I believe that is very unfortunate and unfair.
The Chancellor set the date for the furlough scheme at 19 March rather than 31 March, but that excluded thousands of people, like my constituent Carl. Most companies end their financial year on 31 March, and many like Carl take their annual salary then. The date that the Chancellor set excluded my constituent and many others from the scheme. It is more than a case of semantics.
The discretionary aspect of the furlough scheme also led to difficulty with small business employers who were able to keep their shops open. With a third of staff asking to be furloughed, those who owned the shops had to work six days on 18-hour shifts in an attempt to keep their businesses afloat and their staff happy. On the other hand, there were employers—we all know about them—who refused to furlough when companies on mainland UK did. Again, the guidance could have been a wee bit better.
The fact is that we are facing the worst recession in living memory, and brighter and better minds than mine have come up with steps that could be taken. I put forward the suggestion, which has been mooted in the press and elsewhere, of spending vouchers for certain British businesses on my high streets in Newtownards, Comber, Ballynahinch and Saintfield. That would help many businesses and suppliers in the local economy.
I thank the Minister and the Government for what they have done. Please continue sowing, and we will reap the bounce back from the recession much more quickly. If the things that I and others have talked about are done, our businesses will be in a better place.
Alison Thewliss (Glasgow Central) (SNP)
I want to start with two quotes:
“Everyone in this country has benefited one way or another from what we have been able to do,”
and
“everyone, no matter where they are, has access to more support than they did before this crisis began.”
The Chancellor’s answer to me this morning have rung very hollow to those who have missed out on the coronavirus job retention scheme and the self-employment income support scheme.
My Twitter timeline is full of people infuriated at being left high and dry by the UK Government. Groups campaigning on this matter include ExcludedUK, New Starter Justice, ForgottenLtd, Forgotten Freelancers, Forgotten PAYE, the maternity petition group, those affected by the £50,000 cliff edge, Women in Film and TV, the Association of Independent Professionals and the Self-Employed, which points out the impact on disabled self-employed workers, the people the hon. Member for Wycombe (Mr Baker) mentioned who are campaigning on tronc, and the Federation of Small Businesses. All those people in all those groups, estimated to number around 3 million, would dispute the Chancellor’s assertion. They have gone for more than 100 days with no income, and there is no prospect of that changing very soon unless the Chancellor acts. As other hon. Members have pointed out, those are ordinary people. During this debate, a taxi driver who lives in my constituency, who has had to live on £380 a month, has been in touch to say that he risks bankruptcy as a result of this. He has bills to pay—he has to pay for his taxi and the rest of his household bills—but has had no income.
I do not dispute that the UK Government’s intervention has been substantial. The right hon. Member for Central Devon (Mel Stride) set out quite well the report that came out of the evidence collected by the Treasury Committee, on which I sit. There are many who have fallen through the gaps. The report states:
“the Government must assist these people if it is to completely fulfil its promise to do whatever it takes to protect people from the economic impact of coronavirus”.
The job retention scheme—furlough—has kept many people in employment. By choosing to roll it up prematurely, the Government undermine the whole objective. Businesses fold, and people lose their jobs and are pushed on to benefits, if they are eligible for them at all. There has been a disturbing increase in the number of firms making employees redundant in recent weeks, with reports of some businesses exploiting furlough to cover the notice period and cut redundancy payments.
Businesses that have had no income for months cannot take the additional burden of national insurance costs, followed by an increasing proportion of wages. That is particularly true of hospitality, tourism, travel and the cultural sector as a whole. The engineering and manufacturing sector, which may have fulfilled order books but have not been able to bring in new work due to the lockdown, may also be struggling.
Differential lockdown across the nations of the UK, and indeed within them, also poses a problem for the future. As my hon. Friend the Member for North Ayrshire and Arran (Patricia Gibson) and the hon. Member for Bradford South (Judith Cummins) pointed out, if there is a sudden spike in an area, as there has now been in Leicester, once the coronavirus job retention scheme and SEISS are wound up, families will be placed in an impossible situation.
The furlough scheme must stay in place for as long as it is required.
The design of SEISS has meant that people have faced an arbitrary cut-off, which does not exist in the job retention scheme. There are issues with the design of universal credit: I have had constituents ineligible for support because of their partner’s income or because they have been over the savings limit due to their business savings. An emergency basic payment would plug some of these gaps and help to ensure that people have at least some money coming in.
On further administrative issues with the schemes, I would, first, like to be clear that I do appreciate the strain on the system and the work staff have done, even though, as my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow South West (Chris Stephens) mentioned, they have also faced job losses. I appreciate the scale of the task, both for Ministers and for HMRC. I would be remiss in my duties, however, if I did not raise concerns about the difficulties that businesses and their employees are facing. Having spoken to businesses in my constituency that are still unable to access the JRS, 11 weeks after it opened, it is clear to me that HMRC has little discretion when it comes to overturning claims, and that this rigidity would appear to be a direct instruction from the Treasury. Businesses have shown me evidence of how HMRC’s mistakes have meant they cannot access the JRS. Often there were delays with uploading real-time information that were not their fault. Online access codes were posted to the wrong place or not at all, and call-backs that were promised never materialised. I should say that HMRC often did not call me back either.
In the case of one business in my constituency, the Sub Club, a much-beloved venue in Glasgow, I asked the Financial Secretary to the Treasury, in an email of 22 June, to use any influence he might have to save a stalwart of Glasgow’s night-time economy. Unfortunately, I am yet to receive an acknowledgement of the email, and the Sub Club had to launch a crowdfunder today to keep going. NY Slice has had perpetual difficulties submitting RTI to HMRC. After much to-ing and fro-ing, a complaints handler advised the business on 21 May that its furlough claim had been rejected and there was no right of appeal. The owner contacted me this morning in utter desperation, as he is now being taken to an employment tribunal by staff who had expected their wages. That could have been avoided had HMRC been more reasonable and more supportive.
Glasgow Guild Antiques and Restoration Ltd and KOHI have also faced issues with the RTI registration, as has the Erskine Bridge hotel, in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire North (Gavin Newlands), where 73 employees have been left destitute. The incompetence of HMRC, the failure of its internal processes and its refusal to entertain any appeals, even on the basis of its own mistakes, are needlessly pushing businesses across this country to the brink. The Treasury is aware, yet it seems content with that direction of travel. I beg the Minister to look again at those businesses left on the margins, and to do the right thing by these very viable businesses and their employees.
Lastly, I wish to ask the Minister to clarify the report by Martin Lewis that workers will need to pay tax on vital coronavirus tests. That is utter madness and will completely undermine the hard work of businesses, organisations and all UK Governments across these islands that has gotten us to where we are now. A life-saving test is not a “workplace benefit”, and for HMRC to class it as such shows how completely out of touch the Tories are with reality. I ask the Minister to take action on that today.
The job retention scheme and SEISS have been significant. The Chancellor has a choice tomorrow. I ask him to extend the furlough scheme and SEISS for as long as the UK’s four nations require it, so that nobody is left behind.
Dan Carden (Liverpool, Walton) (Lab)
I am delighted to be taking part in this debate on behalf of the Opposition Front-Bench team, with this being my first time at the Dispatch Box opposite the Financial Secretary. Let me start by thanking the Treasury Committee for its important work in preparation for this debate. This is by no means a run-of-the-mill estimates debate; these are exceptional times, and the schemes put in place by Government, called for and supported by the Opposition and the trade unions, are incomparable to anything we have seen before, with £42 billion for the coronavirus job retention scheme and £10 billion for SEISS.
Since March, communities up and down the country, families, workers, the self-employed, traders and business owners have had their way of life changed beyond recognition. A public health crisis became an economic crisis. The lockdown meant that businesses had to close, work dried up and all but essential parts of the economy came to a standstill. From the beginning, the Government have been too slow: too slow to take the threat seriously; too slow to lock down; and too slow to test, track and isolate. The key aspects of the response required Government to communicate public health messages clearly and to earn public trust for their actions. They have, regrettably, without question, failed on both those measures.
I turn now to the schemes. More than 9 million jobs have been furloughed and more than 2.5 million claims have been made for self-employed income support. Where improvements are needed, we have made suggestions, plugging gaps and ensuring flexibility, and we are still calling on the Government to abandon their one-size-fits-all winding down of these schemes. It was a shame to see the Chancellor dig his heels in on this earlier today. And we are still calling for changes to sick pay so that people are not forced to choose between their health and their income.
There have been problems and missed opportunities with these schemes. All of us will have dealt with the heart-breaking situation of constituents being laid off, despite their employers being eligible for the scheme. The scheme was made available to all employers, but early communication failed to make it clear that firms were expected to furlough staff, not lay them off. New starters were not covered by the scheme. There was a lack of clarity to ensure that employers furloughed staff who needed to shield at home even if businesses continued to function. Agencies, including umbrella agencies, too often chose not to furlough staff, but rather to keep them on their books without work.
Meg Hillier
We were shocked in the Public Accounts Committee to discover that, despite planning for a pandemic, there had been no planning for what to do with the economy in a pandemic, which rather goes to the point that my hon. Friend was making about the muddled advice and the changes to the scheme as it was being implemented.
Dan Carden
I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention. She is absolutely right that far too little preparation was done. We saw that with the stocks of PPE at the beginning of this crisis.
Too many did fall through the gaps. We have heard that it was as many as 3 million, according to ExcludedUK, and upwards of 1 million, according to the Treasury Committee. Perhaps most shamefully, some companies, such as British Airways, have used lockdown and the job retention scheme not to protect jobs, but as cover to plot mass redundancies and drive down the pay, terms and conditions of their workforce. That is a situation that could have been avoided had our Government followed the example of Denmark by making support schemes conditional on jobs being retained. So why did the Chancellor fail to act in the interests of workers? There were also missed opportunities to change corporate tax behaviour, to secure environmental gains, to drive up employment rights and to work with trade unions. It is just plain wrong. Companies that have avoided paying their taxes have received taxpayer bail-outs, with no requirement to change their behaviour, to stop tax avoidance, to stop profit shifting and to stop their use of tax havens. So did the Chancellor fail to act in the interests of taxpayers?
We have called for a full back-to-work Budget, one that is focused on preventing mass unemployment and on creating the jobs of the future, but instead we have an economic update from the Chancellor tomorrow, and we will have to wait to see what comes of that. Some 3.4 million people have already been moved on to universal credit since March and, with lockdown easing, it seems that we have an exit without a strategy.
Let me turn to HMRC itself and where the principle of job retention, it would seem, does not apply. HMRC’s staff numbers have fallen from 105,000 in 2006 to 65,000 in 2019. During those years, the UK cut more revenue collectors than any other European tax authority. Only Greece cut more staff as a proportion of population. The current office closure programme puts a further 2,000 HMRC jobs at risk on top of the more than 900 jobs already cut. One hundred and seventy local tax offices are closing around the UK, leaving 13 regional hubs and four London offices. That will leave no tax office for the south-west closer than Bristol, no tax office in East Anglia at all, and none in Scotland north of Edinburgh and Glasgow, severing the connection with the communities they serve. We oppose the office closures programme. Counter to the Government’s levelling-up narrative, it will see offices closed and jobs lost in towns across the country, from Wrexham to Warrington, Stockton, Dudley, Shipley and Solihull.
Low pay, poor staff retention, high staff turnover and redundancies are all wasting thousands of years of institutional knowledge and expertise at HMRC. It is the incredible work of staff administering the coronavirus schemes that has done so much for people across the country, but it has also meant that key duties elsewhere have had to be suspended. Perhaps our biggest challenge in the coming years will be to restore our public finances and reinstate our tax base, and for that we need HMRC firing on all cylinders.
We know that tax audits bring in at least four times what they cost—£4 to £6 for every £1 spent—and those subject to audits also declare more of their profits in future years. Quite simply, we need tax collectors in order to collect tax. I say sincerely to the Minister that, in the light of the challenges ahead, he should halt the redundancies, stop the office closures and commit to a properly funded and resourced HMRC.
We need the Government to break away from their blanket approach to this crisis. They must look again at sector-specific support beyond October. It can make no sense for viable jobs and sectors simply to be left to collapse, and I implore the Minister to work with trade unions and the TUC to that end. As my hon. Friend the Member for Hackney South and Shoreditch (Meg Hillier) said, the Government have fostered, and indeed pursued, the growth of a gig economy across this country, and the lack of support for those people has been astounding. We have a crisis of hunger in our communities, with food bank use multiplying and people unable to pay their bills, their rent or their mortgages. The Government must do more for those left unemployed by the coronavirus pandemic.
We are also living through the most incredible demonstration of the value of our public services. There has never been greater urgency to ensure that our tax system is fit for purpose, so that those with the broadest shoulders pay their fair share. Never again can a crisis be heaped on the least well-off and the least able to afford it.
During the last decade of austerity, the richest 1,000 people in the UK increased their wealth by 183%. Aggregate private wealth is now over six times our GDP. We therefore welcome the serious academic research under way on how a UK wealth tax would work. That research is being carried out at the London School of Economics and the Centre for Competitive Advantage in the Global Economy at the University of Warwick, alongside the Institute for Fiscal Studies, the Institute for Government, the OECD and the Resolution Foundation.
In order to sustain funding for universal public services, deliver the coronavirus support schemes and create the sustainable green jobs of the future, we need fair and progressive taxation that confronts growing wealth inequality, to build a just and sustainable economy that puts people, jobs and the planet first.
The Financial Secretary to the Treasury (Jesse Norman)
I thank my right hon. Friend the Member for Central Devon (Mel Stride), who chairs the Treasury Committee, and the Backbench Business Committee for using this estimates day debate to shine a light—in many ways a warm light—on the performance of Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs during this extraordinarily testing and difficult period. I am grateful to all Members who have contributed to this interesting and lively debate.
I welcome the hon. Member for Liverpool, Walton (Dan Carden) to his first debate as my opposite number, which I hope will be the first of many, although I do think that he slightly missed the tenor of the argument in calling the Government too slow, given that most other Members who have commented have been concerned about the sheer speed of our delivery and whether people might have been missed out in this set of measures.
The coronavirus has the potential to spread with extraordinary speed across a population.
In March, the Government took the unprecedented step of asking businesses and employees to halt their normal activity for an extended and, at that time, indeterminate period of time. At the same time, or shortly afterwards, the Government unveiled an extensive package of support that included a business rates holiday, VAT and income tax deferrals, and Government-backed and guaranteed loans worth £300 billion.
At the heart of that response was, as has been highlighted in the debate, not one but two major schemes that between them covered the vast majority of the working population. As right hon. and hon. Members from all parties have mentioned—my great friend the Member for Wycombe (Mr Baker) in particular highlighted this—had that been done in normal circumstances, it might have taken months or, more likely, years to deliver just one of the schemes, let alone two. My hon. Friend was absolutely right to highlight what an extraordinary achievement it was to bring in both schemes at the speed at which they were introduced. He used the phrase “extraordinary achievement”, and he was right.
Meg Hillier
It was an achievement, but although there was a planning exercise—there have been many planning exercises for pandemics—the Treasury has told us that in 2016 there was no economic planning for a pandemic. Was the Minister aware of that and does he think that should change?
Jesse Norman
I have not gone into the arrangements for pandemic that the Treasury had in 2016, at the time the hon. Lady mentions, so I cannot comment on that. What I can say is that when pandemic struck, the two schemes were put in place with astonishing speed and capability. I do not think that is contested in the Chamber; it is well understood.
The coronavirus job retention scheme was announced by the Chancellor on 20 March and opened for applications just one month to the day afterwards. Six days later, the Government announced the self-employment income support scheme, with a target of making the first payments by the middle of June. In fact, the online portal opened for applications on 13 May, weeks ahead of schedule, with the first grants being paid into bank accounts on 25 May and within six days of application thereafter. That was achieved with more than 80% of HMRC staff working from home. Silos disappeared and timelines were condensed to extraordinarily short lengths of time as officials from across Whitehall came together to solve the problems. In so doing, they set up a kind of exemplar of what a really effective 21st century civil service would look like. It is a model that we are looking at very closely in our thinking about how we might change the tax administration system to make it more resilient in response to the concerns.
The achievements I have outlined have been widely welcomed in this debate, and rightly so. There cannot be any Member who has not walked down their local high street in the past week or two and spoken to those at the shops that are reopening who have had the benefit of the furlough scheme, or to traders who have had the benefit of the self-employment scheme. I am massively proud—we should be proud as a House—of HMRC’s efforts to design and deliver the schemes so quickly and with such effect.
The CJRS—the furlough scheme—has helped 1.1 million employers throughout the United Kingdom to furlough 9.3 million jobs, while 2.6 million self-employed individuals have applied for grants worth more than £7.7 billion. As has been said often, I do not pretend today for one moment—I do not think any one of us does—that the schemes are a panacea. Right hon. and hon. Members have rightly highlighted instances of groups and individuals who are very regrettably and unfortunately not eligible under the scheme rules. It is important to say that under no circumstances and at no point have those people been in any way forgotten by the Government; we have listened carefully to Members, as well as to employers, and refined both schemes to include more people where possible. For example, those returning to work after periods of parental leave and reservists who return to their jobs after active service in the armed forces are now able to access the flexible version of the furlough scheme, and similar accommodations have been made with respect to the self-employment scheme.
Together, the measures I have outlined represent an economic intervention unmatched in recent history. Nevertheless, the practicalities are such that the Government have not—I recognise this—been able to support everyone in exactly the way they would want. If I may, I shall address some of the specific points raised in the debate in a moment, but first it is important to understand the principles that guided the Government’s response.
Ms Angela Eagle
It is not that we wish the Minister to support people in the way that they want. He has to recognise that there are 1 million people who have been given no support at all; we want some consideration for them. Their businesses and livelihoods have been affected because of Government decisions that—understandably, for health reasons—closed down the economy. Will he please address that?
Jesse Norman
I will be coming to some of the points that the hon. Member raises later in my remarks. We are focusing on the furlough scheme and the self-employment scheme, but of course these schemes have been a small percentage of the overall response, which has included a vast array: £300 billion of loans, tax deferrals, grants, reliefs and the rest of it, as well as support under universal credit and other forms of benefit. It has been a very, very comprehensive system of support, of which we can be proud.
Let me push on. I was talking about the principles involved. The scale and urgency of the crisis were such that the Government’s overwhelming and overriding motivation was to deliver the greatest help to the greatest number of people as quickly as possible. That was the driver behind the schemes. Both were designed to make use of existing processes and verifiable data precisely in order to make the implementation happen in the fastest possible time and to minimise the risk of fraud, error and delay. Any delay would have meant that millions of people who benefited from the schemes would not have received the support when they needed it most.
It has not been possible to extend the self-employment scheme to individuals who became self-employed after 2018-19, because although self-employed taxpayers can file returns for 2019-20, this would have created an opportunity for fraudulent operators and criminals to file fake returns. It does not take an enormous amount of mental mathematics to calculate that a relatively small percentage of additional fraud would equal quite a lot of additional schemes that would have to have been assessed and worked through the system. That is what makes it so difficult. As the House knows, these problems have been highlighted in testimony to the Treasury Committee. It is also important to be clear that these are just two measures within a much larger package of Government support.
I only have one minute left, so let me turn quickly to the points that have been raised. My right hon. Friend the Member for Central Devon raised the question of fairness to individuals. I understand his point. I think he is aware that the schemes are targeted at those who need them most, and the self-employment scheme is most reliant on people’s self-employment income. He has had an explanation of the 95% figure that we have used—that is, those who get more than half their income from self-employment and who could be eligible for the scheme. Of course, many of those people are also entitled to claim other benefits.
The hon. Member for Hackney South and Shoreditch (Meg Hillier) said that it cannot be beyond the wit of the Government to address these issues. Of course, it is true that people have found groups that have been left out, but I put it to her that this has been extraordinarily difficult. We have been able to make changes at the margins but not at the core, precisely in order to deliver the benefits we wanted.
Let me finally say, in response to my hon. Friend the Member for Wycombe, that the OBR has projected some £60 billion in total for the current schemes and £15 billion for supplementary estimates. That may be the order of magnitude that we are talking about. I wish that I could speak for longer.
Mel Stride
I will be brief, Madam Deputy Speaker, because I realise that there is another debate to follow. I think that we largely agree across the House about what is working and the fact that the Government have come out with a major programme at considerable pace, which has been laudable. However, that is not the same as saying that everything is perfect or that it cannot be fixed. It seems to me that the Government and the Chancellor have in the past taken an iterative approach to some of these schemes, as the Minister has just been setting out, and our question will be: why can he not take an iterative approach to some of the gaps?
When the head of HMRC appeared before the Treasury Committee, he used an expression to the effect that HMRC has discovered in this process of rolling out these programmes that it has been capable of doing things that it did not think it was capable of doing. I say to HMRC and the Government: let us have that same approach adopted now in respect of the gaps, and let us look after and support those million-plus hard-working people up and down the country who are worthy of it.
Question deferred until Thursday 9 July at Five o’clock (Standing Order No. 54).
Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy: Departmental Spending
(4 years, 5 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)
The debate will be led by the Chair of the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee, the hon. Member for Bristol North West (Darren Jones). I inform Back Benchers that I will impose an immediate four-minute time limit—I am sure you will appreciate that there is a great deal of demand for this debate.
Darren Jones (Bristol North West) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to open this debate, and I will try to keep my remarks short as possible to give time for colleagues in the House to contribute. Before I begin my substantive remarks, I pay particular tribute to the right hon. Member for Tunbridge Wells (Greg Clark) , who chairs the Science and Technology Committee, and the right hon. Member for Ludlow (Philip Dunne), who chairs the Environmental Audit Committee, for their support. I note that the right hon. Member for Ludlow is unable to take part today because of the lack of virtual proceedings, but he had intended to do so.
The Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy is at the heart of Britain’s recovery. If we are to recover from the economic costs of the pandemic and tackle the climate crisis, it is imperative that we build back better for Britain, with a more inclusive, productive and sustainable economy that provides opportunity, security and resilience for families in every part of the United Kingdom.
That means good jobs for every generation in every part of the country; it means investing in key sectors in order to increase British manufacturing and British exports; it means Government partnering with business to bring forward investments in digitisation and technology transformation to improve productivity, with a specific focus on small and medium-sized enterprises; and it means recognising the importance of a fiscal stimulus in people as well as infrastructure, in the knowledge that an investment in every worker’s skills is an investment in the interests of the British economy. In each of those priorities, embedded in every single spending commitment, the Government must set out how they will accelerate our transition to net zero. Tackling climate change should no longer be a standalone policy; it should be at the heart of every Government decision.
I am confident that across Britain, in every part of our great country, from students and workers to business leaders, entrepreneurs and innovators, we have the capacity to rise to the patriotic challenge before us—that together, we can get Britain back on its feet. That is why, at this turning point for Britain, as we leave the European Union and reset our role in a world quickly changing around us, the Government have an opportunity to rise to the challenge and create a modern, dynamic and aspirational Britain that is fit and ready for the future.
The breadth of interest in this debate is a function of the gamut of responsibilities and policy areas contained in the BEIS brief—an important brief for us to hold to account. The pandemic has given the Government, and BEIS most of all, an overriding and immediate task: to save as many jobs, businesses and livelihoods as possible. Covid has seen day-to-day departmental spending increase eightfold in the space of a year, from £2.1 billion in 2019-20 to £15.9 billion in 2020-21, with a significant majority of it concentrated on delivering emergency loans to the hundreds of thousands of businesses that have required help.
Mark Tami (Alyn and Deeside) (Lab)
Obviously, the aerospace industry is not going to come back any time soon, so we must look at how we will invest to keep those jobs and skills in the medium and longer term. In particular, we have seen the sort of support that has come from the German and French Governments; we really must look at least to mirror that in this country.
Darren Jones
I thank my right hon. Friend for his intervention. He and I have shared constituency interests in that important industry, which I will touch on later in my remarks.
It has been entirely right that the Government have acted quickly, but the scale of the expansion underlines the need for Parliament to scrutinise the effectiveness of its delivery, the extent of the future liabilities to which it exposes Government, and the plan for how support will be provided to the many businesses that are not yet out of the woods and will emerge from this crisis newly indebted—in short, what comes next.
The first key test for the Department must be to ensure that businesses large and small get the help they need in respect of both liquidity and debt management. In the course of our inquiry into the impact of coronavirus on businesses and workers, my Committee has seen evidence of employers doing the right things, but also of businesses and employers doing the wrong things. Conditionality on future support, in respect of both corporate behaviour and embedding the net zero transition and worker training, should become the new normal.
The Department should also take the opportunity to learn lessons from the initial phases of support. For example, my Committee heard consistent evidence of frustration at grindingly slow approval processes for Government-backed coronavirus business interruption loans and a reluctance to lend on the basis of the Government’s 80% loan guarantee, in addition to a widespread perception that eligibility requirements were not being applied consistently.
I wrote to the Secretary of State following the publication of the main estimates to seek an update on whether approval and take-up rates under the interruption loan schemes ever actually increased, particularly following the roll-out of bounce-back loans. It will be vital for my Committee and the House to understand the complete picture in that respect. Equally, although I recognise the trade-offs that exist when providing support at pace, I am conscious that Ministers have since notified the House of a contingent liability of £27 billion. That figure was not included in the estimates and, needless to say, it could dramatically increase.
Today is not the right occasion for a full analysis, but it is more than conceivable that if the Government had been willing to reform the initial loans frameworks and supplement them with targeted help for the worst-hit sectors, they could have provided materially more support earlier in the day at a lower eventual cost to the Exchequer. As Britain emerges from lockdown into a state-sponsored recovery, it is vital that the Department learns the lessons of the past few months in making the strategic interventions necessary to get businesses back on their feet, while balancing the fiscal risks of significant borrowing against value for money and potential future increases in interest rates. We must spend the money we are borrowing wisely. I therefore ask the Minister, in his summing up, to set out for the House what lessons have been learnt about the effectiveness and value for money of the initial support packages, and which lessons will be taken forward in the design and delivery of future support.
Evidence taken by my Committee from sectors in the most immediate need has also underscored the urgency of strategic sector-specific support packages and the high cost of failing to act. As the Member of Parliament for Bristol North West, I see that especially in the hospitality and aerospace sectors, and, while the hospitality sector can start to slowly reopen, the aerospace sector cannot. The aerospace sector should command a bespoke package of support, bringing forward decarbonisation targets for new aircraft and developing the technologies of tomorrow, not just to protect vital jobs and skills, but to maintain our international competitiveness in this important sector. However, the Government seem unwilling to take a coherent sectoral approach. I appreciate that the Minister cannot make any announcements in advance of the statement tomorrow, but I wonder whether he might tell us if he thinks his Department will move from a one-size-fits-all approach to a more sophisticated sectoral approach in the months ahead.
Those decisions should be underpinned by the industrial strategy, a key long-term metric for the Department’s success. In its annual report earlier this year, the Industrial Strategy Council identified key areas for improvement. One was in relation to the Department’s multi-agency research and development spending, principally through UK Research and Innovation. In their letter to me last week, the Secretary of State and the innovation Minister, the Under-Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, the hon. Member for Derby North (Amanda Solloway), undertook to engage and consult on the Department’s research and development roadmap ahead of the autumn spending review. I hope it will include a clear commitment to seeking third-country membership of Horizon Europe, which would contribute about £2 billion of value to British research, regardless of the outcome of trade talks. That would send a much more valuable signal about the Government’s seriousness in ensuring that science and innovation in Britain are supported for the long haul and that the ambitious spending targets identified in the industrial strategy are met.
Of equal importance to the Department’s role in shaping the post-pandemic recovery is the Industrial Strategy Council’s call last month for a clearer overreaching vision for UK skills, with a strategic overhaul and expansion of training policies and institutions. It identifies a median scenario whereby 7 million current UK workers will have seen their jobs automated by 2030 in the absence of sustained investment in reskilling in our workforce. As OECD analysis has shown, the employees most at risk from automation are often the least likely to participate in training. The pandemic only compounds the latent injustices, with the rise of remote working and learning making investment in digital access and digital skills even more important.
I am an advocate of the acceleration of automation and technology adoption, but it must be coupled with economic stabilisers from the state for training and jobs transition for workers and it must tackle inequalities and have a clear view of modern competition. It must also be coupled with consumer and workplace health and safety regulations that protect workers and it must prevent monopolisation and overbearing corporate power from the owners of data technology and digital services. Yet we seem to be in a twilight zone where the Government have an industrial strategy but often seem to lack reference to it, or indeed ignore it, making spending decisions—for example into the OneWeb satellite company—that seem to bear no resemblance to the published strategy while intervening in the market in an often incoherent and opaque manner. That cannot continue and the Government must set out the framework in which they will operate in the years to come, so that the market can understand what rules will be followed and on what basis.
Those of us content with the idea that the state plays a role in the economy would recognise such interventions from the Government in the past few months as an industrial strategy, so it would be useful in summing up today if the Minister could set out what the Government’s industrial strategy actually is and how it will be used in the decisions for post-pandemic growth. This, to be clear, should not be about picking winners. It should be about working with business to deliver on economy-wide objectives. If the Government are going to truly level up the economy, they need to trust, empower and properly finance local decision-making in a real partnership between the functions of the state and business and trade union leaders.
Turning lastly to climate change, as I said at the beginning of my speech, I do not see climate change as standalone policy, but one that is embedded in every decision. I hope the Government will set out how every decision, through the billions of pounds that they spend, helps us to reach our net zero target.
At a time of shifting global power, we should take these opportunities to not only re-emphasise the importance of multilateralism and the rules-based international order in terms of climate and trade, but also evidence why it is in all our interests to work together. The Government have a rare opportunity right before them to create a more inclusive, productive and sustainable economy that delivers good jobs, good pay and security for families at home here in the United Kingdom, while using our soft powers to show the world what we can all achieve together. That goal will be the defining test for this Government.
Mark Pawsey (Rugby) (Con)
It is a pleasure to follow the new Chairman of the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee, who is making good progress. I draw the House’s attention to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests.
It seems to me that businesses face two separate and distinct challenges right now: meeting the social distancing requirements and complying with the Government regulations on the one hand, while establishing whether there is enough demand for the product or service they provide. Those are very different. Some businesses are unable to trade because of the social distancing requirements or are not permitted to trade, but for many others, there is not enough custom. Either way, that can lead to a decision to cease trading or, far worse, business failure.
In terms of those businesses not permitted to trade, I have had regular contact with Helen Taylor of Helen Taylor Aesthetics in Rugby, which is a clinic offering anti-ageing face and body services and skin treatments. It is an environment with high levels of cleanliness and sanitation, and she believes there is a strong case for her business to be open at a time when pubs, non-essential retail and hairdressers are open. I hope the Minister will be able to give some good news to that sector.
Another sector hit hard in respect of both regulation and demand is hospitality. I welcome the move to 1 metre- plus, but that still represents a challenge in many locations where it is only possible to operate at 70% capacity. For many, that is sub-economic in the short term, so they have not opened. Those businesses, like others, welcome the Government’s support. The furlough scheme and the grants and loans have enabled many to keep going, but the question is, for how long? The hospitality sector employs many young people, and it needs a stimulus. I hope that we will hear the Chancellor announce tomorrow not a tweak to the standard rate of VAT—a small amount off the rate will not make much difference to the decision on whether or not to spend—but zero rating of restaurant meals, which would have a big impact on the sector, taking 20% off the price.
Having set up a business, built it up and then sold it, I want to focus on the Department’s role in encouraging entrepreneurship. I get feedback from regular meetings with the Federation of Small Businesses, my chamber of commerce and other business breakfast groups, and one of the best and most interesting inquiries the Select Committee did in the last Parliament was on small business productivity. We found that the support for people running small businesses and the guidance and advice is incredibly patchy. Those running businesses are often unsure where to go and unsure of their obligations in running a business, and that continues through their life.
It is important to recognise that businesses are often set up because somebody is good at a particular trade. They may be an electrician or a builder, and they may have done an apprenticeship. They have learnt the skills needed in that trade, but few have had any training in running and managing a business. It is a different skillset, and it is one that Government need to recognise. Some support is provided by local enterprise partnerships and growth hubs. We have a fantastic one in Coventry and Warwickshire, but we heard that this was incredibly patchy.
We also heard that businesses should make time to work on their business as well as within their business. Often businessmen are too busy, but they need to make some time available and have some support for personal development. One of the skills that we need more businesses to have is salesmanship. Nothing happens until a sale is made. Salesmanship is a professional career recognised by the Association of Professional Sales, and right now, we need the country’s best salesmen pushing for sales of UK-produced products.
Caroline Nokes (Romsey and Southampton North) (Con)
I am taking from my own time by intervening, but my hon. Friend has said “businessmen”, “salesmen”, “salesmanship” and “salesmen” again—will he please acknowledge that there are women in this world?
Mark Pawsey
I certainly acknowledge that point. With four minutes to speak, I am rushing through the content of my speech, but I take the point. We need people to be trained in these skills.
With the little bit of extra time I now have, I want to put in a plug for manufacturing. My constituency is adjacent to Coventry, the home of motor manufacturing. My constituency is also home to the Manufacturing Technology Centre, which has contributed to a new paper, “West Midlands: the Speed to Scale Region”. There is a strategy to deliver new products at pace, and we need to make certain that we include manufacturing as part of our overall business mix.
Judith Cummins (Bradford South) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to follow other members of the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee. On youth unemployment, the Select Committee heard that workers aged under 25 were about two and a half times more likely than other workers to be in a sector that was shut down during the pandemic. The Government must act now to save jobs and create a plan to get young people back into work. I strongly support the TUC’s suggestion of a jobs guarantee for young workers. In essence, it would provide a guaranteed job, including training and pay on at least the living wage, for young workers who have been out of work for more than three months.
In the time I have, I will focus on the economic powerhouse that is the beauty industry—an industry that employs over 300,000 people across the UK in every town, village and city. In many places, including my own constituency, beauty salons are the lifeblood of the high street. The sector’s success is critical in our economic recovery.
Carolyn Harris (Swansea East) (Lab)
Does my hon. Friend agree that the beauty industry, which contributes billions of pounds to the economy and provides over 370,000 jobs, is no laughing matter, despite the Prime Minister’s frivolous and flippant dismissal of the question when he was asked about it in Prime Minister’s questions last Wednesday?
Judith Cummins
I wholeheartedly agree with my hon. Friend. Of course, this industry is predominantly run by women, employing women, and yet the beauty sector has seemingly been forgotten. Hairdressers and barbers have been open since the weekend, but the wider beauty sector is left in a deeply uncertain position. The hair, beauty, spa and wellness industries are a highly integrated sector, with many businesses and premises containing both hair and wider beauty services. Allowing only the hair part to open makes many such businesses economically unviable. The Government have already produced the guidelines for the safe reopening of these businesses, so there is no reason for any delay.
Another industry that has been extremely hard hit in recent months is the wedding and connected hospitality industry, including Pakistan Catering in my constituency. The industry needs guidance as soon as possible on when receptions can resume. Many thousands of jobs in the beauty and hospitality sectors are at risk, and with the Government beginning to wind down the furlough scheme wholesale rather than sector by sector, both sectors need clarity quickly on when they can reopen. I hope the Minister can provide that when he winds up.
Last week, over 200 beauty-related businesses from across the country wrote to the Prime Minister to urge him to provide immediate clarity on when they will be allowed to restart work, and my hon. Friend the Member for Swansea East (Carolyn Harris) and I wrote to him about the disregard and disrespect with which the industry has been treated in this place. It is not a pink and fluffy industry; it is a sector of highly trained professionals, and, quite frankly, they deserve better. My message is simple: this is no laughing matter. The Government must act now to save jobs in this important industry.
Alexander Stafford (Rother Valley) (Con)
The Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy is at the heart of our post-covid recovery. In my speech, I wish to focus on the repatriation of jobs to Britain, boosting our home-grown manufacturing, capitalising on our region’s rich industrial heritage and levelling up across our great country. Those are urgent priorities, which are integral to BEIS’s efforts to relaunch UK plc post covid and, in doing so, ensure the public are guaranteed the best return for the money that is entrusted to us.
Too many jobs have left Britain in the past decade or so, lured away by cheap labour and loose employment protection laws. Companies have left in their droves, while still benefiting from our consumer market. Germany, a country with a similar sized population and economy, has protected its industries and largely succeeded in encouraging German companies to retain their operations at home. It is our job to make the case for the UK as a hub of innovation with a highly educated, highly skilled and highly creative workforce. Companies that have moved jobs abroad have found that the grass is not always greener. In an increasingly complex global climate characterised by the slowdown of China and its tension with the west, and Britain’s withdrawal from the European Union, there is inherent value to business in the stability of our governance and the quality of our British labour market.
We must focus not on repatriating jobs to Britain, but on nourishing and supporting the enterprises that are here. This House knows only too well that many businesses are struggling to survive during the crisis and face many tough months ahead. Accordingly, I welcome the proposal to increase BEIS funding by £12 billion.
For us to emerge from the crisis, we must draw on the industry and ingenuity for which this country is famous. BEIS must support a renaissance in home-grown manufacturing, while promoting the UK as a world leader in certain fields. We have already achieved that in medical research and pharmaceuticals, and there is no reason why we cannot apply that success to sectors such as green energy and renewables, and in doing so steal a march on our rivals. We are already ahead of the game in technologies such as wind power, but we must act with speed and commitment to implement a hydrogen strategy to harness the full potential of this exciting zero-emission fuel of the future. Much of my work on the BEIS Committee revolves around such issues, and I welcome ideas from other Members to make them a reality.
I envision this industrial renaissance being spread out across a chain of innovative manufacturing hubs all across the UK. The Government’s levelling-up agenda is key to a strong economic recovery that works for every Briton and for every part of this nation. I speak from experience: my constituency of Rother Valley in South Yorkshire has a rich industrial heritage from many generations of coal mining and steel production, which is mirrored in constituencies across the north of England, the midlands and other parts of the United Kingdom. Such areas have been neglected and unemployment has soared. Now is the time for BEIS to utilise the manufacturing knowledge and skills possessed by locals in these areas and repurpose it for the industries of the future. This transformative action would provide high-quality jobs to those left-behind areas while firmly positioning the UK as a world leader in new sectors. We would reduce our reliance on overseas actors and be able to use British goods for British infrastructure projects.
As I draw my speech to a close, I underline the incredible opportunity that BEIS has to bring back jobs to Britain, restore struggling business to full health and open a new frontier for British manufacturing and industry. By reinventing areas with an industrial legacy and including them in our plans, we will not only recover from this dreadful virus, but usher in a new industrial revolution and a whole new era for a global Britain.
Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)
Diolch yn fawr Madam Ddirprwy Lefarydd. It is undeniable that the covid-19 pandemic has slammed the brakes on economic activity across the board, but few sectors have taken so severe a shock as tourism. Why? At least half of the income-generating season is now irretrievably lost. In Wales, around 144,000 people are employed in the tourism sector. Coming out of lockdown is essential for many, many communities. While the level of Government support has been so far unprecedented, the impact on the Welsh tourism industry looks set to be long lasting.
The Welsh Government tourism barometer carried out a survey of firms between 22 April and 1 May indicating that the tourism sector experienced an average drop in revenue of 20%. The same survey revealed that 70% of Welsh firms have put at least one worker on furlough— 70% of Welsh firms. In the north, the figure was 80%, probably reflecting the higher reliance on tourism and hospitality in our region. Without additional support, I fear that the clock is ticking on an unprecedented unemployment crisis in regions that have become increasingly reliant on tourism and hospitality.
The first signs of the crisis can already be seen in universal credit and jobseeker’s allowance numbers. Office for National Statistics figures from this spring show an increase of 24% in people claiming unemployment benefits in my constituency of Dwyfor Meirionnydd. For the tourism sector to flourish long term, we need sustained Government intervention and a new approach to ensure that tourism can contribute to reinvigorating our rural and coastal communities.
I urged the Government this week to commit to paying tourism and hospitality employers’ national insurance contributions, as well as increasing the threshold at which national insurance contributions are paid. We also need a temporary VAT cut for both hospitality and tourism, allowing for targeted stimulus for the sectors that most need support. Many in this House have used EU rules on VAT to argue the case for Brexit, but this is one area where flexibility already exists. There is a dispensation for a lower rate—say between 5% and 15%—and frankly it is shocking that the UK has not already reduced VAT for tourism activities when every other country in the EU except Denmark has done so.
My constituency is the proud home of a total of six heritage railways. Across the UK, heritage railways employ 4,000 paid staff alongside 22,000 volunteers, and they attract 13 million visitors. Social distancing requirements make it difficult to run cost-effective timetables, and heritage railways are calling primarily for an extension of the furlough scheme for key staff until spring 2021 in order to cope with the three-winter scenario. Anybody who is talking to anyone in the tourism sector will have talked about the three-winter scenario, and about how we can get businesses through when they are facing the prospect of no income whatsoever. That is particularly true for the heritage railway industry, and I am sure that the Government will be looking to ensure that those jewels in many areas of tourism are maintained into the future.
With our vast mountains and hills and our 870 miles of coastline path, Wales is ideally placed for socially distant tourism, but attracting tourists at any cost should not be our priority. Post covid, sustainable tourism can be a vehicle for supporting our cultural heritage as well as combating the multiple crises of our age: the climate emergency, loss of biodiversity, pollution, and social and economic inequalities. Out of this crisis, we have an opportunity to assess our tourism industry and its role within our economy, and I urge the Government to grasp this opportunity to create a future-proof model of tourism with sustainability at its heart.
Several hon. Members rose—
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)
Order. After the next speaker, I will have to reduce the time limit to three minutes.
Catherine McKinnell (Newcastle upon Tyne North) (Lab)
As Chair of the Petitions Committee, I want to speak today on the report that we published this week on the impact of covid on new parents. Over 227,000 petitioners have called for maternity leave to be extended for a period of three months in light of the difficulties faced during the pandemic. Despite many people benefiting from the Government’s many support schemes, many parents feel forgotten. As a mum of three, I know how challenging it can be to have a new baby at the best of times. The pandemic is posing huge challenges to new parents across the country and it has been hugely disruptive to the crucial early weeks and months of parenthood.
We have heard from parents who feel like anomalies whose circumstances have been missed by the Government. We have heard from parents who feel that their jobs are at risk as they are unable to find childcare. We have also heard from parents whose mental health has suffered and who are in desperate need of help and support. One mum told us:
“The stress of the Coronavirus pandemic, lockdown, having to give birth alone, no visitors after having a c-section etc has ruined the beginning of what is meant to be a memorable happy time and has led to severe anxiety.”
Another new mum said:
“Covid 19 has affected me massively…I have been unable to get the support I need”.
The petitioners are requesting longer maternity leave so that they can have time to do the things that many of us take for granted. They need time for all the things that have been impossible while they have been isolated at home. They need time to adjust back to the realities of everyday working life with a whole new addition in tow. They need time to access childcare, to introduce new babies to families and friends and to attend baby classes. And they need time to get the support they have missed out on, from health visitors, mental health services, dentists and doctors. The Government’s response to the petition to date has been to turn down these requests.
We have heard compelling evidence on the importance of supporting new parents. They have missed out on crucial support, and the science shows us that this has the potential to have a damaging effect on their mental health and that of their children. Dr Alain Gregoire, chair of the Maternal Mental Health Alliance, told our Committee:
“You are the first generation of legislators who have this scientific knowledge…So, there is a huge potential for acting and acting now, to prevent effects in 20- or 30-years’ time, as well as effects tomorrow.”
Our Committee has therefore called on the Government to take action now to prevent damage in the years to come, and we recommend that they should
“extend parental leave and pay for all new parents affected by the pandemic.”
This should include extending adoption leave and considering similar entitlements for special guardians who have welcomed new children into their families during the pandemic. We also recommend that the Government undertake an urgent review of health visitor services and consider the additional support needed for vulnerable families. They should also consider an extension of maternity dentist provision for six months for those who have not been able to access vital care during lockdown. They should also urgently review funding for the childcare sector to ensure that there are enough childcare places for parents who need to return to work.
We also recommend that the Government prioritise extending redundancy protection to new parents and give them longer to challenge unfair dismissal when it happens. We also recommend that they bring forward plans for neonatal leave and ensure priority covid testing for families and babies in neonatal care. When it comes to supporting families in the early years, the cost of doing nothing can be far greater than the cost of intervening early.
If the Government do not urgently review how new parents are supported during this crisis, the negative effects of this pandemic could be felt for years to come by families and the economy. I urge the Government to heed the warnings on maternal mental health, as well as the evidence and recommendations in our report, and to do the right thing now for thousands of families.
Jackie Doyle-Price (Thurrock) (Con)
We in this House are very good at talking about what is going wrong, and talking this country down, but for many of our workers the last few months of dealing with covid have been business as usual. I thank all those workers who have carried on going to work and serving us in our shops. In particular, I thank my constituents who work in the ports and logistics sector, and who carry on unloading those ships and ensuring that our supermarkets are stocked.
As we move out of this crisis, it is important that we do so in a spirit of ambition and positivity, because that is what will get us through it. It will not be the Government; it will be the energy and commitment of all our entrepreneurs and workers, who will seize those opportunities if we give them leadership and encouragement. As an example, just in the past couple of months we have opened a brand new port facility at Tilbury in my constituency. We have seen the opportunities that will be created by Brexit, and invested in them. We got planning permission one year ago, and one year later a £250 million investment has been made, creating new jobs and taking advantage of those opportunities. Take an example from south Essex’s competitive and entrepreneurial spirit, and we will get out of this. It is the job of Government to ensure that they do not get in the way of that.
I would like to raise two points with the Minister. First, we need to find lots of money to pay for what we have invested to get us out of this crisis, but we must ensure that we continue with a competitive taxation system. BEIS needs to act as that entrepreneurial champion and not be a regulator, and it was with some dismay that I heard that 42 pages of regulation were given to hairdressers to help them reopen. We must do much better than that.
I also wish to associate my voice with those who have already called for the reopening of the beauty industry. It has been disappointing to hear the reaction of fellow Members of Parliament when that issue has been raised in the past. Is that because those business are run by women who employ women? I sincerely hope not, but it certainly looks like that to the public. Beauty is a major industry, and if people want our hotels to reopen and be profitable and sustainable, they must also open their spas. This is not just about nail bars; the beauty industry offers a whole range of treatments. More to the point, with office workers still staying at home, people need a reason to go to the high street and continue that footfall in shops. I encourage the Minister to look favourably on that sector.
Nadia Whittome (Nottingham East) (Lab)
Just as the UK was not prepared for the covid-19 pandemic, so the Government are failing adequately to prepare and protect people from the effects of climate change. What are the latest Treasury estimates for the cost of the likely damage to communities, food, food production, and industry as a result of climate change and environmental degradation over the next five to 10 years? Although I welcome several of the measures touted to make the Chancellor’s Budget tomorrow, particularly the green homes grant scheme, a responsible approach to the climate and environmental emergency will require far more than just one or two eye-catching measures and a few slogans. To say that anything less than systemic, transformative fundamental change to society, the economy and lifestyles is needed would be a dangerous and reckless myth.
In the light of what we have seen, or not seen, from the Government on climate change and the environment, I am somewhat sceptical about their new-found love for interventionist approaches. Analysis shows that policies opposed by the Government to date on onshore wind, offshore wind power, home installation, tidal power and transport would have led to nearly 70 million tonnes of CO2 emissions savings per year by 2030. The UK is off track to hit our latest carbon budget emissions targets. We are missing most of our international biodiversity targets, and Natural England and the Environment Agency have been cut so severely that they are barely able even to fulfil their basic statutory functions. In the context of all this, the Cabinet Committee launched to co-ordinate climate policy has, remarkably, met just once.
Covid-19 has shown that we all have the ability to make drastic changes to our way of life, when necessary. We must learn from these changes, not merely return to the old habits and old ways of thinking, and that goes for Government too. As a minimum, any company support package from the Government must ensure there is a clear commitment to tackling climate change. Will the Minister commit to the principle of public money for public goods today, and will the Minister commit to a comprehensive training, jobs and investment programme built around net zero and the circular economy—a green industrial revolution?
Mrs Maria Miller (Basingstoke) (Con)
The Prime Minister has presented a compelling new deal to rebuild Britain following the unprecedented events of the past three months. This Department is at the heart of delivering that, and it has already done so much: the unprecedented support for businesses, large and small, to help protect existing jobs and create new jobs for the future; the unprecedented support for families by helping businesses meet the cost of keeping their employees paid throughout the coronavirus lockdown; and, for those unable to continue their work as usual, an unparalleled furloughing scheme that has supported more than 9 million people.
The events of the last three months have created some of the biggest changes in working practices this country has ever seen. Overnight, businesses and organisations have switched from almost entirely office-based operations to home working. Remarkably, it is estimated that 60% of UK adults were working from home during the coronavirus lockdown. This is a testament to the businesses and the workforce we have.
As the Government plan for the future, we need to think carefully about what getting back to normal looks like. Some of my constituents joined me in a virtual lobby last week to talk about climate change, and one thing was clear: they wanted to see a green recovery for the economy. With CO2 emissions dropping by a quarter during the lockdown, the number of good quality air days increasing by 22% and nitrogen dioxide levels falling by 40%, these things have changed considerably.
Inevitably, as the economy returns to normal, some of those improvements will diminish, but there is an opportunity to embed some of the behavioural change we have seen for the future, particularly when it comes to commuting into work. Experts in the US estimate that more than one in three jobs could be done entirely from home, and it would be interesting to look at the figures for the UK. If some of those who could work remotely continue to do so, this could make a significant contribution to the Government’s plan to be net zero by 2050 and help alleviate some of the overcrowding on public transport.
Of course, many other issues need to be looked at if those working patterns are to be sustained, but this Government have already delivered so much when it comes to the environment—greenhouse gas has been reduced and, indeed, thousands of new carbon-free buses and a comprehensive network of cycleways have been introduced—so embedding this new trend for home working could well be a positive legacy from lockdown that truly helps produce a truly green recovery following the coronavirus lockdown.
Patricia Gibson (North Ayrshire and Arran) (SNP)
Expectations are very high for the Chancellor’s economic statement tomorrow. According to the Office for National Statistics, the UK economy has shrunk since March by a staggering 20.4% and unemployment is climbing rapidly. Cutting the furlough scheme from 1 August while making employers responsible for pension and national insurance contributions will simply make it more expedient for struggling companies to make people redundant. It is vital to stimulate economic growth, boost employment, reduce VAT to 15% across the board and to at least 5% in tourism and hospitality, as many European countries did even before the pandemic, and alleviate the financial burden facing households.
We need more support for our fragile island economies, the unique circumstances of which make them extremely vulnerable for the 300,000 people across the UK who live on our islands. If we want to prevent the depopulation of these islands and to secure their long-term economic sustainability, special measures must be taken to support them. We need more for our aviation, aerospace and tourism sectors—their fates are intertwined—which collectively support 1.6 million jobs and contribute £92 billion to gross domestic product.
We must emerge from this pandemic with a green economic recovery that has inclusion and wellbeing at its heart, which is why the SNP Government commissioned an ambitious and wide-ranging report that emphasised the importance of employment, environment, education and equality in the recovery phase. I commend that report to the Minister for his perusal.
The Prime Minister announced his “new deal” to great fanfare last week, but it amounted to little more than shuffling around money that was already pledged; interestingly, it is not expected that his announcement will deliver any new money for Scotland. The current powers and financial flexibility that the Scottish Parliament has are woefully inadequate to respond effectively to the host of challenges we face. Scotland needs more powers to do more for ourselves, to protect our own jobs and to protect our own economy. People make the best decisions for themselves.
Wera Hobhouse (Bath) (LD)
The climate emergency is real and, as the word “emergency” suggests, it needs urgent action now. I want to thank the Minister for his time yesterday, and I will continue to engage with him; some of what I am going to say now he heard yesterday. I continue to worry that although the Government do something to address the need to lower our carbon emissions, they fall short of addressing the urgent need to get to net zero in the next few decades. The Government need to publish a comprehensive and coherent plan of how to get to net zero, not just to low carbon emissions, across all sectors of our economy—transport, heating, energy, agriculture, construction and so on. All this has to be done simultaneously. It is well understood that this is a very complex task, but any Government who take a climate emergency seriously would have such a plan, not just announce piecemeal measures.
One of the biggest set of carbon emissions comes from heating our homes and buildings. The Government need to set out what they believe the future of heating our public and private buildings will look like, and how the transition to net zero is going to be achieved. If the Government are serious about hydrogen, significant pilot schemes need to be rolled out soon, not only to guarantee their safety but to indicate to investors and businesses what the future direction looks like. I urge the Government to fast-track green hydrogen production, so that we do not end up with hydrogen coming predominantly from natural gas and we do not still pump fossil fuels out of the ground in 30 years’ time. The production of green hydrogen requires a large scaling-up of renewable energy production, so thinking about one sector branches out into another. District heating could play an important part in heating our homes, but rather than going forward with its roll-out, since 2018 we have gone backwards. The energy company obligation scheme is going to be continued into 2022, but I urge the Minister to look into widening it to include the most vulnerable people.
If private vehicles will be largely powered by electricity, we need a large increase in grid capacity. People will find it a lot easier to switch to electric vehicles if they can be confident that they can quickly and easily charge their cars. However, I hear from car makers across the board that the Government have not committed yet to the large infrastructure changes needed to allow them to be confident about the quick and large-scale take-up of electric vehicles. Taking steps in the right direction is not good enough; we need a coherent plan and big leaps to get to net zero.
Sir David Amess (Southend West) (Con)
This time last year, the House was in gridlock because of Brexit. We then changed Prime Minister, had a general election and left the European Union, and I was very excited about the new business opportunities we would get, but then, of course, we had to face this invisible enemy. As far as the Department is concerned, I say to the Minister that only time will tell whether or not we have addressed the current situation well, but from what I can see at the moment I think we have reacted pretty well. Many colleagues have mentioned that beauty salons, tattoo and piercing parlour owners and gym owners feel very much left out in all this. They tell me that they already have personal protective equipment when they help the people who want to take advantage of the service they are offering, so we need to address that.
Since 2012, easyJet has been flying from Southend Airport. Unfortunately, I got a phone call last week to say that it is pulling out of the airport. It is absolutely devastating. I am speaking on behalf of my hon. Friends the Members for Rochford and Southend East (James Duddridge) and for Castle Point (Rebecca Harris) and my right hon. Friend the Member for Rayleigh and Wickford (Mr Francois). There are 185 people who are crying out for help because of the downturn in the numbers of people booking flights. Everyone loves Southend Airport. That is why we are going to become a city, but we desperately need Government support at the moment.
I was delighted with the package that was arranged for the performing arts. Southend West was the alternative city of culture. We are awash with actors, actresses, painters, dancers and all of that, which is absolutely magnificent, but now I am getting emails from constituents saying, “David when precisely are we going to get the money, and how is it going to be dished out?”
I am delighted that the coronavirus local authority discretionary grants fund is open, but we need more clarification around who qualifies. I have three local examples: one is the director of Currency Farm Ltd; another is the owner of the Spread Eagle pub; and the final one is the owner of the magnificent Boatyard Restaurant. May I ask the Minister to have a word with the Secretary of State to see whether we could give greater guidance as to precisely how these grants are to be administered? This is a lot of money that we have given to local authorities to administer, and we need to know how much leeway they have in terms of discretion.
Caroline Nokes (Romsey and Southampton North) (Con)
I want to talk about the entrepreneurs—the people who learned to trade, finessed it working for other people, then took a risk and set up on their own, rented premises and went on to employ others in their turn. I will not repeat the comments of the hon. Member for Bradford South (Judith Cummins), but I am, of course, talking about the beauty industry. If I were talking about construction, we would revere the contribution that it makes to the economy, but, because it is beauty, it is okay to trivialise the massive contribution that it makes to the UK’s GDP. Although it is not okay, and I have a very clear message. This is a formidable sector full of brave, ballsy women—I am not sure I am allowed to say that. They are people who need to be taken seriously. I am prepared to declare an interest, but this is not for me, Madam Deputy Speaker; it is for the industry the length and breadth of the country.
Today I have an opportunity to be a voice for the businesses of Naomi, Bethany, Rina, Karen, Jemma—you get the gist, but I could carry on—and for the hundreds of other entrepreneurs and business owners in the beauty industry, including, indeed, those in tattooing where there are a few more men. They found their businesses described as “parlours”. Have we actually returned to the 1970s? The word “parlour” has all sorts of unfortunate connotations. It is not for the 21st century immaculate clinics and studios that those of us who use the services would recognise.
I am here to emphasise to BEIS Ministers that this is an industry full of professionals who have worked hard to ensure that their businesses are covid-secure. They are angry that they cannot reopen. They are disappointed that it is possible to go to a chiropodist, while Liz at Romsey Holistic Beauty cannot so much as trim the toenails of an elderly customer. They are confused that we can have acupuncture, but not have a new nipple tattooed on after reconstruction surgery. They are angry that, apparently, it is okay to have physiotherapy, but not reflexology. And they are offended that the phrase “not covid-secure” is used in this Chamber in reference to their industry, but not to Wetherspoon on a Saturday night.
All businesses need to plan. They need to know when they can open, so that they can schedule clients, forecast the income that they will bring in, even if that means working long hours, seven days a week, just to re-establish a previously successful business. If the message does not come soon, they will be at the doors of the jobcentres, reliant on the state rather than on themselves, and these are fiercely independent women who do not want that. They are proud of standing on their own two feet, proud they are reliant on themselves for financial wellbeing, and proud of the emotional and mental wellbeing they deliver to their clients. They need a date. They need to be taken seriously and they need that now.
Richard Thomson (Gordon) (SNP)
It is vitally important that we recognise that not every business, not every sector and not every area will recover at the same rate. It is vitally important that support is not removed prematurely or arbitrarily. That is as true for individuals who furlough under the self-employment income support scheme as it is for businesses themselves.
As something approaching normality returns as lockdown eases, we must allow the returning demand in the economy to do whatever it can, but some things are too important to be left entirely to market forces. That means that we will need Governments across these islands to target investment and support. That means, as the right hon. Member for Dwyfor Meirionnydd (Liz Saville Roberts) said, a VAT cut to boost the tourism sector. It means converting loans into grants and perhaps the Government taking equity stakes in key strategic sectors.
In the remaining time I have, let me say there is no more strategically important sector to this country than the North sea in terms of the billions it generates for the Treasury, whether that is through the petroleum revenue taxes or through the economic activity that it generates elsewhere. It is on the brink of thousands of job losses. The Scottish Government have already invested £62 million in an energy transition deal. We need the UK Government to match that ambition and invest that money. There is no route to net zero without harnessing the expertise of that sector. Time, just as it is for me in this debate, is running out for something to happen. The UK Government must act, in congress with the industry and very swiftly.
Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (SNP)
A few minutes cannot cover a Department that has responsibility for business recovery, energy, industrial strategy, climate change, net zero, getting the carbon budgets back on track and leading on COP26. It is not credible that one Secretary of State has all those responsibilities under his belt, as well as leading in the Cabinet on climate change.
If we look at covid business support, we are supposed to believe that only by being in the UK was Scotland able to access support for businesses. It is an absurd proposition that if Scotland were an independent country, somehow it would be the only independent country that could not access borrowing and fund support schemes to support its businesses.
It is no wonder that the Higgins report concluded that additional borrowing is required, rather than the financial straitjacket that Scotland is currently held in. Scotland can only borrow a maximum of £450 million of capital a year, limited to £3 billion overall, yet not that long ago we were hearing the Prime Minister promise us a £20 billion bridge to Ireland—a bridge that we do not want or need. We would far rather have control and have an £8 billion stimulus package for a green industrial recovery.
The business loans that have been administered by BEIS were welcomed initially. They were a good move at the start of the covid outbreak, but more needs to be done. Some of the loans need to be converted to grants, because businesses will not be able to afford to repay the loans, especially when the interest-free period ends. The Chancellor said that up to £330 billion would be available, but only £43 billion of loans have been accessed. That tells us that the scheme has not worked as it was designed to and some major rethinks are needed. The Government could use the outstanding moneys to further the green recovery.
A green recovery will need investment and commitments on a greater scale than anything we have seen to date, and it is shocking to think that BEIS only spends £1 billion a year on tackling climate change, yet spends £2 billion a year on nuclear waste at Sellafield. The nuclear waste liability is estimated to be £131 billion. What a legacy that is, yet the Government and BEIS are still infatuated with nuclear, despite the failing business models. Hinkley has a strike price of £92.50 per MWh for a 35-year concession, yet offshore wind is now at less than £40 per MWh for a mere 15-year concession. It is crazy, and it is time to abandon the nuclear sector deal, which is sucking another £190 million out of the Department’s budget. The nuclear fallout needs to be ended and there needs to be greater investment in renewables. If the Government are still arguing that we need a baseload, I would argue that they should be finding a route to market for pumped hydro storage, which would give the required baseload, rather than nuclear energy.
The contracts for difference scheme operated by BEIS has been welcome and has helped drive down the cost of onshore and offshore wind and solar. To make up for the period when the Government reneged on allowing those technologies to bid in the CfD process, I suggest they look at annual auctions. They also must remove the capacity cap on auctions going forward.
I also suggest that the Government should provide a ring fence for early-stage technologies within the CfD mechanism, to support Scotland’s wave, tidal and floating offshore wind sectors. That would allow Scotland and the UK to become true world leaders. We all know that the UK lost out in the manufacturing of onshore wind because of a lack of Westminster support, so lessons must be learned. Such technologies really do offer a green industrial revolution.
The same is true carbon capture and storage and hydrogen production: the funding of such projects at scale is required in order for us to become world leading. It is critical that funding is provided for the Acorn CCS and hydrogen-production project at St Fergus. The Committee on Climate Change recommends that a funding mechanism must be in place this year.
Support is also required for the oil and gas industry so that it can have a just transition to renewables and the net zero target for 2050. When are we going to see some of the £350 billion of Treasury revenues that came from oil and gas coming back to Scotland to support the sector?
To assist the green recovery, the CfD process should also be refined to incentivise the use of UK supply chains. It is ridiculous that BiFab has made redundancies when so much work could be fabricated at its yards. CS Wind in Campbeltown should also see greater benefits from the UK Government procurement system.
Another simple ask on which the Government have dithered is the installation of energy efficiency measures. It is cost-effective and can transform housing, both inside and out. It creates jobs and could reduce future energy demand up to 25%. The required funding has to be a minimum of at least the £9 billion that was pledged in the Conservative manifesto. We really need to see a programme and it needs to be greater than the rumoured £3 billion.
On facilitating green investment in infrastructure, there also need to be upgrades to national grid pinch points and a resetting of transmission charging, which right now punishes renewable projects in Scotland. We need greater investment in electric vehicle infrastructure, and to have a coherent strategy for a green recovery, we need to see the energy White Paper. We need a national infrastructure strategy to come forward. The heating building strategy, transport decarbonisation plan and net zero review all have to align and come together. The options for investment are massive; if the UK Government will not grasp them, they should give Scotland the powers so that we can continue on our green journey.
Matthew Pennycook (Greenwich and Woolwich) (Lab)
It is a real pleasure to take part in what has been a good debate. I commend the Chair of the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee, my hon. Friend the Member for Bristol North West (Darren Jones), for his characteristically thoughtful and articulate opening remarks. The quality of my hon. Friend’s contribution was matched by many others that followed, and I mention in particular the forceful and powerful speeches made by my hon. Friends the Members for Bradford South (Judith Cummins) and for Newcastle upon Tyne North (Catherine McKinnell). Given the toll that the pandemic has taken on our economy, it is right that they and a number of other Members chose to focus their remarks on the measures introduced by the Department to support businesses and individuals through the lockdown, and on what still needs to be done to address the gaps and deficiencies that exist.
Justin Madders (Ellesmere Port and Neston) (Lab)
On that point, my hon. Friend will be aware that Airbus in Broughton announced 1,400 redundancies last week. Does he agree that when we see countries such as France and Germany offering multibillion-pound support for the aerospace industry, we too need a sector-specific strategy for the aerospace sector?
Matthew Pennycook
Absolutely. My hon. Friend makes a very good point: other countries have done it and we have been calling for sector-specific packages for those in most need. The Government have done it for steel; let us get on and do it for aerospace and the other sectors that need additional support.
A number of other Members mentioned the environment and climate emergency. Given the primacy of the climate threat over the long term and BEIS’s lead role in ensuring that our country plays its part in tackling it, I want to use the time that I have to focus on the Department’s record in driving progress towards the net zero target for which we legislated just over a year ago.
Although 2050 is too late, we can continue to take pride in the fact that we were the first major economy to adopt a legally binding target to cut greenhouse gas emissions to zero. But setting a target is one thing; hitting it is quite another. As things stand, not only are the Government failing to do anything like enough to meet our legally binding 2050 target, but they are not even on track to meet the less ambitious target that preceded it. I am afraid Ministers give every impression of being entirely relaxed about that fact. How else do we explain that over the past 12 months, while basking in the virtuous afterglow of legislating for net zero, the Government have done precious little to set us on the road to carbon neutrality?
The Committee on Climate Change put it in characteristically diplomatic terms when it stated in a recent annual progress report that last year
“was not the year of policy progress that the Committee called for in 2019.”
The charge is irrefutable.
According to the CCC, last year the Government failed on 14 of the 21 progress indicators, fell further behind in many areas, and met only two of 31 key policy milestones. It is simply not good enough.
The human, economic and social cost of the coronavirus crisis has been severe, but as we turn our attention to rebuilding the Government have a once-in-a-generation opportunity to accelerate the decarbonisation of our economy and make up lost ground, and it is imperative that they seize it. There have been some positive signs in recent weeks that suggest that the Government may recognise the force of this argument. Take the package on energy efficiency measures that was trailed yesterday. We believe that the amount allocated to social housing is woefully inadequate, we take issue with the fact that the private rented sector has been almost entirely overlooked, and we have concerns about whether it will be possible to deliver in the seven-month window provided, but the investment is welcome. However, it has to be the first step, rather than the last word, when it comes to energy efficiency; the start of a long-term, year-on-year programme of support rather than merely a one-off annual boost. The same principle must apply in other areas.
All of which is to say that when it comes to judging the impact of tomorrow’s statement and the autumn spending review on our decarbonisation efforts, what matters is not only the scale and nature of the stimulus, but whether the measures to be announced form part of a co-ordinated long-term approach and are interwoven with the policy change required to drive emissions reductions through the remainder of this crucial decade.
If we are to get on track for net zero, the impetus ultimately has to come from the centre, but for obvious reasons BEIS has a crucial role to play in supporting the centre to set that strategic direction on decarbonisation and direct its spending appropriately to that end. Yet in several crucial areas the Department is still failing to provide the clear, stable and well-designed policy framework that businesses and investors require.
With that in mind, I will finish by putting a series of specific questions on the record, in the hope that the Minister may be able to answer at least some of them in his response. First, for the past year, as we have heard, we have been repeatedly promised that the energy White Paper, the aim of which is to provide much-needed certainty to business on the future energy system, is imminent, yet there is no indication in the estimates we are debating today that the Department is preparing for anything other than business as usual. Are we therefore to assume that the White Paper will be further delayed, or is it still the Department’s intention to publish it before the end of this year and then ask the Treasury for the necessary additional resources at a later date?
Secondly, when it comes to the decarbonisation of heat, the estimates merely appear to contain a broadly static commitment to expenditure on the renewable heat incentive. Leaving aside whether funds allocated to the RHI will be rolled over to underpin other proposed low-carbon heat schemes, does the Minister agree that the total resources currently allocated by the Department to heat are nowhere near enough to respond to the challenge presented by this most difficult of sectors?
Thirdly, taking the estimates in the round, is the Minister not uncomfortable about the apparent disparity between the lofty ambitions set out by his Department when it comes to low-carbon energy, particularly in the clean growth plan of 2017, and the focus of day-to-day spending by the Department on older, high-carbon sources?
Fourthly, and finally, given the commitment to phase out coal from our energy system entirely by 2024, why has the application for a new open-cast mine at Highthorn in Northumberland not been dismissed out of hand by the Government?
The Minister for Business, Energy and Clean Growth (Kwasi Kwarteng)
It is a pleasure to respond to this excellent debate, and I commend all hon. Members who have spoken for their thoughtful contributions. In particular, I thank the hon. Member for Bristol North West (Darren Jones) for opening the debate.
I will deal first with the series of questions posed by the hon. Member for Greenwich and Woolwich (Matthew Pennycook). His first question was about the energy White Paper, which we fully expect to be published this year. He will understand that after the new Government took office in July last year, we had the summer recess, followed by the Prorogation debate, debates about the election, then the general election, the Budget and then covid. There were substantial reasons—they are regrettable, I accept—why the White Paper was delayed. We fully expect it to be published this autumn.
The hon. Gentleman asked about the decarbonisation of heat. I refer him to the fact that we have a heat in buildings strategy, which will outline the policies clearly and simply. There is certainly a great deal of movement in that area.
The hon. Gentleman said that there are lofty ambitions for day-to-day spending, and suggested that our spending is perhaps more carbon-emitting than it should be. We have actually had great success on the carbon emissions front, particularly in electricity generation. He will know that in 2010, when I entered in the House—he entered in 2015—offshore wind seemed like a fantasy, but in 10 years we have massively ramped up capacity. People say flippantly, “Oh, well, the cost is £39.50 per MWh”—the hon. Member for Kilmarnock and Loudoun (Alan Brown) said that—but that did not just happen by accident. It was a serious attempt by a serious Government to construct an auction—a CfD round—and it managed to drive down costs. It was led by policy and evidence. It has been very successful and is admired throughout the world. That is an example of BEIS delivering substantial change and innovation on carbon emissions reduction and the climate change debate.
On the open-cast coal mine that the hon. Member for Greenwich and Woolwich mentioned, that was a difficult question that involved the local community and consideration of the amounts of coal and jobs. He will accept that, as far as the coal ambition is concerned, the initial date for removing coal entirely from the electricity generating network was 2025, but we will deliver it a year in advance. How often is a Government anywhere in the world able to say in a parliamentary assembly such as this, “We are going to do better than our target”? That is another area where he is on very shaky ground.
Jackie Doyle-Price
The fact of the matter is that there are industrial processes that still require coal for generation. Is it not better that we mine coal in this country, rather than ship it from Siberia and Australia?
Kwasi Kwarteng
That may well be the case, but I think taking coal off the electricity generating system—the power generation network—is historically one of the most significant things that this country has done. If we look back in our own lifetimes, we see that coal and industrial questions relating to it were a dominant part of industrial and political debate only 20, 30 or 40 years ago, but in 2024 we hope to remove coal entirely from electricity generation. That is a huge success. We typically do not get the credit we would like in this House, but that is a significant achievement.
I want to talk briefly about some of the broader questions relating to this debate. It would be invidious of me to single out individual speeches, as there were so many good ones, but there are one or two areas where I want to reconfirm Government policy and give a good account of what we have achieved.
Many of the speeches I heard as I sat on the Treasury Bench were understandably focused on the Government’s response to the covid-19 outbreak. At the start of the crisis, the Government made it perfectly clear that we would do whatever it took to support our businesses and economy, and we have substantially delivered on that. The hon. Member for Kilmarnock and Loudoun mentioned the £330 billion commitment from the Treasury and said that it is an example of failure because the amount of debt—the loans that we have given—is a fraction of that, but of course the £330 billion also includes the furlough scheme, which was not in the form of a loan. It was the Government intervening and paying wages. It was a huge intervention, and it had nothing to do with loans. I am sure the hon. Gentleman understands that. This has been a cross-Government effort, and we in the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy have played our part in delivering a range of Government-backed finance schemes.
Let me re-enumerate those schemes: the coronavirus business interruption loans scheme, the bounce back loans, the coronavirus large business interruption loan scheme, and the future fund, which is an equity-to-debt scheme. As of this week, £45 billion-worth of loans have been approved through those schemes, backed largely by Government guarantees.
Justin Madders
The Minister is listing a lot of things that have been done in the past. My constituents want to know what is going to happen next, particularly those in the aerospace sector who are losing their jobs now. They look at France and Germany, where they see support for that sector. Can we have sector-specific support, please?
Kwasi Kwarteng
The accusation from some quarters of the House was that the Government had not done enough, and it was very much necessary to state for the record what we actually had done, and that is what I will proceed to do.
In the last few minutes of my remarks, I turn my attention to what is at the centre of the Department and at the centre of its strategy: the net zero commitment. I think it was the hon. Member for Bristol North West who said that this cannot just be a stand-alone policy. It is not; it is at the heart and centre of Government strategy. I also reject those voices that say that somehow we are the laggards and the backward students. That is a completely wrong characterisation. I mentioned coal. Germany’s date to remove coal from its electricity power generation is 2038—a whole 14 years after this Government and this country will have left coal behind. We are leaders, not followers, in many of these respects. The Prime Minister outlined in his speech on 30 June that we intend to
“build back better, build back greener, build back faster”,
and that is exactly what we intend to do.
The Prime Minister has already spoken of our plans to run 4,000 new zero-carbon buses and the new plan for cycleways as part of the upgrades to transport infrastructure. Since the outbreak of covid-19 in this country, we have published the first stage of our transport decarbonisation plan. That plan provides a measure of certainty and a clear pathway to the future. We have announced a £2 billion package for cycling and to encourage people to walk, which is not only more energy efficient, but also tackles issues such as obesity and exercise. We can remobilise and decarbonise at the same time, and that is exactly what we intend to do.
The hon. Member for Nottingham East (Nadia Whittome) made a passionate set of speeches, and I agree with her to some degree—we can always do better and go faster—but I disagree with the idea that somehow we have simply idled our time away and done nothing.
Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker, for your patience and for the very brisk way in which the debate has been handled. We have heard some excellent speeches. BEIS is now considering how best to support businesses. The green recovery is at the heart of what we want to do post covid, and we are exceptionally focused—more than any other Department—on delivering the strategic goal of net zero. In all this work, we will continue to listen to businesses, large and small. I particularly look forward to engaging in debate with Members of this House, as I have done in the past. We are also listening to business representative organisations. We are determined to get it right for individuals and businesses who need support, for our economy and for the future.
Darren Jones
I thank the many right hon. and hon. Members for their contributions today. Whether on key sectors such as the aerospace sector and the beauty industry, about which we have heard from through hon. Members in this debate, or with loud voices such as Unite the union for aerospace, or over 400 letters from thousands of workers and women to the Minister regarding the beauty industry; whether from the Petitions Committee on parents; whether on our lack of progress on net zero; whether on entrepreneurs and those who have fallen between the cracks, the demand on the Government has been clear this evening. That is, we expect a more sophisticated, coherent and transparent set of policies from the Government. With all due respect, the Minister was unable to announce anything about the future this evening. I hope that is because we will hear the plan that we need for Britain and British workers tomorrow from the Chancellor of the Exchequer. No doubt we will all be back to hear that and to hold the Government to account tomorrow.
Question deferred until Thursday 9 July at Five o’clock (Standing Order No. 54).
Business without Debate
Impact of COVID-19 on Luton Borough Council
Rachel Hopkins (Luton South) (Lab)
I speak on behalf of my constituents in Luton South and those of my hon. Friend the Member for Luton North (Sarah Owen). The petition, on the impact of covid-19 on Luton Council, states:
The Petition of residents of Luton,
Declares that the COVID-19 crisis has radically impacted upon the operation of London Luton Airport, resulting in a significant drop in commercial income, which in turn has impacted upon Luton Borough Council’s provision of vital services; notes that in 2018-19 London Luton Airport Ltd paid £20.2 million in dividends to Luton Borough Council to support its funding of vital services; further notes that Luton is facing a £49 million impact on its 2020-21 budget due to the reduction in revenue from its airport, a drop in council tax and business rates, and other costs due to the crisis; further notes that Luton Borough Council has been forced to produce an emergency budget to find savings of £22 million this financial year; and further notes that a related Change.org petition calling for additional funding to Luton for essential services has over ten thousand signatures.
The petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons urge the Government to review the level of support provided to Luton Borough Council to ensure there is no reduction in vital services.
And the petitioners remain, etc.
[P002586]
Ipswich Hospital: Orthopaedic Services
(4 years, 5 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Tom Hunt (Ipswich) (Con)
I thank the Minister for being here to respond to this much-needed debate. It is needed because on 14 July, the Ipswich and East Suffolk and North East Essex clinical commissioning groups will make a decision on plans to remove elective orthopaedic surgery from Ipswich Hospital and transfer it down the A12 to a new centre in Colchester, away from the people who rely on it. If the plans were to go ahead, they would represent a downgrade to Ipswich Hospital and make it the only hospital in the east of England that I am aware of not to offer a full complement of orthopaedic services. Despite that, the CCGs’ papers for the 14 July meeting will recommend that the plans be approved.
In many ways, it is disappointing that this debate is needed in the first place. Public opposition to the plans is overwhelming. I will come to the important reasons why later, but first I want to make the House aware of the scale of the opposition to the plans. An online petition to protect orthopaedic services at Ipswich Hospital established by the Orwell Ahead campaign group currently has more than 8,700 signatures, despite having been up for only a few days. I have already shared the petition with the Minister, but I want him to be aware of how many more people have added their names to it since we last spoke.
As well as the number of signatures, I am sure that the Minister and others who have studied the petition will not have failed to notice that it refers to a joint quote from me and the Labour leader of Ipswich Borough Council, Councillor David Ellesmere. Anyone who follows day-to-day politics in Ipswich will know that Councillor Ellesmere and I do not always see eye to eye, but on this issue we are united as the principal national and local representatives of our town. The quote in the petition comes from one of two joint letters about these proposals that we have sent to the chief officer of the Ipswich and East Suffolk clinical commissioning group. Combined, those letters, which detail our cross-party opposition to the plans, stretch to more than nine pages. However, that is by no means the extent of the opposition that has been expressed.
The 12-week consultation on the plans, which ran between February and April, found that almost two thirds of respondents were opposed to the new centre in Colchester. That is despite the fact that the consultation took on board the views of people in Colchester as well as people in Ipswich. Had the consultation taken place just in Ipswich, that number undoubtedly would have been far higher.
Over the last few weeks, that has been reflected in my inbox. I have received hundreds of letters, emails and other messages from constituents about this issue and not one has expressed support for the plans. They include not only former patients who have told me they would not be walking today were it not for the first-rate orthopaedic care currently provided at Ipswich Hospital, but hospital workers, and elderly and vulnerable people who are worried about the prospect of having to travel to Colchester in future.
When the chief executive of the hospitals trust asked me to pass on the correspondence that I have received from constituents so he could address their concerns, I did. I sent over a dossier that was 20 pages long, yet this still only represented a fraction of the correspondence that I have received. It also excluded many people who have contacted me from further afield in Suffolk, who are among the 390,000 people who depend upon the services provided by Ipswich Hospital. Many of them share my constituents’ concerns, and some patients to the north of Ipswich face even longer and more difficult trips to Colchester than patients in Ipswich.
It is clear now that the only way for the concerns of my constituents and others to be addressed is for these plans to be reviewed. Of course, my overwhelming preference is for new plans to be drawn up and for the approximately £44 million that is currently earmarked for a new centre to be invested in both Ipswich and Colchester hospitals. I know that many of the people from across the political spectrum who signed the petition and who have written to me are also tuning into BBC Parliament this evening and are watching what is said here very closely.
I think it is only right to use this opportunity to refute the claim made jointly by the chief executive of the hospitals trust and the chief officer of the clinical commissioning group that the public’s petition is causing unnecessary concern and fear. Leaving aside the substance of those remarks for one second, I point out that this is not the first time that the chief executive of the hospitals trust and the chief officer of the CCG have written a joint letter or made closely aligned statements. Given that the chief officer of the CCG will be at the heart of the decision-making process on this issue, it is questionable why he is already so firmly in line with the trust on its plans. This adds to the widely shared sense that, for all intents and purposes, this decision has already been made, and that the decision-making process has been compromised. I hope that Ministers will consider that very carefully when looking at this issue and at how these plans are being pushed through against the wishes of my constituents.
I think it is clear to almost everyone, except senior NHS management locally, that it is not the public petition that is causing concerns, but the plans themselves. It is the local NHS management who have failed to make the case for these proposals. They are the ones who have failed to take the public with them on this journey. Unfortunately, these latest remarks by the chief executive and the chief officer are just more evidence of that same senior management failing to listen to the public. However, the public’s concerns deserve to be heard and that is why I will set them out very clearly now.
The removal of elective orthopaedic surgery would mean that patients in Ipswich have to travel further for their surgery. There must not be an assumption that everyone will have loved ones who can take them to Colchester and back or that they will be able to take public transport, especially after just having had a hip or knee replacement. Constituents have also told me that it would be harder for them to visit their loved ones who have undergone surgery in Colchester to give them crucial comfort and support.
Robbie Moore (Keighley) (Con)
I feel for my hon. Friend’s constituents who potentially have to make that extra journey. In my constituency, I am very fortunate that the Airedale General Hospital provides orthopaedic surgery to constituents on a local basis. Does he agree that the right thing to do is to provide that local service so that his constituents in Ipswich can benefit?
Tom Hunt
I agree with my hon. Friend. There is a national challenge when it comes to tackling waiting lists for hip and knee replacements. There is not one hospital across the country that does not have to meet that challenge, but in meeting that challenge, we need to keep services as local as possible for the people who depend on them. That is what I am arguing for this evening.
So far, neither the hospital trust nor the CCG has presented sufficient detail about how vulnerable patients will be supported in making the journey to Colchester, and the reassurances we have received about joint working and engagement with the public just do not cut it. There is major concern among my constituents about the plans, and it is no surprise that people do not support them while this crucial element is not in place.
Secondly, Ipswich Hospital is currently ranked in the top 10% in the country for both hip and knee replacements, and I would like to thank all the surgeons and staff who work in the orthopaedic services. There are real concerns that the fine quality of care currently available to patients in Ipswich will be diminished when combined with the practice in Colchester. Many of my constituents are currently going through an anxious wait for hip and knee replacements during covid-19, but the knowledge that they will receive first-class surgery at their town’s local hospital provides a great deal of reassurance. Under these plans, however, the surgery would certainly not be at their local hospital, and there are fears that the standard of care could be lower too.
James Cartlidge (South Suffolk) (Con)
I am grateful to my hon. Friend and neighbour for giving way. It was great to campaign with him in the election; I knew that he would be a doughty fighter for his constituents, and he is showing that tonight. Does he agree that, however we configure services, the priority must be the people he is talking about who are waiting for elective surgery that has been cancelled or shifted back many months because of covid, and we need to focus on bearing down on that backlog?
Tom Hunt
I thank my hon. Friend. As I said to my hon. Friend the Member for Keighley (Robbie Moore), I am not blind to the fact that covid-19 is putting huge pressure on the NHS and hospitals up and down the country, including Ipswich Hospital, where the frontline staff have gone above and beyond to serve my constituents. We need to deal with these waiting times, but we need to do so in a way that keeps services closer to people. That is very important.
Under the current proposals, most of the surgeons in Ipswich Hospital’s orthopaedic team would split their time between Ipswich Hospital and the new centre in Colchester. In many cases, this would mean that the surgeon who operates on a patient in Colchester one day will not be there to make crucial check-ups on their patient in recovery over the following days. Only the operating surgeon is best placed to see how their patient is responding to the surgery that they carried out. These personal check-ups are also an important source of confidence for patients. This important aspect of high-quality care would largely be lost under the current plans. Questions have also been left unanswered about the impact of the plans on the highly rated emergency orthopaedic practice, which would remain at Ipswich Hospital, with doctors and resources diverted elsewhere.
This all feeds into a third main concern, which is about the wider effect of these plans on the reputation and standing of Ipswich Hospital. Addenbrooke’s Hospital, Peterborough City Hospital, Hinchingbrooke Hospital, Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital, Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Princess Alexandra Hospital, Colchester Hospital, West Suffolk Hospital and James Paget University Hospital are all general hospitals in the east of England that provide elective orthopaedic surgery. Under the current plans, Ipswich Hospital would become the only hospital of its size in the eastern region not to provide a full complement of orthopaedic services. In fact, James Paget University Hospital in Yarmouth serves a population under half the size of Ipswich Hospital.
The question is, why should Ipswich Hospital be stripped of its first-class elective orthopaedic surgery and placed in such an unusual position? More and more people in Ipswich are beginning to answer that question by looking at whether the merger of Ipswich and Colchester Hospitals has been beneficial to Ipswich Hospital and whether the promises that were made about both hospitals improving together have been kept.
In fact, there are significant doubts that the hospitals trust fully explored the options that would allow both Ipswich and Colchester Hospitals to improve their orthopaedic care together, without one hospital losing core services. My understanding is that a full assessment was not made of repurposing space at Ipswich Hospital, to open up room for two additional operating theatres, and the borough council’s two alternative proposals to the Colchester centre were essentially dismissed out of hand.
The hospitals trust has insisted, the whole way through, that the Colchester centre is the only way to create enough capacity to cut waiting times and cancellations to planned surgery. I have spoken to the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) about what we have to do on that across the country.
I ask what justifies these sweeping plans, for many, including within the hospital itself, have doubts that the plans are even justified on their own terms. The proponents of the plans have highlighted that five new operating theatres for hip and knee replacements would be added, and that these would simply replace five existing operating theatres currently in use at Ipswich and Colchester. Cutting waiting times and delays is undoubtedly an important aim, and I am sure, as I said, that there is no hospital in the country where the pressure on waiting lists for hip and knee replacements has not increased due to covid-19. As I mentioned, these plans would largely replicate existing services, at great financial expense and at the unquantifiable cost of moving them further from where people live. It is therefore disappointing that some in north Essex—some of my colleagues in north Essex—cannot see how important it is that both Ipswich and Colchester improve together side by side.
The last major concern I want to mention is that key voices within Ipswich Hospital have been muffled on this issue. The chief executive of the hospitals trust has claimed that the plans are clinically led and that only three out of 27 consultants are opposed to them, but it is my belief that the cards have been stacked in favour of this position. I understand that the 27 consultants he refers to include spinal surgeons as well as surgeons in Colchester. He has also assumed that surgeons who have not directly expressed their opposition to the plans must be in favour of them. Following the private conversations I have had with senior representatives at the hospital who have approached me, I understand that nine out of 12 surgeons at Ipswich Hospital who deliver non-spinal elective and emergency orthopaedic care do not support the proposals, but, understandably, many of them do not want to put their career at risk by speaking out publicly. However, two surgeons did speak out publicly during one of the consultation events, which turned out to be the only one where the audio recording of a public meeting was not uploaded online. It was eventually put online only when the surgeons themselves pointed this out.
To summarise, the plans are incredibly unpopular in Ipswich. The concerns for patients within Ipswich Hospital’s core service are real, and the decision-making process seems to be nothing more than a rubber-stamping exercise to push through the plans against the wishes of my constituents. When I stood for election and won the great honour of being elected as the Member of Parliament for Ipswich, I said to my constituents that I would fight for them with everything that I have. I love my constituency and I love my constituents, and I know how important the hospital is for them.
That is why it is really important for us to be here today. We do need to deal with the waiting lists, and we do need to make sure that people do not wait in pain for hip and knee replacements, but we need to do so in a way that keeps services closer to people. The merger needs to be about Ipswich and Colchester hospitals thriving together side by side, and I will work with my colleagues across the region to make sure that that is the case. At this late stage, I ask the Minister to look into the matter, reflect upon it, and meet me to discuss my concerns before the decision on 14 July.
The Minister for Health (Edward Argar)
I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Ipswich (Tom Hunt) for securing a debate on the important topic of orthopaedic services at Ipswich Hospital. His commitment to his constituency is commendable and well known. He raised this issue with me when we met very recently, and in his recent letter. I pay tribute to the persistence that he has shown in ensuring that his constituents’ voices are heard on this topic, as on all others.
If I recall correctly, when my hon. Friend last spoke in the House on this matter and I responded, he secured my commitment to visit, which I had the pleasure of doing, with him, in February, and it was a visit that I greatly enjoyed. He is undoubtedly a strong voice for his constituents. Of course, when circumstances allow it, I will be very happy to visit Ipswich once again. I also had the opportunity, that same day, to visit Colchester with my hon. Friend the Member for Colchester (Will Quince), who is a similarly strong voice for the interests of his constituents, his local hospital and the needs of his county, and I pay tribute to him.
James Cartlidge
Many of my constituents use both Ipswich Hospital and Colchester Hospital, and I pay tribute to their staff for the incredible effort they have put in throughout the pandemic to look after my constituents, and those of my hon. Friend the Member for Ipswich, to ensure that we get through this keeping our NHS intact. We should be proud of that.
Edward Argar
I am grateful to my hon. Friend, whom I have known for many years. As ever, he puts his finger on exactly the right point. I join with him in paying tribute to all the staff at Ipswich Hospital, Colchester Hospital and across our NHS for the amazing work they do day in, day out, particularly at this time.
My hon. Friend the Member for Ipswich set out his case very clearly. I would say that his hospital has no greater friend than him. I reassure him that there is no question of Ipswich Hospital continuing to be anything other than the first-class hospital it is today. He highlighted in outline a little of the background on this issue. In 2015, Suffolk and North East Essex sustainability and transformation partnership concluded that change in the organisation of services was needed, particularly in orthopaedic planned surgery. Since then, East Suffolk and North Essex NHS Foundation Trust has been developing a proposal for an orthopaedic elective surgery centre. As he touched on, the proposal outlines that the centre would see a roughly £35 million investment in orthopaedic surgery services for the population, offering at least 48 new beds and up to six state-of-the-art ultra-clean operating theatres, providing additional capacity for emergency patients across the area. The NHS in Suffolk and Essex ran a consultation, between 11 February and 1 April 2020, on the specifics of the proposal to create an elective orthopaedic care centre in Colchester, but, as I have set out, those plans have been in genesis for many years and have been extensively and widely consulted on.
I note the points raised by my hon. Friend in his speech and, indeed, those raised in his letter to the chief officer of Ipswich and East Suffolk clinical commissioning group recently. I encourage the clinical commissioning group to take that letter seriously and to respond fully to my hon. Friend, as part of the local accountability which is so important to all our public services. Let me be clear—I will emphasise this again later—that this is a process and a proposal that is rightly driven by the NHS at a local level in his and my hon. Friends’ constituencies. He is right to commend the performance of Ipswich hospital over recent years. I appreciate that he wants to ensure that for his constituents, and, indeed, for all those who use the hospital, the reconfiguration does not in any way diminish the achievement of his hospital and its staff, or have any impact on its other services.
My hon. Friend will appreciate that in winter the number of emergency admissions is much higher than it is during the summer. One aspect of this consultation is that it seeks to address planning for that by enabling more beds across the hospitals to be used to meet that demand. I would not seek, and nor should I seek, to prejudge the decision that will be reached next week by the CCG on this matter—it is rightly its decision—but I will set out its rationale in putting the proposals forward. It states that, in practice, if the orthopaedic centre were built at Colchester, it would release 24 in-patient beds at Ipswich, where they are indeed needed. The new orthopaedic centre would be adjacent to the main Colchester Hospital, but away from the emergency department.
I greatly appreciate the insight my hon. Friend has shared from his constituents in Ipswich, who are thankful for the brilliant surgeries they have been able to access in the NHS. Indeed, that was something he highlighted again when I went to wonderful Ipswich with him. When the CCG considers this matter, I would of course expect it very carefully and respectfully to reflect on the points that he and his constituents have made. The proposals reflect the importance of the surgeries. I hope he and his constituents will welcome the fact that the proposals will not remove access to orthopaedic services at Ipswich Hospital. Of nearly 46,000 in-patient day cases and out-patient appointments completed for orthopaedic patients at Ipswich last year, only about 3% would move to the new centre at Colchester under what the trust is proposing. In its proposal, the trust sets out that day surgery, including shoulder and elbow joint replacements, would remain at Ipswich Hospital, as would services for emergency patients, such as joint replacement after a hip fracture.
As I just mentioned, my hon. Friend described the life-changing impact such surgeries have had on constituents who have been treated at his hospital. This proposal, as the trust sets out, seeks to achieve shorter waiting times for surgery and shorter stays in hospital, so that patients can seek the comfort of home more quickly, and to minimise the risk of cancellation of surgery, as the proposed centre will be built safely away from the emergency department and the knock-on impacts that a busy emergency department can have. It also seeks to achieve improved clinical outcomes in terms of reliability from the standardisation of care and provide training, education and research opportunities for clinicians. The trust maintains that it is on that clinical basis that it is putting forward the proposals, which, it states, seek to support the excellent performance of hospitals in the area by organising services in a sensible way so that necessary elective operations can take place while the system supports patients admitted in an emergency.
My hon. Friend also mentioned the merger of Ipswich and Colchester in June 2018. At the time, NHS England outlined several service improvements that the merger would bring about. As well as improvements in various services from paediatrics to emergency ambulatory care, the enlarged organisation would also have an expanded catchment area, leading to improved opportunities for training, providing a more attractive option for clinicians, resolving a number of historical recruitment and retention issues at both trusts and improving finances. It is important, however, as my hon. Friend alluded to, that the trust is held to account for those promises and that it ensures, by the merger, that both hospitals continue to improve.
I briefly touched on the consultation earlier in my remarks, and my hon. Friend raised several points about the process. He is absolutely right to say that important decisions are made with the best interests of patients from across the area in mind, and that the views of local clinicians should not be diminished. There has been much lengthy consultation. As well as the formal process, my hon. Friend highlights the petition, which has been signed by many of his constituents and, I suspect, more widely. It is absolutely right that everyone has their say, and I commend him for what he is doing to ensure that they have their say. Again, such views should be considered with respect and care when decisions are reached.
My hon. Friend also rightly raised the issue of patients and transport, and that they must be supported to travel should the plans go ahead. He has raised the need for a comprehensive plan, both locally and with Ministers, to ensure that all patients can be supported to access the right care. Access to the current patient transport scheme will, the trust states, be available for those unable to make the journey themselves. Under the proposals, pre-surgery and post-surgery appointments would still take place at the patient’s normal point of care at Ipswich or Colchester. Indeed, I pay tribute to my hon. Friend for fighting his constituents’ corner, should the decision not turn out the way he wishes, and for playing an important part in highlighting that issue as well. The only change for patients would be the actual site travelled to for the planned surgical procedure, which would involve a lengthy stay of three days in hospital. I have also been reassured that local partners completely recognise that, alongside these provisions, additional support will be needed for some patients and, should the proposal be approved, further work is already under way to address that.
Being conscious of the time, I reassure my hon. Friend that the Department of Health and Social Care recognises how important these decisions are and recognises that the right accountability, consultations and people must be included in the process of discussing proposals to change services. This is, of course, not a decision for me or, indeed, for the Secretary of State. The next step, as my hon. Friend said, is the final decision, which will be made locally by the CCG on 14 July, but the proposal is not to downgrade or diminish Ipswich, but to promote an alternative way of delivering clinical services. I have no doubt that the CCG will have heard my hon. Friend’s case today, as will his constituents, in whose interests he has spoken so eloquently. I again encourage the CCG to ensure that it carefully considers his words and the representations in making its decision.
I conclude by thanking my hon. Friend and congratulate him on securing this debate. I also thank those other Members who have intervened. My hon. Friend has set out his case powerfully and his constituents are lucky to have him as their Member of Parliament.
Question put and agreed to.
Counter-Terrorism and Sentencing Bill (Seventh sitting)
Tuesday 7th July 2020
(4 years, 5 months ago)
Public Bill CommitteesRead Full debate Counter-Terrorism and Sentencing Bill 2019-21 View all Counter-Terrorism and Sentencing Bill 2019-21 Debates Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts Amendment Paper: Public Bill Committee Amendments as at 7 July 2020 - (7 Jul 2020)
The Chair
Before we begin, I repeat the usual reminders about switching electronic devices to silent mode, tea and coffee not being allowed, and the importance of social distancing. Also, Hansard Reporters would be grateful if hon. Members sent any electronic copies of their speaking notes to hansardnotes@parliament.uk.
Clause 37
TPIMs: condition as to involvement in terrorism-related activity
Conor McGinn (St Helens North) (Lab)
I beg to move amendment 69, in clause 37, page 34, line 25, leave out
“has reasonable grounds for suspecting”.
and insert
“, on the basis of reasonable and probable grounds, believes”.
This amendment would raise the standard of proof for imposing a TPIM under the proposals in the Bill.
The Chair
With this it will be convenient to discuss amendment 58, in clause 37, page 34, line 26, leave out “suspecting” and insert “believing”.
This amendment would create a higher bar for the standard of proof under these proposals.
Conor McGinn
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Robertson. I am more used to serving alongside you in the all-party parliamentary group on racing and bloodstock, which you chair. I am speaking for the first time as a shadow Minister in Committee, and it gives me great pleasure that you are in the Chair.
We have said throughout proceedings on the Bill that, for all of us, our first and most important responsibility is to keep the British public safe. The Opposition believe that very firmly and we have approached the Bill in that spirit. We have to be forceful and robust in the fight against terrorism and do everything possible to keep our country safe from those who seek to attack our way of life and values or to do us harm. We have said that we will be a constructive Opposition on these matters, not seeking to divide or oppose for the sake of it, but using parliamentary scrutiny to do what this place does best and performing our important duty to seek to strengthen and improve legislation where it is right to do so. That is the spirit in which the amendments in my name to this clause and others are tabled.
The events at Fishmongers’ Hall and Streatham showed that there is a need for this legislation and for examination of measures such as terrorism prevention and investigation measures, which we will discuss this morning. That the perpetrators in each case had been automatically released halfway through their sentences, with no mechanism in place to protect the public, showed that there were major holes in the legislative framework that needed to be filled, first by emergency legislation earlier this year to prevent the imminent release of offenders without appropriate assessments—legislation that we supported—and now, rightly, by this wider Bill before us.
As we discuss the aspects of the Bill that fall under the remit of the Home Office, I want to say that we support the broad principles therein, but as we highlighted on Second Reading and as has been clear in some of the expert advice and evidence received by the Committee, there remain a number of issues of concern that we wish to probe and amend during the passage of the Bill, first to ensure that it does not fall short and secondly, in the spirit of co-operation, to work with the Government to improve it. It is in that spirit that I will discuss the amendments.
The Government are seeking to alter the standard of proof required to impose a TPIM such that the Secretary of State would need to believe it necessary based only on reasonable suspicion rather than the balance of probabilities. In probing further, we have tried to find a middle way, which is “reasonable and probable grounds”. We do not wish to harm the robust nature or operational utility of TPIMs. The Opposition support TPIMS and want them to be as effective as possible to keep people safe, so we welcome in principle any measures that demonstrably would help our police and security services to achieve that.
We acknowledge that the Bill puts Labour Members in a rather strange position when it comes to TPIMs, because of course it was a Labour Government who, on introducing control orders in 2005, imposed a standard of proof as proposed in this Bill, requiring only reasonable grounds for suspecting that an individual was involved in terrorism-related activity. The standard of proof was raised by the coalition Government in 2011 with the creation of the new regime, and then again by the Conservative Government in 2015. I accept and acknowledge that, and I wanted to say it in Committee. However, having heard the evidence and the Minister’s explanations, we struggle to see the logic in lowering the standard of proof now, whether it is looked at from an operational, administrative or procedural perspective. We need to be clear that policy is made based on evidence and not on amending legislation for its own sake, particularly on such an important matter. We need to see the justification, which has been lacking to date.
In November 2019, just five TPIMs were in force. The police and Security Service have been clear that to date no TPIM request has been rejected on the grounds of insufficient evidence, so one could argue that the current threshold has not proved to be an impediment, even though the security landscape has evolved in recent years, with new risk profiles and challenges coming to the fore. At the same time the Government and law enforcement agencies say that they do not wish to see, nor do they foresee, a sudden spike in the number of TPIMs in operation. They are of course valuable mechanisms, but they are also very costly.
Jonathan Hall, the Independent Reviewer of Terrorism Legislation, told the Committee:
“My concern is that you are opening up a greater margin of error if the standard of proof is lowered.”
That risk ought to be addressed by the Government. We have not yet heard a compelling operational or administrative case made for lowering the standard of proof. I have not heard one from the Minister or his colleagues, or from any of the Committee’s witnesses, so why are the Government so intent on pressing ahead with this change? Again, in the words of Jonathan Hall,
“If it is right that the current standard of proof is usable and fair, and I think it is, in a word, if it ain’t broke, why fix it?” .”––[Official Report, Counter-Terrorism and Sentencing Public Bill Committee, 25 June 2020; c. 6, Q6.]
Taken in isolation, that is a serious enough question, but when paired with the proposed changes in clause 38 on the prospective length of TPIMs, it becomes significantly more urgent.
There are concerns about the fundamental contradiction at the heart of part 2. Liberty wrote that jettisoning the limited safeguards that currently exist while ramping up the severity of the measures that can be imposed would be “a retrograde step.” The Minister needs to respond to those concerns. The Opposition are not alone in being slightly confused by the Government’s approach, particularly to lowering the standard of proof. Amnesty International stated:
“That lack of reasoned argument as to the need for this change mirrors the lack of appropriate evidence or justification presented…at second reading.”
The Bar Council said it was not clear why the reduction in the standard of proof was said to be necessary, and the Law Society of Scotland said:
“Little evidence or justification has been provided for making the change.”
Perhaps the Minister will provide clarification for the Committee, as so far the arguments put forth by the Government have not quite assuaged those reasonable concerns, which are grounded in evidence.
Rob Butler (Aylesbury) (Con)
Does the hon. Gentleman accept that, in the evidence session, the assistant chief constable highlighted three scenarios where the Security Service believed that lowering the standard of proof would be of use? One scenario was where an individual’s risk profile was rapidly increasing and they were moving towards posing an actual threat, with an attack plan in place, but there was not enough time to get to the stage of proof; the second was where somebody was returning from abroad, and the third related to sensitive material. The assistant chief constable said that all those scenarios created a need, as MI5 would see it, to lower the standard of proof. Does the hon. Gentleman accept that?
Conor McGinn
I accept what the hon. Gentleman says and the evidence given by the assistant chief constable. However, the assistant chief constable acknowledged that all of those circumstances currently exist, and that there has been no case where an application for a TPIM has not been granted. I think he was saying that shifting from the balance of probabilities to reasonable suspicion would inevitably make it easier, but he had not experienced, nor did he envisage, any circumstances where that practically had happened or would happen.
As I said at the outset, we come to this wanting to assist and support the Government, but we need to hear a little more justification for this measure in terms of its effectiveness and the reason for it. We will not seek to divide the Committee on the amendment. I tabled it to raise our concerns and those of groups in society, to give the Minister the opportunity to address some of those concerns, and to explain why we not only in principle but now clearly in practice support much of what the Government are trying to do.
Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Robertson, and to follow the hon. Member for St Helens North. Before I speak to the specifics of amendment 58, which I do not intend to press to a vote—it is very much a probing amendment—I will reiterate the position of the Scottish National party on the Bill.
We recognise that it is the duty of any Government to keep their citizens safe and secure, and all who serve in Parliament have an obligation to assist in that endeavour. We have already given the Government our assurance that we will attempt to be as constructive as possible, to ensure that the challenge of terrorism is met and that we keep people in all communities across these islands as safe as is reasonably possible. However, we are also mindful of our duties as parliamentarians to uphold the highest standards of human rights protections.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Chris Philp)
I thank the hon. and learned Lady for her constructive tone. Before she gets into the detail, will she tell us whether the Government in Holyrood will grant a legislative consent motion for the Bill?
Joanna Cherry
As the Minister knows, discussions about that are ongoing. He may take it that the constructive approach that I am indicating on behalf of the Scottish National party applies across the board, including the party in government in Scotland. He is aware from our discussions that there are certain concerns the impact of aspects of the Bill on devolved matters. They were addressed last week by my hon. Friend the Member for East Lothian in respect of the order for life-long restriction and the question of polygraph testing. We wish to be constructive on those matters, and that will be the approach of my colleagues at Holyrood.
Today I am focusing on TPIMs, which are a reserved matter. It is fair to say that my colleagues in Holyrood and Humza Yousaf, Scotland’s Justice Minister, have expressed some of the concerns that I am about to elaborate on. Like the hon. Member for St Helens North, my essential concern is that we have not yet seen the case for change—the case for lowering the standard of proof. We do not believe the Government have made that case, and in so saying we are in good company.
Our amendment 58, like the official Opposition’s amendment 69, seeks to raise the standard of proof, albeit it using a slightly different formulation. It is a probing amendment, but in truth, we believe that the standard of proof should stay as it is, because we do not think a case has been made out to change it. We also believe that that is where the balance of the expert evidence that this Committee has heard lies.
It is important to remember that, as has been alluded to, the changes in the Bill align the TPIMs regime more closely with its predecessor, the control orders regime. It is also important to remember that the concerns about control orders were widely shared across the House by Members from all parties. Those concerns are legitimate, because TPIMs restrict some of our most fundamental freedoms, such as freedom of expression, freedom of association, and freedom to have a private and family life. All these fundamental freedoms are restricted when somebody is sent to prison and convicted, but with a TPIM the person involved does not need to have been convicted of any crime for those freedoms to be restricted.
A TPIM is really just a step away from imprisonment, and depending on the package of restrictions, it can amount to a deprivation of liberty for the purposes of article 5 of the European convention on human rights, which for the time being at least is still a part of our domestic law. As none of the exceptions to the right to liberty in article 5 is applicable to the TPIMs regime, if the package of restrictions around a TPIMs regime amount to a deprivation of liberty, article 5 of the ECHR is breached. It is vital, therefore, that the TPIMs regime remains subject to the strictest of safeguards.
The current safeguard whereby a TPIM can only be imposed on the balance of probabilities is something that the Government are seeking to reduce considerably. We are concerned that the low threshold is disproportionate, and we do not think the Government have made out the case for lowering the threshold. It may well be that lowering the threshold would ease the administrative burden on the Government in terms of the evidence that is required for an application for a TPIM to be granted, but easing administrative burdens is not a sufficient reason to lower the standard of proof so drastically.
As I said, I will not push amendment 58 to a vote today, but if the Government continue to fail to deliver any compelling justification for their action, I anticipate that when the Bill returns to the Floor of the House, similar amendments will be tabled and there may even be a vote on whether this change should be made. The concerns that I am expressing are widely held. The hon. Member for St Helens North has told us that they are shared by the official Opposition and by the respected bodies that he listed. I know that some Conservative Back Benchers also share these concerns. Indeed, the Joint Committee on Human Rights, of which I am a member, is anxious, regarding this change as a lowering of the safeguards in relation to TPIMs. I am indebted to that Joint Committee for assisting me in my understanding of these issues.
Perhaps the most significant evidence this Committee has heard was from the current Independent Reviewer of Terrorism Legislation, Jonathan Hall QC. He has said that
“there is reason to doubt whether there exists an operational case for changing the TPIM regime at this point in time.”
I would submit that, notwithstanding the intervention on the hon. Member for St Helens North, we have heard nothing in evidence that has convinced Mr Hall QC otherwise. I asked him whether the Government had given him a business case or a justification for lowering standards of proof. He replied:
“I have obviously had discussions, but I have not been able to identify a cogent business case.” ––[Official Report, Counter-terrorism and Sentencing Public Bill Committee, 25 June 2020; c. 15, Q31.]
That is what is missing here.
The lack of cogency or reasoned argument for the need for change mirrors the lack of appropriate evidence or justification that was presented to the House on Second Reading. If we look at the impact assessment, we see that certain questions are posed, such as:
“What is the problem under consideration? Why is government intervention necessary?”
However, the answers given to such questions relate solely to convicted offenders, with only a later reference to the policy objective to “better protect the public” and a link to the issue of
“individuals of terrorism concern outside of custody.”
Then, there is a vague explanation that the Bill will allow for more effective intervention when that is required. On the changes to TPIMs, the impact assessment says that they
“will enhance the ability of operational partners, such as counterterrorism policing, to manage the risk posed by individuals subject to TPIMs.”
It says that the change to the standard of proof will simply
“help ensure that operational partners are better able to impose TPIM notices on individuals where there is a requirement to protect national security.”
No further justification is given.
Rob Butler
The hon. and learned Lady seems to be arguing for not reducing the burden of proof at all, but the amendment in her name suggests changing “suspecting” to “believing”. “Believing” would still be a reduction from the current standard of proof, so does she accept that there is potentially a halfway house, or is she arguing for no reduction at all?
Joanna Cherry
My primary position is that there should be no reduction at all. That is why I have gone to some lengths to set out the lack of a cogent business case for any reduction. The purpose of the amendment is very much like that of the amendment from the hon. Member for St Helens North: to suggest a halfway house and to probe whether the Government can come up with the business case. I will not push the amendment to a vote.
I end by reiterating what the hon. Member for St Helens North said, which is that it does not seem to be the case that the current standard of proof has been an impediment to the security services. We have had no evidence that it has prevented the security services from seeking a TPIM where they considered it necessary and appropriate to do so. To use the words of Jonathan Hall, until we have that sort of cogent business case, I do not think the Government have made their case for reducing the standard of proof.
I will not press my amendment at this stage, but I expect to see similar amendments when the Bill returns to the Floor of the House. Without such amendments, I would suspect that clause 37 would face a challenge on the Floor of the House.
Julie Marson (Hertford and Stortford) (Con)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship again, Mr Robertson. I have listened very carefully to hon. Members. I appreciate the comments, concerns and the constructive way in which they have made their arguments. I support the Government, and I support the principle of TPIMs and of using every tool that we have in our armoury to protect the public, which I know is a concern for hon. Members.
I would like to try to put this into context, which is important, today of all days. Today is 7 July—7/7—and the 15th anniversary of one of the worst attacks that this country and this city have ever faced. It is an important reminder of why we are here doing this and why the Government want to bring in this legislation to protect the public.
With the indulgence of the Chair and the Committee, I would like to talk about my friend Louise—I will not get emotional. Fifteen years ago today, my friend Louise was on a train from Aldgate to Liverpool Street. The night before, she had had a great night out. She had been in Trafalgar Square, celebrating the fact that London had just won the bid to host the Olympics.
It was a very busy train. She was standing when the train was rocked by an explosion in the next carriage to her. Louise’s carriage filled with smoke. The lights went out and the train screeched to a juddering halt. She says her heart was beating so much she thought it was going to come out of her chest, but she fought to keep calm amid the screams and the panic around her.
Some people managed to control their panic and started helping each other. They were calling up and down the train for doctors and nurses—anyone who could come and help. Some people had fallen. Some had hit their heads. It was chaos. Some people tried to get out. They were trying to get out of the windows between the carriages. They tried to prise the doors apart. None of that would work. Someone cried out that there was a body on the track.
They waited in the dark. Some emergency lights were going on, but it was mainly dark, for over an hour, until Louise says she saw the top of a policeman’s helmet outside the tunnel. From that moment—seeing the policeman—she felt safe. All of a sudden, she felt that she was going to get out and that everything would be all right.
They could not open the doors, so those who were able to moved out of the way to make way for the injured to be carried or to walk past them. They were bloodied, black, bewildered. Many of them were bandaged with commuters’ possessions, like belts and scarves and ties. After what seemed like forever, Louise was able to get off the train, but she had to walk past the bombed carriage. She said it looked like it had just been ripped apart like a can of Coke.
She passed two bodies on the track, covered up by a fluorescent transport worker’s jacket. She saw a man who was badly injured being tended to by paramedics. He was barely clothed and was propped up against the tunnel wall—his entire body blackened by bomb blast.
She said it was very surreal to come from that black, hellish atmosphere into the light, where it was light, there were helicopters above, there were blue lights and sirens, and there was a triage unit on the pavement where people were being treated. Quite surreally, she was told to give her details to the police and she walked off into London, trying to find her husband and blackened by soot. She said she just wanted a cup of tea, very weirdly.
The “Sliding Doors” moments, and the fear, panic and shock, came later. The overriding feeling she was left with was why did she get into that carriage, why did she not get into the next carriage and why did she survive, when so many others did not. She was determined not to change her way of life, so she got straight back on the tube and went straight back to work. I think she personifies bravery, and what we always say, that in the face of terrorism we just get on with it and we will not let our way of life be changed.
Today, 15 years to the day afterwards, Louise will be leaving flowers at Aldgate, as she does every year. Many of her fellow passengers and other victims who were affected by the incident have never been back on a tube. Some are still suffering from anxiety and depression, some suffered life-changing injuries, some lost a loved one and some will never see the light of day again. Over the weekend, I asked Louise what she would say to the Committee. This is what she said:
“Terrorism is the biggest threat we face to our way of life. I have so much faith in our intelligence and security services. I feel they should be given whatever powers and resources they need to fight it. Whilst there will always be those who slip through thej net, especially the lone wolves, we need to feel safe and learn lessons, and let our police and courts have the authority to act and protect us.”
Today I wanted to talk about Louise and pay tribute to her, and all of those affected, not just in that incident but in others. My belief is that the best tribute we could all pay is to pass this Bill.
Taiwo Owatemi (Coventry North West) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Robertson.
The No. 1 priority for all of us here is to keep ourselves and our constituents safe. On this side of the House, we recognise the seriousness of this crime and we will do everything that we can to ensure we can effectively and robustly tackle the threat of extremism, and the terrorists who threaten our national security. As emphasised by my hon. Friend the Member for St Helens North, we aim to be a constructive Opposition in identifying areas in which we can support the Government. In other areas, where we have questions and concerns about the legislation that comes before the House, we seek to strengthen and improve that legislation, where it is right to do so.
In support of amendment 69, I will briefly highlight some of my concerns about the imposition of TPIM notices, as outlined in the Bill. Terrorist offences are especially heinous and it is incumbent on us to ensure that we maintain a good, high standard in believing that an individual falls within this threat category. Having that standard for TPIMs, which we would support to keep our constituents safe, would protect the measures and not impede their robust or operational nature.
As my hon. Friend outlined, this standard of proof has been raised twice before, by the coalition Government in 2011 and by the Conservative Government in 2015. We have to wonder why the Government seek to implement the lowering of the standard of proof in clause 37. That would inevitably broaden the category of people who are suspected of being terrorists, but who may not pose a threat at all.
Jonathan Hall QC, the Independent Reviewer of Terrorism Legislation, has serious concerns that this clause could work on the assumption that courts have and could interpret “reasonable grounds for suspecting” as
“a belief not that the person is a terrorist, only that they may be a terrorist.”
There is a strong possibility that some TPIM subjects would not be actual terrorists and, by virtue of that, be innocent.
Mr Hall, who has access to highly sensitive national security information, said that the current standard of proof “has not proven impractical” and has expressed doubt that there is an operational justification for making these changes to the regime at this time. The Opposition are firm believers in evidence-based policy making and in not amending legislation for its own sake, but these are no small matters. The threat and the serious nature of terrorist activities have implications we are all too familiar with. However, we do not see the merits of targeting individuals for the sake of it. That would see a disproportionate number of ethnic minorities and potentially innocent people subject to quite intrusive measures.
We also do not think it appropriate to add strain to the security services and to the public purse, particularly when resources are already stretched. It prompts the question of why, despite the evidence and the advice of independent reviewers, we are making this change. I urge the Minister to outline his case.
Chris Philp
It is a pleasure to serve once again under your chairmanship, Mr Robertson. Let me once again welcome the shadow Minister to his well-deserved place on the Opposition Front Bench.
The speech given a few moments ago my hon. Friend the Member for Hertford and Stortford outlined with incredible power how important it is that we in this House and in government discharge our duty to protect the public. I thank her for sharing the experience that her friend Louise had 15 years ago today. I ask her to pass on the House’s thanks to Louise for the bravery and fortitude she showed on that day and subsequently, and for sharing her experience with the Committee. Hearing direct first-hand testimony of the kind we did a few moments ago brings to life how important this topic is and how seriously we must take our responsibility to protect our fellow citizens, so I ask my hon. Friend to pass on our thanks to Louise.
It is, of course, right that we take this moment to remember the 52 members of the public who lost their lives 15 years ago, and the 784 who were injured and who will often carry not just physical scars, but mental and psychological scars for many years to come. The shadow cast by terrorism is not just a physical shadow; it is a psychological and emotional shadow.
I turn to clause 37 and the proposed amendments. The first point I want to make, beyond reiterating that protecting the public is our primary duty, is that TPIMs are not something the Government, Ministers or the police reach for first. The first option is always to prosecute where we have evidence to do so, and that is what happens in the vast majority of cases—criminal prosecution before a judge and a jury, to the criminal standard of proof beyond reasonable doubt, is the preferred and first option. We should always keep that in mind. We fall back on TPIMs only where we believe there is a real threat to the public and where they are in fact necessary. The word “necessary” appears in the original 2011 legislation, and that test of necessity is not being changed by this new Bill. It is a last resort.
The hon. Member for St Helens North and the hon. and learned Member for Edinburgh South West both asked about the business case. Why are we introducing this change, and what is the need for this measure? I will begin by answering that question directly. As we have briefly heard from my hon. Friend the Member for Aylesbury, the answer is best found in the evidence that the Committee heard on the morning of Thursday 25 June from Assistant Chief Constable Tim Jacques. I asked him something twice in general terms, and then he answered more specifically. I asked him twice whether this legislation will
“make the public less or more safe”.
He answered very clearly,
“yes, I believe it will make the public safer.”––[Official Report, Counter-Terrorism and Sentencing Public Bill Committee, 25 June 2020; c. 20, Q48.]
To be absolutely sure, I asked him again whether it will make the public safer. He said:
“That is the view of the security services…that is their clear view.”––[Official Report, Counter-Terrorism and Sentencing Public Bill Committee, 25 June 2020; c. 21, Q50.]
Conor McGinn
The witness did say that. The Minister might recall that I then pushed the witness on the specifics of it, and he said he was talking about the totality of the package contained within the Bill—more specifically around sentencing, rather than what was proposed around TPIMs.
Chris Philp
I will elaborate on the questions a little further. Question 50 was specifically about TPIMs and the burden of proof. To clear that up, I will read question 50 in full—it is not very long. “For those three reasons”, which I will go through in a moment,
“you are being categorically clear with this Committee and with Parliament that the proposed lower standard of proof”—
which we are now discussing—
“would be a benefit to the police and the security services, and that it would make the public safer.”
I was expressly referring not just to TPIMs but to the standard of proof. Assistant Chief Constable Jacques replied:
“That is the view of the security services…that is their clear view.”—[Official Report, Counter-Terrorism and Sentencing Public Bill Committee, 25 June 2020; c. 22, Q50.]
He was answering specifically on TPIMs and on the burden of proof in question 50.
Joanna Cherry
If the evidence of the assistant chief constable and the three examples are so central to the Government’s business case, why were they not in the impact assessment and why were they not mentioned on Second Reading, when others and I were probing the Minister? For instance, the hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst, who is Chair of the Justice Committee, asked for the justification for the change. It seems to me the Government are seizing on this now as a justification. If it is the justification, flesh it out, put it in a business case but also, answer the question: why was it not there originally as a justification?
Chris Philp
I thank the hon. and learned Lady for her intervention. First, some of the details I am about to take the Committee through were mentioned on Second Reading. My right hon. Friend the Member for New Forest East (Dr Lewis) and I expressly mentioned the possibility of people returning from conflict zones such as Syria. In response to repeated interventions from the right hon. Member for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford (Yvette Cooper), I gave the justification in general terms, which have been borne out subsequently by the detailed evidence.
Joanna Cherry
The problem of people returning from Syria, which I accept, is a significant one that has existed for a number of years. Is the Minister saying in terms that the current TPIM regime—the current standard of proof—has prevented the security services from dealing with the problem of people returning from Syria? If that is what he saying, he should say so in bald terms, rather than seizing on something after the fact to justify this significant change.
Chris Philp
I will finish dealing with the hon. and learned Lady’s previous intervention and then I will answer her second one. She was asking why the case was not made more fully on Second Reading. I said it was made in general terms and the example of Syria was given. I will come on to that in a moment. The reason we have witnesses appearing before Public Bill Committees is precisely to serve this purpose: to bring out the detail and let them give their testimony to the Committee and the House. The detailed testimony given by Assistant Chief Constable Tim Jacques on the morning of 25 June is precisely why we have witnesses. It is serving the function it should have done, which was to give the Committee and the House the details they asked for on Second Reading and which hon. Members are asking for today.
I turn to the detail of Tim Jacques’s testimony and give the specific and precise reasons why he and the security services believe this is important, one of which is the Syrian example, which I will elaborate on in just a moment. Assistant Chief Constable Jacques’s first reason for why the lower standard of proof is necessary to protect the public is that we may find that there are individuals whose
“risk profile is rapidly increasing”—[Official Report, Counter-Terrorism and Sentencing Public Bill Committee, 25 June 2020; c. 20, Q49.]
If someone’s behaviour is quickly changing they may go from posing a potential threat to an actual threat to actually offending very quickly. He says that it is that rapid change of circumstances that necessitates a lower burden of proof. He then goes on to give a second reason, which was mentioned by the hon. and learned Lady a moment ago, which is the threat of somebody returning from overseas. He says that where someone has been overseas—for example, in Syria—it is extremely difficult, as one can readily imagine, to gather evidence that would meet the criminal standard of proof beyond reasonable doubt.
Clearly, if someone has been operating in Syria, there will typically be no signals intelligence or eye-witness testimony, because it is very hard to get witnesses from Syria to come here, and there will be no results of other forms of surveillance: all the evidence that would normally be presented in a criminal prosecution enabling somebody’s guilt to be established beyond reasonable doubt. It is difficult—impossible, I would say—to achieve that when someone is returning. That is why, in those thankfully relatively rare circumstances, we might need to work to a lower standard of proof and reasonable suspicion in order to protect the public.
The hon. and learned Lady essentially said that people have been going to Syria for five years now, and indeed returning for four or five years. We heard in evidence from both Jonathan Hall and Tim Jacques that, historically, there have not been any examples where a TPIM was desired but not obtained owing to the burden of proof. In fact, that observation applies more generally and not only to the Syrian example. Let me directly answer the criticism immediately.
It is true, I accept, that there have been no occasions historically when a TPIM was desired but not granted owing to the burden of proof that currently exists. However, we are not seeking simply to cater for circumstances that occurred historically; we seek in this legislation, and as parliamentarians, to cater for risks that may arise in the future that may not have arisen in the past. The absence of such risks having happened in the last five or six years does not establish definitively that they will not happen in the future—such a risk might arise in the future. Indeed, the assistant chief constable effectively said that he thinks that is possible, which is why he is advocating for the lower burden of proof.
We must cater for risks, not historical certainties. That is why the evidence of the assistant chief constable is so important and why the Syrian example is a good one, even though historically we have not been inhibited. We might be in the future. A few moments ago, we heard a powerfully eloquent description of the devastating consequences that follow when the public are not protected.
Assistant Chief Constable Jacques laid out a third reason in his evidence concerning sensitive material—material that is gathered covertly, or the disclosure of which might prejudice investigations or the security services:
“The disclosure of sensitive material would potentially compromise sensitive techniques and therefore make our job and that of the Security Service harder”.––[Official Report, Counter-Terrorism and Sentencing Public Bill Committee, 25 June 2020; c. 21, Q49.]
He says that, with a lower standard of proof, that disclosure would be required less frequently so there would not be such a requirement to disclose sensitive information.
In answer to a question posed by both Opposition Front-Bench shadow Ministers, Assistant Chief Constable Jacques laid out the business case powerfully in those three examples that I have just taken the Committee through.
Joanna Cherry
I have the greatest respect for the assistant chief constable and for the assistance he was able to give the Committee, but in a court of law we would call that hearsay evidence. He is not actually dealing with seeking TPIMs. The Independent Reviewer of Terrorism Legislation, who is charged by the Government with the responsibility of overviewing all this, said that there is no cogent business case.
Can the Minister explain why the independent reviewer is not convinced by the assistant chief constable’s three examples? Mr Hall said that he has had discussions with the Government—presumably the Government have put those examples to him if they are so central to the business case. Can the Minister explain to us why the Independent Reviewer of Terrorism Legislation is not convinced that there is a cogent case?
Chris Philp
I was not present at those meetings, so I cannot comment on what was discussed. However, the hon. and learned Lady has herself already observed that Assistant Chief Constable Jacques’s critical testimony was ventilated in such details—publicly at least—for the first time in his evidence; of course, Jonathan Hall gave evidence just before Assistant Chief Constable Jacques. As I say, I was not privy to the conversations that took place between Jonathan Hall and my colleagues in the Home Office, so I do not know what case was presented to him, but I do know that the case presented by Tim Jacques was, at least in my view, compelling.
Chris Philp
Before I move on to the second leg of my support for these measures, I will of course give way to the shadow Minister, who wants to intervene.
Conor McGinn
To echo what the hon. and learned Member for Edinburgh South West said, the evidence of the assistant chief constable was incredibly useful—he is hugely respected across law enforcement. But he was one witness. He made it clear, in response to the Minister’s questions about TPIMs, that it was the view of the security services that the lowering of the standard of proof might have “utility” when it came to the examples that he outlined—but he was also clear that the police are not the applicant.
Chris Philp
I have made this point already, in response to an earlier intervention, but at question 50 I asked the assistant chief constable expressly about TPIMs and the burden of proof. He expressly said that it would make the public safer—he was talking there not about the generality of the Bill, but about TPIMs specifically. Of course, I welcome the fact that in more general terms he feels that the Bill will help, but that question related specifically to TPIMs.
Chris Philp
The assistant chief constable said:
“That is the view of the security services. We are not the applicant, but that is their clear view.”––[Official Report, Counter-Terrorism and Sentencing Public Bill Committee, 25 June 2020; c. 21, Q50.]
Although he was not applying for TPIMs, he is a senior police officer involved in counter-terrorism policing, he had been briefed by the security services before giving evidence, and he is responsible for monitoring and managing TPIMs subsequently. To dismiss his evidence as hearsay—the hon. Gentleman did not, but the hon. and learned Member for Edinburgh South West did—is rather unfair, given that he had the briefing from the security services in front of him when he gave evidence and given the close role he and counter-terrorism police play in managing and monitoring TPIMs.
Joanna Cherry
There is no insult in saying that someone’s evidence is hearsay; it is simply that they are giving evidence about what someone else has told them. I am not undermining the witness in any way, but he is only giving evidence about what he has been told. Let us look at what he said at question 58, when I said:
“So where there is a rapidly escalating situation or where there is a need to manage sensitive material, we already have available to us the option of a new variant TPIM without changing the standard of proof.”
He responded:
“Well, a TPIM is a TPIM. We have the option of a TPIM to manage that case, yes, as it currently stands. MI5 has pointed out that there is no case thus far where the standard of proof has been a blocker.”—[Official Report, Counter-Terrorism and Sentencing Public Bill Committee, 25 June 2020; c. 23, Q58.]
As I said to him, that is an important answer, albeit that it is hearsay. He is telling us that MI5 has said, in respect of two of the examples that the Minister is giving us as a justification for this significant change, that in no case so far has the current standard of proof been a blocker. Does that not perhaps explain why we have three distinguished Independent Reviewers of Terrorism Legislation supporting the existing standard of proof, rather than this Government’s variation?
Chris Philp
I have already accepted, a few minutes ago, that there have not been any historical examples. That was clear from the evidence. I also said, in response to an earlier intervention on Syria, that just because there have not been any historically—we are talking about very small numbers—does not mean to say that there will not be such a situation in the future. We need to guard against potential future risk. That is what we seek to do.
Let me go on to the second plank of my rationale for why this proposed burden of proof is appropriate. It is because there are significant mitigants to any risks of abuse of process, miscarriages of justice or inappropriate behaviour. I rest my case for those mitigants on two legs or stands.
The first is that we do not need to hypothesise about how a Government—any Government—might behave with access to TPIMs, or control orders, with a lower standard of proof. As the hon. Member for St Helens North pointed out, we had control orders, passed by then Labour Government in 2005, which had the lower standard of proof—the reasonable suspicion. Those persisted for approximately six years, from 2005 to 2011. During that period, 52 control orders were issued. On the morning of 25 June, I also asked Jonathan Hall whether he was aware of any misuse in that six-year period—I said seven then, but it is six—when the lower burden of proof prevailed. He said:
“I am not aware of any misuse”.––[Official Report, Counter-Terrorism and Sentencing Public Bill Committee, 25 June 2020; c. 7, Q9.]
I also asked him whether he was aware of the Government ever having misused the powers or used them without care and circumspection; I actually asked whether, as far as he could see, the Government had used the powers “with care and circumspection”. He said:
“I am quite satisfied that the Government are doing that.”––[Official Report, Counter-Terrorism and Sentencing Public Bill Committee, 25 June 2020; c. 6, Q5.]
So the control orders, as they were then, operated with a lower standard of proof for six years with no abuse or misuse identified.
The hon. and learned Member for Edinburgh South West raised a question about ECHR article 5 compliance and whether the lower burden of proof would potentially infringe that. I checked that during the debate. During the six years when 52 control orders were used, at no point, despite some challenges, were they found to be not compliant with the ECHR. The Committee can satisfy itself that when they operated previously, they did so without abuse and were not struck down as an instrument as a whole by the court.
The second set of mitigants is to be found in the Terrorism Prevention and Investigation Measures Act 2011, in which the Committee probably knows there are five conditions, labelled A to E, that have to be met for a TPIM to be granted. We are seeking to amend only one of those five conditions, condition A, which pertains to the burden of proof in so far as it touches on terrorism-related activity.
The four other conditions still have to be met and are not being changed by the Bill. For example, condition C requires the Secretary of State to reasonably consider “that it is necessary”—I labour that word “necessary”—
“for purposes connected with protecting members of the public from a risk of terrorism”.
The Secretary of State must be satisfied that there is necessity. It must not be done on a whim or because it might or may be required. It must be necessary. That is in section 3(3) of the 2011 Act, which is not being amended.
In section 3(4), condition D makes a similar point that the Secretary of State must reasonably consider
“that it is necessary, for purposes connected with preventing or restricting the individual’s involvement in terrorism-related activity”.
Again, it uses the word “necessary”—not “possible”, “maybe” or “might”, but “necessary”. It is a very strong word.
Moreover, in section 3(5), condition E says that the Secretary of State must seek permission from the court, as described further in sections 6 and 9 of the Act. They must go to a court of law and make sure that it feels it is reasonable that a TPIM should be granted. At the outset, there is judicial oversight of the process. The Home Secretary cannot, just by a stroke of a pen, give out a TPIM and thereby restrict someone’s liberty. That is a serious matter, as the hon. and learned Member for Edinburgh South West has already said. There is judicial oversight of the process. I say again that four of the five tests laid down in section 3 of the 2011 Act are not changing. They will stay the same.
Moreover, those subjected to a TPIM have a right of appeal against it. The 2011 Act, which, again, is not being amended, provides that they can go to a court if they feel that a TPIM has been unreasonably imposed, unreasonably varied or unreasonably extended. They can ask a court for relief and the court proceedings can carry on according to the principles used in judicial review. Beyond the simple question of burden of proof around terrorist-related activities, there are those further protections in the Bill and from the courts.
I will conclude, Mr Robertson—always welcome words during one of my speeches—by saying that the powers are used sparingly. There were 52 of the old control orders in total over six years, but at any one time no more than 15 were ever in force. As the shadow Minister has said, as of November last year there were five TPIMs in force, although I think that we heard in evidence that the number might subsequently have gone up to six.
We use such powers very sparingly, for the reason that the hon. and learned Member for Edinburgh South West mentioned: they touch on an individual’s liberty. However, they are occasionally, in the words of the Act, “necessary”—necessary to protect the public, necessary to protect people such as Louise who might otherwise be killed, injured or traumatised and necessary to protect our fellow citizens. It is for those reasons of necessity that I respectfully say that the clause as drafted is an integral and an important part of the Bill.
Conor McGinn
I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 37 ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Clause 38
TPIMs: extension of time limit
Conor McGinn
I beg to move amendment 60, in clause 38, page 34, line 31, at end insert—
“(za) in subsection (3)(a), for “and D” substitute “, D and E”;”
The amendment would require the Secretary of State to seek permission from the High Court for any TPIM extension beyond the two-year mark, as when a TPIM notice is first issued.
The Chair
With this, it will be convenient to discuss amendment 64, in clause 38, page 34, line 31, at end insert—
“(za) in subsection (3)(a), after ‘met’ insert ‘and the court gives the Secretary of State permission’;
(zb) after subsection (3)(a), insert ‘(ab) In determining the extension, the court must apply the principles applicable on an application for judicial review.’”
Conor McGinn
Let me say at the outset that this amendment is intended to probe and provoke some of the debate that we had on the previous clause, although perhaps not in quite as lengthy a way. I will not be pushing any of the amendments in my name to a vote.
The amendments cover another critical aspect to the changes proposed by the Government, which we approach in a constructive manner in the hope of aiding the Government to make a case for them by understanding them and providing proper and effective scrutiny. I know the Minister accepts and welcomes that as the role of the official Opposition.
The proposed changes to TPIMs in clause 38, when taken together, have quite a profound impact on the regime as we currently understand it. If the standard of proof is to be lowered, while simultaneously making it possible to potentially indefinitely detain someone under a TPIM by removing the current two-year limit, scrutiny, oversight and safeguards take on a new-found and even more significant role.
We have therefore tabled a number of amendments to tighten the scrutiny, oversight and effectiveness of TPIMs where they are to be extended beyond the two-year period. We believe amendment 60 would help to ensure adequate scrutiny and oversight of notices that are in place for prolonged periods of time. As the independent reviewer made abundantly clear in his note of 5 June 2020, the current system and the proposed changes lack a sense of continuing judicial oversight, which is only exacerbated by the fact that many individuals subject to a TPIM opt out of the High Court review. The independent reviewer goes on to say:
“The prospect of individuals being subject to administrative measures for many years without robust scrutiny is unappealing”.
With this amendment, we seek to address that problem. As is the case where a TPIM notice is first issued, it would compel the Secretary of State, whether now or under a future Government, to seek permission from a High Court judge where a TPIM notice is to be extended beyond the critical two-year mark.
The Chair
Order. I am terribly sorry to interrupt you. We are only discussing amendment 60 to clause 38 and amendment 64, not amendment 61 at this stage.
Conor McGinn
Thank you, Mr Robertson, for your guidance. I look forward to discussing amendment 61 later.
The Minister will not be unaware of the concerns raised around the extent of the two-year period, given what a TPIM entails. We hope to provide some scrutiny around that, to underscore the effectiveness and credibility of the entire process by judicial oversight review, and maintain those safeguards, to reassure the public that they are protected by TPIMs—we believe they are a hugely important part of this legislation and keeping the public safe—and that this is being done properly, with due diligence and oversight.
Chris Philp
Allow me to explain why the current two-year maximum does not work from a security services perspective. As matters stand, if a TPIM comes to the end of two years and thereby automatically lapses, a brand-new application has to be made, requiring completely fresh evidence, without simply reusing the evidence used at the outset. New evidence must be obtained, which takes some time, particularly if during the two-year period of the TPIM, the subject has been careful to behave themselves, which is the purpose of the TPIM in the first place.
We have had examples of a gap caused by the renewal requirement. Jonathan Hall acknowledged that in answer to my question in his evidence on 25 June,. I asked him about gaps when TPIMs had expired and he said that he had found a couple of examples. He added:
“In one case it was a gap of a year, and in the second it was a gap of 16 months.”
In response, I said:
“It is fair to say that the risk would have existed in that 12 to 16-month period.”––[Official Report, Counter-Terrorism and Sentencing Public Bill Committee, 25 June 2020; Q2, c. 6.]
I was not asking about things that had actually happened; I was asking about risk—what might have happened. In response to that point, Jonathan Hall replied, “Yes.”
I went on similarly to ask Assistant Chief Constable Jacques whether a risk might exist in that gap. He said:
“Because we jointly manage TPIMs once imposed, I can speak on this. Yes, we do see an increase in the threat if that gap occurs, and that gap has occurred, as Jonathan has pointed out previously.”––[Official Report, Counter-Terrorism and Sentencing Public Bill Committee, 25 June 2020; Q51, c. 21.]
We therefore have clear evidence, from both the independent reviewer, Jonathan Hall, and counter-terrorism expert Assistant Chief Constable Jacques, telling us that the gap that follows the two-year expiration of a TPIM poses a risk to the public. It is right that in the Bill we seek to close that risk by allowing for carefully considered annual extensions.
In terms of protecting the subject and ensuring that the extensions are not used unreasonably, let me make the following comments to reassure the Committee and, I hope, the whole House. First, the old control order regime did not have the two-year limit. In the period when the control orders introduced by the Labour Government in 2005 were enforced, 30 lasted for two years or less, eight lasted for between two and three years, four lasted for between three and four years, and only three lasted for between four and five years. The clear majority lasted for less than two years. Only a small number—15, according to the figures that I have—lasted for more than two years, and the bulk of those lasted for three or four years. Once again, when the powers are available, they are used circumspectly and sparingly.
Further protections are laid out in statutory provisions in the Terrorism Prevention and Investigation Measures Act 2011, which will continue. The first is found in section 11 of the Act, which requires the Secretary of State to keep TPIMs under review, in particular conditions C and D, which I mentioned earlier. That is given practical effect via a quarterly review process, once every three months, in which the security services and counter-terrorism police participate. Secondly, there is an ongoing right of appeal by the subject laid out in section 16 of the 2011 Act. Section 16(1), which will continue in force, says that if
“the Secretary of State extends or revives a TPIM”,
the right of appeal will apply, so every time a TPIM is extended, the subject, if they think the extension is unreasonable, has the right to go to court to seek protection.
Given that the current gap is posing a risk to the public, as Jonathan Hall and Assistant Chief Constable Jacques very clearly said, and given that there are good and strong safeguards in place, I believe that the provisions in clause 38, allowing considered, thoughtful annual extensions, serve the purpose of protecting the public.
Joanna Cherry
I am not going to speak to amendment 64, but I will speak in support of Labour’s amendment 61 when we get to it.
Conor McGinn
I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Conor McGinn
I beg to move amendment 61, in clause 38, page 34, line 31, at end insert—
“(za) for subsection (3)(a), substitute—
‘(a) may be extended under subsection (2) only if—
(i) the Secretary of State believes on the balance of probabilities that the individual is, or has been, involved in terrorism-related activity;
(ii) conditions C and D are met.’”
This amendment requires the standard of proof for renewing a TPIM notice beyond two years to be “on the balance of probabilities”, where no new terrorism-related activity can be demonstrated.
Thank you, Mr Robertson, for your gentle guidance in navigating our way through the numerous amendments. Although they are linked, it is important that we examine them on their own merits. At its core, amendment 61, like the amendment we have just discussed, is about securing strong and robust safeguards, which, as I said, we should use the Bill as an opportunity to promote rather than jettison. We should show confidence in the process and procedures that we are introducing to keep the public safe.
The prospect of a TPIM notice enduring for a prolonged or even indefinite period deserves scrutiny. It is important to remember what a TPIM can involve: overnight residence requirements, relocation to another part of the country, police reporting, an electronic monitoring tag, exclusion from specific places, limits on association, limits on the use of financial services, limits on the use of telephones and computers, and a ban on holding travel documents. Even in the dying part of the Labour party that is the traditional old right, I balk a little at some of that. I accept that it is necessary to monitor very dangerous individuals and keep the public safe, but these are some pretty fundamental liberties that we are talking about denying people. There is a responsibility on all of us to acknowledge that, and to make sure that we give it proper scrutiny. These are, rightly, robust measures, and to reiterate: we do not believe there should be impediments in cases where a longer TPIM notice that would genuinely be in the interests of keeping the public safe and secure, which is of course our first priority, should be extended. It is also important to say that these sanctions, effectively, are imposed on people who have not been convicted of any crime, and that they are being taken in addition to the lowering of the standard of proof and the extension of the period without, it appears, due oversight needs to be properly looked at.
The other point is that TPIMs are resource-intensive instruments. Assistant Chief Constable Jacques clearly said that additional resources would need to be provided. It would be good to hear a commitment from the Minister that that would the case and that, whatever law enforcement would need, and notwithstanding that a spike in TPIMs is not envisaged, the extension thereof and any addition to the current number will be properly and fully resourced.
As the hon. and learned Member for Edinburgh South West said earlier, there is testimony not just from the current reviewer of terrorism legislation, but also from previous ones. Someone as respected as Lord Carlile, for example, said that a differentiated standard of proof, effectively, would be created for extending a TPIM beyond the two-year point. That would add another layer to the complexity of what proof is required at what point, and to what extent. Jonathan Hall also noted on 5 June that that would be the case.
As I said previously, not a single TPIM measure has been rejected to date based on insufficient evidence of the higher standard of proof, so the safeguard would not operationally hinder the TPIM regime, which we agree needs to be strong and flexible. We need to ensure that those TPIMs extended for prolonged periods are subject to an extra level of scrutiny and oversight and that they are applied in reasonable and proportionate terms, fundamentally in keeping with the thrust of what they are designed to do, which is to keep the public safe.
Joanna Cherry
I am grateful for the opportunity to speak in support of amendment 61, and to remind hon. Members of what the current Independent Reviewer of Terrorism Legislation said in his evidence to us. I will look in particular at his response to my question 33, when he said that the combination of clause 37 and clause 38 is a “double whammy”,
“not just lowering the standard of proof but also allowing TPIMs to endure forever.”—[Official Report, Counter-terrorism and Sentencing Bill Committee, 25 June 2020; Q33, c.15.]
Indeed, he suggested the very safeguards set out in amendment 60 and 61. I support to amendment 61 for that reason. I take hon. Members back to what he said in response to my question 33. I said:
“What about looking at balancing out the changes made in this Bill to TPIMs by introducing some safeguards to ensure that TPIMs do not breach the human rights of a subject of a TPIM? Have you thought about that? We should always remember that the subject of a TPIM has not been convicted of any crime.”
He answered:
“As far as safeguards are concerned, you will probably have seen from my notes that here you have a double whammy. It is not just reducing the standard of proof but allowing TPIMs to endure forever. Something that was proposed by my predecessor”—
he meant Lord Anderson, as the hon. Member for St Helens North said—is that
“if it were right that a TPIM should continue beyond two years, at least at that stage the authorities should be able to say, on the balance of probabilities, that the person really is a terrorist. That is an example of a safeguard.”
He went on:
“Turning to the question of enduring TPIMs, another safeguard could be to ensure that a judge would have to give permission—in other words, to treat going beyond the two years without any additional proof of new terrorism-related activity as requiring a higher threshold, or some sort of exceptionality or necessity test, as a further safeguard for the subject.”
Again, in fairness, he also said:
“I do not think the authorities will be unwise in the way that they use that, but there is a risk that people will be on TPIMs for a very long time indeed. As you say, they have not been prosecuted, and it seems to be right in principle and fair that there should be some additional safeguards for those individuals.”––[Official Report, Counter-Terrorism and Sentencing Public Bill Committee, 25 June 2020; Q33, cc. 15-16.]
Chris Philp
Amendment 61 seeks to introduce a higher standard of proof—the balance of probabilities—if a TPIM is to be extended beyond two years. We debated at some length the relative merits of reasonable suspicion and the balance of probabilities in relation to clause 37, so I do not propose to repeat those arguments at great length. However, I hope I established in my previous remarks the importance of the reasonable suspicion burden of proof, rather than the balance of probabilities.
On the issue of extension, I gave the reasons why it is important to avoid this two-year cliff edge a few minutes ago, during the debate on amendments 60 and 64. I also drew attention to the protections that exist, particularly the review process in section 11 of the TPIM Act, which is an internal process that goes on on a quarterly basis. I also drew attention to the right of appeal under section 16 of the same Act. Every time one of these orders gets extended by a year, the subject has a right to go back to the court if he or she feels they are being treated unreasonably and unfairly. For all those reasons, I think the annual renewal process, with a right of appeal should the subject feel the renewal is unreasonable, provides adequate protection.
The shadow Minister, the hon. Member for St Helens North, asked about counter-terrorism resources. As I am sure he is aware, counter-terrorism police expenditure was significantly increased earlier this year. The police have a great deal more resources than they had previously, and as Assistant Chief Constable Jacques said in evidence,
“Neither we nor the Security Service envisage a large increase in those numbers—
the numbers of people on TPIMs—
“as a result of the provisions in the Bill”––[Official Report, Counter-Terrorism and Sentencing Public Bill Committee, 25 June 2020; Q49, c. 20.]
although as the shadow Minister said, some may endure longer. We are absolutely committed to making sure the resources required are available.
Conor McGinn
I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Conor McGinn
I beg to move amendment 67, in clause 38, page 34, line 33, at end insert—
“(ab) after subsection (3)(b) insert—
(3A) Where a TPIM notice has been extended under subsection (3), the Secretary of State must review, at 6 monthly intervals, whether it is appropriate to issue a revocation notice under section (13)(1).
(3B) A review under subsection 3A will include a memorandum to—
(a) the chief officer of the relevant police force;
(b) the Security Service,
(c) the Secret Intelligence Service, and
(d) the Government Communications Headquarters
outlining a tailored exit strategy.
(3C) A ‘tailored exit strategy’ under subsection (3B) shall include—
(a) an assessment of the individual’s current security threat, which must include an assessment of the current evidence and investigative steps as provided by the bodies listed in subsection (3B);
(b) a plan for agencies and public services to engage with the individual to promote rehabilitation for the duration of the TPIM; and
(c) a plan for how TPIM measures may be removed if no new evidence of terrorist related activity is provided.”
An amendment to require the Secretary of State to specify a provisional exit strategy for a TPIM notice, upon any renewal beyond the two-year mark.
It always struck me as a strange and inflexible design flaw of TPIMs that they had a set limit of two years. My right hon. Friend the Member for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford, who chairs the Select Committee on Home Affairs, reminded the House on Second Reading that
“Control orders were set for a year but could be renewed”,
but
“TPIMs were fixed at two years.”—[Official Report, 9 June 2020; Vol. 677, c. 229.]
As far back as 2011, my right hon. Friend was raising concerns about what that would mean for the small number of people who might be extremely dangerous after two years, and what provisions would be in place to ensure the public were protected.
It would be good to introduce a measure of flexibility to TPIMs, but my concern is that by doing so that way, the Government leave a very open-ended approach, which could see cases effectively kicked into the long grass, often at great expense and with no realistic strategy for resolution of any kind. When imposing a TPIM, we must always have sight of what resolution is—whether prosecution or the removal of the notice—rather than the idea that we can indefinitely extend the TPIM and leave those who are subject to them in a sort of terrorism-suspect limbo.
The amendment seeks to address the open-ended nature of the Government’s changes by requiring the Secretary of State to specify what we have called a provisional exit strategy for a TPIM notice upon any renewal beyond the two-year mark. Under the provision in the amendment, the Secretary of State would be obliged to undertake a review every six months to set out whether it is appropriate to issue a revocation notice and to draw up, with police and security services, a tailored exit strategy. That strategy would involve an assessment of the individual’s current security threat, which should be the most fundamental and overarching aspect to the TPIM; a plan for agencies and public services to engage with the individual to promote rehabilitation for the duration of the TPIM if possible; and a plan for how TPIM measures can be removed if no new evidence of terrorist-related activity is provided.
It is not in anyone’s interest to allow individuals to remain indefinitely on TPIMs, not just for their own sake but for that of wider society because, crucially, they should be brought to justice and put through the judicial process. As Jonathan Hall said:
“There is the risk that, once a TPIM has been made and someone has been identified as a risk, that takes priority—in other words, the TPIM is the best way of protecting the public—over trying to get criminal evidence to prosecute”.––[Official Report, Counter-Terrorism and Sentencing Public Bill Committee, 25 June 2020; c. 17, Q37.]
Having heard the wide-ranging evidence from witnesses, as well as what the security services and others have said, I am in no doubt that that is far from being the motivation of anyone involved in overseeing a TPIM, but those are important points to bear in mind none the less.
The idea of an indefinite TPIM means that someone convicted of a terrorist offence could conceivably be free of constraints before someone who is placed on an enduring TPIM. As we legislate in this place, we need to be cognisant of the potential for that to occur, which would be quite perverse and bizarre, albeit quite unlikely. The idea of leaving someone subject to a TPIM indefinitely is not cost-effective for the taxpayer and, notwithstanding all the amendments that we have tabled, does nothing to tackle the issues that have brought the individual to the point that they are subjected to the TPIM—namely, entering dangerous extremism and being suspected, as the lower standard of proof would say, of becoming engaged in criminal and terrorist activity.
I worry that the indefinite TPIM discourages a move towards seeking a conviction when that is appropriate, and increases the risk of individuals slipping under the radar over time if their cases are not regularly reviewed by those tasked with implementing the TPIM. An exit strategy would keep that small number of cases at the forefront of the Secretary of State’s mind and would ensure that, if there were enduring or extended TPIMs, we would not allow them to become indefinite beyond that which is reasonable.
Chris Philp
On the point about potential perpetuity TPIMs, once again I assure the Committee that history from the old control order regime teaches us that the number of TPIMs enduring beyond two or three years is exceptionally small, and the subject always has a right of appeal to the court. On the question about reviews and the exit strategy, which is the topic of the amendment, the Government essentially agree with the comments about their importance but, in fact, that is precisely what happens already. I have referred to the fact that section 11 of the TPIM Act requires the Secretary of State to keep under review whether conditions C and D are being met—that is, whether there is terrorist-related activity or whether the public need to be protected. That is given practical effect by a TPIM review group, a so-called TRG, that meets on a quarterly basis. The topics that it discusses are exactly those that the shadow Minister quite rightly and eloquently laid out a few minutes ago, including the exit strategy.
That was reviewed and commented on in the 2018 report of the then Independent Reviewer of Terrorism Legislation, Max Hill QC, who is now, of course, the Director of Public Prosecutions. In relation to the TPIM review group’s activity, he said that
“the TRG meets at three-monthly intervals”,
which is twice as often as the amendment calls for, and that
“very careful consideration is given to every aspect of the TPIM in force, including…the individual measures, each in turn…the exit strategy, in other words timely preparation for returning the TPIM subject to his”—
or her—
“home life at the end of the TPIM.”
I am delighted to be able to say to the Committee that exactly the review mechanisms, including the exit strategy, that the shadow Minister is calling for are already in place and were validated by the then independent reviewer, Max Hill, in 2018.
Conor McGinn
I do not have anything to add except to say that that was a rare example of a probing amendment that probed and received assurances, so I do not seek to press it to a vote. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Conor McGinn
I beg to move amendment 68, in clause 38, page 34, line 35, at end insert—
‘(3A) After section 10 (Criminal investigations into terrorism-related activity) insert—
“Report on terrorism-related activity
10A (1) The chief officer of the appropriate police force must produce a report to—
(a) the Secretary of State; and
(b) the Intelligence and Security Committee of Parliament, as set out in section (1) of the Justice and Security Act 2013.
(2) A report under subsection (1) must address the—
(a) current evidence, and
(b) investigative steps that—
(i) have been, and
(ii) may still be taken
in relation to the TPIM.
(3) A report under subsection (1) must be produced two years after the imposition or extension of a TPIM.
(4) Section (3) (Reports of the ISC) of the Justice and Security Act 2013 is amended as follows.
(5) After subsection (3)(1) insert—
‘(1A) An annual report to Parliament must contain a statement as to whether it is satisfied with the content of a report produced under section (10A) of the Terrorism Prevention and Investigation Measures Act 2011.’
(6) In this section—
(a) ‘appropriate police force’;
(b) ‘chief officer’; and
(c) ‘police force’
have the meaning as set out in section 10.”’
An amendment requiring the chief officer of the relevant police force to produce a report, at a TPIM’s two-year mark, to the Secretary of State and the Intelligence and Security Committee of Parliament on the current evidence and investigative steps that had been and may still be taken in relation to the TPIM.
This amendment, which I tabled on behalf of the official Opposition builds on previous amendments to ensure not only that there is judicial oversight of the extension, as well as an exit strategy, but that the latest evidence and investigative steps, as provided by the local police, can and are thoroughly explored by the Secretary of State.
We reference the Secretary of State directly because the Bill vests a lot of power in the individual who holds that office with regard to the decision about whether to impose a TPIM. I know that the Secretary of State is busy, certainly if she is doing even half the work of the shadow Secretary of State, but it applies only to a small number of individuals. It is right, given the authority that the Secretary of State has to impose TPIMs, that he or she is therefore responsible for their continuing oversight as well.
The Minister and Committee members will know that section 10 of the 2011 Act provides for a process of evidential review whereby the Secretary of State consults the relevant chief officer of the respective police force to determine whether a criminal prosecution at any given moment is viable, credible and practical, yet the independent reviewer writes in his note of 5 June that
“for the review process I found that neither the Home Secretary nor her officials saw anything other than a tick in the box to show that the relevant chief officer had performed this role.”
If the relevant chief officer says that they have fulfilled that duty, I have full and total confidence in that. It may have become an unfashionable view in some quarters, but I trust the police, their judgment and their assessment on such matters, because they are the experts. They are the people who are tasked with overseeing, implementing and doing that work on the ground. Procedurally and practically, however, it would be of real benefit, not just for Ministers and officials in the Home Office, but for the police and the security and intelligence services more widely, if they had access to comprehensive and detailed information from the local police at that critical stage.
The amendment would, in effect, remedy an existing gap. It would strengthen the rigour of the existing process by compelling the chief officer of the appropriate force to produce a detailed report, once again at that crucial two-year mark, to the Secretary of State, outlining the latest evidence and the investigative steps that have been or might still be taken in relation to the TPIM notice. It would allow for a better informed view on the current circumstances of an individual TPIM, but also give greater encouragement and clarity to law enforcement more widely on what the next steps, including the chance of criminal prosecution, might be, which brings us back to the exit strategy that we talked about.
Chris Philp
I will be brief, because we have discussed at some length the question of extensions and an exit strategy. I echo the comments about section 10 of the 2011 Act. As the shadow Minister said, section 10 places a duty on the Secretary of State to consult the relevant chief officer of police as to whether there is sufficient evidence to prosecute a terrorism-related offence before imposing a TPIM. The chief officer must then consult the relevant prosecuting authority. Once the TPIM has been imposed, section 10 says that the chief officer
“must ensure investigations of the TPIM subject’s conduct is kept under review throughout the duration of the TPIM with a view to prosecution for an offence related to terrorism if the evidential threshold can be met”.
Essentially, I think that what the hon. Gentleman reasonably asks for is enshrined in section 10 of the 2011 Act. I point again to the operation of the TPIM review group, to which I referred to in the previous debate, which meets regularly every three months and has input from police and the security services to do exactly what the shadow Minister asks.
On oversight and reporting, the hon. Gentleman mentioned the ISC. I believe it will be constituted soon, but that is not in my gift or purview. I think the most suitable person to oversee, monitor and scrutinise the activities of the Government in this area is the Independent Reviewer of Terrorism Legislation, whom we have all been quoting very frequently. He clearly does a very energetic and active job in this sphere.
Conor McGinn
I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 38 ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Clause 39
TPIMs: variation of measures
Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.
Chris Philp
Clause 39 inserts an additional ground for variation into section 12 of the old TPIM Act that I have been quoting from. By virtue of that, it will be possible for the Secretary of State to vary the relocation measure in a TPIM notice, if considered strictly necessary,
“for reasons connected with the…effective use of resources in relation to the individual.”
The new ground for variation will apply only where the individual has already been relocated away from their home address and where the national security reason for requiring relocation still exists.
Conor McGinn
I want briefly to draw the Minister and the Committee’s attention to the fact that, when these relocation orders were previously challenged by those subject to them, one sixth of those cases were upheld. In introducing this measure, the Government need to ensure that their legal processes are very robust in that regard.
Question put and agreed to.
Clause 39 ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Clause 40
TPIMs: extension of residence measure
Conor McGinn
I beg to move amendment 70, in clause 40, page 36, line 31, at end insert—
“(c) after paragraph (1)(5) insert—
‘(5A) Where the Secretary of State has imposed on an individual a requirement to reside at a specified residence which is shared with another individual or individuals, the Secretary of State shall provide for an assessment to be made of the suitability of these individuals to reside together.’”
Requirement for a report on approved premises putting offenders in shared accommodation together.
This amendment puts forward a requirement for a report on approved premises putting offenders in shared accommodation together. That is an issue of real concern: the most effective sentencing policy or preventive intervention can be meaningless, frankly, when pitted against the pressure, manipulation or radicalisation that a vulnerable person might be exposed to from a friend, associate or, sadly, even a family member.
We heard throughout the witness sessions that custody can only have a protective impact by taking that particular person off the street, so to speak, for that specified period, and that it is on release that they are exposed. As Peter Dawson, from the Prison Reform Trust, said,
“people are going to be released, and that is when the risk arises”.––[Official Report, Counter-Terrorism and Sentencing Public Bill Committee, 25 June 2020; c. 35, Q79.]
The importance of positive relationships cannot be undervalued. As Mr Dawson said,
“particularly after a long sentence, a stable home and relationships with people who have kept faith with you and who have belief in your future are absolutely the things that help someone as a mature person.”––[Official Report, Counter-Terrorism and Sentencing Public Bill Committee, 25 June 2020; c. 36, Q82.]
All the evidence supports that view, so it is also the case that negative association and exposure to extremist pressure within shared accommodation carries real risks, particularly for young offenders.
We are therefore tabling this amendment to ensure that:
“Where the Secretary of State has imposed on an individual a requirement to reside at a specified residence which is shared with another individual or individuals, the Secretary of State shall provide for an assessment to be made of the suitability of these individuals to reside together.”
It would be pointless and perverse for the state to designate specific accommodation as part of a directive, only for that accommodation and those contained therein to be a major influence on increasing reoffending risks. Due diligence must be done on the appropriateness of the residence and those individuals.
The state cannot be responsible for ordering someone into a dangerous or radicalising environment; that would undermine all the other measures contained in the Bill. Therefore, I hope the Government will reflect on this amendment. I do not intend to push it to a vote, but I felt none the less it was important to move it.
Chris Philp
Relocation measures are on occasion a very important way of protecting the public. As Jonathan Hall said in his evidence to us on 25 June:
“Relocation is an important power. It is regrettable, in the sense that it is a very strong measure and causes a lot of disruption, but I am quite satisfied that in a small number of cases it is needed.”––[Official Report, Counter-Terrorism and Sentencing Public Bill Committee, 25 June 2020; c. 18, Q40.]
The necessity of relocation on occasion is not in dispute.
In relation to the point that the shadow Minister makes about not putting people into multi-occupancy premises, let me say that the Government and the police never put people into multi-occupancy premises—that is to say, we do not impose a requirement on the subject to reside with other individuals. They would never be put into accommodation with other people, for all the reasons that he mentioned.
Of course, we do regular risk assessments of TPIM subjects, including via the auspices of the TPIM review group that I mentioned a little earlier, which meets quarterly. The group looks not only at the issues we have talked about previously to do with exit strategy and so on, but at various other matters, including the relocation measures and how those are working.
As I have said previously, a former Independent Reviewer Of Terrorism Legislation has commented positively, saying that these quarterly TPIM review groups entail robust discussion of every aspect of the TPIM, including residency, and consider every individual part of that TPIM in turn. I hope that gives the shadow Minister the assurance he requires that people are not compelled to live in multi-occupancy premises, with the potentially adverse consequences that may flow from that.
Conor McGinn
I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 40 ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Clause 41
TPIMs: polygraph measure
Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.
The Chair
With this, it will be convenient to discuss new clause 12—Additional provision in relation to polygraphs when applicable to individuals under 25—
(1) Where, in accordance with section 28 of the Offender Management Act 2007, as it applies to terrorist offenders, or Schedule 1 to the Terrorism Prevention and Investigation Measures Act 2011, a polygraph session is required of an individual aged between 18 and 25, that polygraph session must be attended by a counsellor.
(2) For the purposes of this section, a counsellor is a person who can assess the appropriateness of the application of the polygraph session and support the person to which the polygraph condition has been applied.
(3) Where the counsellor has concerns about the appropriateness of a polygraph session, these shall be reported to the Secretary of State.
(4) The Secretary of State shall lay in Parliament a report that includes—
(a) a summary of the concerns raised by counsellors on an annual basis; and
(b) a description of the actions proposed or taken to address the concerns raised.”
Alex Cunningham (Stockton North) (Lab)
It will be a pleasure to speak under your chairmanship, Mr Robertson.
New clause 12 would require that a counsellor be present during the time that any individual aged between 18 and 25 is having a polygraph test. As subsection (2) of new clause 12 says:
“a counsellor is a person who can assess the appropriateness of the application of the polygraph session and”—
This is the most important part of all—
“support the person to which the polygraph condition has been applied.”
It is only right that we ensure that someone is present for the participant in a clearly stressful situation. The young person undergoing the polygraph test may not have the knowledge, the confidence or even the ability to speak out if they are not comfortable. Having a counsellor present would provide an extra layer of support and establish more confidence in the process. The counsellor would be required to report
“concerns about the appropriateness of a polygraph session…to the Secretary of State.”
That would mean that the Government would remain on top of any key or alarming issues that arise with polygraph tests, the equipment or even the testers, to ensure that their use is fair and proper in relation to young people.
The new clause would require the Secretary of State to lay in Parliament an annual report containing a summary of the concerns raised by counsellors and setting out the actions proposed or taken to address them. As colleagues will be aware, from time to time we have discussed the use of polygraph tests and how the Government plan to use them in the future. It is a contentious issue and one that we must keep under regular scrutiny. The reason that we specify that there should be a counsellor present when the person undergoing the polygraph is under 25 is in response to the evidence that has already been presented to this Committee that there is a difference in maturity between those under 25 and those over 25. That is why we believe that this extra level of safeguarding—this is a safeguarding issue—is important. I would prefer that we were too cautious and that we focused on ensuring that people undergoing a polygraph test have the appropriate measures in place to provide a sense of trust in the process than that we were not cautious enough and did not put any protective measures in place.
This is a reasonable new clause, with the safeguarding of young people at its heart. I hope that the Minister will be able to recognise what a positive change it would make. Perhaps this time he will also recognise that younger people are different, and that he and we have a duty to protect them.
Chris Philp
It is worth reminding the Committee that the purpose of using polygraphs in this context, rather like the monitoring of licence conditions that we discussed earlier in our proceedings, is simply to seek to prompt new disclosures that might otherwise not happen, or to elicit an indication that might suggest that further investigation by the relevant authority should be undertaken. The purpose of using polygraphs is nothing more nor less than to achieve those very limited objectives.
The provisions of the new clause might be somewhat beyond the scope of the Bill, because it would apply not just to the people we are talking about here, but to sex offenders where polygraphs are used. When the Domestic Abuse Bill receives Royal Assent—it had its Third Reading last night—it would apply to domestic abuse offenders as well, so the scope is significantly beyond just terrorism.
The central point of the new clause is to ensure is that people under the age of 25 have some kind of counsellor present during a polygraph test. The main assurance I can give the Committee and the shadow Minister is the fact that, as we heard from Professor Grubin in his compelling evidence, the people who administer the polygraph tests are highly trained. The regulations that we already use in relation to sex offenders, and that are likely to form the basis of the regulations here, require high levels of training and quality assurance for those who administer the tests. They are expert people who are selected and trained very carefully, and they use their powers and authority in a carefully managed and circumspect manner. I hope the fact that the person who administers the test is well trained and carefully regulated gives the Committee and the shadow Minister confidence that the proposed additional measure of having a counsellor present is an extra level of protection that is essentially nugatory, bearing in mind the expertise of the person doing the test in the first place.
Alex Cunningham
The Minister, apart from the fact that he does not think the safeguarding is necessary, has just made a grand speech in support of my amendment. He has recognised very clearly that, although there may be experts, there are issues that need to be addressed. He actually talked about how the scope of the amendment would go far beyond the issues covered in the Bill. That is a good thing. Why should young sex offenders or young offenders covered by the Domestic Abuse Bill not also have the protection of having a counsellor present at their session? I will not push the new clause to a vote, but I believe that the Minister needs to start to focus very specifically on young people. We will return to the issue of young people on Report, because the Minister seems to dismiss the fact that a small number of young people are different. He does not recognise the difference. We will withdraw the new clause for now, but we will most certainly return to this issue.
Question put and agreed to.
Clause 41 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Clause 42
TPIMs: drug testing measure
Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.
Chris Philp
Clause 42 adds a new drug testing measure to schedule 1 of the TPIM Act 2011. A TPIM subject will be required to submit to drug testing by way of providing a relevant sample. Under the clause, testing is limited to testing for the presence of specified class A and class B drugs. These drugs are the same as the class A and class B drugs specified in the Criminal Justice and Court Services Act 2000. The definition of “permitted sample” sets out an exhaustive list of the non-intimate samples that may be taken, mirroring the definition of “non-intimate sample” in section 65 of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984. Drug testing under the clause may be carried out only by a constable at a police station, but the clause contains a power for the Secretary of State to make regulations prescribing additional or alternative testers and places of testing.
Question put and agreed to.
Clause 42 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Clause 43
TPIMs: provision of information
Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.
Chris Philp
Clause 43 amends an existing measure and inserts a new measure into schedule 1 of the TPIM Act 2011 to allow the Secretary of State to require the TPIM subject to provide additional information.
Question put and agreed to.
Clause 43 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Clause 44
Additional offences attracting notification requirements
Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.
Chris Philp
Clause 44 amends the Counter-Terrorism Act 2008 by adding a breach of TPIM notice and a breach of a temporary exclusion order to the list of terrorism offences that attract registered terrorist offender notification requirements. That ensures that individuals convicted of those offences on or after the day that the Bill comes into force will be subject to registered terrorist offender notification requirements following their release from prison. That will support the police to manage the ongoing risk posed by such individuals, and to take mitigating action as is necessary to protect the public.
Question put and agreed to.
Clause 44 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Clause 45
Police powers to apply for serious crime prevention orders in terrorism cases
Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.
Chris Philp
Clause 45 introduces schedule 12, which amends the Serious Crime Act 2007 to allow the police to make a direct application to the High Court for a serious crime prevention order in terrorist-related cases. That will streamline the application process and is intended to support an increased use of SCPOs in the circumstances I have just described.
Question put and agreed to.
Clause 45 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Schedule 12 agreed to.
Clause 46
Serious crime prevention orders: review of operation of police powers
Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.
Chris Philp
Clause 46 requires the Secretary of State to review the operation of the changes to the Serious Crime Act 2007 made by clause 45, and to publish a report on the outcome.
Question put and agreed to.
Clause 46 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Ordered, That further consideration be now adjourned. —(Tom Pursglove.)
Counter-Terrorism and Sentencing Bill (Eighth sitting)
Tuesday 7th July 2020
(4 years, 5 months ago)
Public Bill CommitteesRead Full debate Counter-Terrorism and Sentencing Bill 2019-21 View all Counter-Terrorism and Sentencing Bill 2019-21 Debates Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts Amendment Paper: Public Bill Committee Amendments as at 7 July 2020 - (7 Jul 2020)
The Committee divided: - Ayes: 5 / Noes: 8 - Question accordingly negatived.
The Committee divided: - Ayes: 6 / Noes: 8 - Question accordingly negatived.
The Chair
Good afternoon. I remind Members to switch electronic devices to silent, that we are not allowed tea or coffee in the Committee room, and that we are asked to respect the social distancing guidelines. Hansard would really appreciate it if Members could send electronic copies of their speaking notes to hansardnotes@parliament.uk. I think that is all the preliminaries.
I have been advised that the intention is to sit into the evening, possibly until around 7 pm. If we do that, I propose suspending the Committee at around 4.30 pm for about half an hour. Obviously, the progress we make and the speed at which we move is in the hands of Committee members.
Clause 47
Persons vulnerable to being drawn into terrorism: timing of independent review
Conor McGinn (St Helens North) (Lab)
I beg to move amendment 62, in clause 47, page 40, line 17, leave out subsection (1) and insert—
“(1) In section 20(9) of the Counter-Terrorism and Border Security Act 2019 (support for persons vulnerable to being drawn into terrorism) for the words from ‘within the period’ to the end substitute ‘by 1 July 2021’.”.
This amendment would reinstate a statutory deadline for the independent review of the Prevent strategy, which will have to report by 1 July 2021.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr McCabe. I know that, over your distinguished years in this House, you have taken a keen interest in home affairs, so it is particularly appropriate for you to chair this session.
I said on Second Reading that, as well as what in the Bill, we are concerned about what it does not contain. The Government have missed a real opportunity to expound upon their wider strategy for tackling extremism, radicalisation and terrorism. This is most acutely felt in the proposal, in effect, to remove the statutory deadline for a review of the Prevent strategy that was announced some 19 months ago. We know that Prevent has been a crucial part of this country’s counter-terrorism strategy. In giving evidence to the Committee, Assistant Chief Constable Tim Jacques said:
“Prevent is a critically important part of our role; it is absolutely vital. It is controversial, and has been controversial, but we engage in it, we operate, and we protect the public through Prevent every day.”––[Official Report, Counter-Terrorism and Sentencing Public Bill Committee, 25 June 2020; c. 25-26, Q66.]
I find myself in full agreement with all that, because it is a vital tool and also, as the ACC acknowledged, one that has an element of controversy, or certainly dispute, around it.
It is hugely disappointing—not, I must add, solely to Opposition Members, but to civic society and, crucially, to those dedicated individuals who deliver the policy on the frontline—to now see a real lack of purpose and clarity regarding the programme’s direction under this Government. The independent review was legally bound to report to the House by 12 August this year, but it is obvious that this deadline is going to be missed, resulting in a further lack of clarity and, sadly, I suspect, a further question mark around the credibility of the programme itself. To make matters worse, the Bill now actively seeks to remove any deadline at all.
The independent review was announced last January— 19 months ago—following a long-running campaign by Opposition Members and civic society, but it has since been delayed and postponed. We believed then, and we believe now, that a wide-ranging, robust review is the right approach. By now, that review should have been finished and reported to Ministers. In fact, that should have happened two months ago; if anything, the Minister should now be preparing to come before the House to give the Government’s response to it.
Frankly, it begs a question about competency at the Home Office that things have been allowed to get to the present stage. We would of course have been willing to accept mitigations that might have been needed because of the impact of the covid-19 pandemic on tight deadlines. However, we have already had dithering and false starts over the period of the review. The fact that the Government are now seeking to remove the statutory deadline, and leaving little indication of when we are to expect completion, leaves the explanations that we have had to date from them with little or no validity.
The Government have said that they would like the report to be completed by next summer; in that case, why not accept my amendment and put that on the face of the Bill? I do not think that I am being unreasonable in saying that we are allowing the Government a year from now—19 months into the process already—by which time it should have reported. We are being constructive in granting another year, and I do not think that it is reasonable for the Government to respond, “Well, you’ll just have to take our word for it.” I am afraid that we have not been able to rely on the Government to meet previous deadlines. The amendment would reinstate the statutory deadline for an independent review of Prevent by 1 July.
As I stressed on Second Reading, the introduction of the Bill before the Prevent review under the 2019 Act has even reported makes it clear what a quantity of time has been wasted. Lord Carlile was initially appointed to lead the review, but he stood down. That is important. I have huge respect for him. I have spoken to him in preparing for the Bill Committee and he has an exceptionally valuable contribution to make to the debate. Lord Carlile’s having to stand down from the review was nothing to do with his integrity or ability; it was to do with the appointment process. It is important that the Opposition say that and make it clear. It was unfortunate and a pity; it was also avoidable. I hope that the Government have learned lessons from that about putting robust mechanisms in place for the appointment of independent reviewers of something that is as controversial and critical as Prevent. I felt that it was important to say that we thank Lord Carlile for the work that he did. We also thank Lord Anderson and the current Independent Reviewer of Terrorism Legislation, Jonathan Hall, for the work that they do.
It is not beyond the bounds of reason, but the Minister cannot see that the amendment is constructive. It it would simply put into the Bill something that he says the Government would like to do, which is to report by next summer. We need some clarity about it. We need to end the continuing speculation about Prevent, which threatens to undermine the effectiveness and credibility of the programme. We need some coherence and surety about its centrality to the Government’s counter-terrorism strategy. The best way to get that is for the Government to commit to completing the review, not a month or even six months from now, but a year from now. That is eminently doable and reasonable.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Chris Philp)
It is a pleasure once again to serve under your chairmanship, Mr McCabe. I agree entirely with the points that the shadow Minister made about the importance of the Prevent review. It is a critical assessment, which the Government welcome, and we look forward to receiving it. As the hon. Member for St Helens North said, the original deadline, set out in previous legislation, was August this year. To state the obvious, that deadline will be missed. The two reasons for that are, first, the coronavirus epidemic, and, secondly, the resignation of Lord Carlile, which the hon. Gentleman mentioned.
Lord Carlile was appointed last summer, so he would have had a year to do his job, but unfortunately he stepped down in December owing to legal challenges about the manner of his appointment. I am able to confirm that a full and open competition is being run for a replacement. The closing date for applications was 22 June—a couple of weeks ago—and the applications will be assessed by an independent panel. I hope that gives the shadow Minister the assurance he sought on questions of process.
Given that the process of appointing Lord Carlile’s successor has not yet concluded because the application deadline was only a couple of weeks ago, completing the review will be challenging, but we want it to be done by the summer of next year, as the shadow Minister says. We would like to see it completed by August 2021, and that is the objective that the new chairman or chairwoman will be given. However, to put the deadline in primary legislation risks repeating the mistakes that we made previously: a deadline was set out in the statute, and for reasons that were not foreseeable at the time—first the resignation of Lord Carlile, and secondly, the coronavirus epidemic—it became impossible to meet that deadline. If unforeseeable circumstances arise again and something unexpected happens that causes another delay, we do not want to fall foul of a statutory deadline that requires primary legislation to correct.
The obligation to complete the review remains in statute. It is a statutory obligation that must be fulfilled, and that remains, but putting a deadline on it as we did before risks our falling into the same trap twice. I hope that the shadow Minister will accept the clear statement of intention to get this done by August next year. The applications were taken in an open process, and they will be assessed by an independent panel, so the process issues will not re-arise. Our commitment is absolute. On the obligation to put this in statute, the deadline could be problematic if something unforeseen happens again.
Conor McGinn
Unusually in our discussions, I cannot accept the Minister’s explanation. I do not think an explanation has been given for the delay between Lord Carlile’s standing down and the beginning of the recruitment process for a new independent chair, which could have predated the coronavirus pandemic. Given one would expect that some preparatory work was done in the period that Lord Carlile was in post, which would inform the new chair’s review, any suggestion that it might not be completed by next summer is hugely concerning.
The fundamental point is that we have been reasonable about it. We have accepted some of what the Government have said about wanting to do this properly, wanting to ensure it is fully independent, and wanting to respect the ongoing recruitment process, but as for giving it from now until 1 July next year to ensure it reports before Parliament goes into summer recess, to give surety and clarity to the wider public, to civic society who take an interest in such matters, and fundamentally to the people we charge with carrying out Prevent and implementing its strategies on the ground, I do not think they should have to wait any longer than is necessary. So I am afraid that, despite what the Minister says, I feel obliged to press the amendment to a vote.
Question put, That the amendment be made.
Chris Philp
We now come to a series of relatively technical parts of the Bill and various technical Government amendments. I will go over these as quickly as I decently and reasonably can.
Clause 48 introduces schedule 13, which contains consequential and related amendments to bring the Bill’s provisions into effect. It will enable the Bill to function as intended across the legislative frameworks in the United Kingdom, as well as introducing several additional required measures related to the Terrorist Offenders (Restrictions of Early Release) Act 2020 provisions we have discussed already.
Question put and agreed to.
Clause 48 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Schedule 13
Consequential and related amendments
Chris Philp
I beg to move amendment 10, in schedule 13, page 102, line 22, at end insert—
“Criminal Justice Act 1982 (c. 48)
6A In section 32 of the Criminal Justice Act 1982 (early release of prisoners to make the best use of the places available for detention, subject to certain exceptions)—
(a) in subsection (1)(a), after “protection” insert “, a serious terrorism sentence”;
(b) in subsection (1A), after paragraph (c) insert—
“(ca) references to a serious terrorism sentence are to a sentence under section 268A or 282A of the Sentencing Code;”.
Mental Health Act 1983 (c. 20)
6B In section 37 of the Mental Health Act 1983 (as amended by the Sentencing Act 2020) (power of courts to order hospital admission etc)—
(a) in subsection (1A), for “273, 274” substitute “268A, 273, 274, 282A”;
(b) in subsection (1B), after paragraph (a) insert—
“(aa) a sentence falls to be imposed under section 268A or 282A of that Code if it is required by section 268B(2) or 282B(2) of that Code and the court is not of the opinion there mentioned;”.”
This amendment excludes an offender serving a serious terrorism sentence from the possibility of early release under the Criminal Justice Act 1982 and provides that a requirement to impose a serious terrorism sentence does not prevent a court from ordering the offender’s detention in hospital in cases where the offender suffers from a mental disorder.
Chris Philp
Amendment 10 amends section 32 of the Criminal Justice Act 1982 and it is to exclude the serious terrorism sentence in England and Wales from the power of the Secretary of State to make an order to release certain prisoners, as may be necessary in emergency circumstances. Amendment 11 amends section 264 of the Criminal Justice Act 2003, so that a serious terrorism sentence for those aged between 18 and 20, which is a sentence to detention, shall be for the purpose of the section considered as a sentence of imprisonment. These are all consequential to clauses that we have debated previously.
Amendment 12 is in several parts, but essentially it amends section 15 of the sentencing code, which provides for committal of dangerous offenders to the Crown court so the serious terrorism sentence is included and the court has power to commit. The purpose of the second part of the amendment is to ensure that the principal guidelines duty, which requires the court to consider any relevant guidelines that apply under section 59 of the sentencing code, is amended to include a reference at subsection (2) to the serious terrorism sentence, clarifying that the duty is subject to the provisions of the serious terrorism sentence that we debated a few days ago. The purpose of the third part of the amendment is to amend section 120 of the sentencing code, which provides the Crown court with the power to fine an offender instead of, or in addition to, any other sentence in disposal.
Amendment 13 inserts a reference to the serious terrorism sentence into section 262(3) of the sentencing code, referring the court to section 399 of that code.
As you will have gathered, Mr McCabe, these are technical or consequential amendments to various measures we debated earlier in the Committee’s proceedings.
Amendment 10 agreed to.
Amendments made: 11, in schedule 13, page 103, line 16, at end insert—
“(9) In section 264(7) (as amended by the Sentencing Act 2020) (application of provisions about consecutive sentences of imprisonment to sentences of detention), for “or 266” substitute “, 266 or 268A”.”
This amendment ensures that the provisions in section 264 of the Criminal Justice Act 2003 (dealing with treatment of consecutive sentences) will apply in relation to serious terrorism sentences including such sentences of detention in a young offender institution.
Amendment 12, in schedule 13, page 103, line 23, at end insert—
“(1A) In section 15 (committal for sentence of dangerous adult offenders)—
(a) after subsection (1) insert—
(1A) This section also applies where—
(a) on the summary trial of an offence specified in Schedule 17A triable either way a person is convicted of the offence, and
(b) the court is of the opinion that the circumstances are such that a serious terrorism sentence (see section 268A or 282A) may be required to be imposed.”;
(b) in subsection (6), for “a specified offence” substitute “an offence”.
(1B) In section 59(2) (provisions to which duty to follow sentencing guidelines is subject), after paragraph (g) insert—
“(ga) sections 268B and 282B (requirement to impose serious terrorism sentence);”.
(1C) In section 61 (sentencing guidelines: extended sentences and life sentences)—
(a) in the heading, after “extended sentences” insert “, serious terrorism sentences”;
(b) after subsection (2) insert—
(2A) Subsection (2B) applies where a court is required to impose a serious terrorism sentence for an offence.
(2B) In determining the appropriate custodial term for the purposes of section 268C(2)(b) or 282C(2)(b) (serious terrorism sentences: appropriate custodial term exceeding 14-year minimum), section 60 applies to the court as it applies to a court in determining the sentence for an offence.”
(1D) In section 120(2)(a) (exceptions to the general power to fine offender convicted on indictment), after sub-paragraph (ii) (but before the final “or”) insert—
(iia) paragraph (ba) (serious terrorism sentences),”.”
This amendment makes amendments to certain provisions in the Sentencing Code, which are consequential on the introduction of the new serious terrorism sentence.
Amendment 13, in schedule 13, page 104, line 10, at end insert—
“(4A) In section 262(3) (circumstances in which detention in young offender institution required), after “mentioned in” insert “—
(a) section 399(ba) (serious terrorism sentences);
(b) ”.”—(Chris Philp.)
This amendment makes an amendment to section 262 of the Sentencing Code consequential on the introduction of the new serious terrorism sentence.
Chris Philp
I beg to move amendment 14, in schedule 13, page 104, line 27, leave out paragraph (a).
This amendment removes an unnecessary consequential amendment.
Chris Philp
The purpose of the amendments is to remove unnecessary consequential amendments, which included a reference to a serious terrorism sentence in sections 273 and 274 of the sentencing code, which was advanced when the Bill was presented to Parliament. Paragraph (a) is removed to ensure legal clarity and the effect is to remove these amendments from the Bill.
Amendment 14 agreed to.
Amendments made: 15, schedule 13, page 105, line 6, leave out paragraph (a).
This amendment removes an unnecessary consequential amendment.
Amendment 16, schedule 13, page 106, line 11, at end insert—
“Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (c. 53)
10A In section 5 of the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 as it forms part of the law of England and Wales (as amended by the Sentencing Act 2020) (rehabilitation periods for particular sentences)—
(a) in subsection (1)(d), after ‘or section 250’ insert ‘or 252A’;
(b) in subsection (8)(f), before ‘of the Sentencing Code’ insert ‘or 252A’.”
This amendment and amendments 17, 18, 20 to 22, 24 and 27 to 29 add consequential amendments to ensure that young offenders given the new type of sentence introduced by clause 22(2) are treated in the same way, for various statutory purposes, as those serving an ordinary sentence of youth detention.
Amendment 17, schedule 13page 106, line 23, at end insert—
“Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994 (c. 33)
12A In section 25(5) of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994 (as amended by the Sentencing Act 2020) (restriction of bail for certain offenders: interpretation), in paragraph (a) of the definition of ‘the relevant enactments’, after ‘250’ insert ‘or 252A’.”
See the explanatory statement for amendment 16.
Amendment 18, schedule 13, page 106, line 25, at beginning insert—
“(1) The Crime and Disorder Act 1998 is amended as follows.
(2) In section 38(4) (as amended by the Sentencing Act 2020) (youth justice services to be provided by local authorities), in paragraph (i), after ‘250,’ insert ‘252A,’.
(3) In section 41(5)(i) (as amended by the Sentencing Act 2020) (accommodation that may be provided under agreement with the Youth Justice Board), in sub-paragraph (ii), after ‘250,’ insert ‘252A,’.”
See the explanatory statement for amendment 16.
Amendment 19, schedule 13, page 106, line 25, leave out “of the Crime and Disorder Act 1998”.
This amendment is consequential on amendment 18.
Amendment 20, schedule 13, page 106, line 32, at end insert—
“Criminal Justice and Court Services Act 2000 (c. 43)
13A (1) The Criminal Justice and Court Services Act 2000 is amended as follows.
(2) In section 62(5) (as amended by the Sentencing Act 2020) (sentences in relation to which electronic monitoring conditions may be imposed on release), in paragraph (d), after ‘250’ insert ‘or 252A’.
(3) In section 62A(4) (as amended by the Sentencing Act 2020) (exceptions from power to require imposition of electronic monitoring condition), in paragraph (b), after ‘250’ insert ‘or 252A’.
(4) In section 64(5) (as amended by the Sentencing Act 2020) (sentences in relation to which drug testing requirement may be imposed on release), in paragraph (d), after ‘250’ insert ‘or 252A’.
(5) In section 64A(8) (as amended by the Sentencing Act 2020) (power to require attendance at drug testing appointment: interpretation), in paragraph (c) of the definition of ‘sentence of imprisonment’, after ‘250’ insert ‘or 252A’.”
See the explanatory statement for amendment 16.
Amendment 21, schedule 13, page 106, line 36, at end insert—
“Sexual Offences Act 2003 (c. 42)
14A In section 131 of the Sexual Offences Act 2003 (as amended by the Sentencing Act 2020) (application of notification requirements and orders to young offenders), in paragraph (h), after ‘250’ insert ‘, 252A’.”
See the explanatory statement for amendment 16.
Amendment 22, schedule 13, page 107, line 21, at end insert—
“(6A) In section 263(4) (as amended by the Sentencing Act 2020) (sentences of detention to which provision about concurrent terms applies), after ‘250,’ insert ‘252A,’.”
See the explanatory statement for amendment 16.
Amendment 23, schedule 13, page 107, line 22, leave out from “264” to “after” on line 23 and insert “(as amended by the Sentencing Act 2020) (consecutive sentences)—
(a) in subsection (6A)(a),”.
This amendment is consequential on amendment 24.
Amendment 24, schedule 13, page 107, line 24, at end insert—
“(b) in subsection (7), after ‘250,’ insert ‘252A,’.
(8) In section 327(3) (as amended by the Sentencing Act 2020) (sentences attracting risk assessment measures for sexual or violent offenders), in paragraph (b)(v), after ‘250’ insert ‘or 252A’.
Domestic Violence, Crime and Victims Act 2004 (c. 28)
15A In section 45(1) of the Domestic Violence, Crime and Victims Act 2004 (as amended by the Sentencing Act 2020) (victims’ representations and information: interpretation), in the definition of ‘relevant sentence’, after ‘250’ insert ‘or 252A’.”
See the explanatory statement for amendment 16.
Amendment 25, schedule 13, page 107, line 26, at beginning insert—
“(1) The Armed Forces Act 2006 is amended as follows.”
This amendment is consequential on amendment 27.
Amendment 26, schedule 13, page 107, line 26, leave out “of the Armed Forces Act 2006”.
This amendment is consequential on amendment 27.
Amendment 27, schedule 13, page 107, line 29, at end insert—
“(3) In section 213(3A) (as substituted by the Sentencing Act 2020) (application of section 253 of the Sentencing Code), after ‘250’ insert ‘or 252A’.
(4) In section 227(3) (as amended by the Sentencing Act 2020) (minimum sentence for certain firearms offences), after ‘250’ insert ‘or 252A’.”
See the explanatory statement for amendment 16.
Amendment 28, schedule 13, page 107, line 36, at end insert—
“Counter-Terrorism Act 2008 (c. 28)
17A In section 45(1)(a) of the Counter-Terrorism Act 2008 (sentences attracting notification requirements), after paragraph (via) (but before the final ‘or’) insert—
‘(vib) detention under section 252A of the Sentencing Code (special sentence for terrorist offenders of particular concern aged under 18),’.”
See the explanatory statement for amendment 16.
Amendment 29, schedule 13, page 110, line 36, at end insert—
“Children (Secure Accommodation) Regulations 1991 (S.I. 1991/1505)
18A In regulation 5(1) of the Children (Secure Accommodation) Regulations 1991 (as amended by the Sentencing Act 2020) (custodial sentences disapplying section 25 of the Children Act 1989), before ‘or 259’ insert ‘, 252A’.
Youth Justice Board for England and Wales Order 2000 (S.I. 2000/1160)
18B In article 4(2) of the Youth Justice Board for England and Wales Order 2000 (as amended by the Sentencing Act 2020) (functions exercisable by the Youth Justice Board concurrently with the Secretary of State)—
(a) in paragraph (a), before ‘or 259’ insert ‘, 252A’;
(b) in paragraph (m)(ii), before ‘or 259’ insert ‘, 252A’.
Child Benefit (General) Regulations 2006 (S.I. 2006/223)
18C In regulation 1(3) of the Child Benefit (General) Regulations 2006 (as amended by the Sentencing Act 2020) (interpretation of Regulations), in paragraph (a) of the definition of ‘penalty’, after ‘250,’ insert ‘252A,’.
Employment and Support Allowance Regulations 2008 (S.I. 2008/794)
18D In regulation 160(5) of the Employment and Support Allowance Regulations 2008 (as amended by the Sentencing Act 2020) (exceptions from disqualification for imprisonment: interpretation), in paragraph (c), after ‘250’ insert ‘, 252A’.
Employment and Support Allowance Regulations 2013 (S.I. 2013/379)
18E In regulation 96(6) of the Employment and Support Allowance Regulations 2013 (as amended by the Sentencing Act 2020) (exceptions from disqualification for imprisonment: interpretation), in paragraph (c), after ‘250’ insert ‘, 252A’.
Children (Secure Accommodation) (Wales) Regulations 2015 (S.I. 2015/1988 (W.298))
18F In regulation 14(a) of the Children (Secure Accommodation) (Wales) Regulations 2015 (as amended by the Sentencing Act 2020) (sentences of detention disapplying section 119 of the Social Services and Well-being (Wales) Act 2014), after ‘250’ insert ‘, 252A’.”
See the explanatory statement for amendment 16.
Amendment 47, schedule 13, page 110, line 36, at end insert—
“Part 4A
Amendments in relation to sentencing under service law
Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (c. 53)
18G (1) The Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 is amended as follows.
(2) In section 5 as it forms part of the law of England and Wales (rehabilitation periods for particular sentences)—
(a) in subsection (1)(d), after ‘or section 209’ insert ‘or 224B’;
(b) in subsection (8), in paragraph (f) of the definition of ‘custodial sentence’, after ‘209’ insert ‘or 224B’.
Criminal Justice Act 1982 (c. 48)
18H In section 32(1A) of the Criminal Justice Act 1982 (sentences excluded from early release of prisoners to make the best use of the places available for detention), in paragraph (ca) (inserted by Part 2 of this Schedule), at the end insert ‘, including a sentence passed as a result of section 219ZA of the Armed Forces Act 2006’.
Crime and Disorder Act 1998 (c. 37)
18I (1) The Crime and Disorder Act 1998 is amended as follows.
(2) In section 38(4) (youth justice services to be provided by local authorities), in paragraph (i), for ‘or 222’ substitute ‘, 222 or 224B’.
(3) In section 41(5)(i) (accommodation that may be provided under agreement with the Youth Justice Board), in sub-paragraph (ii), for ‘or 222’ substitute ‘, 222 or 224B’.
Criminal Justice and Court Services Act 2000 (c. 43)
18J (1) The Criminal Justice and Court Services Act 2000 is amended as follows.
(2) In section 62(5) (sentences in relation to which electronic monitoring conditions may be imposed on release), in paragraph (g), for ‘or 218’ substitute ‘, 218 or 224B’.
(3) In section 62A(4) (exceptions from power to require imposition of electronic monitoring condition), in paragraph (c), after ‘209’ insert ‘or 224B’.
(4) In section 64(5) (sentences in relation to which drug testing requirement may be imposed on release), in paragraph (g), for ‘or 218’ substitute ‘, 218 or 224B’.
(5) In section 64A(8) (power to require attendance at drug testing appointment: interpretation), in paragraph (f) of the definition of ‘sentence of imprisonment’, after ‘209’ insert ‘or 224B’.
Sexual Offences Act 2003 (c. 42)
18K In section 131 of the Sexual Offences Act 2003 (application of notification requirements and orders to young offenders), in paragraph (h), for ‘or 218’ substitute ‘, 218 or 224B’.
Criminal Justice Act 2003 (c. 44)
18L In section 237(1B) of the Criminal Justice Act 2003 (as amended by the Sentencing Act 2020) (service sentences to be treated as equivalent sentences in England and Wales) —
(a) omit the ‘and’ before paragraph (e);
(b) at the end of that paragraph insert—
‘(f) references to a sentence of detention under section 252A of the Sentencing Code include a sentence of detention under section 224B of that Act;
(g) references to a sentence under section 268A or 282A of the Sentencing Code include such a sentence passed as a result of section 219ZA of that Act.’
Armed Forces Act 2006 (c. 52)
18M (1) The Armed Forces Act 2006 is amended as follows.
(2) In section 188 (power to pass consecutive custodial sentences), in subsections (2)(b) and (4)(b), after ‘209’ insert ‘or 224B’.
(3) In section 209 (sentence of detention for offender aged under 18), after subsection (7) insert—
‘(8) This section does not apply if the Court Martial is required to impose a sentence of detention under section 224B.’
(4) In section 210 (place and conditions of youth detention), after ‘209’, in each place it occurs (including in the heading), insert ‘or 224B’.
(5) In section 211(4) (cases in which detention and training order not required), after ‘221A’ insert ‘, 224B’.
(6) In section 213(3A) (as substituted by the Sentencing Act 2020 and as amended by Part 4 of this Schedule) (application of section 253 of the Sentencing Code), after ‘209’ insert ‘or 224B’.
(7) In section 219A(1) (availability of extended sentence for certain violent, sexual or terrorism offences), after paragraph (d) (but before the final ‘and’) insert—
‘(da) the court is not required—
(i) by section 268B(2) of the Sentencing Code (as applied by section 219ZA(4) of this Act) to impose a serious terrorism sentence of detention in a young offender institution for the offence or for an offence associated with it;
(ii) by section 282B(2) of the Sentencing Code (as applied by section 219ZA(7) of this Act) to impose a serious terrorism sentence of imprisonment for the offence or for an offence associated with it;’.
(8) In section 223 (meaning of ‘the required opinion’)—
(a) after subsection (1) insert—
‘(1A) ‘The required opinion’ for the purposes of section 219ZA is the opinion that there is a significant risk to members of the public of serious harm occasioned by the commission by the offender of—
(a) further serious terrorism offences or other specified offences; or
(b) further acts or omissions that would be serious terrorism offences or other specified offences if committed in England or Wales.’;
(b) in subsection (4) (as amended by the Sentencing Act 2020), after the definition of ‘serious harm’ insert—
‘“serious terrorism offence” has the meaning given by that section;’.
(9) In section 224A (special custodial sentence for offenders of particular concern)—
(a) in subsection (1) (as amended by the Sentencing Act 2020), in paragraph (d)—
(i) omit the ‘or’ at the end of sub-paragraph (i);
(ii) after sub-paragraph (ii) insert ‘, or”;
(b) after subsection (3) insert—
‘(3A) Where an offence is found to have been committed over a period of 2 or more days, or at some time during a period of 2 or more days, it must be taken for the purposes of subsection (1A) to have been committed on the last of those days.’
(10) In section 227(3) (as amended by the Sentencing Act 2020) (minimum sentence for certain firearms offences), for the words from ‘, the reference’ to the end substitute ‘—
(a) the reference to a sentence of detention under section 250 of that Code is to be read as a reference to a sentence of detention under section 209 of this Act, and
(b) the reference to a sentence of detention under section 252A of that Code is to be read as a reference to a sentence of detention under section 224B of this Act.’
(11) In section 238(6) (as inserted by the Sentencing Act 2020) (offences aggravated by terrorist connection)—
(a) omit the ‘and’ at the end of paragraph (a);
(b) after paragraph (a) insert—
‘(aa) the reference in subsection (4)(c) to an offence not specified in Schedule A1 includes a reference to an offence under section 42 as respects which the corresponding offence under the law of England and Wales is not specified in Schedule A1, and’;
(c) in paragraph (b), for “(1)” substitute ‘(5)(b)’.
(12) In section 246 (crediting of time in custody), in subsection (6)(a), after ‘209’ insert ‘or 224B’.
(13) In section 256(1)(c) (cases where pre-sentence report to be considered), after ‘219(1),’ insert ‘219ZA(1)(d),’.
(14) In section 260 (as amended by the Sentencing Act 2020) (discretionary custodial sentences: general restrictions) —
(a) in subsection (1)—
(i) for ‘This section applies’ substitute ‘Subsection (2) applies;
(ii) after paragraph (c) insert—
(b) in subsection (4B), before paragraph (a) insert—
‘(za) section 268C(2) or 282C(2) of the Sentencing Code, as applied by section 219ZA of this Act (serious terrorism sentences for offenders aged 18 or over),’.
(15) In section 261 (as amended by the Sentencing Act 2020) (length of discretionary custodial sentences: general), in subsection (1), after paragraph (b) insert—
‘(ba) section 268A or 282A of the Sentencing Code as a result of section 219ZA (serious terrorism sentences),’.
(16) In section 262A (as inserted by the Sentencing Act 2020) (application of section 329 of the Sentencing Code)—
(a) after subsection (2) insert—
‘(2A) In subsection (4A)—
(a) paragraph (a) has effect as if, for “252A”, there were substituted “224B of the Armed Forces Act 2006”;
(b) paragraph (b) has effect as if, after “265”, there were inserted “passed as a result of section 224A of the Armed Forces Act 2006”;
(c) the words after paragraph (b) have effect as if, after “278”, there were inserted “passed as a result of section 224A of the Armed Forces Act 2006”.’;
(b) after subsection (3) insert—
‘(3A) Subsection (5A) has effect as if, at the end, there were inserted “passed as a result of section 219ZA(7) of the Armed Forces Act 2006.’;
(c) in subsection (4)—
(i) after the paragraph (a) treated as substituted in subsection (7) of section 329 of the Sentencing Code insert—
(ii) after the paragraph (d) treated as substituted in subsection (7) of section 329 of the Sentencing Code insert—
(17) In section 374 (interpretation of Act), in the definition of ‘custodial sentence’ (as amended by the Sentencing Act 2020), in paragraph (b), for ‘or 221A’ substitute ‘, 221A or 224B’.
Counter-Terrorism Act 2008 (c. 28)
18N In paragraph 5(1)(a)(iv) of Schedule 6 to the Counter-Terrorism Act 2008 (service sentences of youth detention attracting notification requirements for terrorist offenders), after ‘209’ insert ‘or 224B’.
Sentencing Act 2020
18O (1) The Sentencing Act 2020 is amended as follows.
(2) In section 225 (restriction on consecutive sentences for released prisoners), in subsection (3)(c)(vi), after ‘209’ insert ‘or 224B’.
(3) In section 241 (period of detention and training under detention and training order), in subsections (6)(b)(ii) and (7)(c), after ‘209’ insert ‘or 224B’.
(4) In section 248(4) (meaning of ‘relevant sentence of detention’), in paragraph (c), after ‘209’ insert ‘or 224B’.
(5) In Schedule 27 (transitional provision and savings), in paragraph 16(2), for the words from ‘, the reference’ to the end substitute ‘—
(a) the reference in section 224A(1)(d)(ii) of the Armed Forces Act 2006 to an extended sentence under section 266 or 279 of the Sentencing Code includes a reference to an extended sentence under section 226A of the Criminal Justice Act 2003;
(b) the reference in section 224B(1)(c)(ii) to an extended sentence of detention under section 254 of the Sentencing Code includes a reference to an extended sentence of detention under section 226B of the Criminal Justice Act 2003.’”
This amendment makes amendments to enactments which are consequential on the provisions of Schedule 8 to the Bill (changes to the sentencing regime under service law corresponding to those made to the sentencing regimes in England and Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland).
Amendment 31, schedule 13, page 116, line 7. at end insert—
“Treatment of Offenders Act (Northern Ireland) 1968 (c. 29 (N.I.))
30A In section 26(2) of the Treatment of Offenders Act (Northern Ireland) 1968 (as amended by Part 8 of this Schedule) (length of custodial sentences to be reduced for periods already spent in custody), after ‘Article’ insert ‘13A(6),’.
Rehabilitation of Offenders (Northern Ireland) Order 1978 (S.I. 1978/1908 (N.I. 27))
30B In Article 6 of the Rehabilitation of Offenders (Northern Ireland) Order 1978 (as amended by Part 8 of this Schedule) (rehabilitation periods for particular sentences), in paragraph (9)(b), after ‘Article’ insert ‘13A(6) or’.
Mental Health (Northern Ireland) Order 1986 (S.I. 1985/595 (N.I. 4))
30C In Article 44(1A) of the Mental Health (Northern Ireland) Order 1986 (sentences requirement to impose which does not prevent making of hospital or guardianship order), in sub-paragraph (c), after ‘13’ insert ‘, 13A’.
Criminal Justice (Northern Ireland) Order 1996 (S.I. 1996/3160 (N.I. 24))
30D (1) The Criminal Justice (Northern Ireland) Order 1996 is amended as follows.
(2) In Article 2(2) (meaning of expressions), in paragraph (b) of the definition of ‘custodial sentence’, after ‘13(4)(b)’ insert ‘, 13A(6)’.
(3) In Article 4(1) (power to grant absolute or condition discharge subject to certain sentencing requirements), after ‘13’ insert ‘, 13A’.
(4) In Article 10(1) (power to make probation order subject to certain sentencing requirements), after ‘13’ insert ‘, 13A’.
(5) In Article 13(1) (power to make community service order subject to sentencing requirements), after ‘13’ insert ‘, 13A’.
(6) In Article 15(1) (power to make combined probation and community service order subject to certain sentencing requirements), after ‘13’ insert ‘, 13A’.
Counter-Terrorism Act 2008 (c. 28)
30E In section 45(3) of the Counter-Terrorism Act 2008 (Northern Irish sentences attracting notification requirements), in paragraph (a), after sub-paragraph (iii) insert—
‘(iiia) a serious terrorism sentence under Article 13A(6) of that Order (offenders under 21 convicted of certain serious terrorist or terrorism-related offences),’.”
This amendment makes amendments to various enactments which are consequential on the introduction of the new serious terrorism sentence in Northern Ireland by clause 7.
Amendment 32, schedule 13, page 117, line 24, at end insert—
“Treatment of Offenders Act (Northern Ireland) 1968 (c. 29 (N.I.))
31A In section 26(2) of the Treatment of Offenders Act (Northern Ireland) 1968 (length of custodial sentences to be reduced for periods already spent in custody), after ‘14(5)’ insert ‘or 15A(5)’.
Rehabilitation of Offenders (Northern Ireland) Order 1978 (S.I. 1978/1908 (N.I. 27))
31B In Article 6 of the Rehabilitation of Offenders (Northern Ireland) Order 1978 (rehabilitation periods for particular sentences), in paragraph (9)(b), after ‘centre’ insert ‘, a sentence of detention under Article 15A(5) of the Criminal Justice (Northern Ireland) Order 2008’.
Criminal Justice (Northern Ireland) Order 1996 (S.I. 1996/3160 (N.I. 24))
31C (1) The Criminal Justice (Northern Ireland) Order 1996 is amended as follows.
(2) In Article 2(2) (meaning of expressions), in paragraph (b) of the definition of ‘custodial sentence’, for ‘or 14(5)’ substitute ‘, 14(5) or 15A(5)’.
(3) In Article 4(1) (power to grant absolute or condition discharge subject to certain sentencing requirements), for ‘or 14’ substitute ‘, 14 or 15A’.
(4) In Article 10(1) (power to make probation order subject to certain sentencing requirements), for ‘or 14’ substitute ‘, 14 or 15A’.
(5) In Article 13(1) (power to make community service order subject to certain sentencing requirements), for ‘or 14’ substitute ‘, 14 or 15A’.
(6) In Article 15(1) (power to make combined probation and community service order subject to certain sentencing requirements), for ‘or 14’ substitute ‘, 14 or 15A’.
Sexual Offences Act 2003 (c. 42)
31D In section 131 of the Sexual Offences Act 2003 (application of notification requirements and orders to young offenders), after paragraph (l) of that section as it forms part of the law of England and Wales and Scotland, and after paragraph (m) of that section as it forms part of the law of Northern Ireland, insert—
‘(n) a sentence of detention under Article 15A(5) of the Criminal Justice (Northern Ireland) Order 2008’.
Counter-Terrorism Act 2008 (c. 28)
31E In section 45(3) of the Counter-Terrorism Act 2008 (Northern Irish sentences attracting notification requirements), in paragraph (a), after sub-paragraph (iv) insert—
‘(iva) a sentence under Article 15A(5) of that Order (offenders under 21 convicted of certain terrorist or terrorism-related offences),’.”
This amendment adds consequential amendments to ensure that young offenders given the new type of sentence introduced in Northern Ireland by clause 24 are treated in the same way, for various statutory purposes, as those serving an ordinary sentence of youth detention.
Amendment 33, schedule 13, page 119, line 34, at end insert—
“Justice Act (Northern Ireland) 2016 (c. 21 (N.I.))
35 (1) In section 55(2) of the Justice Act (Northern Ireland) 2016 (prisoners who may be removed early from prison if liable to removal from the United Kingdom), for the words from ‘serving an’ to the end substitute ‘—
(a) who is serving an extended custodial sentence under Article 14 of the 2008 Order, or
(b) to whom Article 20A of that Order applies.’
(2) In the case of a person—
(a) who has been removed from prison under section 55(2) of the Justice Act (Northern Ireland) 2016 before the amendment made by sub-paragraph (1) comes into force, and
(b) to whom Article 20A of the Criminal Justice (Northern Ireland) Order 2008 applies,
subsection (3) of that section continues to apply to the person despite that amendment, but as if for the words ‘has served the requisite custodial period’ there were substituted ‘becomes entitled to be released in accordance with Article 20A of the 2008 Order’.”
This amendment excludes terrorist prisoners subject to the restricted regime for early release in Northern Ireland introduced by clause 30 from early removal from prison for the purpose of removal from the United Kingdom.
Amendment 34, schedule 13, page 119, line 34, at end insert—
“Parole Commissioners’ Rules (Northern Ireland) 2009 (S.R. (N.I.) 2009 No. 82)
36 (1) The Parole Commissioners’ Rules (Northern Ireland) 2009 are amended as follows.
(2) In rule 2(1) (application of the rules), after ‘Articles 18’ insert ‘, 20A’.
(3) In rule 7(2) (persons who may act as representatives of prisoner only with consent of Chief Commissioner), in paragraph (b), for the words from ‘sentenced to’ to the end substitute ‘who —
(i) is on licence having been released under Article 18 or 20A of the 2008 Order, or
(ii) is a person to whom Article 18 or 20A of that Order applies and who is on licence having been released under Article 20 of that Order;’.
(4) In rule 25 (application of rules to recalled life, indeterminate and extended custodial prisoners)—
(a) in the heading after ‘custodial’ insert ‘and terrorist’;
(b) in the words before paragraph (a), for ‘an indeterminate custodial or extended custodial prisoner’s case’ substitute ‘the case of a prisoner who was released on licence under Article 18 or 20A of the 2008 Order’.
(5) In rule 26 (short custodial terms)—
(a) for paragraph (1) substitute—
‘(1) Subject to paragraph (2), where—
(a) the Department of Justice refers to the Commissioners—
(i) the case of an extended custodial prisoner under Article 18 of the 2008 Order, or
(ii) the case of any prisoner under Article 20A of that Order, and
(b) the relevant part of the prisoner’s sentence is less than 26 weeks;
these rules shall apply subject to the modifications made by rule 25(a).’;
(b) after paragraph (2) insert—
‘(3) For the purposes of paragraph (1)(b), the “relevant part of the sentence”—
(a) in the case of an extended custodial prisoner to whom Article 18 of the 2008 Order applies, means one half of the appropriate custodial term of the sentence as defined by Article 14(4) or 14(6) of that Order;
(b) in the case of a prisoner to whom Article 20A of that Order applies, has the meaning given by paragraph (9) of that Article;
and in determining the length of that part any reduction required by section 26(2) of the Treatment of Offenders Act (Northern Ireland) 1968 is to be taken into account.’”—(Chris Philp.)
This amendment makes amendments to Parole Commissioners’ Rules (Northern Ireland) 2009 which are consequential on the new arrangements for restricted early release of terrorist prisoners provided for in clause 30 of the Bill.
Schedule 13, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 49
Power to state effect in Sentencing Act 2020 of commencement of amendments made by this Act
Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.
Chris Philp
I will do my best to rouse more enthusiasm for clause 49 than its predecessor, schedule 13, managed to provoke in the Committee. I fear it may be an uphill task.
Clause 49 gives the Secretary of State the power to amend the sentencing code to incorporate changes to provisions made by the Bill using the power contained in section 419(1) of the Sentencing Act 2020. It is needed so we can, if required, ensure a consistent approach is taken to the amendment of the code, and the Bill, once enacted.
Question put and agreed to.
Clause 49 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Clause 50
Power to make further consequential provision
Chris Philp
I beg to move amendment 1, in clause 50, page 41, line 30, at end insert—
“(7) In the Criminal Justice and Court Services Act 2000—
(a) in section 77 (supplementary and consequential provision), at the end insert—
‘(3) The provision which may be made under subsection (1) in relation to section 61 of this Act (abolition of sentence of detention in young offender institution etc) also includes provision amending or repealing—
(a) any provision of the Counter-Terrorism and Sentencing Act 2020,
(b) any provision of an enactment that was inserted or amended by, or by regulations made under, the Counter- Terrorism and Sentencing Act 2020’;
(b) in section 78(2) (meaning of ‘enactment’), after ‘in this Part’ insert ‘other than section 77(3)’.”
This enables the power in section 77 of the Criminal Justice and Court Services Act 2000 to make amendments consequential on the abolition by that Act of sentences of detention in young offender institutions to be used to deal with references to such sentences inserted by the provisions of this Bill.
Government amendment 1 enables a power in section 77 of the Criminal Justice and Court Services Act 2000. This power is to make any amendment that arises as a consequence of sentences of detention in a young offender institution being abolished by the Act. Should the DYOI be abolished, the power will be used to deal with references to DYOI sentences inserted by the provisions of the Bill.
Alex Cunningham (Stockton North) (Lab)
The amendment in the name of the Minister seeks to amend clause 50 to make reference to sections 77 and 61 of the Criminal Justice and Court Services Act 2000. Despite his introduction, it is unclear what the Minister’s intentions really are. As members of the Committee will be aware, sections 59 and 61 of the 2000 Act allow for the abolition of the special sentence for the detention of a young adult in a young offender institution. The explanatory note to the 2000 Act—passed under a Labour Government, mind you—sets out the policy reason behind that:
“it is now widely accepted that 18, and not 21, is the age of”
maturity, and
“there is no logic in having a separate sentence for those aged between 18 and 20 years old, and those aged 21 and over.”
That almost kills my arguments of the last few days—but it does not, because, despite the provisions being in place for two decades, the 2000 Act to which the amendment refers is yet to be implemented. I, for one, am quite happy about that, but it prompts the question of why the Government’s amendment draws on a 20-year-old piece of outdated legislation. What is the Minister’s intention?
In the 20 years since the 2000 Act was passed, a considerable amount of work has been done on the age of maturity, and it is now widely accepted, as I have said on numerous occasions, that 25 is considered by many to be a more suitable age of maturity. As such, it would be deeply concerning if the Government had any ambition at all to enact the Criminal Justice and Court Services Act. The impact of doing so would be that offenders as young as 18 would be held in prison alongside adults potentially double their age or more. That could be hugely damaging, not only to the individuals but to the hope of rehabilitation too.
The Minister has provided the Committee with a guarantee that he has no intention of housing young offenders caught up in the provisions in the Bill alongside adult prisoners. Many may see this as a technical matter, but there are some very real dangers, as I have alluded to, and I am sure the Committee would welcome a further reassurance from the Minister that the Government have no intention whatsoever of using the Criminal Justice and Court Services Act to imprison young people alongside adults.s
Chris Philp
I understand this to be a technical amendment to ensure legislative consistency between the Bill and the Criminal Justice and Court Services Act. I am not aware of any plans to change the current detention arrangements. I do not believe that the reference is designed to pave the way to do that. It is just a technical amendment to ensure legislative consistency.
Alex Cunningham
Will the Minister be specific? He says he does not think that there is any intention, but it could lead to young people being imprisoned alongside adults. Will he give that assurance to the Committee again? Not understanding or not being aware of something is not good enough.
Chris Philp
I am not the Prisons Minister, I am the Courts Minister, but I am not aware of any plans at all in the Ministry of Justice to change the current detention arrangements. None have been brought to my attention, either generally or in connection with the Bill. I can go and double-check with the Prisons Minister, and I will write to the hon. Gentleman, if he would like me to do that.
Amendment 1 agreed to.
Question proposed, That the clause, as amended, stand part of the Bill.
Chris Philp
Clause 50 gives the Secretary of State the power to make consequential, transitional, transitory or saving provisions by regulation, in relation to provisions in the Bill, by secondary instrument.
Question put and agreed to.
Clause 50, as amended, accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Clause 51
Extent
Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.
Chris Philp
Clause 51 explains the territorial extent of the provisions in the Bill, which we debated quite extensively, because many of the clauses applied separately to England and Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, owing to the different legal systems in the three jurisdictions. The Bill contains provisions that extend to all of those areas. Provisions that change existing legislation are applicable only to the territories to which the existing legislation extends. Certain provisions can also, in some circumstances, be extended to the Channel Islands or the Isle of Man, as per the powers specified in this measure.
Question put and agreed to.
Clause 51 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Clause 52
Commencement
Chris Philp
I beg to move amendment 2, in clause 52, page 42, line 8, at end insert—
“, except as mentioned in subsection (3)(zf)”.
This amendment is consequential on amendment 8.
The Chair
With this it will be convenient to discuss the following: Government amendments 4 to 6.
Government amendment 8.
Chris Philp
These are more technical amendments. Amendment 2 allows the changes being made to the Sentencing Act by clause 21 and schedule 6 of the Bill to apply to the service courts, which we debated earlier. Amendment 8 also allows changes made by the Bill to the Sentencing Act, which come into force on Royal Assent or two months later, to apply to the service courts. Amendment 4 allows changes being made to the Sentencing Act by clause 1 and schedule 1 of the Bill, which apply to the service courts as well as civilian courts, to be brought into force separately if necessary for the service courts. Amendment 5 should be read in conjunction with amendment 6 to allow changes being made to the Sentencing Act by clauses 11 and 15 to 18 of the Bill, which apply to the service courts as well as civilian courts, to be brought into force separately for the service courts.
Chris Philp
I beg to move amendment 3, in clause 52, page 42, line 23, leave out sub-paragraph (vii) and insert—
“(vii) Parts 8 and 9 of that Schedule.”
This amendment and amendment 7 correct a drafting error and provide that Part 8 of Schedule 13, which makes amendments consequential on clause 24 of the Bill, comes into force at the same time as clause 24.
Chris Philp
Amendment 3 is designed to correct drafting relating to the early commencement of the Bill’s provisions in clause 52, and amendment 7 is designed to correct a drafting error at clause 52 of the Bill, again concerned with commencement provisions.
Amendment 3 agreed to.
Amendments made: 4, in clause 52, page 42, line 26, at end insert
“, except as mentioned in subsection (3)(za)”
This amendment is consequential on amendment 8.
5, in clause 52, page 42, line 30, leave out “18” and insert “10”
This amendment is consequential on amendment 8.
6, in clause 52, page 42, line 30, at end insert—
“(ea) section 11, except as mentioned in subsection (3)(zb);
(eb) sections 12 to 14;
(ec) section 15, except as mentioned in subsection (3)(zc);
(ed) section 16, except as mentioned in subsection (3)(zd);
(ee) sections 17 and 18, except as mentioned in subsection (3)(ze);”
This amendment is consequential on amendment 8.
7, in clause 52, page 42, line 46, leave out sub-paragraph (iii) and insert—
“(iii) Part 7 of that Schedule.”
See the explanatory statement for amendment 3.
8, in clause 52, page 43, line 2, at end insert—
“(za) section 1 (and Schedule 1), as they have effect for the purposes of section 69 of the Sentencing Code as applied by section 238 of the Armed Forces Act 2006 (as amended by the Sentencing Act 2020);
(zb) section 11, as it has effect for the purposes of section 323 of the Sentencing Code as applied by section 261A of the Armed Forces Act 2006 (as inserted by the Sentencing Act 2020);
(zc) section 15, as it has effect for the purposes of Schedule 18 to the Sentencing Code as applied by sections 219A and 221A of the Armed Forces Act 2006 (as amended by the Sentencing Act 2020);
(zd) section 16, as it has effect for the purposes of section 256 of the Sentencing Code as applied by section 221A of the Armed Forces Act 2006 (as amended by the Sentencing Act 2020);
(ze) sections 17 and 18, as they have effect for the purposes of sections 268 and 281 of the Sentencing Code as applied by section 219A of the Armed Forces Act 2006 (as amended by the Sentencing Act 2020);
(zf) section 21 (and Schedule 6), as they have effect for the purposes of Schedule 13 to the Sentencing Code as applied by section 224A of the Armed Forces Act 2006 (as amended by the Sentencing Act 2020);”
This amendment provides for certain of the sentencing provisions of the Bill to be brought into force by regulations so far as they apply for the purposes of service law.
9, in clause 52, page 43, line 4, at end insert—
“(c) Part 4A of Schedule 13 (and section 48 to the extent that it relates to that Part).”—(Chris Philp.)
This amendment provides for the new Part 4A of Schedule 13 (see amendment 47) to come into force by regulations made by the Secretary of State (reflecting the position for the provisions to which the
Clause 52, as amended, accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Clause 53
Short title
Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.
Chris Philp
Clause 53 gives the shortened title for the Bill when it is cited, which will be the Counter-Terrorism and Sentencing Act 2020.
Question put and agreed to.
Clause 53 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.
New Clause 1
Review of deradicalization programmes in prisons
“(1) Within one year of this Act being passed, the Secretary of State must publish and lay before Parliament a comprehensive review of the impact of the provisions of this Act on the effectiveness and availability of deradicalization programmes in prisons.
(2) The review must include an assessment of the following matters—
(a) the effectiveness of existing programmes at reducing radicalization and terrorist offending;
(b) how individuals are assessed for their suitability for a programme;
(c) the number of individuals assessed as requiring a place on a programme;
(d) the number of individuals assessed as not requiring a place on a programme;
(e) the average length of time individuals assessed as requiring a place on a programme have to wait to start a programme; and
(f) whether there is sufficient capacity and resource to meet demand for places on deradicalization programmes in prisons.
(3) The review must consider how the provisions of this Act have affected the matters listed in subsection (2).”—(Alex Cunningham.)
This new clause requires a review of the impact of the Act on deradicalization programmes in prisons.
Brought up, and read the First time.
Alex Cunningham
I beg to move, That the Clause be read a Second time.
We have talked in great detail about the many provisions in the Bill, but we have also talked about the many missing provisions, best evidenced by my hon. Friend the Member for St Helens North, who discussed Prevent and the need for an end date for the report on its effectiveness to come into place.
One key area where we could do better in is the deradicalisation programmes in prison. While the minimum sentencing for terror offences has been increased, there is a suggestion that we could simply be delaying inevitable further offences unless we take action to use the offender’s time in prison to deradicalise them. We can only do that if there is an effective deradicalisation programme in place.
We have heard evidence that few people convicted of terrorism offences go on to commit further crimes, but some do. We have also heard evidence that these programmes are not entirely fit for purpose; perhaps, with these new longer minimum sentences, they really need a good overhaul. That is why the new clause has been tabled: to ask the Secretary of State to conduct a review of the impact of the provisions of the Bill on the effectiveness and availability of deradicalisation programmes in prison. Perhaps the Government could just tag it on to the Prevent inquiry and get two for the price of one.
The impact assessment for the Bill claims that longer incapacitation of terrorist offenders will enable
“more time in which to support their disengagement and rehabilitation through the range of tailored interventions available while they are in prison.”
However, the amount of time during which individuals have access to deradicalisation programmes in prison is not a key factor in determining their success or otherwise; rather, it is the effectiveness and the availability of the programmes in prison that has come under increasing scrutiny.
We need to know what is happening in prisons. What programmes are being delivered, who are they delivered to, who are they delivered by, when are offenders undertaking the programmes, how many deradicalisation programmes one offender in for a minimum sentence is expected to cover, and how is the success of programmes delivered? Those are just some of the questions that such a review would look into.
We need to understand the effectiveness of the programmes, where they work, where they do not and what can be improved. Currently, the main deradicalisation programme in prisons is called the Healthy Identity Intervention, which delivers one-to-one, individually tailored sessions. It is supplemented by the Desistance and Disengagement Programme, which can be offered to both prisoners and those released on licence.
Neither the Healthy Identity Intervention or the Desistance and Disengagement Programme courses have undergone any form of evaluation process to date, so perhaps the Minister will agree that a formal review is long overdue. It is a key part of our justice system, and rehabilitation should be at the centre of that, because people are released back into society. Putting someone back into society who has not been rehabilitated simply increases their chances of reoffending.
I remember the evidence from some of our witnesses—in particular from Mark Fairhurst who, at the start of his evidence, spoke of the role of key workers, the Parole Board and a range of professionals working with the offender. It was all very positive and very much to be welcomed. He went on, however, to say that an extended sentence, where an offender serves their whole sentence in prison,
“incentivises people not to behave correctly or to go on deradicalisation courses.”––[Official Report, Counter-Terrorism and Sentencing Public Bill Committee, 30 June 2020; c. 69, Q145.]
All the more reason why Ministers should understand more about how the deradicalisation system works for the offender and for society.
I would particularly like to see data on the average length of time for which an individual has been assessed as needing to undergo a deradicalisation programme before they actually undertake it. I am concerned that in such cases time is of the essence. The offender is likely to feel incredibly hostile to a system that has just imprisoned them. There cannot be an indefinite wait for them to be put on to a programme if they are willing to do it. Not getting on with it just allows more time for further radicalisation and mistrust of the legal and justice system.
In addition to that evidence, Professor Andrew Silke, who has studied efforts to deradicalise those in prison for terrorism offences, has reported that some prisoners who said that they were willing to participate in a programme were never put on one before their release. That could easily be rectified. We cannot and must not take chances. We need to ensure that the programmes are readily available as and when they are needed, and that there are no delays due to capacity issues or availability.
Where insufficient resources or structures are found in prisons, the Secretary of State must take action to resolve that. They must provide the resources to ensure that it is not a lottery and that no risks or gambles are being taken on the rehabilitation of a terror offender. It is really surprising that the Bill has nothing to say on what measures will be taken to ensure that effective deradicalisation programmes are available to individuals in prisons who need them. Arguably, simply by increasing the length of time that people spend in custody the provisions of the Bill risk further alienating them and giving them grounds for grievance against the authorities, placing them at greater risk of radicalisation.
Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)
I apologise for not being present to hear my hon. Friend’s earlier speech, which I gather was excellent, as I was in the House. Does he agree that deradicalisation programmes are even more important for young offenders? The data and evidence produced over the years and provided to this Committee shows that younger offenders—certainly under-25s—are more susceptible to influences, so deradicalisation, when done effectively, is even more effective in reducing reoffending when young offenders are eventually released.
Alex Cunningham
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that intervention. I have no doubt that she is correct. Young people are far more able to change their ways and benefit from the programmes. It is therefore essential that these programmes are in place. That is why I have spent most of my time in the past couple of weeks talking specifically about young people and how they differ from older people.
We all agree that rehabilitation is desirable and preferred, and a core cog in our justice system. Let us commit ourselves not only to talk about it, but to learn about it and ensure we deliver an effective system. The evidence so far to the Committee has suggested that it is not always effective. We need to deliver on that.
I am hopeful that the Minister will accept that a review is needed and that we need a greater understanding, just as we will have with the Prevent strategy. We need that greater understanding to ensure that the terror offenders have the support—and it is support—that they need in prison, so that when they are released into society, they can be the sort of citizens that we need them to be.
Chris Philp
I am grateful to the shadow Minister for raising this extremely important issue. As we heard in evidence a couple of weeks ago, most people who come out of prison having served a terrorism sentence do not go on to reoffend, as the shadow Minister said. I recall that the figure we were given was that only 5% to 10% of those prisoners released go on to commit subsequent terrorism offences. Thankfully, that is a low rate of recidivism, although it is very serious when it happens.
The shadow Minister asked why there are not more deradicalisation measures in this legislation. That is because most of our deradicalisation work and programmes are done operationally inside the Prison and Probation Service; they are not specified in legislation. Let me say, however, that a great deal is being done in this area. The Healthy Identity Intervention programme is one area to which the shadow Minister has referred.
We have doubled the number of specialist probation officers. As per earlier legislation, we are creating a new counter-terrorism assessment and intervention centre, set up as part of the new counter-terrorism StepUp! programme; it represents a major shift in our capability to intervene with terrorist offenders, including young terrorist offenders in exactly the way the shadow Minister was discussing earlier.
Alex Cunningham
The Minister was in full flow and doing very well, but I am interested in the statement he made that the Government have already doubled the probation capability in this area. I invite him to explain what he meant by that statement and say what the timescale is for this new centre, which sounds as if it is on the money.
Chris Philp
The proposals that have been made will double the number of probation officers who specialise in counter-terrorism and deradicalisation work. The new counter-terrorism assessment intervention centre will do the work I was just describing, including identifying the risk people pose and getting the right specialists to work with them to reduce their risk while they are in prison. That has to be the right approach. That is a significant change and evolution in the way in which we deal with this particular cohort.
The shadow Minister mentioned the programme that is already in place—the Healthy Identity Intervention programme—which I think has merit as well.
It is a one-to-one programme that supports desistance and disengagement from extremism by targeting the social and psychological drivers of that behaviour. That intervention is delivered by highly trained psychologists and probation officers in prisons, but also—critically—with offenders on licence after they have left prison.
2.45 pm
The work being done already is valuable; the enhanced work via the new counter-terrorism assessment intervention centre that I described will go even further. I hope that illustrates the direction of travel. We want to do more in this area, for the reasons discussed, and ongoing evaluation of that will be part and parcel of the Government’s approach. There will be the normal three-year review of the legislation, of course—I suspect I may make that comment more than once as we discuss the coming 11 new clauses. That standard three-year review will be a useful and valuable checkpoint to see whether the measures that I have just described are having the desired effect.
Alex Cunningham
I would say that 5% to 10% of people reoffending in a terrorist way is 5% to 10% too many.
Alex Cunningham
The Minister is nodding his head. He may have misinterpreted what I am trying to achieve with the new clause. He was saying that he does not want the detail of how we do deradicalisation in the Bill, but that is not what I am asking. I am asking for a review of how the process is working in prisons; I am not asking for details on how deradicalisation is done to be in the Bill.
The Minister originally said that the probation capability had already been doubled within the service, but in response to my intervention he said that that was a plan yet to be properly implemented. He also talked about the specialist centre, but did not answer the question of what the timescales were. There are an awful lot of unknowns here.
The Minister said that he hoped that what he had to say indicated or illustrated the direction of travel. It did, but we do not seem to be getting anywhere fast, and for that reason I wish to press the new clause to a Division.
Question put, That the clause be read a Second time.
Alex Cunningham
I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.
When I became shadow Justice Minister for courts and sentencing, one of the things that I was most interested in was how our justice system treats women in particular. We know that women are less likely to commit violent offences and make up about 5% of the overall prison population in the UK—although, having said that, I should say that the figure has doubled in recent times. Is that because women are committing more violent offences than ever before? No, it is not. According to Women in Prison, 80% of women entering prison have committed a non-violent offence. In 2017, 30% of all prosecutions of women were for evading the television licence fee. Just 4% of prosecutions of men were for the same offence.
We can debate the failures and merits of imprisonment as an effective or even moral punishment for a non-violent offence, but we are here to talk about counter-terrorism and sentencing. We want to put the issue down of the differences in sentencing between men and women. We need to consider the impact of our policies on all people. The new clause would require the Secretary of State to lay before Parliament a review of the effects of the Bill on women, including the differential effects on sentencing, on the release of terrorist offenders, and on the prevention and investigation of terrorism. The review must also consider the impact of the Bill on the physical and mental health of women.
Many women lose their homes and possessions when going to prison and are consequently released homeless. We often focus much on sentencing and punishing people for their crimes, but we do not do nearly enough, or invest anywhere near enough, to ensure that people get on the right track when they leave prison. When they leave prison and are homeless, and perhaps imprisonment has damaged relationships with their family and friends, they may feel that returning to crime is their only option. If an individual returns to crime because they do not have the support to build a better life for themselves, it is we who have failed.
The issue is not just about accommodation and material possessions. Only 9% of children whose mothers are in prison are cared for by their fathers in their mother’s absence. Just 5% of children remain in their family home when a mother goes to prison. We cannot apply a one-rule-fits-all approach, because one rule does not fit all, and we must recognise the difference in circumstances, outcome and impact that sentencing women has compared with sentencing men.
The review would help us as lawmakers to establish where further policy developments are needed to address any unexpected or undesirable impacts of the new legislation. That could then have an impact on the length of sentence that a woman terrorist received. We would like to know the impact on children if a mother is sentenced to prison for a terror offence. What happens to children to ensure that they do not develop a distrust of the justice system, which can lead to radicalisation? How do we introduce measures that are sensible, proportionate and smart?
I hope that the Minister will be able to tell me what research the Government have done on how approaches to women’s sentencing and licensing differ from those of men in the context of the Bill, and how the Government are recognising and acting on that difference.
Chris Philp
To state the obvious, the measures in the Bill apply equally to men and women. No distinction is made between them. A full equalities assessment was undertaken as part of the preparation for the Bill and has been publicly published. Indeed, it suggests that men will far more affected by the Bill than women, because far more men, unfortunately, commit terrorist offences.
That assessment of gender impact in the context of the Bill has been undertaken already, but Ministers and other public servants operate under further statutory obligations that will ensure that the Bill is implemented in an even-handed manner. For example, section 149 of the Equality Act 2010 places a duty on Ministers and the Department to have due regard to the need to eliminate unlawful discrimination, harassment, victimisation and other prohibited conduct. Moreover, article 14 of the European convention on human rights is engaged.
I understand that there are wider issues to do with sentencing and how female offenders are treated. Those are perfectly legitimate questions, but as far as the Bill, which is about terrorism, is concerned, men and women are treated equally. We have had the equalities impact assessment already and, for the purpose of terrorism legislation, that goes far enough. I am sure that we will debate on many occasions the wider questions of sentencing and prisons policy in relation to men and women, but as far as this Bill is concerned, that has been adequately addressed.
Alex Cunningham
I am grateful to the Minister for his explanation. If the Government recognise all their other statutory obligations in relation to women, that is a positive thing. On that basis, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the clause.
Clause, by leave, withdrawn.
New Clause 3
Financial impact assessment report
“(1) The Secretary of State must, within three years of this Act being passed, lay before Parliament a report on the financial impact of the provisions of this Act.
(2) That report must separately consider the financial impact of—
(a) extended sentences on the prison estate;
(b) extended licence periods;
(c) any increased staffing resources required for Her Majesty‘s Prison and Probation Service;
(d) the extended offenders of particular concern regime; and
(e) adding polygraph testing to certain offenders’ licence conditions.
(3) The report may consider other financial matters.
(4) The report must compare the financial impact of the Act with the Impact Assessment for the Counter-Terrorism and Sentencing Bill published by the Ministry of Justice on 18 May 2020.”
Brought up, and read the First time.
Alex Cunningham
I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.
New clause 3 would require the Secretary of State to lay before Parliament a report on the financial impact of the provisions of the Bill. In that report, the financial impact must be considered, as set out in new clause 3, as consisting of:
“(a) extended sentences on the prison estate;
(b) extended licence periods;
(c) any increased staffing resources required for Her Majesty‘s Prison and Probation Service;
(d) the extended offenders of particular concern regime; and
(e) adding polygraph testing to certain offenders’ licence conditions.”
As the Minister knows, Labour backs the Bill, but we are a little disappointed at the Minister’s considerable reluctance to examine the consequences of the Bill with the reviews and reports that we have called for—not to take up his time, but to inform him and his successors. Above all, however, we know that for the provisions in the Bill to be implemented and effective, there needs to be the resource behind it and the financial support to address the issues that we have raised in Committee, even if they are not addressed in the final Bill, such as deradicalisation programmes.
The Ministry of Justice has estimated that the Bill will only result in an extra 50 prisoners and reckons that the cost will be contained to around £16 million a year. During an earlier discussion last week, we talked about numbers—about which numbers were right and which might be difficult or misunderstood. The Minister replied:
“We can extrapolate how many of those 50 are aged between 18 and 21, as we discussed in the previous sitting. I do not think that number is the annual flow or the number of convictions per year. As I understand it, it is the impact on the total prison population. Given that these sentences are quite long, one would expect that the annual flow into the system affected by these serious terrorism sentence provisions would be somewhat lower than that.”––[Official Report, Counter-Terrorism and Sentencing Public Bill Committee, 2 July 2020; c. 133.]
When I challenged him on that number, asking whether it was an annual number or in fact the total number over a long period of time, he said:
“I will double check that number, but my understanding, which I will check, is that as a consequence of the measures the total prison population will increase by 50, which is different from an extra 50 people extra flowing in each year.” ––[Official Report, Counter-Terrorism and Sentencing Public Bill Committee, 2 July 2020; c. 134.]
Alex Cunningham
I will give way when I am ready, but I am going to refer to the Minister’s letter, because he has written to me; I appreciate that he took the time to do so. He said in that letter:
“Our impact analysis has identified that, in steady state, the provisions may result in fewer than 50 additional prisoners per year, and fewer than 50 additional probation caseload. These are based on historical volumes of convictions and assumes that trends in sentencing remain stable. These impacts relate solely to the effect of longer periods in custody on the number of prison places required, and longer periods on licence with their associated effects on probation caseloads, not to an increased number of sentences.”
I believe that there is a recognition there from the Minister that there is a cumulative effect and that the number is not less than 50; in fact, there could be considerably more people in the system, particularly after a given number of years, and perhaps especially so after 10 years.
I now give way to the Minister.
Chris Philp
I think what I said in my original speech and intervention was correct. As a result of the changes in the Bill, we think that at any one time there will be 50 more people in prison than would otherwise be the case. I think I said that in my original speech, and it was correct.
Alex Cunningham
That leaves me rather confused. The Minister says that his original speech was correct, and I assume that he is also saying that his letter to me was also correct, but as far as I can see those two things conflict. In his letter, he said that
“Our impact analysis has identified that, in steady state, the provisions may result in fewer than 50 additional prisoners per year”.
I emphasise that: “per year”. He goes on in his letter to give a bit more detail; perhaps quoting this will be helpful. He says, in a paragraph towards the end of his letter that I will read in full:
“For further insight, the most recent Home Office statistical publication on the ‘Operation of police powers under terrorism legislation’ shows in the year to December 2019”
—that is, in one year—
“there were 65 individuals charged with a terrorism or related offence, of which 2 (3%) were under age 18 and 10 (15%) were aged 18-20. Twenty-two of those charged were convicted in 2019, of which 1 (5%) was under 18 and 4 (18%) were aged 18-20. We do not expect the Bill to have a notable impact on such small volumes.”
That was the number of charges per year, and 22 people were convicted in 2019. If 22 people are convicted in each of the next four or five years, that is 100 additional people alone. I cannot quite understand what the figures really are. Are they correct in the letter or in the Minister’s original statement to the House?
Chris Philp
I think they are correct in both. There is the stock, and there is the flow. The stock is the number of extra people in prison as a consequence of the measures, which could be 50. The flow is the number of people going into prison each year who might be affected by these provisions, which will be less than 50.
On the numbers that the hon. Member just quoted—the various convictions that occur—not all of those will necessarily be affected by the provisions in the Bill. I realise there are a lot of numbers floating around, but those figures are internally consistent. I would be very happy to sit down in a cold, dark room and go through them again. There is consistency.
Alex Cunningham
I am grateful to the Minister for that intervention. I think it is I who needs a dark room somewhere to try to settle my head on this issue, but it would be a good idea if we could have specific clarification from the Minister at some time in the future.
I acknowledge the relatively small numbers—very small numbers—in this illustration of young people, but it does not matter whether it is one young person or a hundred. We need to treat them in a very different way from the way we treat people in the adult population, either by allowing them to have a counsellor present when they undergo a polygraph test or through the way that pre-sentencing reports are prepared for them prior to sentencing.
Bearing in mind that we do not know what numbers we are playing with now, can the Minister tell us whether the financial cost that has been identified for the new provisions will cover the additional cost of housing prisoners; the additional cost of creating spaces for new prisoners; the additional cost of having more than one specialist centre; the additional cost of having further specially trained prison officers; the cost for probation services of expanding the sentence for offenders of a particular concern regime; the impact of longer licensing on the National Probation Service; the new use of polygraphs; and the impact on youth offender teams? Such measures always have ripple effects, so we ask the Secretary of State to lay before the House within three years a report on the real financial impact of all these things.
There should never be an issue of resources when it comes to justice matters. We should ensure that prisons are properly staffed and that those staff are properly supported, be it for their personal security or to provide them with adequate services when they suffer mental illness as a result of their job—services that we heard are currently inadequate.
We should recognise the challenges that the justice system is facing. The Minister has tried to reassure us that the Government have a handle on the crisis in the courts, with hundreds of thousands of cases yet to reach them. Justice is being chronically underfunded. The Lord Chancellor simply does not have the resources he needs to do his job properly, so I struggle to have much faith that the measures in the Bill would be properly backed up financially.
I am sure the Minister will try to reassure me that all will be well and that there is plenty of cash to meet all the costs that the Bill will result in. Good! He could demonstrate his confidence in his statement by commissioning the report covered by this new clause.
Chris Philp
It is a pleasure to respond to the points that the shadow Minister has just made. I think I answered the points about numbers in my intervention on his speech, so let me speak to the financial cost. The financial cost of the measures proposed in the Bill has been comprehensively assessed in the impact assessment. Because the numbers are so small—an increase in the prison population of 50, or far fewer than 50, per year—the actual financial impact will be extremely small in the context of Her Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service’s budget. Let us remind ourselves that around 80,000 people are in prison, so an additional 50 will not represent a substantial impact in that context
When discussing the previous new clause, I spoke a little about the wider deradicalisation work, the new team and the increased investment in specialist officers who work with radicalised prisoners. An extra £90 million for this year was announced for counter-terrorism policing—catching people in the first place and preventing terrorist atrocities from taking place—which is a substantial increase in spending on exactly the police who are active in this area, so the resourcing is being increased. The total budget for the prison and probation service is substantially higher this year than last year, which I think will be welcome.
On a review, the Bill will clearly have a very small financial impact on the prison and probation service’s total budget. Were we to review this along with the other 11 proposed reviews before us, we would do nothing but reviews all day. The financial review will probably be well caught up in the general financial reviews we conduct anyway and the debates we have on prison and probation funding. I do not think a further review would shed any additional light on that.
Alex Cunningham
I just wonder what probation officers and prison officers will have to say in a few years’ time when they are still telling us that there are insufficient prison and probation officers in the system. That is bound to have an impact in this area as well.
The Minister listed all these wonderful initiatives—the new centres, new initiatives, the different things that are going to happen. These things cost money; I think £16 million was the figure in the in the paperwork. I just wonder how far that will actually go.
I am also interested in whether the £90 million the Minister referred to is not in fact related directly to what will happen as a result of this Bill. However, there is no doubt that that additional money is needed. We need to be able to empower our authorities to secure more convictions. The Minister’s letter, in 2019, stated that one in three people charged with a terror offence were actually convicted according to the Government’s own statistics.
However, I accept that there are other reviews and things as far as financial things are concerned, so we will leave the matter there. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the clause.
Clause, by leave, withdrawn.
New Clause 4
Role of the Parole Board
“(1) The Secretary of State must make an oral statement to the House of Commons on the effects of the provisions of this Act on the functions of the Parole Board.
(2) That statement must be made before the provisions relating to—
(a) life or indeterminate sentences for serious terrorism offences, and
(b) removal or restriction of early release for terrorist prisoners come into force.
(3) The statement must explain—
(a) the intended role for the Parole Board in the release of prisoners affected by the matters in subsection (2);
(b) what, if any, expert assessment of such prisoners will be undertaken before they are released;
(c) who will carry out any such expert assessments;
(d) whether any steps will be taken to compensate for any loss of intelligence gathering from a reduction in Parole Board interviews.”.—(Alex Cunningham.)
Brought up, and read the First time.
Alex Cunningham
I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.
The new clause asks for an oral statement, not a review. The Minister is probably relieved that he would not have to carry out yet another review, but on the basis that he is not carrying out any, I do not know why it has proven a problem to him.
The new clause would require the Secretary of State to make an oral statement to the House of Commons on the effects of the provisions of the Bill on the functions of the Parole Board. The statement must be made before the provisions come into force relating to the life or indeterminate sentences for serious terrorism offences and the removal or restriction of early release for terrorist prisoners. It must also explain the intended role for the Parole Board in the release of prisoners affected by the matters in subsection (2); what, if any, expert assessment of such prisoners will be undertaken before they are released; who will carry out any such expert assessments; and whether any steps will be taken to compensate for the loss of intelligence gathering from a reduction in Parole Board interviews.
The Minister may well say that there is no need for such a report or statement, most likely because he has sacked the board from its role in relation to offenders given indeterminate sentences. That would be sad, and I hope the Minister will take some time between now and Report in a couple of weeks’ time to reflect on how the Parole Board’s expertise could have a role in the assessment and rehabilitation of this particular group. The Parole Board has an unparalleled wealth of experience in managing offenders and assessing risk. We must ensure that experience is used, rather than abandoned.
As well as being asked to assess risk, the Parole Board plays a vital role in providing an incentive for prisoners to reform, and to respect each other as well as prison officers. It also provides intelligence vital to the work of the police and security agencies. I know that the prospect of early release is a key tool—probably the key tool—in the work of the Parole Board, but that is not a good enough single reason to turn our backs on it. The Bill intends to do away entirely with the Parole Board for those convicted of serious terrorist offences, yet we have been given no specifics as to what will replace its role. The Ministry of Justice assures us that no prisoner will be released back into the public realm without being risk-assessed, but we have heard no further detail as to how those assessments will take place, who will carry them out, or how frequently they will be conducted. Quite simply, the Bill removes a vital piece of the rehabilitation and monitoring of prisoners, and nothing has been offered to replace it.
Those who work for the Parole Board are experts in their field, and there is huge concern among Opposition Members that no assessor will be able to meet the standard of scrutiny currently offered by the Board. Ad hoc assessments conducted by unknown persons using unknown methods is just not good enough, and risks leaving us with prisoners released into communities under the supervision of services that will not have the benefit of the expertise that Parole Board members bring. That is an unacceptable risk, and we need assurances from the Government about what their plan is. Can the Minister explain what these assessments will look like, what qualifications the assessor will have, and how they will be appointed? Can he also explain the rationale for removing the Parole Board’s role, and why he thinks this new system that has yet to be clearly defined is better placed to carry out those assessments? Parliament deserves to understand the rationale behind these Government plans.
Chris Philp
The changes we made back in February, through the Terrorist Offenders (Restriction of Early Release) Act 2020, extend the remit of the Parole Board. Previously, terrorist offenders who were released early at the half-way point when serving standard determinate sentences would have been released with no prior consideration by the Parole Board. Now, the Parole Board will consider them prior to release at the two-thirds point, or subsequently if not referred at that point, so those changes dramatically expanded the Parole Board’s involvement with terrorist prisoners. Secondly, the Parole Board will of course still be involved with terrorist prisoners serving indeterminate sentences.
There is one remaining cohort: the very small minority of serious terrorist offenders who we have been debating during consideration of this Bill, those who will serve their full sentence in prison and will not be considered by the Parole Board prior to their release. The shadow Minister asked about the process that will take place in relation to that small minority of prisoners. As we touched on while taking evidence, a whole range of measures are taken to make sure those prisoners are properly managed and risk-assessed. The existing multi-agency public protection arrangements are at the core of that: they have been well-documented and well-reviewed, including by Jonathan Hall, so we know exactly what they are. Those measures also include the work done by the Prison and Probation Service, both in prison and afterwards on release, and work done in conjunction with CT policing.
Where the Parole Board will not be involved in a prisoner’s release decision, all those agencies will continue to be heavily involved in their risk assessment, working with the prisoners on deradicalisation where that is possible and managing them in prison and then in the community afterwards where it is not possible. I think we asked one of our witnesses, although I forget which one, whether they had confidence in those arrangements—MAPPA, the prison service, the probation service and the police—and the witness was very clear that they did. I have confidence in them as well.
Alex Cunningham
I am grateful to the Minister for reminding us about those different cohorts and how they have been dealt with. Of course, the Opposition very much supported the provisions that were introduced earlier this year. As for this particular cohort, although I still think it is regrettable that there is no role for the Parole Board in working with some of our most dangerous offenders, I see no sense in pressing the clause to a vote. I therefore beg to ask leave to withdraw the clause.
Clause, by leave, withdrawn.
New Clause 5
Review of effects on children and young offenders
“(1) The Secretary of State must, within one year of this Act being passed, lay before Parliament a review of the effects of the provisions of this Act on children and young offenders.
(2) That review must detail any differential effects on children and young offenders in—
(a) sentencing;
(b) release of terrorist offenders; and
(c) the prevention and investigation of terrorism.
(3) The review must consider the impact of imprisonment under this Act on the physical and mental health of children and young offenders.
(4) The review must consider the influences on children and young offenders who commit offences under this Act, including but not limited to—
(a) the internet;
(b) peer-pressure; and
(c) vulnerability.
(5) When conducting a review under this section, the Secretary of State must consult with Scottish Ministers.
(6) The review may make recommendations for further changes to legislation, policy and guidance.
(7) For the purposes of this section, young offenders include adults aged under 25.”—(Joanna Cherry.)
This new clause would require the Secretary of State to review the effects of these measures on children and young offenders. It would also require the Secretary of State to consult with Scottish minister when conducting the review.
Brought up, and read the First time.
Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)
I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr McCabe. I apologise if I am interrupting the flow of the hon. Member for Stockton North as we go through the new clauses, but I suspect that he will sympathise with this one, which I move on behalf of the Scottish National party. I remind colleagues that sentencing is a devolved matter, and that there will have to be a legislative consent motion in relation to the Bill, but clearly the Bill has implications for sentencing across the United Kingdom and Northern Ireland.
New clause 5 would require the Secretary of State to carry out a review of the effects of the provisions of the Bill on children and young offenders, to lay that review before the House within one year of the Bill being passed, and to consult with Scottish Ministers when conducting it. The clause reflects concerns already expressed by the hon. Member for Stockton North and by some of our witnesses about the impact of the legislation on children and young people. In support of it, I will refer to four aspects of the evidence that the Committee has received in writing or orally.
The first relates to evidence from the Independent Reviewer of Terrorism Legislation, Jonathan Hall, which we heard on the first day of evidence, 25 June—in particular, his responses to questions 15 and 16, which were asked of him by the hon. Member for Stockton North in reference to one of several notes that Jonathan Hall has prepared on the Bill. The hon. Gentleman asked him about point 10 of the first of those notes, titled “Note on Counter-Terrorism and Sentencing Bill: Sentencing Reforms (1)”, in which Mr Hall says:
“The requirement of a minimum mandatory sentence for all adult offenders, however young, puts in doubt whether judges can properly reflect the fact that an adult of 18 years and one month may not be any more mature than a child of 17 years and 11 months”.
Of course, those sentences are not available for a child, but they are available for those defined as over 18. Mr Hall went on to say:
“Age may or may not result in ‘exceptional circumstances’ being found, which is the only basis on which the 14-year minimum can be avoided.”
The hon. Member for Stockton North put it to Mr Hall, in question 15, that that struck him as a cautionary note, and he invited him to elaborate upon it. Mr Hall said:
“I have identified what is really a policy choice for Parliament. As a matter of fact, I can say that an increasing number of quite young people are being caught up in terrorism, including new forms of terrorism—not just conventional Islamist, extremist or right-wing terrorism, but other new emerging forms, such as the incel movement or even things at the very boundaries of what you might consider terrorism that are very violent. It is not impossible that young people will be caught up in this.
The point I am making—I have referred to an authority from England and Wales and I think I have also referred to the approach in Scotland—is that there is recognition that people who are young and immature are probably more susceptible to change than adults. I suppose it is a choice for Parliament, but the age for a mandatory minimum sentence—meaning no prospect of early release, and effectively putting to one side the possibility of reform—might be raised to 21, rather than that being for those in the 18-to-21 bracket. I understand that in Scotland there is a debate over whether it should be as far as 25.
All I can do is identify the choice that has been made and point out that when it comes to sentencing, traditionally it is recognised that people are not necessarily that different when they are one month over 18 as opposed to one month under 18.”––[Official Report, Counter-Terrorism and Sentencing Public Bill Committee, 25 June 2020; c. 10, Q15.]
The hon. Member for Stockton North said:
“But the bottom line is that with young people, perhaps, there is greater change. You have said that there may be greater opportunity for reform there than with those who are considerably older.”
Mr Hall replied:
“That is what judges are increasingly finding.”––[Official Report, Counter-Terrorism and Sentencing Public Bill Committee, 25 June 2020; c. 10, Q16.]
The hon. Member for Stockton North has mentioned this afternoon that there might be a greater opportunity for young people to reform their ways and be deradicalized than there is for middle-aged and older people.
My second piece of evidence is Mr Hall’s third note on the Counter-Terrorism and Sentencing Bill, which deals specifically with the effect of the proposed changes in sentencing in Scotland and Northern Ireland. In particular, in paragraphs 21 to 26 Mr Hall talks about children and young people, and states:
“Striking features of the proposed legislation concern its application to children and young offenders.
The proposed application of the serious terrorism sentence to offenders aged 18 to 21 in Scotland raises starkly the question of whether there is a bright line between offenders above and below the age of 18. This is because the Scottish Sentencing Council is currently consulting on its third draft guideline, ‘Sentencing Young People’ and proposes that special sentencing principles should apply to offenders up to the age of 25.”
Paragraph 23 of the note states:
“Even if the Sentencing Council guideline does not ultimately go as far as 25, the application of the minimum mandatory sentences to those in the 18 to 21 bracket, and even more so the removal of the role of the Parole Board…for dangerous serious terrorism offenders for both adults and children, appears inconsistent with the distinct youth criminal justice regimes which have developed in each part of the United Kingdom.”
Mr Hall says:
“The current trend in Scotland is towards a welfarist approach to youth criminal justice, reflected in the Scottish government’s Youth Justice Strategy in June 2015. In Northern Ireland, following a recommendation by the Criminal Justice Review…the Youth Justice Agency was established to administer youth justice in Northern Ireland.”
He continues:
“There is a risk in Northern Ireland, as elsewhere, that young offenders may be manipulated by terrorist groups or other unscrupulous individuals operating in the real world or online.”
He concludes at paragraph 26:
“As part of my role I receive regular briefings on counter-terrorism detention. I am aware of children, including quite young children, being arrested and detained for serious offences. Age does not necessarily inhibit capability (particularly technical capability) and intent. The internet, peer-pressure, and vulnerability are all significant factors in the types of offences committed and ideologies espoused. I question whether children who receive extended sentences for serious terrorist offences are so different from children who commit extended sentences for other serious offences, as to justify removing the Parole Board’s role.”
That is a fairly detailed exposition of the concern that the Independent Reviewer of Terrorist Legislation has about the impact of the Bill on children and young offenders.
My third piece of evidence is the written evidence from the Law Society of Scotland. On page 6 it echoes the concerns of the Independent Reviewer of Terrorism Legislation, and draws attention to the fact that the Scottish Sentencing Council is currently consulting on sentencing young people and considering changing the definition of a young person by raising the age to 25. That consultation opened on 28 February and will close on 21 August. Views are being sought on the sentencing of young people, with a recognition that that is complex and challenging and a suggestion that the sentencing of young people requires a more individual approach, with a need to take the unique circumstances of the young person into account.
The Law Society of Scotland states in its evidence that the
“introduction of mandatory minimum sentencing gives rise to concerns about the effect on young persons”,
because, as Jonathan Hall has said, they are more responsive to internet peer pressure and more vulnerable—those are significant factors in their offending.
Peter Dawson, the director of the Prison Reform Trust, has extensive experience of working in the system as a governor and deputy governor. In his oral evidence session, I asked him to elaborate on something that he had told the Minister at the beginning of the session:
“You said that some aspects of the Bill may undermine public protection. Can you summarise what you meant by that?”
Mr Dawson replied:
“There are two aspects in particular. One I have spoken about: the absence of a process for some of the people affected. There is probably nothing more to say on that.
The second is probably rather more controversial because it is about the length of sentences. The Government, in explaining the Bill and justifying a 14-year minimum, say that that gives time for work to be done with the offender during the sentence. That is much longer than is needed for that work to be done. The difficulty with very long sentences, across the board, is that they destroy what is known in the trade as protective factors—they destroy the things that are most likely to help someone out of crime in the future.
Relationships are an obvious example. For somebody who is convicted in their late teens or early 20s and who is not released until their mid to late 30s, the opportunity to build a life that is worth living, in which they can contribute to or play a part in society, has very often been destroyed. All of the things that the rest of us do during that period in our lives have not happened and may not happen once that person is released. It is a disgruntling process. Long sentences are justified for the most serious crime, but the longer we make them, the more harm we do and the more difficult it is for the person to live the rest of their life in the way that we all do.” ––[Official Report, Counter-Terrorism and Sentencing Public Bill Committee, 25 June 2020; c. 34, Q78.]
I then asked Mr Dawson:
“How important is rehabilitating terrorist offenders for the ongoing protection of our constituents and the public at large?”––[Official Report, Counter-Terrorism and Sentencing Public Bill Committee, 25 June 2020; c. 35, Q79.]
He said, “It is essential.” I read from that that Mr Dawson was drawing on his long experience to say that we are potentially creating real difficulty for ourselves by applying minimum mandatory sentences to children and young people. Those who are convicted in their late teens and early 20s will not get out until their mid to late 30s. During that time, most of us are maturing, learning how to participate in the labour market, forming significant relationships, and possibly having children or taking on responsibility for children in our wider family and friendship circles. Those convicted young people will be unable to do any of those things, which may prevent their deradicalisation.
Drawing on the evidence from Jonathan Hall, the Law Society of Scotland and Mr Dawson, I think that there is real and well-founded concern about the potential impact of minimum mandatory sentences on children and young people, which happens against the backdrop of divergent approaches to youth justice across these islands—I have explained what is happening and is being contemplated in Scotland, and what is happening in Northern Ireland. It is against the backdrop of those—in my submission—well-placed concerns that I seek to amend the Bill to mandate the Government to carry out, within one year, a review of the effect of the provisions on children and young offenders.
We would probably all accept that children and young people are different from middle-aged and older people and that we perhaps have a special responsibility towards them. In this context, with particular regard to the evidence given by Mr Dawson and Jonathan Hall, we have a responsibility to the public to try to rehabilitate children and young people who become involved in terrorism. There seems to be strong evidence that there is more chance of rehabilitating them than there is with older people.
There are two good reasons to have this review: our responsibilities to children and young people in general and, perhaps more importantly, our responsibility to the public, and British citizens at large, to do what we can to try and deradicalise convicted terrorists. We know we are much more likely to be able to do that with children and young people. I will be interested to hear what the Minister has to say in response to my new clause.
Taiwo Owatemi (Coventry North West) (Lab)
Once again, it is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr McCabe.
I speak in support of new clause 5, in the name of the hon. and learned Member for Edinburgh South West, which calls on the Secretary of State to review the effect of the measures in the Bill on children and young offenders. Much of the new clause relates to young offenders, and I agree that the impact of this Bill on them must be huge. We simply cannot treat young offenders in the same way as fully matured, grown adults, who fully understand their actions. The impact on their mental and physical wellbeing should be a fundamental consideration on how we carry out justice in this country.
The new clause also leaves room to consider the more general impact on children who are not accused of a crime. Children are often victims in the pursuit of justice, when they have done nothing to deserve the situation or warrant being the victims of a crime. All too often, children of offenders will pay the price for their parents’ crimes. This crime will also have serious effects on women. Only 9% of children whose mothers are in prison are cared for by their fathers, in the absence of their mothers. Only 5% of children remain in their family home when their mother goes to prison. A fifth of women prisoners are lone parents before imprisonment.
I am not aware of the background of Members in this Committee, but I cannot imagine how it must be for a child to see their parents taken away from them for a long period of time and having to live in a different way, with different people. Victims of crime never deserve to be so. It is imperative that this House recognise the true impact of our legislative decisions and how they affect the most vulnerable, in this case children. We support this new clause on that basis.
The young offenders of today do not have to be the reoffenders of tomorrow, but we need to make an effort and carry out the research to stop that happening. There will be children and young offenders caught up in terror crimes. It would be naive of us to think that there is any crime that children cannot be drawn into, but we have a choice about how we respond. We have the opportunity to ensure that they are not defined by the actions of their youth and that the actions of others will not disproportionately affect their lives.
I hope that the Minister will be able to support this new clause, as we do, and act to acknowledge that we must put the focus on how children and young offenders are treated and impacted.
Chris Philp
I thank the hon. and learned Member for Edinburgh South West for moving the new clause, and for the eloquence and passion with which she described its various component parts.
The Bill already treats people under the age of 18 very differently from those aged over 18. It has different provisions, as we have already debated. Therefore, people who are children in the legal sense of the term—people who are under the age of 18—are already treated completely differently by the Bill, compared with those over the age of 18.
In relation to those aged between 18 and 20, 18 and 21, or 18 and 24, depending on where the line is drawn, there is clearly a wider debate to be had about the way that their brains mature and about the opportunity to reform those people, compared with people who are a little bit older. However, in the context of the Bill, I emphasise that we are talking about the most serious terrorist offenders. We are not talking about the average 20 or 21-year-old. We are talking about people who have committed the most serious terrorist offences.
It is worth reminding ourselves what level of severity has to be met before somebody gets the mandatory 14-year minimum term, all of which gets spent in prison. To qualify for that sentence, it has to be a serious terrorist offence. The offender has to be found to be dangerous—a finding that the judge makes on reading a pre-sentence report, so the judge can take that into account. It has to be an offence—one of the most serious offences—that ordinarily carries a life sentence. Most chillingly of all, it has to be an offence where there was a risk of causing multiple deaths, and the person carrying out the offence would have known or should have known about that. So we are talking about offences of the most exceptional gravity.
Ruth Cadbury
I entirely accept the important point that the Minister raises and how the issue is about severity. However, Labour Members keep raising the point about maturity. Whether it is stealing apples or being involved in planning a major terrorist incident where loss of life is potential or actual, maturity is an issue. As colleagues have said several times, and there is a raft of evidence, young people under 21—they get more mature as they get nearer 25—are at risk of coercion and radicalisation, and their very immaturity draws them into these crimes, however severe. All we ask in this new clause is that there should be a review and that maturity should be taken into account, in the same way that it is now taken into account in the context of sentencing those over 18.
Chris Philp
I appreciate the hon. Lady’s intervention and the sentiments behind it, but I am not sure I entirely agree that this very small number of offences can be compared with the theft of apples. We are talking about a tiny handful of people who have committed the most serious offences where multiple people could have been killed and where the judge has found that the offenders are dangerous. Had they simply been misled, or coerced even, it might be open to interpretation as an exceptional circumstance, although we expect the exceptional circumstance derogation to be extremely rare—as the name implies, it is truly exceptional. Should truly exceptional circumstances exist, there is that opportunity open to the judge, but it would have to be truly exceptional.
To emphasise again how small the numbers are, the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Stockton North, reading out my letter when we debated a previous clause, said that, last year, in 2019, of the 22 people convicted of terrorist offences, only four were aged between 18 and 20, and not all of those would meet the criteria for the serious terrorist sentence that we are talking about, so the numbers are microscopically small, thankfully, for those aged between 18 and 20. There is also the exceptional circumstance override, and we are talking about offences of the most serious kind, which have to pass three or four different hurdles before qualifying for the assessment that we have just described. In that context, where the offending is so serious and the risk so grave, the approach being taken is a reasonable one, but I accept the more general point about maturity in other, less serious contexts.
On the question of a review, given that the numbers are so very small, I am not wholly convinced that a bespoke review is the right thing to do, but, of course, there will be a regular review, as I might say frequently in the coming clauses, at the three-year mark, where it is right that the matter gets considered.
The hon. and learned Member for Edinburgh South West raised some points that will require consideration. It might well be that nobody at all aged 18 to 20 ends up being affected by this measure, in which case it will be a pretty short consideration. Mandating it by statute is not necessary. There are other review mechanisms. As we saw when we debated the Prevent review earlier, if we have too many statutory reviews, we end up tripping over our own shoelaces by failing to meet all the deadlines that we have created.
The questions are serious. I understand and respect them. We will need to debate them in future, quite properly and rightly, but putting this measure in the Bill is a step that we do not need to take this afternoon.
Joanna Cherry
I thank the Minister for taking on board some of the points that I have made. In response to his points, first, I accept that this is only for the most serious terrorist offences. I completely accept that, and I accept that the numbers of children and young people who are so sentenced may be very small, but the important thing is that, if we have a young person or child convicted of a serious terrorist offence, and given the evidence we have heard about the opportunity to deradicalise and rehabilitate, there is all the more reason to try to make sure that that opportunity is taken.
All we are asking for is a review. If it turns out that the numbers are small, as is expected, it will not be a complex or time-consuming review. Although I am not going to push my new clause to a vote, I anticipate bringing it back to the Floor of the House. I would appreciate it if the Minister, in the spirit in which he responded, could take the evidential concerns away and consider what could be done specifically to measure the impact of this legislation on children and young offenders across these isles. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the clause.
Clause, by leave, withdrawn.
New Clause 7
Review of legislation: Northern Ireland
“(1) On an annual basis from the day of this Act being passed, a report that reviews the application of the provisions of this Act in Northern Ireland must be published and laid before both Houses of Parliament by the Secretary of State.
(2) Annual reports under subsection (1) must be produced in consultation with the Northern Ireland Minister for Justice and the Northern Ireland Executive —(Conor McGinn.)
This new clause ensures that all measures in the Bill as they pertain to Northern Ireland shall be reviewed annually with the Northern Ireland Minister for Justice and the Northern Ireland Executive, and a report shall be published and laid before both Houses of Parliament.
Brought up, and read the First time.
Conor McGinn
I beg to move, that the clause be read a Second time.
I will not detain the Committee too long. I have much sympathy with what the Minister says about the number of reviews that have been called for, but I hope, similarly, that he might have some sympathy with those of us on the Opposition Benches. While he, in government, gets to do, all we can do at the minute is ask to review. I hope that position might change after the next election.
On Second Reading, a number of hon. Members from Northern Ireland raised the critically important point that this legislation is clearly of great significance to that region. I think we would all wish to acknowledge that so many people there have lived and continue to live with the devastating consequences of violence in their communities. It is only following concerted efforts for peace and reconciliation, which remain so vital that, we see some of those scars starting to heal.
The Minister rightly said that the Bill was designed to deal with terrorism in all its forms and was a UK-wide Bill. However, given the unique and long-standing circumstances in Northern Ireland and the hard work done to build the Good Friday and subsequent agreements and the Northern Ireland Executive, it is important that we do not risk any unintended consequences from measures in the Bill, which could have an effect in Northern Ireland and could have damaging consequences.
To that end, on behalf of the official Opposition, I am tabling new clause 7 to ensure that all measures in the Bill, as they pertain in Northern Ireland, will be renewed annually with the Northern Ireland Justice Minister and the Northern Ireland Executive and that a report is published and laid before both Houses of Parliament. The Minister will know that the Justice Minister in Northern Ireland, with whom he and I have had extensive discussions, has herself expressed some concerns about the extension of provisions in the Bill to Northern Ireland, and has raised some potential inadvertent and unintended consequences that would be undesirable.
It is vital to the success of the legislation in performing and fulfilling a UK-wide function that we seek the benefit of her expertise—or that of whoever holds that post—and continue to monitor the legislation’s implications in Northern Ireland. The structure of sentences in Northern Ireland, for example, differs from that in the rest of the UK, and there are special and unique circumstances there that mean that we ought to ensure we legislate specifically and responsibly. For example, post-sentencing regimes work in prisons for paramilitary prisoners and those in prison for reasons related to terrorist offending, and in terms of an approach to deradicalisation and the points made by the hon. and learned Member for Edinburgh South West about young people. Just as the polygraph section of the Bill has been crafted to be permissible but not mandatory in Northern Ireland, so it is right that all aspects of the Bill should be subject to review through the unique prism of Northern Ireland.
As we heard in the evidence sessions, the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission set out a number of concerns about the legislation, including the retrospective nature of some provisions, both in terms of sentencing and release, the polygraph test, as has been mentioned, and the impact of provisions on those under the age of 18. I will not revise all those arguments here—they are known to members of the Committee—but it does seem obvious to me that it would be more advisable for the Government to work constructively with the Minister for Justice, rather than to risk legal or human rights challenges down the line. We spoke about that earlier in the Committee.
Chris Philp
I thank the shadow Minister for introducing new clause 7, which would, along with other proposed new clauses, create a veritable snowstorm of statutory reviews. I appreciate the comments he made about the tools available to the Opposition, which I hope not to have to avail myself of in the near future—who knows what might happen?—but I would say that the Opposition have many tools at their disposal, which they frequently use, including debates, questions, parliamentary questions, Freedom of Information Act requests, and so on and so forth. There is no shortage of methods, quite rightly, by which any Government may be properly held to account by Parliament.
On Northern Ireland particularly, we fully recognise that it has a unique history and that terrorism is interwoven into some parts of that. We have taken very careful time—a great deal of time—to make sure that we have not in any way interfered with or unpicked the very important provisions in the Belfast agreement, because we do not want to do anything that interferes with or undermines that very important agreement. However, matters of national security and terrorism are reserved matters and, as far as possible, we would like to have a consistent position, which is broadly speaking what the Bill seeks to do.
I understand there are issues of sensitivity, which the Justice Minister in Northern Ireland, Naomi Long, has raised with the Ministry of Justice here in London; it sounds as if she has also raised them with the shadow Minister. As I said in response to an intervention on our very first day of line-by-line consideration, we are in the process of having a very detailed, in-depth dialogue on those issues and are going through them one by one. Whether it is before or after the Bill is enacted, as I hope it will, I put on the record that we will always engage sensitively and deeply with the Northern Ireland Administration and, of course, the Government in Scotland in these areas, recognising how important they are to all parts of the United Kingdom. I assure the hon. Gentleman that that will be done with sensitivity and receptiveness.
On a statutory obligation to conduct a further review, I have mentioned my general position. Given Parliament’s ability to question and debate, to FOI and so on and so forth—there is no lack of scrutiny—I do not think that a further statutory review would add anything to the process. I accept the point, however, that we need to keep a close eye on these matters and be in continued and close dialogue with all our colleagues in the various Administrations, in Belfast and Holyrood in particular.
Conor McGinn
I thank the Minister for his comments. The only part I would challenge is the claim that there is no lack of scrutiny in Parliament, as we have a body that is tasked with overseeing scrutiny and overviewing all these matters that has not yet been reconstituted—the Intelligence and Security Committee. It is clear to me from discussions with colleagues in Northern Ireland, and given the dialogue that the Minister has had with the hon. Member for East Lothian and the hon. and learned Member for Edinburgh South West that he is acting in good faith and is keen to resolve any outstanding matters with the devolved legislatures. It is important to put on record that that is very much the message that I have received. I encourage him to continue those discussions.
The Minister is right to assert that it is clearly a reserved matter, but there are elements that require a legislative consent motion, which will be difficult to get through the Northern Ireland Assembly. If the Justice Minister has reservations about it, one can only imagine what other parties in the Assembly and the Executive might have to say. I encourage him to continue those discussions. I am happy to assist him in finding a resolution and a way forward, because it is important that we get it right. On that basis, I will not press the clause to a vote and I beg to ask leave to withdraw the clause.
Clause, by leave, withdrawn.
New Clause 8
Lone terrorists: Review of strategy
‘(1) The Secretary of State must commission a review and publish a report on the effectiveness of current strategies to deal with lone terrorists.
(2) A review under subsection (1) must be conducted by a person who meets the criteria for qualification for appointment to the Supreme Court, as set out in section 25 of the Constitutional Reform Act 2005.
(3) A review under subsection (1) must consider—
(a) counter-terrorism policy;
(b) sentencing policy as it applies to terrorist offenders;
(c) the interaction and effectiveness of public services with respect to incidents of lone terrorist attacks.
(4) For the purposes of subsection (3)(c), “public services” includes but is not limited to—
(a) probation;
(b) the prison system;
(c) mental health services;
(d) local authorities; and
(e) housing providers.
(5) The Secretary of State must lay a copy of the report before Parliament.
(6) A Minister of the Crown must, not later than 3 months after the report has been laid before Parliament, make a motion in the House of Commons in relation to the report.’—(Conor McGinn.)
This new clause ensures that the Government orders a judge-led review into the effectiveness of current strategies to deal with lone terrorists including, but not exclusively, current counter-terrorism and sentencing policy.
Brought up, and read the First time.
Conor McGinn
I beg to move, That the Clause be read a Second time.
As we have reiterated throughout the passage of the Bill, our overriding priority, which is shared on both sides of the Committee, is and always will be to keep the public safe, including from those individuals who seek to attack our values, destroy our way of life and divide us through abhorrent acts of violence and terror. The remarks made this morning by the hon. Member for Hertford and Stortford were a testament to that and the response to it. We in Committee were privileged to hear the speech, which was worthy of a wider audience. I hope to hear her invoke some of what her friend Louise said again on the Floor of the House on Report, because it was very valuable.
Following the shocking and tragic incident in Reading a matter of weeks ago, we need to take stock of the new and emerging threats from terrorism. The agility that the Minister has asked for in amending TPIMs should be applied when it comes to looking at the threat from lone actors. That is why we have asked for a judge-led review into the Government’s strategy on tackling the dangerous and growing menace of lone attackers. Reading was the third time in less than a year that we have witnessed such devastation on UK streets, each with a lone attacker at its core, callously intent on mayhem and destruction in our communities.
Our proposal would make provision to address the systemic response needed to that phenomenon. The new clause asks the Government to order a judge-led review of the effectiveness of current strategies to deal with lone terrorists. It should address counter-terrorism sentencing policy, as the Bill does, as it applies to terrorist offenders and the interaction and effectiveness of public services with respect to incidents of lone terrorist attacks.
Fundamentally, the review would seek to build firmly on previous research and expertise, such as the extensive work carried out by Lord Anderson that has provided a valuable insight into how we can improve and better connect the current systems. It would include an analysis of a wide range of key public services, including our probation and prison system, whose value and potential have been closely reflected on throughout these debates, but also mental health services, housing providers and local authorities, each of which can intervene at critical points. That is also why we need to get on with the Prevent review, which will play a critical part in addressing some of those issues.
There is absolutely no question about the high skill, dedication and bravery of our police and security and intelligence services. We need to do everything we can to support them as they set about their task of tackling extremism from root to branch, which is not easy. The fall in terrorism-related arrests to its lowest level in six years is concerning, particularly at a time when radicalisers and dangerous extremists increasingly operate through more and more sophisticated networks of hatred online, which are often understandably difficult for the authorities to monitor and intercept.
While the dangers of Islamist extremism persist, the menacing threat from far-right extremism is growing at a deeply disturbing rate. Far-right cases now make up almost a quarter of Prevent referrals and nearly half of all adopted Channel cases. All the while, the number of individuals in custody for terrorism-related offences and subscribing to those vile and hateful ideologies is up by one third on last year. That is on top of already record levels and steady rises over recent years.
We must urgently face up to this threat. We need to see that coherent and comprehensive strategy which, at this moment, I am afraid to say, appears to be lacking. The suspect in the Reading case was believed to be known to multiple public agencies and to have had a history of significant mental health issues; so too did the London Bridge and Streatham attackers. So many of our vital public services have interactions with individuals, which give them real concern, but they must have the necessary tools to intervene and work together in the most effective and efficient manner possible, ultimately to save lives and keep people safe.
The Lord Anderson review of 2017 outlines interesting pilot work on multi-agency centre pilots. They involve the identification of newly closed, high-risk subjects of interest; the sharing of data by MI5 and counter-terror policing with other agencies, such as local authorities and Government Departments; and the enrichment of that data from the databases of multi-agency partners. I wonder whether the Minister would write to me or enlighten the Committee on what is being done to address the existing barriers that were identified by the review to local partners’ involvement in managing subjects of interest, including the challenges of resourcing.
Lord Anderson said that
“some local authority representatives cautioned against unrealistic expectations of services such as mental health and community safety… against, what was described to me as, a background of widespread recent degradation of local services”.
Ruth Cadbury
I thank my hon. Friend for highlighting so clearly the risk of lone offenders, who are often not clearly linked to any particular organised network and are operating off not much more than hate, mental health problems and the internet. I think of David Copeland, who, in the space of two weeks, used nail bombs in violent attacks, causing death and injury to the black community in Brixton, gay people outside the Admiral Duncan in Soho and the Asian community in east London. Does he agree that there are potential new threats, as the independent reviewer pointed out in his evidence, such as the incel movement?
Conor McGinn
I do. My hon. Friend has eloquently outlined the development of the terrorist threat and its changed dynamics, as well as the fundamental point that hatred and terrorism does not discriminate. It is not homogeneous, because it is perpetrated by different people with different motives, nor does it discriminate, because fundamentally other people are hurt by it.
In asking for this, we are saying to the Government that those three attacks in different places, perpetrated by different people with no connections, over a relatively short space of time, provide evidence of a new and increasing threat. Coupled with the increase in right-wing extremism and the manifestation of that through referrals to Prevent and arrests, that needs to be looked at very carefully. Things have moved on since Lord Anderson’s very good report in 2017.
It is time that the Government looked at that again to identify the issues Lord Anderson raised and what they have done to break down some of the barriers that he identified in 2017 that were preventing us from apprehending these people at various junctures throughout their journey—from starting out with an extremist ideology to, on their own, as lone actors, committing the most heinous crimes, causing the types of suffering, hurt and heartache that were expressed so eloquently earlier today.
Chris Philp
The hon. Member for St Helens North has raised an important matter: the problem of lone wolf attackers acting outside recognised group structures. We have seen, in those incidents that he referred to, the terrible impact of the actions of those people who, while they are acting alone, none the less cause devastating consequences for the victims of their actions. We should take the threat they pose extremely seriously.
Since those first two events—at Fishmongers’ Hall and in Streatham—we have moved to change the law in a number of areas. First, we introduced emergency legislation—the Terrorist Offenders (Restriction of Early Release) Act 2020—which came into force on 26 February. As we know, that ended the automatic early release of terrorist prisoners and instead moved their release point to two thirds with Parole Board consent or later if not given, followed by the period on licence. We have legislated today to ensure that there is at least a year on licence, even where they serve their full term. That was one element of the response to those events to which the hon. Gentleman referred.
Of course, this legislation we are debating is part of that response, making sure that those most serious offenders are physically prevented from harming the public by incapacitation, which is a second important element of the Government’s response. The third element was a review of the MAPPA—multi-agency public protection arrangements—which the Home Secretary and the Lord Chancellor commissioned in the aftermath of the Fishmongers’ Hall attack from Jonathan Hall QC, whom we met a couple of weeks ago, to see what more we can do to ensure that those agencies are working together where opportunities arise to identify somebody who might pose a threat to the public. That work was extremely important.
It is worth saying that in the three years since March 2017, 25 different attacks have been foiled so, while it is of course a tragedy that any attacks at all happen, the measures taken have disrupted, foiled and prevented 25 atrocities that might otherwise have taken place. Now would be a good time, in that context, to extend our thanks and gratitude to counter-terrorism police and the security services, who have done that work to keep us and our constituents safe these past few years.
The hon. Gentleman’s point about the need to be vigilant on this topic is well made. My colleague the Security Minister, my right hon. Friend the Member for Old Bexley and—
Chris Philp
The hon. Member for St Helens North is more familiar with parliamentary constituencies than I am. My hon. Friend the Security Minister is working on this and I am sure, in a spirit of cross-party co-working, he would be willing to sit down and have a chat, possibly a confidential chat, with the hon. Gentleman about the work that is going on in this area.
It is a good topic to debate and to think about. I have made my views on statutory reviews clear and I will not repeat them, but this is a topic that Parliament should be considering. We have been discussing it ourselves, because these threats do exist and we need to do everything we can on prevention, not only through policing, but through other forms of intervention. The spirit of the hon Gentleman’s comments is one I embrace and agree with, while very gently and politely resisting another statutory review.
Conor McGinn
I was going to put the new clause to a vote, but I thank the Minister for his very generous offer—
Conor McGinn
His colleague’s time, I note, but I think this is something we can work on together. My colleague, the shadow Home Secretary, has written to the Home Secretary on this matter, so while awaiting a response to that, which hopefully we will receive before Report, I will not push the new clause to a vote on this occasion.
We have approached all these amendments in the spirit of wanting to work together with the Government. As the Minister rightly says, while we are focusing here on how we can improve things, that should not for a minute be taken as an indication that we have anything other than incredible gratitude for the work that has been done to prevent what could have been many more catastrophic and devastating attacks. In that spirit, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the clause.
Clause, by leave, withdrawn.
New Clause 9
Assessment of the mental health of individuals serving a sentence affected by this Act
“(1) Where an individual is serving a sentence affected by this Act, they must be subject to an annual assessment of their mental health for the duration of their sentence and their term on licence.
(2) Where an assessment under subsection (1) indicates—
(a) a mental health condition; or
(b) a deterioration in a mental health condition since the previous assessment
the Secretary of State must take measures to treat such a mental health condition.”
Brought up, and read the First time.
Alex Cunningham
I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.
New clause 9 would require a mental health assessment of an individual who has committed a terror offence to be carried out annually for the duration of their sentence and their term on licence. It would also require that where a mental health condition is found, or where there has been a deterioration of a mental health condition since the previous assessment, the Secretary of State must take measures to treat the mental health condition.
I am not a mental health professional and I do not claim to understand the psychology behind why somebody commits or plans to commit an act of terrorism, but it strikes me as eminently sensible to carry out regular mental health assessments of those who have committed an offence under the Bill, not because there is any correlation between having a mental health condition and committing acts of terrorism, but because mental health conditions can turn people into who they are not. By treating mental health conditions, we can provide support and reduce the chance of further criminal acts being carried out when a prisoner is released.
This is not just about preventing terrorism; it is about how we treat each other as people. It is common for people to wander down the wrong path. Of course, some paths are much more dangerous than others and it is right that people are appropriately sentenced for their crimes, but I can only imagine what it is like to be in prison for years on end. A few hours in my local Holme House Prison in Stockton is certainly enough for me. I cannot fathom what impact being in prison for a long sentence has on an individual’s mental health year after year, and time spent in prison without receiving treatment can make an existing mental health condition much worse. The individual released into society after their prison sentence has been served is left to struggle with their mental health condition. It is a recipe for disaster, but we can take simple precautions to address the problem.
Prisons and the Government have a duty of care for the physical and mental wellbeing of people in our prisons, and they should stay on top of any identified mental health conditions in order to best support offenders in their rehabilitation, so that they can make the most of deradicalisation programmes and rejoin society without any mental health illnesses blocking their way. That way, we can ensure that we have covered all the bases, that we are providing what should be basic necessities, such as mental health treatment, and that we are helping people on their way to becoming citizens who can contribute positively to society.
I recognise that mental health services in this country need much more resources, and they are often inadequate for people in the general population. That is another task for the Government: to establish high-quality mental health services for all. The new clause could take the pressure off community health services in the longer term by ensuring that people convicted of terrorist charges are as healthy as they can be when they return to society. I look forward to hearing what the Minister has to say.
Chris Philp
Let me again thank the shadow Minister for raising a very important point. We know mental health can often contribute to, or perhaps even cause, significant portions of offending, including some elements of terrorist offending—not all terrorist offending, but certainly some. It is certainly an important area that we need to be very conscious of.
It is already a fundamental aspect of the health and justice system that we have processes in place to identify, assess and then treat offenders with a wide range of mental health needs, both in custody and throughout the criminal justice process. The intervention that the shadow Minister calls for is already inherent in the way the system operates. The NHS long-term plan already stipulates that all prisoners, not just terrorist prisoners, receive an early reception screening and an assessment within the first 24 hours of entry into the prison system, followed by a second screening within seven days. Decisions about whether to provide mental health treatment are made on the basis of identified clinical need. The mental health teams that work in this area have clear clinical pathways describing such referrals. Prisoners in custody, but also those out on licence, are monitored for mental health issues. Where mental health problems are identified, they are referred and treated, including if there is a change in their condition—a deterioration, as the new clause describes it.
Regarding the capacity to provide treatment, I am sure that as constituency MPs we are all aware of the importance of building mental health treatment capacity. I was pleased that over the past year or two, recent announcements in relation to NHS funding have included a lot more funding for mental health treatment facilities in the NHS, which will treat prisoners as much as they will treat people who are not in custody. The spirit of the new clause is an entirely reasonable one, but it is already inherent in how the system operates that people are medically screened and monitored, with appropriate treatment following, as it should. I acknowledge the importance of identifying and treating mental health conditions in all offender cohorts, including terrorist offenders.
Alex Cunningham
I am grateful to the Minister for his helpful response, but if mental health services in prisons reflect mental health services in wider society, I am worried, because we know how inadequate mental health services across our country currently are. That is something to which the Government need to give extra attention. The Minister has talked about extra investment in mental health, which is welcome; however, even though I will withdraw the new clause, I suggest that at some time in the future he comes to the House and talks about some of the issues around mental health in prisons, so we can gain a greater understanding of what is and is not happening. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the clause.
Clause, by leave, withdrawn.
New Clause 10
Review of legislation: National Probation Service
“(1) Within 18 months of enactment, the Secretary of State must commission a review and publish a report on the impact of the provisions in the Act on the National Probation Service.
(2) A review under subsection (1) must consider—
(a) the probation support provided to offenders convicted for terrorist offences;
(b) how probation support provided to offenders convicted for terrorist offences has varied since implementation of this Act;
(c) the—
(i) type; and
(ii) number
of specialist staff employed by the National Probation Service to work with terrorist offenders;
(d) the—
(i) training;
(ii) assessed skill level; and
(iii) assessed experience
of specialist staff employed by the National Probation Service to work with terrorist offenders;
(e) the turnover of probation staff;
(f) the average length of service of probation staff;
(g) the non-staff resources provided to manage offenders convicted for terrorist offences; and
(h) the adequacy of the operating budget of the National Probation Service.
(3) A report under subsection (1) may make recommendations to improve the probation support to terrorist offenders.
(4) Where a report has made recommendations under subsection (4), the Secretary of State shall respond within 2 months.
(5) The Secretary of State must lay a copy of the report under subsection (1) before Parliament.
(6) A Minister of the Crown must, not later than 3 months after the report has been laid before Parliament, make a motion in the House of Commons in relation to the report.”—(Alex Cunningham.)
Brought up, and read the First time.
Alex Cunningham
I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.
I would be doing a disservice to the many probation officers and others working in the service if I did not raise the issue of what has happened to our probation service in recent times. I am personally delighted that probation is no longer out there with a load of private organisations, but has been brought back in house. I hope that the necessary improvements will take place so we can deliver an effective probation service in future.
New clause 10 would require the Secretary of State to commission and publish a report on the impact of the Bill’s provisions on the National Probation Service, its support for terrorist offenders and various specialist staffing and resource matters, and to respond within two months to any recommendations made in the report.
The work of the probation service is to assess and monitor risk, but it is also to provide support while trying to change an individual’s mindset so that they have a second chance, are less likely to reoffend, and can take up a positive role in society. It is true that terror offences can pose problems in this area: many individuals convicted of such offences are motivated by strong political views and actively do not want to change. This is one of the reasons why it is appropriate to have specialism within the probation service. At the same time, it is important to not lose sight of the rehabilitative purposes of probation, even if those sometimes have to be secondary to the risk management purpose.
Let us remember that there are particular issues that affect the rehabilitation of terror licensees, even if they are strongly engaged with desistance. Those include rejection by family and community, a sense of hopelessness and that they will never be trusted again, and fear on the part of educational and volunteer organisations and employers. Community-led organisations that do not focus exclusively on terror licensees sometimes have the best chance of getting honest and sustained engagement from that challenging group. If no one is ever speaking to those people in such a way that their barriers come down, how are we actually going to know what is going on? How are we going to know what interventions are needed to stop reoffending?
Very long licence periods such as those proposed in the Bill are, in practice, very similar to life or other indeterminate sentences, and have the same consequences for probation staff and for the rehabilitation prospects of licensees. They increase workloads for highly specialist and rare probation staff and can make rehabilitation and risk assessment more difficult by reducing the incentives to engage and co-operate. Specialist probation officers are thinly spread and consequently hold very high case loads of terror-related cases—more than 120% the normal rate. That level is appallingly high and the Government recognise that it needs to come down.
Research shows that more time spent with offenders is essential for proper assessment and rehabilitation, but that is not possible with such high case loads. More time requires more money. I have already addressed the need for financial reports on the impact of the Bill in new clause 3. The very long licence cases, such as lifers and those with indeterminate sentences, are a special challenge for probation staff because they never really come off their case loads, even as more new cases are constantly added.
On Second Reading, the Secretary of State referenced doubling the size of the probation terrorism unit. However, as I said earlier today, it is not clear exactly what difference that will make to the service’s capacity, given that the provisions in the Bill will change demand in ways that are hard to predict. It is not even clear what he meant by doubling the unit. I hope the Minister will tell us a little more. I invite him yet again to tell us what that means, what the Government are going to do and when that is going to happen.
Longer licences will significantly increase demand on the probation service, while ending some early releases could help to spread the resource. The general issue with increasing the number of probation specialists is that they can only be recruited from experienced staff. In recent years, the service has been hollowed out and huge amounts of experience lost. Lots of generalist roles will need to be backfilled with newly qualified staff before the more experienced staff can move into specialist roles.
I have a host of questions for the Minister this afternoon. What modelling has the Department done of the expected net effect of the changes the Bill makes on the total probation case load in the years and decades to come? How many new staff will be required to join the terrorism unit to manage the increasing case loads? That will have to be factored into the current recruitment drive. Have the Government assessed the extent of overtime and emergency working that may be needed in the terrorism-related probation unit until sufficient numbers of trained staff are available? Have Ministers considered the consequences for standards of monitoring and for staff welfare and retention? Will the Government commit to reducing the case load of specialist probation officers, not just in line with other probation staff, but by significantly more in recognition of currently higher case loads and the difficulty of those cases? Will they set up a strategy and targets to achieve that?
As there is with other counter-terror work, there can be a lot of secrecy around the work of counter-terror probation staff. Our professional officers do their best in the most difficult of circumstances and often go beyond what can reasonably be expected of them, yet mainstream probation staff often have little knowledge or confidence in their ability, for example, to recognise the early signs of extremism. It may turn out that some recent incidents have occurred despite contact with non-specialist probation staff. Not every probation staffer can be a specialist, so there may be a need for some amount of counter-terror training for all, so that signs can be spotted even where no terrorist link or offence has been identified in the past. Will there be counter-terror training for all probation officers? The growth in far-right extremism may mean that we need more people to be able to spot that early on. Have the Government considered establishing counter-terror as a more formal and funded specialism in probation, like integrated offender management?
We have already talked about the impact of the Bill’s removal of early release and the fact that that might lead to lower engagement with rehabilitation and deradicalisation programmes. That would make the task of probation staff even harder. The National Probation Service needs some serious attention from the Government, but I hope that, having brought the service back totally in-house now, we will see those improvements in future.
Without an effective and fully funded service, the intentions behind the Bill fall to pieces. That is why we have tabled the new clause requiring the Government to review the impact of the Bill on the National Probation Service. We cannot simply increase the responsibility and case load and consider the matter closed, because if there are more than the estimated 50 new prisoners, we will have other things to consider. There will be the longer sentences and longer licences as well, all creating more work, but without the resource to back it up. Let us be clear: effective probation working is essential to monitor the risks that offenders on licence pose; it is no less essential than counter-terror policing or intelligence work, yet the probation service is again under-resourced at a much lower level, and is paid far less attention than some other services.
I have asked the Minister a wide range of questions and I look forward to his detailed responses. Ultimately we need him to tell us exactly what action his Government will take to sort out the issues raised and ensure that the National Probation Service can get on with its day-to-day role, before we turn to the particular issues raised by the Bill.
Chris Philp
Clearly, the probation service is important and I pay tribute to the thousands of men and women who work in that service helping to rehabilitate offenders, and by so doing keep the public safe. Several questions have arisen, some of which would probably be better directed at the Prisons and Probation Minister, but I will attempt to answer some of them to give the shadow Minister a flavour of what is going on.
First, in terms of overall resourcing levels, the spending review last September laid out a significantly increased funding package for the Prison and Probation Service, which is, as we speak, flowing to the frontline. Another spending review is coming this autumn, and the hon. Gentleman will no doubt study that carefully to see what is in it for the Prison and Probation Service, and indeed the Courts and Tribunals Service, but the spending review last September was good news for the probation service in terms of financial support.
The shadow Minister also referred to community rehabilitation companies coming in house. The restoration of a comprehensive National Probation Service run directly by the Ministry of Justice is something that I suspect everybody involved in the criminal justice system will welcome, and it will provide an opportunity to do a lot more with the offender cohorts that the hon. Gentleman referred to in his speech.
Earlier this year—I think it was in January—a host of announcements were made in relation to counter-terrorism, one component of which was the extra £90 million for counter-terrorism police. It was also announced that we would double the number of specialist probation officers who focus on terrorist prisoners. We will also be creating the new counter-terrorism assessment and intervention centre that I talked about a little earlier. I am not sure whether all prison and probation staff will have counter-terrorism training. I will have to let the hon. Gentleman know, but given that only 200 or so prisoners out of a population of approximately 80,000 are in for terrorist offences, he can draw his own conclusions about the numbers. However, I will check with my colleague, the Prisons and Probation Minister, and come back to him on that specific point.
In relation to the new clause itself and the desire for a review of the probation service, once again there are already good mechanisms in place to review the probation service. I point in particular to Her Majesty’s inspectorate of probation, whose duty it is to conduct on an ongoing basis—not just after 18 months, but the whole time—precisely the kind of review that the new clause calls for. I hope that the hon. Gentleman is content to rely on the excellent work that Her Majesty’s inspectorate of probation does in conducting the analysis that he calls for in his new clause.
Alex Cunningham
I very much welcome the increased resources that the Minister says are flowing into the frontline, but everything that we have heard from him today suggests that that is a work in progress. We do not yet know how many new probation officers are being trained; we do not know when the new centre to which he alluded will open; and we do not know how we will end up with more than one facility to accommodate terrorist offenders in future.
I hope that the Minister will consider writing to members of the Committee to tell us exactly where we have got to with all the new investment and where the money is being spent; how many probation officers we had before the funding was made available and how many we have now; and what the timeline is to complete the doubling of the resource in the service. Similarly, I would like to understand when the new facilities will actually be available, because if we are going to accommodate people in prison for a longer time, we must ensure that there are appropriate centres.
I see no sense in pressing the new clause to a vote. As the Minister said, people out there are working extremely hard and we pay tribute to them, but we must always be mindful that, due to the lack of resource, the probation service is not operating in the way that professional officers would like. I hope that the Minister’s confidence in the new resource package will bear the fruit that we all want to see. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the clause.
Clause, by leave, withdrawn.
New Clause 11
Review of legislation: Effectiveness of inter-agency cooperation
‘(1) The Secretary of State must commission a review and publish a report on the effectiveness of agencies working to manage an individual who is serving a sentence affected by this Act.
(2) A review under subsection (1) must consider—
(a) the effectiveness of the transition when an individual who is serving a sentence affected by this Act is transferred from the responsibility of one agency to another;
(b) the procedural safeguards that are put in place to ensure an effective transition; and
(c) the processing and transfer of information and intelligence from one agency to another.
(3) For the purposes of this section “agencies” includes but is not limited to—
(a) police;
(b) the prison system;
(c) intelligence services;
(d) probation services;
(e) mental health services;
(f) local authorities; and
(g) housing providers.
(4) The Secretary of State must lay a copy of the report before Parliament.
(5) A Minister of the Crown must, not later than 3 months after the report has been laid before Parliament, make a motion in the House of Commons in relation to the report.’—(Alex Cunningham.)
Brought up, and read the First time.
The Chair
Well, this is what happens when you follow someone else’s damned notes. It does not say his name here, but who I am to argue? I call Alex Cunningham.
Alex Cunningham
I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.
If the hon. Lady would like to deliver my speech, I would be quite happy to sit down and shut up. I think she suggested earlier that I was talking a bit too much.
Alex Cunningham
Oh, never? Well that is fine. Maybe it is because we share the same accent and she feels at home when she hears me speak, although I think there is a certain anglification in my accent these days.
Alex Cunningham
I am very relieved to hear that, and I am sure that, as a fellow Scot, you will also appreciate it, Mr McCabe.
The new clause would require the Secretary of State to commission a review and publish a report on the effectiveness of the agencies working to manage offenders who have committed offences under the provisions in the Bill. I know how fond the Minister is of my reviews, and this one would consider the effectiveness of the transition when an offender is transferred from the responsibility of one agency to that of another; the procedural safeguards that are in place to ensure an effective transition; and the processing and transfer of information and intelligence from one agency to another.
Tackling and responding to crime is not and cannot be the responsibility of a sole agency. The police do not arrest, convict, sentence, look after, monitor and assess people, and nor should they. Different agencies with different responsibilities working together are a key part of our checks and balances. By not giving anyone so much responsibility that they cannot fulfil their obligations, we ensure that they can perform their role in the system to a high standard. To ensure that there is a seamless transition from one agency to another, and that organisations are fully aware of their responsibilities, there needs to be effective communication.
The purpose of the new clause is to find out how agencies communicate with each other and how effective those methods are. We would like to know if there are communication issues between the agencies; we have already seen the horrific consequence of communication breakdown, when crucial information is not properly shared. We also need to find out what problems the Secretary of State can act on to rectify. We cannot afford to get this wrong. If there are failures in communication, it can fail the whole process—the justice system itself fails.
Chris Philp
I sense a certain appetite for brevity, so I will endeavour to achieve that in my response. I entirely agree with the points about the importance of inter-agency working. Many different agencies will encounter offenders or potential offenders at different times, and it is of course critical that they work together.
For that very reason, following the terrible attacks at the end of last year, the Government commissioned Jonathan Hall QC, the Independent Reviewer of Terrorism Legislation, to carry out a review of the effectiveness of multi-agency public protection arrangements—exactly the kind of cross-agency working to which the shadow Minister refers. I believe that report is now with my colleagues, who are carefully considering its findings. We will publish the report, which is on exactly the topic that the shadow Minister wants us to review, at the earliest opportunity, so this may be an area where the shadow Minister not only gets a report but gets it perhaps earlier that he would otherwise have expected, which is a nice note to end on.
The shadow Minister is quite right that cross-agency working is important. We intend to make sure that it happens in the effective way that it should, and Jonathan Hall’s report will be an important part of that.
Alex Cunningham
Success at last. I can leave the Committee Room a happy man. I will not press the new clause to a vote, but it is important. Communications are central. Across all public services, we see a lack of communication leading to all manner of horrors in our society—children dying, terrorists recommitting offences; all manner of things happen because the communication is not right. It is clear that the Minister understands the importance of this. I look forward to Jonathan Hall’s report; I am sure that it will be good bedtime reading. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the clause.
Clause, by leave, withdrawn.
Question proposed, That the Chair do report the Bill, as amended, to the House.
Chris Philp
On a point of order, Mr McCabe. Before you conclude the final sentence of this Committee proceeding, I shall quickly take this opportunity to thank all Committee members for their service over the last few weeks in considering this incredibly important Bill, which touches on the safety and security of our constituents. Nothing more powerfully illustrated that than the very moving speech given earlier by my hon. Friend the Member for Hertford and Stortford on the experience of her friend Louise, which I think all of us will vividly remember. It reminds us how important the work we are doing here is.
I believe that, with this Bill, we are taking a significant step forward, largely in a spirit of cross-party co-operation from all corners of the House, as it should be for something as important as national security and the safety of our constituents. Of course, we have our differences elsewhere, but on this topic we seem to be mostly on the same page, which is extremely welcome.
I thank everyone who has supported this process. I thank the Whips on both sides for getting us through the Bill a little earlier than expected, which is welcome. I thank Mr McCabe and Mr Robertson for chairing the Committee proceedings with such aplomb, and for correcting the shadow Ministers and me when we occasionally erred from the path we were supposed to be following.
I thank the witnesses who took the time to give us evidence earlier in the proceedings. It was genuinely useful, and the fact that we spent a lot of time in our earlier debates dissecting that evidence shows just how illuminating it was. I do not think any of us will forget Professor Grubin, but I certainly will not be volunteering to hook myself up to any of his machines in a hurry.
Chris Philp
Do not tempt me.
Finally, I thank the phenomenal public servants who have supported the preparation of the Bill and the wider work that goes on, in particular members of my private office—I can see Andrew sitting over there—and all the people working in the policy, legal and financial teams at the Ministry of Justice. They are incredible civil servants who have been working so hard to put this Bill together, including working over the weekend to respond to the various amendments that arrived on Friday. A huge thank you to everyone in the Ministry of Justice and the Home Office for the work they have done on this Bill.
It is appropriate to conclude by thanking those people on the frontline in the constant struggle to keep us and our fellow citizens safe—the police, the Prison Service, the probation service and the security service. Our thanks is due to them most of all. On a daily basis, they put themselves in harm’s way, to keep us safe. I put on record my gratitude to those outstanding public servants.
Alex Cunningham
Further to that point of order, Mr McCabe. I would like to reflect what the Minister has said and, first and foremost, thank you and Mr Robertson for conducting our proceedings professionally and getting us through the business quickly.
I also specifically thank the Clerks to the Committee. They understand the things that I am trying to say and they can put them into the jargon that is required to appear on the amendment paper. I am very appreciative of that. I have come to the realisation that they understand more about what I am trying to get across than I do myself.
I thank Committee colleagues for some robust debate and a few corrections along the way. I thank the staff who had to work over the weekend. I pass on my thanks to them and I am sorry if I was the cause of all that additional work. At least we had reasonable responses from the Minister, and I welcome that. With that, I will simply sit down.
Joanna Cherry
Further to that point of order, Mr McCabe. I will not detain people for long, other than to add my words of thanks to those that have been given already. I would particularly like to thank the Clerks to the Committee for their assistance in framing amendments. I thank the Whips for the assistance that they have given me and a third party in relation to this.
I acknowledge the powerful and moving speech we heard earlier. When I woke up this morning, the first thing I remembered was that that event was 15 years ago, but the way in which we were reminded of that as a Committee was particularly powerful and very personal. I thank the hon. Member for Hertford and Stortford for that.
Question put and agreed to.
Bill, as amended, accordingly to be reported.
Written Statements
Intellectual Property
(4 years, 5 months ago)
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The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (Amanda Solloway)
Our industrial strategy sets out the Government’s vision for making the UK the most innovative country in the world. The UK starts from a position of strength and is already ranked in the top five of the global innovation index and top 10 by the World Bank as the best place to start and grow a business. But the global landscape is changing and we must continue to invest in research and development. The industrial strategy has set an ambition to raise total research and development to 2.4% of GDP by 2027, helping businesses access the right funds and equip them to face the opportunities and challenges presented by new technologies and new ways of doing business.
Intellectual property (IP) plays a crucial role in innovation and touches everything that makes modern life more enjoyable, easier, safer and prosperous. It provides inventors, creators and entrepreneurs with the confidence to invest knowing that they will reap the benefits of their investments. UK investment in IP rights reached almost £64 billion in 2016 and studies have shown that industries that rely on IP have accounted for over a quarter of UK employment and almost half of GDP. Our IP system matters. It creates jobs and economic growth and is helping to propel Britain to the forefront of innovation.
The Intellectual Property Office (IPO) corporate plan 2020-21 explains how through its stewardship of the IP system, it will help the UK to be the most innovative and creative country in the world. It will do this through delivering excellent IP services, creating a world leading IP environment and attracting and retaining the best people by making the IPO a brilliant place to work.
The UK already has one of the best IP regimes in the world, consistently ranked as one of the top regimes in indices such as those from the US Chamber of Commerce International IP Index, and during 2020-21, the IPO will continue to contribute to building a business environment that makes the UK the best place in the world to start and run a business.
As an executive agency and trading fund of the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, the IPO has set targets which are agreed by Ministers and laid before Parliament. I am glad that today I can inform the House that for 2020-21 the IPO’s targets are:
Deliver excellent customer service with our average overall customer satisfaction at least 85%.
Deliver our services efficiently through continuously improving our systems, processes and ways of working to make things better for our customers and our people, reduce costs and improve the value for money we provide. Our target is to achieve efficiencies worth at least 3.5% of our core operating costs.
We will have created equivalent UK rights from existing EU trade marks and designs to the UK register on 31 December 2020.
We want to ensure that the UK’s IP framework incentivises the development and adoption of AI technologies, supporting the Government’s ambition of putting the UK at the forefront of the AI and data revolution. We will do this by developing our understanding of how AI impacts the IP framework through launching a call for views and publishing our response so as to provide the clarity our customers need to confidently invest in AI.
It is important to note that our plan and our targets were developed prior to the outbreak of the coronavirus (covid-19) epidemic. At present our targets are unchanged but we will review this as the impact of the virus becomes clearer. We have the ability to adapt our finance and resource models according to emerging trends and we will do so. We will also work with BEIS and our other partner organisations to review our priorities regularly, ensuring we support wider Government responses to the economic impact of the virus and seek to focus our efforts and resources where they will have the most significant impact driving the UK innovation and creative economy.
[HCWS342]
UK-EU Future Relationship Negotiations
(4 years, 5 months ago)
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The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Minister for the Cabinet Office (Michael Gove)
The Government have made a commitment to update Parliament on the progress of our future relationship negotiations with the EU. This statement provides an update on the intensified talks process as agreed at the high level meeting between the Prime Minister and the three presidents on the EU side on 15 June. The timetable for this process was published on 12 June as an addendum to the terms of reference on the UK-EU future relationship negotiations.
Intensified talks took place in Brussels between 29 June and 2 July in a restricted format and led by the UK chief negotiator David Frost. The talks covered: trade in goods; trade in services and investment and other issues; fisheries; horizontal arrangements and governance; level playing field for open and fair competition; criminal law and judicial co-operation; mobility, social security, thematic co-operation; energy and transport; and participation in Union programmes.
These talks were comprehensive and useful. However, they have underlined the significant differences that still remain between us on a number of important issues. Further discussions will take place later this week in London. The UK remains committed to working hard to find an early understanding on the principles underlying an agreement out of the intensified talks process during July, as agreed at the high level meeting on 15 June.
[HCWS346]
Armed Forces Pay Review Body: Appointments
(4 years, 5 months ago)
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The Minister for Defence People and Veterans (Johnny Mercer)
I am pleased to announce that the Secretary of State for Defence has appointed Miss Jenni Douglas Todd, Mr Julian Miller CB and Rear Admiral William Entwisle OBE MVO as members of the armed forces’ pay review body. Their appointment commenced on 20 May 2020 and will run until 30 April 2023. These appointments have been conducted in accordance with the governance code for public appointments.
[HCWS341]
Armed Forces: Wraparound Childcare
(4 years, 5 months ago)
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The Secretary of State for Defence (Mr Ben Wallace)
I am pleased to announce today the launch of a wraparound childcare pilot scheme for UK armed forces families. This announcement represents another significant step towards the Government meeting their manifesto commitment to provide free wraparound childcare for forces families.
It is the latest in a series of measures which my Department has introduced with the aim of easing the unique burdens on service families. Our armed forces have a 24 hours a day, seven days a week commitment to their duties and meeting this manifesto pledge will not only provide them with the support they deserve, but also help to build the diverse workforce we need for a modernised UK Defence.
I am determined to make the armed forces a more modern, inclusive and family friendly employer, in order to improve the working environment for retention of all personnel but also to encourage more talented women to pursue long, and fulfilling careers in uniform.
This follows the introduction of flexible service last year, which allows—for the first time in the armed forces—personnel to flex their working arrangements to accommodate changes in personal circumstances.
By introducing these measures we plan to make life easier for service personnel and their families, who are required to be mobile and can be deployed at short notice. Wraparound childcare will help them to secure appropriate support when it is required, by covering early starts and late finishes for eligible working parents of children aged four to 11.
The first pilot sites of RAF High Wycombe and RAF Halton will see funding for before and after school care during term time from the start of the 2020 academic year. Further pilot sites at Catterick garrison and the Plymouth naval area will follow in January 2021.
Service personnel assigned to each of the pilot sites will be eligible to access the funding, regardless of the geographical location of their children within the UK. The few families located in Scotland but assigned to the first pilot sites will, therefore, begin in August.
The launch of this pilot comes amidst the wider return to education, following the disruption of the coronavirus pandemic. Service personnel from all of our armed forces have provided critical support to their colleagues in health and social care, often deployed away from home at short notice.
Their professionalism, versatility, and commitment make them the best armed forces in the world, and we are committed to honouring their service by providing them the best support possible.
[HCWS343]
Arts, Culture and Heritage: Support Package
(4 years, 5 months ago)
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The Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (Oliver Dowden)
I wish to set out to the House details of the £1.57 billion rescue package that the Government have provided to support the arts, creative and heritage sectors to respond to the economic shock caused by coronavirus.
The coronavirus pandemic has affected the whole economy, but presents particular challenges for organisations that depend on engaging with audiences and visitors in person. It has forced thousands of cultural institutions to close their doors and, while some galleries and museums reopened on 4 July, even those that have reopened face significant financial constraints on operating in a socially distanced way.
Through the establishment of the Cultural Renewal Taskforce, and the Entertainment and Events Working Group, I have been working closely with the cultural sector and medical experts to address these challenges and to try and help organisations to reopen as soon as it is safe to do so.
However, this pandemic will continue to disrupt business models in the cultural sectors and social distancing will mean that crowded venues are not possible for some time. This means that much of the UK cultural sector, including well-established organisations that had robust business models prior to the coronavirus pandemic, are not able to restore their incomes, and face significant financial risks which if not mitigated could lead to widespread insolvencies and loss of much of the UK’s invaluable culture and heritage.
Government have therefore taken action to provide the necessary support that will help organisations to survive this period and reopen when it is safe and economically viable to do so.
This funding represents the biggest ever one-off investment in UK culture, and builds on the financial assistance many cultural and heritage institutions have already received from the Government’s pan-economy measures including loans, business rate holidays and participation in the coronavirus job retention scheme. More than 350,000 people in the recreation and leisure sector have been furloughed since the pandemic began.
The rescue package will support thousands of organisations across a range of sectors including the performing arts and theatres, heritage, museums, galleries, live music and independent cinema. It will cover both the largest and most famous institutions, and the lesser known but equally cherished cultural and heritage organisations in regions across the country—those which have been the anchors of their local communities for years.
This funding package includes:
£1.15 billion support for cultural organisations in England delivered through a mix of grants and repayable finance.
£100 million of targeted support for the national cultural institutions in England and the English Heritage Trust.
£120 million capital investment to restart construction on cultural infrastructure and for heritage construction projects in England which were paused due to the coronavirus pandemic.
This new funding will also mean an extra £188 million for the devolved Administrations—with the following allocations via the Barnett formula: Northern Ireland (£33 million); Scotland (£97 million); and Wales (£59 million).
Decisions on awards will be made by DCMS arm’s length bodies, in particular the Arts Council England, British Film Institute, Historic England, and the National Lottery Heritage Fund, working alongside expert independent figures from the sector.
The funding will predominantly be grant funding, with repayable finance available for the largest organisations. This repayable finance will be issued on generous terms tailored for cultural institutions to ensure that it is affordable.
In order to receive support, organisations will need to demonstrate that they are at risk in this financial year and have done all they can to support themselves. We will be prioritising institutions of national and international significance and those that are crucial to safeguarding access to culture and driving economic growth across the whole country.
Further details on the scope of the fund, the criteria that will determine which organisations are eligible for each element of the fund, and the timing for allocating funding, will be set out in detailed guidance. DCMS is working intensively with its arm’s length bodies, and will publish this guidance for applications shortly.
[HCWS345]
Coronavirus Update
(4 years, 5 months ago)
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The Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Matt Hancock)
On 26 March 2020, the Health Protection (Coronavirus, Restrictions) (England) Regulations 2020 came into force, imposing restrictions on people’s movements and gatherings, and requiring the closure of certain retail and public premises, to protect public health in light of the coronavirus pandemic. We have kept these regulations under continual review and have amended these regulations four times.
On 23 June 2020, the Prime Minister announced in Parliament the changes being made following the fourth review of the coronavirus regulations. Due to the substantial changes being made at this point, I am revoking the existing regulations and replacing them with The Health Protection (Coronavirus, Restrictions) (No. 2) (England) Regulations 2020. This approach will mean that the regulations are clearer and easier for the general public to understand.
These new regulations mean that from 4 July, a wide range of sectors have been permitted to reopen, with guidance that covid-19 secure measures are implemented in their reopening. This includes the hospitality, leisure, tourism, and recreation sectors. Group prayer and collective worship, overnight stays in self-contained accommodation, including hotels, second homes, and bed and breakfasts are also allowed. Although most businesses are now able to open, a number remain which are still considered too high risk to reopen due to the likely prolonged exposure and close contact between individuals; these businesses are listed in the regulations as having to remain closed.
These new regulations have also removed the restriction on overnight stays. The previous gathering limits have been removed from legislation and replaced with a 30-person limit on gatherings in private dwellings, ships or boats, and public outdoor spaces. This new gathering limit will ensure that police have the powers to prevent the type of gatherings taking place which are not likely to be able to follow social distancing measures, such as house parties, boat parties or raves. These gathering limits are subject to exceptions. These regulations have removed most of the restrictions placed on individuals by the previous set of regulations, however the Government have provided clear guidance outlining what steps people should be taking to protect themselves or others. This outlines that gatherings should be limited to two households indoors, or two households or six people outdoors (whichever is greater). It is very important that everyone continues to follow the guidance—and continues to socially distance from those they do not live with (or have not formed a support bubble with).
As national restrictions are rightly relaxed to reflect the lower infection rates, we must ensure that we have the ability to act swiftly and effectively where risky behaviour occurs. These regulations therefore introduce new powers for the Secretary of State to either restrict access to or close public outdoor places (for example beauty spots) by a direction if this is judged necessary to protect public health.
As I announced to the House on 29 June, the changes that came into effect on 4 July will not apply in Leicester. This follows a rise in cases and is based on clinical advice. In addition, non-essential retail based in Leicester has had to close. The new regulations make this a legal requirement. In addition, they will prohibit overnight stays by Leicester residents inside and outside of Leicester, and by residents from elsewhere within Leicester. They will continue to prohibit gatherings of more than six people outdoors and mixing between households, apart from where this is allowed by the support bubble policy. The new regulations will continue to only allow places of worship to open for specific reasons, including private prayer. We are continuing to monitor the situation and we will review the whether this position can be changed by 18 July.
Publicly available Government guidance on gov.uk is being updated to ensure it fully corresponds with the new regulations.
[HCWS340]
Violence and Abuse towards Shop Staff: Call for Evidence
(4 years, 5 months ago)
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The Minister for Crime and Policing (Kit Malthouse)
Today the Government have published their formal response to the call for evidence on violence and abuse toward shop staff. The Government recognise that the violence and abuse shop workers face can have a significant impact, not only physically but mentally and emotionally.
The Government launched a call for evidence in April 2019 on violence and abuse towards shop staff to understand the scale of the issue, the measures which may help prevent these crimes and the extent to which existing legislation is being used to tackle them; and to identify examples of best practice. I want to emphasise that violence and abuse of shop staff is unacceptable and must not be tolerated, and we will work towards tackling these crimes. I would also like to take this opportunity to thank the retail sector who have during the coronavirus pandemic worked tirelessly to keep the nation fed while implementing social distancing measures to keep the public safe.
In light of the responses to the call for evidence, the Government recognise that there are issues which need to be dealt with in an evidence-based manner with the support and involvement of the sector. Therefore, I have begun work with the National Retail Crime Steering Group, which we co-chair with the British Retail Consortium, to jointly develop and deliver a programme of work to drive down abuse and violence, with three key aims:
Deepen our understanding and address the drivers of violence and assault against shop worker;
Send a clear message that such crimes are not tolerated and should be recorded whenever and wherever they take place;
Provide effective support to those shop workers who are the victims of violence and abuse.
In delivering these priorities we will work with partners, including the Welsh Government, to ensure that plans are tailored and effective. The call for evidence generated a high level of interest and the Government would like to thank all those who took part and for the work they have contributed. The evidence and comments received has been vital in helping develop a better understanding of the issue. I wish to be clear that this is only the beginning of the process, rather than the conclusion as further work is needed to deliver an evidence-based response to these crimes.
The “Government Response to the Call for Evidence on Violence and Abuse Toward Shop Staff” will be placed in the Libraries of both Houses.
[HCWS344]
Export Licences: Saudi Arabia
(4 years, 5 months ago)
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The Secretary of State for International Trade (Elizabeth Truss)
I want to update the House on the steps that have been taken to comply with the judgment of the Court of Appeal of 20 June 2019 regarding licences for military exports to Saudi Arabia for possible use in the conflict in Yemen.
The legal proceedings concerned the decisions of the then Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills of 9 December 2015:
Not to suspend extant export licences for the sale or transfer of arms and military equipment to Saudi Arabia for possible use in the conflict in Yemen; and
To continue to grant further such licences.
The legal proceedings concerned Criterion 2c of the Consolidated EU and National Arms Export Licensing Criteria—which requires the Government to assess Saudi Arabia’s attitude towards relevant principles of international law and provides 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 (IHL).
The Divisional Court found in favour of the Government in its judgment of July 2017, noting that we applied a rigorous and robust, multi-layered process of analysis to making our licensing decisions. Our approach has focused on a predictive evaluation of risk as to the attitude and future conduct of the Saudi-led coalition, recognising the inherent difficulties of seeking to reach findings on IHL for specific incidents where we do not have access to complete information. Even so, this analysis has always incorporated a detailed and careful review of past allegations of incidents of concern. This included analysis, to the extent possible, of whether there were patterns of concern, in particular arising from trends in the number of allegations of civilian casualties and of damage to key civilian infrastructure. The Court of Appeal broadly endorsed this decision-making process.
The principal issue in the Court of Appeal was whether this analysis needed to go further. In the Court’s judgment, the question of whether there was an historic pattern of breaches of IHL was a question which 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. It was because we had not reached findings on whether specific incidents constituted breaches of IHL as part of our assessment of clear risk, under Criterion 2c, that the Court of Appeal concluded that our decision-making process was irrational and therefore unlawful.
To address the Court of Appeal’s judgment, we have developed a revised methodology in respect of all allegations which it is assessed are likely to have occurred and to have been caused by fixed-wing aircraft, reflecting the factual circumstances that the court proceedings concerned. Each of those allegations has been subject to detailed analysis by reference to the relevant principles of IHL and in the light of all the information and intelligence available. An evaluation has then been made, in respect of each incident, whether it is possible that it constitutes a breach of IHL or whether it is unlikely that it represents a breach. For a number of incidents, as envisaged by the Court of Appeal, there is insufficient information to make this evaluation. Where an incident is assessed as being a “possible” breach, it is regarded—for the purposes of the Criterion 2c analysis—as if it were a breach of IHL. By setting the threshold as “possible” the IHL analysis has captured the widest range of relevant potential IHL breaches, to provide a base from which to assess the prospective risk for Criterion 2c.
The IHL analysis has now been applied to all credible incidents of concern of which we are aware. Some of these incidents have been assessed as “possible” violations of IHL. These have therefore been factored into the overall Criterion 2c analysis on the basis that they are violations of IHL.
We have sought to determine whether these “violations” are indicative of:
any patterns of non-compliance;
a lack of commitment on the part of Saudi Arabia to comply with IHL; and or
a lack of capacity or systemic weaknesses which might give rise to a clear risk of IHL breaches.
We have similarly looked for patterns and trends across the incidents which have been assessed as being unlikely to be breaches of IHL and those for which there is insufficient information to make an assessment.
This analysis has not revealed any such patterns, trends or systemic weaknesses. It is noted, in particular, that the incidents which have been assessed to be possible violations of IHL occurred at different times, in different circumstances and for different reasons. The conclusion is that these are isolated incidents.
I want to emphasise that the IHL analysis is just one part of the Criterion 2c assessment. In retaking these decisions, I have taken into account the full range of information available to the Government. In the light of all that information and analysis, I have concluded that, notwithstanding the isolated incidents which have been factored into the analysis as historic violations of IHL, Saudi Arabia has a genuine intent and the capacity to comply with IHL.
On that basis, I have assessed that there is not a clear risk that the export of arms and military equipment to Saudi Arabia might be used in the commission of a serious violation of IHL.
Having now re-taken the decisions that were the subject of judicial review on the correct legal basis, as required by the Order of the Court of Appeal of 20 June, it follows that the undertaking that my predecessor gave to the Court—that we would not grant any new licences for the export of arms or military equipment to Saudi Arabia for possible use in Yemen—falls away. The broader commitment that was given to Parliament, relating to licences for Saudi Arabia and its coalition partners, also no longer applies.
The Government will now begin the process of clearing the backlog of licence applications for Saudi Arabia and its coalition partners that has built up since 20 June last year. Each application will, of course, be carefully assessed against the Consolidated EU and National Arms Export Licensing Criteria and a licence would not be granted if to do so would be a breach of the Criteria. It may take some months to clear this backlog.
Finally, as indicated in the statement made to the House on 20 June 2019, we sought permission to appeal to the Supreme Court against the Court of Appeal’s judgment. Permission was granted by the Court of Appeal on 9 July 2019. In light of the revised methodology which I have just described, I will now be taking steps to withdraw this appeal. I want to update the House on the steps that have been taken to comply with the judgment of the Court of Appeal of 20 June 2019 regarding licences for military exports to Saudi Arabia for possible use in the conflict in Yemen.
[HCWS339]
House of Lords
Arrangement of Business
The Deputy Speaker (Lord Lexden) (Con)
My Lords, the Hybrid Sitting of the House will now begin. A limited number of Members are here in the Chamber, respecting social distancing; other Members will participate remotely, but all Members will be treated equally, wherever they are. For Members participating remotely, microphones must unmute shortly before they are to speak—please accept any on-screen prompt to unmute. Microphones will be muted after each speech. I ask noble Lords to be patient if there are any short delays as we switch between physical and remote participants.
Oral Questions will now commence. I ask those asking supplementary questions to keep them short and confined to two points. I ask that Ministers’ replies are also brief.
Covid-19: Local Government Finance
(4 years, 5 months ago)
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Lord Kennedy of Southwark
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the financial stability of local government in England in the light of the additional (1) costs incurred, and (2) income lost, as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The Minister of State, Home Office and Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (Lord Greenhalgh) (Con)
My Lords, councils across the country are supporting communities, protecting the most vulnerable and helping the NHS in its efforts to combat Covid-19. We have made £3.7 billion in un-ring-fenced funding available to local authorities and have introduced a targeted income support package so that they can address pressures in response to the pandemic. In total, the Government have committed nearly £28 billion to local areas to support councils and their communities, alongside more than £5 billion of cash-flow support.
Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Lab Co-op) [V]
My Lords, I refer the House to my relevant registered interest as a vice-president of the Local Government Association. Using his experience as a former leader of a large London borough council, what words of advice is the Minister giving his right honourable friend Robert Jenrick to help the Secretary of State stand up for local government in his discussions with the Chancellor of the Exchequer?
Lord Greenhalgh
My advice to the Secretary of State would be to focus on the three pillars of support that we need to give councils. We are covering demand pressures through the Covid-19 pandemic and we have announced an income support package. Councils are also facing irrecoverable tax losses, and the principle of sharing that between national and local government has been agreed, but not the precise proportions. I would therefore encourage my right honourable friend the Secretary of State to agree that with the Treasury as part of the spending review.
Lord Young of Cookham (Con) [V]
My Lords, further to the Question asked by the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy, on financial stability, local authorities borrow substantial sums of money from the market. While some local authorities have recently had their credit rating reduced, most have so far maintained high ratings, enabling them to borrow cheaply. Will my noble friend do all he can to take the necessary steps to ensure that this remains the case to avoid further pressures on local authority budgets?
Lord Greenhalgh
My noble friend is right to say that the credit ratings of local authorities remain strong, and where there have been some downgrades, that happened before the pandemic. I have made an undertaking to see that local authorities continue to get access to funding. However, we should recognise that the main lender to them is the Public Works Loan Board, which is an agency of HM Treasury.
The Earl of Clancarty (CB) [V]
My Lords, given the current concerns about social care, how will the Government support local authorities to improve and extend meeting social care needs, particularly in the light of a potential second wave of Covid-19?
Lord Greenhalgh
Adult social care is a considerable part of local authority financing—approximately one-third for most councils. It is worth noting that around 40% of the funding provided so far to meet demand pressures has gone to adult social care, and as we have made the commitment to support those demand pressures through the pandemic, that continues to be a feature of the money that is being provided to local authorities. Whether further funding is required is being kept under review.
Baroness Pitkeathley (Lab) [V]
Is the Minister aware of the effect that local authority funding problems have had on the voluntary and charitable organisations which provide many services to individuals and communities? They have lost both grant funding from and contracts with local authorities and many are now under threat of closure. How do the Government intend to ensure that these vital services are safeguarded? I declare an interest as president of the NCVO.
Lord Greenhalgh
The commitment to the local voluntary sector has been covered by the large grant that has been made available by the DCMS. We recognise the important part that local government plays in providing funding to the third sector. That will continue to be made possible because of the support that we are providing both in income support and to meet demand pressures. The third pillar, which is the loss in tax revenue, has been covered in part as well.
Lord Goddard of Stockport (LD) [V]
First, I thank the Minister personally for the support that has been given to Greater Manchester during the pandemic. The 10,000 laptops and devices that have been distributed across the region will make a real difference to disadvantaged children who need this help in these difficult times. However, the broader issue of local government funding needs to be addressed. Will the Minister commit today to do all he can to ensure that the Greater Manchester deficit, which is running at £378 million and growing, will be clawed back?
Lord Greenhalgh
We are aware of the specific problems with regard to Greater Manchester. These are being exacerbated by the loss of the dividends that it normally gets from the airport, which is clearly having an effect on local authority incomes. I can commit that the department will continue to work closely with Greater Manchester councils to ensure that if a bespoke package is needed, that will provided for them.
Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP) [V]
My Lords, I declare my position as a vice-president of the LGA. I welcome the £1.57 billion rescue package for the arts that the Government announced for theatres, galleries and museums, but can the Minister tell me how much of it will be distributed by local councils? In a normal year, they put more than £1 billion into the arts around the country. Can the Minister reassure me that this money will not go to just a few large institutions, particularly in London, but will be spread around the country through local councils, so that we can hope to rescue and protect wonderful institutions, such as the theatres in Southampton and Sheffield—where I am speaking from now—and little rural arts centres up and down the country?
Lord Greenhalgh
I can give a commitment that funding will extend beyond a few well-known names to the important local theatres and museums that are often supported by local authorities. I cannot give the noble Baroness the precise extent to be distributed via local authorities and will have to write to her with further information on that.
Lord Naseby (Con) [V]
I was formerly the leader of a local authority in London, as was the Minister. We both appreciate how important local authorities are to the public. Yesterday, we had the Second Reading of the very important Business and Planning Bill. It will have implications for local authority expenditure, and some charges, I imagine. Is the Minister in a position to confirm that the Government will make sure that all those costs are covered? Finally, on care homes and social care, the Government have to recognise that procedures were not adequate for the transfer of patients from hospitals to care homes, in the early stages of the pandemic. There were huge costs incurred and the Government must pick up the bill. Can the Minister confirm that that will be looked at?
Lord Greenhalgh
I confirm to my noble friend that the guidance on care homes was not as clear as it could have been. He is right to raise the lessons we have to learn from that. On the pressures from the Business and Planning Bill that is going through the House, I guarantee that any additional burdens on local authorities will be covered by the new burdens doctrine, as soon as they are identified.
Viscount Waverley (CB) [V]
My Lords, this has been a particularly tough period in the history of local governance, with the LGA playing an instrumental role. Do the Government recognise that a funding gap will remain, even after the injection confirmed by the Minister just now? To address this, do the Government have plans to give greater autonomy to local authorities, as part of any new financial settlement to enable councils to get on the front foot, possibly achieved by spreading tax deficits over three years rather than the usual one?
Lord Greenhalgh
It has been announced that tax deficits will be deferred over three years, rather than one. That was directly in response to the Local Government Association. It is clear that the financial stability of local councils is being kept under review, with monthly updates to the department. I am sure that more announcements will be forthcoming.
Baroness Andrews (Lab) [V]
My Lords, is the Minister aware that, because of Covid, referrals to children’s social care have fallen by more than half in some areas? Children’s services are braced for a huge influx of cases of children at risk when schools return. Will the Government make sure that those services have the extra funds they need to protect those vulnerable children? The £500 million allocated so far is simply not enough.
Lord Greenhalgh
Social care for children is recognised as a priority service for the Government. I give the assurance that the funding required, as a result of demand pressures from this pandemic, will be looked at and covered.
The Deputy Speaker (Lord Lexden) (Con)
My Lords, the time allowed for this Question has now elapsed.
Immigration: Detainee Support
(4 years, 5 months ago)
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Lord Roberts of Llandudno
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what steps they are taking to ensure that no detainee of an immigration removal centre is released without support for (1) finding, and (2) funding, accommodation.
The Minister of State, Home Office (Baroness Williams of Trafford) (Con)
My Lords, if a detainee leaving detention has an outstanding asylum claim and would otherwise be destitute, they can apply for support. They will be provided with free furnished accommodation if granted. We cover utility costs and provide a cash allowance. When the person is at immediate risk of homelessness, we provide emergency accommodation while the application is assessed. Those who do not qualify for asylum support may be eligible under immigration bail provisions.
Lord Roberts of Llandudno (LD) [V]
My Lords, first, the Minister will be aware of the report by the Chief Inspector of Prisons about the situation in immigration and detention centres during the pandemic, and the report that nine detainees from Harmondsworth were released into the streets without any support whatever. Secondly, the stabbing and shooting at the Park Inn Hotel in Glasgow cause deep concern. I am sure the Minister has heard many times before that, when somebody goes into provided accommodation, they lose their £35-a-week allowance. Can something be done about that? Does the Minister agree that it is high time we had a thorough overhaul of both detention and immigration procedures?
Baroness Williams of Trafford
My Lords, this country is probably one of the most generous in the world when it comes to our treatment of asylum seekers. The noble Lord refers to the accommodation in Glasgow. It is three-star accommodation in a Radisson hotel, which I think is very generous by all measures. People would not be getting the £35 a week because everything is provided for them—bed, board, food and any other needs they have.
Lord Judd (Lab) [V]
We all know that the noble Baroness is very compassionate and decent. But whatever her intentions, that is not the present reality in too many instances. If people are left destitute and desperate, this appears to them and those around them, and to the world, to be highly cynical and simply not compatible with civilised values. Can she redouble efforts to ensure that there is proper support and guidance for people who are being released into the community, given all the risks that will confront them?
Baroness Williams of Trafford
My Lords, nobody should be left destitute in the current situation. Anyone who has applied for asylum, and even those who have been refused asylum, is being housed either in hotels or initial accommodation. If anyone is destitute, it is perhaps because they have breached the conditions which they are obliged to follow. In the main, we are a very humane country, with a humane Government who want to help these people. During the pandemic, everybody who has claimed asylum, and even those whose asylum claims have failed, is being looked after.
Baroness Sheehan (LD) [V]
My Lords, immigration detention is an inhumane system, where people, most of whom will not ultimately be removed, can be locked up indefinitely without trial. Does the Minister agree that Covid-19 has put into the spotlight the arbitrary nature of the Home Office’s approach to detention and shown it to be both cruel and unnecessary? If she does not agree, can she say why immigration detainees have had a 95% success rate in bail applications since lockdown started?
Baroness Williams of Trafford
I do not agree with the noble Baroness that detention is inhumane. Detention, in the main, is for the purposes of removal. Clearly, at this time, removal is far more difficult than it would usually be, and we are trying to grant bail where it is safe to do so.
Baroness Warsi (Con) [V]
My Lords, my question follows that of the noble Baroness, Lady Sheehan. What has clearly been shown during the Covid period is that the number of immigration detainees has reduced significantly, by some 900 individuals since December of last year. Indeed, it is now one of the lowest numbers we have had since the previous decade. What lessons have been learned from this reduction in the number of immigration detainees? Can my noble friend assure the House that this positive move will continue as lockdown eases?
Baroness Williams of Trafford
The noble Baroness points to our wish to avoid immigration detention at all costs. It is for the purposes of removal when the right of appeal has been exhausted and there is no other prospect of removing people. One lesson we have learned is how humane this country is. We have taken in people from Greece, which, I think, no other European country has been able to. I am very proud of that position.
Lord Singh of Wimbledon (CB) [V]
My Lords, the near-prison environment of detention centres can lead to mental trauma and frequent self-harm. Does the Minister agree that we have an obligation to ensure that, on release, these vulnerable people are properly settled in society?
Baroness Williams of Trafford
I agree with the noble Lord. Anyone in asylum accommodation has access to our advice, issue reporting and eligibility provider, Migrant Help. He is right that there will be vulnerable people in our detention estate.
Lord Rosser (Lab) [V]
I want to come back to a question raised by the noble Baronesses, Lady Sheehan and Lady Warsi. They made the point that there has been a big reduction in the number of people in removal centres because of the risks due to the pandemic. My question is a follow-up to those previous questions: do the Government now expect that, in the light of being able to remove so many people from immigration removal centres, there will in future be a significant reduction in the use of such detention? Presumably, we have shown that we can manage these cases in the community. Will there be a reduction in future?
Baroness Williams of Trafford
My Lords, the Government do not want to put anyone in detention centres for the purposes of removal. Obviously, there are conditions around people being put on bail, including being asked to live at a specified address in the community. In the future, all these things will be based on a risk-management system.
Baroness Doocey (LD) [V]
My Lords, many non-UK detainees released from immigration removal centres are victims of trafficking. Despite this, they have been allowed simply to walk out of the centre without any basic resources and protection being put in place. According to every charity that works in this area, this is happening regularly—can the Minister explain why? Does she agree that this puts detainees at the mercy of their original traffickers?
Baroness Williams of Trafford
I agree with the noble Baroness that human trafficking is an issue that often comes to light in the detention estate. As I said, a risk-based assessment is done when people leave detention, and people have access to support should they need it, if they are victims of trafficking. However, she is right: this is a real concern at the moment.
Lord Dubs (Lab) [V]
My Lords, the Minister said in reply to an earlier question that detention was for the purposes of removal. Could she then explain why in 2018—the latest year for which I have figures—56% of those detained were released back into the community? Is that not a sign that we are using detention far too much when we do not need to?
Baroness Williams of Trafford
People are released from detention for a number of reasons, including appeals that succeed because late information is provided. However, the noble Lord makes a valid point that we should look back on this period of the pandemic to see whether some of the things that we are doing now could be used in future to manage people in the community.
The Deputy Speaker (Lord Lexden) (Con)
My Lords, the time allowed for this Question has elapsed.
Food: Chicken and Beef
(4 years, 5 months ago)
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Lord Lilley
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what advice they give to British travellers to the United States of America on the risks of eating (1) chicken which has been subject to a pathogen reduction treatment, and (2) hormone-fed beef.
The Minister of State, Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, Foreign and Commonwealth Office and Department for International Development (Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park) (Con) [V]
My Lords, the Government do not offer advice on this specific matter to British travellers. The Foreign Office keeps our travel advice under constant review and ensures that it reflects the most relevant risks to British nationals travelling overseas. All travel advice pages signpost to expert travel health advice from UK health bodies.
Lord Lilley (Con) [V]
Is not the real reason for not issuing a health warning that American chicken and beef pose no health risks? Indeed, there are fewer salmonella and campylobacter cases in America than in Europe. Has this scare not been concocted by anti-Americans who want to sabotage a potential UK-US trade deal? They will not succeed because 90% of US chicken is not washed with chlorine, which anyway poses no health risks, and American animal welfare standards are no lower than in eastern Europe, Thailand and Brazil, from which we currently import chicken and beef. Should we not focus on the opportunities a US deal could offer British farmers, manufacturers and financial services?
Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park [V]
Each country must make its own decision on a range of issues based on its own individual circumstances and attitude to risk. As my noble friend will know, we have legislated by the withdrawal Act 2018 against the use of artificial growth hormones in domestic production and imported meat products. Our legislation also prohibits the use of anything other than potable water to decontaminate poultry carcasses. Any changes would require new legislation. It is important to note that the approach we follow in this country, which I believe consumers want, is one where animals are reared in a way that does not necessitate chlorine treatment to be made safe.
The Lord Bishop of Carlisle
My Lords, I am grateful for what the Minister just said. Can he tell us whether Her Majesty’s Government have conducted any assessment of antibiotic use among beef farmers in the United States? If so, what might be the potential implications for public health of beef imports following any future trade deal?
Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park [V]
That is an enormously important point. I will have to get back to the right reverend Prelate with the precise data, but there is no doubt that we will need a big reduction in the use of antibiotics in farming globally. The UK is pushing hard for that, particularly on prophylactic or preventative use, where there are emerging links between overuse of antibiotics and antibiotic resistance, which can pass and spread to humans. There is a potential for overuse of antibiotics to represent the greatest threat to human health of almost anything else on the horizon. This is a priority area for the Government. We have been working extremely hard to reduce antibiotic use in this country and have succeeded in doing so, although there is more to do. We need to ensure that the same happens elsewhere.
Lord Dobbs (Con) [V]
Could my noble friend clear my muddled mind? Is it true that there is not a shred of evidence that washing chicken in chlorine is harming US consumers? Is it not true that here in the UK we wash fruit and vegetables in chlorine, as well as our kids in swimming pools? Is it not true that we put chlorine in our drinking water to keep us healthy? Surely Sherlock Holmes would conclude that this commotion is being pushed largely by those who have a political rather than scientific objective. They want consumers and taxpayers to pay for it. Am I anywhere near the target?
Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park [V]
With respect, I disagree with my noble friend. There are many reasons to be concerned about the use of chlorine to wash chicken carcasses. One concern that has been raised and which I hinted at earlier is the process that necessitates the use of chlorine. In this country, our legislative approach requires the rearing of animals in such a way that they do not at the time of slaughter need to be washed down with chlorine to make them safe. The process matters as much as the outcome. That is the approach used in this country and across the European Union. Where produce in the United States meets a standard that is vaguely comparable with our own, we would be very keen to encourage and facilitate trade between our two countries for all the obvious reasons.
Baroness Deech (CB) [V]
Does the Minister agree that we need to push back against EU propaganda designed to frustrate our deal with the USA? The global food security index 2020, which is based on quality, affordability and availability, places the USA at number three in the world, with the UK at number 17 and many European states much lower down. It is Europe that saw the scandals of horsemeat, cooking oil, and tainted Perrier, Coca-Cola, eggs and baby milk because it is all regulation and no enforcement. Will he agree that US food standards are at least as good, if not superior, to our own?
Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park [V]
On some areas I agree very strongly with the noble Baroness. As a champion of free trade, the Government absolutely believe that an ambitious free trade agreement is in both the UK’s and the US’s interests. It will help our economies bounce back following the economic challenges imposed on us by coronavirus. A UK-US free trade agreement will strengthen the economic relationship with what is, let us remember, our largest bilateral trading partner and create opportunities throughout the economy. For example, an agreement with the US could remove tariffs on British beef of up to 26%, which would be worth an enormous amount to our farmers. A free trade agreement could remove the 17% tariff on Cheddar cheese, for example. If a free trade agreement enabled just a 10% increase in exports to the US, that would result in an estimated £90,000 for the average cheese producer. The benefits are very obvious and we are passionately in favour of free trade. However, on standards, it is important that the imports that come into this country do not undercut unfairly our own producers, who are required to produce their food to very high standards in terms of the environment, health and animal welfare.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab Co-op) [V]
My Lords, does the Minister recall mad cow disease and when Edwina Currie resigned over the salmonella outbreak? That was in the days when Ministers resigned when they made a mistake. Will he confirm to the noble Lord, Lord Dobbs, and the whole House that chlorine washing chicken hides the bacteria? If the US trade deal goes ahead, what measures will be introduced to ensure the British public are kept safe from any of these threats from the United States?
Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park [V]
As has been pointed out many times, we have already legislated by the withdrawal Act against artificial growth hormones and decontaminating poultry carcasses with chlorine. If we were to change that it would require legislation to be brought before Parliament. I have no doubt at all that Parliament would choose not to relax those regulations, and in my view rightly so. The Government have committed, as we did in our manifesto before the election, to ensuring that our high animal welfare and environmental standards are not undermined through the pursuit of free trade agreements.
Baroness Northover (LD) [V]
My Lords, as the Minister said, antimicrobial resistance is an exceptionally dangerous global risk. Given the size of the US economy compared with ours, and without the power of being an EU member, how does he think we can tackle this global challenge while seeking a trade deal with the United States?
Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park [V]
There is without a doubt growing concern globally about overuse of antibiotics. I believe that more than half of all antibiotics in the United States are used on farms, in many cases to keep animals alive that would otherwise not survive the conditions in which they are reared. The same has been true for many years across the European Union, including in the United Kingdom, where we have also been guilty of massive overuse of antibiotics in agriculture. We have taken great strides, working with the industry, to reduce the amount of antibiotics used in agriculture. The same is true across some countries in the European Union, but not all. Global awareness is growing. I believe that coronavirus has lowered our collective tolerance for risk. The noble Baroness is absolutely right that this should be top of the health agenda.
Lord Bowness (Con) [V]
My Lords, I thank the Minister for his replies and for acknowledging that it is not only human health which concerns people, but the welfare aspects of the methods of keeping chickens and other animals and rearing beef. Can he again confirm that it will be a red line for the whole of the Government in any free trade negotiations with the United States that we do not change our standards? When we have completed those negotiations, will he also take on board that we need a robust statement on labelling so that customers know the methods of rearing and slaughter and can choose whether to buy?
Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park [V]
The Government are looking very closely at labelling. It is a complex issue, but we are making progress and will be coming forward with something shortly. On standards, it is not so much that standards should not change but that we should always seek to improve the outcomes from an environmental health and animal welfare perspective. That could mean improving, changing or even streamlining regulations. We know that agriculture will be a tricky area, as it always is in free trade agreements, but we uphold very high food safety and animal welfare standards and we will not allow imports to undermine those standards. Our manifesto is clear that in all our trade negotiations, we will maintain our high environmental protection, animal welfare and food standards and we will hold firm in trade negotiations. That position has been reiterated time and again by the Government, not just by the department on whose behalf I am speaking today.
The Deputy Speaker (Lord Lexden) (Con)
My Lords, the time allowed for this Question has elapsed. I repeat the request that questions and ministerial answers be kept brief.
Covid-19: Public Transport
(4 years, 5 months ago)
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Baroness Randerson
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what steps they are taking to encourage greater use of public transport (1) during, and (2) after, the Covid-19 pandemic.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Transport (Baroness Vere of Norbiton) (Con) [V]
My Lords, as sectors gradually reopen, we are seeking to maximise available capacity, while social distancing measures remain in place, to meet demand. We have issued guidance to ensure that people stay safe while using public transport; this guidance is being kept under review. We are fully supportive of encouraging people back on to public transport, but it must be done when safe to do so.
Baroness Randerson (LD) [V]
The Government have succeeded in dissuading us from using public transport but as we get back to work, we must get back on the buses and trains to avoid traffic congestion choking our cities and our lungs. When do the Government intend to launch the new message that public transport is safe to use, and how much funding do they intend to allocate to that campaign and to bus operators to support the changes they are having to make?
Baroness Vere of Norbiton [V]
The noble Baroness will be well aware that the Government’s communication strategy is evolving over time as we respond to coronavirus. She raises some very important points, and we must also consider what will happen in the future, particularly as people return to work in greater numbers in the autumn and children return to school in September. We are cognisant of all these things and our messaging is appropriate.
Lord Snape (Lab) [V]
Does the Minister accept that Transport Ministers’ consistently doom-laden warnings about the risks involved in travelling on public transport have destroyed public confidence in the safety of our transport systems? Does she accept that any failure to extend taxpayer support beyond the proposed cut-off date of 20 September is likely to mean that buses and trains will be few and far between after that date, outside of Britain’s major conurbations? What comfort can she offer to bus and train operators and their passengers that the future of public transport in this country is secure?
Baroness Vere of Norbiton [V]
The travelling public have listened to the Government and decided to heed our warnings about travelling on public transport because capacity is so limited, not because it is unsafe. The Government are working extremely closely with transport operators across all modes to establish a medium-term funding mechanism, because we want high-quality public transport in the future and our public transport system to rebound, when it is safe to do so.
Baroness Wheatcroft (Non-Afl) [V]
My Lords, understandably, people are loath to travel on buses if not all passengers are wearing face coverings. Transport police have the power to fine offenders, but they are by no means omnipresent. How might bus drivers be given more power to implement the regulations and insist that passengers wear face coverings?
Baroness Vere of Norbiton [V]
In our conversations with transport operators, it has become clear that bus drivers do not want to be the enforcement mechanism for using face coverings, particularly if they have to issue penalty notices. However, they can guide passengers to do the right thing. I can reassure the noble Baroness that the recent ONS survey showed that 86% of passengers are wearing face coverings, and we are increasing the amount of enforcement by British Transport Police and TfL authorised persons over the coming weeks.
Lord McColl of Dulwich (Con) [V]
As the virus is spread by droplets, does the Minister agree that it would be helpful if passengers on crowded public transport spoke as little as possible, since the virus can escape quite easily from the sides of the face mask?
Baroness Vere of Norbiton [V]
My noble friend raises an important point about the different mitigations that can be put in place. As he will know, the recent guidance was updated from two-metre social distancing to one metre plus, and the later guidance includes not only enhanced cleaning and ventilation and wearing face coverings, but no shouting or singing. We are considering all these elements to minimise the spread of coronavirus on public transport.
Lord Willis of Knaresborough (LD) [V]
My Lords, the demand for public transport increases by about five times during peak periods. Research by McKinsey has shown that the majority of those using public transport at peak times are office workers, students and recreational users, most of whom can vary their arrival and departure times. Will the Government consider requiring that only those who need to travel at a specific time—key workers—be allowed to do so, and that all organisations review their hours of activity to reflect this guidance?
Baroness Vere of Norbiton [V]
The noble Lord raises an important point. We have had a number of conversations about staggered start times with not only businesses but schools. However, this must be put in the context of changing travel demand patterns. Peak periods are not where they used to be, and we must keep an eye on how they change as people start using the public transport system in greater numbers in the autumn and as schools go back in September, as I said earlier to the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson.
Lord Robathan (Con) [V]
My Lords, the Government find themselves in a cleft stick because they have been so successful, together with the Mayor of London and an over-panicked media, at scaring people from travelling on public transport. But if we take the precautions the Minister has mentioned, the risk can be borne, especially by younger people. Will the Government now express the view that it can be safe to travel on public transport if you take sensible precautions, and hammer that home so the fear that many people have is diminished?
Baroness Vere of Norbiton [V]
I agree with my noble friend that we must diminish any perception of fear. It has never been the Government’s intention to scare people off public transport. We have encouraged them to avoid it and to use other methods because of the capacity limits that are in place with social distancing. I reassure my noble friend that people are returning to public transport. Demand is varying significantly by mode and location, which, as I am sure noble Lords will understand, presents its own challenges, because a one-size-fits-all solution cannot help in those circumstances.
Baroness Finlay of Llandaff (CB) [V]
As people who completely depend on public transport emerge from shielding themselves or others, their risk of infection increases as distancing lessens in public areas even with masks. Do the Government recognise the urgent need for a clear UK-wide symbol, such as the one NHS Wales endorsed, to prompt distancing? Will she meet me to take this forward, as this costs next to nothing and can save lives?
Baroness Vere of Norbiton [V]
I would be very happy to receive further information about the scheme to which the noble Baroness is referring. I am not aware of it, but we are looking at all sorts of schemes to make it easier for people to travel on public transport. For example, those exempt from face coverings can get themselves an exemption card which can be very helpful to show people who might otherwise try to enforce their use.
Lord Rosser (Lab) [V]
From yesterday, rail services were to be close to 85% of pre-Covid levels and more bus services are now running. As has been said, the problem is the severe shortage of passengers. Passenger numbers are well below even those allowed under current social distancing requirements. There may be very good reasons for it, but why is it that some airlines —with government acceptance—can apparently operate planes safely with potentially all seats occupied by passengers, but for trains and buses this is not only still not possible to do safely but apparently not anywhere near possible?
Baroness Vere of Norbiton [V]
The Government are working very closely with transport operators in all modes to encourage them to do their own risk assessments, work out a safe configuration of passengers and make other interventions, such as cleaning and ventilation, so that passengers are carried as safely as possible.
Baroness Ludford (LD) [V]
My Lords, organisations concerned for pedestrians are very worried about e-scooters. The RNIB has called them
“a real and genuine threat to the ability of blind and partially sighted people to move around independently and safely.”
This is even more true if they use pavements, as they will; they already have done while they have been illegal. Unlike now, will there be robust enforcement? What arrangements are in place with police and local authorities to that end?
Baroness Vere of Norbiton [V]
The noble Baroness will know that we are introducing trials of e-scooters, which will give us more data. Appropriate enforcement will be in place.
Lord Kilclooney (CB)
The Government have given handouts which have been very welcome in stabilising the economy, but do they accept that the most important contribution to the economy is getting people back to work, that the biggest gap in our economy is people who work in offices in our town centres, and that many of these people travel by public transport? Will the Government give priority to the use of public transport as quickly as possible?
Baroness Vere of Norbiton [V]
My Lords, the Government have been asked by a number of different groups to give priority to public transport over the past few months, but to operationalise that is incredibly hard. While we are not looking to put in those sorts of mechanisms at this time, we are looking to maximise the capacity and make sure that demand comes on to the system at the appropriate time, which is why, as I said earlier, staggered starting of offices and schools is so important.
The Deputy Speaker (Lord Lexden) (Con)
My Lords, the time allowed for this Question has now elapsed.
Arrangement of Business
The Deputy Speaker (Baroness Henig) (Lab)
My Lords, proceedings will now commence. Some Members are here in the Chamber and others are participating virtually, but all Members are treated equally. For Members participating remotely, microphones will unmute shortly before they are to speak. Please accept any on-screen prompt to unmute. Microphones will be muted after each speech. If the capacity of the Chamber is exceeded, I will immediately adjourn the House. I ask noble Lords to be patient if there are any short delays as we switch between physical and remote participants. The usual rules and courtesies in debate apply.
Independent Residential Care
(4 years, 5 months ago)
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Lord Laming
To ask Her Majesty’s Government, further to the remarks made by the Chief Executive of NHS England on 5 July, what measures they plan to put in place to assist independent residential care providers should any such provider face (1) financial, or (2) operational, difficulties.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Health and Social Care (Lord Bethell) (Con) [V]
My Lords, this disease has targeted the vulnerable, and those working and living in social care have faced daunting threats. The Government have intervened with £3.7 billion for local authorities, including specific funds such as the £600 million infection control fund and the £500 million announced on 2 July. Delivery is being supported by our social care Covid-19 task force.
Lord Laming (CB) [V]
My Lords, I am grateful to the Minister for that reply, but he will know that, nowadays, residential care homes are provided not by local authorities but by thousands of independent organisations. It is now thought that some of these organisations may be in financial difficulties. Can the Minister tell the House what plans are in place to protect the residents of a home which ceases to operate, especially as these residents are not only very vulnerable but, frankly, have nowhere else to go?
Lord Bethell [V]
My Lords, the noble Lord is entirely right. The protection of residents is our number one priority and our responsibilities under the Care Act 2014 remain in place. The care home economy is mixed. We are looking very carefully at the financial resilience of all the providers involved. We are providing the funds necessary to see them through this epidemic and we will do whatever it takes to protect residents.
Baroness Armstrong of Hill Top (Lab) [V]
My Lords, given the unfortunate words of the Prime Minister last night, where he seemingly blamed care homes for high rates of Covid-19, when will the Government actually produce the long-promised proposals for the future of social care, which will guarantee quality through acknowledging the need for a skilled, stable and trained workforce, properly valued?
Lord Bethell [V]
My Lords, we are enormously grateful to all those working in the care home sector, who have protected residents through this awful epidemic, and we continue to support them. We have increased recruitment in the area, and are in the midst of an enormous recruitment marketing campaign to bring new, qualified people into the care home sector. The Secretary of State wrote to relevant stakeholders on 14 May, inviting them to cross-party talks on the care home sector. We are continuing those conversations and hope to bring them to a head at the earliest opportunity.
Baroness Brinton (LD) [V]
Yesterday, our Prime Minister said that
“too many care homes didn’t really follow the procedures”.
In March, the care sector asked for testing for patients discharged from hospital. The Government’s reply—not necessary. The sector could not get the promised PPE as government supplies failed to appear. All our amazing 1.6 million care home workers needed testing from March—it took the Government three months. Complex government guidance changed frequently, sometimes even daily. Our care homes have had to cope with 30,000 excess deaths in three months and massively increased costs. Does the Minister agree with our Prime Minister, or with the National Care Forum, which said that Boris Johnson’s remarks were, “frankly, hugely insulting”?
Lord Bethell [V]
I thank all those who work in the care home sector for the enormous amount of sacrifice and commitment that they have shown to protecting residents. The noble Baroness, I think, portrays the situation unfairly. Guidelines have changed quickly because the situation changed quickly. PPE demand could never have been expected at the levels it reached; the Government responded incredibly quickly to move PPE into both NHS and social care. On testing, we started from a very low base; testing has now been introduced in care homes for both patients and staff. The Government will continue to be committed to protecting both staff and residents in the care sector.
Lord Mackay of Clashfern (Con) [V]
My Lords, is the money that the Government give to local authorities for social care ring-fenced for that purpose?
Lord Bethell [V]
My Lords, the money that my noble friend refers to is not currently ring-fenced. Local authorities have been written to, to explain that the money should be prioritised for Covid—but, at the request of the local authorities themselves, the money was not ring-fenced.
Baroness Hollins (CB) [V]
My Lords, the Vivaldi project found that, in care homes where staff received sick pay, there were lower levels of infection in residents. During the next pandemic, will our priority to be to save the NCS—the new national care service—as well as the NHS, or will we have an integrated NHCS national health and care service, or, what other urgent measures are Her Majesty’s Government considering to protect care?
Lord Bethell [V]
The noble Baroness puts her question extremely well, but I am afraid it is beyond my ability to predict as she asks exactly what the shape of the national care provisions will be. What I can say is that the role of agency staff was always, from the very earliest stage, one of the gravest concerns we had. The CMO flagged it very early, and we moved as quickly as we could to tackle the difficult issue of itinerant staff, and to put in place both the funding and the procedures to anticipate problems of infection around staff who move from one home to the next.
Baroness Thornton (Lab) [V]
My Lords, I return to the question raised by my noble friend Lady Armstrong and the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, because, while it is obviously welcome for the Minister to thank those who work in care homes for the sacrifices that they have made, he needs to acknowledge the hurt that the Prime Minister has caused with his words. Will the Minister clarify which procedures care homes are accused of disregarding? Are they procedures related to the Government’s policy of allowing hospital patients to be discharged without testing, to the failure to provide the required PPE or, perhaps, to setting up the testing programme so late?
Lord Bethell [V]
My Lords, it is not the role of a junior Minister to speak on behalf of the Prime Minister, but I can say that the Prime Minister, the Secretary of State and I are all enormously grateful for the huge amount of work that social care staff have put into this epidemic. I have seen with own eyes the commitment and expertise that they have provided during these very difficult days. We are, as a nation, enormously grateful for their hard work and skill.
Baroness Tyler of Enfield (LD) [V]
My Lords, the pandemic has placed a very harsh spotlight on the resilience of the care system, with 30,000 excess deaths in care homes in England and Wales in a three-month period. At the weekend Sir Simon Stevens made it crystal clear that we just do not have a fair or properly resourced social care system with proper workforce support. With some homes already running close to bankruptcy due to the additional costs and occupancy rates slipping below 87% when many smaller homes become financially unviable, what immediate steps are the Government taking to protect these smaller homes?
Lord Bethell [V]
The noble Baroness is entirely right that the issue of excess beds is an unfortunate and unwelcome added pressure on an already pressured system. Sir Simon Stevens was echoing the sentiments of the Government and the Secretary of State when he said that we need to move towards a long-term settlement for social care. That was very much the commitment of the Prime Minister during the election and in the manifesto. Steps have been taken towards working on that but we have been interrupted by Covid-19. It remains a number one priority for the Government. In the meantime, we will be putting in the financial resources necessary to provide the resilience for those smaller homes of which the noble Baroness speaks.
Lord Forsyth of Drumlean (Con) [V]
My Lords, does my noble friend think it reasonable that, 12 months after the Economic Affairs Committee produced the report Social Care Funding: Time to End a National Scandal, we have not had a debate on the report or a response from the Government? He talks about providing resources for social care. That report identified an £8 billion gap just to get back to the standards we had in 2010. Does he not think that instead of the occupants of Nos. 10 and 11 Downing Street standing on their doorsteps and putting their hands together to clap the achievements of social care workers, their hands should be put in the Treasury’s pocket to find the money now urgently needed to prevent the collapse of nursing homes and to prevent us continuing to rely on the good will and hard work of people who are being pressed beyond endurance? This delay cannot go on longer and longer, which has been the pattern for the last decade.
Lord Bethell [V]
My noble friend asks the question extremely well. The Lords Economic Affairs Committee report is an extremely thoughtful and respected piece of work. Under normal circumstances we would certainly have had that debate and moved forward on this incredibly important issue, which was flagged both in the election and in the manifesto as a major government priority. However, I cannot hide from my noble friend that the Covid epidemic has disrupted progress, particularly on this delicate issue, which requires a huge amount of management time by senior healthcare officials, who are utterly consumed by Covid at the moment. Please be under no illusion that this is a major priority for the Government. Once the preparations for winter are in place, it will be at the top of the list.
Lord Harries of Pentregarth (CB) [V]
The Covid crisis has revealed the crucial role that care homes and care workers play in our national life. Does the Minister agree that it is high time to take a radical look at the role of care homes and of social care more generally, especially the status and the pay of care workers, who have revealed their worth so wonderfully over these last few months?
Lord Bethell [V]
The noble and right reverend Lord is entirely right: the value and contribution of care home workers to society and to the communities that they work in go way beyond the actual monetary value of their salary. We completely respect and pay tribute to the contribution that they have made, particularly during this epidemic. We have sought during the epidemic to run recruitment campaigns to bring in new workers and to help plug any skills gaps, but this is the kind of issue that needs to be addressed in a long-term plan. We have already started work on that plan and look forward to bringing it to Parliament when the kind of cross-party support that is needed is in place.
Baroness Falkner of Margravine (Non-Afl) [V]
My Lords, I welcome the initiation of cross-party talks. The Minister will know now that more than two-thirds of the public want to fund health and social care through higher taxation. Will he now accept that as a principle if that is the result of the cross-party talks, instead of his Government ruling out tax increases?
Lord Bethell [V]
The noble Baroness makes her case well. There are a large number of considerations in this matter—my noble friend Lord Forsyth has already made a strong case for the recommendations of the Economic Affairs Committee—and we need to look at all of them. It is an extremely complicated area. We need to get buy-in from cross-party support and from a wide number of stakeholders and the businesses involved. Once we are in that position, we will be able to make a plan that delivers a long-term solution to this knotty problem.
Lord Desai (Lab) [V]
My Lords, we must welcome Sir Simon Stevens’ promise to help independent care providers, but will we make sure that when the money goes to those providers they pay their staff properly, give them protective equipment and do not let them go on working in an unsafe and underpaid profession?
Lord Bethell [V]
My Lords, the role of the staff is essential. We have put in place an infection fund of £500 million to help to provide a safe working environment for staff, and we are looking at mobilising a huge PPE effort, led by my noble friend Lord Deighton. The protection and payment of staff are essential. However, a long-term solution for staff will depend on a long-term deal. We are working on that but I cannot give any assurances until the important work of building cross-party support has been fulfilled.
Agriculture Bill
Tuesday 7th July 2020
(4 years, 5 months ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Agriculture Act 2020 View all Agriculture Act 2020 Debates Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts Amendment Paper: HL Bill 112-II(Rev) Revised second marshalled list for Committee - (7 Jul 2020)
The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Baroness Henig) (Lab)
My Lords, a limited number of Members are here in the Chamber, respecting social distancing. If the capacity of the Chamber is exceeded, I will immediately adjourn the House. Other Members will participate remotely, but all Members will be treated equally wherever they are. For Members participating remotely, microphones will unmute shortly before they are to speak—please accept any on-screen prompt to unmute. Microphones will be muted after each speech. I ask noble Lords to be patient if there are any short delays as we switch between physical and remote participants. I should remind the House that our normal courtesies in debate still very much apply in this new hybrid way of working.
A participants’ list for today’s proceedings has been published and is in my brief, which Members should have received. I also have lists of Members who have put their names to the amendments, or expressed an interest in speaking, on each group. I will call Members to speak in the order listed. Members’ microphones will be muted by the broadcasters except when I call a Member to speak. Interventions during speeches or before the noble Lord sits down are not permitted and uncalled speakers will not be heard.
During the debate on each group, I will invite Members, including Members in the Chamber, to email the clerk if they wish to speak after the Minister. I will call Members to speak in order of request and will call the Minister to reply each time. The groupings are binding, and it will not be possible to degroup an amendment for separate debate. A Member intending to press an amendment already debated to a Division should have given notice in the debate. Leave should be given to withdraw amendments. When putting the Question, I will collect voices in the Chamber only. If a Member taking part remotely intends to trigger a Division, they should make this clear when speaking on the group.
Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)
My Lords, with the leave of the House, I draw to the attention of noble Lords that there is a very large number of participants wishing to speak in this debate, particularly on the first group. If noble Lords could be concise and non-repetitive in their contributions, it would greatly aid the smooth and swift passage of the Bill.
Clause 1: Secretary of State’s powers to give financial assistance
Amendment 1
The Earl of Dundee
Member’s explanatory statement
A probing amendment to clarify whether the Secretary of State will provide financial assistance for the purposes listed under Clause 1(1).
The Earl of Dundee (Con) [V]
My Lords, Amendment 1 is connected to Amendment 74, also in my name. Both amendments address the Secretary of State’s new financial assistance powers outlined in the first clause of the Bill. Clause 1(1) indicates ambiguity of delivery:
“The Secretary of State may give financial assistance”.
Picking up this aspect of uncertainty, Amendment 1 therefore implies that giving financial assistance, as envisaged, might not necessarily work out as intended, not least taking into account how current forms of international competition threaten to curb the viability of United Kingdom food production. Yet, if, within the Bill, incentives should fail to produce intended results, to some extent Amendment 74’s proposal can provide a remedy.
In itself, Clause 1 is evidence of an impressive vision. The Government are committed to preserving the national environment; thus, competent environmental land management can become a clear aim for farmers, who are properly rewarded if they achieve this. Nevertheless, so far, in other respects the Bill is less clear. What are the Government’s plans for sustainable food production? Post Brexit, will they develop new and even higher standards than those of the European Union? Or will they set land aside for afforestation, public access and wildlife conservation while leaving agriculture to market forces, as do the United States and Brazil? Among those options, although unstated, no doubt the Government would prefer that which combines high standards for environmental land management along with those for sustainable food production. Yet, if so, how can these two objectives best be realised and British farmers perform and compete against cheap imports from the United States and those from EU states paid a high level of agricultural subsidies?
Perhaps some of the answer, beginning at home, would be that, in order to further these twin objectives, the Government might better prioritise and adjust existing incentives within the Bill. For if that adjustment is made now, in the first place, then there will be a greater chance that, through time and against external market forces, much of those current joint aims for the United Kingdom of good environmental land management and sustainable food production can be attained.
Clause 1 details 10 purposes eligible for financial assistance. It is certainly right that funding should be provided for each of them carried out by a farm. Yet, where multiple purposes are addressed, the Bill could now be amended so that a financial bonus would apply. For example, if a farm accomplished [Connection lost.]
The Deputy Chairman of Committees
I shall have to move the amendment on the noble Earl’s behalf. I beg to move Amendment 1.
Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP) [V]
My Lords, I have attached my name to Amendment 1 and shall speak also to a number of other amendments in the group. I thank the noble Earl for tabling Amendment 1: it was something I was thinking about. Indeed, I spoke to the Table Office, because much of the discussion around the Bill has focused on the fact that it provides powers but not duties. I suggested to the Table Office that we could go through the whole Bill and change every “may” to “must”, and those in the Table Office persuaded me that that might not be the best way forward. I thank them for their patience and all their expert assistance. I think the noble Earl has managed to focus on the key part of the Bill, where “may” should be changed to “must”. I know he tabled it as a probing amendment, but we should think about this as a serious way forward: a duty to look after the key principles of carbon storage, ecosystems, the state of our natural world and healthy food. These should be a duty of the Minister.
Amendments 8, 22, 25, 31 and 50, in the name of my noble friend Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, are all about air pollution, which is a huge gaping hole in the Bill. It looks at water, at soil and at our ecosystems on the ground, but does not talk about the air; yet it is all part of an interrelated system and we know that air pollution and farming issues are closely interrelated.
I have also attached my name to Amendment 67 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, which says:
“Financial assistance may only be given for Environmental Land Management Schemes Tier 2 and Tier 3 if those individual schemes are in line with the local Nature Recovery Strategy”.
This addresses a crucial point: we need joined-up, systematic thinking about the nature of our countryside. At the moment, we have a number of silos. We have the Environment Bill, the Agriculture Bill and the now delayed food strategy, and we need to make sure that these are all joined up and working together, not at cross-purposes to each other. We need a whole-landscape approach, something the Wildlife Trust has been doing a lot of excellent work on, although we have to notice that what we see in the Environment Bill will lay new duties on councils, which, as we discussed in Oral Questions, already have enormous burdens on them.
Finally, Amendment 234 in my name, would add a clause headed “Agricultural extension”. It has notable similarities with an amendment in another group—Amendment 122, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Grantchester. Both of us are getting at the point that farmers need reliable, independent, secure, certain expert advice. In preparing for today I looked at the debates in your Lordships’ House back in 1996 and 1997 when the Agricultural Development and Advisory Service was privatised. There were some very telling words from the late Lord Mackie of Benshie, who talked about how, since the Agricultural Development and Advisory Service had started charging for its services, less use was being made of them. Some people —perhaps those who needed them most—could not afford them.
The state of our countryside and our agricultural land is a matter of national interest. It is something that we cannot leave to market forces. We have seen, in terms of agricultural extension and advice, a huge reduction, huge privatisation and a move towards many farmers being forced to take advice from the suppliers of agricultural chemicals and agricultural seeds, and even from their buyers, the supermarkets. Farmers need independent, expert advice. We need people to be able to develop careers in providing that advice. If we have an expert on growing potatoes in the south-west who spends decades focusing just on that, that is very hard to do in the private sector. If potatoes have a few bad years, no one can afford to pay that person and they do not have the chance to develop their skills in the way that they would in an advisory service.
We have to look at the whole system here. Part of a proper agricultural system has to be a government-run advice service. That is something that has existed historically for a very long time. It can a be traced back three millennia: in ancient China we know that there was a government Minister advising farmers on how to improve agricultural systems. This is a matter of national interest; it needs national involvement and a proper advice service.
Lord Teverson (LD)
My Lords, I shall speak to my Amendment 67 and I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, for her support for it. My main interest here is in connection with the broader environmental policies of the Government as they bring these forward in legislation. As I said at Second Reading, I very much welcome the ELMS initiative; it is a major step forward in the use of state aid for the farming industry and how it is to be targeted.
Lord Lucas (Con) [V]
My Lords, I have a number of amendments in this group. Amendments 5, 17 and 89 question the different wording in different sections of the Bill. Clause 1(1)(a) uses “protects or improves”; Clause 1(1)(c) uses “maintains, restores or enhances”; elsewhere, “conserves” is used, which is defined as including “restoring or enhancing”.
Using different words in close proximity in the Bill gives the strong impression that different things are meant by them and that words which are not included each time are therefore in some way excluded. For simplicity of reading, we should choose one word. I would choose “enhances”; I have gone with “conserves” because that is the Government’s choice. If we have one word which is defined to encompass all the other concepts, this clause will read more clearly.
With Amendments 27 and 28, I wish to check with the Government that we are not confining ourselves to additional varieties and species, but that we will be able to apply funds to new species of animal livestock and in particular to new plant crop species. Genetic engineering should mean that we can move many of the crops that now grow some way south of us a good way north and therefore improve the resilience and variety of our agriculture.
Amendment 86 checks where the boundary is for an activity such as coppicing. It was not clear to me from the words used that the whole process of felling trees and particularly extracting them from woodland could be covered by finance. If we are going to make it profitable for small woods in particular—I declare an interest in owning one—to supply coppice for the power station industry, for instance, we must look at how we will get that wood extracted. If not, there will be no benefit in extracting it and therefore no benefit in coppicing.
Lastly and most importantly, Amendment 76 addresses local nature partnerships. In the Bill we ought ideally to recognise the role that these have come to play in the negotiations between the various entities which have a finger in the pie of looking after nature in our countryside. They have been remarkably successful and I very much hope we will continue to support them and embed them in how we take decisions about nature and the countryside.
Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Con)
My Lords, in speaking to my three amendments, I take this opportunity to thank the Minister, the Bill team and everybody for getting us to this stage. It is quite remarkable that we have a book of amendments almost as large as the Bill itself. I know the lengths to which my noble friend will go to accommodate us.
I will speak first to Amendments 24 and 104 in my name. I thank other noble Lords who have joined me in signing Amendment 24, which is for probing and debating purposes only. Obviously, I do not wish to see land taken out of “managing land or water” that will benefit from new financial assistance under the Bill. I am grateful to my noble friend, who is responding today, and to our noble friend Lord Goldsmith for responding to my concerns, which I have also set out in Amendment 104.
There will be opportunities for farmers to create reservoirs, working either on their own or with water companies. This will be recognised as financial assistance, other than where they may already fall within a flood plain, which I think is the one exclusion. My noble friend said that the equivalent of 25 Olympic-sized pools would fall within the provisions of the Reservoirs Act 1975.
We are absolutely delighted to have the Slowing the Flow at Pickering scheme. I am sure that many other schemes like it will benefit from the provisions of this Bill. I welcome that. It could be not just for farm use, but caravan parks and golf clubs may consider storing water temporarily or more permanently on their land. However, could my noble friend be a little more precise? In my noble friend Lord Goldsmith’s reply to me in a letter on 2 July, he said:
“The temporary storage of floodwater on land would not necessarily constitute a raised reservoir and would therefore be exempt from reservoir safety regulations in England.”
It would be helpful if my noble friend could place that letter in the Library so that I do not need to refer to it in any more detail. Could we have an assurance today on what will be considered temporary storage and what permanent storage, to reassure those seeking to retain water temporarily as floodwater that they will not fall within the provisions of the 1975 Act, which are particularly onerous for reservoirs and would reduce it to 10,000 cubic metres?
Further, the reservoir we had initially sought for the Slowing the Flow scheme could not be signed off by the panel engineer from the Institution of Civil Engineers. Can my noble friend assure the House today that even water stored temporarily to retain floodwater on land will not fall into that category? That would be most helpful.
Amendment 24 relates to financial assistance for upland and hill farms in particular, which produce pasture-fed livestock. There are concerns that hill farmers may not benefit because many of them are tenants. In North Yorkshire and other parts, I think almost 50% of farms are tenanted. Later we will consider county council farms, which are almost exclusively tenanted farms by their very nature. This is a probing amendment to see whether my noble friend would be minded to use financial assistance to promote pasture-fed livestock farming systems. It is something that we are particularly good at in the United Kingdom, in parts of northern England, Scotland, Devon and, I am sure, Wales and other parts as well. The taste of the spring lamb off the North Yorkshire moors is hard to beat but that is not why we are here today.
Pasture-fed livestock farming is responsible for the management of a significant part of our landscape. The national parks have done a great piece of work on this, which we will come on to consider. But it is particularly important in this regard to seek financial assistance for the way the uplands are managed. Too often, calves and other animals that are fattened on the pastures come in for unnecessary and unwanted attacks from interest groups which perhaps do not understand how red meat is produced and how important it is to a balanced diet. The uplands also play a role as a carbon sink—storing carbon in the grasslands—and in harvesting carbon from the atmosphere on an ongoing basis. Given the wider benefits of pasture-fed systems, I urge the Government to address this sector within the realm of public goods, under Clause 1(1).
I make it clear that this is complementary to and supportive of the provisions on native breeds, whether on pasture or other systems. I acknowledge that native breeds are probably already recognised, so I nudge my noble friend towards considering that pasture-fed livestock also come under the provision, for biodiversity and public health reasons as well.
Lord Bruce of Bennachie (LD) [V]
My Lords, I am glad to follow the noble Baroness, whose closing remarks on pasture-fed livestock echo my own Amendment 78, which seeks the following:
“In framing any financial assistance scheme, the Secretary of State must have regard to maintaining support for hill farms and other marginal land previously designated as less favoured areas.”
I support what the noble Baroness said in praise—not just support—of those areas.
We need to recognise the geographical importance as well as the environmental, agricultural and food production importance. Less favoured areas in England cover the Pennines, the Lake District, the Yorkshire Dales —Yorkshire generally—Devon and Cornwall and most of Wales; and, of course, a huge chunk of Scotland, which I know is not directly covered by the Bill but this demonstrates how important it is. In those areas it is a very significant part of the local economy, in terms of employment, the environment, access and the general diversity of the economy. As the noble Baroness made clear, our uplands—our hill lands—are most useful for livestock rearing, grazing and pasture feeding, particularly of lamb and beef, and are not suitable, really, for cropping, other than in marginal circumstances.
The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Baroness Garden of Frognal) (LD)
I call the noble Earl, Lord Dundee. We lost the connection earlier, but I understand that we can now hear him.
The Earl of Dundee [V]
Thank you. I will resume at the point where I was cut off.
In itself, Clause 1 is evidence of an impressive vision. The Government are committed to preserving the natural environment, thus competent environmental land management can become a clear aim for farmers, who are properly rewarded if they achieve this.
Nevertheless, so far, in other respects the Bill is less clear. What are the Government’s plans for sustainable food production? Post Brexit will they develop new and even higher standards than those of the EU, or instead set aside land for afforestation, public access and wildlife conservation, while leaving agriculture to market forces, as do the United States and Brazil?
Among those options, and although unstated, no doubt the Government would prefer that which combines high standards for environmental land management with those for sustainable food production. Yet, if so, how can these two objectives best be realised? British farmers also perform and compete against cheap imports from the United States, and those from EU states pay a high level of agricultural subsidies.
Perhaps some of the answer, beginning at home, lies in how, in order to further these twin objectives, the Government might better prioritise and adjust existing incentives within the Bill. For if that adjustment is made now in the first place, there will be a greater chance through time and against external market forces. Much of those current joint aims for the United Kingdom of good environmental land management and sustainable food production can be attained.
Section 1 details 10 purposes eligible for financial assistance, and it is certainly right that funding should be provided for each of them if carried out by a farm. Yet where multiple purposes are addressed, the Bill could now be amended so that a financial bonus would apply. For example, if a farm accomplishes fewer than four of the purposes, it simply receives funding for each of them. However, if instead the farm were to carry out more than four purposes, such as five or six of them, it could receive a bonus grant for achieving that level of multiple purposes. There could be a further multiple purpose supplementary payment if seven or eight of them had been carried out, then a further and final one for achieving 10 purposes. For what we want to achieve is that farms should receive supplementary funding for carrying out many or even all the purposes. That is because doing so puts them at a commercial disadvantage to other farms, which might adopt only a few of the purposes—hence the connection between Amendments 1 and 74.
Amendment 1, as a probing expedient, seeks to illustrate that, while the Government’s vision to encourage both good environmental management and sustained food production together is much to be welcomed, nevertheless, the effect of their plans for delivering financial incentives is uncertain in two respects. The first is as a result of the challenge to UK food production from a combination of cheap imports from the United States and from the highly subsidised agricultural products from the European Union states. Secondly, and as already outlined, it is owing to the risk in the first place of an inadequate response to incentives arising from an inconsistent and anomalous delivery to recipient United Kingdom farms, whereby those best at multiple purposes are still insufficiently recompensed within the Bill as it is.
Amendment 74 offers a partial solution through a detailed bonus scheme, as already outlined, whereby farms carrying out multiple purposes would come to be rewarded better and in a fairer way than they are at present within the Bill. Through time, and in spite of international market competition, that would in turn also increase the likelihood that within the United Kingdom the Government could achieve more of the joint aims themselves of good environmental management and sustained food production.
Amendment 45, the third in my name in this grouping, seeks to encourage the purchase of domestically produced animal feed with the intention of reducing carbon emissions from imported feed. Considering the United Kingdom’s agricultural capacity relative to its population, it would be unrealistic to restrict imported animal feed too much. However, these imports have three major disadvantages. First, they undermine the United Kingdom’s food security; secondly, there is the carbon footprint arising from their production and transport; and, thirdly, there is the environmental damage which in the first place their cultivation causes in certain countries, notably soybeans in Brazil and Argentina. Efforts should thus be made to augment the supply of home-grown animal feed. At the same time, United Kingdom importers ought to be encouraged to buy feed from countries demonstrating similar environmental standards to those of the United Kingdom, with the process perhaps guided by international certification bodies. Hence, bearing in mind the Bill’s focus on environmental land management, this amendment on animal feeds simply calls for improved consistency of standards between what the United Kingdom imports and what it produces domestically.
Earl of Devon (CB)
My Lords, I echo the words of the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, in congratulating the Minister and so many other noble Lords on marshalling such a remarkable number of amendments. In fact, there are so many amendments that it somewhat gives the game away that the Bill means so much to so many people. In the words of the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, it is something of a dog’s dinner. I would not be so disparaging, but I would also say that it is more than a single dinner—it seems to be everything the dog has eaten for an awfully long time.
The first four of my amendments in this group relate to the deletion of the word “water” in the provisions of Clause 1. That is because I believe this is the Agriculture Bill, not the aquaculture Bill, the Fisheries Bill, the Environment Bill or the water resources Bill. As drafted—as I understand it, there is no limitation to the definition of water—it could spread the impact of the Bill very far and wide. In proposing a number of amendments, I seek to focus the Bill on agriculture and to not let its very positive environmental aims spread too far beyond those reasonable limits. If the Minister were able to provide some clarity in concluding, it would help us to know what water this applies to.
Noble Lords should know that, as well as a farmer, I am also a holder of intertidal habitat and foreshore rights, and it is interesting to me whether the provisions of the Bill and of ELMS will be able to extend to intertidal habitat. As I understand it, intertidal habitat has enormous potential for carbon sequestration and other very positive aspects, but it is not clear whether the Bill as drafted goes to that area between high and low tide, which is obviously such an important area around the coast of Devon.
Amendment 21 also seeks to remove reference to livestock from Clause 1(1)(d). This is merely so that it conforms to the other paragraphs. It is not clear why livestock should be included in managing land, water or livestock in a way that mitigates climate change, when it is not included in managing land or water in a way that protects the environment. It is very unclear as to why livestock should appear specifically in Clause 1(1)(d) when it does not appear in (a), (c) and (e). I note the points that the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, made around reservoirs, but farmers are not water managers. They use water, and I very much agree that the environmental aim should be to prevent what they do on their land having an adverse impact on water—but they are not by definition water managers, and we should recognise that.
To continue with the water theme, I propose Amendment 91, which adds the term “wetlands” to “uplands” in the definition of cultural or natural heritage. There is lots of important focus on uplands, because they are such an important part of our natural environment. However, I do not want your Lordships’ focus to depart wholly from wetlands, which are equally important to our biodiversity. They are equally marginal in many respects as a form of agricultural land, and are equally important culturally. I took the train this morning through the Somerset Levels, and we all remember the terrible floods they suffered a number of years ago. The focus should not be just on uplands. The other point about wetlands is that, given their often low-lying presence near the mouths of estuaries and rivers, they are often very proximate to large urban settlements. The interface between a large urban population and a rural, ecologically sensitive landscape is very important; it is an important part of ELMS and it should be focused upon.
The final amendment in this group, which I am proud to propose, is Amendment 236, which is supported by the Greener UK group. It seeks to add some teeth to the enforcement of the environmental provisions. As they currently exist under European regulations, good agricultural and environmental condition requirements cover the management of soils. This is in the cross-compliance provisions of the current European legislation. That will be lost from January 2021, and it is not clear that there will be adequate enforcement of the maintenance of the quality and nature of soil going forward.
The amendment adds to the agricultural diffuse pollution regulations and provides the Environment Agency with some teeth in forcing farmers to maintain the quality of soil. Soil is obviously all-important to the management of our agricultural land. Over this past winter we have seen how soil runs off in heavy rain, but how, if you have good organic matter in your soil, in a very dry spring such as the one we have just had you can retain some moisture. It enhances the resilience of our agriculture, and as climate change takes effect, that is absolutely key to our agriculture. Those are the amendments I wish to speak to now.
Lord Greaves (LD)
My Lords, there has already been some discussion which hinges on the question: what is the Bill about? We start off with a very important clause which lists nine environmental aims, together with one aim concerning
“the health and welfare of livestock”,
which at least is about agriculture. Is this an environmental provision or an agricultural one? Those of us who are very keen on the environmental aspects of the Bill must nevertheless recognise that it is fundamentally about the future of farming in this country, not about the wider issue of the environment. It is unfortunate, as has been hinted at by at least one noble Lord, that the Environment Bill has not come first and we have not legislated on the Government’s new vision for the environment of Britain and then been able to fit farming into it. This is a problem that runs through the Bill, as the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, raised at Second Reading.
However, we have the Bill as it is. I was pleased to add my name to the amendment of the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering, on drainage schemes and so on, which are crucial. There is an important thing here which links to the proposals for the three tiers of the environmental management scheme. I think everybody is beginning to understand the importance of managing water on a catchment area basis; otherwise, if you do something upstream which affects something downstream, they are not co-ordinated.
The Government talk about peatlands and tree planting as tier 3 schemes, and it is easy to understand how they might work because of their nature. A catchment area scheme, by its very nature, will involve a very large number of landholdings and land managers. It can succeed only if a large proportion of them take part; otherwise, people may be persuaded to take part if they benefit but refuse if they do not. The whole catchment area must be treated as a unity. If such a scheme exists, will it be a condition on a landholding that is part of that catchment area, for all the other grants that it might want, to take part in the tier 3 scheme—the catchment area scheme? I ask the Minister that question because it is crucial.
I very much support what my noble friend Lord Bruce said about hill farming, and I added my name to his amendment. As someone who lives in the middle of the Pennines, in the north of England, I endorse everything he said. There is a tendency among some people to suggest that in such areas, land managers should be just that and that farming becomes irrelevant—in so far as farming takes place, it is there simply because the sheep are needed to manage the land in the way that people want, and hill farmers should become some special variety of civil servant operating on behalf of the Government, because that is the only way they can make a living. The hill farmers I have known over the years in the Lake District, the Pennines and Wales—and, indeed, in parts of Europe—are not the sort of people who want their lives regulated by officialdom. That is putting it fairly mildly. Will it really work like that?
It seems to me that in the hills, in the less favoured areas—in the Pennines, for example—farmers will continue to exist only if they can continue farming and can make enough of their income, their livelihood, from farming. They will not want to become land managers engaged by some bureaucratic board to manage the landscape in a particular way. There are parts where that will be the answer, but they will be a minority. By and large, if our economies, communities and landscapes in those areas are to survive, they will need to make enough money from what they produce. I see no way in which direct subsidy of the products they produce can be done away with in those areas. In the rest of England, perhaps so, but in those areas it will not happen. As we know, at the moment, people are producing milk for more than the price at which the supermarkets sell it; that is the cost to them. They are able to survive because they get the subsidy.
The only other thing I want to mention briefly is that I have two amendments, Amendments 80 and 81, which are amendments to an amendment proposed by the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, who has not yet moved her amendment, so it is a bit awkward. She is talking about big cities; I agree with everything I think she is putting forward, which is that in many urban areas, the rural fringe between the towns and the countryside is a bit of a mess. It is what some of us call the zone of tatty land. All I will say is that that applies to small and medium-sized towns, not just big cities.
Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Non-Afl) [V]
My Lords, I support Amendments 1 and 37. I understand what the noble Earl, Lord Dundee, said about Amendment 1: he seeks simply to probe in relation to financial assistance. We need to end the uncertainty felt by farming folk as we come out of the common agricultural policy and enter a new regime of funding. Therefore, there needs to be greater certainty about funding provided to farmers. Perhaps the Minister will provide some elucidation on that.
I support Amendment 37 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering. To me, many of the amendments in today’s groups deal specifically with how we manage our land environment and new financial assistance powers which are grounded in Clause 1. Amendment 37 gives an opportunity because it gives the Secretary of State the power to issue payments to those farmers who protect or improve and manage the landscape. It is important that farmers are allowed to manage their own land environment for food and livestock production because, after all, they work that land daily, they know about the soil texture and the production levels that the land they farm is capable of. In so doing, they are then enabled to protect the flora, fauna and wildlife, which are all part of the natural environment.
As the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering, said, Amendment 37 is about ensuring that that financial assistance recognises and is provided for the protection, improvement or management of landscapes and biodiversity through pasture-fed grazing livestock systems. She referred in particular to upland farming, and I recall that when she was in the other place as chairman of the EFRA Select Committee, of which I was a member, she had a particular passion for the needs of upland farmers. Coming from Northern Ireland and from an area where upland farming is a central part of farming, I fully understand that.
Like the noble Lord, Lord Bruce, I believe there needs to be some co-operation between the devolved regions and Westminster, or Defra, on how this funding could be managed, how the less favoured areas classified under the old common agricultural policy, including those upland areas, could be managed and protected, and how farmers using that pasture-led grazing system can eke a subsistence and a living out of it and ensure a good farming life.
Always remember that the world’s soils represent the largest terrestrial carbon reservoir. In the UK, two-thirds of our farmland is pasture. Ruminants can effectively convert this into produce of value to us all. The capacity of pasture to build the fertility and health of the soil and the vital role of grazing animals in that process have been known for a long time. With a growing recognition of the environmental costs, and the cost of concentrate feed around five times that of grazed land, there is a shift to feeding ruminants increasingly on pasture.
Pasture-fed grazing livestock systems show a care for the animals, the environment, the land, the soils and the landscape. They bring value to the land, to the farming industry and to us as consumers. As the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering, said, they produce good-quality food in terms of feed production. Pasture also provides a natural and unstressed environment in which ruminants can express themselves while producing nutrient-dense meat and milk that has measurable health benefits for us all and for the wider consumer market.
I believe this needs to be reflected in the Bill and am very content to support this amendment, which I have signed but is in the principal name of the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering. I hope the Minister can provide us with some elucidation on adding that as a purpose for financial assistance and ensuring that the purpose of financial assistance in itself is much more, shall we say, mandatory than simply permissory.
Baroness Meacher (CB) [V]
My Lords, I will speak to my Amendment 79; I thank the noble Lord, Lord Greaves, for his support. This is a probing amendment. It aims to ensure that development of the land around our large towns and cities will feature in the Government’s strategy. By “large towns and cities” I am referring to urban areas with a population of at least 200,000, but of course priority is bound to be given to our great metropolitan cities—London, Manchester, Birmingham and others.
We know that green-belt land represents 13% of England’s land-mass: 1.6 million hectares. I believe the green-belt area doubled in size between 1979 and 1993. According to the Government’s official climate change advisers, the UK needs 1.5 billion more trees to absorb sufficient carbon dioxide and help restore wildlife. We can argue about how much agricultural land should be given over to trees, but there are swathes of undeveloped green-belt land. Surely we can do a great deal better than we do at the moment, not only for our urban populations but for the climate.
Mass tree planting is just one part of the solution to the green-belt wasteland, if I may call it that. Others include agricultural and horticultural development to provide the nearby urban populations with fresh food, in particular fruit and vegetables—avoiding the climate-destroying long-distance transport too often involved currently. Of course, an effective green policy for the green belt would need a shift in people’s attitudes to eating out-of-season fruit and vegetables. If people continue to demand to eat strawberries in December, however much we grow on the green belt will not help the climate as much as it should and could.
Finally, some investment on the green belt should surely be into energy products: solar panels and wind farms. Again, proximity to our metropolitan areas and other large towns and cities should be a driving factor for that. I hope the Minister will assure the Committee that climate-friendly development of the green-belt land will be an important element in the Government’s plan.
Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con) [V]
My Lords, it is a great pleasure to be here today and to contribute to a debate on this wide-ranging group. I was quite taken aback to be balloted out of speaking at Second Reading. I could barely be more steeped in agriculture. I was brought up on a family farm in Wiltshire and used to stand in gateways from an early age to help my father keep the cows in order; I even knew their names. My Civil Service career was mainly at the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, where I was responsible for the farm woodland scheme and the Food Safety Act. I spent more than 15 years as a director at Tesco and devoted a lot of energy to farming matters and green issues. I was a director at 2 Sisters Food Group before joining the Government. Now, to declare my current interest entered in the register, I am chairman of Assured Food Standards—Red Tractor, as we call it—which is responsible for assuring some £15 billion-worth of British food a year from all four nations of the UK.
In my view, anyone should be able to speak at Second Reading, and I hope the powers that be have learned from the unjustifiable exclusion of several of us. I also express my concern that my noble friend Lord Dobbs was excluded from proceedings in Committee today owing to the loss of an email and the deadlines laid down by the House under Covid. All this underlines the need to get back to normal working, as Peers on all sides of the House are beginning to say. However, I put on record my thanks to my noble friend Lord Gardiner for the courtesy of a meeting to discuss my thoughts.
I turn to my Amendment 82 on impact assessment. This Bill, especially Clause 1, represents a huge change in farming and countryside management in the UK; just look at its extraordinarily long title. This needs to be quantified. We need to look at the economic costs, benefits and risks that the new framework will entail, so it is a perfect candidate for an impact assessment at the Bill stage, when the parameters are being settled.
Interestingly, the Regulatory Policy Committee, which has the important responsibility of independently—I emphasise that word—vetting the quality of government departments’ impact assessments, agrees. From its relatively narrow perspective, it advised on 20 February that the Bill will have “significant impacts on businesses”. I cite the radical changes to financial assistance and its tiers and conditions, and the shift in marketing standards and carcass classification, which we will discuss next week.
The fact is that impact assessments should have been submitted to the RPC for independent scrutiny, seen by Ministers and provided to Parliament. I know how valuable this can be to us. For example, DWP did a high-class job on the Pension Schemes Bill, which eased its passage. The RPC added value to an MHCLG assessment on plans to exempt extra floors on housing developments, pointing out the need to provide for the cost and risk of moving telephone masts—vital to HMG’s important plans for digital connectivity. Data, cost and risk assessment are essential to good government—allegedly one of the reasons why the Prime Minister and his consigliere Dominic Cummings are reforming the Civil Service.
Although the subject of my amendment is the framing of the financial assistance scheme itself, that stage would be far too late. I believe the Government could help themselves and Parliament by submitting an impact assessment for this scheme—and, indeed, for this whole Bill—now, and promising to act similarly for future Bills on the environment and trade. They might even adapt the assessment framework to encourage the sort of data analysis favoured by Mr Cummings. I hope the Minister will seriously consider my request before I return to the matter on Report.
The Earl of Caithness (Con) [V]
My Lords, I will pick up a theme started by the noble Earl, Lord Devon, when he mentioned the importance of this Bill. This is an absolutely vital Bill—a watershed Bill in British agricultural terms. It is going to be a template for the future, very much as the 1947 Act was a template for farming for about 50 years. It is a privilege to be allowed to take part in these proceedings, which demonstrate how important it is for the Government to get the Bill absolutely right, because it will set the tone for farming for many years to come.
The noble Earl, Lord Devon, was also right to question the wide spread of the Bill because the wider the Bill is spread, the less money there will be to go around, and important projects could well fall by the wayside. I too urge the Minister to clarify exactly how far this Bill is going to spread, whether reservoirs are to be included and whether the whole of forestry is to be included. There is a definitional problem here as far as I can see. In Clause 1(1) we talk about woodland and in Clause 1(2) we talk about forestry. Do these mean exactly the same things? I hope the Minister can be clear about that before we move to the next stage.
I added my name to two amendments in this group and I will first talk to Amendment 37, moved by my noble friend Lady McIntosh of Pickering. I was attracted to this amendment because it refers to
“protecting or improving the management of landscapes”.
Farmers do not exist in isolation but within a landscape, and farming is absolutely crucial to that landscape and its productivity. I am a great believer in multi-functional landscapes. There is no such thing as the average farmer: farmers vary hugely, as does the soil on which they farm. What is able to be grown in one field could be very different from that grown in an adjacent field, perhaps because the soil has changed from green sand to heavy clay and there are two different products to deal with it. Farming is therefore a much more complicated business than a production factory.
The idea of landscapes is gaining momentum, as the noble Lord, Lord Greaves, said and I agree with him on this point. The key factor in making landscapes work sensibly is to work on a big, cohesive basis. The Minister knows a lot about the great success of the Northern Devon Nature Improvement Area, which is a template for how such projects could work. It is working on a water catchment area, as the noble Lord, Lord Greaves, said, and it brings farmers and other users of the countryside together to get the right policy for that area.
Amendment 7, which is a probing amendment, concerns growing crops for biofuel. There is potentially a very big future market for farmers growing bioenergy crops such as miscanthus for carbon capture and storage. I would not want them to be unable to obtain taxpayers’ money, considering the public good they would be doing. Can the Minister confirm that bioenergy crops are also included in this ambit?
Turning to Amendment 67 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, I like the idea in principle of trying to attach the rewards of this Bill to the Environment Bill. Of course, there is a fundamental flaw in the noble Lord’s proposal. If, for instance, he had a farm that was subject to a tier 3 grant in a nature recovery area, he could well be signing up purely to get the money. If I were farming outside that area—not a nature recovery area—but wanted to increase my songbird population, I would be excluded by the noble Lord’s amendment. I hope the Minister will take up this point because it is key to the success of this Bill. We have to enthuse the farmer: I would much rather the farmer was enthusiastic about biodiversity and improving the ecology and the soil—wanting to spend the time doing it—than in the scheme purely in order to get the grants.
Lord Wigley (PC) [V]
I am happy to follow the noble Earl, Lord Caithness. I certainly identify with his comments on the 1947 Act and its significance. God help us if agriculture went back to the state it was in in the 1930s. There needs to be a reliable, transparent and dependable framework which our farmers and everyone involved in the countryside can depend upon. I draw attention to my interests as declared in the register.
This Bill applies primarily to England, although Wales will also come within its scope until such time as Welsh Ministers decide to have our own legislation. As the noble Lord, Lord Bruce, mentioned a moment ago, Amendment 66 addresses the question of the relationship between Wales, England, Northern Ireland and Scotland and the new regimes that will emerge. In the context of the European Union, there has been a framework for some understanding, whereas at the moment, unless some mechanism is brought in, there is a danger of us not having such a framework. My Amendment 66, which is in this group, attempts at least to flag up this question and seek an answer. This issue is probably better addressed later in the Bill, when we have already dealt with provisions relating to Wales—Schedule 5 and Part 7. Amendment 290, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch, is probably a better point at which to address it. None the less, my amendment gives the Minister an opportunity to explain the initial thinking on it.
I agree with what was said in introducing the first amendment about the need for certainty and clarity. We need transparency regarding what exactly is going to replace the existing regime. The CAP can rightly be criticised for being expensive and bureaucratic, but it had one benefit: it brought certainty. It is important that farmers and others have certainty. In order to invest in the land, they need long-term certainty. We need to investigate that issue in Committee.
I also accept entirely what the noble Lord, Lord Bruce, and others said about less favoured areas. We need clarity and certainty there, too, because they depended so much on the European regimes. I support the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, on the question of reservoirs and water storage—an issue that might become even more important, given the climate change dangers we are facing. Having said this, many of these issues will be discussed in greater detail in considering later amendments, so on that basis, I will curtail my remarks at this point.
Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP) [V]
My Lords, it is always a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Wigley. I will speak to my own Amendments 8, 22, 25, 31 and 50, which all relate to the issue of air pollution. I also support the amendments signed by my noble friend Lady Bennett of Manor Castle and Amendment 37, on pasture-fed grazing livestock systems, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering.
In this clause, there is near-unlimited potential for amendments, so we should all be commended if we manage to stay focused on our most pressing issues. As I said, the main focus of my five amendments in this group is on reducing the air pollution that results from farming and from land management, and on recognising the benefits of doing so.
Agricultural activities are a critical source of air pollution in rural areas—not just the fumes from machinery but the chemicals, slurries and manures that are applied to the land. Reducing this air pollution would obviously be of great benefit to the people who live and work on and around the land, but it would also benefit nearby towns and villages while reducing the accompanying smells. In most cases, farming-related air pollution is not an inevitable by-product of farming activity; it is in fact a huge waste of resources. For example, the offgassing of ammonia and nitrogen gases is an escape of nutrients that would be much better off retained in the soil.
Lord Thomas of Gresford (LD) [V]
My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, and I certainly support her in her concern about air quality. Clause 1(3) of the Bill reads as follows:
“Financial assistance may only be given in relation to England.”
Amendment 66, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, to which I have added my name, adds to that,
“or to facilitate and implement the development of a framework for agricultural co-operation between England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland relevant to the purposes in subsection (1).”
In his speech, the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, called for certainty and clarity, and I certainly support him on that.
I have no objection to the Bill being, in the main, limited to England, because Wales passed its own important legislation in 2015 on land management and sustainable development. The Well-being of Future Generations (Wales) Act 2015 set out goals for Wales of a very similar nature to Clause 1, although perhaps with a rather wider scope. Goal 2 says that Wales is to be:
“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).”
Other goals call for:
“A Wales of cohesive communities”
and
“A Wales of vibrant culture and thriving Welsh language.”
The Act places all public bodies under a duty to carry out these goals, and it sets out the planning framework for achieving them. I have no doubt that there are similar aspirations in legislation in Scotland and Northern Ireland.
In achieving the goals set out in the Welsh Act or the goals for which financial assistance is to be available under this Bill in England, each administration is constrained by the nature of the land: its situation and its climate within its jurisdiction. Soil depth and quality, slope, wind exposure, drought and flooding—as referred to by the noble Earl, Lord Devon—are factors that cannot be changed by government decree.
As the noble Lord, Lord Bruce, pointed out, most of Wales is a less favoured area. Indeed, there is only one area of grade 1 land in the whole of Wales. It is some 400 acres around the village of Holt on the edge of the River Dee and the English border—some three miles from where I live. I do not have the happiest memories, I can tell your Lordships, of picking strawberries for two and sixpence an hour there as a schoolboy, with my nose pressed closely into grade 1 land.
Amendment 78, which I support, seeks to add to the goals for England set out in Section 1 an explicit reference to maintaining support for hill farms and other marginal land previously designated as less favoured areas. I support that amendment because it encompasses a large part of the agricultural industry in Wales.
However, suppose a conflict arises as to the level of support a Welsh hill farmer receives as compared to that of the Yorkshire farmer of the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh. This could lead to significant competitive advantage or disadvantage in the United Kingdom single market. Levels of support between the four nations are bound to diverge. I referred to this issue at Second Reading, where the noble Duke, the Duke of Montrose, said that
“I am struck by the absence of any hint of common frameworks for the devolved Administrations.”—[Official Report, 10/6/20; col. 1802.]
He asked the Minister to indicate progress in the area of agriculture.
A paper published a year ago by the Cabinet Office, entitled An Update on Progress in Common Frameworks, contained this paragraph:
“The UK Internal Market. The UK Government continues to seek development of a shared approach to the UK Internal Market with the devolved administrations, and, alongside the work being undertaken by policy teams, we are considering how to manage internal market issues across framework areas.”
The paper contained an extensive illustration of a framework agreement, but in the field of hazardous waste. It describes, in considerable detail, the policy area, the scope of the framework agreement, an outline of the legislation required, how decisions are to be made, the roles and responsibilities of each party, dispute resolution and many other sections.
Seeing that it is government policy to abandon the common agricultural policy in six months’ time, I think we are entitled to know where we are and to have the questions that we put forward at Second Reading answered. I am with my noble friend Lord Greaves; we do not want to have an agricultural industry, particularly in the Pennines or in Wales, that is paid to mow the grass, clip the hedges and mend the stone walls, while we get our lamb from New Zealand, our chlorinated chicken from the United States, our beef from Brazil and our pork from the Netherlands. We want a vibrant countryside producing food—and healthy food at that—short supply lines, local produce for local people and an internal market that reflects the diversity of our farming but allows the four nations fair and competitive markets.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab Co-op) [V]
My Lords, I intend to be brief, as requested. I am very proud to be a member of the excellent organisation Peers for the Planet, set up by the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, and a number of other colleagues. I want to see a much more sustainable farming system that incorporates a good balance between food production on the one hand and environmental protection on the other.
My main aim today is to support Amendments 1 and 74, moved so well by the noble Earl, Lord Dundee—I am glad we were able to get back in touch with him after that technical problem. These amendments will ensure that the Government must provide the financial resources necessary to support farmers to change their practices and to make these aims possible.
I believe that there should not be just an opt-in button for the Government when providing financial assistance to farmers, with the vital support that they need. With major changes expected in how we farm and utilise the surrounding land to protect wider biodiversity and provide a more inclusive system—one that is for the wider public benefit—the Government must provide the necessary financial assistance to support these infrastructural changes.
The noble Lord, Lord Teverson, and others have mentioned ELMS—the environmental land management scheme—which is of course a central part of the Bill. It needs to be effective and attractive for farmers, while being deliverable by the Government. There therefore needs to be much greater support from the Government, not only in funding for equipment but in supporting new technologies, skills development and providing advice on signing up for new schemes.
Finally, as one of the large number of Scottish Peers I am glad to see speaking in today’s debate, I agree wholeheartedly with the noble Lords, Lord Bruce of Bennachie and Lord Wigley, and others. I too am keen to highlight the need for strong co-operation among all four nations of the United Kingdom. We saw the recently published report of the Constitution Committee highlighting the concerns about relations between the UK and the devolved Administrations. Disputes between the UK Government and the devolved nations are in danger of becoming increasingly likely after Brexit. Can the Minister, in summing up on this debate, give the Committee an indication of what work the Government are doing to proactively and effectively engage with the home nations to ensure that, where there are areas of devolved competence, there is as much co-operation as possible?
Baroness Bryan of Partick (Lab) [V]
I speak in support of Amendment 66, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Wigley. If the UK had not been in the EU in 1997 when it started along the road to devolution, it would have been obliged to give more thought to the relationship between the four nations. As it was, EU regulations ensured common standards across a range of areas so that while agriculture was a devolved power in Scotland, most of the rules came from Europe. If the UK had not been a member of the EU when devising a system of devolution, there would have had to be much closer consideration of how decisions would be made on areas of common interest that cross territorial divides. That process would inevitably have resulted in changes to how Westminster interacted with the devolved Administrations and we may well have developed a more federal system of government.
However, we are where we are. In devising a way of recognising the rights and responsibilities of the four parts of the UK, there should be an acceptance that each Administration has parity of esteem. This will not be easily achieved when there is hostility, suspicion and concerns about Westminster power grabs. Whatever the reason for the lack of progress on common frameworks, the impact on the industry has been uncertainty, insecurity and concern for the future. For the politicians, it could further damage the prospect of ongoing co-operation, just at a time when that is vital for agriculture and other industries. However, I am pleased that the Minister will be moving an amendment that may alleviate some of the objections from the Scottish Government, who claim that the powers being given to the Secretary of State ought to require the consent of Scottish Ministers.
It is of course Northern Ireland that has been made integral to the withdrawal process. Just last week, your Lordships’ EU Energy and Environment Sub-Committee completed a short inquiry on agri-food and the Northern Ireland protocol. The overwhelming view of those awaiting details of how the protocol will affect them was concern about the lack of meaningful government engagement. The fear is that any changes in standards will impact on the viability of Northern Ireland agriculture. There is real concern that the Bill does not provide sufficient safeguards.
If it is the case that we need a UK-wide internal market to replace the EU internal market, we have to work urgently to establish its rules of operation. It may have to involve a four-way arrangement, with each Administration having a right of veto. It cannot be the UK Government acting as a player in the discussions and then as final arbiter of the outcome. I hope that the Minister will take on board the issue of co-operation that the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, has raised with his amendment and that we can work for co-operation between the nations of the UK.
Lord Marlesford (Con) [V]
My Lords, I declare my interest as a Suffolk farmer. It must be a matter of real regret that the Second Reading of this important Bill was, in effect, guillotined. Only six hours were allocated for that debate, meaning that some 65 of the 90 Members who wished to speak were able to do so—and they had only four minutes each. Frankly, if there had been another two hours at least the other 30 Members could have been heard.
I am glad that we have my noble friend Lord Gardiner to shepherd us through what will be a complicated and controversial Bill, with this mass of amendments. He is one of the two finest Agriculture Ministers that we have had in the 29 years that I have been a Member of your Lordships’ House, the other being the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, who sorted out the shambles with the Rural Payments Agency, which his predecessors had failed to do. Although I was not one of the lucky ones to speak at Second Reading, I have, of course, read the whole of the debate. This first group of amendments covers a wide spectrum, so I make no apology for focusing on the context in which they should be considered.
The move from the confines of the EU’s CAP is a moment of both opportunity and danger. We should remember that the three objectives when the CAP was first established back in 1962 have not lost their relevance today. They were market unity, protection of that market and the need for financial stability in rural communities. The late Lord Cockfield, who I think was the United Kingdom’s second Commissioner in Brussels, used to describe the CAP as the marriage contract for Europe between France and Germany. France would accept German manufactures and Germany would look after French farmers. Both countries flourished in this marriage: German manufacturers came to dominate Europe, while France led Europe with a highly efficient and constantly modernising agricultural system.
Agriculture has, over the decades, been subjected to huge pressures and swings between prosperity and depression. Much can be learned by following the price of wheat. It had been at dangerously high levels, causing much social distress, in the first half of the 19th century. During the Napoleonic wars it reached £28 a ton, without allowing for inflation. That price was not reached again until 1953. Those high prices were of course helped by the 30 years of protection under the corn laws. After the American Civil War and the railways opening up corn-growing in the Midwest, a great agricultural recession reached Europe by about 1870, with wheat prices reaching as low as £5 a ton by 1894. After a revival to £15 during the First World War, there was another major agricultural depression during the 1930s, already referred to this afternoon, when wheat went back to £6 a ton. After a revival of output during World War II, there was a prolonged period of agricultural prosperity.
Farming has become hugely dependent on the common agricultural policy which, for many medium-sized farms, comes to an average of 70% of any taxable profit. In some years, it is well over 100%, but it is seldom under 35%. The idea that agricultural production can be sustained if a large proportion of this money is—[Inaudible] —schemes is high risk, as far as any sustainability of the food supply is concerned. That is why the basic concept of a Bill that says that public money is payable for public good only, and that food production is not a public good, is dangerous thinking, not just for farming, but for the whole rural economy. Above all—[Inaudible]—must be protected not by tariffs—[Inaudible]—food production or imported food—[Inaudible.]
Baroness Finlay of Llandaff (CB) [V]
The noble Lord, Lord Wigley, has described why it is essential that, although agriculture is devolved, financial support decisions intersect to affect all the UK. Wales has led the way with its legislation to look at the future generations principle, as set out by the noble Lord, Lord Thomas of Gresford. We must also look to future generations in this legislation, recognising all partners in the legacy of the land and all it produces. The infrastructure to recognise this in practice must be in place.
The approach of the Government, in listening to Wales, has resulted in government amendments that Wales requested and I support. Collaborative working needs to be locked into a framework carried forward for future generations through clear financial arrangements that recognise diversity across the UK. Less favoured areas must be supported, as described by the noble Lord, Lord Bruce of Bennachie, because support for variation in activities in farming results in far wider support to the economy in these areas. Devolution requires co-operation, and I hope that we will pursue Amendment 66 further.
Baroness Butler-Sloss (CB) [V]
Rather unusually, my Lords, I speak not to support an amendment but to oppose some. I live in Devon, owned Dartmoor ponies and share the concerns of the Dartmoor Pony Society and other Dartmoor groups about some of the amendments to Part 1 on financial assistance. These groups have no criticism of the present clauses and the financial assistance proposed is much welcome. We are concerned, because the amendments should not be accepted. There are two in the first group about which I wish to speak, Amendments 17 and 27.
The effect of these amendments is either to exclude or to reduce the preservation of the semi-wild ponies on Dartmoor. Amendment 17 does not include native ponies, because the definition of wildlife does not include it, so there is a problem with using “conserves”. Amendment 27, by leaving out “native livestock” and “native”, would completely exclude the semi-wild Dartmoor ponies, which are such an iconic part of Devon and English heritage. I therefore hope that these two amendments are not accepted.
Lord Whitty (Lab) [V]
My Lords, I asked to intervene on this group primarily to make a few general points, which relate to Clause 1 and the amendments to it, in this and subsequent groups. I also register my strong support for a couple of amendments that have already been spoken to. First, the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, spoke about the amendment relating to air pollution, which I strongly support. Secondly, Amendment 51 and other amendments tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Greaves, relate to the public good that farming provides in relation to the rural community and economy.
I speak having been Agriculture Minister when the last dramatic change to the EU—and hence UK— subsidy policy was made in 2005 with the official reform. That did not go entirely well. As the noble Lord, Lord Marlesford, said, it was introduced with administrative shambles here, although not quite so much in other countries. It was based on two premises that proved not to be the case. The first was that abolishing production subsidies would deliver us a multilateral trade agreement—the Doha round that never materialised. The second was that moving subsidy from production to the land would enable us to effectively ensure the environmental and agricultural status of all agricultural land, through a system of cross-compliance. Theoretically that has been the case and has worked in some places, but in many it has not, because of a lack of enforcement and clarity in the bureaucrats who were supposed to support it.
I strongly support the concept of public good in Clause 1 itself. However, we cannot get away from the fact that this introduces a system of subsidy that is substantially more complex than previous systems. The additional amendments, many of which I support in principle, probably make it more complicated. There is a need for farmers to relate to a much wider range of bodies than currently, not just in the way they practise farming but in their receipt of the subsidy—ranging from the Environment Agency to the water companies, private companies, local authorities and, presumably, the office for environmental protection and other bodies that will be set up by the Environment Bill and which we have not yet seen.
The noble Lord, Lord Teverson, warned us against putting everything into silos, and I recommend that the Government observe a number of principles in introducing this system. First, they should take it in stages. I therefore oppose any slow-down in the seven-year switchover period. Secondly, they need to require a system of whole-farm certification, in one form or another. That does not necessarily have to be onerous. It could include framework agreements for receipt of subsidies and be based on existing voluntary and commercial schemes. Thirdly, they need to provide a better system of advice and support to farmers. I mention ADAS; it does not have to be the same as ADAS, but farmers will need additional support. Fourthly and crucially, it needs to be made clear which bodies are responsible for which forms of support, and which for the responsibility of enforcement of standards and the conditions attaching support.
I favour multiple forms of support for farming, because farming has multiple outputs, but it is complex and the Government need to be clear, early in the process, what the bureaucratic structure is, how agencies will be co-ordinated, to what degree we can rely on commercial or voluntary arrangements and whether the agencies are adequately resourced and have adequate powers. If we do not get this right in the first year or two of switchover, there will be multiple problems later. The Government need to make this clear, because farming is not solely confined to itself. It is part of the rural economy and community, the food system, the nation’s health and diet, and the local, national and global environment. Government support needs to reflect all these dimensions but, for it to be a success, we need to be a lot clearer than the Bill and the Government currently are.
The Duke of Wellington (Non-Afl)
My Lords, I rise to comment briefly on and support three amendments. I should declare my agricultural interests as detailed in the register. The first is Amendment 37, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering, relating to pasture-fed livestock. There is much evidence that extensively grazing livestock on pasture, both lowland and upland, is the most efficient way to convert grassland into a food product for human consumption. Feeding concentrates to livestock is certainly a great deal less efficient in terms of use of resources. On arable land, cereals and similar plants should ideally be grown for human consumption. We have plentiful grasslands in the United Kingdom. They absorb carbon, if correctly managed, and produce food, if grazed by the right breeds of livestock, so I strongly support Amendment 37.
I also support Amendment 78, in the name of the noble Lords, Lord Bruce and Lord Greaves. Hill farms are of great concern, particularly the smaller ones, to me and many others. They are all marginal, almost by definition. More than their total profit comes from current forms of financial support. I have an amendment in a later group which seeks to protect the basic payment for the next three years for smaller farms in less favoured areas. All these farms, almost without exception, lose money, and they survive only through financial support, so, using the words in the amendment, I certainly support that Ministers should,
“have regard to maintaining support for”
these small farms. When the Minister replies, it would be very helpful if he could give us some reassurance on this matter. I also hope that the noble Lords, Lord Beith, Lord Greaves and Lord Wigley, may support my Amendment 149 which comes in a later group.
The third amendment which I shall support is Amendment 91, in the name of the noble Earl, Lord Devon. He specifically refers to wetlands. I think he has in mind lowland wetlands, but in many upland areas there are very important wetlands. They are an important absorber of carbon. Many of these upland wetland areas have sphagnum moss and other plants that absorb a great deal of carbon. If the noble Earl believes that it is advantageous to include wetlands in the definitions, I am happy to support him.
These three amendments would improve the Bill and, if they are brought back on Report, I will be happy to support them.
Baroness Young of Old Scone (Lab) [V]
My Lords, I would like to make a general point about this group. We have a considerable number of amendments to Clause 1. They add further purposes for which the Secretary of State can give financial assistance. In my view, the Bill runs the risk of becoming a bit of a Christmas tree—everybody wants to hang a bauble on it. Many of these baubles are lovely. They highlight important activities which the new environmental land management scheme should support, such as integrated pest management and nature-friendly farming. I have signed to support some amendments, such as those on agroforestry and agroecology, so I am as guilty as many noble Lords in wanting to hang baubles on this Christmas tree as it passes. We all want our bauble to shine to impress on the Minister how vital they are so that he will consider whether these additions could be added to the Bill.
However, I think we need to examine our conscience and look at whether some of these proposals can be delivered under the current purposes in Clause 1, since they clearly come under the heading of improving the environment, mitigating climate change or improving soil et cetera. Many of them are about management practices rather than the purposes that those management practices are intended to deliver. So, although I will polish my baubles nicely when the amendments I have signed come up in order to impress on the Minister that they are important issues, I think we all have to ponder whether we really want the Christmas tree to crash to the ground overwhelmed by the weight of amendments in its first clause and to create an overly complicated framework for the future of agriculture and land management.
I shall also comment on those amendments in this group that could be interpreted as a return to payments directly for food production. We all know from the past that that distorted markets, encouraged environmental harm and ended up being a rather poor use of taxpayers’ money. The Bill needs to be much more visionary than that. It is a ground-breaking opportunity to set a new UK-based framework for agriculture. It needs to be focused with rapier precision, not a loose, baggy monster.
Finally, I support Amendment 1, which requires that the Secretary of State “must” fund the public goods that are listed in the Bill, rather than a discretionary “may”. We need a duty on the Secretary of State, not simply a power.
Baroness Mallalieu (Lab) [V]
My Lords, I support Amendments 37 and 78. A great many noble Lords from all sides of the House have done so with great eloquence, so I will cut my speech short. The Bill needs to be beefed up in relation to pasture-fed grazing systems and support for hill farms and other marginal land.
In speaking as I do, I declare an interest in addition to those set out in the register as a patron of the Exmoor Pony Society and as someone with a particular interest in the conservation of rare breeds. I follow on from the remarks that have already been made by the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss. Version 1 of the Agriculture Bill contained no provisions such as those which are now set out in Clause 1(1)(g), which provides the possibility of financial assistance for,
“conserving native livestock, native equines or genetic resources relating to any such animal.”
In tandem with the noble Lord, Lord De Mauley, who I think is going to speak later, if this version 2 Bill had emerged with the same deficiency, we had intended to try to introduce just such a provision, so I am grateful that this second version made good that deficit as a result of a number of approaches from the Rare Breeds Survival Trust and many others, assisted, I do not doubt, by the Secretary of State for the Environment’s personal knowledge and appreciation of the value of the British Lop pig, a breed on the endangered species list.
It was therefore with some dismay that I saw Amendment 27, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, which proposes to widen the clause from native livestock to all livestock at a time when we all know that funds are going to be very limited. Were he to succeed, he would so water down the provision that the very purpose of this paragraph would be rendered pointless. The Explanatory Notes to the Bill say that it is,
“to provide financial assistance for measures to support the conservation and maintenance of UK native Genetic Resources relating to livestock or equines.”
A dilution of such funds as are likely to be available would necessarily weaken our ability to meet our obligations under Aichi target 13 of the biodiversity convention and United Nations sustainable development goal 2.5, both of which require us to conserve the diversity of our livestock breeds.
The amendment would remove something which I believe could be a means of encouraging and incentivising farmers to invest in rare and native breeds, many of which have gone already. We are only just at the very beginning of an appreciation of the genetic bank that we possess in relation to our native breeds. We are only just beginning to carry out widespread genetic testing, which is revealing just how precious and potentially valuable some of those genetic qualities are. A genetic ability to cope with extreme weather conditions, such as that possessed by the Dartmoor hill ponies of the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, the ability to thrive on inferior pasture, like the Exmoor pony, and docility, good mothering abilities and not running to excess fat, like George Eustice’s British Lop pigs, have not just an actual value but a potential one, which is as yet often unknown.
Some people still keep these breeds because they like them, out of tradition or sentiment, or due to local culture, which is not unimportant. However, without an incentive to farmers to conserve them, which is often the case at present, many have been lost and many more are under threat. Clause 1(1)(g) is their lifeline, and I hope that it will not be cut.
Lord Empey (UUP) [V]
My Lords, I wish to add to the remarks made by one or two participants about being balloted out of the Second Reading. That was most unfortunate. With other major Bills in the pipeline, I hope it will be possible to ensure that alternative mechanisms are found to enable people to fully participate.
I will speak specifically to Amendment 7, in the name of my noble friend Lord Caithness, which refers to growing crops for biofuel. Biofuels are something that we in Northern Ireland know a little about, because we have had one of the greatest financial scandals ever on the back of them. The renewable heating scheme was designed to replace the use of carbon-based fuels with more natural products, but of course it collapsed. Nevertheless, the point made in the amendment is important, and we need to ensure that it is included. If we are to meet our environmental targets over the years, we need to include not only fuels that are currently available but fuels that may subsequently become available—otherwise a great opportunity will be lost.
A number of Members have referred to hill farms, and that is a huge issue for us in this part of the country. But there is a wider point I want to make to the Minister—one which is perhaps not fully understood. Whatever is in the Bill, the fact remains that, to all intents and purposes, we remain, in very large measure, within the European Union as far as agriculture is concerned. Therefore, amendments that we will come to later in the Bill, including one of my own on standards, become progressively more important.
In many respects, the Government have refused to concede or acknowledge the reality of what they have agreed with the European Union in the protocol that deals with Northern Ireland. Even this week, as we are having this debate, people here are talking about building border control posts and asking how many acres need to be set aside to provide for suitable inspections.
In many respects this Bill is taking place in a vacuum, in that some of us are still bound, as far as state aid is concerned, and will have to comply fully with all that. Perhaps the Minister will address this in his winding-up speech, but I wonder whether he and his colleagues fully appreciate the downstream consequences of this as we go forward. If trade deals are done with other countries and cheap food emerges, we in Northern Ireland will still be bound by European Union standards; our farmers will have to ensure that welfare and other matters are fully adhered to. So if imports are not protected and we do not get the adequate standards in the Bill, our farmers will be at a huge disadvantage.
The noble Lord, Lord Wigley, referred to a framework, but the framework we already have is the CAP and the standards that flow from it. In other words, we will end up with a two-track agriculture system in the United Kingdom—and we should bear in mind that agriculture is a much more significant part of our economy in Northern Ireland than it is in the UK economy as a whole.
I hope that the Minister, in winding up on this group, will be kind enough to address this issue and tell us how it is proposed to ensure that we have at least a parallel process in the United Kingdom, given that one part of it will be governed by the European Union, into which we will have no input, and yet the rest of the country will not. That is the dilemma that we face here.
Lord Adonis (Lab) [V]
My Lords, I want to pick up where the noble Lord, Lord Empey, has just left off on the hugely important issue of co-operation between different parts of the United Kingdom.
Amendment 66, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, looks to be superfluous, as I assume that the Minister will tell us that there is absolutely nothing to prevent a framework for agricultural co-operation between England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland by the free will of their respective Governments. The issue, then, is not whether a legal power is needed—I assume that no legal power is needed—but what machinery the Government envisage will be needed to promote co-operation between England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland on agriculture and the environment; I am not aware that any such machinery is in place at the moment. I think that the Committee would be grateful if the Minister could address that point. It is about not just ongoing talks but what institutional machinery there will be to promote co-operation.
The noble Lord, Lord Empey, has just raised a very important point. In respect of co-operating with Northern Ireland, that means co-operating with the EU. As so often in our debates, I am afraid that everything comes back to Brexit.
This relates also a very important amendment in this very large group which has barely been discussed, because there are so many other issues. Amendment 234, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, proposes that:
“The Secretary of State must establish a service to provide a means for farmers to associate, and to support, advise and assist them to deliver improvements in food security, nutrition and environmental standards.”
In respect of agriculture and the environment, this strikes me as a very similar role to that which NICE—the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence—plays in respect of the NHS, as an independent body promoting best practice on the basis of thorough research and engagement. Most people who have experience of the NICE arrangements in the NHS think that they work well, have by and large promoted good practice, and to some extent have helped to depoliticise what would otherwise be very thorny issues.
Amendment 234, and the body that the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, envisages, looks to me to be a very good move, and I hope that the Minister will be able to indicate a willingness to consider it. It may be that we could work this up into a proposal between now and Report. I cannot think of any good argument against it, including from the Government’s perspective, because it is in the interests of the Government that a body of impartial evidence and the promotion of best practice are encouraged.
This comes back to the issue raised by the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, in Amendment 66. I am a supporter of devolution, and it is to my great regret that, in the past 20 years, Scotland and Wales have tended, as a matter of reflex, to define themselves against what England does. I think that sometimes they are right to do so and sometimes they are wrong to do so. To my huge regret, often what happens in Scotland and Wales is not a decision about whether or not policies are better than those in England, but just wanting to be different from England.
There is a real danger for the management of environment and agricultural support that Scotland, Wales and to a lesser extent Northern Ireland—Northern Ireland is effectively still part of the EU—will seek to define themselves against England for the sake of doing so. That would be hugely regrettable. Therefore, machinery to promote co-operation is important. An impartial best-practice body of the kind envisaged in Amendment 234 could act as a means to promote co-operation between the constituent parts of the UK. It would not be the Government in London seeking to promote in any partisan way their own policies and the interests of England; rather, if this works well, it would be serious experts and a serious process of promoting consensus that could, if that is done, even though it starts off being in respect of only England, have an impact on promoting co-operation between Scotland and Wales. It could also interact with the European Union, which would be good in its own right, but also enormously beneficial for relations with Northern Ireland.
Lord Chidgey (LD) [V]
I will speak to Amendment 83 to Clause 1, in particular the work that my noble friend Lord Greaves mentioned. I will highlight the issue of catchment areas and draw attention to the fact that, while they create great difficulty in some areas of the country, they also do so in some of the most favoured areas, if I may put it that way.
The catchment areas in question are a series of spring-fed chalk streams and their seasonal winterbournes, which define the landscape around Winchester in north Hampshire. Many people know that they are famed for their world-class fly fishing for the most favoured in the rivers Test and Itchen, and for the watercress industry around Alresford. The unique landscape is a product of human as well as natural history, providing drinking water for Southampton and, at one time, pure water for banknote watermarking at the De La Rue works near Basingstoke.
In the last 50 years—certainly while I have lived in the area—more than half of all wildlife species have declined across the UK, never more so than in Hampshire’s winterbourne and watercress landscape, including its conservation areas, sites of special scientific interest and areas of outstanding natural beauty. Historically, efforts to protect rivers and their ecology focused on the channel and possibly the immediate floodplain. There now needs to be an increasing awareness that a river system is inherently linked to and affected by its wider catchment.
The water framework directive recognises this and requires a holistic view of the needs of the freshwater environment. It identified the pressures affecting Hampshire’s seven headwater chalk streams and set targets for the improvement of the chemical and ecological status of each. It also required stakeholders to be involved in local decision-making and delivery. Clearly, the quality of the water in these headwater chalk streams is critical, contributing as the streams do to the Test and Itchen river systems and the groundwater resource they share.
It therefore has to be a cause of considerable concern that recent surveys have shown that all the streams are at risk from excessive levels of nutrients, sediment and pesticides, the worst case being the River Alre, which is literally on my doorstep. The lake behind a weir, built in the 16th century to control the river waters before entering Alresford’s watercress beds, is heavily polluted with nitrates and phosphates, largely due to agricultural run-off. The Environment Agency is understood to have recently tested the water in the River Alre above the lake and found it below standard. An industrial-scale salad-washing plant is nearby and is licensed to use the river water to wash all pesticides and other chemicals from salads imported from Europe and elsewhere for distribution across the UK.
Apparently, the Environment Agency is required to negotiate with polluters over infringements rather than close them, with predictable results. The Agriculture Bill should present an opportunity to strengthen this rather toothless organisation to tackle this extremely harmful abuse. To give just one example, Salmon & Trout Conservation considers the presence of these pesticides responsible for the marked decline in Gammarus freshwater shrimp, the foodstuff of the trout of the river.
I draw your Lordships’ attention to the UK Progress on Reducing Nitrate Pollution report from the other place. Have the Government taken action to take up and recognise the recommendations made by the committee that produced the report? They will be essential to tackle this hugely damaging problem of nitrates in our watercourses, water tables and water catchments.
Lord Inglewood (Non-Afl) [V]
My Lords, as one of the silenced ones at Second Reading, I must begin by declaring my interests in the register. In particular, I point to the fact that I farm, have land and am involved in land management in Cumbria. I endorse the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Greaves, and a number of other noble Lords about the condition of the uplands.
Although this afternoon should have been the second day of the Second Reading—after all, the Bill is not due to conclude until September—I do not propose to make a Second Reading speech. Rather, perhaps unusually, I intend to follow the recommendation of the Government Front Bench not to be repetitious. I have heard the various contributions made across the Floor of the House and it is clear that they run with the grain of my thinking through this discussion of the first group of amendments, many of which would improve, refine and calibrate the general principles on the Bill. It is necessary to be clear what the generalities might in turn entail.
Many of your Lordships have said that we are at a very important point of change—perhaps as important as joining the CAP or even the great radical changes of the 1940s. In fact, I suspect it is a more important change, because we have not only political and administrative changes; they are combined with very far-reaching scientific and social change and a great deal of enhanced environmental consciousness. That is why I join a number of your Lordships in saying that it is a great pity that this legislation is not being run in substantive tandem with the new environmental legislation due to come on to the statute book. The underlying reality is that many of the Bill’s provisions cannot be free-standing in their own terms. The remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, were particularly important in this context when he talked about the complications and importance of systems and administration.
Lord Judd (Lab) [V]
My Lords, my interests, all unremunerated so far as they are relevant to the Bill, are listed in the register. I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Gardiner, as he listens to these amendments, will be encouraged and proud that he has stimulated so much interest among his fellow Peers and that so many are anxious to help him ensure that the Bill is as effective as it should be. I always enjoy following the noble Lord, Lord Inglewood. As someone who lives in Cumbria, he has illustrated again today why he is held in such widespread respect. He always speaks with knowledge, experience, balance and wisdom and we should be grateful for that.
I strongly support Amendment 83, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Greaves—in many ways, I wish I had put my name to it. If financial assistance is to be effective, it must be informed by reconnaissance and strategic understanding of all that is associated with the specific objective for which it is being given. This amendment makes a terrific contribution to the quality of the Bill by pointing out that it is essential to look at all the other activities, many of which will be receiving government assistance in their own right, and to make sure that what is being done fully harmonises with them. It strengthens the effectiveness of what is being sought. It also makes for better financial accountability, because it is possible to see how relevant the financial support really is. It does a great deal to enhance the potential contribution being made. The noble Lord, Lord Greaves, has done a great service by bringing to bear his considerable experience on the front line of local government and rural affairs. I hope that he will pursue this issue on Report, if necessary, and that the Minister will feel able to respond positively.
Lord De Mauley (Con) [V]
My Lords, I will speak briefly on Amendments 5, 17 and 27, in the name of my noble friend Lord Lucas. I declare my interest as a landowner and land manager, and as Master of the Horse. My concerns centre on the fact that the breeds of semi-wild, native ponies on Dartmoor and Exmoor, and in the New Forest, are, in some cases, on the critically endangered list, yet represent important gene pools which we lose at our peril. These genetic resources could offer a sustainable way to increase food production and/or improve our capacity to adapt to climate change. They could also help us tackle the emergence of new animal or plant diseases by contributing to a breadth of genetic traits. As has been found in areas such as plant science, genes from ancient species can help us tackle 21st-century problems. These ponies do not fit neatly within the definition of wildlife, any more than they do within that of livestock. Amendments 5 and 17 could mean that the potential financial support and protections currently offered by the Bill for semi-wild pony herds is significantly impaired.
For the same reason, like the noble Baroness, Lady Mallalieu, I have significant—perhaps greater—concerns about Amendment 27. Removing the word “native” would destroy the whole reason behind the clause, changing its meaning entirely. The Explanatory Notes point out that the clause is concerned with
“the conservation and maintenance of UK native Genetic Resources relating to livestock or equines.”
As the noble Baroness said, Amendment 27 might also inhibit the UK’s ability to comply with our obligations under Aichi target 13 of the biodiversity convention and sustainable development goal 2.5, which require us to conserve the genetic diversity of the UK’s livestock breeds. If Amendment 27 were upheld, it could lead to the waste of a great deal of public money because it would support investment in any breed, without differentiation. I am afraid that I cannot, therefore, support these amendments.
Lord Morris of Aberavon (Lab) [V]
My Lords, I will say a few words in support of Amendment 78. I come from a long line of sheep farmers and I have no financial interest to declare, other than that my brothers, nephews and nieces continue the long family tradition. As I said at Second Reading, I am fully aware that the Bill applies to England and that it is for the devolved Governments to phrase their own financial provision, as they should, agriculture having been devolved. However, there is, allowing for divergence, an emphasis on a single UK market. For some years, the agreement reached with the Welsh Government will make that provision. My noble friend Lord Adonis coupled Wales with Scotland. He failed to understand the different approaches of Wales and Scotland in the agreements they have reached. The Welsh Government will, I suspect—hope—take fully on board what happens in England in the way agricultural support is drafted, and draft legislation suitable for the needs of Wales.
I will make three points. First, hill farmers operate on very narrow margins and survive, to some extent, on the present financial assistance. Secondly, there is only limited opportunity for alternative uses of the hills and marginal lands. Thirdly, there are possibilities for encouraging other financial uses of premises, particularly for tourism. It would be a great loss to the country, and to my nation in particular, if any substantial part of the hill farming industry went out of existence. The loss would not be confined to those engaged in the industry; it would affect those who enjoy the countryside and who visit the area from time to time.
Bearing in mind Gray’s elegy, an empty countryside would be very much less attractive to everyone. Hence, we need a policy for hill and marginal land. Do we believe in maintaining them, and to what extent? What financial support should we contemplate? This is crucial, so that such farmers can plan for the future. It would be an enormous loss to the whole country if we allowed hill farmers and marginal farmers to wither on the vine. I am therefore anxious to hear the Government spell out in detail their plans, so that those farmers know where they stand, what they can look forward to and what other financial support they can hope to receive.
Lord Campbell of Pittenweem (LD) [V]
My Lords, in the new farming environment there will be many challenges, which undoubtedly will affect some, if not all, of the four nations of the United Kingdom. In these circumstances, co-operation is not just desirable but necessary; that is why I support Amendment 66. Looking around us, we see the absence of co-operation between all four nations in relation to the virus. This should be an example to us of the importance of co-operation when it comes to agriculture. It is better to have an existing framework for Westminster, Cardiff, Edinburgh and Belfast than to deal with issues on the basis of ad hoc responses.
I have a few comments to add to the remarks of my noble friend Lord Bruce of Bennachie on Amendment 78. Support for what used to be the less favoured areas constitutes a set of public goods. First, it allows farming to continue in a viable business fashion. Secondly, it avoids the risk of land abandonment. Thirdly, it helps to maintain continued agricultural use. Of course, all three help to combat depopulation. But it goes further than that. Agriculture support helps to preserve communities and services such as education, and to maintain social infrastructure in areas where population is thinner than it is in the towns. Amendments 66 and 78 warrant support.
Lord Naseby (Con) [V]
My Lords, I have enormous sympathy for my noble friend on the Front Bench. This debate is all-embracing; I take a specialist interest in horticulture and forestry, but I feel almost out of my depth here. It reminds me of the Maastricht treaty, but I remind my noble friend the Minister: that was a Bill of four clauses, 500 amendments in order and 25 days of sitting, with three all-night sittings. Having said that, I am going to be brief, as there are only two amendments that I wish to comment on.
One is Amendment 5 in the name of my noble friend Lord Lucas, in which he suggests substituting “conserves” for “protects or improves”. In the debate, he reflected that “enhance” would be better. I think he is right, and I ask my noble friend the Minister to consider that.
Secondly, Amendment 7, in the name of my noble friend Lord Caithness, is quite important, inserting the phrase
“including growing crops for bioenergy”.
This is a vital area. I had the privilege of being on the energy Select Committee when there were the beginnings of some thinking about this. That was quite a long time ago, but if we are serious about carbon capture and storage, as I think we are in this country—there is a great deal moving forward on that—farmers must be encouraged to grow crops for bioenergy, assuming that the soil is suitable, et cetera.
I very much hope that my noble friend the Minister will be able to accept my noble friend Lord Caithness’s Amendment 7.
Lord Tyler (LD) [V]
My Lords, the noble Earl, Lord Dundee, when opening the debate, observed that Clause 1 gives Ministers powers, not duties, so the financial assistance objectives of the Bill are only permissive and thus inevitably subject to the economic context in which it all becomes operational. It is all very well trying to allocate the most appropriate slices of the financial cake, as all amendments in this group do, but the overall size of that cake is the more critical issue for 2021 and beyond. Every single one of the bids for inclusion is at risk if the cake is drastically shrunken.
I said at Second Reading that I have no interests to declare, but in addition to substantial constituency and Commons responsibilities, until last year I had a small shareholding in a large farming company, and over the years, that enterprise had dairy and substantial arable interests, as well as renewable energy projects. I hope I can claim, therefore, to take an informed interest in the economic health of agriculture and rural areas.
The Bill is a legislative pig in a poke. Perhaps inevitably, but with dire consequences, it is entirely dependent on its context, and in the last week, since Second Reading, the likely context has deteriorated still further. First, the Government, for absurdly obstinate and dogmatic doctrinal reasons, refused to even consider giving the Brexit negotiators more room for manoeuvre by extending the transition. Secondly, Mr Frost then failed again to make any progress in the current discussions. Growers of fruit, vegetables and flowers are all too familiar with substantial frost damage. However, this frost damage is on an incalculable scale. We seem destined to charge towards a really bad deal for British agriculture, or, even worse, no deal at all. In his otherwise very comprehensive letter to us all on 29 June, the Minister completely failed to acknowledge this unprecedented uncertainty. He could make no concrete commitments. How could he, with the Covid-19 recession heading towards us at breakneck speed?
There are global trends to which our industry is especially vulnerable; for example, the failure of Trump’s attempt to build a market for US crops in China has left powerful American agribusinesses desperate to dump into the UK. On top of those major challenges, the combination of the Covid-19 recession and the Brexit failures is producing a uniquely unfavourable financial combination for UK farmers and growers, and the longer the crisis lasts, the nastier the results will be. For example, farmers will start to produce less. We are already experiencing the impact of having few of the 90,000 pickers we usually have from Europe. There will be resultant harvest losses. Then there is scarce credit. As operations slow down, loan terms are extended, cash is trapped and lenders are reluctant to finance commodities and are wary of volatile currencies. Governments everywhere will get scared. Export controls or attempted bans will cause price rises and shortages, with deprived communities hit disproportionately hard.
This all adds up to all the sectors of UK agriculture and horticulture finding it impossible to plan or invest in a climate of unprecedented uncertainty, just as the Government will be grappling with the worst economic crisis since the Second World War, and here, I thought the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Inglewood, were very relevant. In these circumstances, Ministers can hardly be blamed for being so vague about the multiannual financial assistance plan specified in Clause 4. I am willing to bet that this appears only much later in the year, long after the Bill has reached the statute book.
In his letter, the Minister wrote:
“The Government intends to provide more detail about the early years of the transition, including Direct Payments and future schemes, in the autumn.”
I warn farmers and growers not to expect a cheerful Christmas present. With all the other competing claims—the NHS, the care sector, schools, reviving our already hard-pressed manufacturing sector and trying to stabilise service industries that are forced out of Europe—the Treasury is never going to be very generous to farmers.
Clearly, No. 10 plans to bury Brexit under the Covid-19 recession, but it risks burying large numbers of farmers and growers in the process, with calamitous consequences for consumers and for the nation’s food security. These amendments are crucial. They require the Government to be realistic and frank, because empty promises are literally worthless.
Lord Blunkett (Lab)
My Lords, I am very pleased to be back in the Chamber after nearly 15 weeks, and to reflect on what the noble Baroness, Lady Neville-Rolfe, and others have said about the need to accommodate more Members and get back to normal as quickly as possible. I have a personal interest in that I have discovered that I am very poor at reading a speech into a computer microphone, or even improvising, and whatever skills I have in oratory, humour and irony are absolutely wasted when online—not that I intend to draw on all three of those this afternoon.
I want to reinforce points made by the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, and the noble Lord, Lord Greaves, and to comment on the speech by my old—not in age but in longevity of friendship—friend, the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher. For those who do not know, the city of Sheffield incorporates in its boundaries a substantial part of the Peak District; in fact, a third of the landmass of Sheffield is in the Peak park. For the benefit of the noble Baroness, I can say that it is not, like some other cities, tatty—I think that was the word used by the noble Lord, Lord Greaves—land on the edge of the city. It is an essential part of the Peak park, as well as a breathing space, as it always has been, for the city itself.
The reason I mention it is that, as lockdown diminished—this was not one of those forays to discover whether I could drive a car safely—I went out into the area, still in Sheffield, around the Redmires Reservoir, and heard a curlew, one of the greatest sounds you can imagine. As the speeches this afternoon have emphasised, I simply want to say that in conserving as well as developing our agriculture, we should nurture the natural environment. I am all in favour of growing trees—they have to be the right trees—but we need our moorlands. On a point about water-gathering and conservation, we need to understand the essential nature of upland wet areas, particularly the peat bogs, which 13 years ago dried out to the point where, at around this time, in late June or early July, we had the most enormous flooding. At that time, civil servants told the Secretary of State, who happened—and continues —to be a friend of mine, that we were exaggerating when we said we had a problem. When the RAF lifted people by helicopter off the Meadowhall shopping centre, and when a 14-tonne piece of equipment was lifted out of its moorings and swept 100 yards from the Forgemasters factory in the lower Don Valley, I think they may have changed their minds. We need to be aware of what we do, how it affects our environment and why the Environment Bill that is to be brought forward and this legislation should go hand in hand.
I want to comment briefly on land management. The noble Lord, Lord Greaves, is right to indicate that small farmers—tenant farmers, herdsmen—have a job surviving; they use their skills to try to make a sufficient living from keeping the countryside working. But I say to the noble Earl, Lord Devon, that there are large landlords who, like the Duke of Devonshire—no relation —have been struggling to manage the watercourse. They have been working to defend the river running through the land around Chatsworth House from the scourge of American crayfish—which is not one of the breeds that I hope we will be protecting so Amendment 27 is, perhaps, not appropriate after all. They have been trying to do this by persuading Defra to give them a licence so that, having dealt with these crayfish under proper regulations so that nobody thinks of farming them, they can dispose of the fish in a way that allows them to cover the enormous costs involved. I am talking about 20,000 crayfish per year from a stretch of water of just two miles, which destroy the embankments, undermine the area around and are incredibly dangerous in relation to flooding.
All these things go hand in hand. My plea this afternoon is that, as we go through this Bill in Committee and on Report, we reserve for amendments those things that are in synergy with each other, to ensure that the Bill comes out not as a Christmas tree but as a good English pine.
Viscount Trenchard (Con)
My Lords, I am delighted to follow the noble Lord, Lord Blunkett, and strongly endorse his remarks with respect to the need to get back to this House properly, as soon as possible. I declare an interest as a trustee of the Fonthill Estate in Wiltshire, as listed in the register. I have read and considered all 36 of the amendments in this group and believe that the majority are unnecessary, even if they are well intentioned.
My noble friend Lord Lucas likes to use the verb “conserve” and attributes to it a meaning wider than words such as “protect” and “improve”. I sympathise with his intention to broaden the scope of the purposes for which the Secretary of State may provide financial assistance, but I am not sure that his suggestion to use “conserve” actually clarifies approved purposes, except in the cases of species of animals and plants.
My noble friend Lord Dundee and the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, seek in Amendment 1 to clarify whether the Secretary of State really will provide financial assistance for the activities listed in Clause 1. I should have thought that this was obvious, but I welcome this amendment if it will encourage my noble friend the Minister to be much more specific in informing your Lordships of how much financial assistance will be made available under the ELMS scheme, and whether it will completely compensate for the loss of direct support payments, which will hit farming businesses hard in 2021.
It may be true that the larger estates are better able to survive the withdrawal of direct payments, but it is also true that the larger farming businesses employ a large majority of agricultural workers, and the prospects for those currently furloughed to return to the payroll will be enhanced if the Government can give a lot more clarity on how businesses can mitigate the loss of direct payments. Indeed, it should be made possible for those who are particularly innovative and active in introducing new, environmentally friendly practices to receive more than they have been receiving under the present system.
Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville (LD) [V]
My Lords, we have engaged in a long and wide-ranging debate on part of the first clause of this Bill, as tends to be your Lordships’ practice in Committee. The first clause of any Bill sets the tone for the rest of the Bill, and in this case, since agriculture is moving from direct payments under the EU CAP and into UK law, it is quite right that the powers surrounding financial assistance should be at the front of the Bill.
As we have seen from the debate on this group of 36 amendments, there are a range of views about what measures should or should not be included in the list of purposes for which the Secretary of State can give financial assistance. Some 40 Peers have spoken this afternoon, only 20 fewer than took part at Second Reading. The way that Second Reading was organised shut out a list of important Peers from contributing to this debate, and that could have been avoided by spreading the debate over two days. Like other Peers, I believe that the Government have a lot of lessons to learn from that.
The noble Earl, Lord Dundee, and the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle, feel that the Secretary of State “must” give assistance to all items in the list, and that this should not be left to his or her discretion but enshrined in the Bill. I support that view but there is a question mark over the number of additions that would be made to the list. There is huge uncertainty in the farming community about what is going to happen and how those who manage the land, grow crops, tend animals and produce food are going to make a living. The Bill presents an opportunity to move forward and away from what many saw as the straitjacket of the CAP funding, but this needs to be done in a way that will provide reassurance for all concerned, especially farmers. While I would normally support flexibility as likely to provide the best solution, in this case I feel that “must” is the only way to produce that reassurance.
My noble friend Lord Teverson spoke about the need for the nature recovery strategies to work together with ELMS. I support this view but note the objection to it from the noble Earl, Lord Caithness.
Water management is key to land management. The noble Earl, Lord Devon, would like water removed from the list in Clause 1(1) while the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering, would like to know how flood mitigation will be provided for, how new reservoirs will be funded and whether that will be under the Reservoirs Act 1975. How we make provision for the management of our water resources is key to the success of land management and food production. The noble Lord, Lord Inglewood, made links with the Environment Bill and I support that view; it is key that the two Bills are worked together.
Opposition to Amendment 27, which would take out “native”, has come from several noble Lords: the noble Lord, Lord De Mauley, the noble Baroness, Lady Mallalieu, and the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss. I support them in opposing the amendment; I think it unwise to broaden the clause.
I was interested in Amendment 7 tabled by the noble Earl, Lord Caithness, regarding growing crops for bioenergy, and others have supported it. However, we should tread carefully here. The spectre of growing bioethanol crops in South America to power domestic vehicles in the West led to the start of the destruction of the rainforest in a gallop to plant palms to provide oil for this purpose. We have all seen the disastrous results of that and the massive loss of habitat of some of the world’s most iconic species. Great care is needed.
Many noble Lords have referred to the very wide range of the Bill, expressing concern that the agricultural budget will be spread too thinly. I would be grateful to hear the Minister’s response on that.
The reduction of air pollution is important and needs to be a thread that runs through the various clauses of the Bill. I look forward to the Minister’s response to the points raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, supported by the noble Lord, Lord Whitty.
Several noble Lords also spoke about how co-operation between the devolved Administrations will take place. These include the noble Lords, Lord Wigley, Lord Thomas of Gresford, Lord Foulkes and Lord Empey, and the noble Baronesses, Lady Bryan of Partick and Lady Finlay. It is really important that the devolved Administrations are fully involved in what is going on.
Many noble Lords are attempting to widen the scope of Clause 1 to be in effect a catch-all. Hill farming, as described by my noble friend Lord Bruce of Bennachie, has been the subject of many debates in this Chamber. Despite warm words from the Government, we have still not received a firm commitment that hill farmers will receive support—that is, unless the contribution from Defra to suggest grazing bison on the uplands is serious. That would appear to be in direct conflict with one of the main aims of the Bill, improving accessibility to the countryside. There is a world of difference between walking along an open footpath through a hillside of sheep and attempting to do that through a herd of bison. These areas are heavily dependent on subsidies but are part of the public good and deserve support in future, despite being classified as less favoured areas.
Given that the Bill is only a framework, it was inevitable that increasing its scope would be a prime objective for all taking part in this opening debate. Many of the amendments are vital to the success of a proper agricultural policy in England. Many deserve to be covered in other Bills, some in the upcoming Environment Bill. We have a long sitting in front of us and I look forward to the Minister’s response.
Baroness Jones of Whitchurch (Lab)
I am grateful to all noble Lords who have spoken on their amendments today. We have indeed had a very wide-ranging debate, and many of those amendments have set the scene for more detailed discussions that we will have elsewhere in the Bill as we journey through it. However, we do not get the opportunity to reshape the future of agriculture in the UK very often, so it is right that we debate and test the boundaries of what is possible within the constraints of a public subsidy as far as it can go. The fact that so many amendments have been tabled is a measure of a real enthusiasm among noble Lords to shape the legislation for the next generation into something that we can be proud of, but also something with which we can learn the lessons of the past.
As many noble Lords have said, their amendments are probing amendments, which do just that. As such, we welcome many of the intentions behind those amendments. I will come back to some of the specifics shortly, but I will make a couple of general points first.
First, we believe that the Bill is broadly on the right track and we welcome the improvements that have already been made since it was introduced. The underlying principle of public money for public goods is important and it is right that we should incentivise those who work on our land to restore and improve the natural environment.
Secondly, however we look at it, we are dealing with a limited pot of money. It would be a brave person who thought that we would get more than the £3 billion a year which the Government have already promise and— who knows—the economic crisis might even put that promise on the line. We will deal with the detail of how that money is to be divided up and allocated when we discuss amendments to later clauses, but we need to be wary of spreading too widely the purposes for which that money can be allocated. This point was well made by a number of noble Lords, and I liked my noble friend Lady Young of Old Scone’s analogy of a Christmas tree, with its baubles crashing down, overweighed with good intentions.
What we do not want is for existing active farmers, with the good will and enthusiasm to embrace good environmental practices, to find that they cannot access sufficient financial assistance to make their farm pay. I agree with my noble friend Lord Whitty that there is a danger of creating a very complex system of payments and tiers of regulations which is no better than the system that we had in the past. We do not want farmers to find that that very bureaucracy prevents them accessing the money to which they are entitled. We cannot make light of this, because the impact of the Covid pandemic has illustrated all too starkly that many farm incomes are indeed in a perilous position. We cannot replace one bureaucracy with another, and we need to make sure that the income of our farming communities, when they agree with the new ambitions that we have, is secure. As I have said before, this is a delicate balance between the environment and agriculture, and it is our responsibility to make sure that we get that balance right as we work our way through the Bill.
Thirdly, the one fundamental area in the Bill where I do not think the Government have got it right is food policy—the importance of farmers producing healthy food and contributing to greater UK food stability. We will return to this in later groups, but it is flagged up in this group in Amendment 234 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, which talks about better advice for farmers in order to deliver improved food security and nutrition. I agree with all of that, but the advice should be expert advice. We have some later amendments about the need to put some limits on the number of advisers and consultants who will try to move into this space, when really what we need is for the money to go to its core purpose.
I turn to some of the amendments. The noble Earls, Lord Devon and Lord Dundee, and other noble Lords referred to the need for farming to play its part in mitigating climate change. We agree, and that the management and protection of soils and peatlands can play a huge role in good agricultural practice, as well as mitigating climate change. The noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, raised the important issue of the impact of agriculture on air pollution. We agree with those points. Our Amendment 272, which we will deal with separately, sets out in more detail what we believe to be the Government’s responsibilities to ensure that agriculture meets all the Paris Agreement targets on climate change.
The noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, the noble Earl, Lord Devon, and other noble Lords sought to spell out in more detail what good environmental policy should look like. They referenced pasture-fed livestock, the protection of soil and the link with natural recovery strategies. They rightly raised the need for those policies to have a synergy across other Bills, such as the Environment Bill, and environment policies. We agree with these points and feel that there ought to be a way of embedding those principles in the Bill but also making sure that we have a common approach on these issues. We also agree with the noble Lord, Lord Bruce, and the many other noble Lords who have spoken on this issue that hill farmers and upland farmers have a particular need and desire for reassurance about and support for their future. I hope that the Minister will be able to provide some of that reassurance in his response.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Lord Gardiner of Kimble) (Con)
My Lords, this has quite clearly been an extensive debate; it has been most rewarding for me to hear such a range of views on Clause 1 and financial assistance. I say to the noble Lord, Lord Judd, that I have thoroughly enjoyed this debate. I agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch: there will be disagreements along the way—I have no doubt—but I think we should all be enthusiastic about the opportunity that we have.
I open by declaring my farming interests as set out in the register. I also say to the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, that I agree with the sound comments he made in many respects. That is precisely why there is an agricultural transition period of seven years and why we are working with farmers on tests and trials, so that we get this right.
Turning to the amendments, as I must and will, I may ask for your Lordships’ indulgence and support in my discussion with the Chief Whip if I go a little over time, because I want to address all the amendments properly.
On Amendment 1, we have chosen to use the term “may” rather than “must”, which is entirely consistent with other legislation. Free from the constraints of the common agricultural policy, the Government need the flexibility to reprioritise and adapt in response to changing environmental circumstances and new evidence. “May” also gives the flexibility to establish and fund schemes for a range of different purposes. The Government set out their long-term vision for what we will use public money to fund in the 25-year environment plan and the policy document published alongside the Bill. I emphasise to all noble Lords and absolutely confirm that there is no doubt that we will introduce new financial assistance.
I agree with the noble Baronesses, Lady Young of Old Scone and Lady Jones of Whitchurch, and my noble friend Lord Trenchard that the construction of the Bill is deliberately broad so that we can embrace almost everything raised on many of the matters. I will have to say that the Government are very clear on some amendments. If, when we come to it, I mention ponies and other breeds, that is the context in which the Government have problems with some of the amendments. We want to ensure that we have it broad deliberately, so that many of the points noble Lords have made are embraced.
On my noble friend Lord Dundee’s Amendment 74, the Government recognise that farms should be incentivised to deliver multiple purposes. However, it will be very hard, if not impossible, to separate farms into single-purpose or multipurpose farms in this way. To take an example, if financial assistance is given for
“managing land or water in a way that protects or improves the environment”
under Clause 1(1)(a), many of those actions are likely to contribute to other purposes, such as mitigating or adapting to climate change in Clause 1(1)(d), reducing environmental hazards in Clause 1(1)(e) and so forth. This would tie the Government into creating systems that attempt to unpick the complexity of the natural environment to meet a bureaucratic requirement—albeit, I accept, a well-intentioned one. I think this was a point the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, made from his experience: beware of creating a bureaucratic monster by trying to have a perfect form.
In Amendments 4, 16, 21, 91 and 236, the noble Earl, Lord Devon, seeks to limit the scope of the purposes for giving financial assistance to the management of land by removing “water”, thereby narrowing what the Government can pay for under future financial assistance schemes. There are critical actions related to the management of water, and indeed of livestock, that the Government would want to pay for, particularly through ELM. For example, the mitigation of and adaptation to climate change can be supported by encouraging farmers to manage their livestock feed, to help reduce emissions that are emitted from livestock. Protecting and improving our environment or our cultural and natural heritage may involve the management of water. For example, creating, maintaining and restoring water-based habitats on farms can support a healthy ecosystem and ensure that we meet our commitments to biodiversity. This may involve the management of ponds, lakes and ditches, which would not be included in a definition of agricultural land.
I take this opportunity to refer to the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Chidgey, about nitrates. The Government have taken action to mitigate nitrate pollution by placing farmers under regulations and providing them with grants. Farmers in nitrate-vulnerable zones are bound by the nitrates regulations.
The requirement of
“managing land or water in a way that maintains, restores or enhances cultural or natural heritage”
includes the management of our wetlands. Just to clarify, the marine environment is not in scope of the Bill, but I was very pleased that the noble Lord, Lord Blunkett, mentioned curlews. A much longer conversation with the noble Lord is required on crayfish. I have worked on this, and there are difficulties. At a later time I will perhaps spend some time explaining the issues.
Clause 1(1)(j) provides for financial assistance to be given for the protection and improvement of soil. This assistance will further aid in meeting this ambition for sustainably managed soils. Soil is clearly one of our greatest natural assets and the Government are committed to having sustainably managed soils by 2030, as set out in our 25-year environment plan, under which we are developing a healthy soils indicator. I also say to the noble Earl, Lord Devon, that the Reduction and Prevention of Agricultural Diffuse Pollution (England) Regulations 2018 define environmental outcomes that land managers must take account to avoid, including soil run-off and erosion. Indeed, civil sanctions are available.
On Amendments 5, 17, 89, 27 and 28 from my noble friend Lord Lucas, the Bill already allows funding for the management of land and water in a way that conserves the environment or our cultural or natural heritage, which could include “conserve” habitats. On the amendment that would expand the definition of “conserve”, Clause 1(5) already includes creating, protecting and maintaining.
Clause 1 allows support for the conservation of species and habitats if it contributes to protecting and improving the environment or maintaining, restoring and enhancing cultural or natural heritage. For example, ELM could support farmers to manage moorlands using traditional grazing techniques and native breeds or provide funding for the creation of new woodlands or flood plains. Clause 1(1)(g) and 1(1)(i) could be used to incentivise farmers to rear rare and native breeds or support measures to utilise crop wild relatives, thereby safeguarding those genetic traits that may offer a way to sustainably increase food production or improve our capacity to adapt to the emergence of new animal or plant diseases. I say to the noble Baronesses, Lady Mallalieu and Lady Jones of Whitchurch, the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, and my noble friend Lord De Mauley that the Government are wedded to the current drafting of the Bill. I say to my noble friend Lord Lucas that the Bill already caters for support for the conservation of newly established crop species that contribute to the provision of public goods.
Amendment 45 touches on existing work taking place to support the development of the UK’s domestic animal feed production. We are already funding research in this area through the Pulse Crop Genetic Improvement Network, a project due to end in 2023. A key part of our programme looks at how to produce better-quality animal feed and potential alternatives to imported soya protein.
On Amendment 76, the Government’s current proposals for the ELM scheme already include a significant space for the direct involvement of local groups. Local nature partnerships would be ideally placed to apply their expertise and ensure that tiers 2 and 3 of ELM are designed to support land managers in the delivery of environmental outcomes by providing the right things in the right places. The Government are already working closely with many of the organisations involved with local nature partnerships.
The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord McNicol of West Kilbride) (Lab)
My Lords, I have received requests from a number of noble Lords to speak after the Minister: the noble Earl, Lord Devon, and the noble Lords, Lord Bruce and Lord Teverson. I call the noble Earl, Lord Devon.
Earl of Devon
My Lords, I apologise for keeping us a little longer on this group of amendments, but I would not do so were it not for a very important issue. I refer to Amendment 236 in my name relating to soils. In August 2019, Defra stated explicitly
“we will not allow environmental standards to decrease when we leave the EU.”
If I understand the Minister correctly, he is saying that the GAEC standards I referenced, particularly standards 4 and 5 on maintaining minimum soil coverage, will not be replicated in domestic legislation—those standards will be lost and standards will decrease. Could he clarify that point?
Lord Gardiner of Kimble
My Lords, I want to make sure I get this right. I referred to the 2018 regulations for England about environmental outcomes that land managers must take action to avoid. There is no suggestion of any diminution of standards—in fact, quite the reverse. I will have to write and will put a copy in the Library. I want to make sure that I get all the regulations and how they are interconnected right. There is no intention from the Government on soil quality other than to enhance it, because that is the route to vibrant agriculture. I am most grateful to the noble Earl and will provide full details of all the requirements that will remain.
Lord Bruce of Bennachie [V]
I thank the Minister for his very positive response to my amendment, which I never doubted he would provide. When he says that the scheme will be farmer-led, how will that come about and how soon? Is there any timetable for when the structure of direct support for farmers in the context of rural payments will be clarified? I am sure he appreciates that the hill farming sector is extremely vulnerable, fragile and anxious to get a clear steer. How and when will that be provided?
Lord Gardiner of Kimble
I am most grateful to the noble Lord. I did not have an opportunity to flesh out the tests and trials. The tests and trials on the ELM are designed to work with ranges of farmers in different topographies and tenures in all parts of the country. There are schemes that will be suitable. In this case, there are clearly tests and trials with hill farmers in the uplands so that we can ensure that those schemes are in place. Some are under way already and farmers are receiving financial assistance for participating in them.
When we roll out the entire ELM in 2024, we want to follow the success in the recording and improving of those tests and trials so that we can ensure that, in the case of the noble Lord’s concern about hill farmers, these schemes will automatically work for them. Hill farmers are key to ensuring that the environmental enhancements we all want are available. I am confident that, working with those hill farmers, we will get the sorts of schemes that will be of benefit and that the farmers will actively wish to be engaged in.
Lord Teverson
I thank the Minister for his extensive reply. I was particularly pleased that he mentioned the shared prosperity fund. I realise that it is not a Defra issue, but it is an important structural issue and there has been very little information about when this fund, which is a Conservative Party manifesto pledge, will actually start. While I would like to ask him that question, I am sure he does not know the answer to it as it is not a Defra issue. However, will he really press his colleagues in Government to get this fund going? The EU structural funding is going to end very soon. There will be an end there, and it is very important that the rural parts of that funding start. Will he press his colleagues to get announcements here so that people can prepare and not have this gap?
Lord Gardiner of Kimble
I am most grateful to the noble Lord. Clearly, rural-proofing means that anything we do across Whitehall should be considered in terms of the impact on rural communities, and UK shared prosperity means rural communities. I am also grateful because I can assure him that the whole of Defra takes this approach and, as Minister for Rural Affairs, I get my teeth into this regularly because clearly we need to work with MHCLG so that this goes across all communities and will benefit rural communities, which, after all, have so much to offer the country.
The Earl of Dundee [V]
My Lords, I join other noble Lords in welcoming and supporting the Bill, and I thank the Minister for his helpful responses to this Committee debate, which has covered a wide range of matters concerning sustainable food production and a well-cared-for environment.
Proposed amendments have included: requests for better soil management; the mitigation of floods—whether or not these may have been induced by crayfish, as the noble Lord, Lord Blunkett, warns; the reduction of air pollution; a focus on the predicament of farmers having to deal with hill and marginal land; the case for being ever alert to promote innovations, such as further developments in energy crops or new livestock species; the case for improved management of land around towns and cities where it is not being used for housing development; the need for timely advice to farmers on how to raise and maintain standards in terms of the Bill; the need for impact assessments; and, not least, the desirability that all parts of the United Kingdom should benefit together from the Bill’s useful prescription.
I am grateful to the Minister for his comments on my Amendment 74 about how incentives might be paid slightly differently for those farms that are responding to what is already offered by the Bill. Meanwhile, I beg to withdraw Amendment 1.
The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord McNicol of West Kilbride) (Lab)
My Lords, we now come to the group beginning with Amendment 2. I remind noble Lords that anyone wishing to speak after the Minister should email the clerk during the debate. Anyone wishing to press this, or any other amendment in this group, to a Division should make that clear in debate.
Amendment 2
Lord Addington
Lord Addington (LD)
My Lords, the origins of this amendment are fairly straightforward. As we go through this Bill, we talk about great changes to agriculture. We start off with a list of changes and where things are going to change in relation to government support for agriculture. We do not actually define those whom we are going to support, and I feel that they should be on the face of the Bill. If they are not on the face of the Bill, we should know exactly where that list is.
All the positive changes that might affect the environment and people’s access to it, which I will discuss at considerable length in the next group, are going to be dependent upon farmers taking much of the action and getting through financially in what they need to do. Unless the Government pay them, it is not going to happen. Unless we are getting some sort of new force that is going to go marching into the countryside equipped with whatever it is and on whatever legal authority it is—which I have seen no hint of anywhere —we are dependent on those involved in farming and related industries actually to fulfil this for us. The only way we can reasonably expect them to do it is if they are properly paid, so there is a symbiotic relationship there: they get money for changing their behaviour.
The change of behaviour for farmers is going to be difficult: culturally, financially and in every other way, it is going to be a change in a way of life in many cases. To what extent and where depends on who they are and in what situation, but that is what I am trying to get on the face of the Bill. I do not pretend that this amendment is perfect because I literally went through and thought, “Good, this is in the Bill or that’s in the Bill” and at the end of it, I said, “What about land managers? Let us try to get some idea about this.” They are the delivery system for the other changes set out in the Bill, so let us make sure that they get some support. It does not really go much further than that, other than to say that we have to make sure that they are there and identified. If the identification comes somewhere else, that is great, but if it means running down a list saying, “By the way, if you look across and go legally through and jump across sideways, that’s where the definition is,” that is the classic way to make mistakes. The lay person will not be able to find out what is going on. We have all, in this Chamber, been involved in situations where somebody said, “Legally, it was there,” but we could not find it. It might be slightly more straightforward here than in some of the cases we are talking about, but that is what I am trying to get at.
There is another amendment in my name, Amendment 115, on the accountability system for taking on any action. That probably would have read better in the next group, but if the Government have any undertakings on this, let us find out what is going on. That is really what my initial thinking was about, and I look forward to hearing from those who are going to speak on the rest of the group, but that is my primary motive for moving this amendment. I beg to move.
Baroness McIntosh of Pickering
My Lords, I will speak to three amendments in my name in this group and thank the noble Baronesses, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb and Lady Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville, and my noble friend Lord Caithness for supporting Amendment 65. The purpose of this amendment is again to probe the Government. As was said in conclusion by the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch, we have a limited pot of money being spread very thinly. I hope that we can focus where the money goes on farming, obviously within the remit of agriculture, horticulture and forestry.
In keeping the focus on farming, I will turn to Amendment 103. Just before I do, I will take the opportunity to ask my noble friend the Minister about the types of activities that he feels may be covered. For example, there have been sectors in the past that have received no support but have spent huge amounts of money—I am thinking in particular about antibiotic use, which we have reduced at some considerable expense, although I think this has put Britain in the driving seat with regard to the reduction of antibiotics.
There may be possibilities of supporting, for example, pigs through outbuildings and storage facilities, which will help to tackle climate change and bring a number of benefits while improving the way that we manage—or rather pig producers manage; I do not, obviously—manure and slurry reduction. While it has not been beneficial in the past, I hope that it will help to tackle climate change and increase production. Is that something that my noble friend thinks might be supported?
I want to flag up something that I am sure we will return to in later groups: the potential funding gap between when basic farm payments phase out and when ELMS—which I know we are going to explore in more detail in further amendments—will come in. How is that going to be addressed? I am also looking at the socioeconomic aspects of this, where natural capital seems to have been the focus of great emphasis, although it benefits only those who own the land, for the most part, and it cannot necessarily be shared with tenant farmers, who actually do much of the farming on that land in many circumstances.
I thank the noble Baronesses, Lady Ritchie of Downpatrick, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb and Lady Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville, for supporting Amendment 103. I am sure that my noble friend will recognise this text because it has come, in great part, from the Government’s own paper Health and Harmony. The public good is very ephemeral and opaque, and I give him the opportunity to put more meat on the bones and reward activities that are related directly to the production of food or farming in its broader aspects and, furthermore, activities from which tenants may benefit. We might focus too much on trees and the planting of crops like special grasses that soak up the water and have many qualities, and I want to make sure that landowners and tenants will benefit.
Baroness Parminter (LD) [V]
My Lords, I will speak to two amendments I have tabled in this group, namely Amendments 118 and 121. These aim to ensure that we get a strong regulatory framework to enforce this new system of paying public money for public goods because, as it stands, the Bill says that the Government only “may” introduce regulations to do this. It should be not just a power but a duty to do so, given that what we are talking about is ensuring public confidence in the money spent to deliver societal goods.
We know that the current regulatory framework for farming is not fit for purpose. It is estimated that only every one in 200 farmers will get inspected, and the Government have known this for some time. They commissioned a review in 2018 but have not done anything since then to overhaul the existing regulatory framework, so it is really important that the Bill states that the Government have a duty to put together new regulations and work quickly with relevant stakeholders to draw up a new framework to give the public confidence. I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch, for supporting me in that amendment.
I appreciate that this is almost two sides of a coin. I am talking about the regulatory side that we need to ensure is in place to manage the giving of public money in the future. I am very much in support of other noble Lords, including my noble friend Lord Teverson and the noble Earl, Lord Caithness, who have talked about the vast majority of farmers; we know that they are doing and want to do the right thing, and there is a real need to ensure that, alongside a strong regulatory framework, there is good provision of advice. I want to ensure that Members do not think that I think all farmers are bad apples; they are not. However, we need to ensure that good farmers have their reputations preserved by a strong regulatory framework.
I would find it very helpful if in winding up the Minister would say something about the Government’s current thinking on the timeframe and the consultees—almost the how and the when—when they are producing this new regulatory farm framework, so that the public can have confidence that taxpayers’ money is being properly spent to deliver the environmental and animal welfare benefits that we all want.
Lord Lucas [V]
My Lords, I shall speak to my Amendments 108 and 109. I am looking for two reassurances from the Minister. The first is that we are going to look at a system of risk-based regulation. We have a lot of changes and improvements to make. We need a system of regulation which, supported by science, supports change without destroying older technology, in both of which aspects the EU system has proved deficient. Secondly, I want reassurance that we will permit local variation—indeed, individual variation. This ought to be a bottom-up system of support. No farm is the same as any other farm. No set of geology or human geography is the same. Everything will need to be local if it is going to work well. I very much hope that this is the way in which the Government are looking at regulation.
Amendment 110 has been stranded in this group. I will speak to this subject under the group beginning with Amendment 29. Suffice it to say that, as far as I am concerned, the answer lies in the soil.
Baroness Grey-Thompson (CB) [V]
My Lords, I apologise for not taking part in the Second Reading of the Bill due to logistical issues on my part.
I shall speak to Amendment 115 in this group, to which my name is attached. I support the words of the noble Lord, Lord Addington. There are many opportunities through amendments to the Bill to establish a different and positive way for more people to access the countryside. Existing public rights of way are the primary means by which people can get outdoors. The return on investment will be enhanced where existing access is well maintained so that the public can benefit from enhancement in, for example, biodiversity, cultural heritage and air quality.
It is also important that the regulatory framework that encourages farmers to keep paths clear as a condition of receiving payment from the public purse is right. I would like to see increased creativity in how we move forward with this Bill in creating paths, circular routes and links to connect communities with transport hubs and amenities and, close to my heart, in improving surfaces and infrastructure, such as gates and stiles, with less restrictive alternatives. They are often put in place to stop misuse but are a huge barrier for to wheelchair and handbike users. It would open up much-needed space.
A set of conditions, including those relating to public access, provides clarity for farmers over the baseline standards expected. It also helps to create a level playing field within the sector. Many farmers fulfil their legal obligations, so it would be unfair for those who do not to be treated equally, without any sanction for their failure to keep access open.
To sum up briefly my support for this amendment, I believe that, in the interests of transparency, information published should include details of the conditions of receipt of financial assistance and evidence of compliance with these conditions. As the money is from the public purse, it should be clear that recipients of funding under the scheme are meeting any conditions set by the Secretary of State.
Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb [V]
My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson. I was also excluded from the Second Reading by virtue of being a surplus Peer when we were not able to get all of us into our virtual Chamber. I am sure that that was in the early days of remote working and could not possibly happen again on any future big Bills.
I have signed three amendments in this group—Amendments 65, 103 and 106—which are all in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering. Clause 2 could be greatly improved so that the legislation and the resulting funding schemes reflect the scale of ambition that the Government are laying out. Amendment 103 would better target financial support to specific environmental and social outcomes. The conditions would help focus schemes around specific purposes, rather than leaving so much room for ministerial discretion. I know the Minister will soothingly reassure us about why this is all better left to ministerial discretion, but your Lordships’ House may favour the greater wisdom contained in our greater numbers. That is what I am hoping, anyway.
The other probing amendments in this group are about ensuring funding is directed to the most effective places to achieve the aims of the Bill. Funding must be available for a wide range of land managers, so that whatever are the most environmentally and socially beneficial activities can be encouraged. That said, it is worth probing the Minister on how the Government will ensure that that will be the case so that money is not put into the wrong hands. We must remember that these are large sums of money, so we must target them well and be able to explain who is eligible for public funds and why.
Some noble Lords have taken the opportunity to lobby for a return to the new normal of us all returning to the Chamber. I would just like to point out that many of us like remote working. We do not want to risk disease and death. We have to remember that coronavirus is likely to be part of the normal for the next few months and possibly years, so let us take advantage of the fact that we can be a hybrid House, unlike the House at the other end of the building.
The Earl of Devon
The amendments I have tabled in this group largely go to the same issue which the noble Baronesses, Lady McIntosh and Lady Jones, have touched on, which is who is to receive payments under the ELMS and for what specific land they are to receive them. Noble Lords will see that I have suggested that it should be agricultural land. As I said previously, this is the Agriculture Bill. I would hate these payments to go to highways, Heathrow or Hyde Park. As the Bill is currently drafted, it strikes me that environmental land management in all those non-agricultural spaces would qualify. For that reason, Amendments 3, 15, 20, 23 and 30 focus the Bill and Clause 1 specifically on agricultural land.
In Amendment 85, I have lifted the definition of agricultural land from the current rules for the BPS. However, I added to that definition “common land” because, under the current rules, there is some uncertainty around whether common land, which is often found in uplands which we have discussed a great deal today, qualifies, as the right to claim BPS for common land is quite opaque. I would appreciate it if, in summing up, the Minister could address how common land will be treated under ELMS, because a major concern for common rights holders on Dartmoor and elsewhere is whether they will qualify and how.
Amendment 64 suggests that ELMS payments should be directed to farmers and those who are active in the management of agricultural land. This amendment and its wording find favour with the NFU and is therefore strongly supported by the agricultural and farming community. It allows us to determine exactly who should be the recipients. As the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, said, we do not want the money to be given to people who are not engaged in agricultural practices.
Lord Greaves
I have just been told that because I was not here at the beginning of this group, I cannot speak. I thought that it was a Committee where you could wander in and out all the time. It is not a desperately important point that I want to make, so I will discuss it afterwards with people.
Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick [V]
My Lords, I support Amendment 106 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering. There are two principal points here. The Government want this Agriculture Bill, which is a major Bill and the first in many years, to be about public money for public goods. The second point was raised by the previous speaker, the noble Earl, Lord Devon: who is to receive those funds?
I believe that money should support those actively involved in farming activity. They used to be known as active farmers but, as the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, said, that definition has probably broadened now to the wider issue of agricultural activity. If that is the case, and the Government support it, then we can ensure high standards in environmental works on the farm and in food production. We can ensure high standards of food security and perhaps in so doing, we will be able to ensure, along with good food security, good accessibility to food for all in terms of the food chain.
On reallocated entitlements, applicant farmers must be able to demonstrate that they enjoy the decision-making power, benefits and financial risks attached to the agricultural activity on each parcel of land for which an allocation of entitlements is requested. That is right and proper; it is also ethical and moral.
Furthermore, the Minister referred during the previous group to the ongoing work and discussions between Defra and the devolved Administrations. What actual work has been done on broadening agricultural activity? Who will be eligible for such payments and what grades of activity will be eligible? Land ownership probably varies throughout the devolved Administrations compared with what pertains in England. Coming from the Northern Ireland context—there will possibly be some separate legislation for Northern Ireland—I know that we have a conacre system, which is an ancient Irish system whereby people keep land under conacre for one year. It differs from the tenant farmer situation that exists in Britain. What discussions have taken place on agricultural activity between the Minister, his ministerial colleagues in Defra and ministerial colleagues in the devolved regions?
The Earl of Caithness [V]
In introducing the amendment, the noble Lord, Lord Addington, said that farmers would have to get paid to do all these good works in the future. We should pause and thank all the many farmers doing exactly these now without any money at all from the Government. They are doing it of their own free will because they love the land that they farm—they might have been farming it for generations—and the biodiversity and nature that goes with it. We must pay them a big thank you for continuing the work.
The noble Lord, Lord Addington, jogged my mind. It slightly irks me that we paid farmers to take hedges out and destroy landscape and biodiversity. We are now going to pay the same farmers to put those things back. It is worth remembering that a lot of farmers did not take out any hedges and kept the biodiversity but got no money at all for that.
I put my name to Amendments 65 and 106 and I was pleased to do so. Amendment 65, tabled by my noble friend Lady McIntosh of Pickering, would add the words,
“agriculture, horticulture and forestry in England”
to the end of Clause 1(3). At the moment, the wording just stops at “England”. It seems logical to put the words in the amendment into the Bill.
While I am on forestry, my noble friend Lord Gardiner did not say on the first amendment—I am not surprised —what he actually means by “woodland” and “forestry”. Are they the same or two different things? If there will be grants for help for forestry and biodiversity, presumably there will be no grants for people planting vast acres of Sitka spruce, which are biodiversity unfriendly.
Forestry also raises another issue covered by Amendment 106: who gets the benefit of these payments of public money? I will focus on tenant farmers, as my noble friend Lady McIntosh of Pickering did. When I was a land agent, my experience was that pretty well every tree was not in the tenancy agreement; it belonged to the landlord. Tenants were not allowed to plant woodland. That was excluded and outside the tenancy agreement.
We have an imbalance here and two different classes of farmer. We have the owner-occupier, who can do everything on their own land, and the tenant, who will be severely restricted. Who will get the benefit from these payments? If the tenant signs up to a scheme, I know many landlords who will say to them, “Thank you; I’m glad you signed up to that scheme. I’m glad you’re getting the money. Your rent is now going to increase and I’m going to take most of that money from you because you can afford to pay it.” Who will get this money? Is there a way one can incentivise tenants to do these schemes and reap the benefit that they deserve for putting the risk, capital and expertise at stake in doing so?
Lord Wigley [V]
My Amendment 94, which I will speak to solely, addresses a central weakness in the Bill, identified in this debate and the preceding one: the open-ended nature of the powers given to the Secretary of State under Clause 1, which states that money can be used for
“managing land … in a way that … improves the environment”,
or cultural heritage, or mitigating climate change, or improving the health of livestock, presumably including racehorses et cetera. That strikes me as far too open-ended an approach in a Bill that is, after all, an agriculture Bill.
Therefore, later in Clause 1, at page 3, line 12, I propose that these words be added:
“‘land’ means land that is used for agricultural, horticultural or forestry purposes or which is intended to be so used, or used for purposes ancillary to those functions.”
That gives a clear definition, to my mind, of the purposes of Clause 1(1). Without something along those or similar lines—no doubt the wording could be improved—it is far too open-ended. Although the present Minister and Secretary of State would want to work within the confines of the Bill, once it is on the statue book it will be open to all sorts of abuse. I do not think that is the intention of an agricultural Bill and that is why I propose this amendment.
Lord Carrington (CB) [V]
My Lords, I declare my farming and land-owning interests, as set out in the register, in particular my receipt of basic payments over the years. I support Amendments 2, 3, 15, 20, 23, 36, 64, 85 and 106, which aim to concentrate this agricultural Bill on farming, horticulture and forestry, with the associated aims of encouraging sustainable farming, strengthening food security, and improving animal welfare, access and the environment. However, we need to consider the starting point and existing situation, if the Bill is to succeed.
Currently, farmers are governed by the CAP and receive area-based payments. Figures show that 25% of farmers are profitable without the BPS. Direct payments account for around 58% of average farm businesses’ income. Figures rise for both beef and sheep. Although it is accepted that area-based payments are going and that payments will be made in exchange for public goods, there is little understanding among farmers of what this means. This is not helped by the almost complete lack of detail. Only 10 days ago, I received the policy discussion document on environmental land management schemes. It says all the right things, but clearly demonstrates how much more is to be done. The low take-up of current environmental schemes is due to them being both complicated and bureaucratic.
Farmers are not a homogenous group of wealthy landowners; nor is land homogenous. Farmers have very different levels of education and expectations of life. The Bill will shock most of them, because so much detail is missing and may not be available until 2024. This brings into question the Minister’s statement that there is a seven-year transition period. We will be clearer about what we are transitioning into only after 2024, which makes it a four-year transition by some definitions. Many farmers will just close their eyes and continue to farm as they know best.
For the Bill to be a success, there needs to be a high take-up of the new ELM scheme, otherwise farming profitability will sink, farmers will go to the wall and important farming skills will be lost. To avoid this awful scenario, ELM details are essential as soon as possible. In particular, we need to know how much farmers will be paid. Area payments have worked well, in the absence of any other reliable measurement, so do not discount them, although they sound like winding back the clock.
Lord Randall of Uxbridge (Con) [V]
My Lords, this is my first opportunity to speak on this Bill, as unfortunately I did not make the cut at Second Reading. I would like to say briefly that, having been involved in the backroom in a previous iteration of this Bill, as adviser on the environment to Theresa May, I know the immense hard work that has gone into it by many civil servants, the Bill team and Ministers. This is a pretty difficult circle to square, because there are so many interests—as we have heard today. I would also like to pay tribute to Michael Gove, who had the inspiration to bring forward the innovative and ground-breaking idea of money for public goods.
In that capacity, I was fortunate enough to make a series of visits to farms. I have no direct farming interests, although if you were to go back three or four generations, I think you would find that my family worked on the land. I echo the words of the noble Earl, Lord Caithness: farmers are custodians of the land. They want to look after the land, and they want to know what they have to do. By and large, they care for their land in a way that perhaps those of us who only visit it cannot really understand. I also echo the words of the noble Lord, Lord Carrington. Having been in a family business myself, as the fourth generation, I understand exactly the problems and concerns of family businesses. As the noble Lord said, these are not just businesses; the family lives on the land. Those are important issues.
I understand the general drift of the amendments in this group, particularly those tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Addington. There is a great danger of narrowing the recipients. Farmers and farming businesses are, of course, going to be the primary beneficiaries of the management of public goods. However, the aim of the Bill is to make it a little wider, mainly because the environmental land management scheme will also be the principal mechanism for delivering many of the ambitions of the 25-year environment plan. We should not, therefore, limit the scope to agricultural land only. I have a great deal of sympathy with Amendment 103, which talks about other things that should be included. For example, I do not think that blanket bogs would be classed as agricultural land, yet they will play a vital role in future climate change mitigation.
I also associate myself with the words of the noble Earl, Lord Devon, about social prescribing and the merits of getting out into the environment and nature. It does not always have to be in the countryside. Agriculture and farming are not exclusive to rural areas. In my former constituency of Uxbridge—from where I am speaking now—there are several farms, and most people would not realise that. They are not something that you get only in the rolling landscapes of England.
Baroness Butler-Sloss [V]
My Lords, I was delighted by what the Minister had to say about native breeds. None the less, there are a number of amendments in this group which I would like to identify as potentially limiting the financial assistance for native breeds such as Dartmoor, Exmoor or New Forest ponies. They are Amendments 10, 15, 30, 64, 85 and 103. There is a particular concern about Amendment 64, which appears to suggest financial assistance only for agriculture, leaving out the native breeds. Amendment 103, after Clause 1, would limit the benefit of financial assistance in such a way as is likely to be a disincentive for landowners to use native ponies for conservation in other regions. Dartmoor ponies are currently used as conservation grazers right across the country.
Lord Rooker (Lab) [V]
My Lords, I apologise that I was not able to speak at Second Reading; I was not sworn in to your Lordships’ House due to illness. I am having trouble with my broadband, so I will make this incredibly brief. I will comment on Amendments 106 and 103, which I see as key.
On Amendment 106 in particular, I am very much opposed to the money going to the person who is not taking the risk in managing the land on a day-to-day basis or in occupation of the land. During my two spells as a Farming Minister, in MAFF and in Defra, I did many farm visits. I remember on more than one occasion being taken to one side privately by a farmer to spell out the fact that they were doing certain things that were improving income and diversifying but the landlord had started to interrupt and take a slice. I would be very much opposed to the National Trust, for example, being a big recipient of this money on behalf of tenant farmers. We should be quite ruthless about where the money goes. It is essentially farm income; it is not for other bodies. I am not singling out the National Trust, but I can think of two or three examples where it was the main culprit.
I very much agree with Amendment 103. I would like to make a couple of points that impinge on the next group, on which I will not speak because there is an overlap. First, on the monitoring of animal health and welfare, farmers have to be proactive. There is of course a fear that leaving the CAP might mean less form-filling and more of a free-for-all. We cannot afford that; there has to be really proactive monitoring of animal health and welfare, and farmers have to be encouraged to do that. Secondly, in respect of public access, better paths around field margins to replace unsafe lanes, deliberately creating circular routes rather than single routes, have to be of great benefit to the public.
I will give the Committee a good example to go and look at. In the Langdale valley in Cumbria there have been massive changes in recent years to allow access on the floor of the valley to wheelchair users. What has happened there has been quite dramatic. I would say that that example, above all the others that I came across, is absolutely fantastic. I will conclude there.
Lord Burnett (LD) [V]
My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Rooker. He was a distinguished Farming Minister and it is good to see him back with us.
I declare my interests as set out in the register. I will speak to Amendment 2 in the names of my noble friends Lady Scott and Lord Addington. The effect of the amendment would be to limit financial assistance to those involved in agriculture, horticulture, forestry and land management. One of the main purposes of the Bill is to continue to maintain financial support for agriculture and other activities specified in the amendment. Farmers, growers and others are, like so many other businesses, extremely apprehensive about the future, especially when the transition period ends on 31 December this year. They understand from media reports that the Brexit negotiations seem to be going nowhere, and it is becoming more likely by the day that we shall leave the EU on WTO terms. The financial shock to our whole economy of such a crash-out will be immense, and farmers, growers and others described in the amendment will need all the support that they can get. I mentioned at Second Reading the likely disastrous effect on stock prices, especially in the sheep sector but also quite possibly in the beef sector.
Over the years, farmers and others have wholeheartedly embraced policies to protect and enhance the environment and the countryside, to farm extensively and to achieve high standards of animal welfare. They have diversified as much as they can. Our farmers are aware and proud that they are the custodians of our landscape, including the uplands and the vast bulk of the landmass of the country that is turned over to agriculture and forestry. Farmers strongly resist the cheap and dangerous solutions practised elsewhere, such as the use of growth hormones and toxic pesticides. They value our landscape and our countryside. Farmers and growers embrace their role in producing the bulk of the food to feed our country. However, all this comes at a high cost, not only a high capital cost but often a cost in the diminution of future income.
Lord Liddle (Lab)
My Lords, I am no expert on agricultural questions but, as a Cumbria county councillor, I am deeply interested in them because they are so important to our local area. I hope that the Government will listen to what the noble Lord, Lord Burnett, has just said. The prospect of failing to avoid tariffs in agriculture in our current discussions with the EU represents a serious threat to the agricultural sector and, frankly, makes our present considerations under this Bill look relatively insignificant.
We have an opportunity to create a better system of support for farming and for the countryside. The debate on this group of amendments brings out my view that there is a lack of clarity about the objectives. Is this about farmers or about the wider rural economy? I strongly support Amendment 103, which outlines a broad set of objectives for financial assistance. I would be interested to know the Minister’s reaction to that amendment. Are the Government supportive of it, or do they think that it stretches the definition of eligibility for the ELM payments too far?
I have another concern. The common agricultural policy, which had many faults, was introduced as a measure almost of social assistance to facilitate economic transition on the continent from a rural to an urban society. In the 1950s, 30% of people in France worked on the land, while 25% did so in Germany and 40% in Italy, yet we saw in the decades after that a tremendous move to the cities. This was achieved with little social friction, and the support for farming was an important part of that transition. Of course, the way it was done had serious snags to it. Initially, it was done by giving subsidies to production. Why was it done that way? Because there was no other way of regulating it—no other simple way of handing money to the agricultural sector when it was in this process of transition.
I have two doubts about the Bill, both of which I think are relevant to this group of amendments. The first is: what are we setting these objectives for, farming or the countryside, and who will be eligible to receive the payments? How will these objectives be regulated? The Government give us little detail on that point. How are we going to tell whether farmers have met these very worthy objectives that are being debated in this set of amendments?
My second point is that, while I dare say economic assessments have been done—this is an economic question—when it comes to the problems of low-income farmers, who fulfil a vital social function in areas such as the hill farms of the Lake District, can we be sure that this new system of setting them environmental objectives will give them a sustainable living? That is what matters: are they going to get enough money to continue to do their job? The answer is that I do not know. What the Government are saying about environmental land management sounds very good and of course I support it—who would not?—but how is it going to be done and what will its economic consequences be for different farming communities? The Government have to give better answers to those questions before we can give proper consideration to the Bill.
Lord Marlesford [V]
I want to follow on closely from what the noble Lord, Lord Liddle, was saying. I believe that the Bill has to be changed somewhat. First, the emphasis should be more on the rural economy, of which farming is of course a key element. I believe that the way forward is to consolidate and formalise the diversification approach that many farmers have already moved on to. We should do so through the concept of the rural business unit, or RBU, as originally set out in 1992 in the Bunbury report of the CLA. At that time it was not adopted by the Government, but the CLA, of which I am a member, has developed the idea and recently presented it to the Treasury.
Historically, farmers have been among the earliest entrepreneurs, always open to new ideas of how to make the best use of areas of land, large or small. Equally, they have always seen themselves as being custodians of the land. That custodianship must continue to be buttressed by a strong and sensible planning system. The planning system that we have in this country is, together with the NHS, one of the two great inheritances from the post-war Attlee Government, and I have been rather concerned at stories that the Government are in some ways aiming to try to dismantle part of it. I say right away that they will have no support from me if they weaken the planning system.
The sort of activities that should be encouraged through the rural business unit include, obviously, tourism in its many forms; the protection and enhancement of the landscape; conservation and encouragement of our diversity of flora and fauna; forestry, as has been referred to, especially hardwoods; the provision of additional housing, especially through the sensitive conversion of redundant farm buildings into dwellings; the development of premises for small businesses to use, whether for homeworking, offices or manufacturing; the provision of additional access, with facilities for walkers and riders; sporting facilities, including shooting and fishing; and, certainly not least, the adding of value by processing the products of agriculture or forestry, whether arable, vegetable or animal. All this may involve changes to the tax rules to offer the same advantages of accounting integration that have long been encouraged for other industry and commerce. I hope that the Minister might look favourably on this approach.
Viscount Trenchard (Con)
My Lords, I am a bit puzzled as to the intentions of the noble Lord, Lord Addington, and the noble Baroness, Lady Scott of Needham Market, with Amendment 2. I should have thought that, by engaging in activities to support any of the purposes listed in Clauses 1(1) or 1(2), someone must by definition be involved in one of the four activities mentioned in the amendment. Therefore, I feel the amendment is unnecessary.
We have already discussed Amendment 4, proposed by the noble Earl, Lord Devon, and perhaps his Amendment 3 would have been better grouped with that. However, I cannot support his intention to exclude managers of land other than managers of agricultural land, which would exclude forestry, horticulture and other landholdings.
The noble Earl rightly challenges the drafting of Clause 1(1)(b), on “supporting public access”. It has always struck me as interesting that public access in Scotland is much more freely available under the right to roam legislation. However, most of Scotland has very much lower population density than England, and I believe the Government should tread carefully here. Many birds and animals may benefit from less intensive agriculture but will surely suffer as a result of greater disturbance caused by increased numbers of walkers and perhaps a more intrusive network of public footpaths.
As for Amendment 10 in the name of the noble Earl, I agree that the word “enjoyment” in relation to the countryside, farmland or woodland seems a little strange. I would support the inclusion of “health and wellbeing benefits”. Perhaps the term “natural capital” is a better and wider term than “environment”, and I think “awareness” is better than “understanding”, which may be too subjective.
In Amendment 64, the noble Earl seeks to restrict those who may be entitled to financial assistance, but I am not sure that his amendment is necessary. There are many farmers whose businesses have diversified into other activities, but it is clear that their ability to receive financial assistance relates only to the purposes set out.
As I thought about the noble Earl’s amendments, it occurred to me that “financial assistance” is not quite right as a term to describe the Government’s intentions. It sounds as though farmers are being helped because they are in need. Some may be in need, but others are not. Surely, what is proposed is that farmers should be appropriately rewarded for the value they add to the land they own or occupy. I do not think that a company provides “financial assistance” to its employees for doing their work in a diligent manner. Perhaps “support” or “compensation” would be better.
In Amendment 106, my noble friend Lady McIntosh seeks to ensure that financial assistance is targeted at active farmers and land managers. However, what about an estate owned by a person or persons not in day-to-day management control of their land because they are busy in other businesses and have appointed agents or managers to run the businesses? They retain ultimate control through their ownership of the land or farming business. It is not clear whether the amendment might disqualify some estates from the scheme.
I caution against adopting Amendment 108, proposed by my noble friend Lord Lucas. We have heard a great deal about following the science, but we know that science is based on different scientists’ different interpretations of the facts: it is not absolute and is very subjective. I agree with his intention on soil management contained in Amendment 110, but I am not sure why he thinks it necessary to spell that out here, when it is arguably covered in Clause 1.
I briefly mention Amendments 114 and 116, proposed by the noble Lord, Lord Carrington. I think he is right both to seek assurance that the design and purpose of schemes is not delegated to non-governmental, non-accountable bodies and organisations and to strictly limit the publication of information relating to the recipients of financial assistance.
Baroness Young of Old Scone [V]
My Lords, I am afraid that I want to take a different position from several noble Lords who have already spoken about the amendments in this group. I speak specifically to reject Amendments 64 and 106 and other amendments in the group that would restrict payments to agricultural, horticultural and forestry land only. This Bill is about delivering public good through land management, and the environmental land management scheme will be one of the major ways in which the Government’s 25-year environment plan will be delivered. Therefore, although many of these public goods will be delivered by farmers and farm businesses, not all of them will: for example, restoration of non-agricultural habitats, such as blanket bogs, and the creation of non-commercial woodlands, such as community woodlands, both of which are important for combating climate change. I therefore do not support these amendments, which would limit the scope to agricultural, horticultural and forestry management rather than wider land management. These would reduce the Bill’s effectiveness in delivering its key purposes.
A number of noble Lords have said that this is an Agriculture Bill and so it should be about farmers and food production. I do not agree: I believe that this Bill is not about modest changes in the way we support and incentivise farmers but about how in the future we support anyone who manages land to deliver the things that the nation needs from the land. This will include food production, but it will also include a wide range of other things. This Bill is not simply about filling the gap left by leaving the common agricultural policy; it is about setting a vision for the future of the way the scarce resource of land is managed. Farmers will form a vital part of this transition and need to be helped and supported to make this transition, but it cannot be about farmers alone. Can the Minister assure me that the restrictions in these amendments will not be accepted?
I turn to Amendments 118 and 121 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Parminter. I share her view that the checking, enforcement and monitoring of the new financial support schemes cannot be optional: they have to be required on the face of the Bill.
The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Baroness Garden of Frognal) (LD)
I understand that the noble Baroness, Lady Mallalieu, has scratched, so I now call the noble Lord, Lord Empey.
Lord Empey [V]
My Lords, one theme that has come up today has been the theme of definition. In the last group, the amendments of the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, led to a discussion of the differences between “conserve” and “enhance”. In this group, the noble Earl, Lord Devon, has drawn our attention to the difference between “enjoyment” and “health and wellbeing”. I am inclined to agree with him on that, and the noble Viscount, Lord Trenchard, did so as well. When we look at access to the countryside, clearly a balance has to be struck: where large amounts of taxpayers’ money are being invested in the countryside, then quite clearly many people wish to seek access to it. I understand that, in certain cases, people who seek access to the countryside under certain circumstances can cause harm in so far as they can spread diseases and so on. Lots of people feel that, as part of the country, they need to have access and have a right to have access, so it is a question of getting the balance right. The point that the noble Earl, Lord Devon, was making was that by making health and well-being a public good, it categorises something. Enjoyment is such a broadly based point that it lacks any kind of clarity. Those terms should be revisited.
On the general point about access to the countryside, we encourage people for health and well-being purposes to go there if they are resident in cities. However, we have to remember that many people live in the countryside who are not farmers, and there are many parts of the agricultural sector that are not farms. Some people have this idea that it is the job of people who work in the countryside to make sure that the hedges are well trimmed so that when the city dwellers come out at the weekend, it all looks very pretty. That is not what it is—it is not a museum. It cannot be maintained in aspic. The rural areas are living, working workplaces in many cases, and we want to ensure that that continues. However, I say to the Minister that the question of balance requires some consistency in how we define these matters, particularly when we are establishing public good. The general thrust of the Bill is good, but we must put more effort into consistency of definition.
The Deputy Chairman of Committees
I call the noble Lord, Lord Naseby. We cannot hear him so we will move on to the noble Lord, Lord De Mauley, and will try to get the noble Lord, Lord Naseby, back later.
Lord De Mauley [V]
My Lords, I will speak briefly to Amendment 103, the impact of which would be to limit the range of activities benefiting from the Secretary of State’s financial support outlined in the Bill. In line with my comments on the last group of amendments, I consider that to do so would risk closing off the incentives for farmers and landowners to use native equines for conservation grazing in regions away from where they are traditionally bred. For Dartmoor, for example, this would dramatically shrink the size of the sink where the rare genetics of the Dartmoor hill pony, whose benefits I spoke of in my comments on the last group, would be safely held.
Such ex situ sinks are essential if the populations on Dartmoor ever need to be replenished: for example, if the semi-wild herds on the moor were devastated by disease. That would risk the loss of the rare genetics such ponies hold, which are so important to surviving and grazing on the uplands, creating habitats for wildlife. It would shrink a market selling native ponies as conservation grazers and would exacerbate animal welfare problems. If not sold, semi-wild native ponies, which must leave the upland herds in order to comply with number limits imposed by Defra agri-environment schemes, will be culled. So I am therefore very concerned by this amendment.
Lord Morris of Aberavon [V]
My Lords, I will speak to Amendment 106, which I support in spirit. It is good to see my noble friend Lord Rooker back, and I look forward to sitting next to him when the House resumes in its proper role.
I will be very brief and will ask the Minister a question. We know that under the CAP system, as I understand it, there is no restriction as regards the receivers of EU money. I believe that this is untenable in the future. The amendment sets out new limitations to confine financing assistance to those actively engaged in farming or land management. I support the spirit, as I said, but the amendment may need redrafting. There is no other justification for spending taxpayers’ money. I ask the Minister specifically: will there be any restrictions or limitations on who payments will be made to in future under the Bill?
The Duke of Montrose (Con) [V]
My Lords, forgive me if I turn off the video, because my signal is very poor. I declare my interests as in the register; my background is in livestock production in a hill area. As a Scottish farmer, I am particularly interested in the outcome of the devolution framework negotiation.
I was interested to hear my noble friend Lord Marlesford saying that we must emphasise the context in which we are. Behind it all, we have to bear in mind that as a country at present we should go out and buy exotic food or cheap food as and where we can find it, but we need to remember the warnings in the Beddington report that before too long these other parts of the world will need most of what they produce to feed themselves.
The Bill as it stands already opens up 10 headings of activities or causes for which the Government propose to offer financial assistance. Many noble Lords have tried to define a more focused approach to the payments. The noble Earl, Lord Devon, told us of his rationale for focusing only on agriculture and how he envisages rural support to be directed. I was interested to hear that he had drawn his definition of land from an EU definition.
In Amendment 64 the noble Earl envisages limiting the land eligible for assistance by the type of activity it supports, but those of your Lordships who have been involved in existing support schemes will be familiar with the difficulties that were dreamed up when the rules were made in Brussels to start to try to make clear what was agricultural land, starting off with a mapping exercise. Very many in my part of the world had to spend a great deal of time identifying what were rocky outcrops, patches of impenetrable scrub, bracken or bog on a field-by-field basis. I seem to remember that Northern Ireland faced a huge fine for claiming on areas with these conditions. I am glad to see that in Amendment 91 in the previous group, the noble Earl added a role for managing wetlands as part of cultural or natural heritage.
Following on from my noble friend Lord Randall’s concern, many noble Lords have drawn attention to what the EU now describes as “areas of natural constraint”. There would be a problem if we went solely down the line of production. There is a difficulty in dealing with the more awkward parts of what, in the Countryside and Rights of Way Act, was described as
“mountain, moor, heath or down”.
Some of these areas support agricultural production but, since the advent of the current basic payment scheme, some areas have no livestock on them at all. They are perhaps given over to conservation or peatland restoration. Are these to be excluded from any development assistance as we go forward?
As I said, many amendments are trying to direct more defined targets for funding. As we go forward, it will be interesting to see whether any wording will be found that will be acceptable to my noble friend the Minister.
Lord McConnell of Glenscorrodale (Lab)
My Lords, I will first say that I strongly support Amendment 118 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Parminter. If we are talking about public funds for public goods, it makes absolute sense that there must be regulations to oversee the system. I cannot understand why we would want to leave that as optional. Her amendment does not specify the regulations or get into detail on what might be in place in future, but she quite correctly highlights the need for this to be a priority. A substantial amount of public funds will be distributed following the passing of this Bill, and clearly there should be regulations to check on the way in which these funds are being spent.
The Deputy Chairman of Committees (The Earl of Kinnoull) (Non-Afl)
My Lords, after the noble Lord, Lord Judd, speaks, I will call the noble Lord, Lord Naseby, again.
Lord Inglewood [V]
My Lords, with the first group of amendments, we did the easy bit: we discussed the generalities. Now, as we move towards specifics, it becomes harder. I will not speak to a specific amendment, for the simple reason that I agree with them and I disagree with them. It is all a muddle. My starting point is very much the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Liddle, and my noble friend Lord Marlesford. After all, at the end of the war, it was clear that agriculture was coterminous with the rural economy. That is no longer the case. The remarks of my noble friend Lord Marlesford about the Rural Business Unit, merit very serious consideration and have an important part to play in the evolution of policy in this area.
As far as the immediate matters we are discussing are concerned, the crucial thing is to think about the provision of public goods. This is not a form of outdoor relief, but an arrangement for the acquisition, in the public interest, of things it is desirable for the public to have. Their acquisition divides into two separate things. First, it is an ongoing product which is essentially a function of maintaining land, but to do that, in certain circumstances it is necessary to invest capital. If you start looking at the economics of it in that way, it becomes more understandable.
The other thing that I have learned from farming is that just about all you can be certain of is that things go wrong. In this country, as we know, an awful lot of agriculture is conducted under the landlord and tenant system, but this disguises a whole range of arrangements between landlords and tenants. In those arrangements, the various parties contribute very differently and the risk is carried differently. In any event, if you are thinking about these subjects, how do you deal with the landlord and tenant system separately from that of owner-occupiers? How, in financial terms, is an owner-occupier with large borrowings different from a tenant who is borrowing “money” from a landlord? That makes it very difficult.
In addition, there is not only one form of land tenure. In the north, where I come from, there is a great deal of common land, as we have heard this afternoon. The problems with common land have caused considerable injustice in the way in which they have locked, or failed to lock properly, into environmental payments. The noble Baroness, Lady Ritchie, spoke about conacre in Ireland, which I have heard about but never come across personally.
Furthermore, in looking at public money for public goods, we have to be clear that what is suitable in place A is not suitable in place B. Different bits of Britain are completely different from one another. I live in Cumbria, on the edge of the Lake District, but I spent a number of years in East Anglia on the edge of the Fens. They are as different as the automotive industry and the aerospace industry. We have to be very specific and careful and start by thinking about what advantage the public can gain from any particular place.
In terms of money, it seems axiomatic that there should be proper audit. This must be accounted for properly because, in any commercial transaction and wherever public money is involved, you have to be able to see what is going on and trace it properly. However, confidentiality is also important, a point which I think has been made. I am a dairy farmer; we have had our supplier on to us about security in the face of animal welfare activists.
At the end of the day, it is for the Government to work out what they want to buy under the principle of public money for public goods. As I and others have said, they are pretty vague in their own mind about what they want to do. In dealing with the consequences for the people on the ground, as much as possible—this has been touched on by a number of speakers—if it is appropriate to find an agreement between the various interests involved in the use of land, that must be a very good starting point to take it further forward.
Lord Judd [V]
My Lords, I return to the basic amendment for this group from the noble Lord, Lord Addington, and the noble Baroness, Lady Scott of Needham Market. It makes sense. It spells out more fully the range of activity which I am sure the Government intend to cover and specifies some of these areas more clearly. At this point in our economic history, which is not very cheerful, horticulture may become very much more important than it is even today. It may become an important part of our way of life and an important way of generating income for a cross-section of people. This will not be altogether a bad thing. It will lead to a better quality of life for them, frankly, than what they may have been involved in before. For all these reasons, we should be grateful for this amendment. I certainly support it.
The Deputy Chairman of Committees
I regret that we have been unable to reconnect with the noble Lord, Lord Naseby, so I call the noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville.
Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville [V]
My Lords, this group of amendments moves us to the question of what type of land will qualify for financial assistance. My noble friends Lord Addington and Lord Burnett are arguing for a widening of this to include agriculture, horticulture, forestry and land management. Along with the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering, and the noble Earl, Lord Caithness, I have added my name to Amendment 65, which would ensure that the Secretary of State focuses his financial assistance on the issues we believe should be covered in the Bill: agriculture, horticulture and forestry.
I look forward to clarification from the Minister on this matter, especially around the rights of tenant farmers, so well set out by the noble Earl, Lord Caithness, the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, and my noble friend Lord Burnett. As I am nearly the last speaker on this group of amendments, all the relevant arguments have been successfully made by others, but I wish the Minister to be aware of the depth of feeling over this issue and of just how important it is to be absolutely clear what functions and services are to be eligible for financial assistance.
I support Amendments 118 and 121, in the name of my noble friend Lady Parminter. I believe that consultation and what is to be consulted on are vital.
I turn to Amendment 103, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering, to which I have added my name. Others have already spoken on this amendment, so the Committee will be pleased to hear that I will not speak to all its proposed paragraphs. I would like to draw attention to paragraphs (a), (b), (e), (f), (h) and (j) in subsection (2)—but do not worry, I will not be that long. This is not to say that the other paragraphs are not important; I just do not want us to be here at 10 pm this evening.
Mitigating the risk of flooding is very important, not only on the uplands. Rural communities are rarely flat and the way in which a farmer ploughs his sloping land has an impact on how the water drains away during heavy storms. Although I have seen leaflets encouraging farmers to consider run-off from their land, some seem unable to grasp this. Beautifully neat rows of soil look good, especially when planted with maize, except during heavy rainfall. Then, the water streams down the furrows, through the gate and out into the roads—where, carrying topsoil and silt as it goes, it cascades down them and into the drains, blocking them completely within a short space of time. This ensures that the water continues on its way down into the village, causing distress and mess to those living there. Financial incentives seem to be the only way to alter the behaviour of some farmers.
The Minister will be expecting me to mention peat bogs. In Somerset, the extraction of peat on the Levels has been a local industry for a very long time. However, we now see a move away from peat extraction and towards improving and enhancing what is left behind. In many Somerset villages, the peat workings have been enhanced so that there are now wildlife and wild-flower sanctuaries, with public access along and between the lakes which have been created. The county council, along with the peat producer organisations, has been key in assisting this to happen. Financial assistance should not be given where peatbogs are exploited and not restored. Peat moors and bogs are essential in carbon sequestration, and this should form part of the financial equation.
Paragraphs (e), (f), (h) and (j) are interlinked. Environmental enhancement and protecting the environment improve air quality and contribute to addressing climate change. The noble Lord, Lord Cameron of Dillington, has long been a champion of rural proofing and productivity; I have heard him speak eloquently on the subject on many occasions. But still we find that the government policies handed down have a detrimental effect on those of us living in rural towns and villages. Under the Bill, we have the opportunity to ensure that the financial assistance to be linked to the various measures in it is fully rural proofed, ensuring the protection and sustainability of the environment and contributing to addressing climate change.
Finally, I will state what we all know: during April and May and the early part of June, the roads were quiet. The skies were not full of aircraft and even the railway lines were much quieter. Those of us lucky enough to have gardens heard the birds singing and watched them collecting materials for their nests. The air we were breathing was clean. Those of us with asthma found that we did not need our medication as often as previously. We all want this to continue. For one thing, our physical and mental well-being is dependent on it. We do not want to return to wholesale pollution. Air quality and climate change must move to the top of the agenda. I look forward to the Minister’s response to this important group of amendments.
Lord Grantchester (Lab)
I thank all Peers who have tabled their amendments in this group. At the start of each day in Committee when I am speaking, I shall declare my interests as at present receiving payments in relation to my interests, as declared in the register.
I will speak to one amendment in this group, Amendment 121, to which my noble friend Lady Jones of Whitchurch has added her name. I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Parminter, for proposing this amendment, which would require the Secretary of State to conduct a consultation on the strong regulatory framework for those in receipt of financial assistance under her Amendment 118. This must be a wide-ranging consultation with participants on the impact of the overarching approach of reward for public goods in relation to environmental impacts. It is important that the Government commit at this stage to consult on the overall framework and impact, not merely on the various regulations that will come as secondary legislation.
Lord Gardiner of Kimble
My Lords, I thank all noble Lords for what again has been an interesting debate which has taken us into a range of issues. I shall begin with Amendment 2 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Addington, Amendments 3, 10, 15, 20, 23, 30, 64 and 85 from the noble Earl, Lord Devon, Amendment 65 from my noble friend Lady McIntosh and Amendment 94 from the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, all of which deal with eligibility for financial assistance.
This is of course the Agriculture Bill, and the powers it contains have been designed with agriculture in mind. Schemes are overwhelmingly designed to work for farmers and land managers, and we intend that they will reap the benefits of providing public goods across agriculture, forestry and horticulture. Farmers will, and indeed must, be at the very heart of future schemes, as I have said before.
I say to the noble Lord, Lord Carrington, that, yes, we want to avoid bureaucracy, but one of the reasons to have these tests and trials across the nation is so that almost all the ranges of what is in Clause 1 are tested, so that we can come forward with a national rollout which we think will be dynamic and work for farmers.
The ELM scheme will pay farmers, foresters and other land managers to deliver environmental public goods identified in the Government’s 25-year environment plan. About 70% of land in England is farmed so, as stewards of our land, farmers will play an essential role in this. That is why tier 1 of the ELM scheme will focus on supporting farmers to farm their land in an environmentally sustainable way. Other schemes, such as those aiming to improve animal health and welfare, will focus on supporting livestock farmers. The noble Lord, Lord Empey, used a word which is important in all of what we have to do: “balance”.
One of the areas where a number of noble Lords have taken contrary views is on assigning this just for, say, agricultural land. My noble friend the Duke of Montrose was right to highlight some of the issues and complexities, as did my noble friends Lord Randall of Uxbridge and Lord Trenchard and the noble Baroness, Lady Young of Old Scone. Woodland, rivers and wetlands, among many others, may well be able to deliver important public goods. This is an issue that we need to think through. When we try to be so precise, we might end up missing out if we were to accept some of these amendments. I am very glad that the noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville, mentioned the restoration of peatland. Many of these features will be managed by farmers on their land, but if we define it as just agricultural land, are we in difficulties about woodland, rivers and wetlands, all of which make a major contribution on one’s farm to how one can enhance the environment? Restricting eligibility to those managing land for agriculture, horticulture or forestry would mean that we risk missing out the important benefits that can be gained when land managers work together. For example, we would not wish for all those managing land in a particular river catchment to lose out on the possibility of joining a scheme just because one parcel of land in the catchment was not agricultural.
I am very mindful of what the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, and my noble friend Lord De Mauley said about native breeds. The Government are currently developing the details of the ELM scheme with stakeholders, including eligibility criteria. The ELM discussion document was reopened on 24 June. The Government’s view is that the Bill as drafted strikes the right balance between affirming the Government’s support to fund farmers, foresters and land managers under future schemes and providing a helpful degree of flexibility in designing future schemes.
There was a very interesting discussion about well-being. We had important contributions. Clause 1 could be used to contribute to the delivery of societal benefits, including engagement with the environment. The ELM could fund the creation of new paths, such as footpaths and bridleways, and could support access to water and waterways, such as lakes and rivers, which allow for—yes—enjoyment of the countryside. I have a bit to do with this very important area, particularly in relation to loneliness: I represent Defra on the ministerial task force on that. The noble Lord, Lord Empey, also mentioned social prescribing, health and well-being. Defra and the DHSC, working jointly, are bidding, through the shared outcomes fund, to develop a mental health project to support scaling up nature-based preventive and therapeutic interventions, working with PHE, NHS England, the MHCLG and Natural England. I am genuinely interested in how we craft the Bill. We think that “enjoyment” covers all that would be required. If a farmer was going to engage with something like social prescribing or health and well-being, then that is part of environmental enhancement. I am not promising anything, but I am interested in a conversation on how we encompass all this. With what the nation is going through with this crisis, the Government place great importance on this area for health, well-being, mental health and social prescribing.
I turn to Amendment 106, in the name of my noble friend Lady McIntosh. It was great to see the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, even if it was only on the screen. The Government recognise that schemes should, of course, be available to tenant farmers. It is the Government’s intention that the ELM scheme will provide funding to those carrying out the management of the land or water to deliver the environmental public goods. My noble friend Lord Inglewood, an experienced land manager, spoke wise words when he referred to the range of issues. The Government are engaging with a wide range of different types of farmer and land manager, including tenant farmers, to inform the development of ELM and to understand and address any particular issues, including in relation to tenant farmers, to which my noble friend Lady McIntosh’s amendment refers.
In response to the noble Earl, Lord Devon, I say that the Government are designing future financial schemes to be accessible to as many farmers and land managers as possible, including those who work on common land.
I turn to amendments which deal with conditions placed on recipients of financial assistance. I reassure my noble friend Lady McIntosh that the Government recognise the importance of the issues listed in her Amendment 103 and are committed to supporting their delivery, both through schemes that will be delivered under Clause 1—I will not go through the list of what they are—and wider government initiatives. On the issue raised by the noble Lord, Lord Liddle, I say that we already have robust domestic regulatory protections in place that require all farmers and land managers, irrespective of whether they receive financial assistance or not, to meet stringent standards. I was interested in what the noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville, said. These rules include the farming rules for water, which protect against water pollution, and the welfare of farmed animals regulations, which protect farm livestock, a point that the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, referred to. These protections will continue.
The Government are reviewing, in partnership with industry, where we can make improvements to our regulatory regime. There will be some areas where the Government will raise standards. As announced in the clean air strategy, the Government will require and support farmers to take more action to reduce ammonia emissions, for example. Where appropriate, we will look to provide greater scope to remedy underperformance before sanctions are applied. The Government agree with Dame Glenys Stacey that advice has an important role in an effective regulatory system.
The Deputy Chairman of Committees
My Lords, I have received one request to speak after the Minister. I call the noble Lord, Lord Grantchester.
Lord Grantchester
I rise merely to press the Minister on his statements around the different levels of tiers and how payments may differ as the higher tiers are approached. I wondered whether this was going to become clear in the regulations or whether there is a bit of experience of how many people will be applying under the different tiers. Will it be defined in regulations?
Lord Gardiner of Kimble
Clearly, we know that there are 80,000-plus claimants under the BPS at the moment. Obviously, the range of opportunities, with regard to numbers, will depend on clusters and how many farmers will want to group together—as we have had with farm clusters in other schemes—and those that wish to have individual, predominantly tier 1 consideration. Again, clearly this is why the trials are going on; they will show how that is going to work with the varying tiers and indeed how they all interrelate.
I do not think I would feel comfortable taking it any further than that at this stage, only because this is work in progress. I should think it will go on beyond enactment, but what I will do is make sure that—obviously, there will be continuing work on this and regulations will be coming forward—when we get to further stages of how ELM is coming forward, noble Lords are kept informed.
Lord Addington
My Lords, I thank the Minister for his usual courteous and informed reply. However, the point that I was trying to raise seems to have got slightly lost: namely, where do we find out who is going to be eligible? If the answer is “We do not know”, I think we might have to come back and dig again to find out exactly where that is placed, but at the moment I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
The Deputy Chairman of Committees
My Lords, we now come to the group beginning with Amendment 6. I remind noble Lords that anyone wishing to speak after the Minister should email the clerk during the debate. Anyone wishing to press this, or any other amendments in this group, to a Division should make that clear in the debate.
Amendment 6
Lord Addington
Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment seeks to ensure that where financial assistance is provided for the protection or improvement of the environment, public access enhancements are, where appropriate, incorporated so that people can experience and benefit from the actions taken.
Lord Addington
My Lords, we come to a rather more honed group of amendments. We are talking about access, inspired by
“supporting … access to and enjoyment of the countryside”
in Clause 1(1)(b). It is a pretty fundamental change here that you are getting finance for that purpose, and I believe we should take quite a long and hard look at this. It is changing everything that goes on inside the countryside, but it cannot sit by itself in agriculture. If you are talking about access, you are talking about getting access to activity going out there. We are going through a crisis caused by a disease which does not affect people with decent cardiovascular systems as badly. There is a public health element. There is a sports and recreation policy element here—it affects everything else. There is a tourism element here. If you have good footpaths, you can sell that weekend in a cottage. You can go on and on here, but I will not insult the intelligence of this Chamber by doing so at any great length. The fact is that access matters, both as a principle, as being of practical value to the rural economy and, I hope, to farmers directly now as well. If they are providing this access—the point I was trying to make earlier on—they deserve to get some payment, but we deserve something back for that activity. It is a two-way street. I hope that these amendments will open up a discussion that goes through.
I should also mention that these amendments were created in conjunction with the ramblers and the canoeists. There is a huge amount of activity on waterways which hits all those targets we are talking about: public health, access, enjoyment—it is all connected with the waterways. There are the canoeists—the paddlers—and the wild swimmers can be included here as well. That group’s activity probably becomes more attractive for most of us during the summer months, but it happens. We could have gone to other groups. I have some sympathy with the Minister, because these groups have a reputation for squabbling with each other. Anglers and canoeists are not traditionally the best of friends but they should get on together, and the defence of reasonableness that runs through British law should be applied to all of them. Those on scrambler bikes and those who might occasionally use a byway or a bridle path rather annoy those on horses. I congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Hodgson, and my noble friend Lord Greaves on Amendment 100, as somebody who has, shall we say, a strong equestrian influence in my household—it was rather remiss of me not to bring them in. All these groups slightly compete for access, but they all have to get in there. However, to draw the Minister’s attention to some of the other amendments here, the idea of enhancing access runs through many of these amendments.
If you start talking about footpaths, you get the vision that a footpath is a path that runs across some countryside, often following a historical road. That does not fulfil many of the criteria I have been talking about. If you simply have a muddy path, it can become not easily used by many people incredibly quickly. Some of the amendments here are designed to reward farmers to make sure that these remain useful. There is the buggy and self-propelled wheelchair test—the buggy test is probably the most applicable one here. If there is a muddy path on a winter’s day, especially if it is on a route that people can get to, it will have a habit of getting holes and then puddles in it, which expand. That damages any land around it, either as regards its environmental or agricultural purposes. If you reward farmers for making sure that that has a toughened surface, it will take much more use and will cause less damage to the things around it.
Other people then sometimes contradict this. I remember we did it during the passage of the CROW Bill—my noble friend Lord Greaves, I think, has the scars from that—and we have not yet got anywhere near the number of amendments we had on that; I like to clang the death knell every now and again. There was a great deal of discussion then. People in motorised wheelchairs gained a great deal of traction, which was fair enough—they like access to the countryside—but their issues are not the same as those of a person with a slightly bad knee who needs that surface.
Where is it appropriate to use a gate as opposed to a stile? How do you maintain it? I have heard many a farmer say, “Yes, great, we could put a gate in there. Do you have any idea what they cost and how difficult they are to maintain, and about replacements?” The answer, of course, was that I did not at that time. We must make sure there is a structure here that rewards that sort of help, which will help everybody else here, too: if you need to get to a waterway, for example, you will have a path that is useful and allows access through. These amendments are not so draconian that they would say exactly what the enhancement must be. There will be somebody who lives on the Wiltshire-Berkshire border and somebody, like my noble friend Lord Greaves, who lives in the Pennines, where the hills are steeper and more formidable—he says they are not; he is being kind—but I come from East Anglia and the change was pretty substantial: there, a hill is an event. The point is that different bits of the countryside will need different practices going forward.
Part of the answer here plays into other areas. The Agriculture Bill may be predominantly about agriculture, but it must be aware of what else is going on. I hope the Minister will at the very least be able to give us an idea of how this important aspect of the Bill will be tied into other policy and enhanced. If we do not do this, we are missing a trick. I beg to move.
Baroness Scott of Needham Market (LD) [V]
My Lords, like some other noble Lords, I fell victim to the Second Reading cull. Had I been able to speak at Second Reading, I would have focused entirely on the question of public access, so I am very pleased to have the opportunity this evening of supporting my noble friend Lord Addington’s amendments and saying a few words.
We are all agreed that the principle of reward for public good is the right one, and it feels to me as if public access is one of the most important public goods that we can put in the Bill. We know that open-air activity in the countryside—not just walking but all sorts of activity—has a huge contribution to make to individual health and well-being. I think it should sit alongside access to good-quality food as an important outcome of the Bill. I was very heartened to hear the Minister’s response to the last group amendments, when he talked about the importance of projects for well-being and partnership working with other departments.
But it goes much further. There is, of course, an economic development argument, with people coming to visit farm shops, cafés and pubs, but it is even more fundamental than that. One thing that has troubled many of us is the real disconnect between people, the food they eat and the way that it is produced. Noble Lords have tabled a number of amendments later in the Bill to deal with that. Regular access to the countryside is one important way of helping to stimulate this interest in and understanding of the way that our food is produced. It is also a way of exciting young people into thinking, potentially, about careers in agriculture, land management or forestry—individuals who come from towns, not necessarily just country dwellers. The same can be said about biodiversity, landscape, animal welfare—the more access people have to the countryside, the more committed they will be to those things.
For a decade, I chaired a rights of way committee in Suffolk. I know that some landowners are more accommodating than others and that some users do not behave in ways that we might like them to, but this stand-off really does need to end, because going forward, the link between individual taxpayers and farmers will be much clearer than it was in the days of the CAP. If people have a perception that they are somehow not welcome in the countryside, they will ask, “Why should my tax money support you?” I think that it would be in everyone’s interests to begin to think much more carefully about public access.
In the interests of time, I will not go through the amendments, but there are two categories. There are the ones that seek to make sure that nothing in the Bill makes the situation any worse. An example is the important question of cross-compliance: making sure that we do not pay for farmers and landowners who do not even comply with their duties under the Highways Act. Nor should we be using taxpayers’ money to help them to do what they should be doing anyway. So we have one set of amendments that are negative in focus, but then the much more positive ones which talk about enhancement and all the things we do to improve public access—not just public footpaths and rights of way, but access more generally, and particularly how we should think about getting people from towns and cities out into the countryside that we all enjoy. I look forward to the Minister’s response.
Baroness Grey-Thompson [V]
Many of the amendments to which I have added my name cover issues around water. I welcome the comments of the Minister when he summed up on the earlier group and the discussion about how we could be more creative. I was also delighted to hear many noble Lords raise the issue of social prescribing.
I would like to declare an interest in that my daughter is a kayaker and has previously been on a British Canoeing junior development programme. Because of that, as an individual I have spent countless hours trying to get better access to the countryside and to water which, as a wheelchair user, is not easy. Indeed, it is often not easy for disabled people to access anything much beyond a car park—if they are lucky enough to find somewhere to park. So I welcome all the amendments that seek to offer financial assistance to help increase and improve access for everyone.
Although I have not specifically raised the issue of disability access in any amendments, it needs far more consideration. I have said previously that too many barriers have been put in place which stop wheelchair users getting around. I have been discussing this with the all-party group on cycling and I would also like to thank the noble Lord, Lord Addington, for widening the issue out to discuss scooters and families with buggies. I should also like to thank British Canoeing and the Ramblers for helping to clarify some of the points that I wish to raise.
I believe that it would advantageous to define the term “waters” within the Bill so as to be clear about what is or is not included. There is a lack of clarity in the scope that may lead to inconsistencies in how the text is interpreted. There could be an assumption that public access and enjoyment should be supported only on land. The definition should be broad enough to ensure that financial support can be given to the widest range of farmers and landowners who are seeking to improve the use and maintenance of or access to the water that falls within their land.
The annual waterways survey estimates that around 2.1 million people go paddling every year, 35,000 of whom have direct contact with British Canoeing. However, a similar number of people swim outdoors and the 2018 survey showed that 50% of them had experienced conflict around access and 84% of that was on rivers. Of the 42,700 miles of inland waterways, only 1,400 miles are uncontested. So less than 4% of all rivers have a statutory right of access. This can be a huge barrier to participation, so I believe that there is scope for the Bill to support farmers in making more space for nature and for people.
I also believe that wider contact with an environment that is rich in wildlife will help to increase understanding of the need to protect it and it will increase people’s ability to be physically active, but it is necessary to support farmers and landowners to do that. I am afraid that I disagree with the noble Viscount, Lord Trenchard, who talked about access in the previous group. England may be more densely populated than Scotland, but we have to educate walkers, paddlers and anyone who is accessing the countryside to not damage or disturb wildlife.
With regard to water, I would argue that it is more damaging to restrict people to using just a tiny amount of water. If we could spread that use out, the burden on existing pressure points would surely be eased. It goes without saying, however, that those who use these spaces need to be respectful. I know from my daughter’s experience that people are taught about the environment and flooding, as well as how to look after an area, clean up litter and report things that they see along the way. They would want to protect certain areas, for example where fish are spawning, and not cause damage.
With improved access to and along waterways, we need to be looking at places to launch and land, and access around dangerous obstacles, such as weirs. We should not forget that through our communities, our towns and cities, we are perhaps more disconnected from water than we have ever been. Including these amendments will be a crucial stepping stone for the Government to meet their objectives in the Defra 25-year plan and be part of a green recovery. I believe the Government can help farmers and landowners to make this happen.
Lord Randall of Uxbridge [V]
My Lords, I have added my name to Amendments 6 and 18 and I am very happy to support the noble Lord, Lord Addington, on those. I am very keen on getting more public access, but it is not just about creating new footpaths and so forth; it is about improving what we have as well, as he said. If footpaths are very muddy, that will put people off. I have examples locally where we used to have a bridleway. That got very muddy, the hooves churned it up and it is now very good for horses, very good for cyclists and very good for walkers, so this can be done and is, I think, very important. I have taken a great interest in getting more access to the countryside. It is not just about wheelchair users, although that is very important.
I got a great deal of assistance from an organisation called Birding for All and a gentleman called Bo Beolens, whose blog goes under the title “Grumpy Old Birder”—I was rather sorry that he got there first. He pointed out to me the problems you can have. For example, he can be given a key so that he can drive his car to a car park—somewhere walkers cannot go but he can get to a hide or something—but he has to get out of his car, assemble his wheelchair, go to the gate, unlock it, get back to the car, take his wheelchair down, go to the other side of the gate, get out again and repeat the process. It takes a long time and a lot of effort, so there have to be some innovative ideas. However, as I said, it is not just that. Something he pointed out that I think might have some resonance for many Members of your Lordships’ House is that, as you get older, sometimes you want to sit down on your walk, calling for provision of some resting place. It does not have to be a fancy seat; it could be an old log appropriately placed, or something like that. So, there are lots of things that can be done.
The other thing that has not been mentioned is getting access for those people who are very nervous of going out into the countryside, or even into nature. It does not have to be into the countryside; as I said earlier, we have lots of suburban areas. They are normally referred to as BAME, but there is another expression, which is the “visible minority ethnic” population, who feel very nervous about going out into areas where they do not see many other people who look like them. If we want to encourage more people to get into and understand the countryside, including farming, this is something we have to look at.
The Minister echoed the word “balance”, which was used previously, and balance is all-important here. The noble Lord, Lord Addington, mentioned the fact that there are competing desires. As somebody who goes out to enjoy nature, I am not always entirely chuffed to find myself in an area where there are lots of cyclists hurtling around when I am trying to spot a butterfly or something else, so there has to be balance.
I also well understand that landowners and farmers are nervous because, as we have seen in recent weeks and months, where people have been going out there seems to be an increase in irresponsible littering and fly-tipping, although that is a slightly different thing. I can understand why they do not want to have open access too much. We must also not forget irresponsible dog owners. Although it is probably a minority, you need only one person or a couple people to leave things around to put people off allowing access. Even on those areas that have public access, about a month ago a very important heathland in Surrey was set on fire. almost certainly by people using portable barbecues. I think that has also happened elsewhere. I can understand why, if I were a farmer, I would want there to be a balance in letting people in. We have to persuade and educate people on how to treat wild open spaces with respect.
That said, this is an important area that we should look at. For those people getting payment for public goods, public goods could well be encouraging people to use the countryside.
Lord Greaves
My Lords, yes, there have been fires on Pennine moors during the hot weather and lockdown, almost certainly caused by barbecues. I am one of the people pressing the Government to ban the use of mobile barbecues on open spaces. The sooner it happens the better.
I have been musing on the fact that I cut my teeth in the House of Lords on the Countryside and Rights of Way Bill almost exactly 20 years ago. At least three of us here in this debate are survivors of the all-night sitting we had in Committee—one of 11 Committee sessions. The Opposition at that time, the Conservatives, wanted 23 if I remember rightly. It was negotiated down to 11. If Members here think that they are hard done by, you ain’t seen nothing yet.
At that time there was also a pretty strong anti-access lobby in the House of Lords that was vociferous and quite angry. It is interesting that that has almost entirely disappeared and even those who raise questions are now reasonable and polite about it, which was not always the case at that time. That is a result of the success of the legislation that the then Labour Government brought in 20 years ago, which I was very proud to have been associated with in a very minor way.
I got together a speech to make today about how important access and recreation in the countryside are, but it is not necessary any more because it is generally accepted that that is the case. The value of recreation in the countryside for mental as well as physical health is generally accepted and that argument has been won.
As my noble friend Lady Scott said, we are talking about trying to make sure that things do not get worse and that they get better. Better small-scale facilities such as signposts and stiles that you can get over without demolishing dry stone walls in the process—I have done that twice in my life, simply because the facilities had deteriorated and it was a little-used footpath—help proper use and help land managers and farmers to cope with people walking across their land. It is win-win.
I am particularly supportive of Amendment 59, which is about enhancing access infrastructure. I am very fortunate to live in Pendle, on the edge of the town, with access to wonderful Pennine countryside, up on the Yorkshire border with Lancashire. Over the years, a huge amount of work had been done there on providing this kind of access. It is now beginning to fall apart a little, partly because the county council does not have the funding for it and partly because the schemes under which the work was done are not there anymore. It is very important indeed that the replacement and maintenance of facilities is part of what we are talking about.
I want to say something about the work that is going on in the Mendips by the Trails Trust, which the Minister will know about, as part of one of the trials looking at the provision of better and improved access. Will the Minister comment on that and tell us whether that kind of thing is going on in other areas? The trust is finding a lot of new bridleways, and those will be highly valuable. Indeed, I signed my name to the amendment from the noble Baroness, Lady Hodgson, about better bridleways.
One thing that is forgotten about is cycleways. Cycleways are not just urban things—they can be rural. They can be combined with horse riding and walking on local byways; indeed, you can cycle on a bridleway, but very often the surface is not all that good for cycling. They are not part of the rights of way legislation, because, at the time when that was based, cycles did not exist—they had not been invented. This is something that should be looked at now.
I ask the Government to look specifically at the problems raised by my noble friend Lady Scott concerning the ending of cross-compliance. Rights of way authorities have found cross-compliance requiring landowners to adhere to the Highways Act 1980 valuable, basically because they could threaten them for not doing it if they were getting grants. If that is removed, will a cross-compliance-type ruling be automatic, particularly in tier 1 grants and schemes, insisting that cross-compliance on rights of way on the land continues to exist—it would not be called “cross-compliance” but it would be the same thing—as a condition for getting the grant? Even if the grant does not cover rights of way at all, will landowners still be required to adhere to cross-compliance?
Finally, I come back to rights of way improvement plans, which I mentioned at Second Reading, and which the access authorities are supposed to have in place. Very often, the enthusiasm that went into these plans has gone, because rights of way departments have shrunk under the cuts to local authority budgets. The Environmental Land Management Policy Discussion Document, published in February, says that tier 2 outcomes are
“locally targeted environmental outcomes”
with
“some form of spatial targeting and local planning”.
This seems to be ideally suited to rights of way improvement plans across an area. Is that the kind of thing that the Government will look at and consider favourably? Will they encourage rights of way improvement authorities to put forward plans and try to integrate them into the new environmental land management system?
Lord Lucas [V]
My Lords, the amendments in this group are crucial to the success of this Bill—or at least, the spirit behind them is. When I was young, a family t-shirt read: “Farmer Palmer says ‘Get orf moy laaand!’”. Things have changed, and I am delighted by that, but it is not just offering access that is important but labelling access: making it practically possible for the people paying for these payments to farmers to enjoy the outcome. As my noble friend Lord Randall said, it includes things such as a resting place, information, enabling enjoyment when you get there and even some provision for the dog poo fairy—a range of things to make the visit worth while, a positive experience and something that people really engage with and appreciate.
Baroness Hodgson of Abinger (Con) [V]
My Lords, I will speak to Amendment 100 in my name. I welcome the opportunity to take part in scrutinising this legislation. It was a great disappointment that the Government did not allow more time for Second Reading and prevented me and other Members of this House from taking part. I declare my interest as a director of a company that owns some farming land. Also, I recently served on the Rural Economy Select Committee and, some time ago, on the Farm Animal Welfare Committee and the FSA animal feedingstuffs committee. I am a member of the BHA.
Amendment 100 is a probing amendment. First, there is no definition in the Bill of “public access”. I also raise the issue of allowing walkers and riders access to agricultural land. While there is a good number of footpaths, in some parts of the country bridle paths are in short supply. Horse riders have access to only 22% of the public rights network, which is the only real way they have of accessing countryside.
Certain responsibilities and liabilities go with creating bridle paths, which means many landowners are reluctant to create more. With the number of cars and bicycles now on the roads—cyclists can be a real danger to horse riders too, as they seem so silent and frightening to horses—there are far fewer safe place for horse riders to go. Access to agricultural land would give the benefit of opening up more safe places to walk and, especially, to ride.
Lord Judd [V]
My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Addington, is to be congratulated on this group of amendments. They are vital, and I am very glad to be associated with Amendment 111. I would have been associated with more if there had been spaces when I came to put my name down.
In our modern society—urbanised, digitalised, impersonal—it is serious for the whole future of humanity that so many people have totally lost contact with the countryside. Whether it be about the inspiration, an uplifting experience, or the spiritual or physical enhancement of being there, enjoying it and being active within the countryside, it is just not a reality for many people. We have a major challenge to put this right. It seems that all of us who have engagement with the countryside have a big responsibility for it—whether the land be in private ownership, public ownership, national parks or whatever—to make sure that people are re-engaging with what is, of course, in the end, fundamental to the well-being of society and to people’s own well-being in terms of food and the rest.
There has been too much surreptitious—sometimes quite sinister—cutting off of access to the countryside. We should take this very seriously indeed. It is wrong and it is very dangerous in terms of what I have just been saying. For these reasons and many others, these amendments are crucially important and I am very glad to be able to support them.
The Earl of Devon
My Lords, I am amazed to hear that there were 11 days in Committee for the then CROW Bill and we have four for this much larger and more extensive Bill. It is amazing how things have changed.
I have been steward of the family farm for only a few years. During that time, I have experienced a number of issues with public access. We have had IRA bombs hidden in the woods; we have had oysters stolen; I have seen lambs mauled by dogs; I have seen sheep bludgeoned to death with baseball bats. We have chestnut blight throughout our woods spread by spores, which are carried on feet, and asbestos fly-tipped in ancient forests. I have just restored the belvedere tower that was burnt down by vandals more than 50 years ago. Public access to the countryside is quite sobering and your Lordships might be surprised that I am very supportive of it. It really needs to be managed, because it has incredibly dangerous and negative implications if it is not handled well.
It requires more than 45 minutes of this debate to really do justice to the issues but, as I see it, access is principally about education in what the countryside is about, how it works and how it is managed. I am encouraged that some of these amendments really focus on that. They focus on education on the countryside and what farming is about. Farming is about life and death, uncomfortable decisions and balancing the well-being of animals with the well-being of humans. The more that ELMS can be used to encourage responsible, sustainable and resilient access to the countryside for the benefit of people’s health and well-being, the better for all of us and, particularly, the better for land managers, whose management of the land suddenly becomes relevant to a much wider swathe of the population.
I am pleased with the positive reaction to the suggestion that health and well-being benefits are the purpose of access. Can the Minister comment and think about how we are funding this access, and whether it is just ELMS or whether we could perhaps look to the national health budget to provide additional financial support if we are doing so much good for people’s health and well-being, particularly their mental well-being? Perhaps some of the health budget can be directed towards land management for the benefit of public access.
We really need to think very firmly about biosecurity. I mentioned the chestnut blight, but there are so many diseases that are rampant in our countryside. Farmers do not exclude people from the countryside just because they do not want them there: they often exclude them because it is very damaging to have people all over the countryside, particularly in sensitive areas where one is dealing with disease and pestilence that is really ravaging so much of our native flora and fauna.
There is also physical security. Many in rural areas live in isolated houses; free access to the countryside can cause all sorts of issues with rural crime, fly-tipping and health and safety. Who pays when someone trips and falls? How does insurance cover that? All these things need to be worked through if we are to encourage more access to the countryside, as I hope we will be able to do.
Baroness Kennedy of Cradley (Non-Afl) [V]
My Lords, I support the general aim of Clause 1 to move to a system of public payments for public good, and putting in the Bill a list of purposes for which assistance could be provided. Amendments 6 and 9 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Addington, add to this clause that measures which would ensure enhanced public access to the countryside can qualify for financial assistance. This is welcome and necessary as, despite improvements to our beautiful countryside in recent years, in many places access is not guaranteed. This can be because the routes are inaccessible or do not exist. By introducing these amendments, landowners and others will be encouraged to support greater access to the countryside by improving rights of way, stiles, gates and signage and developing new paths along field margins. If the noble Lord, Lord Gardiner of Kimble, is not minded to accept these amendments, can he set out clearly how the Government intend to achieve the intent behind them and encourage greater access to the countryside?
Lord Moynihan (Con)
My Lords, I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Addington, the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson, and others on their focus on access to and enjoyment of the countryside, and the sport and recreation policy element, which I know the Minister shares.
These amendments seek to establish a clear commitment from the Government that, under these new arrangements, public funds will be directed towards delivering improvements in public access to the countryside in a balanced way for all users, as the noble Earl, Lord Devon, rightly emphasised, particularly for those engaged in sport and recreational activities which have over the years established a good, close and effective working relationship with farmers and landowners, particularly where rights of way exist, not least to and on water. I am pleased that point was emphasised by the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson. It is also important to recognise in this context the strength of argument put forward by my noble friend Lady Hodgson on the important equestrian issues at stake. The Bill provides an excellent opportunity to bring improved public benefits. I hope farmers and landowners will be encouraged not to restrict access for any person on any inland waterway or lake which forms part of that land for the purpose of open-air recreation.
I hope the Minister will find ways to ensure fair and equitable access to our countryside for all sustainable recreational pursuits on land and water at a time when fitness and activity levels are in crisis. I hope he will also agree that we should strive to deliver a new and improved regulatory regime that drives and enhances improvement and access to the maintenance of existing public rights of way for all users of the countryside. Enhanced access to the countryside and improved protection of the existing path network have been called for today in your Lordships’ House. I hope the Minister will signal his support for these objectives, to which I add my strong support. I believe he can, because I hope he will emphasise that in Clause 1(1)(b) it is possible to deliver these aims. In future, I hope that we in this House will hold this and future Governments to the important effect that that clause should deliver in the interests of a wider sport and recreational policy and an enhanced enjoyment of the countryside.
Lord Blencathra (Con) [V]
My Lords, I declare my interests, as on the register. I too regret that I was unable to participate in the Second Reading, but I will be mercifully brief with my comments on this group of amendments.
My worry with this group is the same as that which I had with the first two groups, on which I desperately wanted to speak but, through my incompetence, I notified the Whips incorrectly. My worry is that these amendments, like the others, are too prescriptive and not necessary to achieve the objectives on which all noble Lords agree. I counted and, if all the amendments in the first two groups are agreed, Clause 1 of the Bill will have 42 new and additional purposes added to it. I think that is unnecessary.
I am very keen on access to the countryside and to all green space, and I share the views of my noble friend Lord Randall that we need to increase the number of people from minority groups who visit the countryside. Studies show that the problem is that some youngsters will not go to a park 500 yards from their home. In such circumstances, it is difficult to get them into the wider countryside. This is a huge educational problem.
I do not support the amendments of my noble friend Lord Randall and the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson, on a small but important technicality. I believe that the word “supporting” can include “enhancing”; therefore, changing it is not necessary and could be damaging. If the definition is simply enhancing, it may freeze out farmers who have done a lot of access work, above the minimum, but can do no more to enhance it and would not qualify. It would therefore be a bit unfair if those farmers, having already reached a high access standard, got no payment, but those who had done little got payment for enhancing by just a small amount. I submit that the word “supporting” is adequate and can do all the enhancing work that colleagues suggested.
I say to the noble Earl, Lord Devon, that the NHS and Public Health England are working with lots of organisations, including Natural England, on something called social prescribing. I believe that, until a few months ago, about 2,000 NHS staff were being trained in GPs’ surgeries to get people to do various things other than queue up for pills. That put it rather crudely; I do not mean that to be unfair on people who need pills. But social prescribing could save the NHS billions. Once this Covid-19 crisis is over or under control, I hope we get back to social prescribing.
On Amendment 34, I agree it would be good if the wider or urban public understood what agriculture does or where their food comes from, but this is not a job for government. Farmers themselves and their organisations—the NFU, CLA and Tenant Farmers Association—through farm open days and schoolchildren visits, must promote public understanding and engagement with agriculture. That is their business. No one knows it better. They are the best people to educate the public, rather than the Government.
Lord Clark of Windermere (Lab) [V]
My Lords, the Government deserve congratulations for bringing forward this Agriculture Bill. It offers the same potential as the Attlee Government’s efforts in 1947 and the common agricultural policy that has dominated us for so long. I am particularly pleased that the Government have realised that farming is changing and changing quite dramatically. I sometimes feel that those at the centre do not quite understand the subtlety of those changes.
I have an advantage: I live in the area where I started work, on the land, 50 or 60 years ago. I can determine the changes in agriculture. I will come back to that in a moment on these clauses. This has been a particularly interesting eight hours of debate. There were issues in the previous two groups of amendments related to those we are discussing now, but I held back because I wanted to speak on rights of access, which I think are critical.
Before I develop that, it seems as if this has been a Second Reading debate, made even more confusing by the considerate and detailed response of the Minister, who has gone out of his way to sum up, on two occasions, which has been an advantage. One point has kept coming up about forestry and woodland. There is confusion on what the Government have in mind; perhaps they have not got their sights completely set at this stage. I was led to believe that certain parts of woodland, and certain forests—which were a bit different—might receive a public grant. We were certainly looking at huge areas of new woodlands being created up here in Cumbria, just outside the national park. There is a great deal of potential for access in and on forestry land.
I had the honour of being chair of the Forestry Commission for nine years. It will be no surprise to the Minister that I was very keen to promote the right to roam in forests. We were not covered by the legislation—that was mountains, moorlands and heath above a certain height. But, when I was chair, we decided that there would be a legal right of access in all our freehold Forestry Commission land. This has not caused any fundamental difficulties in running our forests. I press the Minister to look at the possibility of permitting access to forestry land as well.
I also want to make the point that, amazingly enough, quite a lot of forestry land is near the centres of big towns, cities and urban areas. There is great potential for access in those areas. You can often get there much easier, but there are difficulties. I remember trying to negotiate access to a large forest within two miles of the centre of Newcastle. The Forestry Commission—we the people—owned the freehold, but I could not grant access, because when the land was bought it was agreed that the shooting rights in the forest would remain with the original vendors. To this day, people in a concentrated, built-up area are not allowed to use that forest, because of the shooting rights. I hope it might even be possible that some of the money available under the new government proposals could be used to buy out those rights. I know that there are difficulties, but I cite this because it is the way we ought to be moving forward. The holistic approach which the Government are taking to agricultural support in the future is the right one.
I mentioned earlier the subtle changes. Just outside the Lake District National Park in the lower levels of the valleys there were a lot of small mixed farms. Those farms provided employment and were viable, but I can tell the House that in the Bowness-on-Windermere area in which I live, I cannot think of a farm that has a single cow. There is the odd steer about, but all the land is grazed by sheep. That means that most of the small farmsteads have been sold off to be converted into country cottages. We are now finding the cost of that. Field upon field which used to be pristine hayfields are now covered in reeds. Stone walls which were maintained and rebuilt if they fell over—you had to do that to keep the cows in—are now left unbuilt. It is a real problem when you are trying to have countryside that deals with so many people. The Lake District National Park—I tell the House this repeatedly, and I do not apologise—has 19 million visitors a year, a vast number.
Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist
We have pressures on our time, so will the noble Lord draw his comments to a close?
Lord Clark of Windermere [V]
I was going to do that. We have 19 million visitors. In order to accommodate them, there need to be facilities. If we are going to have public access, we need small car parks and public transport to get people to the attractive areas.
Baroness McIntosh of Pickering
My Lords, I shall be brief as I do not have amendments in this little group. I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Addington. Overall, access has been a phenomenal success although we heard from the noble Earl, Lord Devon, that that is not always the case. My concern is that the flip side of access should be responsibility on the part of those using the access. Over the lockdown period we saw regrettable behaviour by a few irresponsible people which unfortunately tarnished it for many.
I remember that when I was growing up there was something—I think there may be a later amendment on this—called the countryside code. It was on television. There were adverts saying simple things like, if you walk on the Pennine Way, which is near where I grew up, you close the gate if there is livestock in the field and that it is dangerous to enter a field where there is a calf, as the cow will defend it to the death. We have even seen a vet, who was walking their dog through a field, killed in the past two years. Like the noble Lord, Lord Greaves, I cut my parliamentary teeth next door on the CROW Bill, so I bear the scars. We ran one or two very unsuccessful exercises as an opposition, I recall. How can the Government ensure that the flip side of access will be responsibility and that the costs will not be disproportionate to the enjoyment? I hope those using the access will behave in a responsible manner. We saw some malicious fires—It was not just fly-tipping; the materials were burned to get rid of them so they could not be traced—and the irresponsible use of barbeques. When there are crops growing in a field, you cannot have access until the crops have been taken out. We need responsible behaviour so that the cost will be proportionate to the enjoyment.
Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick [V]
My Lords, I rise to support the amendment and to congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Addington. As somebody who over the years has supported access to the countryside, I fully understand and appreciate that. However, I come back to the principle, raised by the noble Lord, Lord Empey, and the Minister, of the balance of competing rights: the right of people to enjoy the countryside, and their right to have access to it while at the same time respecting it. Like the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering, I am well aware that during lockdown there was a certain despoliation of the countryside—a considerable level of littering and probably interference with farm animals. It comes back to the issue of getting the balance right. After all, access to the countryside can be a pretty disputatious issue if it is not managed properly.
The Earl of Caithness [V]
My Lords, first, how nice it is to see the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, back with us and participating. We have missed him; I wish him very well and good health for the future. I also thank the noble Lord, Lord Clark of Windermere, for picking up the question I have asked the Minister twice, so far, about forestry and woodland. I hope that, third time lucky, we might get a reply from him.
I want to address the provision of public access; we will come to the consequences of public access in two amendments’ time, so I am not going to mention those. I am a great supporter of public access. It was absolutely crucial to me when I came out of hospital, and was being pushed around in a wheelchair, to be able to get out into the countryside on footpaths that could accommodate a wheelchair. They were quite difficult to find but we found them. It did my health and whole well-being a power of good. Having got out of the wheelchair, I have been using the footpaths to get as fit as I can. Some footpaths have certainly been good, but the bridleways are an absolute nightmare for anybody with bad knees or bad feet, and who has to use sticks.
What does the Minister mean by “public access”? There is no definition in the Bill. I believe that this is the beginning of the right to roam in England; I am sure that will come as a logical consequence of the Bill. Many farmers fear that public access will turn parts of England into a recreational theme park, rather than places with farming communities. The problem with public access is that it is a legal minefield. What public access is to be granted? Is it to be a permissive path or a bridleway? Will it be a BOAT—a byway open to all traffic—or a restrictive byway? We do not know. As my noble friend Lord Gardiner said, we want farmers to participate in this scheme, but they will not do so until they know what the consequences of these amendments are and what they actually mean.
Balance was mentioned by the noble Baronesses, Lady Scott of Needham Market and Lady Ritchie of Downpatrick, the noble Earl, Lord Devon, and my noble friend Lord Moynihan. We all would like a sensible balance in this, but there has been a huge amount of warfare between farmers and public access groups. There is a big history here. Let us take the example of two schools that have had huge problems just trying to divert footpaths: Helmshore Primary School in Lancashire and Wardour Catholic Primary School in Wiltshire. The ramblers have refused and have contested every opportunity to deviate the path along the edge of the field rather than through the playing fields, meaning that a school has lost a large chunk of its playing fields and, because of coronavirus, has had to fence that path off. That path must be monitored by staff when the children are out and cleared of dog mess regularly. It has caused the school a whole lot of problems. That has not helped in getting towards a balanced system.
Similarly, as the Minister will know, there is a huge backlog of applications to create rights of way where there may not be any at the moment. He will be aware that the South Somerset Bridleways Association has 261 applications to create new routes under the existing legislation. If we cannot get the existing system right, people will be very fearful of the future system. The British Horse Society trying to open a bridleway in Derbyshire contributed to the suicide of one of the owners; a suicide in Somerset was also linked to the aggressive attitude of Somerset County Council when trying to open a right of way that did not exist. There is a big history here. We must get this right, and that will take a lot of resolve by the Government.
One must also look at what the Open Spaces Society says on its website. If we are talking about balance, where is the balance in saying that your position is to oppose path changes? That is a complete no-no. It does not want any path changes. It goes on to say:
“Diversions out of farmyards should normally be opposed”
and that if spreading disease is given as a reason, it is invalid. How can it be invalid with coronavirus rampant?
We have a massive problem with the existing legislation. It is a legal minefield, it is costing owners thousands of pounds to prove a negative in many cases, and we are now faced with a Bill in which public access is to be opened up. I approve of that, but there will have to be a huge effort by the Government to get the present situation under control to reassure farmers about the future situation.
What will happen after 2026? If a landowner agrees a scheme over a public right of access before 2026, will it retrospectively become a bridleway or a public footpath? Will they be able to claim that when it was on a temporary basis or part of some project? These are the legal questions that farmers must face, and the Government must face up to, because at the moment it is a mess. We debated this in the Moses Room, and afterwards, a number of people who had come in to listen were very heated about the lack of progress.
I know that there have been problems and staff have been seconded to look after the Covid-19 situation, but can the Minister tell us where we have got to in trying to correct the present situation regarding footpaths?
Lord Mann (Non-Afl) [V]
My Lords, to begin, I take my reference point from the Book of Genesis, where Adam and Eve were told that they had to be stewards of all creation. That was further defined in the Book of Leviticus, which makes clear that the use of land is to provide abundant crops but also that it is to be a place of sanctuary. Of course, Leviticus goes further, for those who wish a literal interpretation and application of the holy book, because it says that all land must be owned for only 50 years and then passed back by the owner. So landowners who have had land for many centuries need to bear in mind that their tenancy over that land also incorporates long-standing rights of access.
I was a little surprised to hear the noble Earl, Lord Devon, suggesting not just that the NHS budget be diverted to landowners but that access was a major problem. It has certainly not been a major problem at Powderham Castle for the hundreds of thousands of revellers who have visited to watch Noel Gallagher, Coldplay or the range of other concerts that have taken place there. We need the facts to be accurate in these debates.
Health, sanctuary and well-being are fundamental to humanity. Society cannot function without them. Access to the sanctuary of quietness away from the towns and cities is fundamental to the physical and mental well-being of the citizens of this country. There is therefore a balance to be struck between the subsidies demanded and received by the farming community year on year—be it through the new government policy or, previously, the excessive common agricultural policy—and the right of citizens to access rights of way without hindrance, to go out into the fresh air into the sanctuary, as Leviticus defined, in order for our well-being to be preserved. At this time, with the horrors of coronavirus, those rights of access are fundamental. In my view, these amendments are apposite in getting the balance right.
Lord Cormack (Con)
I want to begin by saying, “There endeth the lesson”. Having sat here now for well over seven hours and heard virtually every speech, I am glad to have the brief opportunity to say a few words.
The Government must learn the lesson of the Second Reading. Time and again we have heard today from people who were excluded; I myself was one of the 22, or whatever the number was. If we had had a two-day debate on the Bill, I think we would have moved a little more expeditiously through Committee because a lot of Second Reading points have been made.
I urge my noble friend, for whom I have enormous regard, to discuss with his colleagues the inevitable extension of the Committee stage of the Bill. It will not get through in four sessions and, frankly, it should not.
Lord Rosser (Lab) [V]
My Lords, I will speak in support of Amendments 6, 9, 98 and 111 in this group. For many people, Covid-19 has provided an opportunity —or perhaps a necessity—to go on and discover local walks in their own immediate neighbourhood, to get exercise and fresh air and not spend the whole day in their own home. A crucial feature of the Bill, as we know, is the introduction of a new system of financial assistance for farmers to replace subsidies paid as part of the EU’s common agricultural policy. In future funding will be in exchange for the delivery of public goods, which includes better public access.
Clause 1(1) states:
“The Secretary of State may give financial assistance for or in connection with any one or more of the following purposes”,
with paragraph (a) reading
“managing land or water in a way that protects or improves the environment”.
Although this is helpful, it does not acknowledge the value added of enabling people to experience some benefit from improvements in environmental quality. Amendment 6 adds
“and people’s access to it”
and seeks to ensure that where financial assistance is provided for the protection or improvement of the environment, public access enhancements are incorporated, where appropriate, so that people can experience some benefit from the actions taken. This is particularly important near centres of population, where the recreational value of new woodlands or better access to paths across open land is far higher than in more remote locations.
Clause 1(1)(b) refers to
“supporting public access to and enjoyment of the countryside, farmland or woodland and better understanding of the environment”.
However, as landowners or occupants, farmers are already required by law to keep clear public access to their land, so “supporting public access” could appear to be providing funding for doing something for which there is already a legal requirement. There is thus no certainty that funding will be provided for new public access or for making existing paths more accessible, yet this is important in enabling more people to get outdoors. Natural England estimates that 20% of people cannot use rights of way because they cannot use stiles or gates or they are with someone who cannot.
Amendment 9 replaces “supporting” with “enhancing” to express more clearly that financial assistance will be provided to enhance public access to the countryside by improving accessibility beyond the legal minimum of existing rights of way. It also helps ensure that funding can be provided for the creation of new access opportunities through, for example, the provision of paths along field margins as alternatives to unsafe country roads and at the rural-urban fringe to increase the connection of communities to nature and the rural world.
Clause 1(1)(b), which enables the Secretary of State to provide financial assistance for
“supporting public access to and enjoyment of the countryside”
is welcome, but more clarity is needed on the outcomes in terms of public access to and enjoyment of the countryside that will be supported through further financial assistance to farmers. Amendment 98 seeks to do this by adding to Clause 1(5)
“‘supporting public access to and enjoyment of the countryside’ includes the provision of new public access or improving the accessibility of existing public rights of way”.
Thus the amendment provides certainty that financial assistance may be provided for new public access or steps to make existing rights of way more accessible, and also that the new financial assistance scheme will provide direct benefits for the public through better access to the countryside.
Clause 2(2) states:
“Financial assistance may be given subject to such conditions as the Secretary of State considers appropriate.”
Landowners and land managers are required under the Highways Act 1980 to keep rights of way on their land clear and accessible to the public. The duty was reinforced by the system of cross-compliance governing payments to farmers under the EU’s common agricultural policy, which required, among other things, the fulfilment of legal duties for rights of way as a condition of receiving funding from the public purse. The Government are committed to ending cross-compliance and have suggested they will establish a new, simplified regulatory regime.
The principle of financial assistance being subject to conditions, as introduced in subsection (2), is welcome. What it does not do is specify what those conditions will be. Amendment 111 provides that:
“The conditions may (among other things) require the recipient to fulfil their duties for public rights of way under the Highways Act 1980.”
It will thus help ensure that landowners’ and occupiers’ duties for public rights of way are among the conditions that the Secretary of State may attach to the provision of financial assistance. This is important because existing rights of way are the primary means by which people can get outdoors. It is, therefore, vital to have in place a regulatory framework that encourages farmers to keep paths clear as a condition of receiving payments from the public purse.
The set of conditions, including those relating to public access, provide clarity for farmers over the baseline standards expected, and it also—as the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson, said earlier—helps create a level playing field within the sector. Most farmers fulfil their legal obligations, so those who do not should not be treated equally and without any sanction for not keeping access open.
I hope the Government will give careful consideration to this group of amendments and the objectives they seek to achieve. It would be helpful if the Minister could say, in his response, whether they are also government objectives, either in whole or in part. If they are but the Government do not feel overexcited by these amendments, I hope, like my noble friend Lady Kennedy of Cradley, that the Minister will spell out very clearly in his response why the Government believe that the wording in the Bill—and which wording that is—already provides, without any doubt, the safeguards and assurances that these amendments to which I have referred are intended to provide.
Our farmers must have, and deserve, a fair deal as we leave the EU, and we need to make sure this Bill delivers precisely that. However, our countryside should be accessible to all and, in return, those who visit the countryside must exercise that right responsibly and in a manner that does not adversely affect those who earn their livelihood from the land and who provide us with a basic necessity of life—namely, food.
Viscount Trenchard
My Lords, whilst I can support reasonable extension to public access, as I said earlier it is indeed a double-edged sword. In those parts of the country where agricultural land is close to towns or cities, significant opening up of more footpaths, or increasing the numbers of people entering land used for agriculture, forestry or horticulture, may cause disturbance to birds and animals and exacerbate a littering problem that has got worse during the lockdown anyway.
It is likely that farmers, whose financial rewards are going to depend more on the quality and condition in which they maintain their land, are going to be reluctant to encourage more public access unless they are paid to provide it. They need to be paid because they will need to make good, or mitigate the damage to, the land, crops, fences, gates and wildlife habitats that will result from increased public access in those parts of the country near significant population centres.
Perhaps the amounts that farmers should be paid for public access would have to be more than is justified in terms of the numbers of people who would benefit. We should also remember that you do not need to have access to the improved environment in order to benefit from it in terms of better air quality, higher standards of food products and cleaner water in our rivers.
I sympathise with the intention of my noble friend Lord Lucas in Amendment 34, but I believe this is already covered by subsection (1)(b), whether the drafting of that is changed or not.
Amendment 59, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Addington, seeks to enhance public access not only to land but also to water. Would my noble friend the Minister not agree that farmers and riparian owners would have to be compensated for the significant additional costs of this? Would he also concede that compensation should be paid to owners of fisheries whose catch numbers would be damaged by an increase in kayaking and boating on rivers and inland waterways?
Lastly, I slightly fear that too much path surfacing, signage and waymarking may make the countryside more like a cross between a golf course and a public park, which, in extremis, will urbanise the appearance of the countryside and remove its wildness, which is so valuable.
The Duke of Montrose [V]
My Lords, I start by asking my noble friend the Minister whether, in his mind, the definition in the Bill of the countryside, farmland and woodland excludes water. One would think that water would be included in that, but obviously the noble Lord, Lord Addington, would like to have it added to the Bill.
It is quite useful that the Bill is to support the provision of access. Presumably it allows the land occupier to direct the access where they can cope with it, if necessary with access to water. My noble friend Lord Trenchard just mentioned the Scottish attitude to right to roam. I understand that the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson, lives far enough away not to have ready access to the Scottish right to roam. In many ways it conjures up a nightmare for most landowners, in that people can go anywhere they like other than the curtilage of a dwelling house. As my noble friend Lord Trenchard mentioned, the pressures in Scotland are not as great as they are down south, although I happen to live by Loch Lomond and the pressures there are certainly equal to any other area in the country—so much so that the national park has brought in a prohibition on drinking alcohol on one side of the loch, because the public were wont to make a nonsense of that.
One aspect of this power in the Bill is that nowadays farmers are almost necessitated to have an element of diversification in what they do. Very often it is a question of having some feature that the public will come to and offer payment for. The powers that the Government are providing will be taken up with enthusiasm by these people, because it will give them a more attractive way to have people come and visit them and enjoy what they have to offer.
However, like my noble friend Lord Trenchard, I have considerable reservations regarding all that is contained in the descriptive Amendment 99. It seems to conjure up access even to ditches or anything with a bit of water in the bottom of it and then to ask for access even to the banks of those. That makes a bit of a mockery of the remaining legislation in England that access must only be by an approved route so that all the interests in establishing the route can be considered.
Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville [V]
My Lords, this group of amendments is primarily about financial assistance being provided for public access to the countryside and waterways. My noble friends Lady Scott of Needham Market, Lord Addington and Lord Greaves have given extremely good reasons why public access is a public good. The noble Lord, Lord Randall of Uxbridge, supports improving current footpaths rather than creating new ones, and I share that view.
The noble Baroness, Lady Hodgson of Abinger, has defined public access to include horse-riding. Certainly, horse-riding is a very popular pastime, and it is extremely healthy. The enjoyment of the countryside, whether walking, riding or canoeing, should be encouraged wherever possible. However, I share the view of the noble Earl, Lord Devon, that there must be a balance. Not all who use rights of way respect them in the way they should.
There is nothing better than going for an energetic walk along a right of way and ending up at a pub for lunch. However, I stress to all that it is important that the countryside alongside the footpaths, bridleways, watercourses and RUPPs should be respected by those who use them.
There are a number of rights of way across the country open to the disabled and mothers with pushchairs. The Tissington trail in the Peak District and the Tarka trail in Devon are two such. I would like the Government to encourage more landowners and farmers to create more level access for people with disabilities and small children, as set out by my noble friend Lord Addington and the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson.
I have little sympathy for enthusiasts who insist on applying for footpaths through domestic homes and gardens just to prove that there once was a right of way along a route years ago. In these cases, there are often perfectly adequate footpaths on a nearby route that provide an alternative. I agree with the noble Earl, Lord Caithness, that the Ramblers do themselves no good at all with their intransigent attitude. That said, it will be incumbent on landowners and farmers who have rights of way running across their grounds to keep them clear and safe for the enjoyment of all who wish to use them. Bridleways should be kept clear, especially of overhanging branches and brambles, as should watercourses which canoeists will be using.
Access to the countryside is extremely important, and I look forward to the Minister’s response.
Baroness Jones of Whitchurch
My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Addington, and the many other noble Lords who spoke on these amendments. It seems that I spoke too soon when I said in the debate on the first group that a level of consensus seemed to be developing. The more we get into the details, the more divides begin to appear. Indeed, I started off with some certainty and now I have more questions than answers. I hope that, as we go through the Bill, some of my questions will be answered or dispelled. It is important that we get these issues out on the table, and some of those difficult issues to do with rights and responsibilities need to be addressed. Obviously, Committee is the right place to do that.
As president of the Friends of the South Downs and a former long-standing member of the Ramblers, I very much support greater public access to the countryside. For example, I am proud of Labour’s record on delivering the right to roam and our network of long-distance footpaths. I also agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson, who rightly raised disability access, that clearly a great deal more needs to be done to improve access to our countryside. As the president of the South Downs society, I have to say that many of the issues we have are about elderly people walking the paths who cannot climb the stiles or find it difficult to access some of the more difficult terrains and so on, which could easily be adjusted. It is not just about people with disabilities but about making sure there is public access for all.
We know the public can gain huge benefits from being in the open air and walking in the countryside. As many noble Lords have said, we have learned that very acutely during the recent Covid crisis, when people have been denied that access. The point made on the previous group by the noble Earl, Lord Devon, is important: fundamentally, this is about health and well-being, and we need to bear that in mind.
It is also important that public understanding of farming and nature is enhanced. I have seen some fantastic examples of school visits to farms that have really enthused young people for the first time about the importance of the countryside. We need to encourage those sorts of visits. That will clearly have the effect of persuading young people to respect the countryside more and will go some way to addressing some of the concerns that a number of noble Lords have raised—the noble Earl, Lord Devon, did so rather vividly—about some of the problems when young people do not respect the countryside: littering, fires, vandalism, fly-tipping and so on. At the same time as creating access, we need to create respect.
Supporting public access to the countryside and providing a better understanding of the environment are already in the financial assistance set out in Clause 1, so the issue we have here is what further wording we need in amendments, beyond those rights already spelt out and the existing legal minimum. That is the challenge for us today: to make sure that if we make adjustments and additions, we get them in balance.
My noble friend Lord Clark of Windermere made an important point about access to forests. Until he explained it, I had not quite understood what some of those issues were, but it is important, particularly as we look to extend the planting of trees. It would be helpful if the Minister could address that question and explain the Government’s plans for giving us greater public access to forest areas.
The amendments we have been looking at also specify access to waterways. The noble Lord, Lord Addington, and the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson, talked about those issues and the importance, for example, of canoeing and wild swimming. I do not doubt that all those activities should be encouraged, but I have a genuine question as to whether this falls within the original intention of the Bill, which was to support agriculture, food production and the environment. This might be something the Minister can shed some light on in his response.
On the other groups, we talked about the Bill’s connection with water, and I am still struggling to understand quite where the boundaries of that lie. For example, I had assumed that the references to “managing land or water” in Clause 1 were meant to address the impact of farming activities on the quality of adjoining water rather than encouraging a wider responsibility for recreation to take place on local rivers. That is an issue that a number of noble Lords raised, so we need to understand the interconnection between what is essential, what is voluntary and what are the real advantages to us of access to that water. That is a genuine question and I do not know the answer to it.
Lord Gardiner of Kimble
My Lords, I am grateful to all noble Lords. This has been an important debate. When preparing for today, I never realised that we might hear references to Leviticus—but it is an interesting way forward. I will begin by replying to the amendments tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Addington, and I will also take in Amendment 100, tabled by my noble friend Lady Hodgson.
I agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch. Public access to the countryside provides a huge range of benefits, including improving physical and mental health, and supporting local communities and economies. Spending time in the natural environment, as a resident or a visitor, can reduce stress, fatigue, anxiety and depression. It can help boost the immune system and encourage physical activity, and it may reduce the risk of chronic diseases such as asthma. It can combat loneliness and bind communities together.
Here, the word “balance” comes up again. In my experience, the countryside is about balance. It is overwhelmingly not in the interests of any farmer to fall out with their neighbours, because, in the end, we all have to find a way through. My noble friend Lord Cormack, the noble Baroness, Lady Ritchie of Downpatrick, the noble Lord, Lord Judd, the noble Earl, Lord Devon, and the two noble Baronesses from the Front Benches spoke of this.
The noble Earl, Lord Devon, said that these things need to be handled well. Well, we all need to try to handle things well, but this is an area where inflammatory language is extremely unwise. I do not think that we are going to get anywhere unless we work collaboratively. That is why we have this power. I say to the noble Lord, Lord Addington, that we have a power in the Bill to provide financial assistance to support public access to, and enjoyment of, the countryside, farmland and woodland. That is a good basis from which we should be working.
The Government are supporting and enhancing access to the countryside in a number of different ways. I am very pleased that tourism was raised. The completion of the England coastal path—the noble Lord, Lord Greaves, knows I have written to him—was delayed, unfortunately, because of coronavirus, but we are working on this. Not only domestic but overseas visitors thoroughly enjoy walking in this country, so we are supporting our network of national trails and ensuring that rights of way are recorded and protected, as well as developing ways to support access through the environmental land management scheme. One of the most rewarding elements of my responsibility for the England coastal path has been to join many people of a range of abilities and disabilities at openings of some of the England coastal path. For instance, there are platforms that settle well into some of the dunes to enable people in wheelchairs to get out into the dunes while keeping away from tern nests. Again, it is all about balance in how we organise these things.
I say to the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch, and the noble Lord, Lord Greaves, that there are three ELM tests and trials looking at issues concerning access, and these will help us understand how the scheme could work in a real-life environment. For example, the ELM scheme could fund the creation of new paths, such as footpaths and bridleways, which provide access for cyclists, riders and pedestrians where appropriate. It could support access to water and waterways on someone’s land. In particular, the Mendip Hills trials will work with farmers and land managers in the Mendip Hills to explore a range of issues relating to creating access infrastructure—another point made by the noble Lord, Lord Addington, and the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson. The tests will conclude in 2021 and will be very helpful. I say also to the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson, that funding may be given under Clause 1(1)(b) to support access to water bodies and waterways in the countryside, farmland and woodland, which could provide access to those locations. Our ELM scheme will reward land managers for the public goods that they deliver, which could include granting of public access to water.
My noble friend Lord Trenchard asked about trials. We need to have these trials and that is why I do not think the discussion we are having is immensely valuable. We should not try to ring-fence the detail at this stage in this primary legislation; we need to be pragmatic to get the right results, because it is by getting those right results that we will encourage more farmers to feel that this is their scheme and access is not a forbidding element of the financial assistance package. Defra continues to liaise regularly with other key stakeholders, including the NFU, of which I declare my membership, Ramblers, with which I have a lot of good relationships, and the British Horse Society, of which I declare my membership, among others, to discuss access and Covid-19 recovery opportunities.
I say to my noble friend Lord Caithness and the noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville, that one of the ways we are going to get this right is by getting people around the table. That is why Defra has a stakeholder group advising on rights of way reform that brings together landowners, users and local authorities to develop a consensus on areas for change and the necessary implementation. I am anxious to get this as far forward as possible, and my noble friend Lord Caithness keeps me on my toes. He ought to recognise, and I am sure he does, that we are dealing with a number of issues in terms of legislation and it has not been possible to bring forward the deregulation package on rights of way reform that we all desire, but I cannot engage in a mission impossible when we have many other demands on the Government’s legislative plate and the delays because of coronavirus.
On the conditions land managers must meet in order to take part in the scheme, the current wording enables a range of different conditions to be set and, again, we will work with stakeholders to develop these. Of course, land managers’ legal responsibilities in relation to access over their land will still be applicable.
The noble Lords, Lord Rosser and Lord Greaves, and my noble friend Lord Moynihan raised points about meeting baseline regulatory standards. We expect farmers and managers to meet regulatory standards, regardless of whether they are claiming an ELM payment. This is voluntary; I would resist entirely if noble Lords thought this was an opportunity to start instructing people what they should do on their land, beyond their legal responsibilities and requirements. In the ELM discussion document published on 25 February, the Government explained that they are also exploring whether establishing compliance with relevant regulatory requirements should be an entry requirement for tier 1 of the ELM scheme. The Government are committed to maintaining a strong regulatory baseline, with proportionate and effective enforcement mechanisms. All farmers and land managers must continue to comply with regulatory standards and obligations, including those on public access.
A number of noble Lords, including the noble Earl, Lord Devon, the noble Lord, Lord Greaves, the noble Baroness, Lady Scott of Needham Market, and my noble friend Lady McIntosh of Pickering, raised the Countryside Code. The messages in the Countryside Code are being promoted widely, via Natural England’s local and national partner organisations, as well as landowners and managers. Defra and Natural England have recently released some targeted communications to tackle specific issues such as wildfire and littering. In response to the noble Lord, Lord Greaves, there was a discussion in Defra about this. Local authorities already have the powers to make bylaws to prohibit barbecues in public spaces. That is the way it should be done, because that is the way that local communities and local authorities can work together. There is legal provision for that, so it can be placed in the local context.
Footpaths, bridle paths, byways, and open-access land are all important in making sure that as many people as possible can enjoy our natural environment. However, it is important to ensure that the Bill enables public support for all types of access, including access to water, and access on other legally designated types of path.
I turn to Amendment 88. Clause 1(5) clarifies that
“‘better understanding of the environment’ includes better understanding of agroecology”.
The clause, as drafted, already allows the Secretary of State to give financial assistance to support farmers, foresters and other land managers so that they can improve public understanding of the environment, for example through educational visits.
On Amendment 34, in the name of my noble friend Lord Lucas, Clause 1(1)(b) states that the Secretary of State may give financial assistance for or in connection with
“supporting public access to and enjoyment of the countryside, farmland or woodland and better understanding of the environment”.
This will allow us to pay for matters such as educational infrastructure, to ensure that our farmers have the right facilities to host farm visits, including school visits.
In response to my noble friend Lord Blencathra and the noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville, last year was the Year of Green Action, a year-long drive to get more people from all backgrounds involved in projects to improve the natural world. Due to the positive reception from all audiences, young people will continue to be able to take up these opportunities and provide a crucial viewpoint on these important matters.
There was mention of young people and littering. My experience, I am afraid, is that people of all generations are culpable on this. We have to engage young people in the quest to improve our environment. Candidly, dropping litter should be an anti-social behaviour. We should all lead on this as best we can.
I am chided by my noble friend Lord Caithness. I might get tetchy with him if he starts saying that I do not answer questions. I endeavour to do so as often as possible. In answer to the noble Lord, Lord Clark, my legal advice is that Clause 1(1)(b) allows support for access to forestry land equalling woodland. I hope that is helpful to my noble friend Lord Caithness.
The Deputy Chairman of Committees
My Lords, I have received no requests to speak after the Minister, so I call the noble Lord, Lord Addington.
Lord Addington
My Lords, the Minister has done his usual thing of being thorough and charming at the same time—and I have now damned him with praise. However, I cannot help but feel that we should take a look at how we expect these trials to go through and see whether we can clarify that at a later stage. With that caveat, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Domestic Abuse Bill
Tuesday 7th July 2020
(4 years, 5 months ago)
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